Gustav Kessler

Gustav Kessler (German spelling: "Keßler") (1832-1904) was a German trade unionist.

He joined the Progress Party in 1883 and was the editor of "Bauhandwerker", a construction workers' unionist magazine from 1884 to 1886. As a result of the Anti-Socialist Laws, he was expelled from Berlin in 1886 and eventually from other towns as well. In 1899, he was a delegate at the Second International's founding congress in Paris. He was editor of the socialist newspaper "Volksblatt für Teltow-Beeskow-Storkow-Charlottenburg" from 1890. In 1890 and 1891, he was the SPD party delegate from Calbe-Aschersleben. He ran for the "Reichstag" repeatedly. An important figure in the localist current of the German labor movement, he was one of the leading founders of the Free Association of German Trade Unions in 1897 and the editor of its organ "Einigkeit" until his death in 1904.

References

* cite book
last = Müller
first = Dirk H.
title = Gewerkschaftliche Versammlungsdemokratie und Arbeiterdelegierte vor 1918: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Lokalismus, des Syndikalismus und der entstehenden Rätebewegung
origyear = 1985
publisher = Colloqium Verlag
location = Berlin
language = German
isbn = 3-7678-0650-9 . Pg. 36.