Mediation Throughout U.S. History

With our nation’s Independence Day holiday this week, it’s appropriate to reflect back on history.

Mediation has a long history worldwide. In North America, Native American and First Nations peoples are believed to use consensus-based council meetings led by elders to resolve disputes. In the colonies, religious groups—most notably Quakers and Puritans—used voluntary and informal dispute resolution, so it can be argued that much of the early use of mediation in the colonies was based on their practices.

The Quaker belief of sharing or relinquishing power, rather than acquiring it, encouraged parties in conflict to view the mediator as trustworthy. Quaker mediators had a genuine respect and concern for the parties in conflict and worked to help them change the way they perceived their adversaries, themselves and the conflict. And, in fact, particularly in the middle colonies, civil suits were frowned upon as mediation was the preferred method of dispute resolution.

The use of mediation faded into the background as the country developed. In 1831, the 26 year-old French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville toured the young United States and observed the growing acceptance of extreme individualism. And with this extreme individualism Americans were more likely to turn to the courts to advocate for their self interest rather than consensus.

It wasn’t until the violent labor disputes of the late 19th century that the U.S. Congress then brought mediation back to the forefront. In 1913 Congress established the U.S. Department of Labor and a panel called the “commissioners of conciliation” to handle disputes between labor and management. This became the U.S. Conciliation Service and in 1947 the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service or FMCS.

The expertise the FMCS developed and became the model for contemporary mediation in the United States that is commonly used today.