Samuel Gompers was an American labor union leader and a key figure in American labor history. Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor and held the position as president of the organization for all but one year from 1886 until he died in 1924. He sought to promote harmony among the different craft unions that comprised the AFL, and opposed the imposition of industrial unionism unless unions like the United Mine Workers and the Brewery Workers, for example, chose that form of organization for themselves. Focused on higher wages and collective bargaining, he favored trade unionism over socialism. After 1907, he encouraged the AFL to take political action to "elect their friends" and "defeat their enemies." When it appeared that the US was going to enter the First World War, he and the AFL offered support at a time when Eugene V. Debs and other leftists were against the war.