In May 1937 she [Dorothy Healy] was called in to help by striking cotton pickers in Southern California: ‘It was a constant struggle … As I looked out on that audience there was a kind of joy. There were people in most desperate living conditions who had discovered what unity meant. What solidarity meant.’ Seeing Red: Stories of American Communists, interview Dorothy Healey, 1983
The summer of 1973 was one of the roughest we’ve had. Two of our strikers were killed. Dozens of our people were beaten. Thousands were arrested and thrown in jail. And all because we dared to stand up to the growers when they made one more desperate attempt to crush our union. Fighting for Our Lives, 1975
Some of the complaints the workers were making … forcing workers to sign cards … ‘We believe in justice for farmworkers’ … Our union was the United Farm Workers. ibid.
The effort of farmworkers to unionise themselves is not a recent effort – it’s been going on for 85 years in this state. ibid.
When we tried to reach the workers from outside the fields they drowned out our loudspeakers … Once we were in the labour camps they’d kick us out. ibid.
The growers called in the Teamsters … A whole group of Teamsters attacked our picket line. ibid.
58 different court orders … the arrest of 3,538 of our brothers and sisters. ibid.
They [police] beat the hell out of them. ibid. union guy
And take our cause to the people. ibid.
40th anniversary of the Great GM Sit-Down Strike: ‘… faced the buckshot, faced the tear-gas, this armband still has the tear-gas on it. The Women’s Emergency Brigade of Flint, Michigan, made American history …’ With Banners & Babies: Story of the Women’s Emergency Brigade, conference speaker, 1979
We were the pioneers of the labour movement. ibid. striker
The more you produced, the more likely you would keep their job. ibid.
The foremen were using the girls and holding it over their heads that if they didn’t do what they wanted to do, they wouldn’t have a job. ibid.
That’s all we had in Flint, Michigan – churches and bars. ibid.
We met in a little coalshed. ibid.
They would have done anything to turn one against the other. ibid.
That’s when we decided to form the Women’s Auxiliary. ibid.
General Motors’ goons – our lives were in danger – they actually prepared with guns. ibid.
First they turned the heat off on ’em, then they turned the water off on ’em. ibid.
The victory was won and the UAW was born. ibid.
Meanwhile at Dagenham the unofficial strike committee at Ford’s have increased their demands to thirteen reasons why Henry III was a bad king. Monty Python’s Flying Circus s2e13: Royal Episode 13, BBC 1970
It all started in north London at a small photographic processing lab called Grunwick … He [Ward] sacked the strikers … He still wouldn’t deal with the unions: it was the Freedom Association … There were over 50 vehicles involved in [Operation] Pony Express … 20,000 pickets came to Grunwick … The Freedom Association kept George Ward in business. Tory! Tory! Tory! II: Path to Power, BBC 2006
In 1980 there was a massive strike in the steel industry; inflation was high and workers wanted a pay rise to match it … The strike went on for three months. ibid.
‘I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half.’ Plutocracy: Political Repression in the USA I: Divide and Rule, Jay Gould, 19th century American railroad developer, 2015
Each mining town was a feudal dominion with the company acting as lord and master … The laws were the company’s rules. ibid.
1907: The most deadly mine disaster in US history occurred when an explosion killed 361 men and boys in a West Virginia coal mine. ibid.
Accidents in American mines were double that of Germany, three times more than England. ibid.
‘Freedom from industrial feudalism … freedom from the terrorism inflicted by hired gunmen … and the struggle for liberties promised in the Bill of Rights.’ ibid. 2003 American Labor History Theme Study
In 1912 coal miners in Kanawha Country in West Virginia issued a list of demands including a shorter workday, the right to organise, recognition of a worker’s constitutional rights to free speech and assembly, an end to the blacklisting of union organisers, and alternatives to company stores. The requested pay raise would have cost the company fifteen cents per miner per day. Instead of negotiating, the company hired a private militia to break the strike. ibid.
[Mother] Jones had been declared the Most Dangerous Woman in America. ibid.
Union organisers were blacklisted and beaten. ibid.
The West Virginian mine wars were part of a broader conflict between the forces of labor and the forces of capital. A struggle that claimed the lives of thousands of American workers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; thousands more were beaten, maimed, imprisoned, tortured and sent to early graves due to poor working conditions and dismal safety standards. ibid.
‘In all civilised countries the people fall into different classes having a real or supposed difference of interests … There will be particularly the distinction between rich and poor.’ ibid.
The ability of the wealthy to buy their way out of military services caused rage among the poor. ibid.
Irish immigrants were mocked for their accents, their religion and their overall impoverishment. They were also amongst the first ethnic groups in the United States to form labor unions. ibid.
‘You are made to hate each other because upon that hatred is rested the keystone of the arch of financial despotism which enslaves you both.’ ibid. Tom Watson, populist leader
Jim Crow laws enforced segregation and curtailed African-American voting rights. During the same time period poor white voters were also disenfranchised. ibid.
In California a genocidal campaign had reduced the indigenous population from 150,000 in 1846 to 30,000 by 1870. ibid.
The robber barons took every opportunity to bribe politicians and crush their competitors. ibid.
Congress became known as the Millionaires Club. ibid.
By 1900 something like 20% of all American workers were under the age of 18. ibid.
Police were also used to discipline the working class. In Tompkins Square New York 1874 7,000 workers protested unemployment only to be savagely attacked by police. ibid.
A spirited labor press emerged in all of the major cities. ibid.
Unions around the country were becoming increasingly militant. ibid.
‘Anarchy is on trial … Make examples of them, hang them … save our institutions, our society.’ ibid. Julius S Grinnell, prosecutor of anarchists
One in eleven steelworkers died while on the job, often from a lack of sleep. ibid.
When Chinese railroad workers went on strike in 1867 demanding higher wages, shorter working hours, a ban on whipping, and the right to quit their jobs, almost no-one came to their aid. ibid.
The New Orleans strike was emblematic of a growing spirit of solidarity between workers. ibid.
‘My friends, it is solidarity of labor we want … We must be together; our masters are joined together and we must do the same thing.’ Plutocracy II: Solidarity Forever, Mother Jones, 2016
In the late 19th century a brutal class-war was underway in the United States. And as in all wars the poor suffered the majority of casualties. ibid.
American industry had the highest job accident rate of any country in the industrialised world. ibid.
Presiding over society was a small group of industrialists and bankers nicknamed the Robber Barons. ibid.
The National Guard came to the Pinkertons’ rescue protecting strike-breakers and defeating the union. ibid.
Among the targets were the Molly Maguires … a secret society of Irish immigrants … during the 1870s, victims of perilous working conditions. ibid.
One of the most important labor struggles in the late 19th century was the Pullmen’s strike of 1894. ibid.
Chicago 1894: 12,000 US army troops were sent in to attack their own citizens. ibid.
Day of Blood at Lattimer! Lower End Mine Strike Takes a Terrible Turn … They fire on Marching Strikers with Terrible Effect … Deputies Use Rifles! … 16 killed 70 wounded. ibid. newspaper report
Working class prisoners were used as virtual slaves … More African/Americans died under the convict-leasing system than during slavery. ibid.
The link between wealth and voting rights sometimes caused unrest. ibid.
The Women’s Movement was also plagued by the same class and racial bigotries that afflicted labor unions. ibid.
‘I cannot think it probable that [working people] will be permanently contented with the condition of laboring for wages as their ultimate state. To work at the bidding and for the profit of another, without any interest in the work … is, not even when wages are high, a satisfactory state for human beings.’ ibid. John Stuart Mill
‘The IWW was openly anti-capitalist.’ ibid. Historian
Migrant workers from Mexico had become a super-exploited class. ibid.