Episodes
Monday Sep 20, 2021
September 20 - The Fight for Equality
Monday Sep 20, 2021
Monday Sep 20, 2021
On this day in Labor History the year was 1830.
That was the day that the Reverend Richard Allen brought black leaders together at his Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church in Philadelphia.
They met to discuss the rising white racial violence and discrimination toward free black residents of northern cities.
Forty people answered Allen’s call, representing seven states.
The delegates included many of the leading black ministers and abolitionists of the day.
Those who attended risked personal harm as white mobs threatened the delegates.
Due to the danger, the group met in secret starting on September 15th.
Then on this day they began open sessions.
For five days the delegates considered multiple responses to the conditions black northerners faced.
They founded the “American Society for Free Persons of Colour for Improving their Condition in the United States: For Purchasing Lands: and for Establishment of a Settlement in the Province of Canada.”
The organization emphasized pushing for legal protections for black residents in the United States.
They focused on education as a means of uplifting and improving the lives of black citizens.
But delegates also supported the idea of an outlet to Canada for those black families who wanted to leave for their safety.
The national Convention reconvened several times over the next three decades.
Multiple meetings were held at the state and local levels.
These meetings gave black leaders a chance to devise coordinated strategies to stand up against the increasing violence and restrictive laws of the North, and to call for the end of slavery in the South.
One outcome of these meetings was the founding of labor schools to train black students in the skilled trades, as means to gain economic independence.
Sunday Sep 19, 2021
September 19 - The End of My Sweet Jennie
Sunday Sep 19, 2021
Sunday Sep 19, 2021
On this day in Labor History the year was 1977.
That was the day that is remembered in Youngstown, Ohio as “Black Monday.”
The Youngstown Sheet & Tube Company announced plans to close its doors laying off more than 4,000 workers.
Youngstown was a steel town.
During the first half of the twentieth century, plants were booming.
Youngstown was a union town, a stronghold for the United Steelworkers by the 1940s.
But by the 1970s the once booming steel industry was going bust in Youngstown.
More and more jobs moved overseas and to states with less union protections.
Black Monday began a devastating series of plant closings.
Two years later Brier Hill Mill closed, followed in 1980 by US Steel.
In 1985 it was Republic Steels’ turn.
By the early 1990s, the steel industry, which had once employed 40,000 people only had 1,000 workers left in Youngstown.
William Lawson, the Executive Director of the Mahoning Valley Historical Society, recalled the impact of the closings.
“Over the course of my high school career, many boys and girls I had known in grade school left—some in the middle of school years, most during the summers—as their parents accepted transfers…to work in other plants around the country, or lost their jobs and went out in search of employment elsewhere.”
In 1997, the Jeanette Furnace at the shuttered Briar Hill plant was dynamited, despite preservationists’ efforts to save it.
Bringing down the “Sweet Jennie” furnace became symbol of Youngstown’s economic ruin, memorialized in Bruce Springtseen’s song Youngstown.
Saturday Sep 18, 2021
September 18 - The Atlanta Compromise
Saturday Sep 18, 2021
Saturday Sep 18, 2021
On this day in Labor History the year was 1895.
That was the day that Booker T. Washington delivered what came to be known as the “Atlanta Compromise Speech,” which outlined his vision for race relations and black labor in the South.
Washington was the founder of the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, a college to train black students for careers in teaching, farming and other trades.
Washington was invited to give an address to the Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta.
It was the first time that a black man was asked to speak before a black and white Southern audience.
In his speech he urged Southern land owners and business leaders to employ black labor over European immigrants.
He said, “To those of the white race who look to the incoming of those of foreign birth and strange tongue and habits for the prosperity of the South, were I permitted, I would repeat what I say to my own race, “Cast down your bucket where you are.”
He continued, “Cast it down among those people who have, without strikes and labor wars, tilled your fields, cleared your forests, built your railroads and cities, and brought forth treasures from the bowels of the earth and helped make possible this magnificent representation of the progress of the South.”
His speech outlined a plan for gradual black economic advancement.
He declared, “agitation of questions of social equality is the extremist folly.”
Other black leaders, most notably W. E. B. Du Bois rejected Booker T. Washington’s ideas of gradual advancement.
Instead DuBois fought racial discrimination through the legal system and helped to found the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the NAACP.
Friday Sep 17, 2021
September 17 - The Southern Differential
Friday Sep 17, 2021
Friday Sep 17, 2021
On this day in labor history, the year was 1947.
That was the day workers at the International Harvester plant in Louisville, Kentucky had had enough.
They had just rejected a pay scale lower than that of Harvester workers elsewhere.
In her recent article for Leo Weekly, historian Toni Gilpin refers to the lower pay as the “Southern Differential.”
Harvester workers walked off the job in a 40-day strike.
Black and white Louisville workers were united in a rare form of solidarity.
International Harvester had had a long labor-hating history.
Its forerunner had been the McCormick Reaper Works, the site that sparked the 1886 Haymarket incident in Chicago.
Harvester had been able to keep the unions out until the Farm Equipment Workers/CIO finally organized there in 1941.
And the FE followed Harvester as they attempted to escape to the union-free South.
The FE successfully organized the new Louisville plant, just two months before the strike.
Workers learned quickly that they were paid much less making the same equipment as their brothers in Chicago, Indianapolis and elsewhere.
Gilpin adds that FE literature forthrightly stated, “Once the Negro and white workers were united, the low-wage system of the South would collapse.”
Workers pressed for their demands, and appealed to area farmers for support.
They stressed that farmers would not pay less for equipment, simply because local workers were paid less.
Black and white workers picketed together, ate together and planned their strike together at their new union hall.
Harvester initially tried to redbait FE leaders.
When that failed, the company was forced to grant steep wage increases.
Gilpin cites FE News, which reported “two smashing victories in hand, one over International Harvester, the other over the Mason-Dixon, low-wage line.”
Wednesday Sep 15, 2021
September 16 -Oil Workers Demand 52 for 40
Wednesday Sep 15, 2021
Wednesday Sep 15, 2021
On this day in labor history, the year was 1945.
That was the day oil workers walked off the job.
The strike soon spread to 20 states and involved more than 43,000 workers at 22 oil companies.
After years of wartime wage freezes, the union’s demand was 52 for 40—fifty-two hours pay for 40 hours work.
Workers demanded a 30% pay increase, shift differentials and an eventual return to the 36-hour workweek.
The strike began in Michigan at the Socony-Vacuum refinery in Trenton.
From there it spread to Gulf, Sinclair and Shell.
By October 4, President Truman signed executive order 9639, allowing the Secretary of the Navy to seize petroleum operations.
The Oil Workers International Union/CIO immediately called off the strike and ordered its members back to work.
A month later, the Navy had still not relinquished control of operations.
The union considered Truman’s seizure a betrayal.
There was no mechanism put in place to settle the dispute or consider workers demands.
By January 1946, the Oil Panel, created by the Secretary of Labor, finally awarded oil workers an 18% wage increase.
Though disappointed, the union considered it a victory.
They asserted the strike action was significant on a number of levels.
The first nationwide industry strike had just forced the oil companies to meet with the union for the first time.
The OWI believed the groundwork for industry-wide bargaining had finally been established.
It had been the first post-war strike and had forced the government to begin moving away from wartime wage controls.
Of the post-war strikes, it won the largest pay increase.
And importantly, it broke the power of Standard Oil to dictate wages to the industry through its dealings with its “independent union.”
Wednesday Sep 15, 2021
September 15 - GM Rocked by Strike Wave of 350,000
Wednesday Sep 15, 2021
Wednesday Sep 15, 2021
On this day in labor history, the year was 1970.
That was the day 350,000 GM workers kicked off a 67-day strike.
It was the largest auto strike since the end of World War II.
According to historian Jefferson Cowie, it was likely the costliest.
In his book, Stayin’ Alive, Cowie notes that the strike cost GM a billion dollars in profits and nearly bankrupted the union.
But he adds it “lacked the proletarian drama that fired journalists’ hearts.”
For Cowie, it was an example of labor-management cooperation, “a civilized affair.”
But historian Jeremy Brecher points out that The Wall Street Journal drew different conclusions about the strike at the time.
In a series of articles, the paper noted that labor-management cooperation during the strike served ironically, to get workers back to work.
A long and costly strike served a number of functions.
It wore down strikers’ expectations.
After eight or ten weeks, workers would be amenable to terms they initially rejected.
It also provided an escape valve for built up frustration over working conditions.
And a long strike served to coalesce internal union factions around a common enemy, strengthening the union’s leadership in the process.
For management, a long and costly strike leant hope that workers would be reluctant to strike in the future.
But Brecher notes, these ideas about workers motives nearly backfired.
Strikers simply wouldn’t budge on their demands.
They made gains in wages, pensions and cost of living allowances.
And they were finally able to retire after 30 years.
But critics argued the agreement fell short of initial demands.
And workers lacked more say in the workplace.
This would be a key issue in the many strikes and wildcats in the years to come.
Tuesday Sep 14, 2021
September 14 - The Springfield General Strike
Tuesday Sep 14, 2021
Tuesday Sep 14, 2021
On this day in labor history, the year was 1917.
That was the day Illinois Governor Frank Lowden hoped to meet with striking streetcar men in an effort to end their strike.
Transit workers in Springfield, the state’s capitol, had been off the job since July 25th.
But the strike had gained so much support that Springfield had now erupted into a full blown general strike.
According to the Sangamon County Historical Society, thousands of “union members shut down mines, railroads, bakeries, restaurants, laundries and construction sites… following the violent crackdown of a pro-labor march by state police and militia.”
That march had been scheduled for September 9.
The unions hoped to show support for the striking streetcar men after a number of clashes between strikers and state militia.
After they were denied a permit, many of the 50 or so unions decided to march anyway, and were attacked.
Some were shot, more than 40 suffered bayonet-inflicted injuries.
By the 11th, most everyone in Springfield had walked off the job.
Striking women shoe factory workers stopped a streetcar, pulling the scab drivers off by force.
By the end of the week, as many as 12,000 members of 34 unions in the city were on strike.
When telephone operators walked off the job, they paralyzed communications of the scab streetcar drivers and the State National Guardsmen.
The streetcar strikers refused to meet with the governor until troops were withdrawn from the city.
The governor insisted disloyal, pro-German forces were at fault for the “labor troubles.”
By the 16th, the streetcar men agreed to negotiate and the general strike was called off.
But the company refused to meet striker demands for recognition and higher wages or even to take them back.
Monday Sep 13, 2021
September 13 - Shoot to Kill Orders in Rhode Island
Monday Sep 13, 2021
Monday Sep 13, 2021
On this day in labor history, the year was 1934.
That was the day Rhode Island Governor Theodore Green demanded that federal troops be sent to crush a textile strike in his state.
The General Textile Strike, then in its second week, stretched across the Piedmont from New England to Georgia.
Green declared, “We are face to face, not with a textile strike but with a communist uprising.”
His demands came after days of pitched battles between thousands of strikers and the Rhode Island National Guard in Saylesville and Woonsocket.
Secretary of War George Dern assured the governor and the press that 3,000 combat troops were ready and available for immediate duty in Rhode Island.
President Roosevelt declined to send federal troops.
But the state assembly authorized the governor to close the mills and appropriated $100,000 in funds to beef up state police forces.
The governor then directed Rhode Island’s police chiefs to round up all communists on charges of inciting riots in textile centers across the state.
It gave local authorities the pretext to round up and arrest over 200 alleged agitators, strike leaders, militants and radicals.
Over the course of four days, three strikers had been killed, including Charles Gorcynski at Saylesville and Jude Courtemanche, at Woonsocket.
Hundreds had been seriously injured in the two cities.
Seven of the sixteen strikers who had been shot by state troops were near death.
State National Guardsmen had been given “shoot to kill” orders to protect textile mills and scabs.
Once the Governor shut down the mills, police forces easily arrested dozens of flying squadron picketers and established martial law like conditions, though it was never officially established.
Within days, the strike would be quelled in Rhode Island.
Sunday Sep 12, 2021
September 12 - The United Rubber Workers is Founded
Sunday Sep 12, 2021
Sunday Sep 12, 2021
On this day in labor history, the year was 1935.
That was the day the United Rubber Workers was founded in Akron, Ohio.
Akron was the rubber capital of the world.
All the major companies were there—Goodyear, Firestone, Goodrich and General Tire.
In Akron alone, there were more than 40,000 rubber workers and thousands more throughout the country.
After 30 years of struggling to build the union, hopes of organizing the industry were finally made real.
The founding of the international came after a successful strike the year before.
But the union was born amid growing tensions within the AFL.
These were years of industrial organizing that rivaled the exclusive skilled craft unions.
Growing demands to organize the mass industries would explode the next month at the historic AFL convention in Atlantic City.
The tensions between AFL leaders and rubber workers delegates gave a taste of things to come.
At the founding convention, rubber workers delegates opposed a number of AFL leaders’ demands.
The AFL insisted on appointing officers.
They threatened to withdraw financial assistance when the delegates demanded democratic elections.
But AFL leaders backed off when unionists from across the city protested.
Then, delegates voted down an AFL constitutional clause proposal to bar “communists” from the union.
They also refused AFL orders to organize on anything less than a total industrial basis.
Organizing skilled workers into the URW became a contentious issue at the October AFL convention.
It led to the fight between Carpenters leader Bill Hutcheson and UMW president John Lewis, which precipitated the AFL split.
By the following spring, the new URW would lead another successful strike that put it firmly among the industrial unions of the CIO.
Saturday Sep 11, 2021
September 11 - The World Trade Center Health Program
Saturday Sep 11, 2021
Saturday Sep 11, 2021
On this day in labor history, the year was 2001.
We pause to remember those who died in the 9/11 attacks.
Of those killed, nearly a quarter were union people.
Hundreds of firefighters were lost.
Dozens of building trades people, including carpenters and electricians were also killed.
And many other unions lost members as well, including the AFT, SEIU, UNITE-HERE, CWA, and AFSCME.
Those lost that day will remains firmly forever in our memories.
What is less well known is the number of those first responders who are suffering from chronic and fatal diseases related to 9/11 or those who have already died.
It is estimated that over 400,000 people were exposed to World Trade Center contaminants.
These include more than 70 carcinogens and other hazardous substances.
Of those exposed, over 91,000 were first responders.
As of June 2017, over 67,000 first responders and over 12,000 survivors had registered in the World Trade Center Health Program run by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The program provides medical monitoring, health evaluations and treatment for those who qualify.
Of those registered responders still alive, more than 45,000 suffer from certified conditions as defined by the Zadroga Act of 2010.
And for registered survivors, nearly 10,000 suffer from certified conditions.
Close to 700 registered first responders have already died from certified conditions.
However, this number is considered a low estimate, given there were many who died before the program was established.
There are also a number of illnesses believed related to the attacks but not yet certified.
If you are a survivor or were a 9/11 First Responder and would like to enroll in the World Trade Center Health Program, please visit www.cdc.gov/wtc or call toll free 1-888-982-4748.