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a224a217e9265f0efaadf0d2f8399dc7.ppt
- Количество слайдов: 52
Labor Force Distribution 1870 -1900
The Changing American Labor Force
Child Labor
Child Labor
“Galley Labor”
Labor Unrest: 1870 -1900
Management vs. Labor “Tools” of Management “Tools” of Labor M “scabs” M boycotts M P. R. campaign M sympathy demonstrations M Pinkertons M lockout M blacklisting M court injunctions M informational picketing M organized strikes
The Corporate “Bully-Boys”: Pinkerton Agents
A Striker Confronts a SCAB!
Knights of Labor Terence V. Powderly An injury to one is the concern of all!
Knights of Labor trade card
Goals of the Knights of Labor ù Eight-hour workday. ù Workers’ cooperatives. ù Worker-owned factories. ù Abolition of child and prison labor. ù Increased circulation of greenbacks. ù Equal pay for men and women. ù Safety codes in the workplace. ù Prohibition of contract foreign labor. ù Abolition of the National Bank.
The Great Railroad Strike of 1877
• The Great Railroad Strike of 1877 was the country's first major rail strike and witnessed the first general strikes in the nation's history. • The Pennsylvania Railroad, the nation's largest, cut wages by 10 percent and then, in June, by another 10 percent. Other railroads followed suit. • The strikes and the violence it spawned briefly paralyzed the country's commerce and led governors in ten states to mobilize 60, 000 militia members to reopen rail traffic.
The Tournament of Today: A Set-to Between Labor and Monopoly
Haymarket Riot (1886) Mc. Cormick Harvesting Machine Co.
• 40, 000 Chicago workers struck against Mc. Cormick Harvesting Company on May 1 st, wanted an eight-hour workday. • anarchists and political radicals involved • May 3 rd, confrontation between police and the strikers that left two strikers dead. • The next day (May 4 th) a meeting was to be held at Chicago’s Haymarket Square. It was peaceful and small, but as the rally began to break up nearly 200 police arrived and a bomb exploded in their midst. The police responded with gunfire and when the smoke cleared, 70 officers lay wounded. Seven were killed and one civilian died. • Eight anarchists were charged with the bombing. They were found guilty of
Haymarket Martyrs
Governor John Peter Altgeld
The American Federation of Labor: 1886 Samuel Gompers
How the AF of L Would Help the Workers ù Catered to the skilled worker. ù Represented workers in matters of national legislation. ù Maintained a national strike fund. ù Prevented disputes among the many craft unions. ù Mediated disputes between management and labor. ù Pushed for closed shops. union security agreement under which the employer agrees to hire union members only, and employees must remain members of the union at all times in order to remain employed
Homestead Steel Strike (1892) Homestead Steel Works The Amalgamated Association of Iron & Steel Workers
• 1892, a strike at Andrew Carnegie's Homestead Steel Works, protested wage cuts. The mangers instituted a lockout and hired 300 guards to protect plant. There was a violent clash and 16 people were killed.
Big Corporate Profits!
A “Company Town”: Pullman, IL
The Pullman Strike of 1894
• • • George Pullman’s sleeping-car factory and company town outside Chicago (south side), wages were cut, but he didn’t lower rent or cost of goods in company store. Eugene V. Debs was an American union leader, one of the founding members of the International Labor Union and the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), - Eugene V. Debs, head of American Railway Union, supported Pullman workers and urged union members to refuse to work or ride in Pullman cars. This brought rail traffic to a near halt. The rail companies asked federal government to step in (since it was interfering with interstate commerce and delivery of mail).
President Grover Cleveland If it takes the entire army and navy to deliver a postal card in Chicago, that card will be delivered!
The Pullman Strike of 1894 Government by injunction!
International Workers of the World (“Wobblies”)
• IWW membership does not require that one work in a represented workplace, nor does it exclude membership in another labor union. • The IWW contends that all workers should be united as a class and that the wage system should be abolished.
“Big Bill” Haywood of the IWW M Violence was justified to overthrow capitalism.
I W W & the Internationale
The Hand That Will Rule the World One Big Union
Mother Jones: “The Miner’s Angel” M Mary Harris. M Organizer for the United Mine Workers. M Founded the Social Democratic Party in 1898. M One of the founding members of the I. W. W. in 1905.
The “Bread & Roses” Strike Lawrence Textile Strike was a strike of immigrant workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts in 1912 led by the Industrial Workers of the World. Prompted by one mill owner's decision to lower wages when a new law shortening the workweek went into effect in January, the strike spread rapidly through the town, growing to more than twenty thousand workers at nearly every mill within a week. DEMANDS: ù 15¢/hr. wage increase. ù Double pay for overtime. ù No discrimination against strikers. ù An end to “speed-up” on the assembly line. ù An end to discrimination against foreign immigrant workers.
Labor Union Membership
“Solidarity Forever!” by Ralph Chapin (1915) When the union's inspiration through the workers‘ blood shall run, There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun; Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one, But the union makes us strong! CHORUS: Solidarity forever, For the union makes us strong!
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire (March 25, 1911)
• The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in. New York City on March 25, 1911, was the largest industrial disasterin the history of the city of New York, causing the death of 146 garment workerswho either died in the fire or jumped to their deaths. The fire led to legislation requiring improved factory safety standards and helped spur the growth of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union, which fought for better working conditions for sweatshop workers in that industry.
• The conditions of the factory were typical of the time. Flammable textiles were stored throughout the factory, scraps of fabric littered the floors, patterns and designs on sheets of tissue paper hung above the tables, smoking was common, illumination was provided by open gas lighting, and there were no fire extinguishers.
In the afternoon of March 25, 1911, a fire began on the eighth floor, possibly sparked by a lighted match or 25, 1911, a cigarette. A New York Times article also theorized that the fire may have been started by the engines running the sewing machines in the building. To this day, no one knows whether it was accidental or intentional. Most of the workers who were alerted on the tenth and eighth floors were able to evacuate. However the warning about the fire did not reach the ninth floor in time.
• The ninth floor had only two doors leading out. One stairwell was already filling with smoke and flames by the time the seamstresses realized the building was ablaze. The other door had been locked, ostensibly to prevent workers from stealing materials or taking breaks and to keep out union organizers.
• The single exterior fire escape, a flimsy, poorly-anchored iron structure, soon twisted and collapsed under the weight of people trying to escape. The elevator also stopped working, cutting off that means of escape, partly because the panicked workers tried to save themselves by jumping down the shaft to land on the roof of the elevator.
Cartoon point out the corruption inherent in the inspection of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory by city officials.
Picture taken soon after fire was extinguished on ninth floor.
Workers Benefits Today
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