Arbejdskampe i USA i 1930’erne / Worker’s struggles in the US during the 1930’s

Linkbox om amerikanske strejker og arbejdskampe i 1930erne, med særligt henblik på transportarbejder-strejkerne i 1934 og General Motors-strejkerne i 1936.
(Modkraft.dk/Tidsskriftcentret, december 2011)

Links on US strikes and labour struggles in the 30’s, mostly on the strikes of transport workers/teamsters in 1934 and General Motors in 1936-37.

- Harlan County 1931
- Strejker i 1930erne / Strikes in the 1930’s
- Transportarbejder-strejkerne 1934 / Teamsters Minneapolis Strike 1934
- General Motors-strejkerne 1936 / General Motors (Flint) 1936

Union workers and sympathizers march toward a rally in Detroit’s Cadillac Square in early 1937. The fledgling United Auto Workers were striking General Motors plants in Flint and other locations, and were encouraged when the Detroit rally drew 150,000 supporters.

Harlan County 1931

- Battle of Evarts (Wikipedia.org)
- "Bloody Harlan": The Enduring Strike (American Labour Crises; Mercyhurst College, Eria, PA, USA)
- United Mine Workers; Harlan County War (Wikipedia.org)
Song:
- Which Site Are You On (song) (Wikipedia.org)
- Which Site Are You On - Almanac Singers, 1941 (YouTube.com, 2:12 min.). Version with lyrics (Natalie Merchant)
- Version : Ms Florence Reece sings for you (YouTube.com). From meeting at the 1973 strike.
Se også:
- Harlan County (Documentary 1973 struggle). Directed & produced by Barbara Kopple, 1977 (YouTube, 104 min.)
Harlan County, USA (film) (Wikipedia.org)
Harlan County, USA: The miners’ struggle. Review by Peter Biskind (Jump Cut, No.14, 1977)
Harlan County, USA: The documentary form. Review by E. Ann Kaplan (Jump Cut, No.15, 1977)

Strejker i 1930erne

San Francisco General Strike, 1934 - Part 1 (YouTube; ) Union workers in San Francisco stage a general strike, shutting down the city to support striking longshoremen.

- 1934 West Coast Waterfront strike (Wikipedia.org) + more links in this section below.
- Fighting back. By Megan Trudell (Socialist Review, September 2012). Review of John Newsinger, Fighting back: the American working class in the 1930s (Bookmarks, 2012)
"In this splendid corrective John Newsinger tells a very different - and often hidden - history of the dramatic strikes and sit-down movement of the 1930s ...". See also John Newsinger: Once upon a time in America (Socialist Worker, Issue 2313, 28 July 2012)
- 1934: Strike wave in the South (SocialistWorker.org, August 22, 2012)
"Russell Pryor examines the obstacles faced by Southern workers during the General Textile Strike of 1934."
- Fighting evictions during the Great Depression: the Great Rent Strike War of 1932 in the Bronx. By Mark Naison (International Socialist Review, Issue 81, January-February 2012)
- The sit-down strikes (1990). By Sharon Smith (SocialistWorker.org, June 10, 2011)
"The years 1936 and 1937 represented the highest point of class struggle in the U.S. to date - when a wave of sit-down strikes swept across U.S. industry. Those strikes built the Congress of Industrial Organizations and changed the face of the labor movement."
- 1937: the year of the sitdown (International Socialism, Issue 127, Summer 2010, p.81-110)
"John Newsinger discusses the grat wave of sitdown strikes in the mid1930s that broke bosses’ resistance to the unionisation of basic industry in the United States."
- The unemployed movement of the 1930s: Bringing misery out of hiding. By Danny Lucia (International Socialist Review, Issue 71, May-June 2010)
"The Communist Party, Socialist Party, and followers of radical pacifist A.J. Muste created unemployed organizations that mobilized hundreds of thousands of jobless workers in local and national protests."
- 1934: year of the fightback. By John Newsinger (International Socialism, Issue 122, Spring 2009, p.65-90)
"John Newsinger looks at how workers fought back in the face of vicious attacks by employers and the state, and despite initially weak trade unions."
- The lessons of 1934. By Sharon Smith (SocialistWorker.org, October 6, 2009)
"The year 1934 marked a turning point for the working-class struggle during the Great Depression, with three strikes in three cities - Toledo, San Francisco and Minneapolis - that showed workers could fight back and win."
- The battle for the docks (SocialistWorker.org, September 21, 2009)
"Here, Todd Chretien tells how the battle of longshore workers, led by members of the Communist Party, against the tyranny of the port bosses led to the largest general strike in American history."
- 75 years since the San Francisco general strike. By Marge Holland and Robert Louis (World Socialist Web Site, 18 September 2009)
"On May 9, 1934, San Francisco longshoremen went out on strike against West Coast ship owners, igniting a movement of 35,000 maritime workers of the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) that shut down 2,000 miles of Pacific coastline from Bellingham, Washington, to San Diego, California."
- Labor’s breakthrough in Toledo (SocialistWorker.org, 15 September 2009)
"Here, Elizabeth Schulte tells the story of the Auto-Lite strike in Toledo, Ohio, where workers and the unemployed united to beat back the bosses and their troops."
- 75th anniversary of the Toledo Auto-Lite strike: Historic 1934 struggle. By Charles Bogle (World Socialist Web Site, 27 May 2009)
"This year marks the 75th anniversary of the Toledo, Ohio, Auto-Lite strike. From February until June 1934, the city of Toledo, Ohio - a major industrial city on Lake Erie - was gripped by the workers’ struggle against the auto parts manufacturer, Electric Auto-Lite."

Minneapolis workers fight the police

20. juli 1934

"Bloody Friday" i Minneapolis, USA, da 67 lastbilchauffører og sympatisører blev skudt ned under strejken, der endte med sejr.
Se:
- Minneapolis Teamsters Strike of 1934 (Wikipedia.org)
- Section: 1934 Minneapolis Teamster Strikes (Marxists Internet Archive; History Archive. Bl.a. bogen: American City (1937) by Charles Rumford Walker: "First hand narration and interviews with the major participants of the strike."
- Transportarbetarfackets uppror i Minneapolis 1934 (Offensiv, nr. 630, 30. dec. 2004)
"För sjuttio år sedan resulterade en generalstrejksrörelse ledd av en liten trotskistisk grupp i USA-staden Minneapolis i en seger för transportarbetarfacket och markerade en avgörande fas i USA:s arbetarkamp."
- The Teamster rebellion of 1934 (SocialistWorker.org, May 20, 2011)
"Three strikes in 1934 helped transform the situation. Phil Gasper looks at the Teamster rebellion in Minneapolis."
- The Teamsters’ rebellion sparked struggle (Socialist Worker, Issue 2227, 13 November 2010)
"Mass strikes rocked the US in the 1930s, with rank and file workers and revolutionaries at the heart of them. Simon Basketter looks at the key events of Minneapolis in 1934."
- The rebellion in Minneapolis (SocialistWorker.org, September 29, 2009)
"Here, Adam Turl how a wave of strikes that started with coal drivers drew in growing numbers of workers - and provoked bigger and bigger confrontations with big business and the state."
- 75th anniversary of the Minneapolis truck drivers’ strike: Revolutionary leadership and the struggle of 1934. By Ron Jorgenson (World Socialist Web Site, 31 August 2009)
"We are posting here an article on the 1934 Minneapolis general truck drivers’ strike, originally published in four parts."
- US: The 75th anniversary of the 1934 Minneapolis Teamsters strike. Part 1. By David May (In Defence of Marxism, 17 July 2009) + Part 2 (24 September 2009)
"The 1934 Teamsters strike in Minneapolis, led by the Trotskyists of the Communist League of America (the forerunner of the Socialist Workers Party), was a decisive moment in the US labor and socialist movements. During the years preceding the strike, few would have expected the upsurge that took place in 1934."
- 70th anniversary of Labor’s historic victory in Minneapolis (SocialistWorld.net, 23 January 2005)
"Seventy years ago, a small mid-western city was shaken to its very foundations. The 1934 Minneapolis Teamster strike is one of the greatest labor battles in U.S. history. For two months, the working class owned the streets."
- Rebellion in Minneapolis (SocialistWorker.org, March 20, 2009). Uddrag fra Sidney Lens’ bog: The Labor Wars: From the Molly Maguires to the Sit-Downs (2009/1973)
"Here, we reprint an excerpt from a chapter of The Labor Wars that chronicles some of the crucial union battles of the Great Depression - strikes on the West Coast waterfront strike, at the Auto-Lite plant in Toledo, Ohio, and of Teamsters in Minneapolis in 1934."
- The 1934 Minneapolis Strike (1934). By Carl Skoglund (Revolutionay History, Vol.2, No.1, Spring 1988)
"The Minneapolis strikes of 1934 have always occupied a special place in the historical understanding of the Trotskyist movement, as they were the first clearly documented demonstration of the ability of a small Trotskyist organisation to make the breakthrough into the broader labour movement, and to lead one of its sections to victory."
Litteratur:
- Teamsters Rebellion. By Farrell Dobbs (Monad Press/Pathfinders Press, 1972, 190 p.). See book review (Socialist Appeal, 17 July 2007)
"The first of four books in a series, this is a true life account of the struggles for union recognition fought by the transport workers in Minnesota, US in 1934."

30. december 1936

Bilarbejderne i Flint, Michigan, starter besættelser, der fører til 135.000 i strejke mod General Motors. "The most important strike in American labor history."
Se:
- Flint Sit-Down Strike (Wikipedia.org) + very good links.
- The 1936-37 Flint, Michigan sit-down strike (BBC)
- Sit Down Strike of 1937 (life-size bronze sculpture) Janice Trimpe (Art as Large as Life)
- The Flint sit-down strike audio gallery: Remembering the Flint sit-down strike 1936-1937 (HistoricalVoices.org)
Introduction, organization, strike, aftermath + audio timeline, strike map, slideshow.
- When workers occupied (SocialistWorker.org, October 18, 2011)
Excerpt from Sharon Smith’s book, Subterranean Fire: A History of Working-Class Radicalism in the United States (Haymarket, 2006, p.135-142)
- Flint occupation lit a flame (Socialist Worker, Issue 2162, 1 August 2009)
"In 1936 car workers occupied their factory in Flint in the US and won a victory over the General Motors corporation. The struggle holds lessons for today, writes Sadie Robinson."
- 70 years ago workers won Flint sit-down strike: 1937 Flint sit-down labor history series, Part 1-10. By Martha Grevatt (Workers World, Feb 28-June 8, 2007)
- The historic 1936-37 Flint auto plant strikes. By Vivian M. Baulch and Patricia Zacharias (The Detroit News, June 23, 1997)
"The feisty young United Auto Workers launched the first of a series of sit-down strikes against General Motors at Fisher Body Plant No. 1 in Flint ... The strike lasted 44 days and became the first of many union victories."
- Introduction: The Flint sitdown for beginners. By Charlie Post (Against the Current, No.62, May/June 1996)
"The sitdown strike at GM’s Flint, Michigan Fisher Body and Chevrolet plants (December 1936-February 1937) was a turning point in the history of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO)."
- Flint and the rewriting of history. By Sol Dollinger (Against the Current, No.62, May/June 1996)
"t is understandable that these events, which were led by radical political parties, would produce partisan perceptions of these historic happenings. In the main this history has been the major province of the supporters of the Communist Party (CP)."
- Politics and memory in the Flit sitdown strikes. By Nelson Lichtenstein (Against the Current, No.62, May/June 1996)
"Sol Dollinger renders a great service in correcting the historical record. Whether by omission or outright bias, Henry Kraus has slighted the role played by Socialist Party activists in the leadership of the Flint sit-down strikes."
- Striking Flint (1995) (Marxists Internet Archive)
"Genora (Johnson) Dollinger remembers the 1936-37 General Motors sit-down strike ... as told to Susan Rosenthal 1995."

- 75 years ago: Worker militancy spreads from Flint (World Socialist Web Site, 13 February 2012; This week in history) 1 printed page.

The Flint Sit-down Strike of 1936-1937. By Laureen Brady & Cloe Rose Less (YouTube, 6:33 min.)

Se også / See also:

Linkboxe:
- Wall Street krisen 1929
- New Deal-politiken i USA
- Emneindex/Subject heading: USA/United States of America