“Labor is prior to, and independent of, Capital. Capital is only the fruit of Labor and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to Capital and deserves much the higher consideration.” -Abraham Lincoln, Progressive Republican
Wednesday, June 28:
Birthday of Matthew Maguire, New Jersey Union machinist, who in 1882, proposed to the CLU (Central Labor Union) the creation of the Labor Day holiday to celebrate United States workers. -1850
The federal government sues the Teamsters to force reforms on the union, the nation's largest. The following March, the government and the union sign a consent decree requiring direct election of the union's president and the creation of an Independent Review Board. -1988
Thursday, June 29:
IWW strikes Weyerhauser and other Idaho lumber camps. The IWW successfully organized and represented many lumber mills and loggers in the western states. -1936
Jesus Pallares, the founder of the 8,000-member coal miners’ union, Liga Obrera de Habla Espanola, is deported as an "undesirable alien." The union operated in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. -1936
Friday, June 30:
One million railway shopmen strike. -1922
Alabama outlaws the leasing of convicts to coal mine owners, a practice that had been in place since 1848. 73 percent of the state's total revenue came from this source. 25 percent of all black leased convicts died. -1928
The Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers, a Union whose roots traced back to the militant Western Federation of Miners, and which helped found the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), merges into the United Steelworkers of America. -1967
Anaconda Company suspends all operations in Butte. The massive wealth and profits flowed out of state while the taxpayer was left with a world-class poisonous mess. (Privatize the profits, socialize the cost - the ugly truth of U.S. “Free Market” Capitalism) -1983
Saturday, July 1:
Homestead, Pa., steel strike. 7 strikers were murdered as Andrew Carnegie hires armed thugs and Pinkertons to protect his high profits by keeping wages at starvation levels and working conditions deadly. -1892
Copper miners begin a years-long, bitter strike against Phelps-Dodge in Clifton, Ariz. Democratic Gov. Bruce Babbitt repeatedly deployed state police and National Guardsmen to assist the company and protect profits over the course of the strike. -1983
Sunday, July 2:
Bituminous coal miners begin a 10-week strike for less deadly working conditions and better pay. -1897
An auto worker at a Detroit Chrysler plant pulled out an M-1 carbine and killed 3 supervisors before he was subdued by UAW union committeemen. A jury found Johnson innocent because of insanity after visiting and being shocked by what they considered the “maddening conditions” at Johnson's place of work. -1970
Monday, July 3:
Children employed in the silk mills in Paterson, N.J., go on strike for 11-hour day and 6-day week. A compromise settlement resulted in a 69-hour work week for children laborers. -1835
Butte Montana: Mayor Lewis Duncan (Socialist) is attacked and stabbed in his office. Duncan shoots his attacker in self-defense. Elected twice as a Socialist Mayor, Duncan's socialist policies ended corruption, increased public services, improved the city streets and sanitation, lowered infant mortality rates by fifty percent, and brought Butte out of bankruptcy. -1914
Tuesday, July 4:
AFL dedicates its new Washington, D.C., headquarters building at 9th St. and Massachusetts Ave. NW. The building, still standing, later became headquarters for the Plumbers and Pipefitters. -1916
Madison, Wisconsin: The Capital Times reporter John Patrick Hunter asks people on the street to sign a "petition", (actually the preamble of the Declaration of Independence, 6 amendments from the Bill of Rights and the 15th amendment of the U.S. Constitution). Only 1 in 112 does. 20 accuse Hunter of being a “Communist”. Many feared McCarthy could use it against them. The rest find the words in the petition “too subversive”. The journalist's actions demonstrated that an ignorant fearful populace incited by McCarthyism can and do threaten the very foundations of our Democracy. -1951
This Week in Labor History is compiled by Kevin D. Curtis
