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Atlanta's Washerwomen Strike
With slavery less than two decades behind them, thousands of black laundresses went on strike for higher wages, respect for their work and control over how their work was organized. In the summer of 1881, the laundresses took on Atlanta’s business and political establishment and gained so much support that they threatened to call a general strike, which would have shut the city down. -
Great Southwest Railroad Strike
the American railroad industry was expanding quickly. In 1886 the Knights of Labor went on strike at the Union Pacific and Missouri Pacific railroads. two Hundred thousand workers across five states refused to work, claiming unsafe conditions and unfair hours and pay. The strike suffered from a lack of commitment from other railroad unions, the successful hiring of nonunion workers by Gould and from violence and scare tactics. -
1892 Homestead Strike
The 1892 Homestead strike in Pennsylvania and the ensuing bloody battle instigated by the steel plant's management remain a transformational moment in U.S. history, leaving scars that have never fully healed after five generations. The skilled workers at the steel mills in Homestead, seven miles southeast of downtown Pittsburgh, were members of the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers who had bargained exceptionally good wages and work rules. Homestead's management, with millionair -
The Pullman Strike
Facing 12-hour work days and wage cuts resulting from the depressed economy, factory workers at the Pullman Palace Car Company walked out in protest. The workers were soon joined by members of the American Railway Union (ARU), who refused to work on or run any trains, including Pullman-owned cars. Soon enough, 250,000 industry workers joined in the strike, effectively shutting down train traffic to the west of Chicago. The strike ended when President Grover Cleveland sent federal troops to Chica -
Great Anthracite Coal Strike
At the turn of the last century, the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) began a strike that threatened to create an energy crisis. Seeking better wages and conditions, the union went on strike in eastern Pennsylvania, an area that contained the majority of the nations supply of anthracite coal. As the winter of 1903 approached President Theodore Roosevelt became concerned that a heating crisis could develop and attempted to intervene unsuccessfully. Industrialist and financier J.P. Morgan -
McKees Rock Strike: Turning Point for Immigrant Workers
Eugene V. Debs, arguably the foremost union activist in American history, described the 1909 McKees Rock, Pa., strike this way: "The greatest labor fight in all my history in the labor movement." Yet today, few remember this struggle when immigrant workers rose up and changed the course of American unionism. The strike took place at the huge Pressed Steel Car Co. plant in McKees Rock, a few miles down the Ohio River from Pittsburgh, where between 5,000 and 8,000 mostly immigrant workers from so -
Uprising of 20,000 and the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire
On Saturday, March 25, 1911, a fire broke out on the top floors of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory. Firefighters arrived at the scene, but their ladders weren’t tall enough to reach the upper floors of the 10-story building. Trapped inside because the owners had locked the fire escape exit doors, workers jumped to their deaths. In a half an hour, the fire was over, and 146 of the 500 workers—mostly young women—were dead. Many of us have read about the tragic Triangle fire in school textbooks. B -
Steel Strike of 1919
Following World War I, United States Steel Corporation workers represented by the American Federation of Labor (AFL) organized a strike against poor working conditions, long hours, low wages and corporate harassment regarding union involvement. The number of strikers quickly grew to 350,000, shutting down nearly half of the steel industry. Company owners, however, invoked public concerns over communism and immigration as a way of turning public sentiment against the unions. This resulted in the -
National Labor Relations Act (NLRA)
to “encourage a healthy relationship between private-sector workers and the employers. Before the NLRA, employers were not required by to recognize a union or to bargain. By establishing employees basic rights to join unions and engage in collective bargaining, Congress wanted to reduce work stoppages and strikes, other conflicts between labor and management had all too often resulted in violence. -
The Fair Labor Standards Act
The FLSA introduced the forty-hour work week, making a national minimum wage, guaranteing "time-and-a-half" for overtime in most jobs, and banned most employment of minors in child labor -
Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA)
deals with the relationship between a union and its members. It protects union money and promotes union democracy making labor organizations file annual financial reports, requiring union officials, employers, and labor consultants to file reports, and by establishing standards for the election of union officers. The act is administered by the Office of Labor-Management Standards.
