1936-37 Flint auto plant strikes - Part 2
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.
We left off looking at the 1937 sit down strike in Detroit. It had just started on January 4, 1937.
On Jan. 3, 1937, The Detroit News reported that Knudsen said: "A meeting between the management and the union was scheduled for Monday, Jan. 4, but on Wednesday, before that meeting could take place, the second shift sat down and caused the plant to close, throwing out of work 7,000 men. More than 1,000 are still in the plant." Nearly all 7,000 plant workers were union members.
The News gave the union version: "Flint Fisher Body Plant No.1 sat down at 10 p.m. Wednesday because the company was reported moving dies from the plant to Grand Rapids and Pontiac, which the union contends amounted to breaking faith."
This is unusual. As we have seen in other strikes the press always took the side of management distorting facts and eliciting sympathy for the Corporation from the public. Things were very bad for working people in the early 1900’s. By 1937 people had had it with the cruelties of unfettered Capitalism.
Pictured Alfred P. Sloan Jr., president of General Motors, considered his workers to be among the most "pampered" in the industry.
Compare this with today with the movement of work, not just down to a nonunion South in the US, but overseas no less. We have seen stories of people training their overseas replacements. The Global Economy is accepted as some natural fact. We feel disempowered. This will all change over the next 10 to 20 years.
Pictured A United Auto Workers rally in Detroit's Cadillac Square drew 150,000 supporters. http://www.reuther.wayne.edu
/faces/massmeeting.htmlThe union called for supporters to gather at Cadillac Square in Detroit as a show of strength. The overflowing crowd of 150,000 supporters surprised even the union sympathizers and gave the union the self-confidence they needed to show its power and solidarity over its management "oppressors." Other union workers joined in sympathy strikes, closing plants in other states.
Pictured, Retired Major Henry A. Geerds examines a model of a machine gun made by strikers at the Fisher Body Plant no. 2 in Flint.
Among the plants closed by a sit-down strike was Fisher No. 2, also in Flint. The company responded by turning off the heat, and the cold winter caused the strikers there to compare themselves to George Washington and his men at Valley Forge.
Here workers were occupying the Corporation’s production plant. The plant belongs to the Corporation. So, is this a taking of property which should be protected by the police?
What do you think about this? How much power should Employers have? How much power should Employees have?
Then, on Jan. 11, 1937, the police tried to stop food delivery. A riot ensued.
"The rioting at Flint resulted in injury to 16 strikers and spectators and 11 officers," The Detroit News reported. "The condition of one striker was reported to be critical. Most of the strikers were injured by buckshot fired from riot guns by the Flint police. The officers were injured principally by missiles thrown from the plant by the stay-in strikers.
Rioting? Who provoked this rioting? Was it justified on either side?
"A pitched battle raged at the gates of the plant for 20 minutes, with 30 to 40 policemen opposing several hundred enraged strikers. The strikers pelted the officers with iron nuts, bolts and milk bottles and spurted thick streams of water on them from fire hoses. The police retaliated with tear gas and riot guns."
Pictured, Walter Reuther, future president of the UAW,
was one of the leaders of the Flint strikes.Biographer Nelson Lichtenstein tells of the Reuther brothers' role in the incident: "Roy and Walter were in the thick of the twilight battle, but Victor proved the real hero. For hours he manned the UAW sound car, from which he poured forth a constant stream of encouragement and tactical guidance described by one observer as 'an inexhaustible furious flood pouring courage into the men.'"
Pictured children prading in support of strike http://www.reuther.wayne.edu/pic/sitdown/kids.jpg
Twice the attacking police were repulsed. The winds had shifted and sent the tear gas back on the officers, who were then pelted with metal hinges thrown by the strikers. A crowd of sympathizers protected the strikers and the police retreated.
We have seen sympathizers trying to protect strikers before. The difference here is the occupation of the plant by workers, if we strip away our conventional ideas taught to us in schools.
If working people produce all the wealth there is, then the plant was built by workers and worked in by workers. So, does the “Owner” really own the plant? If working people created the wealth that is the plant and its products, should they have entitled ownership of the plant?
Picture sitdown coordinator in plant from http://www.historicalvoices.org/flint/
This is dangerous ground. Not just for owners, but for all citizens. We need incentive to motivate people to work and strive. We don’t need a Corporate Royalty living high on the hog by denying working people their fair share of the fruits of their work.
How would you solve this problem?
"The battle ended with the strikers in complete control of the gates," The News continued. "A crowd of nearly 2,000 watched the struggle. The plant lies in a valley, on the north side of the Flint River. The onlookers stood on both slopes of the valley, well out of harm's way. There was little to be seen from these points of vantage. The clouds of tear gas obscured the batttlefield.
"After the fighting had subsided, the crowd grew to about 5,000. They stood there most of the night, awaiting new developments which did not come."
News of the riot, dubbed "the Battle of the Running Bulls," reached Gov. Frank Murphy in Lansing before midnight. Before he left by auto for the riot site, he said, "It won't happen again ... Peace and order will prevail. The people of Flint are not going to be terrorized. The State of Michigan will be supreme."
National Guardsmen. http://www.historicalvoices.org/flint/
The people of Flint terrorized? The nasty Corporate management team may have been somewhat terrorized at the thought of losing control. One of the worst things for Corporate types. And the wealth created by the workers was halted. The worst possible event a Corporation could imagine.
The “Ruling Class” had ticked off the “Producing Class.” Not good!! But the people of Flint?
However, despite his mobilizing 4,000 National Guardsmen, Murphy refused to use them against the workers. The besieged sit-downers held. They continued to warm themselves with barrels of burning coke. Wives and others sympathizers brought food and news to the windows.
Must not have been the people of Flint afterall!
Inside, they formed different groups such as guards, cleaners, news gatherers and food handlers. Others played cards, while some played musical instruments smuggled in, undoubtedly singing union folk songs.
Sound like rioters to you?
Paralysis of the Chevrolet and Fisher Body division plants in Flint developed as the union's foremost objective. The future of the union depended on its ability to keep these key units of GM out of production.
Clearly, this is an economic move. Corporations make economic moves too. Today Corporations blackmail communities with jobs. Boeing did not want to meet is obligations to schools, roads, and a myriad of other things taxes go toward.
Picture from http://www.historicalvoices.org/flint/
Boeing got tax breaks just to keep jobs in Washington State. Is this Fair? Is this Moral? There is nothing wrong with making money. But frequently those who have a lot lord it over those who have little. If carried to extreme, like say the Tsars in Russia, the “little people” revolt.
Labor laws were established to keep such a revolting development such as this from happening. Those laws are being weakened and repealed. Things will get worse. What do you think will happen 20 to 30 years from now?
GM had rejected flatly all of the union's demands early in January, 1937. The corporation tried to push a back-to-work movement and sought federal assistance to sweep the sit-down strikers out of its plants.
On Jan. 29, GM went to court to request an injunction ordering the strikers out. The judge, Edward Black of Genesee County, owned $150,000 of GM stock and his order was derided by laughter. It only caused more union reinforcements to pour into Flint.
Remember, judges are frequently appointed by politicians. So the politicians we elect can influence our lives for a very long time after they leave office. If a judge is appointed for a life term who hates labor unions and thinks they should be eradicated, how do you think the IBEW would fair in a decission made by such a judge?
Other than "the Battle of the Running Bulls," only one other violent incident was reported during the sit-down strikes, on Feb. 1, when some 28 persons were injured. Striker Earl DeLong, 22, shot in the stomach, was the most seriously hurt.
Perhaps Earl was singing labor songs too loud. What if the CEO was shot in the stomach? Oh, but it was justified because of the sit-in.
Picture from http://www.historicalvoices.org/flint/
The Feb. 1 riot happened at Chevrolet plant No. 4 in Flint, when the union tried to encourage the 6,000 day shift workers to join the sit-down strike. Five hundred union men entered the plant to protest "discrimination against union members." The News reported that the union men began breaking factory windows. Tear gas and missiles were thrown, but no shooting was reported. Roy Reuther and Powers Hapgood manned the sound truck. The plant, a few blocks from the Fisher Body plant, had resumed work a week earlier because the workers decided to go back.
The News gave this account: "The guardsmen forming a line around the No. 4 plant were part of a contingent of 1,200 who formed a bayoneted ring of steel around the 80-acre grounds which house all 12 plants of the Chevrolet Motor Car Co. at Flint. Machine guns emplacements were at strategic approaches and except for a small group of pickets outside the gates of the No. 4 plant, all visitors were barred unless they had special military passes.
Picture from http://www.historicalvoices.org/flint/
"The guardsmen surrounded the grounds and 'enforced peace' on orders of Gov. Murphy, following the rioting."
Picture from http://www.historicalvoices.org/flint/
The News also gave the union version: "Then company police and hundreds of thugs, armed with tear gas pistols, tear gas bombs, blackjacks and clubs manufactured in the Chevrolet woodshop, attacked all workers in the plant, using floods of tear gas. It was a clear case, apparently, of company thugs against the workers since all the injured workers were found in the plants and no one was injured on the outside of the company property. City police do not seem to have been involved."
Well this is fair and balanced in so far as the two accounts of what happened were reported unlike today. The next step in reporting is to try to find out which version is the most truthful. That rarely happens today.
The National Guard fixed bayonets and halted any delivery of food to the occupiers. But the governor never ordered the troops into action.
Pictured Michigan National Guard confronting union supporters outside GM plants in Flint, 1937 http://www.reuther.wayne.edu/exhibits/sitdown.html
President Roosevelt asked GM to meet with the union once more. The tension subsided. General Motors signed an agreement with the UAW, giving the union bargaining rights in 17 GM plants shut by sit-downs.
Employees at the 17 plants involved got 5 percent pay hikes and were allowed to speak in the lunchroom. The company agreed not to discriminate against union members and agreed to begin negotiations on other matters.
Looks like the Parties reached a meeting of the minds! It was tough. The ruling class versus the working class. The age old battle between the haves and have-nots. This is where things are headed again. Corporations know this. They have control of the Federal Government today. They are making preparations.
A synopsis of the issues included in the union demands:
1. Recognition of UAW as sole bargaining agency.
2. Abolition of piece work in favor of straight hourly rates.
3. A 30 hour week and 6 hour day, with time and a half for overtime.
4. A “minimum rate of pay commensurate with an American standard of living.”
5. Seniority rights based on length of service.
6. Reinstatement of all employes “unjustly discharged.”
7. Mutual agreement on “speed of production.”
Pictured end of strike celibration
http://www.reuther.wayne.edu/exhibits/sitdown.html
The dramatic military style battles depict the times and the desperation of those involved. The outcome much later in time proved that both the union and the company could coexist and indeed prosper beyond anyone’s expectations. Those who made the cars could finally afford to buy them, pouring profits back to the stockholders. Spreading the wealth caused more to be created. The pension and wages won by the workers raised the standard of living for the whole country.
Prosparity lies in spreading the wealth. The fuzzyheaded Neoconservatives just don’t get it. Sure the Corporate “Royalty” will make a lot of money in the short term as wealth is tightly controlled and kept by the few. It has all happened before. We aren’t so different than those who came before us. We will make the same needless mistakes. Workers will rise up. Bad things will happen. And it all starts over again. History could save us all a lot of pain and hardship if only people would study it.
