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By 1936 the CIO was vigorously organizing steelworkers, textile workers, automotive assembly-line workers, and others across the nation amid much violence between management and labor. Bloody battles, started by either side, were not uncommon. In Seattle there was an abortive effort by workers to call a general strike. Perhaps the most innovative forms of worker protest, however, were the sit-down strikes at mid decade. Rather than leaving the plants and marching outside at the gates as in traditional strikes, the "sitdowners" elected to occupy the plants — literally to sit down next to their machinery— until their demands were met. The best known of these sit-down strikes was launched just before Christmas 1936 by the automotive assembly-line workers. Supported by their wives and others on the outside, who organized food and blanket brigades to help them, the workers occupied automotive factories for weeks. In February...
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This section contains 252 words (approx. 1 page at 300 words per page) |
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