‘Power in the hands of people’: union leaders push to revive ailing US labor movement

This month in labour history

3-04-1968 In a church in Memphis, Tennessee, 10,000 citizens gather to hear what will be the last speech by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He will stress the similarities between the labour movement and that of civil rights. [more]

8-04-1911 An explosion at the Banner coal mine near Birmingham, Alabama, kills 128 prisoners rented to the company as miners, under a contract with the prison administration. [more]

10-04-1930 Dolores Huerta, Mexican-American labour leader, is born. [more]

11-04-1934 Frank Norman is murdered by the Ku Klux Klan for organising citrus workers irrespective of their race. [more]

11-04-1974 United Mine Workers President W. A. “Tony” Boyle is found guilty of first-degree murder, for ordering the 1969 assassination of union reformer Joseph A. “Jock” Yablonski. Yablonski, his wife and daughter were murdered on December 30, 1969. [more]

14-04-1939 'The Grapes of Wrath', John Steinbeck's classic novel about itinerant labor, strikes and the Great Depression, is published. [more]

15-04-1889 Birth of labour and civil rights leader A. Phillip Randolph [more]

15-04-1916 The newspaper of the Industrial Workers of the World union announced the formation of its Domestic Workers Union in Denver. [more]

15-04-1973 housands of members of the United Farm Workers union walked out on strike. They were battling the Teamsters union over the right to represent farm workers. The dispute ended with victory for the UFW. [more]

16-04-1970 A white foreman at a Chrysler plant in Detroit threatened to murder a black worker. When the worker complained Chrysler sacked him. 1,000 workers, white and black, walked out on strike in protest until management backed down. [more]

17-04-1944 Members of the militant machinists' union Lodge 68 in San Francisco began an overtime ban in pursuance of a new contract. They ended up fighting the employer, the government and even the Communist Party. [more]

18-04-1941 After 4 weeks of a boycott, New York bus companies agree to hire 200 black drivers and mechanics [more]

21-04-1967 New York Governor Rockefeller signs the Taylor Law, allowing unions in the public sector, but banning strikes. [more]

21-04-1920 The Anaconda Road massacre took place in Butte, Montana, when mine guards employed by the Anaconda company shot 17 striking miners, killing one. All were shot in the back as they tried to flee. No one was charged for the killing. [more]

21-04-1894 A nationwide strike of coal miners against pay cuts began. 145,000 miners walked out, and despite violent repression and facing starvation they held out for weeks and won some concessions. [more]

24-04-1999 The ILWU halts shipping on the West Coast in solidarity with Mumia Abu-Jamal. [more]