On September 8, 1965, Filipino American grape workers in the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee walked out on strike against Delano-area table and wine grape growers, protesting years of poverty wages and brutal working conditions, and asked Cesar Chavez’s National Farm Workers …
United Farm WorkersCesar ChavezAgricultural Workers Organizing CommitteeDelano Grape Growerslabor-organizingdemocratic-resistanceworker-power
In September 1962, Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta founded the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA) to organize California’s agricultural workers, who had been systematically excluded from New Deal labor protections and faced conditions resembling debt peonage. Farmworkers endured poverty …
Cesar ChavezDolores HuertaNational Farm Workers AssociationAgricultural Workers Organizing Committeelabor-organizingdemocratic-resistanceworker-power
On February 11, 1937, General Motors—the world’s largest industrial corporation—capitulates to the UAW after 44 days of sit-down strikes, signing a one-page agreement that recognizes the United Auto Workers as exclusive bargaining representative for union members for six months and …
United Auto WorkersGeneral MotorsAlfred Sloan Jr.William KnudsenFisher Body workers+2 morelabor-rightsstrikessit-down-strikesuawgeneral-motors+2 more
On November 9, 1935, John L. Lewis of the United Mine Workers met with leaders of eight unions—including Sidney Hillman of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers and David Dubinsky of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union—to formally establish the Committee for Industrial Organization within the …
John L. LewisUnited Mine Workers of AmericaSidney HillmanDavid DubinskyPhilip Murraylabor-organizingdemocratic-resistanceworker-power
From June 27 through July 8, 1905, two hundred socialists, anarchists, Marxists, and radical trade unionists convened at Brand’s Hall in Chicago to found the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), launching the most significant challenge to corporate capitalism and conservative trade unionism …
William "Big Bill" HaywoodEugene V. DebsMother JonesLucy ParsonsDaniel De Leon+1 morelabor-organizingdemocratic-resistanceworker-power