A General Strike in the Heartland?

As the fight for basic union rights escalated in Wisconsin, the Madison-based South Central Federation of Labor endorsed the idea of a general strike if Governor Walker’s union-busting bill passed.

A general strike in Wisconsin? Surely that sort of thing only happens in France or Italy or Greece.

But it has been done here as well. The best known is the May 1, 1886, general strike called by the new AFL to win the eight-hour day. About three-quarters of a million workers struck that day. Seattle saw a general strike in 1919 and San Francisco in 1934.

And in 1946, the big industrial unions (Auto Workers, Steelworkers, Electrical Workers) led a major strike wave that put a total of 5 million workers in the streets.

What is less well-known is that general strikes broke out that year in six American cities—a response to mid-sized local employers’ fierce battle to set back collective bargaining. This employer offensive was political from the start—hacking away at union power and usually backed by local or state government.

MIDDLE AMERICA STRIKES

Local labor movements led general strikes in support of machinists in Stamford, Connecticut; city employees in Rochester, New York, and Houston; transit workers in Lancaster, Pennsylvania; electrical power workers in Pittsburgh; and retail clerks in Oakland, California.

In these towns workers saw an employer’s attack on one group as the opening assault on all the unions in the city. Where mayors and governors supported management, the strikes forced them to back off.

When the mayor of Stamford refused to use the police to break machinists’ picket lines at the Yale & Towne lock plant, the governor of Connecticut answered the company’s pleas by having state police attack the strikers. The word went from local to local and the next morning, workers marched downtown to a giant rally that kicked off the general strike. The Yale & Towne workers eventually won everything they had demanded.

In Oakland, the strike began with a walkout of retail clerks at two major department stores. When the city brought in police to break the strike, streetcar operators, followed by truck and bus drivers, simply stopped their vehicles.

“By stranding thousands of work-bound people in the heart of the city, they had called the general strike,” said a strike veteran. The strike spread from block to block in working class neighborhoods. Later the city’s union leaders made it official.

In the 1940s public workers didn’t have collective bargaining rights by law. But in Houston and Rochester, unions or employee associations demanded wage increases and security against accelerating layoffs, as city budgets were stretched due to returning soldiers and rising unemployment.

Mass mobilizations were the key to starting things. In both cities workers were fired when they struck, and the police were sent in. The one-day Houston general strike was called a “labor holiday” and more or less failed. In Rochester a similar one-day strike brought the city to a halt. All firings were rescinded and the workers won the right to join a union.

The story in the other struck cities was similar, with the strikes sometimes officially called to begin with and sometimes after events were under way. But always it was local unions and working class neighborhoods that turned out the numbers. They were solidarity strikes, but became instantly political as they confronted local governments and made them back down.

Most strikes won, heading off management’s attacks and forcing city governments to withdraw support from employers.

One of the most valuable aspects of a general strike is to demonstrate just how essential labor is to run a city. When workers struck, “the giant apparatus of commerce was a lifeless, helpless hulk,” one historian said about San Francisco’s strike. “Labor had withdrawn its hand.”

HOW DOES EUROPE DO IT?

SUPPORT LABOR NOTES

BECOME A MONTHLY DONOR

Give $10 a month or more and get our "Fight the Boss, Build the Union" T-shirt.

To look at news reports about big general strikes in Europe, you would think it’s just a matter of top officials sending out the call and, presto, everyone is in the streets.

Look a little closer and you’ll see that it often comes down to certain groups in local areas who take the lead—the Paris subway workers, for example. They bring the city to a halt, and soon after, everyone is out.

In the mid-1990s, shortly after one of several one-day general strikes in Spain, I asked a well-placed union official how it was done. Did everyone just walk out on cue?

No, he said. The best organized workers in transport, or on the docks, or in big factories go out first. They all march into town, going past the smaller workplaces and shops, giving the less organized the support they need to come out.

The top officials are waiting at the platforms in the plaza to give speeches. These strikes wouldn’t happen if the top leaders didn’t call them and make preparations. But it’s the grassroots that give them momentum.

CONCENTRATION OF WORKERS

Madison’s South Central Federation of Labor didn’t “call” for a general strike. Only its 97 affiliated unions can officially take strike action. Sensibly, the federation called for education for such a groundbreaking event.

Madison’s unionists have had momentum and mobilizing experience galore for weeks. And they have public support, with nearly 2-to-1 in their favor not only in Wisconsin but across the country. But Madison has something else often key to a successful general strike—an unusual concentration of organized workers.

Madison may lack the giant factories, central rail systems, and bustling waterfronts past general strikes relied on for initial backbone. What it does have, as the state capital and a university center, is a dense concentration of unionized public sector workers who are at the heart of city and state functioning.

Let labor withdraw its hand and mind in Madison and all will see the importance of public sector workers to daily life. If private sector workers join in, America will get a new lesson in just who is essential to society and why it is reasonable they should have decent wages and working conditions.

WHO’S ON TOP NOW?

There’s something else. As Wisconsinites know from their own history, American politics are volatile—one day pro-labor Bob La Follette, Jr. is senator, and the next it’s Joe McCarthy. In November, Scott Walker was riding high. Now his popularity is in the toilet.

Last year it was the Tea Party, backed by billionaires like the Koch brothers, that dominated the news. This month the country learned Collective Bargaining 101, and what it means to workers.

When labor looms large, parasite bankers, chiselling employers, libertarian billionaires, and political hirelings like Walker are cut down to size. A general strike in the heartland could do a lot to change the political landscape all across the country.

Kim Moody is a former director of Labor Notes who now lives in Britain.