Today in Labor History May 15

Today in Labor History May 15, 1872: Julia Ward Howe declared the first Mother’s Day as an anti-war holiday. Howe was an abolitionist and a feminist who wrote the lyrics for the Battle Hymn of the Republic. However, despite her disgust with slavery, she never thought black and white people were truly equal.

1890s

May 15, 1894: New Jersey became the first state to prohibit employment discrimination against union members.

LGBTQ Rights

_{Vita homosexualis, 1902 collection of August Fleischmann’s pamphlets on third gender and against Paragraph 175 of the Criminal Code. By Wikiwlh – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0}

_{Hirschfeld in 1932. Wellcome L0024860.jpg, CC BY 4.0,}

Today in Labor History May 15, 1897: Magnus Hershfield and colleagues formed The Scientific-Humanitarian Committee in Berlin to campaign for the rights of LGBT people. Consequently, it was the first LGBT rights organization in history. The organization formed just four days before Oscar Wilde’s release from prison. Hershfield was an outspoken advocate for the rights of gender and sexual minorities. The committee was based in Hershfield’s Institute for Sexual Sciences until the Nazis destroyed the institute in 1933. They provided legal support for people being charged under Germany’s anti-sodomy laws and lobbied to abolish the laws entirely. Albert Einstein, Herman Hesse, Thomas Mann, and Tolstoy all signed their petitions.

_{Gompers c. 1902. By James Edward Purdy. Public Domain,}

1900s

Today in Labor History May 15, 1906: The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Samuel Gompers and other unions on their boycott of the Buck Stove and Range Co. in St. Louis. Workers there were striking for a nine-hour day. Furthermore, they were being imprisoned for refusing to obey the judge’s anti-boycott injunction.

1910s Bonnot Gang

_{Octavio Garnier. By Richard Parry, Pub Dom}

May 15, 1912: French police gunned down Andre Rene Valet (1890-1912) and Octave Garnier (1889-1912), of the anarchist Bonnot Gang. The two were the last of the gang to be killed (or apprehended). They were attacked by 300 policemen and gendarmes, plus 800 soldiers. However, even this was not enough to apprehend them. So, the cops set off a bomb that killed Garnier. Valet continued fighting, despite his mortal wounds. In the aftermath, the authorities went on a witch hunt, rounding up anarchists and labor activists throughout France, much like the Palmer raids in the U.S.

1910s Wobblies

Today in Labor History May 15, 1913: The Patterson silk strike continued. The strike went on from February through July. Police arrested 1,850 workers during the strike, including IWW leaders Elizabeth Gurly Flynn and Big Bill Haywood. In June, they held a pageant at Madison Square Garden to raise funds for the strike. Walter Lippmen, Mabel Dodge, Max Eastman and John Reed participated. However, in the end, the bosses won and two strikers died.

_{Strike leaders Patrick L. Quinlan, Carlo Tresca, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Adolph Lessig, and Bill Haywood. Pub Dom}

May 15, 1913: The IWW lumber strike at Pilchuck, WA continued.

_{By Bain News Service, publisher. Public Domain,}

Today in Labor History May 15, 1917: The Library Employees’ Union was founded in New York City. It was the first union of public library workers in the United States. One of their main goals was to elevate the low status of women library workers and their miserable salaries. Maud Malone (1873-1951) was a founding member of the union. She was also a militant suffragist and an infamous heckler at presidential campaign speeches. As a result of her heckling, she received numerous fines and served time in jail.

Winnipeg General Strike

Newsreel footage of the Winnipeg general strike of 1919

May 15, 1919: Workers in Winnipeg, Canada, initiated a huge general strike involving 30,000 workers. The workers called for a six-hour workday and a five-day work week. During the strike, virtually the entire workforce halted work. Even the cops voted for the strike. However, the strike committee asked the cops and utility workers to stay on the job to help keep basic services functioning. They set up a huge public kitchen which served food to hundreds of people each day.

The strike lasted until June 26th, when the Winnipeg Labor Council declared the strike over. During the strike, police tried repeatedly to violently suppress the workers. The Winnipeg “Free Press” called the strikers bohunks, aliens and anarchists. The called in the Royal Mounted Police and arrested dozens of people, charging some with seditious conspiracy. On Bloody Saturday, June 21, the Mounties fired into the crowd, killing one and wounding thirty others. In May and June, General Strikes broke out in 30 other Canadian cities.

1920s

Today in Labor History May 15, 1920: The first labor bank opened in Washington, D.C., launched by officers of the Machinists. The Locomotive Engineers opened a bank in Cleveland later that year.

May 15, 1921: Pat Sullivan released the radical animated Felix the Cat cartoon, “Felix Revolts.”

1930s-1940s

Today in Labor History May 15, 1935: The National Labor Relations Act was passed, recognizing workers’ right to organize and bargain collectively.

_{Little Red Songbook}. _{By Hunter Gray. CC BY-SA 3.0,}

May 15, 1942: IWW songwriter T-Bone Slim died in New York City. T-Bone wrote such Wobbly classics as “The Mysteries of a Hobo’s Life,” “The Popular Wobbly,” and “The Lumberjack’s Prayer.” T-Bone Walker once said, “Wherever you find injustice, the proper form of politeness is attack.” He also said, “Tear Gas: The most effective agent used by employers to persuade their employees that the interests of capital and labor are identical.” T-Bone Slim was Finnish. His real name was Matti Valentin Huhta. In addition to songwriting, he worked as a dockworker and a journalist, writing for several Wobbly papers. His songs are perennially featured in the IWW’s Little Red Song Book.

1960s-1970s

Today in Labor History May 15, 1969: Police fought students in the Battle for People’s Park at the University of California Berkeley, California. The battle was over a small strip of land that the students had claimed as community commons. Governor Ronald Reagan sent in the National Guards to reclaim the Park. Police gunfire killed a bystander, James Rector, and wounded 60 others, including Alan Blanchard, who was blinded for life. Street fighting continued for 17 days. Another 150 demonstrators would be shot and wounded.

May 15, 1973 – Wall Street Journal reporter Jonathon Kwitney uncovered the true face of American labor bosses. He identified AFL-CIO President George Meany, Secretary-Treasurer Lane Kirkland and other union officials as leading stockholders in the 15,000 acre Punta Cana resort in the Dominican Republic. Thus, these union leaders were reaping huge financial gains from the Dominican president’s violent eviction of impoverished tobacco farmers and fishermen who had lived there for generations.