Lest We Forget: In Tribute To The Pioneers Of The Great Flint Sit-down Strike
Shortly after this picture was taken of Plant #4 on Feb. 1, 1937, the divisionary attack on Plant #9 allowed strikers to sieze Plant #4 and thus to effectively shut down all of General Motors Chevrolet Production.
Lest We Forget:
In Tribute to the Pioneers
Of the Great Flint Sit-Down Strike
by Ronda Hauben
Remember when the 'Sit-Down' came?
And all the papers laid the claim
Against each Union Member's name?
'Subversive!'
from the poem "Subversive" by
Floyd Hoke-Miller
Fifty years ago, on Feb. 11, 1937, auto workers in Flint, Michigan marched triumphantly out of the factories they had occupied for 44 days. They had endured cold, tear gas, gun-shot wounds, injunctions, etc., but they did indeed "Hold the Fort" until General Motors (GM) agreed to grant sole bargaining rights to their union, the United Auto Workers (UAW). One historian, evaluating the significance of the Sit-Down, writes:
"The era of the New Deal was studded with great strikes, many of them signifying an upheaval of unskilled labor in the nation's mass production industries."
(Thomas Karman, "The Flint Sit-Down Strike," Michigan History, June 1962, p. 98)
The strike wave of the 1930's made it possible, for the first time, to have industry-wide rather than craft unions in the United States. But to understand the strike wave of the 1930's it is necessary to look back to its roots in the 1880's.
"There has been labor unrest ever since there was a factory system," points out one commentator, "but the movement referred to [in the 1930's-ed] can properly be traced back to 1886-87, a period of open warfare characterized for the first time by a series of important strikes on the issue of the right to organize and bargain collectively through nationwide unions."
(Fortune Magazine, Nov. 1937)
The "right to organize and bargain collectively" was the long-sough goal of the labor movement through the 50 year period from the 1880's through the 1930's. That right had been conceded in other industrial countries, but it was bitterly resisted in the U.S.
American businessmen adamantly opposed this right. In the mid '30's, 35% of the workers in Britain were in unions and 70% of Swedish workers were unionized. But the U.S. nonagricultural labor force had only 18% of its workers in unions. Interestingly now, in 1987, once again, only 18% of the U.S. labor force, down from 37% in 1945, is unionized.
The period before and after the Depression of 1929, was one of radical technological change. The auto industry of the 1920's was heralded as the epitomy of the modern world. It was pointed to as proof that the "old-fashioned" features of modern industrial life like trade unions had been "eliminated."
But for workers, the situation was quite different. Ken Malone, a '37 sit-downer described what life in the shops was like before the Depression:
"We were a pretty good bunch of guys in those days. No Seniority. No Union. No Contract. No Committeeman. No Pay. No nothing but work, work, work, and more work. There wasn't a war on then, but we worked 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. Absenteeism was unheard of. Failure to report to work cost you your "job."
("Whadda Yuh Mean, Tough Cookies," The Searchlight, Jan. 20, 1944, p.2)
The assembly line had become the definition of modern labor relations.
With the stock market crash of '29 came even more intolerable working conditions. Malone describes the effect of the Depression on his working conditions at GM:
"About this time the depression hit. Thousands...were laid off without any means of making a living...I well remember the boss coming to me and saying, 'Ken, production has been cut out two-thirds and we are going to lay off a large number of men and here is the way we are going to do it. The next two weeks we are going to watch all men and see who runs the most production and WE ARE GOING TO KEEP THE MEN WHO RUN THE MOST...' We all speeded up, so instead of 70% being laid off it was 90%. After the lay off we worked about two days a week but in those two days we did about four days work, for everyday the boss was threatening us if we didn't run more stock." (ibid.)
By the mid 1930's the economy was recovering, but there were still more than 11 million out of work. The Amerian Federation of Labor (AFL) called for a congressional investigation into the new technolody that management was using to displace workers. The headlines of a typical article in an AFL newspaper during the period read: "Business Recovers, but Millions are Kept Jobless." (Flint Weekly Review, Jan. 17, 1936)
Workers were organizing and looking for some mechanism of fighting their intolerable conditions. In 1936 the newly formed UAW sent an organizer to Flint, Michigan, the heart of the GM empire. Wyndham Mortimer wrote a series of articles he sent to workers decribing the problems brought about by the rapid technological change and outlining the UAW program. In one article he described the kind of trouble auto workers were facing.
"In Cleveland," he wrote, "1,000 workers have permanently lost their jobs as a result of the elimination of wood in the all steel bodies. In Norwood, Ohio, 200 men are permanently out of work for the same reason...There is the ever increasing productivity of the improdved machinery that produces prodigiously with an ever decreasing number of workers." His artivles proposed shorter hours, higher wages, and unionization in the mass production industries. ("Mortimer Points Out the Evils of New Machinery", FWR, Sept. 18, 1936)
To combat the growing movement for industry-wide unions, companies like General Motors introduced company unions, known as Works Councils. An individual grievance procedure was set up, but workers found the Works Concils, controlled as they were by the centralized power of GM management, powerless.
On Dec. 30, 1936, management in the Fisher II factory in Flint, MI tried to fire three UAW members. Fellow and sister workers stopped work and occupied the factory. The major daily newspaper in Flint reported: "A sit-down strike in which 22 men are said to have taken part, halted all operations at the No. 2 plant of the Fisher Body Division here this morning...throwing 2,200 men out of work."
(Strike Halts Car Assembly," Flint Journal, Dec. 30, 1936)
A sit-downer in the plant remembers the story quite differently. Not 22 workers, but everyone he worked with stopped work to join the sit-down. "Every one of those fellows," he recalls, "had pretty much the same idea and they weren't taught by anybody....The idea was to stay put and to hold the plant."
(interview with Roscoe Rich, Dec. 30, 1986)
"We were," he stressed, "all different people thinking the same." Roscoe Rich, who was elected the Sit-Downers' Chief of Police in Fisher II, explains that before the sit-down strike most of the men working in the plant didn't even know each other's names. But they got to know each other once the sit-down began. A lot, he explains, were young guys, since GM usually threw a man out by the time he was 40. But he and others felt that working under such bad conditions meant: "there were no tomorrows so what have you got to lose."
An anoymous sit-downer, writing in his strike diary, describes the seizure of the Fisher II plant on December 30, 1936 at 6:45 am:
"Men waving arms--they have fired some more union men. Stop the lines. Men shouting. Loud talking. The strike is on. Well here we are, Mr. Diary....This strike has been coming for years. Speed-up system, seniority, overbearing foremen. You can go just so far you know, even with working men. So let's you and I stick it out with the rest of the boys. We are right and when you're right you can't lose." ("Holding the Fort: A Sit-downer's Diary", Flint, MI 1986)
Several hours later, on the afternoon of Dec. 30, workers at the Standard Cotton Products Co., a supplier for GMm sat-down. Then around 10pm that night, workers at the big Fisher I factory in Flint took over their plant.
"Thus began the first great auto strike, one of the most dramatic labor conflicts in our histroy," comments J. Raymond Walsh in his book, "CIO: Industrial Unionism In Action," (NY, 1937). He goes on to document how the impetus for the Flint Strike came from the ranks of the auto workers, in oppostition to the leadership of the CIO. "The CIO high command," he explains, "preoccupied with the drive in steel, tried in vain to prevent the strike; it was fed by deep springs of resentment among thousands of men against a coportaion grossly derelict in its obligation...." (p. 112)
Then on Jan. 3, 1937, 200 UAW delegates from around the country met in Flint to create a Board of Strategy. They elected Kermit Johnson, a rank and file auto worker at the Chevrolet Engine Plant as the head of their strategy committee. The delegaets authorized a formal corporation-wide strike and served GM with a set of the following eight demands:
"...first of all, that the representatives of the United Auto Workers and General Motors meet for an industry-wide conference to discuss the differences between labor and management; second, that all piece-work be abolished and straight hourly rates of pay be adopted; third, that a 30 hour work week and a six-hour workday be established with time and a half for overtime; fourth, that a minimum rate of pay commensurate with the American standard of living be established throughout the corporation's domestic plants; fifth, that all employees unjustly discharged be reinstated; sixth, that seniority rights be based upon length of service; seventh, that the UAW be recognized as the sole bargaining agent between General Motors and its employees; and finally, the speed of production be mutually agreed upon by management and a union committee in all General Motors plants."
(Thomas A. Karman, "The Flint Sit-Down Strike," Michigan History, June, 1962, pages 105-6)
General Motors responded to the strikes with a back-to-work movement called the Flint Alliance, ("The Flint Alliance for the Security of Our Jobs, Our Homes and Our Community"). The "Flint Journal" was filled with news of petitions signed by "happy" workers who wanted the strike ended. (Even in 1987, 50 years later, the "Flint Journal" is still trying to rewrite history, claiming that 91% of the workers in Chevrolet signed back-to-work petitions. See "Flint Journal," Jan. 9, 1987, p. D1)
A union newspaper called "The Chevy Worker" was started on Jan. 7, 1937 to counter the company back-to-work movement. One article in the first issue exposed how workers were being forced to sign the Flint Alliance petitions and were threatened if they didn't sign.
"A petition is supposed to be a voluntary expression of opinion," the article explained, "How voluntary are these petitions that you have had to sign Chevy workers: glance at a few facts...Thursday morning, January 7th, a petition was circulated in Plant No. 5 and those refusing to sign were told that their names would be referred to the office and that they would be ineligible for loans from the company thereafter." The article goes on to give other examples of supervisors threatening workers to solicit their signatures.
While the petitions were being passed around and forced on workers by supervision, a group of workers meeting outside the Chevy union hall were attacked by some GM supervisors: "Violence has been started in this strike by the company," Chevy workers reported, "We know who the men were...we are going to name the dirty rats right here and now, so that they can be shunned by all honest men." ("GM Starts Violence," Chevy Auto Workers, vol. 1, no. 2, Jan. 8, 1937.) The police came and arrested not the attackers, but the victims of the attack. Two union men were taken off to jail. The police charged them with fighting each other. 200 demonstrators went to the jail protesting the arrest and demanding the release of the two. In the meantime, a union member from Fisher I, William Coburn leaving the demonstration, was hit by a car and died as a result of his injuries.
On Jan. 11, 1937, police tried to cut off food to the strikers in Fisher II. A battle ensued when the police shot tear gas and shot-gun bullets at the strikers and their supporters who surrounded the plant. "At midnight," reported Rose Pesotta, (a CIO organizer who was sent to the scene) "the police tried a second time to force their way into the plant, but were met by a deluge of cold water from a firehouse and an avalanche of two-pound steel automobile hinges. The cops' line broke under this defensive onslaught. Defeated and shame-faced they left the scene at top speed." (Bread Upon the Waters, NY, 1944, p. 241-2) The victorious battle of Jan. 11 became known as the Battle of Bulls Run, for the police, who were at that time called "bulls," had been routed.
Pesota visited the sit-downers inside the occupied plants and describes how they endured the 44-day ordeal to hold their goal. She writes:
"Newspapers and periodicals of various political shades, labor papers and mystery magazines were among the reading matter in evidence....Most of these men had worked for Fisher Body from four to twelve years. They told me it was tough to sit around and do nothing after the speed-up had got into their blood. 'But I'll sit here till hell freezes under me,' said one. 'I won't give up the fight for I know where I'll land if we don't win this time.'" (p. 238-239)
Each occupied plant had its own governing body to make decision and to carry out discipline. There was a kangaroo court charged with disciplining violations of the regulations passed. There were sanitation committees, recreation committees, educational committees, among others. "Punch Press," the official strike bulletin of the sit-downers, provided the follwing description of how strikers organized themselves in the plants:
"The most astonishing feeling you get in the sit-down plants is that of ORDER. Every activity is systemized. Communications are automatic; each striker has his hours of duty, his hours of play and rest; there is an organization set up for every routine problem, plus a lot of other problems; if you want first-aid, it is a department, a subdivision of Welfare. Transportation? That also is a section by itself. Would you beautify yourself? It has a department. The plant has been re-administered. As one striker said, 'No matter what happends, this plant will never be the same again!' " (Punch Press, Official Strike Bulletin", No. 7 U.A.W.A. local #156, p.1)
By Jan., 1937, strikes had shut down a large part of GM's operations. Almost all of the company's 200,000 employees were out on strike or were out of work because of the lack of parts. Eighteen plants in ten cities were on strike. Besides Flint, the other cities hit by strikes were Detroit; St. Louis, Mo.; Toledo, Ohio; Cleveland, Ohio; Janesville, Wisc.; Anderson, Ind.; Norwood, Ohio; Altlanta, Georgia; and Kansas City, Mo. GM seemed to be getting desperate.
There were growing indications that the company was willing to try to use violence to break the strike. Mobs had attacked strikers in Anderson, Indiana on Jan. 27, in Bay City, Mich. on Jan. 27, and in Anderson, Indiana on Jan. 28. The sit-downers felt that it was important to go on the offensive. But they understood the need to take into account the presence of company-planted stool pigeons inside the union, as shown through the LaFollette investigation being conducted by Congress. Rose Pesota explains "As in war, something unexpected and startling was called for..." (p. 243). What followed was one of the most skillful and strategic plans used by labor in all of American history. Kermit Johnson, the rank and file chairman of the '37 strike strategy committee describes what was done:
"A few of us on the strike committee had met almost constantly for a week on a plan to shut down the Motor Plant of Chevrolet....Plant 4 [the Chevrolet Engine Plant] was huge and sprawling, a most difficult target, but extremely important to us because the corporation was running the plant, even though they had to stockpile motors in anticipation of favorable court action; GM had already recovered from the first shock of being forced to surrender four of their largest body shops to sit-down strikes. They already had the legal machinery in motion that would, within a short time, expel by force (if necessary) the strikers from the plants. If that happened, we knew the strike would be broken." (from "Lest We Forget," The Searchlight, Flint, MI, Feb. 11, 1960)
Kermit Johnson and the rest of the strike strategy committee realized that if they could get and hold Plant 4, they could stop production sufficiently to mortally would GM. But 100 feet from plant 4 was the company personnel building which was used as an arsenal for the company police.
"Even the top leadership in the CIO, including John L. Lewis," Kermit wrote, "were seriously worried about the GM situation. When Lewis' right-hand man, John Brophy, approved our plan of action, he did it with great reluctance and a complete lack of confidence. He couldn't conceive of a successful strike in a plant that was less than one-fourth organized." The strike strategy committee developed a diversionary plan. They held a meeting of carefully chosen union men, but insuring that a General Motor's informant was included. They convinced the men at the meeting that they would take Plant 9, despite the fact that Plant 4 was the vital plant for Chevrolet production. The stool pigeon convinced GM that the strikers planned to seize Plant 9. Thus the strikers lured the plant guards away from Plant 4. With the guards gone, the thousands of workers in Plant 4 were able to fight the necessary battles against supervision and company goons to gain control of their plant. And when the police tried to enter Plant 4, they were stopped at the gate by the Women's Emergency Brigade, a group of women who played an important role in defending the sit-downers.
Writers in Fortune Magazine in Nov., 1937 were compelled to admit, "Out of all the sensational news of the auto strike, the seizing of Chevy IV was the high point." They acknowledged it as an "illustration of labor's growing initiative...a landmark measuring how far labor had traveled in less than three years and through some 4,000 strikes."
On Feb. 11, 1937, sit-downers emerged from their occupied factories and joined a long parade through the streets of downtown Flint. General Motors had been forced to sign a one-page document conceding to the UAW the basis to become the sole bargaining unit for the auto workers.
The sit-downers went back to work by Feb. 18. They found that GM had not changed. To the contrary, the LaFollette Committee hearings document how GM management singled out union people and threatened or tried to fire them when they returned to work. In Chevrolet, Arnold Lenz, the anti-union plant manager, marched 1,000
(CONT. ON NEXT PAGE)
SIT-DOWN
men armed with clubs through the plant. And the workers fought back, sometimes with slowdowns, sometimes with sit-down strikes as their way to resolve grievances or settle injustices. For example, there were sitdowns at plant No. 4 and No. 8 in Flint on March 6 when 6,500 workers sat-down, and on March 8, 500 workers in Plant 4 sat-down. (Sidney Fine, "Sit-Down," Ann Arbor, MI, 1969, p. 322)
Floyd Hoke-Miller, a sit-downer in Plant 4, sums up the victory of '37: "We didn't win the war, but we developed the unity to fight the coming battles."
"The Chevy Worker," the newspaper started by the Chevy workers on Jan. 7, 1937 to name the "dirty rats... so that they can be shunned by all honest men" became the precursor of shop papers put out by UAW locals across the country.
The newspaper put out by the Plant 4 sit-downers was called The Searchlight, subtitled, "The Voice of the Chevrolet Worker." In testimony before the War Labor Board in Washington, GM's Director of Labor Relations complained, "We always had a tough bunch of cookies up at Chevrolet-Flint to deal with. That was the breeding ground for the sit-down strikes...It is this same group of people," he went on, "that we thought that through the evolution of labor relationship..would probably be changed and improved." He lamented, "They are now back in the saddle and one very interesting paper ("The Searchlight," official local publication) they got out recently is directed at 'Herr Thomas' [Pres. of the UAW]. So the worm had turned and they have got their own union officials, some of whom they dislike, to replace us in the news." (The Flint Journal, Jan. 7, 1944)
In response, George Carroll, the first editor of The Searchlight, explained, "We have criticized (not attacked) R. J. Thomas [Pres. of UAW] and Philip Murray [Pres. of CIO] and shall continue to exercise the right to criticize as long as they pursue a policy we feel to be detrimental to the best interests of the membership of this Local."
Floyd Hoke-Miller, co-editor of The Searchlight, replied in verse to Coen's labelling the Chevy workers "tough cookies":
You can't be nice to human lice
That feed upon your blood,
And boast with pride about their side
A liftin' you outta the mud."
(from "Tough Cookies: With No Apologies" by Floyd Hoke-Miller.)
(SEE "SIT-DOWN," PAGE 23)
SIT-DOWN
(FROM PAGE 7)
In 1987, all of the gains of the past 50 years won by the hard efforts of the sit-downers and the workers who followed in their footsteps are under attack. And the sit-down pioneers are still being treated as "subversives." UAW union officials have vetoed any appropriate commemoration to mark the 50th anniversary of Feb. 11 in Flint or elsewhere in Michigan. But if the history is known of what was won and how, there will be the basis to carry on the proud tradition of Feb. 11, 1937.
(c) Ronda Hauben
This article may be reprinted as long as writer and source are cited.
*Note: This poem is in a collection of poems by Floyd Hoke-Miller, "A Laborer Looks at Life: Then and Now," Flint, MI 1984
Photographs and cartoons used as illustrations are from the collection of "Doc" Wilson, also a Flint sit-down pioneer. (except for the Rivera mural)
"We were a pretty good bunch of guys in those days. No Seniority. No Union. No Contract. No Commiteeman. No Pay. No nothing but work, work, work, and more work. There wasn't a war then, but we worked 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. Absenteeism was unheard of. Failure to report to work cost you your job."
("Whadda Yuh Mean, Tough Cookies,"
The Searchlight. Jan. 20, 1944, p. 2)