This Union Cause (1962)

[Music] [Music] oh [Music] the year is 1739 in colonial America there were free people indentured servants and [Music] slaves 6 to9 British pounds bought a man or a woman without skills for a 4-year period skill workers on the Block brought in 10 PBS per if the bidding was Lively the year is 1806 the place Philadelphia the defendants a small group of shoemakers cord winers they were called their crime combining in an attempt to raise their wages improve their conditions of work guilty said the court of violating the law unions of working men are illegal guilty as charged this was a time when men were imprisoned for debts when to be unable to pay your debts was a crime and under this harsh penalty it was not the well to do who suffered in the new factories that came with the Industrial Revolution women and children were the workers Public Schools almost non-existent some voices the poet shell was one did speak out against this cruel plight isra referred to the Two Worlds the world of the rich the world of the poor America's Walt Whitman chanted a song of democracy Bryant upheld the right of men to join unions and in Parliament in England opposing the death sentence for workers who dared to protest their lot Lord Byron declared you call these men a mob it is the mob that labor in your fields and serve in your houses that man your Navy and recruit your army never have I seen such squalid wretchedness and what is your remedy death is there not enough blood under your penal [Music] code now the year is 1830 the place New York and wage Jers were beginning to find their voices too unions even though illegal were organized in most cities and working men's political parties were making demands for social justice the 10hour day an end to child labor in New York Francis Wright the woman reformer together with George Henry Evans Robert Dale ow and Thomas Skidmore LED The Campaign which established the public schools broadened the right to vote closed the DOR prisons finally but slaves continued on the Block I I tremble for my country Thomas Jefferson said when I reflect that God is just and cannot sleep forever some helped them Escape through the Underground Railroad to Canada others fighting slavery gave their lives John Brown had I so interfered on behalf of the rich it would have been all right to have interfered on behalf of his despised poor I did no wrong now if it be deemed necessary that I should forfeit my life I said let it be done the date January 1st 1863 Abraham Lincoln signs the Emancipation Proclamation all persons held as slaves are and henceforth shall be free distant dreams of the youthful American labor movement beginning to come true land grant colleges established for farmers and wage earners a homestead law enacted giving free land to settlers now for the first time the railroads built by Chinese and Irish laborers reached from the Atlantic to the Pacific a new metal working industry came into existence and unions local combinations of workers until now were growing into National bodies William silvas Labor's First National figure Labor's Champion I love this Union cause I hold it more dear than my family for my life I'm willing to devote to it all that I am have or hope for in this world and this Union cause thrived the National Labor Union was formed a national labor party met then after the Civil War Boom the crash the hunger and violence of the great upheaval strikes by desperate men and state troopers called out to break them in Pennsylvania Irish immigrant miners denied the right to belong openly to Legal unions had organized a secret society the Molly magui to protect their claims to justice as workers the evidence on which 10 mollies were convicted was found to be false 75 years after they had gone to the Gallows and were hanged Frank FR faroh introduces Terren V powderly to the annual meeting of the Knights of Labor their Creed Universal Brotherhood and in 15 years 700,000 members had rallied to that idea the knights launch a nationwide campaign for an 8-hour day then at Chicago May 4th 1886 four men killed by armed strike Breakers at The mccormic Works plan in the evening without warning police attack a workers protest meeting there is shooting a bomb is thrown and before the Clash is halted 10 lie dead 100 injured 6 years later the innocence of the hey Market anarchists was revealed but again too late for the executed and for the nights of Labor destroyed with them the first Labor Day and to lead the march of Labor with the first plan for successful Union Organization three men appeared Samuel gumpers earning his way as a youth reading books aloud to sigar ERS while they listened and worked the other two Peter Maguire of the Carpenters Union auto straser of the cigar makers said strer we have no ultimate ends we fight only for immediate objects 1881 they helped to create a Federation of organized trades and labor unions 1886 it becomes with gers as president president the American Federation of [Music] Labor but the road for workers was a hard one still and in more than one trial defeat now they have pitted against the pulman company makers of railroad cars on trial is Eugene Debs his prosecutor the Attorney General of the United States for the defense the famous Clarence darl the issue before the court can Al La intended to regulate business be used to authorize labor injunctions the answer yes Debs went to jail the strike was lost the union destroyed the turn of the century and Great Waves of immigrants coming to America Italians Greeks Irish Czechs poles Romanians Russians Jews a million a year seeking Freedom they found slums seeking wealth they found the sweatsh s but if Justice did not walk their streets Jewish immigrants found they could work for it through the Garment unions they organized enriching practical Union goals with a new sense of industrial and social democracy the turn of the century pope Leo 13th emphasizing the right of workers to join trade [Music] unions president Teddy Roosevelt warning of the growing hold of monopolies urging their regulation JP Morgan Banker putting together us steel International Harvester the great corporate trusts William Hayward head of the iww the industrial workers of the world the wobblies organizing the unskilled Henry Ford engineering the modern assembly line applying the principle of mass production John Mitchell helping to establish the United Mine Workers Union these were among the dominant figures the 20th century opens labor force 29 million the work week 57 hours average weekly wage $13 out of the locomotive repair pits came the machinists Union and the Murray Hill agreement one of the first national contracts establishing the 9-hour day another step towards the 8h hour day that the Knights of Labor a generation earlier had sought in vain the winds were foul the work was hard from Liverpool docks to Brooklyn yard Leave Her Johnny Leave Her But Johnny couldn't leave her under the law in 1895 Congress had reduced the penalty for desertion made it illegal for officers to beat Seaman guaranteed Sailors the right to demand safe ships the right to collect their pay but the Supreme Court said the law was unconstitutional just as it said a law forbidding child labor was unconstitutional after 20 years pleading Andrew fusf head of the Seaman Union won a hearing before Congress and the lafalot act of 1915 ended slavery aboard the nation ships 1912 The Clayton anti-monopoly Act the labor of a human being is not a commodity 1916 The Adamson Act the great goal of Labor comes into view an 8- hour day for the nation's railroads the new freedoms advocated by President woodro Wilson a war labor board gives workers the right to organize 1918 the first world war ends but in 1919 no peace in the steel towns living in HS pitifully underpaid exhausted from an endless 12-hour day sometimes 7 days a week once again the men sought Deliverance through a Union 24 craft unions banded into a single committee responding to appeals in 29 languages 100,000 workers flocked to join within a year but the companies refused to negotiate said the New York world the Pennsylvania state constabulary the dreaded Co and iron police has been concentrated at commanding points in the end violence the strike lost 20 dead 18 of them union members said a Protestant Church commission us steel is too big to be beaten by 300,000 workers 1920 the labor force 42 million the work week 50 hours average weekly wage $35 1924 for the affl a difficult period corporations attacking with harsh injunctions paternalistic welfare plans employer dominated company Union William green succeeding Samuel gumpers becomes president of the American Federation of Labor Senator Robert lafallet Wisconsin's great Progressive leader runs for president of the United States with AFL support Senator George Norris of Nebraska architect of the Tennessee Valley Authority leads a lonely struggle for public use of National Resources he and New York Congressman fella LaGuardia draft the Nars LaGuardia anti-injunction law and the use of federal courts to deny workers their rights October 29 the stock market crashed and by 1930 the Great Depression had set in Herbert Hoover in the White House of a labor force of 49 million 16 million unemployed average weekly wage for those with jobs $23.25 for the others the bread lines factories stood empty while hungry men searched for work and on farms the food surpluses rotted communities of shanties Hooverville they were called sprang up in the outskirts of cities and here in the most degrading squalor families lived by 1932 the depression found Millions facing foreclosure desperate demanding jobs in relief hunger Marchers needy War veterans converged on Washington a grim Administration reacted it ordered Ed federal troops to drive them out with Bandits and tear gas then at the age of disaster with a banking system and collapse a new deal we have nothing to fear but fear itself President Franklin Delano Roosevelt proclaimed it his inaugural in the rebound of spirit a million and a half workers joined the labor movement within the first 6 months along with the New Deal came industrial unions organization by industry not only by Craft led by John L Lewis the CIO was born the Congress of industrial organizations the miners the Garment workers the printers the Oil Workers and the newspaper men led by Haywood Brun whose writings articulated the hopes of working people surveying the ferment among industrial workers John L Lewis declared he is a Madman or a fool who believes that this River of human sentiment can be damned December 1936 telegram to Governor Frank Murphy Lancing Michigan we the workers have carried on a stay-in strike over a month to make General Motors obey the law and engage in collective bargaining stop the introduction of the militia sheriffs or police with murderous weapons will mean a bloodbath of unarmed workers stop we have decided to stay in the plant stop Corporation spokesman demanded the governor Murphy orders State troops into Flint to drive the men out with baners instead he used them to maintain order while Union and Company [Music] negotiated finally in mid-February Murphy's Lincoln likee patience prevailed an agreement was reached between a new Union the UAW CIO the Auto Workers and General Motors America's largest Industrial Corporation when the wave of sit down strikes had subsided industrial unions were firmly seated at the bargaining tables almost here in Chicago on a sunlet Memorial Day morning a peaceful parade had formed to demand that little steel recognize the right of its employees to belong to a union the huge steel companies called little steel had continued to defy the law refusing to negotiate through a union the Defiance erupted in Bloodshed in Chicago our Memorial day 1937 10 men were killed all union members dressed in their Sunday clothes all shot in the back the Grim truth of the massacre would never have been known but for the efforts of a senate committee presided over by Young Bob lafallet investigating corporate violations of civil rights from such disclosures came the New Deal reforms the Social Security law pensions unemployment insurance a ban on child labor the 8-hour day and the 5day week and at last the Wagner Act guaranteeing workers the right to belong to unions to choose in government supervised elections the union to represent them by 1941 Ford and little steel were finally brought under the law the labor force had grown to 53 million and Union membership 14 million men and women working under signed Collective Agreement Philip Murray successor to John L Lewis as president of the CIO directed the organization of Steel negotiated the first Ford contract under Murray of the CIO and William green heading the AFL the two labor bodies learned to work with one another as all America closed ranks during the national mobilization of the second world war against Hitler's Germany and the militarists in Asia [Music] on the home front union members turned their energies to the National Emergency in the shops and factories of America production soared through their unions wage earners ordinary men freem men purchased defense bonds donated to blood banks helped organize industry councils participated in rationing boards and economic councils helped mobilize the economy 1949 and a new Union the communications workers of America of its 400,000 members 65% were women marking the entry into the ranks of organized labor of a new kind of wage earner the first big Union after the newspaper Guild to cross the line from Blue Collar to White NOW a new word to bedevil the worker automation devices to replace human hands and judgment starting and stopping themselves able to manufacture calculate detect flaws better and faster than human hand or brain the answer of the unions plan for full production retrain workers losing jobs through automation provide dismissal allowances relocation payments and earlier retirement shorter hours longer vacations in effect to guarantee a new security to the wage earners in America this was part of the vision of Philip Murray who once had expressed it in its simplest terms Carpets on the floors of workers homes pictures on their walls and music in their lives Unity December 1955 AFL and CIO become AFL CIO in its 127th year organized labor 16 million strong Under The Joint chairmanship of AFL President George Mei and CIO president Walter Ruther a unified labor movement meets in its first convention now the 16 million become a part of 60 million workers throughout the world members of the international Confederation of free trade unions seeking a modern version of the Justice a small band of cord wayers sought in colonial Philadelphia a century and a half ago [Music] remembering the inch byin advances the hard one betterment of their lives and the sacrifices ordinary people made and the men who died for these [Music] beliefs remembering the rights and freedoms won out of a past that was cruel and unhuman when there was not even kindness aware of the Bright Futures and remembering still the long apprenticeship the debt to all those nameless Men Who Loved this Union cause [Music]