The Last Great Strike

THIS DAY IN HISTORY:MAY 28, 1937

THIS DAY IN HISTORY:MAY 28, 1937

Police Ignore the Right to Picket On May 28, 1937, an orderly column numbering between 700 and 1000 people marched on Republic Steel’s South Chicago Works. The march was led by a woman, a bicyclist, and a man named "Dominic Esposito," who was carrying an American flag. A block from the mill gate, the marchers met a “force of club-swinging policemen.” When the marchers tried to continue to the mill gate, the police broke a club over Esposito’s head and then laid into the other

THIS DAY IN HISTORY: MAY 26, 1937

THIS DAY IN HISTORY: MAY 26, 1937

Steelworkers Out on Strike On May 26, 1937, SWOC launched a strike against Little Steel after attempting for a year to negotiate with the companies. The strikers wanted a union, the ability to negotiate as a group with their employers, and the right to strike and picket. These rights had been denied for decades to most American workers, but they had been enacted into federal law two years earlier, via the Wagner Act, a legislative centerpiece of the Roosevelt administration’s

BOOK TALK, SEMINARY CO-OP BOOKSTORES, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

BOOK TALK, SEMINARY CO-OP BOOKSTORES, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

Ahmed White Discusses THE LAST GREAT STRIKE at one of the Nation's Preeminent Bookstores On May 25, 2016, Professor Cedric Johnson interviewed Professor Ahmed White, at the Seminary Co-op Bookstore on Woodlawn Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, about Professor White's recent book, The Last Great Strike. Professor Johnson is an Associate Professor of Political Science and African American Studies at the University of Illinois. Professor White is the Rosenbaum Professor of law at the

THIS MONTH IN HISTORY: MAY 1937

THIS MONTH IN HISTORY: MAY 1937

Companies Spend Obscene Amounts to Defeat Steelworkers In May 1937, the steel companies moved quickly to prepare for a looming strike. Youngstown Sheet & Tube contemplated spending “several million dollars” to defeat the union (one million in 1937 dollars would be nearly seventeen million today . . . so "several million dollars" could be upwards of sixty-eight million). By May, the company had already set aside $550,000 to address such "contingencies" (in today's dollars, th

THIS DAY IN HISTORY: MAY 12, 1937

THIS DAY IN HISTORY: MAY 11, 1937

BOOK TALK, SEMINARY CO-OP BOOKSTORES, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

BOOK TALK, SEMINARY CO-OP BOOKSTORES, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

Ahmed White Discusses THE LAST GREAT STRIKE at one of the Nation's Preeminent Bookstores On May 25, 2016, Professor Cedric Johnson interviewed Professor Ahmed White, at the Seminary Co-op Bookstore on Woodlawn Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, about Professor White's recent book, The Last Great Strike. Professor Johnson is an Associate Professor of Political Science and African American Studies at the University of Illinois. Professor White is the Rosenbaum Professor of law at the

THIS MONTH IN HISTORY: MAY 1937

THIS MONTH IN HISTORY: MAY 1937

THIS MONTH IN HISTORY: MAY 1937

As Possibility of Strike Looms, Steel Companies Prepare for War By May 5, 1937, with a steel strike looming, the sheriff of Mahoning County, Ohio (where Youngstown is located) had sworn in 214 deputies. Fifty-seven were on Republic Steel’s payroll and 114 on Sheet & Tube's. Between May 6 and May 25, he swore in another 168 of the companies’ employees as deputies. Meanwhile, Republic shipped over $16,000 worth of munitions, mainly gas weapons, to the sheriff’s department; this

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