Syndicalism is a revolutionary current within the labor movement that, through industrial unionism, seeks to unionize workers according to industry and advance their demands through strikes, with the eventual goal of gaining control over the means of production and the economy at large through social ownership. Developed in French labor unions during the late 19th century, syndicalist movements were most predominant amongst the socialist movement during the interwar period that preceded the outbreak of World War II.
The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), whose members are nicknamed "Wobblies", is an international labor union founded in Chicago in 1905. The nickname's origin is uncertain. Its ideology combines general unionism with industrial unionism, as it is a general union, subdivided between the various industries which employ its members. The philosophy and tactics of the IWW are described as "revolutionary industrial unionism", with ties to socialist, syndicalist, and anarchist labor movements.
Anarcho-syndicalism is a political philosophy and anarchist school of thought that views revolutionary industrial unionism or syndicalism as a method for workers in capitalist society to gain control of an economy and thus control influence in broader society. The goal of syndicalism is to abolish the wage system, regarding it as wage slavery. Anarcho-syndicalist theory generally focuses on the labour movement. Reflecting the anarchist philosophy from which it draws its primary inspiration, anarcho-syndicalism is centred on the idea that power corrupts and that any hierarchy that cannot be ethically justified must be dismantled.
Industrial unionism is a trade union organising method through which all workers in the same industry are organized into the same union, regardless of skill or trade, thus giving workers in one industry, or in all industries, more leverage in bargaining and in strike situations.
Ole Hanson was an American politician who served as mayor of Seattle, Washington, from 1918 to 1919. Hanson became a national figure promoting law and order when he took a hardline position during the 1919 Seattle General Strike. He then resigned as mayor, wrote a book, and toured the lecture circuit, earning tens of thousands of dollars in honoraria lecturing to conservative civic groups about his experiences and views, promoting opposition to labor unions and Bolshevism. Hanson later left Washington and founded the city of San Clemente, California, in 1925.
Free speech fights are struggles over free speech, and especially those struggles which involved the Industrial Workers of the World and their attempts to gain awareness for labor issues by organizing workers and urging them to use their collective voice. During the World War I period in the United States, the IWW members, engaged in free speech fights over labor issues which were closely connected to the developing industrial world as well as the Socialist Party. The Wobblies, along with other radical groups, were often met with opposition from local governments and especially business leaders, in their free speech fights.
Wobbly lingo is a collection of technical language, jargon, and historic slang used by the Industrial Workers of the World, known as the Wobblies, for more than a century. Many Wobbly terms derive from or are coextensive with hobo expressions used through the 1940s.
The Liberty Hill Foundation is a non-profit organization founded by Sarah Pillsbury, heir to the Minnesota Pillsbury baking fortune, along with Anne Mendel, Larry Janss and Win McCormack, in 1976. Its motto is "Change. Not Charity."
The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) is a union of wage workers which was formed in Chicago in 1905 by militant unionists and their supporters due to anger over the conservatism, philosophy, and craft-based structure of the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Throughout the early part of the 20th century, the philosophy and tactics of the IWW were frequently in direct conflict with those of the AFL concerning the best ways to organize workers, and how to best improve the society in which they toiled. The AFL had one guiding principle—"pure and simple trade unionism", often summarized with the slogan "a fair day's pay for a fair day's work." The IWW embraced two guiding principles, fighting like the AFL for better wages, hours, and conditions, but also promoting an eventual, permanent solution to the problems of strikes, injunctions, bull pens, and union scabbing.
The 1934 California gubernatorial election was held on November 6, 1934. Held in the midst of the Great Depression, the 1934 election was amongst the most controversial in the state's political history, pitting conservative Republican Frank Merriam against former Socialist Party member turned Democrat Upton Sinclair, author of The Jungle. A strong third party challenge came from Progressive Raymond L. Haight, a Los Angeles lawyer campaigning for the political center. Much of the campaign's emphasis was directed at Sinclair's EPIC movement, proposing interventionist reforms to cure the state's ailing economy. Merriam, who had recently assumed the governorship following the death of James Rolph, characterized Sinclair's proposal as a step towards communism.
The Industrial Pioneer was a monthly publication of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) from 1921 to 1926. It was published in Chicago by the general executive board of the IWW, under various editors. The precursor of the Industrial Pioneer was the The One Big Union Monthly.
The Industrial Workers of Great Britain was a group which promoted industrial unionism in the early 20th century.
Louis D. Oaks served as the Chief of Police of the Los Angeles Police Department from April 22, 1922 to August 1, 1923. He succeeded James W. Everington and was succeeded by ex-Berkeley, California Police Chief August Vollmer, a prominent criminologist.
The California agricultural strikes of 1933 were a series of strikes by mostly Mexican and Filipino agricultural workers throughout the San Joaquin Valley. More than 47,500 workers were involved in the wave of approximately 30 strikes from 1931 to 1941. Twenty-four of the strikes, involving 37,500 union members, were led by the Cannery and Agricultural Workers' Industrial Union (CAWIU). The strikes are grouped together because most of them were organized by the CAWIU. Strike actions began in August among cherry, grape, peach, pear, sugar beet, and tomato workers, and culminated in a number of strikes against cotton growers in the San Joaquin Valley in October. The cotton strikes involved the largest number of workers. Sources vary as to numbers involved in the cotton strikes, with some sources claiming 18,000 workers and others just 12,000 workers, 80% of whom were Mexican.
Nicolaas Steelink was a Dutch American labor activist who was a member of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), an international industrial union, and an important figure in the creation of the California Soccer League, which resulted in his induction into the United States Soccer Hall of Fame. During his time as a member of the IWW, due to his involvement with the union and radical ideals, he was convicted of criminal syndicalism and sentenced to prison in 1920.
Criminal syndicalism has been defined as a doctrine of criminal acts for political, industrial, and social change. These criminal acts include advocation of crime, sabotage, violence, and other unlawful methods of terrorism. Criminal syndicalism laws were enacted to oppose economic radicalism.
The 1923 San Pedro maritime strike was, at the time, the biggest challenge to the dominance of the open shop culture of Los Angeles, California until the rise of the Congress of Industrial Organizations in the 1930s.
Pat Chambers was an influential labor organizer and Communist Party member in the 1930s in California. He was a key figure in some of the largest California agricultural strikes of 1933. Chambers was the inspiration for the character "Mac" in John Steinbeck's 1936 novel, In Dubious Battle.
The history of Los Angeles began in 1781 when 44 settlers from central New Spain established a permanent settlement in what is now Downtown Los Angeles, as instructed by Spanish Governor of Las Californias, Felipe de Neve, and authorized by Viceroy Antonio María de Bucareli. After sovereignty changed from Mexico to the United States in 1849, great changes came from the completion of the Santa Fe railroad line from Chicago to Los Angeles in 1885. "Overlanders" flooded in, mostly white Protestants from the Lower Midwest and South.
Jane Tuttle Street was the founder and secretary of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) Local No. 113, the Domestic Workers' Industrial Union, in Denver, Colorado in 1916. Street was known for her techniques for organizing domestic workers who had not been included in early labor laws and who faced many obstacles to organization and vulnerabilities due to their isolation in the homes of individual employers.
