History 471-1 Spring 2005 Workers in
Course message board
Note that this message board will read: “History 261”, please ignore that, I
cannot change the title, but it’s free
Contact information, course description,
grading percentages, and books/readings required
www.laborhistorylinks.niu.edu
--website that gives more information for the topics in the course
January 18-20 –Introduction to Working Class
History: Class and Memory
Read for Jan 20:
·
Excerpt
from Michael Zweig, The Working Class Majority first part and second part
· and Bill Fletcher, When Race Enters Class,
chapter from Zwieg, What’s Class Got to Do with it?
· You need adobe reader to download
these files; click to download adobe
reader if you don’t already have
it, to read these files
January 25 The Labor Systems of Early
Read:
· Folks, 1-23;
· Am Labor 7-31
(American Labor
lists questions for focus, please note those questions to help guide the
readings. Also be sure to read the Folks book for background information prior to
reading the documents. Write questions for discussion or clarification. How do
these readings provoke challenges to your previous perception of notions of
“freedom” in the “new world?” What comparisons can you make between the degree
of power for slaves and other bound labor or “free labor”? How did even unfree
laborers exert power? Can you compare European notions of labor and property
with those of Native Americans? W
Read: Folks, 24-59 “The American
Revolution” and the reinforcement of
slavery Am.Labor 50-51
· “The Happiest Laboring Class in
the World”: Two Virginia Slaveholders Debate Methods of Slave Management, 1837.
(note printer friendly version on this page)
· Charles
Ball Describes a Typical Day on a Slave Plantation
· Notions on the Management of Negroes,
Farmer’s Register 4 (December 1836):495;
· Slave
Production at Pleasant Hill Plantation, 1850
· Malitis
Feb 1 Freedom
and Slavery in the New Republic, II
Read: Folks 59-75 American Labor: 53-80
· Orestes
A. Brownson on "Free Labor" (1840)
· Recruitment
of Lowell Operatives (1846)
·
Timetable
of the Lowell Mills (1853)
· White
Artisans in South Contest the Labor of Black Workers, 1838
Feb 3: The Conflict over Slave Labor and the Meaning of Reconstruction for
Labor
Read: Folks, 75-109; American Labor, 80-87
Begin the Grand Army of Starvation
· “ We Are Not Slaves”: Female Shoe
and Textile Workers in Marblehead, Massachusetts, 1860
· There Was Never Any Pay-day For
the Negroes”: Ex-slave Jourdon Anderson
Demands Wages , 1865
·
Forced Labor in the “New South”,
1904
· White Women Protest the Hiring of
Black “Wage-Slaves”
In addition to the questions in the text, keep in
mind the following questions for consideration of the readings from Jan 25-Feb
3 altogether: what are the sources of employers power in the workplace? What
are the sources of workers’ power? How did workers express their views of the
meaning of “free labor”? What were their grievances, and to how did employers
react to their grievances?
Read:
·
Folks 110-126 (end of first
paragraph) American Labor
115-126
·
The Workingman’s Ten Commandments
·
Workers, Indians, Immigrants as
the menace to national order
·
Excerpt from Strikers, Communists,
Tramps, and Detectives by Alan Pinkerton-
· "Fair Wages,"
commentary in the North American Review reflecting on the 1877 strike
·
Printer Albert R. Parsons
Testifies before Congress about the Eight Hour Day
· Slumming Among the Unemployed:
William Wycoff Studies Joblessness in the 1890s
· The Baby Was Made ’Delegate No.
800’”: Frances Willard Meets Elizabeth Rodgers in the 1880s
· Racial Controvery at Knights of
Labor Convention
What caused workers to rebel in the
late 19th century? Discuss some specifics from the Folks reading and
from these individual documents. What are some of the positions of the Knights
on women’s and African-American participation? Who did they bar from membership
and why? How were they organized
differently from the AFL?
How did workers frame their
arguments for rights? What strategies
did they employ?
How was unemployment viewed from the
various perspectives in the readings. Was the 8 hour day a “radical” proposal ?
Read:
· Folks 126-137
·
Illinois
National Guard use by Civil Authorities
(browse)
· Oscar Neebe, The Crimes
I have committed
· Prosecution
Exhibit, Haymarket Trial
· Prosecution
Exhibit, Haymarket Trial (Parsons)
· Forcible
Gospel, Defense Exhibit from Haymarket Trial
· Letter to Lucy Parsons from George
Schilling, 1893
· The Friends of Mad
Dogs (view)
· Waldheim Cemetary
(photo of memorial) and current City Plaque (view)
Be able to discuss
the way that Haymarket has been remembered and why. Why was the fight over a
monument so ferocious and what does it tell us about the importance of memory?.
What were some of the anarchists views on capitalism and force? What strategies
and tactics did the police and prosecution use to damn them? What were the
arguments against them both outside and within the working class?
Read: Folks,
138-145
American
Labor, 95-104
· “The Common Laborer” from David
Montgomery, Fall of the House of Labor (warning—long pdf file )
We have seen that between 1870s and 1890s, there was widespread dissent
to the new economic order. But workers were far from unified; there were many
fault lines that divided them. This continues as the
-- I invite you to post any unfinished business from the
Haymarket and repression readings on the course web board. Please join an
ongoing conversation or post your reaction to the readings. I wish we had been
able to discuss the memory and privilege articles more thoroughly, so I would
especially like to hear your reaction to those.
On request, I have
posted the points of the overheads I presented on Feb 15 here: Working Class Formation lecture
Feb 17: Working Class Formation in global context, 1870-1920,
continued
Read: Part 1
” and Part 2 of “Everything We Had” Chapter Like A
Family: The Making of A Southern Mill World 1-44
The Cultures of First-Generation Industrial
Workers
Elfido López
Recalls Rural Mexican-American Life in the Late 19th century
The transformation
of rural people into wage earners was a global phenomenon that is continuing in
the present. These readings give an in-depth depiction of how the working class
was formed from the periphery and pre-capitalist cultures, as discussed in the
Read:
· Folks: 145-150, paying attention to
section on Frederick Taylor on 147-148
· The
Operative 112-154
from David Montgomery, The Fall of the House of Labor
· Frederick Winslow Taylor on
Scientific Management
· The Story of
Schmidt
·
Testimony before
Congress by a Machinist on Taylor’s system
·
Work Rules and Manliness
by
·
Excerpt from
Strom, Beyond the Typewriter
·
A student’s view of “soldiering”
As we have seen from previous
readings, people bring their own cultures and expectations and values to the
worksite. Many of these were ordered by the inherited peasant and
pre-industrial immigrant cultures, and gendered and racialized identities. We
will explore that as we show how managers sought to get control of the
workplace to order it for higher production output. In these readings, you will
see how gender and hierarchy operated to structure the workplace in the early
20th century. What kind of
informal rules guided the workplace that Frederick Taylor sought to eradicate?
What distinguished the “operative” from skilled workers and laborers? How did
gender work in this system? How did age fit into the dynamic of workplace
hierarchy and gendered expectations?
What role did manliness play in the construction of opposition to
employer goals? What were
February 24: Gender, hierarchy and Labor
Segmentation
NOTE: beginning with this
class, you must bring a one-page summary of what conclusions and insights you
drew from the readings, so that I can see that you’ve completed them. It might be useful for you to address
questions I ask, but you are free to raise other issues, as long as you show me
that you completed the readings.
Read:
· American Labor 104-115, 127-129 (doc 3.26)
· Experiences of a Domestic Worker
·
“In the Sight of God”: Woes of a Miner’s
Wife
·
“Women as Bread Winners—the Error of
the Age”
·
Kessler-Harris, Excerpt from a Woman’s
Wage and p.65 of
this document (missing from the
main file, sorry)
·
Nan Enstad, Fashioning Political
Identies
Be able to discuss the key arguments
of Kessler-Harris and Nan Enstad. Be able to point out the arguments for and
against women as wage earners in the primary source documents, the specific
nature of women’s place in the labor market derived from this reading.
--please
note that we will continue to bring in insights from the Operative, Work Rules and
Manliness documents that we didn’t get to on Tuesday
Bibliography for Formal Writing Assignment due
March 1 follow the directions in the Formal
writing assignment ; contact me if you
are having ANY difficulties with this. We can even talk by phone.
Read:
· American Labor 129-134
Why did college youth become strikebreakers? How did it
reflect issues of masculinity? How does it compare to the masculinity described
by skilled workers Montgomery in the reading on Feb 22? What was the function of mercenary agencies
in the
Note: mark your calendars
for the movie Matewan, a 2 hour film that will be shown on Thursday March 3 at
March 3: Radicals
in the Labor Movement vs. “business/craft unionism” Model reading response
for March 3
Read
· Folks, Review 145-150 (assigned earlier),
read 150-160;
· American Labor read 134-137 review
125-127(assigned earlier
· Eugene
Debs on IWW’s Class Unionism
· Mother
Jones letter to Mrs. Potter Palmer
· Memories
of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, the “Rebel Girl”
·
Sabotage,
by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
What are some of the
justifications made for a radical approach to workers problems? What is “class”
unionism, compared to craft unionism (Debs reading above and Manifesto, 3.34 in
American Labor)? What are the key arguments Flynn uses to justify
“sabotage.” Is her definition of
sabotage different from what you might have understood sabotage to mean before
reading this material? If so, how is it different. What insights on the IWW did you gain from reading her memories
of the movement?
Matewan:
Thursday
March 3:
Friday
March 4:
Read:
March 10 WWI and Postwar Red Scare
Read: Folks, 160-173; American Labor: section
on WWI 143-154
What are some of the major changes that affected workers
that took place during the war? (use documents and the various readings to draw
3-4 conclusions, paying attention to differences for difference for different
groups). What role did the government (in all its levels and functions) play
for workers during this period?
Please note
that you will have to turn in all reading responses, and that they will be
weighted according to the amount of reading for that date.
Here is one
example of excellent 1-page responses for previous reading responses. I will
post others as I get them electronically.
Midterm deadline
extended til March 22: Model midterm paper #1 Model midterm paper
#2
March 22: Fordism and Capitalist
Crisis (don’t worry about the word Fordism, I will address that in class) Model reading response for March 22
Read:
Folks, 174-186
American Labor
154-176
Strikebreaking and Intimidation, 171-180(thru end of first
paragraph, “slaves”)
Using these
readings, make some assessments of the lives of workers in the 1920s. What were
the most important developments of this era, in your opinion? Also, note the questions in American
Labor for response
March 24: Great
Depression and Workers Self-Organization
Model Reading response for March 24
Read:
Folks,
189-202
American
Labor 176-187
Documents from the 1934 Minneapolis strike: “ . . . If
It Takes All Summer”
Drivers’
Strike Reveals Workers’ Great Resources (referenced on 197 Folks)
How did workers react to the downturn of the Great
Depression? What would you suggest was the most interesting or surprising about
how the early Great Depression was experienced, compared to what you knew
previously? What did grass-roots unionism mean (here include docs from 1934
strike)? Also, note the questions in American Labor as well for that set of
readings, especially the question about the changing attitudes toward
government.
March 29: Workers
Organize: Industrial Unionism Model Reading response for
March 29
Read: Folks, 202-212
American
Labor, 187-194
Norwood, Strikebreaking
and Intimidation 194-225 (to end of 1st full paragraph)
·
“Susie Steno”: A Union’s View of
Clerical Workers
· Textile Workers Write to D.C.
· "Must a Fellow Wait to
Die?": Workers Write to Frances Perkins
See questions for both dates
below.
March 31: Workers and the
New Deal: industrial unionism in the 1930s, continued
· Folks, 212-220
· American Labor 192-194
· “We Are Americans!”: The Homestead Workers
Issue a Declaration of Independence in 1936
· “The CIO Doesn’t
Exist Here” –excerpt from Vargas, Labor Rights are Civil Rights:
Mexican-American Workers in the 20th Century (Princeton University Press, 2005) 134-143
· Strikebreaking and Intimidation 180-191
How and why did workers organize successfully in this
period? What was management’s strategy and workers strategies in the great
conflicts in the Auto industry? To what extent were CIO unions different from
or similar to that of the AFL, IWW, Knights of Labor? What was accomplished in
the 1930s and what do you think, was not accomplished, based on these
materials? Cite specific articles to draw your conclusions. What role did
government play in the developments of the 1930s?
Note: The
formal writing assignment will be due Thurs, April 28. This has not been
changed on the links yet.
April 5: World War II
-Note: here
is the Fascism definition that Mike passed
along. He got it from Prof. Jason Hawke.
In addition,
here is another model example of a reading
response from the March 22 readings. Note how the materials are used to
address questions and consider issues.
Read: Folks, p. 221-231; American Labor
194-205 Strikebreaking and
Intimidation 191-193, 225-227
What are some of the key changes that happened during the
war for workers? Compare what happened during WWI with what happened during
WWII. Note questions in American Labor as well.
April 7:
Building a Postwar Order: Competing Visions
Read:
· Folks
231-240
· Defending the Free
Enterprise System (33-62) Excerpts from Elizabeth Fones Wolf, Selling
Free Enterprise: The Business Assault on Labor and Liberalism
What are some of the most important developments of the postwar era in your opinion? What, according to Fones-Wolf, were some of the goals and strategies of the business campaign in the immediate postwar era? What views were they opposing, and what views were they advocating? Why did they oppose the full-employment law? Why did the Taft-Hartley Act pass?
April 12: review assigned readings for April 7, you may resubmit. Please use this time to work on your papers.
How did the Cold
War affect labor politics in the postwar era? What were the consequences of the
postwar purge of labor militants from the unions? Why was labor a target of
McCarthyism? What role did Taft-Hartley Act play in changing the labor
movement? Make a comprehensive list, referring to the various comments made in
the interviews as well as by Schrecker. Using the oral history interviews,
discuss how the purge affected the content of union struggle, its affect on
race relations. How did this play out in the racial politics of the south
(using FTA article)
Read: Folks, 240-245
My lecture on the postwar order (the beginning of this goes over points I’ve
already made, but the rest needs to be read carefully)
American Labor p. 207-213
Norwood, 226 beginning “In Neither”…--- 237,
(end of page)
American Labor 217-231
Fred Roman on the Life of an Accountant
from Studs Terkel
Lee
Radler Archacki explains why she chose the night shift
Women Workers Wages in the age of
affluence
What are some of the key arguments about the postwar in my
lecture outline, in Folks, Norwood, and American Labor 207-213? Please bring
questions or comments on the points of the lecture. I will call on some people
randomly to discuss some of the issues I think are the most important. Using
all of the relevant documents, how would you describe workers attitudes towards
their jobs in this era? This is the known as the era of worker
contentment. How would YOU characterize
it? What are some of the key factors
influencing women’s economic position in the postwar era? Why were their wages
lower?
April 21: 1960s civil rights movement and the labor movement
Read: Folks
246-259
American
Labor 231-237, 239-240
Michael
Honey essay on King and Memphis Sanitation workers strike from Major Problems
in History of American Workers, ed. Lichtenstein & Boris
Assess the overall impact of the civil rights movement on the labor movement and vice versa. What linkages did King make between economic justice, trade unionism and the civil rights movement by 1968?
Read:
Folks
259-275
American Labor 237-238, 240-255
Compare the farm workers movement to other labor struggles we have studied in this class. What impediments to a better work life and organizing did that movement face. What strategies were used and how effective were they? What role did class mean in the 1960s.. was this a struggle for power, and if so, over what? If not, why not? Do these readings change your mind about the meaning of the 60s, compared to whatever you knew before you read this material?
April 28: Labor Decline
Read:
Folks,
276-307
Norwood, 238-247
American Labor, 293-296 (thru 6.24) 263-270,
274-279, 289(bottom)-290
Summarize the leading factors that led to the demise of organized labor. Be able to list by categories, from legal to social to global. How much has “globalization” accounted for this, do you think, and how much is accounted for by other factors. Also list some of the most important statistics to illustrate the condition of American workers. Where did the middle class sentiments lay in this development?
Formal writing
assignment due on April 28. For
those of you who are looking for primary sources, the Chicago Tribune has just been added to the digitized newspapers available at Founders’
library. This means that you can search the content from late 19th
through the entire 20th by key terms. Thanks to Jason for alerting
us to this!!
If anyone wants to go to May Day (Sunday) events in Chicago, and needs a
ride, please contact me.
May 3: Labor in 21st century global capitalism
Read: Folks, 308-330
My outline on globalization ( outline
is recommended, not required reading)
A Certain Kind of Globalization (these next 3 are all in one pdf file, it will take a
while to load)
American Labor 291-292 285-288, 279-284
List the points in these articles that go against the usual
conception of globalization as one of uplift and inevitable generation of
wealth for all. How do these readings allow you to see the issues of power
between classes in the “new” globalization?
What role do immigrants play in the system, especially the female
immigrants discussed in the Nanny Visa reading ? Can the reading on the Nanny
Visa help you to explain the concept of surplus labor that we discussed earlier
in the system? Can you compare this to the 19th /early 20th
century? To what extent has the
globalization of capital reshaped the agenda of the U.S. workforce and labor
movement?
May 5: Naming the
system and alternatives Return all reading responses on
this day, you will receive them back the following thursday
Read: Folks 331-332<
