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Minneapolis general strike of 1934: Difference between revisions

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{{Infobox civil conflict
| title = Minneapolis general strike of 1934
| partof =
| image = [[File:battle strike 1934.jpg|300px]]
| place = [[Minneapolis, Minnesota]]
| date = May 16, 1934 - August 21, 1934
| caption = Open battle between striking teamsters armed with pipes and the police in the streets of Minneapolis
| map_type =
| map_captionmap_type =
| map_sizemap_caption =
| map_size =
| coordinates = {{coord|44|58|52|N|93|16|37|W|region:US-MN_type:event_scale:50000|display=inline,title}}
| goals = [[Unionization]]
| methods = [[Strike action|Strikes]], [[Protest]], [[Demonstration (people)|Demonstrations]]
| status =
| result =
| concessions =
| side1 = {{Flagiconflagicon image|MinnesotaSocialist red flag.svg}} [[GovernmentCommunist League of MinnesotaAmerica]]
* [[International Brotherhood of Teamsters]]▼
| side2 = {{Flagicon|Minnesota}} [[Government of Minnesota]]
*{{flagicon image|Seal of the United States Army National Guard.svg}} [[Minnesota Army National Guard]]
{{flagicon image|Flag of Minneapolis, Minnesota.svg}} [[City of Minneapolis]]
*{{flagicon image|}} [[Minneapolis Police Department]]
| leadfigures2leadfigures1 = [[Daniel J. Tobin]]<br />[[Vincent R. Dunne]]<br />[[Carl Skoglund]]<br />[[Farrell Dobbs]]▼
| side2= {{flagicon image|Red flag.svg}} [[Communist League of America]]
| leadfigures1leadfigures2 = [[Floyd B. Olson]]<br />Mike Johannes▼
{{flagicon image|}} [[International Brotherhood of Teamsters]]
| casualties1 = {{plainlist|▼
▲| leadfigures1= [[Floyd B. Olson]]<br />Mike Johannes
*'''Injuries:''' 67+
▲| leadfigures2= [[Daniel J. Tobin]]<br />[[Vincent R. Dunne]]<br />[[Carl Skoglund]]<br />[[Farrell Dobbs]]
*'''Fatalities:''' 2 strikers
▲| casualties1=
*'''Arrests:''' Many}}
| casualties2 = {{plainlist|
| casualties_label= ▼
*'''Fatalities:''' 2 deputized civilians}}
| fatalities=4▼
▲| casualties_label =
| injuries=67+
▲| fatalities =4
| arrests=Many
| strength1injuries =
| strength2arrests =
| strength1 =
| strength2 =
| sidebox = {{Campaignbox general strikes}}
}}
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The strike began on May 16, 1934. The strike was remarkably effective, shutting down most commercial transport in the city with the exception of certain farmers, who were allowed to bring their produce into town, but delivering directly to grocers, rather than to the market area, which the union had shut down.
 
The market was to be the scene of the fiercest fighting during the earliest part of the strike. On Saturday, May 19, 1934, [[Minneapolis Police]] and private guards beat a number of strikers trying to prevent strikebreakers from unloading a truck in that area and waylaid several strikers who had responded to a report that [[Scab labour|scab]] drivers were unloading newsprint at the two major dailies' loading docks. When those injured strikers were brought back to the strike headquarters the police followed; theThe strikers, however, not only refused to let the police into the headquarters, butand left two of them unconscious on the sidewalk outside.
 
Fighting intensified the following Monday, May 21, when the police, augmented by several hundred newly deputized members of the [[Citizens Alliance]], an employer organization, attempted to open up the market for trucking. Fighting began when a loaded truck began leaving a loading dock. The battle became a general melee when hundreds of pickets armed with clubs of all sorts rushed to the area to support the picketers; when the police drew their guns as if to shoot, the union sent a truck loaded with picketers into the mass of police and deputies in order to make it impossible for them to fire without shooting each other.
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Other unions, particularly in the building trades, began to strike in sympathy with the Teamsters. The [[American Federation of Labor]]'s [[AFL–CIO#State_and_local_bodies|Central Labor Council]] in Minneapolis offered financial and moral support for the strike, allowing the union to coordinate some of its picketing activities from its headquarters.
 
The fighting resumed on Tuesday, May 22. The picketers took the offensive and succeeded in driving both police and deputies from the market and the area around the union's headquarters. Of the several hundred deputized "special police", two (C. Arthur Lyman and Peter Erath) were cornered and killed. In the following "general riot" another roughly two dozen special police, municipal police, and strikers were beaten or wounded.<ref>{{cite news |date=15 May 1948 |title=Killings, Riots Mark Strikes in Minnesota |pages=4 |publisher=Chicago Tribune |url=http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1948/05/15/page/4/article/killings-riots-mark-strikes-in-minnesota |access-date=16 April 2017}}</ref>{{Additional citation needed|publisherdate=ChicagoJune Tribune2023|datereason=15Date Mayof 1948newspaper that makes claim is much later then actual event.}}</ref>
 
==Negotiations==
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==Martial law and settlement==
A public commission, set up later by the governor, reported: {{blockquote|Police took direct aim at the pickets and fired to kill. Physical safety of the police was at no time endangered. No weapons were in possession of the pickets.}}
On July 26, andafter these deaths of protesters at the hands of the police, [[Farmer-Labor]] governor Olson declared [[martial law]] and mobilized four thousand National Guardsmen of the 34th Infantry. Following this mobilization, there was no further loss of life.
 
Between July 26 and August 1, the National Guard began issuing operating permits to truck drivers, and engaging in roving patrols, curfews, and security details. On August 1, National Guard troops seized strike headquarters and placed arrested union leaders in a [[stockade]] at the state fairgrounds in Saint Paul. The next day, the headquarters were restored to the union and the leaders released from the stockade, as the National Guard carried out a token raid on the Citizens Alliance headquarters.
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The union appealed to the Central Labor Union for a general strike and the governor issued an ultimatum that he would stop all trucks by midnight, August 5, if there was no settlement. Nevertheless, by August 14, there were thousands of trucks operating under military permits. Although the strike was gravely weakened by martial law and economic pressure, union leaders made it clear that it would continue.
 
On August 21, a federal mediator got acceptance of a settlement proposal from A. W. Strong, head of the Citizens Alliance, incorporating the union's major demands. The settlement was ratified, andbreaking the back of employer resistance to unionization in Minneapolis was broken. In March 1935, International president Daniel Tobin expelled Local 574 from the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT). However, in August 1936, Tobin was forced to relent and recharter the local as 544. The leaders of 544 went on to develop the area and conference bargaining that exists today in the IBT.
 
Local 544 remained under socialist leadership until 1941, when eighteen leaders of the union and the [[Communist League of America|Socialist Workers Party]] were sentenced to federal prison,. They were the first victims of the anti-radical [[Smith Act]], a law eventually found by the United States Supreme Court eventually found to be unconstitutional. Names ofThe members sentenced to prison: included James P.Cannon, Grace Carlson, Jake Cooper, Oscar Coover, Harry DeBoer, Farrell Dobbs, V.R. Dunne,
Max Geldman, Albert Goldman, Clarence Hamel, Emil Hansen, Carlos Hudson, Karl Kuehn, Felix Morrow, Edward Palmquist, Alfred Russel, Oscar Schoenfeld, Carl Skoglund.
 
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{{Portal|Organized labour}}
* [[Union violence in the United States]]
* [[1938 New York City truckers strike]]
* [[34th Infantry Division (United States)]]
* [[Bloody Friday (Minneapolis)]]▼
* [[Communist League of America]]
* [[Ellard A. Walsh]]
* [[Floyd B. Olson]]
▲* [[International Brotherhood of Teamsters]]
* [[History of Minneapolis]]
* [[Minneapolis Police Department]]
* [[Murder of workers in labor disputes in the United States]]
 
==References==
{{Reflist}}
==Further reading==
* Dobbs, Farrell. ''Teamster Rebellion.'' Paperback ed. New York: Pathfinder Press, 1998. {{ISBN|0-87348-845-8}}
* Dobbs, Farrell. ''Teamster Power.'' New York: Pathfinder Press, 1973. {{ISBN|0-913460-20-6}}
* Korth, Philip. ''Minneapolis Teamsters Strike of 1934.'' East Lansing, Mich.: Michigan State University Press, 1995. {{ISBN|0-87013-385-3}}
* Palmer, Bryan D. ''Revolutionary teamsters: The Minneapolis truckers’ strikes of 1934'' (Brill, 2013). [https://books.google.com/books?id=Df-ZAAAAQBAJ&dq=Minneapolis+general+strike+of+1934&pg=PP7 online]
* Walker, Charles Rumford. ''American City: A Rank-and-File History.'' Paperback reissue. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2005. (Originally published in 1937.) {{ISBN|0-8166-4607-4}}
* Zieger, Robert H., and Gilbert J. Gall. ''American Workers, American Unions The Twentieth Century (The American Moment)''. New York: The Johns Hopkins UP, 2002. Print. Page 74. {{ISBN|0-8018-7078-X}}
* Palmer, Bryan D., ''Revolutionary Teamsters: The Minneapolis Truckers' Strikes of 1934''. Haymarket Books 2014.
 
==External sources==
* [https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/date/1934/1934-mpls/index.htm 1934 Minneapolis Teamster Strikes Archive] at [[marxists.org]]
* [http://struggle.net/ALC/TWITTU.htm Trotskyist Work in the Trade Unions, by Chris Knox] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070516225629/http://struggle.net/ALC/TWITTU.htm |date=2007-05-16 }}
* [http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/aug2009/mpls-a26.shtml 75th anniversary of the Minneapolis truck drivers’ strike, by Ron Jorgenson]
{{Minneapolis Police Department|state=autocollapse}}
{{American Labor Conflicts}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Minneapolis Teamsters Strike Ofof 1934}}
[[Category:1930s strikes in the United States]]
[[Category:1934 labor disputes and strikes]]
[[Category:1934 riots]]
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[[Category:Labor disputes led by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters]]
[[Category:General strikes in the United States]]
▲* [[BloodyCategory:1930s Fridayin (Minneapolis)]]
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