Abstract
A month before the Little Steel Strike was even on the horizon, the editors of Public Management dedicated an entire volume to the problem of labor unrest in modern America. The International City Managers’ Association of Chicago reprinted the edition as a booklet titled The City’s Role in Strikes. The rising tide of labor militancy prompted the Association to establish some guidelines for managing the issue. One of the writers who contributed an article to the symposium was none other than Philip Murray. “At heart,” Murray observed, “most policemen are for the workers because they are in that class themselves.” It was not the individual patrolman who chose to become a strikebreaker, but the “reactionary administrations” that set the tone for handling strikes. They failed to instruct police officers on the rights of workers to strike and picket. Unenlightened city administrators bore the responsibility for labor violence.
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Notes
Philip Murray, “Labor Asks Protection of Picket Lines,” in The City’s Role in Strikes: A New Outlook and Suggested Techniques for Municipal Officials (Chicago: International City Managers’ Association, 1937), pp. 3–4, Chicago Historical Society; Donald C. Stone, “The Public Interest in Labor Disputes,” ibid., pp. 8–9; Editors, “Preface,” p. 2.
LSC, Part 14, the Chicago Memorial Day Incident, “Testimony of Joe R. Weber,” (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1937; Arno Press Reprint, 1971), pp. 4917–18.
Ibid., “Testimony of Joe R. Weber,” p. 4919; “Testimony of Meyer Levin,” pp. 4892–3; “Testimony of Ralph Beck,” pp. 4851–3; LSC, Part 15D, the Chicago Memorial Day Incident: Industrial Munitioning, Exhibit 3536, “Testimony Before Cook County Coroner Re the Memorial Day Incident,” Everett C. Parker Deposition, Cook County, July 13, 1937, p. 6913; George Patterson Autobiography, Book Two, pp. 20–1, Box 9, Folder 6, George Patterson Papers; Howard Fast, “An Occurrence at Republic Steel,” in Isabel Leigh ton ed., The Aspirin Age, 1919–1941 (New York: Simon and Shuster, 1949), p. 384; Levin, Citizens, pp. 11–12;
Morris Childs, “The Party and the Daily Worker in Strike Struggles,” Party Organizer 11 (August 1937): 23, microfiche, Memorial University Library.
Ibid; Nathan Godfried, WCFL: Chicago’s Voice of Labor, 1926–1978 (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1997), pp. 181–2.
John L. Lewis, “Industrial Democracy in Steel,” radio address, July 6, 1936, in Howard Zinn (ed.), New Deal Thought (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1966), p. 210; “Acceptance of the Renomination for the Presidency, Philadelphia, Pa., June 27, 1936,” in The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Volume Five, The People Approve, 1936 (New York: Random House, 1938), pp. 233–6.
Robert Zieger, The CIO, 1935–1955 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995), p. 33; LSC, Part 14, the Chicago Memorial Day Incident, “Testimony of Frank McCullogh,” pp. 4903, 4906.
Fast, “An Occurrence at Republic Steel,” pp. 384–5; LSC, Part 15-D, the Chicago Memorial Day Incident, Exhibit 3548, Edwin J. Kennedy Deposition, July 17, 1937, p. 6917; LSC, Part 14, the Chicago Memorial Day Incident, “Testimony of Frank W. McCullogh,” p. 4903; “Testimony of James Stewart,” p. 4910; “Testimony of John Riffe,” p. 4871; “Testimony of Anton Goldasic,” p. 4934; “Report of Citizens Joint Commission of Inquiry on South Chicago Memorial Day Incident, 1937,” p. 7; Donald G. Sofchalk, “the Chicago Memorial Day Incident: An Episode of Mass Action,” Labor History 6 (Winter 1965): 14.
LSC, Part 14, the Chicago Memorial Day Incident, “Testimony of Joe R. Weber,” p. 4921; “Report of the Committee on Education and Labor: the Chicago Memorial Day Incident,” Report No. 46, Part 2, pp. 9–10; Daniel J. Leab, “The Memorial Day Massacre,” Midcontin ent American Studies Journal 8 (1967): 7.
Meyer Levin, Citizens (New York: Viking Press, 1940), pp. 18–19.
Roger Biles, Big City Boss in Depression and War: Mayor Edward J. Kelly of Chicago (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 1984), p. 61.
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© 2010 Michael Dennis
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Dennis, M. (2010). “Trouble Is Certain to Follow”. In: The Memorial Day Massacre and the Movement for Industrial Democracy. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230114722_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230114722_7
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