California agricultural strikes of 1933

The California agricultural strikes of 1933 were a series of strikes by agricultural workers in the U.S. state of California in 1933. More than 47,500 workers were involved in the wave of approximately 30 strikes.^[1] Twenty-four of the strikes, involving 37,500 union members, were led by the Cannery and Agricultural Workers' Industrial Union (CAWIU).^{[1][lower-alpha 1]}

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^[3] and others just 12,000 workers.^{[4][lower-alpha 2]} Striking workers were evicted from company housing, and growers and many of their managerial staff were deputized by local law enforcement. Attacks by employers on peaceful striking workers were common. In one attack in the town of Pixley, California, two workers were killed and eight others wounded. CAWIU organizers Pat Chambers and Caroline Decker were arrested and charged under the California Criminal Syndicalism Act for their labor organizing activities.

Culmination: The cotton strikes of October 1933

Cotton growers in the San Joaquin Valley relied on extremely low labor costs to make their crop pay. Although California cotton growers paid marginally better than cotton growers in other states, wages for cotton pickers in California had declined significantly from $1.50 per hundred pounds in 1928 to just 40 cents per hundred pounds in 1932 (although the rate could go as high as 60 cents per hundred pounds for ground being picked over a second or third time). Wages for cotton pickers in the San Joaquin Valley were set by the Agricultural Labor Bureau, an employers' organization.^[5]

The Cannery and Agricultural Workers' Industrial Union had been organizing in the cotton fields for some time, and by 1933 had come to provide leadership for the cotton pickers, most of whom were Mexican. The CAWIU was militant in its demands, and threatened a valley-wide strike if they were not met. These demands included a wage rate of $1.00 per hundred pounds of cotton picked, recognition of the CAWIU as the workers' collective bargaining agent, and abolition of "contract labor" (the contracting of a large group of workers for a one-time job or for seasonal labor). These demands were made in practically every cotton strike which followed in 1933.^[6]

The cotton strikes in the San Joaquin Valley began on October 4, 1933, with the establishment of picket lines by workers at the work site: "At the Camp. West and Lowe ranch, the pickets were uncommunicative, but it was learned through their captain that the picketers are organized for shifts continuing throughout twenty-four hours. All wore signs reading 'This ranch under strike.'"^[7] The Los Angeles Times reported that the rationale for the strikes was to obtain "a rate increase of 40 cents a hundred pounds for picketers over the rate established at the recent meeting of the San Joaquin Valley Agricultural Bureau, and which cotton growers throughout Kern county agreed to support. The rate as established is 60 cents per hundred pounds."^[7]

Three days into the protests, the cotton growers became concerned that their cotton crop was not going to be picked at its peak value, and that angry workers would destroy their crops or harm workers who engaged in strikebreaking.^[8]

Two days later, the strike turned violent and workers were evicted from company housing. in Tulare County, armed men employed by the growers clashed with striking workers and CAWIU labor organizers, and CAWIU staff were forcibly ejected out of the county. Growers in Kings, Fresno, Madera, Merced Stanislaus, and San Luis Obispo counties armed themselves and their employees, announcing they would drive off any troublemakers. In Kern County, about 200 strikers and their families were evicted from their employer-owned cottages, their belongings dumped on the road, and told to get out of the county or face trouble.^[9]

Tensions reached a peak on October 10 in Pixley when about 30 ranchers surrounded a meeting of striking workers. The ranchers fired on the strikers, killing three and wounded a number of others.^[10] That same day, a group of striking grape pickers faced a group of armed growers' men at a farm near Arvin, California, about 60 miles (97 km) south of Pixley. After several hours confronting one another at the border of the employer's land, the two sides began attacking each other (the workers armed with wooden poles, the growers' men using the butt of their rifles). A shot rang out and a striking worker was killed. A sheriff's deputy threw a tear gas grenade at the group, and the growers' men opened fire. Several strikers were wounded.^[11]

End of the cotton strikes

The cotton strikes came to a halt at the end of October. The killings at Pixley and Arvin led to public condemnation of the growers' actions, and California Highway Patrol flooded the area to restore order. Federal and state strike mediators arrived to try to end the strikes, and federal welfare and public works officials arrived to see what they could do to end economic problems that might be causing the strikes.^[12] Angry workers wished to engage in armed reprisal against growers, but CAWIU leaders were able to prevent this.^[13] Public opinion supported the strikers so strongly now that California Governor James Rolph agreed to meet with union leaders to receive their demands. Although Rolph declined to send in more police or disarm growers, he did announce that the State Emergency Relief Administration would spend federal money to provide financial assistance to striking workers.^[14]

George Creel, chair of the Regional Labor Board of the National Labor Board (a federal labor relations agency), began to aggressively intervene as a mediator in the strikes. Although Creel lacked any formal powers, his bravado and air of authority impressed both growers and union workers. He warned growers that the Roosevelt administration would suspend federal agricultural assistance to California if violence continued, and proposed a three-member fact-finding commission to settle the strike. The growers agreed. Because Creel had assured the growers that workers would return to work at the rate of 60 cents per hundred pounds while the commission did its work, both the federal government and state officials mounted a major "back to work" effort to end the strikes on October 14. The effort failed. When state officials conditioned the receipt of relief payments on a return to work, striking workers refused to accept them. The state unconditionally resumed payments on October 21. The commission held its hearings on October 19 and 20. Pushed by Creel, the commission announced on October 23 that growers should offer a rate of 75 cents per hundred. The growers accepted this solution on October 25. CAWIU asked for 80 cents per hundred and recognition of the union, but Creel said relief payments would be completely cut off if the workers did not agree to the commission's rate. Although workers were apparently overwhelmingly in favor of continuing the strikes, CAWIU leaders agreed to the commission's solution on October 26 and called an end to all cotton strikes then ongoing in California.^[15][16]

See also

• List of worker deaths in United States labor disputes

References

Notes

Citations

Bibliography

• Acuña, Rodolofo (2007). Corridors of Migration: The Odyssey of Mexican Laborers, 1600-1933. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. ISBN 9780816526369. 
• Barry, Raymond P., ed. (1938). A Documentary History of Migratory Farm Labor in California: The California Cotton Pickers Strike, 1933 (Report). Oakland, Calif.: Federal Writers' Project. 
• Bronfenbrenner, Kate (1990). "California Farmworkers' Strikes of 1933". In Filippelli, Ronald L. Labor Conflict in the United States: An Encyclopedia. New York: Garland Publishing. ISBN 9780824079680. 
• Daniel, Cletus E. (1982). Bitter Harvest: A History of California Farmworkers, 1870-1941. Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press. ISBN 9780520047228. 

Further reading

• Bucki, Cecelia (2009). Social History of the United States: Volume 3, The 1930s. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO. ISBN 9781851099214. 
• Hosmer, Helen; Jarrell, Randall (1992). Helen Hosmer: A Radical Critic of California Agribusiness in the 1930s. Santa Cruz, Calif.: University of California, Santa Cruz. 
• Loftis, Anne (1998). Witnesses to the Struggle: Imaging the 1930s California Labor Movement. Reno, Nev.: University of Nevada Press. ISBN 9780874173055. 
• Starr, Kevin (1997). Endangered Dreams: The Great Depression in California. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195118025. 
• Weber, Devra (1994). Dark Sweat, White Gold: California Farm Workers, Cotton, and the New Deal. Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press. ISBN 9780520918474.