The Jewish Publication Society: Garment Workers: The Fight for Labor Rights

Garment Workers: The Fight for Labor Rights

Garment workers parading on May Day in New York, 1916. Job opportunities for recent immigrants were limited. Poor working conditions and low wages led many to join unions. Banded together, they fought for and won improved conditions in their shops (Library of Congress).

In 1900, workers in garment factories decided to unite and fight for their rights. Many of them were Jewish. Although most were not religious, they lived in Jewish environments, spoke Yiddish and understood Jewish customs and culture. They had brought with them from Europe a tradition of socialist activism. "In unity there is strength," they told each other. They founded the ILGWU, the International Ladies Garment Workers Union. Clara Lemlich became an active union supporter, described by a union leader as "a pint of trouble for the bosses."

The Leiserson and Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Strikes

In September 1909, Clara and other women could no longer tolerate their harsh working conditions. They walked out of the Leiserson factory and went on strike. Within a few days the strike spread to the workers at the nearby Triangle Shirtwaist Company. Day after day the young women strikers picketed the factories to let the public know they were on strike and to prevent replacement workers from entering the factories. They walked up and down the sidewalk in front of the buildings; some carried signs while others chanted and sang.

The factory owners hired gangs of tough men to frighten the pickets. As the mostly Jewish and Italian teenage girls peacefully walked the picket lines they were threatened and pushed by the ruffians. Women were beaten, punched and thrown to the ground. Many were badly hurt. The police did little to prevent the violence … During one attack in mid-November Clara and two other young women were so badly beaten the police had to rush them to a hospital.

Eleven weeks after walking out of the Leiserson and Triangle companies, the women workers saw no end to the bloody strike. While they were on strike they earned no money, and the poor women faced a harsh, hungry and cold winter. Union leaders realized that the only quick way to improve working conditions and wages was to shut down every shirtwaist factory in New York. On November 22, 1909, thousands of shirtwaist workers gathered in the Cooper Union Auditorium. It was time to make a decision …

"The Uprising of the Twenty Thousand"

The audience cheered a succession of speakers, finally focusing their attention on Samuel Gompers, the best-known speaker of the evening. He was the founder and president of America's most powerful union, the American Federation of Labor …

After two hours of cautious speeches with no end in site, "a thin wisp of a girl" asked to speak. As she stepped onto the platform, the crowd quieted. Everyone knew Clara Lemlich, the brave union worker who had just been released from the hospital. She still showed signs of the violent beating she received on the picket line. Her words, spoken in clear and passionate Yiddish, echoed through the hall. It was a clarion call to action.

"I have listened to all the speakers, and I have no further patience for talk. I am a working girl, one of those striking against intolerable conditions. I am tired of listening to speakers who talk in generalities. What we are here for is to decide whether or not to strike. I offer a resolution that a general strike be declared – now!"

The audience erupted into wild applause. People jumped from their seats, cheered and waved handkerchiefs. This was the moment they had waited for …

Within two days the entire shirtwaist industry in New York City was shut down. No one had predicted the resolve of the strikers. Twenty thousand workers, mainly Jewish and Italian teenage girls and young women, marched in picket lines before factories throughout lower Manhattan … Newspapers widely reported on the brutality against the strikers. Other women, wealthy and educated, decided to prevent the brutality and unfair arrests. With great publicity, they joined the poorly dressed and ill-fed immigrant women workers on the picket lines …

The brave struggle of Clara Lemlich and the other women workers is known as the "Uprising of the Twenty Thousand." By February 15, 1910, it was over. The strikers won a shorter workweek of fifty-two hours, higher wages and the end of unfair deductions for supplies, chairs and lockers.

-- This excerpt on Jews in American life is adapted from Forged in Freedom: Shaping the Jewish-American Experience, by Norman H. Finkelstein. (JPS, 2002).

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