The purpose of this council was to provide solidarity and aid to the workers’ struggles. The council represented the widely exploited and most oppressed sections of the community. The Council was located at 87 Exchange Alley next door to where today’s Marriott Hotel, 555 Canal Street, is located. This form of organization was a clever idea designed to pursue a specific form of struggle. That summer, the workers had organized a city-wide united front called the Workingmen’s Amalgamated Council. The New Orleans Board of Trade refused to recognize the Triple Alliance. The Board of Trade would make decisions for them. The New Orleans Board of Trade, located at 316 Magazine Street, represented the interests of this social class of owners and bosses.
They amassed a huge strike-breaking and terror fund. Their allies consisted of the bosses of the four railroads that entered the city, and also the bosses of cotton, sugar, and rice commodity exchanges. The exploiter and oppressor social class of owners and bosses organized an all-out strike-breaking assault.
Less than 30 years after the end of the Civil War, and with the counterrevolution of Reconstruction, Black and white workers united to walk out for joint demands. The city’s employing class (banks, stevedores, foundries, hotels, merchants, etc.) was struck with terror. There were between two to three thousand workers on strike. On October 24, these three unions went on strike for a shorter work day (10-hour day), overtime pay for after 60 hours and a union shop.
General strike drivers#
Teamsters moved commodities by carriages, wagons, drays (carts) as drivers and general laborers. Teamsters were those laborers considered not as skilled as scalesmen and packers. Packers had specific tools to pack or ‘screw’ the commodities in place. Packers were those laborers who loaded or ‘packed’ commodities for shipment on vessels such as boats, trains or other moving vehicles. Scalesmen’s labor was that of weighing commodities, a function that determined the value, the exchange value or selling price of a commodity. Scalesmen and Packers were skilled laborers. The three unions were the white Scalesmen and Packers unions and the Black Teamsters. The strike in October was organized by three key unions that formed a partnership – the Triple Alliance. This action was later followed by an important strike in October. Plessy and the Citizens Committee initiated their fight for equality and freedom against the Segregated Railroad Car Act at the railroad depot located then at Press and Royal Streets. Labor hours were reduced from 16 hours to 10 hours. In New Orleans, May 1892, the streetcar drivers struck for shorter working hours and a closed shop. The strike was violently defeated by Pinkerton guards with several strikers and guards killed.
On June 30, 1892, a major steel strike was launched in Homestead, Pennsylvania. labor organizations were founded: the International Longshoremen Association and the International Seamen Union. The general strike grew out of the labor movement struggles for improved economic well-being and Black peoples’ continued struggles for equality and freedom.ġ892 was an active year of class struggle. Textġ25 years ago, one of the greatest united strikes happened here in New Orleans – the General Strike of 1892. Over 120 years ago, one of the greatest united strikes happened here in New Orleans.
0 kommentar(er)
