We Ask Justice For Our Union Leaders! - 1948 Pamphlet - International Fur & Leather Workers Union C.I.O.

"Almost from the very day that the fur workers first organized themselves into a union to fight for better working conditions, the bosses hired gangsters to smash the union. They sent their agents to disrupt it from within. They attacked the union through injunctions and court cases. They slandered and besmirched the union through the big-business controlled press. And as is their usual practice, they singled out trustworthy and militant leaders of the workers for frame-ups and persecutions - men in whom the membership had the greatest faith, leaders whose entire lives were devoted to serving the membership.

But the union survived and grew, despite violence and gangsters and lockouts of employers.

Why was it able to survive attacks as fierce as any ever aimed at a labor organization in the United States? Who were these men who could not be threatened, bribed, or slugged into submission?

The history of the I.L.F.W.U. answers these questions. We give here only a few highlights of that fighting history. In its pages are lessons that can help the labor movement beat back the Tafts and Hartleys and those they stand for."

The International Fur and Leather Workers Union, another of the 11 expelled CIO unions were among the most radical and militant of the bunch. They faced some of the most extreme oppression, including frame ups, deportation trials, arrests of leadership and violent clashes with hired goons. Philip Foner authored a massive book documenting their history.

This pamphlet is extraordinary. I intend to get a full scan of it's pages and will provide the text when I have a bit more time.

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International Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's Union - C.I.O. Local Union list

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United Cannery, Agricultural, Packing & Allied Workers of America C.I.O. - 1938 Membership Book

"Being fully aware that the conflict between capital and labor grows with intensity from time to time and tends to work disastrous results on the working millions unless we combine for mutual protection and benefit, and realizing fully that the struggle to better our working and living conditions is in vain unless we are united to protect ourselves against the organized forces of the employers and exploiters of labor, and Knowing full well that the old craft and isolated local forms of trade union organizations are unable to defend effectively the interests and improve the conditions of the workers, THEREFORE, WE, THE WORKERS ENGAGED IN THE CANNING, AGRICULTURAL, PACKING AND ALLIED INDUSTRIES form an organization which unites all workers in our industry on an industrial and democratic basis, regardless of age, sex, nationality, race, creed, color or political and religious beliefs, and pursues at all times a policy of aggressive activity to improve our social and economic c...

The Point Gorda Strike - Marine Workers Industrial Union Pamphlet

This pamphlet is fascinating, but perhaps the real gems here are the preamble to the MWIU and the list of headquarters on the back page. MWIU were a militant communist organization. They were the marine section of the Trade Union Unity League who were directly affiliated with the Red International of Labor Unions (RILU). In the early 1920's the communist international's strategy was to form "red" communist run unions instead of trying to enter and radicalize existing AFL unions. In the United States, MWIU set to work building a militant industrial union for waterfront workers. Most of their activity was in New York. They advocated industrial unionism exclusively and laid the foundation for the major surge in organizing in the mid 1930's with the formation of the Committee for Industrial Organizations. Most of the TUUL sections would transition into CIO unions. The MWIU helped establish the National Maritime Union (CIO), Likewise, the Cannery & Agricultur...

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