Sit-down Strike Research Articles

An Experimental Study of Strike Propaganda

I NDUSTRIAL conflict is in the forefront of the news today, and is likely to stay there for some time in the future. The emotional appeals of the radical and labor press are familiar to all. The daily press has also been much criticized for its treatment of strike news. Its use of terms such as loyal workers instead of strike-breakers, its tendency to condemn strikers as reds and to accept uncritically back-to-work movements and the statements of vigilante leaders such as Hiram Evans of the Klu Klux Klan have often been noted. Sometimes the press furnishes ammunition to its critics, as in the San Francisco general strike of 1934. Editor and Publisher magazine for July z8, 1934 contained an article boasting that the publishers of the San Francisco Bay region organized to break the strike under the leadership of Hearst general counsel Neylan. They encouraged vigilanteism by a campaign of publicity calling the strike a revolution, and turned the tide of public sympathy away from the strikers. This type of behavior is to be expected, since modern metropolitan newspapers are big business, closely interwoven with the rest of our industrial structure, and since the newspapers are extremely susceptible to pressure from their advertisers. The American Institute of Public Opinion has given some data on public sentiment on labor questions in its surveys of the past year. Seventy-six percent of those polled said that they were in favor of labor unions; 67 percent preferred the American Federation of Labor to the Committee for Industrial Organization. Eighty-six percent favored compulsory incorporation of labor unions, and 69 percent thought that the government should regulate the unions. Sixty-seven percent thought that sit-down strikes should be made illegal. These sentiments follow closely the dominant editorial policies of our daily press. The purpose of this study is to analyze the treatment of a specific strike in the press and to determine experimentally the effects (i) of typical statements from several different editorial points of view, and (:) of the background of experience of the subjects, upon the opinions they hold.

Economics for Everybody: From the Pyramids to the Sit-down Strike

Economics for Everybody: From the Pyramids to the Sit-down Strike

Labor Law: Legal Status of Sit-down Strike: Legal and Equitable Remedies

Labor Law: Legal Status of Sit-down Strike: Legal and Equitable Remedies

The Relative Status of the Sitdown Strike in the Development of Labor Law

The Relative Status of the Sitdown Strike in the Development of Labor Law