Reel 18

Scope and Contents From the Collection: Consist of correspondence, reports, ledgers, legal documents, leaflets, printed material, photographs, and newspapers published by the union. These document the activities of the Southern Tenant Farmers' Union from its origins through its transformations into the National Farm Labor Union in 1946 and the National Agriculture Workers Union in 1952, and through its merger with the Amalgamated Meat Cutters Union in 1960. The records also contain selected materials from the Socialist Party...

Scope and Contents The dispute over NSW continued and resulted in the decision to form a permanent "National Sharecroppers Committee" , independent of the WDL, to raise money for the STFU and other sharecropper causes. The key documents include: a report from Betton and Mitchell on their negotiations with the NSW Policy Committee (11), minutes of the NEC meeting which took up the question (19), and an exchange of correspondence between Mitchell and Harold L. Oram on setting up the new committee (22, 25, 29)....

Scope and Contents The effort to obtain a minimum wage for farm workers went into high gear. See the STFU press release on the campaign, including a copy of the bill as introduced by Senator William Langer of North Dakota and a three-page statement by Mitchell (2). There is a four-page letter from Butler to Secretary of Agriculture Claude R. Wickard, trying to convince him to incorporate the measure into his own legislative program (16), as well as correspondence on the bill from Congressman Jerry Voorhis of...

Scope and Contents The Farm Security Administration, under attack from the Farm Bureau, became highly receptive to the idea of cooperating with the STFU on organizing drives in northern Alabama and other areas. Mitchell moved quickly to exploit the opportunity; see his letters to FSA officials (16) and his detailed explanation of the situation to Norman Thomas (25). For further information on the organizing drive, see Mitchell's repots to Butler on his trip to Alabama, Texas, and Oklahoma (18,22) and Butler's...

Scope and Contents The NEC met on July 11 and 12; the papers include the agenda, minutes, proposed budget, and a report by Mitchell on "Cooperation with the FSA" (11). In addition, there are reports to the NEC on the STFU organizing drive from Odis Sweeden in Oklahoma (3), Noah P. Graham in Missouri (8), W.M. Tanner in Missouri (9), John Alford in Arkansas (11), and from J.E. Clayton in Texas and Missouri (12). Plans for cooperation with the FSA continued to develop; see FSA Administrator C. B. Baldwin to his...