Reel 32

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 papers become very spotty during both 1946 and 1947, with an average of about ten items appearing each month. During the first few months of 1946, the major topic is the attempt to roll back the USDA wage ceiling for cotton workers. During the summer, the STFU, which had changed its name to the National Farm Labor Union (NFLU) became affiliated with the AF of L; the formal NFLU request for affiliation is dated August 14. Also during the summer, the union became embroiled in a furious...

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"Draft for a Union Farm Agreement"; press releases on the appointment of Barney B. Taylor as NFLU Organization Director, on affiliation with the AF of L, on the trouble at the Campbell Soup Co., and on the defeat of the USDA wage ceiling program; Voice of America address by the USDA wage ceiling program; Voice of America address by H.L. Mitchell on the NFLU program; Constitution of the NFLU

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Folder 1128 -- Lists of workers sent to food processing plants in New Jersey and Maryland, 1946

Scope and Contents The Thirteenth Annual Convention was held at Washington, D.C. from January 13 to 15; the papers include a press release, the report of the Executive Council, and the NFLU Constitution as amended by the Convention (Jan. 13). Other items of special interest include: two formal statements by Mitchell, one to the House Agriculture Committee on Farm Labor Bill H.R. 3367 (June 18), and the other to a USDA hearing on "Minimum Wage Rates of Sugar Cane Workers" (July 26); an exchange between Mitchell...

Scope and Contents On September 2, there is a memorandum to the Robert Marshall Civil Liberties Trust Fund proposing a survey of the civil liberties of migratory farm workers to be conducted by Ernesto Galarza. Virtually all the correspondence from October through December concerns the strike of 1,200 workers at the Di Giorgio Ranch in Bakersfield, Calif., called by the NFLU with the aid of the California Federation of Labor. There are frequent mimeographed strike bulletins, as well as a list of donors to the...

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Address by H.L. Mitchell to the Second Annual Convention of Midwest Sugar Workers; several press releases on the Di Giorgio strike; NFLU memorandum on plans for organization in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California; address by Mitchell to the California State Federation of Labor; a six-page statement on the NFLU program; memorandum by Mitchell on the background and activities of FTA-CIO President Donald Henderson

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Folder 1133 -- Lists of workers sent to food processing plants in New Jersey, 1947

Scope and Contents The Di Giorgio strike continues to be the topic of greatest importance in the papers through the end of March. The reader may best follow the sequence of strike events through the numerous strike bulletins, issued approximately every ten days, and through the correspondence of NFLU California organizer Jim Wrightson. During the last week of January and the first week of February, several sizable contributions to the strike relief fund arrived from AF of L unions; a complete list of donors...

Scope and Contents Black workers at the Edgar F. Hurff Co. in New Jersey loyal to FTA-CIO staged a wildcat strike during April demanding that the company sever its agreement with the AFL Meat Cutters Union. Since the NFLU placed its own workers at the Hurff Co. through the Meat Cutters, the union became directly involved in the dispute. See the detailed reports of F.R. Betton, who was sent to New Jersey to help quash the strike. The NFLU's own strike at the Di Giorgio Corp. continued and may be followed...