Sidney Hillman

Hellraisers Journal: Thousands of Chicago Garment Strikers Win 48-Hour Week With No Loss of Wages

You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age.
Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones

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Saturday December 18, 1915
From the Chicago Day Book: Thousands of Striking Garment Workers Win Shorter Hours

The Day Book of Chicago, Illinois, reported in its December 16th edition that, although recognition of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America has not been granted, nevertheless, thousands of Garment Workers have won the 48-hour week with no reduction in wages:

Chicago Garment Workers Strike of 1915, Day Book headline, Dec 16.png

Hellraisers Journal: Edith Wyatt on "The Chicago Clothing Strike" in Harper's Weekly, Illustrated

You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age.
Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones

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Wednesday December 15, 1915
From Harper's Weekly: Edith Wyatt on the Chicago Clothing Strike & Special Police Guards

In the December 11th edition of Harper's, Edith Wyatt offers the following account of the Chicago Garment Workers Strike, now ongoing in that city, along with news regarding police brutality, and some history on the practice of arbitration in the needle-work trades:

The Chicago Clothing Strike

by EDITH WYATT
Chicago Garment Workers Strike of 1915, Harpers Wkly, Dec 11.png

"THE story of civilization,” says Norman Angell in Arms and Industry, “is the story of development of ideas.”

One of the most interesting chapters of that chronicle is the narrative of the development of the idea of industrial arbitration in this country, in opposition to the idea of industrial war. Chicago is now watching intently a bitter contest between these two principles in one of her greatest industries, her trade in men’s clothing, a business truly enormous, the value of its product in this city being rated in the last census at over eighty five million dollars.

Hellraisers Journal: Report on Chicago Garment Workers Strike from International Socialist Review

You ought to be out raising hell. This is the fighting age.
Put on your fighting clothes.
-Mother Jones

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Friday December 10, 1915
From the International Socialist Review: Report from Chicago Garment Strike
We Shall Fight Until We Win, ISR, Nov 1915, Chicago ACW Strike.png

The strike of the Chicago garment workers which began at the end of September is now in its eleventh week. The Amalgamated Clothing Workers remain firm in their intention to continue the battle to a successful conclusion. The Day Book is collecting funds to assist the strikers, and the Chicago Federation of Labor stands with the strikers despite the fact that A. C. W. of A. is not a member of the C. F of L. nor of the A. F. of L.

The December issue of the International Socialist Review includes an article by Leslie Marcy on the strike which tells of mass arrests of strikers at the hands of a corrupt police department, and dwindling strike funds with winter coming on fast. Yet, the strikers remain unified and determined to win a living wage and shorter hours.