Mighty rise of unions in 1930s posed need for a labor party

Vol. 85/No. 23 - June 14, 2021
Sit-down strike by autoworkers in 1937 at General Motors in Flint, Michigan, was part of strike wave during 1930s Depression that built Congress of Industrial Organizations and posed need, and potential, for a party of labor to advance the class struggle onto the political plane.

One of Pathfinder’s Books of the Month for June is Teamster Politics by Farrell Dobbs. It tells how Teamsters Local 574 members in Minneapolis in 1934 during the Great Depression learned to wield their union power to win strikes. With…


‘Teamsters union treated owner-drivers as fellow workers’

Vol. 83/No. 45 - December 9, 2019
Truck drivers picket in Wilmington, California, Sept. 9, demanding NFI company bosses treat them as workers, not “contractors.” Farrell Dobbs explains how owner-operators, loaded by debt, are also exploited workers.

Teamster Politics by Farrell Dobbs is one of Pathfinder’s Books of the Month for November. It is the third volume of a four-part series on the history of that union during the giant labor battles of the 1930s. Dobbs emerged…