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The California agricultural strikes of 1933 were a series of strikes by agricultural workers in the U.S. state of California in 1933. More than 47,500 workers were involved in the wave of approximately 30 strikes. Twenty-four of the strikes, involving 37,500 union members, were led by the Cannery and Agricultural Workers' Industrial Union (CAWIU). The strikes are grouped together because most of them were organized by the CAWIU. Strike actions began in August among cherry, grape, peach, pear, sugar beet, and tomato workers, and culminated in a number of strikes against cotton growers in the San Joaquin Valley in October. The cotton strikes involved the largest number of workers. Sources vary as to numbers involved in the cotton strikes, with some sources claiming 18,000 workers and others just 12,000 workers. Striking workers were evicted from company housing, and growers and many of their managerial staff were deputized by local law enforcement. Attacks by employers on peaceful striking workers were common. In one attack in the town of Pixley, California, two workers were killed and eight others wounded. CAWIU organizers Pat Chambers and Caroline Decker were arrested and charged under the California Criminal Syndicalism Act for their labor organizing activities. ==Culmination: The cotton strikes of October 1933== Cotton growers in the San Joaquin Valley relied on extremely low labor costs to make their crop pay. Although California cotton growers paid marginally better than cotton growers in other states, wages for cotton pickers in California had declined significantly from $1.50 per hundred pounds in 1928 to just 40 cents per hundred pounds in 1932 (although the rate could go as high as 60 cents per hundred pounds for ground being picked over a second or third time). Wages for cotton pickers in the San Joaquin Valley were set by the Agricultural Labor Bureau, an employers' organization. The Cannery and Agricultural Workers' Industrial Union had been organizing in the cotton fields for some time, and by 1933 had come to provide leadership for the cotton pickers, most of whom were Mexican. The CAWIU was militant in its demands, and threatened a valley-wide strike if they were not met. These demands included a wage rate of $1.00 per hundred pounds of cotton picked, recognition of the CAWIU as the workers' collective bargaining agent, and abolition of "contract labor" (the contracting of a large group of workers for a one-time job or for seasonal labor). These demands were made in practically every cotton strike which followed in 1933. The cotton strikes in the San Joaquin Valley began on October 4, 1933, with the establishment of picket lines by workers at the work site: "At the Camp. West and Lowe ranch, the pickets were uncommunicative, but it was learned through their captain that the picketers are organized for shifts continuing throughout twenty-four hours. All wore signs reading 'This ranch under strike.'" The ''Los Angeles Times'' reported that the rationale for the strikes was to obtain "a rate increase of 40 cents a hundred pounds for picketers over the rate established at the recent meeting of the San Joaquin Valley Agricultural Bureau, and which cotton growers throughout Kern county agreed to support. The rate as established is 60 cents per hundred pounds."〔 Three days into the protests, the cotton growers became concerned that their cotton crop was not going to be picked at its peak value, and that angry workers would destroy their crops or harm workers who engaged in strikebreaking. Two days later, the strike turned violent and workers were evicted from company housing. in Tulare County, armed men employed by the growers clashed with striking workers and CAWIU labor organizers, and CAWIU staff were forcibly ejected out of the county. Growers in Kings, Fresno, Madera, Merced Stanislaus, and San Luis Obispo counties armed themselves and their employees, announcing they would drive off any troublemakers. In Kern County, about 200 strikers and their families were evicted from their employer-owned cottages, their belongings dumped on the road, and told to get out of the county or face trouble. Tensions reached a peak on October 10 in Pixley when about 30 ranchers surrounded a meeting of striking workers. The ranchers fired on the strikers, killing three and wounded a number of others. That same day, a group of striking grape pickers faced a group of armed growers' men at a farm near Arvin, California, about south of Pixley. After several hours confronting one another at the border of the employer's land, the two sides began attacking each other (the workers armed with wooden poles, the growers' men using the butt of their rifles). A shot rang out and a striking worker was killed. A sheriff's deputy threw a tear gas grenade at the group, and the growers' men opened fire. Several strikers were wounded. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「California agricultural strikes of 1933」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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