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A History of the American Worker #1
The Lean Years: A History of the American Worker, 1920-1933
“Pre-eminent among historians of labor history.” —Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.
The textbook history of the 1920s is a story of Prohibition, flappers, and unbounded prosperity. For millions of industrial workers, however, the “roaring twenties” looked very different. Working-class communities were already in crisis in the years before the stock market crash of 1929. Strikes in the 1920s and attempts to organize the unemployed and fight evictions in the early 1930s often fell victim to police violence and repression.
Here, Irving Bernstein recaptures the social history of the decade leading up to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s inauguration, uncovers its widespread inequality, and sheds light on the long-forgotten struggles that form the prelude to the great labor victories of the 1930s.
"In other words, viewed from afar, most of the people who were suffering the hardships of the Depression were depressed and even ashamed, ready to blame themselves for their plight. But the train of developments that connects changes in social conditions to a changed consciousness is not simple. People, including ordinary people, harbor somewhere in their memories the building blocks of different and contradictory interpretations of what it is that is happening to them, of who should be blamed, and what can be done about it. Even the hangdog and ashamed unemployed worker who swings his lunch box and strides down the street so the neighbors will think he is going to a job can also have other ideas that only have to be evoked, and when they are make it possible for him on another day to rally with others and rise up in anger at his condition.
—From the new introduction by Frances Fox Piven
The textbook history of the 1920s is a story of Prohibition, flappers, and unbounded prosperity. For millions of industrial workers, however, the “roaring twenties” looked very different. Working-class communities were already in crisis in the years before the stock market crash of 1929. Strikes in the 1920s and attempts to organize the unemployed and fight evictions in the early 1930s often fell victim to police violence and repression.
Here, Irving Bernstein recaptures the social history of the decade leading up to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s inauguration, uncovers its widespread inequality, and sheds light on the long-forgotten struggles that form the prelude to the great labor victories of the 1930s.
"In other words, viewed from afar, most of the people who were suffering the hardships of the Depression were depressed and even ashamed, ready to blame themselves for their plight. But the train of developments that connects changes in social conditions to a changed consciousness is not simple. People, including ordinary people, harbor somewhere in their memories the building blocks of different and contradictory interpretations of what it is that is happening to them, of who should be blamed, and what can be done about it. Even the hangdog and ashamed unemployed worker who swings his lunch box and strides down the street so the neighbors will think he is going to a job can also have other ideas that only have to be evoked, and when they are make it possible for him on another day to rally with others and rise up in anger at his condition.
—From the new introduction by Frances Fox Piven
592 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1960
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About the author
Irving Bernstein
30 booksIrving Bernstein was an American professor of political science at the University of California, Los Angeles and a noted labor historian.
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September 2, 2022
On May 19, 1920, a group of coal miners in Matewan, West Virginia, fought a gun battle with members of the Baldwin-Felts Detective Agency, a notorious firm of strikebreakers. Sent in response to efforts by the United Mine Workers (UMW) to unionize the coal miners of Mingo County, the detectives were on their way to the train station after evicting families from the coal camp just outside of town when they were stopped by the town’s chief of police, Sid Hatfield, and a group of deputized miners, who had arrived to serve a warrant on the lead detective, Albert Felts. When Felts produced a warrant of his own for Hatfield’s arrest, the town’s mayor dismissed it as bogus, at which point the two sides began exchanging gunfire. By the time it was over, Felts, the mayor, and eight others were dead, and five others wounded.
The events in Matewan – known variously as the Battle of Matewan, or the Matewan Massacre – proved the opening round in a conflict between coal miners and mine operators in the region that would continue over the next year and a half. It ended in a major defeat for the miners, one that, as Irving Bernstein demonstrates, proved a foretaste of the years that followed. Though remembered today as the “Roaring Twenties,” for millions of American workers the 1920s was a decade that posed numerous economic and political challenges, many of which were only exacerbated by the onset of the Great Depression at the end of the decade. Bernstein’s book is a wide-ranging examination of this period in labor history, one that identifies these challenges and the efforts by workers to overcome them, most of which proved in vain.
Bernstein divides his examination of these years into two parts. In the first one, he describes the challenges facing American workers in an ostensible age of prosperity. Though the economy thrived throughout much of the 1920s, the benefits of this were mainly enjoyed by those at the top. Instead of prospering, blue-collar workers found themselves squeezed by a combination of mechanization and the continuing migration of rural Americans to the cities. What leverage they might have enjoyed from the growth in labor unions over the previous two decades had been eroded by the anti-union crackdowns during World War I and in the “Red Scare” that followed. Most public officials continued to view organized labor with hostility, with federal court decisions – particularly those from the staunchly conservative Supreme Court – invalidating pro-labor laws and supporting efforts to defeat labor protests. In response, most labor leaders adapted to this unfavorable environment by seeking cooperation rather than conflict with management, which was met tepidly by employers and which did nothing to arrest the decline in union membership.
The election of the moderately sympathetic Herbert Hoover to the presidency in 1928 seemingly heralded an improvement in the beleaguered status of American labor. Instead, the economy soon embarked upon a long period of contraction that only worsened the plight of workers. The woefully inadequate relief system, which existed mainly at the local and private level, found itself overwhelmed by the demand. With millions thrown out of work, organized labor found itself on the brink of extinction. And with a growing number of people demanding greater action from the federal government, Hoover responded cautiously with only modest proposals that were wholly inadequate to the scale of the problem. By 1931 American workers were in crisis, with growing signs of discontent and frustration with the lack of action. Though conservatives feared and Communists hoped this would translate into revolutionary action, Bernstein notes that most workers were too desperate to think of revolution. What they wanted was work, and while this was not forthcoming a growing number of Americans were convinced by the end of 1932 of the need for change, one that would drive dramatic changes for American workers in the years to come.
Bernstein’s book is a remarkably comprehensive survey of its subject. Though the plight of unions is a major part of his story, he makes it clear that his book is not a history of unionism but of the workers themselves and their place in American life. Uncovering this is no easy feat, and to accomplish his task Bernstein draws upon a considerable range of statistical data, contemporary reportage, and government studies to gain his insights into such a broad segment of the nation. This helped to make his book a classic of American labor history, one that remains the best account of his subject and which still rewards reading today, especially for the echoes within it of the challenges facing American workers today.
The events in Matewan – known variously as the Battle of Matewan, or the Matewan Massacre – proved the opening round in a conflict between coal miners and mine operators in the region that would continue over the next year and a half. It ended in a major defeat for the miners, one that, as Irving Bernstein demonstrates, proved a foretaste of the years that followed. Though remembered today as the “Roaring Twenties,” for millions of American workers the 1920s was a decade that posed numerous economic and political challenges, many of which were only exacerbated by the onset of the Great Depression at the end of the decade. Bernstein’s book is a wide-ranging examination of this period in labor history, one that identifies these challenges and the efforts by workers to overcome them, most of which proved in vain.
Bernstein divides his examination of these years into two parts. In the first one, he describes the challenges facing American workers in an ostensible age of prosperity. Though the economy thrived throughout much of the 1920s, the benefits of this were mainly enjoyed by those at the top. Instead of prospering, blue-collar workers found themselves squeezed by a combination of mechanization and the continuing migration of rural Americans to the cities. What leverage they might have enjoyed from the growth in labor unions over the previous two decades had been eroded by the anti-union crackdowns during World War I and in the “Red Scare” that followed. Most public officials continued to view organized labor with hostility, with federal court decisions – particularly those from the staunchly conservative Supreme Court – invalidating pro-labor laws and supporting efforts to defeat labor protests. In response, most labor leaders adapted to this unfavorable environment by seeking cooperation rather than conflict with management, which was met tepidly by employers and which did nothing to arrest the decline in union membership.
The election of the moderately sympathetic Herbert Hoover to the presidency in 1928 seemingly heralded an improvement in the beleaguered status of American labor. Instead, the economy soon embarked upon a long period of contraction that only worsened the plight of workers. The woefully inadequate relief system, which existed mainly at the local and private level, found itself overwhelmed by the demand. With millions thrown out of work, organized labor found itself on the brink of extinction. And with a growing number of people demanding greater action from the federal government, Hoover responded cautiously with only modest proposals that were wholly inadequate to the scale of the problem. By 1931 American workers were in crisis, with growing signs of discontent and frustration with the lack of action. Though conservatives feared and Communists hoped this would translate into revolutionary action, Bernstein notes that most workers were too desperate to think of revolution. What they wanted was work, and while this was not forthcoming a growing number of Americans were convinced by the end of 1932 of the need for change, one that would drive dramatic changes for American workers in the years to come.
Bernstein’s book is a remarkably comprehensive survey of its subject. Though the plight of unions is a major part of his story, he makes it clear that his book is not a history of unionism but of the workers themselves and their place in American life. Uncovering this is no easy feat, and to accomplish his task Bernstein draws upon a considerable range of statistical data, contemporary reportage, and government studies to gain his insights into such a broad segment of the nation. This helped to make his book a classic of American labor history, one that remains the best account of his subject and which still rewards reading today, especially for the echoes within it of the challenges facing American workers today.
September 3, 2016
Irving Bernstein was a professor of political science at UCLA. His early work focused on New Deal labor policy, the arbitration of wage disputes, use of the Taft-Hartley Act to suppress strikes, and the economics of the motion picture industry.
In 1960, he published The Lean Years: A History of the American Worker, 1920-1933, the first in a trilogy that focused on the American labor movement from the end of World War I to the beginning of World War II. The book won widespread acclaim. In 1969, he followed it up with The Turbulent Years: A History of the American Worker, 1933-1941 , which focused on union growth under the New Deal. The third book, A Caring Society: The New Deal, the Worker, and the Great Depression: A History of the American Worker, 1933-1941 , was issued in 1985 and was much less well received (one critic said it was "neither fresh nor complete").
Labor history in the United States, as an academic discipline, had in its early years been defined by scholars such as John R. Commons, Philip Taft, and Richard T. Ely from an institutional and economic perspective. That is, the focus was on national forces like economics, and on institutions like labor unions. Bernstein, following in the footsteps of Selig Perlman, focused less on marco-level forces and institutions and more on individual workers. Unlike Perlman, Bernstein did not bring a Marxist theoretical approach to his study of class. And, unlike Perlman, Berstein understood that race, status, ethnicity, and other sociological factors had as much impact as class on workers.
Bernstein's focus is on the post-World War I period because it is the first "normal" period for American labor following the great advances made during the war. From the Civil War to 1915, American workers had suffered immensely under Gilded Age robber-barons. Leftist political philosophies like socialism were increasingly widely held by manual laborers, even as the state and business worked ever-more-closely to suppress collective action. The great strikes of the period, like the national rail strike of 1877, the Homestead strike of 1892, and the Pullman strike of 1894, were all suppressed with the use of military force -- as various state militias, and even the U.S Army, stamped out strike activity. Even when federal legislation outlawed abuses like the strike injunction, courts gutted these laws and imposed a radical notion of contract on workers.
The American labor movement was moribund and all but dead when World War I broke out. Because it was essential to keep production going, President Woodrow Wilson understood that it was critical to placate labor. While labor unions (institutions) were down and out, workers were not -- and they understood the power they could wield during wartime if they struck or threatened to strike. Subsequently, the War Labor Act forced employers to accept labor unions and unionized workers for the duration of the war.
But after the end of the war in 1918, Congress refused to implement a peacetime labor policy. With Wilson crippled by a stroke and his successor, Warren G. Harding, a president wedded to the "old school" style of worker suppression, the gains made by the American labor movement swiftly faded away.
But workers, having had a taste of what unions could do for them, would not fade away as quietly.
This is where Bernstein's emphasis on workers, rather than institutions, proves so critical. Unions (institutions) made no gains during the Roaring Twenties. But workers became increasingly restless as the massive economic growth of the 1920s left them with nothing. Although workers tried to form self-help collective organizations (unions), they often failed. That didn't mean that they did not try. And their failures were almost always due to the heavy repressive tools which business had at its disposal. Bernstein shows how the heavy-handed response by business was necessary, as workers became increasingly sophisticated and confident and came ever-closer to achieving their goals.
Although it's barely remembered today, American unions (institutions) were riven by a major philosophical difference in the 1920s and 1930s. Many labor unions had collapsed under repressive employer tactics in the 1870s. Even the massive Knights of Labor, a national coalition of unions and workers, collapsed. In 1881, cigarmakers' union president Samuel Gompers essentially saved the American labor movement by forming the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions. This organization, which became the American Federation of Labor in 1886, essentially abandoned the worker. Gompers argued that only highly-skilled workers had the community of interest to resist the employer's repressive tactics. It was also hard to replace highly-skilled workers, which forced the employer into a Hobson's choice: Destroy the union, but at the cost of destroying the business. Gompers proved correct, and any union successes from 1881 to 1929 were largely because the AFL unions adopted Gompers' "craft union" philosophy. (That craft unionism had the side-effect of organizing only the highest-paid workers, who could afford to pay high dues, was noted but not really the reason for adopting craft unionism.)
But as Bernstein points out, two changes completely undermined craft unionism. The first was the sudden (yes, it was sudden) shift away from the use of highly-skilled workers toward the use of mass production and its focus on unskilled workers. While some industries (e.g., coal mining) had always used unskilled labor, the shift toward mass production saw not only a massive increase in the number of workers but also a massive increase in the number of unskilled workers. The shift dramatically affected workers, as Bernstein observes. Unskilled workers had always been treated more harshly by employers. But now, vastly more workers were unskilled -- essentially creating a huge underclass of mistreated people. Working conditions in the mass production industries (steel, automobiles, rubber, textiles) were horrific, and worsening.
The second great change was the Great Depression. Workers were fed the myth that "anyone can make it big in America" (unlike class-riven Europe). Workers were fed the myth that merit was rewarded. Workers were fed the myth that hard work and sacrifice could lead to a better life. The Great Depression exposed this myth as a complete lie. There was no hope for a better life. The only hope lay in fundamentally changing the nature of the economic system -- in other words, taking power (and profits) from the employer and putting it in the hands of workers.
The AFL, wedded to craft unionism, refused -- and that is the correct term -- to even attempt to organize mass production workers. But as Bernstein points out, this did not stop workers from organizing themselves, much of the time outside the existing institutional structures. That workers failed is irrelevant: They were using the lessons learned in the 1920s, and only the extreme repressive tactics of employers, many of whom had large private armies outfitted with machine-guns, tear gas bombs, and fire hoses, kept workers from succeeding.
Thus, Bernstein points out, America in 1933 was on the verge of civil war. The plight of the American worker -- essentially, the American voter -- was so bad, that workers were now willing to vote to upend the economic and political system. As employer repression of workers (not unions) worsened, workers increasingly took to the streets, and the ballot box, to not just remove the advantages that employers had but to remove the entire economic system (capitalism) that made business possible.
Revolution was in the air. There is absolutely no denying it. And Bernstein documents this "revolution from below" as it became more and more powerful from 1929 to 1933.
The battles which workers fought as this revolution occurred are nearly forgotten now, which is why Bernstein's book is so astonishing. He digs up the old histories, interviews the people, and creates memory where history had been forgotten. The stories he tells are astonishing for their violence, the missed chances, the large numbers of people involved.
And he does it with a clear, simple prose style that makes reading his histories a joy.
In 1960, he published The Lean Years: A History of the American Worker, 1920-1933, the first in a trilogy that focused on the American labor movement from the end of World War I to the beginning of World War II. The book won widespread acclaim. In 1969, he followed it up with The Turbulent Years: A History of the American Worker, 1933-1941 , which focused on union growth under the New Deal. The third book, A Caring Society: The New Deal, the Worker, and the Great Depression: A History of the American Worker, 1933-1941 , was issued in 1985 and was much less well received (one critic said it was "neither fresh nor complete").
Labor history in the United States, as an academic discipline, had in its early years been defined by scholars such as John R. Commons, Philip Taft, and Richard T. Ely from an institutional and economic perspective. That is, the focus was on national forces like economics, and on institutions like labor unions. Bernstein, following in the footsteps of Selig Perlman, focused less on marco-level forces and institutions and more on individual workers. Unlike Perlman, Bernstein did not bring a Marxist theoretical approach to his study of class. And, unlike Perlman, Berstein understood that race, status, ethnicity, and other sociological factors had as much impact as class on workers.
Bernstein's focus is on the post-World War I period because it is the first "normal" period for American labor following the great advances made during the war. From the Civil War to 1915, American workers had suffered immensely under Gilded Age robber-barons. Leftist political philosophies like socialism were increasingly widely held by manual laborers, even as the state and business worked ever-more-closely to suppress collective action. The great strikes of the period, like the national rail strike of 1877, the Homestead strike of 1892, and the Pullman strike of 1894, were all suppressed with the use of military force -- as various state militias, and even the U.S Army, stamped out strike activity. Even when federal legislation outlawed abuses like the strike injunction, courts gutted these laws and imposed a radical notion of contract on workers.
The American labor movement was moribund and all but dead when World War I broke out. Because it was essential to keep production going, President Woodrow Wilson understood that it was critical to placate labor. While labor unions (institutions) were down and out, workers were not -- and they understood the power they could wield during wartime if they struck or threatened to strike. Subsequently, the War Labor Act forced employers to accept labor unions and unionized workers for the duration of the war.
But after the end of the war in 1918, Congress refused to implement a peacetime labor policy. With Wilson crippled by a stroke and his successor, Warren G. Harding, a president wedded to the "old school" style of worker suppression, the gains made by the American labor movement swiftly faded away.
But workers, having had a taste of what unions could do for them, would not fade away as quietly.
This is where Bernstein's emphasis on workers, rather than institutions, proves so critical. Unions (institutions) made no gains during the Roaring Twenties. But workers became increasingly restless as the massive economic growth of the 1920s left them with nothing. Although workers tried to form self-help collective organizations (unions), they often failed. That didn't mean that they did not try. And their failures were almost always due to the heavy repressive tools which business had at its disposal. Bernstein shows how the heavy-handed response by business was necessary, as workers became increasingly sophisticated and confident and came ever-closer to achieving their goals.
Although it's barely remembered today, American unions (institutions) were riven by a major philosophical difference in the 1920s and 1930s. Many labor unions had collapsed under repressive employer tactics in the 1870s. Even the massive Knights of Labor, a national coalition of unions and workers, collapsed. In 1881, cigarmakers' union president Samuel Gompers essentially saved the American labor movement by forming the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions. This organization, which became the American Federation of Labor in 1886, essentially abandoned the worker. Gompers argued that only highly-skilled workers had the community of interest to resist the employer's repressive tactics. It was also hard to replace highly-skilled workers, which forced the employer into a Hobson's choice: Destroy the union, but at the cost of destroying the business. Gompers proved correct, and any union successes from 1881 to 1929 were largely because the AFL unions adopted Gompers' "craft union" philosophy. (That craft unionism had the side-effect of organizing only the highest-paid workers, who could afford to pay high dues, was noted but not really the reason for adopting craft unionism.)
But as Bernstein points out, two changes completely undermined craft unionism. The first was the sudden (yes, it was sudden) shift away from the use of highly-skilled workers toward the use of mass production and its focus on unskilled workers. While some industries (e.g., coal mining) had always used unskilled labor, the shift toward mass production saw not only a massive increase in the number of workers but also a massive increase in the number of unskilled workers. The shift dramatically affected workers, as Bernstein observes. Unskilled workers had always been treated more harshly by employers. But now, vastly more workers were unskilled -- essentially creating a huge underclass of mistreated people. Working conditions in the mass production industries (steel, automobiles, rubber, textiles) were horrific, and worsening.
The second great change was the Great Depression. Workers were fed the myth that "anyone can make it big in America" (unlike class-riven Europe). Workers were fed the myth that merit was rewarded. Workers were fed the myth that hard work and sacrifice could lead to a better life. The Great Depression exposed this myth as a complete lie. There was no hope for a better life. The only hope lay in fundamentally changing the nature of the economic system -- in other words, taking power (and profits) from the employer and putting it in the hands of workers.
The AFL, wedded to craft unionism, refused -- and that is the correct term -- to even attempt to organize mass production workers. But as Bernstein points out, this did not stop workers from organizing themselves, much of the time outside the existing institutional structures. That workers failed is irrelevant: They were using the lessons learned in the 1920s, and only the extreme repressive tactics of employers, many of whom had large private armies outfitted with machine-guns, tear gas bombs, and fire hoses, kept workers from succeeding.
Thus, Bernstein points out, America in 1933 was on the verge of civil war. The plight of the American worker -- essentially, the American voter -- was so bad, that workers were now willing to vote to upend the economic and political system. As employer repression of workers (not unions) worsened, workers increasingly took to the streets, and the ballot box, to not just remove the advantages that employers had but to remove the entire economic system (capitalism) that made business possible.
Revolution was in the air. There is absolutely no denying it. And Bernstein documents this "revolution from below" as it became more and more powerful from 1929 to 1933.
The battles which workers fought as this revolution occurred are nearly forgotten now, which is why Bernstein's book is so astonishing. He digs up the old histories, interviews the people, and creates memory where history had been forgotten. The stories he tells are astonishing for their violence, the missed chances, the large numbers of people involved.
And he does it with a clear, simple prose style that makes reading his histories a joy.
January 20, 2024
A dated (perhaps out-dated?) classic. Caught between the earlier style of institutionalist labor history of Commons et. al. and the coming "new" social history, Bernstein's book curiously leaves the workers out of the story at times. Still, his accounts of Taft-Hartley and the debates over unemployment insurance are definitive.
August 30, 2008
There isn't much that is readable about the history of unions. This book is brilliant and leaves some room for hope today as labor, flat on its back in the 15 years before the depression, was able to rise again. Of course, it took the great depression to do it.
July 25, 2021
A thorough overview of all things to do with the American worker from the roaring twenties to the inauguration of FDR. Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand why all segments of American society were so unprepared to respond to the Depression. Unfortunately, Bernstein's rapid liberal anti-communism, a product of the Cold War, causes him to have major blind spots. Communists never develop genuine connections with the people they want to mobilize; they only ever infiltrate, any success a product of their devious machinations.
October 12, 2020
This is a remarkable survey of labor and unemployment relief laws and the political will that both fueled and hampered their enactment in the ‘20s and early ‘30s. Would give it 4 stars were the terminology and notions of equality not so outdated.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews