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Winnipeg general strike

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Crowd gathered outside old City Hall during the Winnipeg General Strike, June 21, 1919

The Winnipeg General Strike was Canada's most influential labour action. After World War I many Canadian soldiers returned home to find few opportunities, all while companies had enjoyed enormous profits on war contracts. Wages and working conditions were dismal and labour regulations were mostly non-existent. The Bolshevik revolution had just occurred in Russia and many workers saw this as an example of a successful socialist revolution.

In March 1919 labour delegates from across Western Canada convened in Calgary to form a branch of the "One Big Union," with the intention of earning rights for Canadian workers through a series of general strikes.

In Winnipeg, workers within the building and metal industries attempted to unionize by forming the Building Trade Council and Metal Trade Council respectively, but the management refused to negotiate. Due to the restrictions of labour policy in the 1900s a union could only be recognized voluntarily by employers or through strike action. Therefore, workers from both industries went on strike to gain union recognition.

The Building and Metal Trade Councils further appealed to the Trades and Labour Union the central union body representing the interests of many of Winnipeg's workers for support in their endeavours. The Trades and Labour Union in a show of union solidarity voted in favour of a sympathetic strike in support of the Building and Metal Trade Councils. By 11 AM on May 15, 1919, virtually the entire working population of Winnipeg had walked off the job. 30,000 to 35,000 people were on strike in a city of 200,000. Even essential public employees such as fire fighters went on strike, but returned midway through the strike with the approval of the Strike Committee. The Winnipeg Police were technically on strike but remained on patrol in practice.

The strike was generally non-violent. Relations with police were tense but generally did not result in clashes, although a young boy was accidentally killed early in the strike.

The newspapers were generally nothing short of hysterical. The local newspapers, the Manitoba Free Press and Winnipeg Tribune had lost the majority of their employees due to the strike and took a decidedly anti-strike stance. The New York Times front page proclaimed "Bolshevism Invades Canada." The Manitoba Free Press called the strikers "bohunks," "aliens," and anarchists and ran cartoons depicting hooked-nosed Jewish radicals throwing bombs. These anti-strike views greatly influenced the opinions of Winnipeg residents. However, the majority of the strikers were reformist, not revolutionary. They wanted to amend the system, not destroy it and build a new one.

A counter-strike Committee, the "Citizens' Committee of One Thousand" was created by Winnipeg's wealthy elite. The Committee declared the strike to be a violent, revolutionary conspiracy by a small group of foreigners. On June 21 the Committee dismissed most of the city's 200 police, replacing them with their own militia.

The Citizens' Committee met with federal Minister of Labour Gideon Decker Robertson and Minister of the Interior (and acting Minister of Justice) Arthur Meighen, warned them that the leaders of the general strike were revolutionists and demanding action. Robertson ordered federal government employees back to work threatening them with dismissal if they refused. Meighen had the Criminal Code of Canada amended to broaden the definition of sedition and also amended the Immigration Act to target British born radicals for deportation. The two ministers refused to meet the Central Strike Committee to consider its grievances.

On June 17 the federal government ordered the arrest of ten strike leaders (including J.S. Woodsworth and A.A. Heaps). Four days later strikers assembled at Market Square where the Mayor read the Riot Act. Royal North-West Mounted Police were sent and charged into a crowd of strikers beating them with clubs and firing weapons. Two were killed and at least 30 were injured in what became known as Bloody Saturday. Eastern European immigrants were rounded up and deported.

By June 25, 1919 the workers were gradually giving up and the Central Strike Committee decided to halt the strike.

The head of the Royal Commission which investigated the strike found that the strike was not a criminal conspiracy by foreigners and suggested that "if Capital does not provide enough to assure Labour a contented existence...Government might find it necessary [to intervene] and let the state do these things at the expense of Capital."

Organized labour thereafter was hostile towards the Conservatives, particularly Meighen and Robertson, for their forcefull role in putting down the strike. Combined with high tariffs in the federal budget passed in the same year which farmers disliked, this contributed to the Conservatives' heavy defeat in the 1921 election. The succeeding Liberal government, fearing the growing support for hard left elements, pledged to enact the labour reforms proposed by the Commission. In this way the Winnipeg General Strike can be said to have resulted in much improved working conditions for millions of Canadians. J.S. Woodsworth, a strike leader who was briefly imprisoned, would go on to found Canada's first socialist political party, and the forerunner of the NDP, the CCF.

See also

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