AJR40: Joint Resolution Text

LRB-2010/4

RAC:cjs&jld:jd

2015 - 2016 LEGISLATURE

2015 Assembly JOINT RESOLUTION 40

May 14, 2015 - Introduced by Representatives Sinicki, Brostoff, Mason, Ohnstad, Milroy, Kessler, Johnson, C. Taylor, Zamarripa, Sargent, Berceau, Subeck, Goyke, Spreitzer, Barca, Pope, Genrich, Young, Riemer, Zepnick, Barnes and Bowen, cosponsored by Senators C. Larson, Carpenter, L. Taylor, Harris Dodd, Wirch, Bewley and Vinehout. Referred to Committee on Rules.

AJR40,1,1 Relating to: commemorating the Bay View labor strike and tragedy.

AJR40,1,6 Whereas, Wisconsin workers and reformers have long made important contributions in the history of labor in the United States, having helped enact new state laws early in the 20th century such as Worker's Compensation and Unemployment Insurance, that, in turn, were adopted by other states and the federal government; and

AJR40,1,9 Whereas, decades earlier, in the late 1800s, workers were still struggling to attain basic rights in the workplace, and still generally labored at physically punishing jobs for 10 to 12 hours a day, six days a week; and

AJR40,1,12 Whereas, in the 1880s, workers in Milwaukee began, like others in Chicago and across the country, to advocate for the eight-hour work day, an early cornerstone of the basic bill of rights of all people in the workplace; and

AJR40,2,2 Whereas, facing no apparent efforts toward this reform on the part of employers, eventually workers' organizations across the nation called upon all workers to cease their labor if employers had not adopted a standard eight-hour work day by May 1, 1886; and

AJR40,2,5 Whereas, in Milwaukee, civil parades and demonstrations developed over the first five days of May, 1886, as workers peaceably and without violence joined the national work-stoppage to protest and abolish inhumane work hours; and

AJR40,2,9 Whereas, on May 2nd there was a huge Eight-Hour Day Parade that many German and Polish workers and their families walked in to the picnic grounds, and on May 3rd thousands of workers from the breweries and the building trades went on strikes and marched around from factory to factory; and

AJR40,2,13 Whereas, by May 5th, 1886, unrest among Milwaukee's laborers over the struggle for better work hours had led to more than a dozen strikes in the city, involving carpenters, coal heavers, sewer diggers, iron moulders, teamsters, common laborers, and other workers asking for humane work hours; and

AJR40,2,16 Whereas, the last grand factory in Milwaukee still in operation that day was the North Chicago Rolling Mill, in Bay View, which manufactured rails for the nation's railroads; and

AJR40,2,19 Whereas, on May 5th, despite the threat of violence from the state militia, a crowd of striking workers started to walk, peaceably and unarmed, to the Rolling Mill to enjoin workers there to participate in the general strike; and

AJR40,2,23 Whereas, despite the law-abiding nature of their procession, this group of walking laborers was fired upon by the state militia upon direct orders from Governor Jeremiah Rusk to do so, killing seven people and wounding four, including innocent bystanders; and

AJR40,3,2 Whereas, some   50 of those workers who marched that day and were fired upon were indicted on charges of rioting and conspiracy for merely exercising their right of freedom to assemble, and three of them eventually served six to nine months in prison; and

AJR40,3,7 Whereas, the infamous events of May 5th, 1886, will remain a part of Wisconsin's cultural and economic legacy forever, and should remind us in the present to honor the sacrifices our forebears made, including laying down their lives, so that all those who labor might lead safer and more productive work lives; now, therefore, be it

AJR40,3,12 Resolved by the assembly, the senate concurring, That the Wisconsin legislature recognizes the historic significance of this pivotal series of events in Wisconsin's and the nation's history, and directs that, from this day forward, the fifth day of May each year will be observed in our state as the anniversary of the Bay View Labor Strike and Tragedy.

AJR40,3,13 (End)