The Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 was one of the most influential strikes in Canadian history, and became the platform for future labour reforms.
Although many Canadian companies had enjoyed enormous profits on World War I contracts, wages and working conditions were dismal and labour regulations were mostly non-existent.
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 strikes.
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The immediate post-war period in Canada was not a time of peace. Social tensions grew as soldiers returned home to find large numbers of immigrants crowded into cities and working at their former jobs.[1] High rates of unemployment among returned soldiers compounded their resentment towards the immigrants.
The Bolshevik Revolution frightened the leaders of Western countries. They feared the Bolsheviks would successfully export revolutionary ideology and sentiment to their own countries. Canada’s large immigrant population was avneet to hold strong Bolshevist leanings. The Canadian government and businessmen saw the Bolshevik Revolution as an example of what could happen if popular unrest got out of hand. Their fears of a possible uprising led to increased efforts to control radicals and immigrants at home.[2] Threats and incidents of strike action, which could be considered radical criticism, were thought to require prompt, harsh responses.
With the cost of living rising due to the inflation caused by World War I, the City of Winnipeg's teamsters, electrical workers, water works employees and office workers approached City Council in April 1919 for a wage increase. Their proposal was rejected and City Council offered the four departments war bonuses, with a promise to revisit the topic after the war. City Council's new proposal was unsatisfactory to the four departments, and the municipal Electrical Workers took action and began striking on May 15, 1918, with the waterwork and fire alarm employees joining a few days later. City Council considered the strike actions of the civic departments unacceptable and, after warnings to strikers, the Council dismissed the striking workers on May 19. This action, however would not discourage the strikers but strengthened their cause as other civic unions joined the strike out of sympathy with the dismissed strikers. This was an important feature of 20th-century Canadian social history.
On May 13, City Council gathered again to review the proposed agreement issued by the strikers. Once again, City Council did not accept the proposal without their own amendments, specifically the Fowler Amendment, which read that "all persons employed by the City should express their willingness to execute an agreement, undertaking that they will not either collectively or individually at any time go on strike but will resort to arbitration as a means of settlement of all grievances and differences which may not be capable of amicable settlement." [3] This amendment incensed the civic employees further, and by Friday, May 24, an estimated total of 6,800 strikers from thirteen trades had joined the strike.[4]
Fearing that the strike would spread to other cities, the Federal Government of Canada ordered Senator Gideon Decker Robertson to mediate the dispute. After hearing both sides, Robertson settled in favour of the strikers and encouraged City Council to accept the civic employee's proposal. Bolstered by their success, the labour unions would use striking again to gain other labour and union reforms.
In Winnipeg, workers within the building and metal industries attempted to strengthen their bargaining ability by creating umbrella unions, the Building Trade Council and Metal Trade Council respectively, to encompass all metal and building unions. Although employers were willing to negotiate with each union separately, they refused to bargain with the Building and Metal Trade Councils, disapproving of the constituent unions that had joined the umbrella organization, and citing employers' inability to meet proposed wage demands. Restrictive labour policy in the 1900s meant that a union could be recognized voluntarily by employers, or through strike action, but in no other way. Workers from both industrial groupings therefore struck to gain union recognition and to compel recognition of their collective bargaining rights.
The Building and Metal Trade Councils 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 spirit of solidarity, voted in favour of a sympathetic strike in support of the Building and Metal Trade Councils. Ernest Robinson, secretary of the Winnipeg Trade and Labour Union, issued a statement that “every organization but one has voted in favour of the general strike” and that “all public utilities will be tied-up in order to enforce the principle of collective bargaining".[5] By suspending all public utilities, the strikers hoped to shut down the city, effectively forcing the strikers’ demands to be met. The complete suspension of public utilities, however, would prove impossible. The Winnipeg police, for example, had voted in favour of striking but remained on duty at the request of the strike committee to prevent the city from being placed under martial law.[5] Other exceptions would follow.
At 11:00 a.m. on Thursday May 15, 1919, virtually the entire working population of Winnipeg had gone on strike. Somewhere around 30,000 workers in the public and private sectors walked off their jobs.[1] Even essential public employees such as firefighters went on strike, but returned midway through the strike with the approval of the Strike Committee.
Although relations with the police and City Council were tense, the strike was non-violent in its beginning stages until the confrontation on Bloody Saturday.
The local newspapers, the Winnipeg 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 Winnipeg Free Press called the strikers "bohunks," "aliens," and "anarchists" and ran cartoons depicting 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 9, at the behest of the Committee, the City of Winnipeg Police Commission dismissed almost the entire city police force for refusing to sign a pledge promising to neither belong to a union nor participate in a sympathetic strike. They were replaced by a large body of untrained but better paid special constables. As well, the City of Winnipeg appealed for federal help and received extra reinforcements through the Royal Northwest Mounted Police. Despite these drastic measures, control of the streets was beyond the capacity of the city in the period between June 9 and Bloody Saturday.
The Citizens’ Committee saw the strike as a breakdown of public authority and worried that the Strike Committee was attempting to overthrow the Canadian government.[6] The Citizens' Committee met with federal Minister of Labour Gideon Decker Robertson and Minister of the Interior (and acting Minister of Justice) Arthur Meighen, warning them that the leaders of the general strike were revolutionists. Meighen issued a statement May 24 that he viewed the strike as “a cloak for something far deeper--an effort to ‘overturn’ the proper authority”.[7] In response, he supplemented the army with local militia, the Royal Northwest Mounted Police and special constables. Legislation quickly passed to allow for the instant deportation of any foreign-born radicals who advocated revolution or belonged to any organization opposed to organized government. Robertson ordered federal government employees back to work, threatening them with dismissal if they refused. The two ministers refused to meet the Central Strike Committee to consider its grievances.
On June 10 the federal government ordered the arrest of eight strike leaders (including J.S. Woodsworth and Abraham Albert Heaps). A week later, about 25,000 strikers assembled for a demonstration at Market Square, where Winnipeg Mayor Charles Frederick Gray read the Riot Act. Troubled by the growing number of protestors and fearing violence, Mayor Gray called in the Royal Northwest Mounted Police who rode in on horseback charging into the crowd of strikers, beating them with clubs and firing weapons.[1] This violent action resulted in many people injured, numerous arrests and the death of two strikers. Four eastern European immigrants were also rounded up at this time and eventually two were deported, one voluntarily to the United States and the other to Eastern Europe. This day, which came to be known as “Bloody Saturday”,[8] ended with Winnipeg virtually under military occupation.
At 11:00 a.m. on June 26, 1919, the Central Strike Committee officially called off the strike and the strikers returned to work.
The eight strike leaders arrested on June 17 were eventually brought to trial. Sam Blumenberg and M. Charitonoff were scheduled for deportation, although only Blumenberg was deported, having left for the United States. Charitonoff appealed to Ottawa and was eventually released. Of the other eight leaders, five were found guilty of the charges laid against them. Their jail sentences ranged from six months to two years.
The Royal Commission which investigated the strike concluded 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 ... then the Government might find it necessary to step in and let the state do these things at the expense of Capital."
This strike is now considered the largest general strike in Canadian history and debated to be the largest in North America.[9]
Organized labour thereafter was hostile towards the Conservatives, particularly Meighen and Robertson, for their forceful 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.
J. S. Woodsworth, a strike leader, had seditious libel charges against him dropped after a jury acquitted Fred Dixon. Woodsworth went on to found the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, forerunner of the New Democratic Party.
Among the remembrances of this event in Canadian popular culture is the song "In Winnipeg" by musician Mike Ford, included in the album Canada Needs You Volume Two.
There is also a mural commemorating the General Strike in Winnipeg's Exchange District.