Today in labor history Mar 19 New York City moves to condemn and seize Fifth Avenue Coach

[Omaha Steve]

March 19

March 19, 1883 - The New York Memorial meeting for Karl Marx was held, chaired by P. J. McGuire, leader of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners and a founder of the American Federation of Labor.

March 19, 1920 - The Citizen’s Alliance of Ramsey & Dakota Counties was formed with the support of several large St. Paul corporations. Although the Citizens Alliance claimed its goal was "to preserve and perpetuate individual freedom," its real intention was "to maintain St. Paul as an open shop city by preventing the extension of unionism to trades not now organized." Citizen Alliance leaders said they had to uproot the "tree of class consciousness" planted by unions if freedom and industrial progress were to be preserved. Unlike the Citizens Alliance of Minneapolis, which thrived for decades and suppressed unions and workers' wages, the Citizens Alliance of Ramsey & Dakota Counties fell apart after a few years.

For more information, read these two excellent books:


A Union Against Unions: The Minneapolis Citizens Alliance and Its Fight Against Organized Labor, 1903-1947 by Bill Millikan, 2001, Minnesota Historical Society Press


Claiming the City: Politics, Faith and the Power of Place in St. Paul by Mary Wingerd, 2003, Cornell University Press


In an effort to block massive layoffs and end a strike, New York City moves to condemn and seize Fifth Avenue Coach, the largest privately owned bus company in the world - 1962