Society for Comparative Studies in Society and History
The Occupation of the Factories: Paris 1936, Flint 1937
Author(s): Michael Torigian
Reviewed work(s):
Source: Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 41, No. 2 (Apr., 1999), pp. 324-347
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The Occupation of the Factories:
Paris 1936, Flint 1937
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
The highest stage in the history of the labor movement came with the unionizationof the Fordist-Tayloristfactorysystem.' Neitherbeforenor since has labor achieveda comparableinfluence.In the UnitedStatesandFrance,this stage
was reached in the same period and throughroughly similar means. In June
1936, a massive wave of factory occupationsswept across the Paris metal industry,forcingemployersto introduceone of the world'smost progressivesystems of industrialrelations.Six months later, sit-in strikesin Flint, Michigan,
defeatedthe open shop at the GeneralMotorsCorporation,opening the way to
the subsequentunionizationof America's mass-productionsector. These two
events, the dominantpeaks in the historyof the modernlabormovement,have
rarelybeen viewed in the same light, yet they were partof a unique set of circumstancesaffectingnot merely the fate of unionism,but thatof industrialsociety.2
PARIS,
FLINT,
AND
RADICAL
LABOR
ACTION
Centralto strikesboth in Paris and Flint was an environmentfavoringradical
laboraction.Because the Parisoccupationscame first andthen set the standard
for the resultingoccupations,let us begin with them.TheWorldDepressioncreated the crucial backdropto "labor's giant step." Although it did not reach
Franceuntil 1931 and was qualitativelyless severe thanthe U.S. economic crisis, the French depression nonetheless shut down factories, sharpenedsocial
The concept of the "Fordist-Tayloristfactory system," first developed in Antonio Gramsci,
"Americanismand Fordism,"in Selectionsfrom the Prison Notebooks (New York:International
Publishers, 1971), 277-318, was popularizedin the 1970s by France's "regulationeconomists"
(Boyer,Aglietta,Lipietz, Coriat).It refersto those mass-productionmetal-fabricationplantsbased
on the assembly-linetechniquesdevised by HenryFordand managedaccordingto the "scientific"
principlesworkedout by FrederickWinslowTaylor.The U.S. autoindustryof the 1920s and 1930s
best exemplifies this form of production.
2 Most accounts of the Frenchand Americanoccupationsmake referenceto the other national
case, but the only actual attemptto comparethem is to be found in Sidney Fine, Sit-Down: The
General Motors Strikeof 1936-1937 (Ann Arbor:University of Michigan Press, 1969), 125-8.
Notwithstandinghis definitive study of the Flint occupations,Fine's treatmentof the Parisstrikes,
based on a few English language sources, examines only their generalcontours,not the structural
and contingentfactorslinking them with the Flint movement.Cf. Val R. Lorwin, "Reflectionson
the Historyof the FrenchandAmericanLaborMovements,"TheJournal of EconomicHistory, 17
(March 1957).
0010-4175/99/2501-1375$7.50 + . 10 ? 1999SocietyforComparative
Studyof SocietyandHistory
324
FACTORY OCCUPATION: PARIS 1936, FLINT 1937
325
conflict, and disrupted the nation's political life. The Depression's destabilizing effects were especially prominent after February 1934, when a series of violent right-wing demonstrations, fueled by the declining economy, threatened
the existence of the French republic. In response to these threats, the Confederation General du Travail (CGT) called a general strike to defend republican institutions and the Parti Communist Francais (PCF) rallied the left parties
in an anti-fascist alliance to ward off further attacks. The successful work stoppage of February 12 and the left alliance emerging from it had an immediate
and electrifying effect on French workers, rousing them as no other movement
or this century. In their eyes, the "republican union" linking the unions and the
progressive parties represented not merely a barrier to "fascism" but a possible
panacea to the various economic ills affecting the depressed factory system.3
Then, as the Radical, Socialist, and Communist parties affiliated with the republican union scored a sweeping victory in the legislative elections of
April and May in 1936 and won the right to form a Popular Front government,
working-class France began to anticipate a new deal in the shops.4 On May 11,
shortly before the installation of the new government, this anticipation took active form as aviation workers in the port city of Le Havre staged the first
overnight occupation in the French metal industry. After two days and nights
encamped in their plant, these workers succeeded in forcing their employer to
rehire several recently fired unionists and, without precedent, to pay wages lost
during the work stoppage. On the 13th in Toulouse and on the 14th in the Paris
Region, similar strikes led to similar results. At least two, perhaps all three, of
these occupations were instigated by Communist unionists, supported by the
left parties, who provided logistical supports, set up negotiations, and went unopposed by the caretaker government in Paris.5 Unbeknownst to their organizers and participants, these strikes were to serve as a dress rehearsal for the massive wave of factory occupations that was about to reshape the social contours
of French industry.6
3 For example, Henri Vieilledent, Souvenirsd' un TravailleurManuel Syndicaliste (Paris:La
Pensee Universelle, 1978), 218; L'Union des Metaux (CGT), October 1935.
4 "Les Conflits de Juin dans la Region Parisienne," Etudes: Revue
Catholique d'lnteret
Generale, December 5, 1936; Le Populaire (SFIO), May 28, 1936; L'AubeNouvelle (PCF), May
23, 1936.
5 The Communist-controlledMetal Union was firmly entrenchedat the Brequet plant in Le
Havre and at the Bloch plant in the ParisRegion. See Louis Eudier,"Brequet-LeHavre:Premiere
Occupationen 1936," Cahiers d'Histoire de l'lnstitut Maurice Thorez, 1 (NS) (November-September1972), andLa VoixPopulaire(PCF),March6, 1936. The situationin Toulouseis somewhat
moreopaque,but Daniel Browerin TheNew Jacobins: TheFrenchCommunistPartyand the Popular Front(Ithaca:CornellUniversityPress, 1968) suggests thatmetal workerstherehad been agitatedby local Communistsin the days leading up to the occupation.
6 The occupations are one of the few chaptersin Frenchlabor history that has attractedmore
than a modicum of scholarlyattention.Among the many works devoted to them, 1 would recommend Saloman Schwarz,"Les Occupationsd'Usines en Francede Mai et Juin 1936,"International Reviewfor Social History,2 (1937); JacquesDanos and MarcelGibelin,Juin 36, Nouvelle Edition (Paris: La Decouverte, 1986); Georges Lefranc, Juin 36: "L'ExplosionSocial" du Front
326
MICHAEL TORIGIAN
On May 24, in the lull following the initial occupations,one of the largest
and most imposingworking-classdemonstrationsin Frenchhistorytook place,
as 600,000 Parisiansmade the annualcommemorativemarchto the Mur des
Federes,where in 1871 the last of the Communardshad takentheirfinal stand.
This massive laborturnout,following in the wake of the electoraltriumphand
the evolving psychology in the plants,did not pass withoutconsequence.7Two
days later,while the shops and courtyardsof the Paris metal industrybustled
with agitation,4,000 metallos seized and occupied 6 factories. Each of these
occupationswas instigatedby militantsfromthe CGT'sParisMetalUnion, who
sought to capitalize on the favorablepolitical climate fosteredby the election
andthe march.8Supportedby the red municipalitiesof the Parissuburbs,which
fed and aided the strikers, the occupations quickly spread and on the 28th
reachedRenault,the largestauto makeroutside NorthAmerica.9Again, under
Communistinstigation, the Renault workers occupied their plant, elected a
strike committee, and drew up a list of demands,foremost of which was for
union recognition.At this point, as the occupationsassumedan imposing magnitude,employersagreedto go to the bargainingtables-on the conditionthat
the strikersevacuatethe factories.Against the reluctanceof many in the struck
plants, the Metal Union acceded to these conditions in the hope of winning a
contractthatwould institutionalizeits bargainingrights.In the ensuing negotiations,employerswere preparedto bow to every uniondemandexcept the most
important,for a contract.Then on June 2, afterconfrontingthe stymied talks,
Populaire (Paris:Julliard,1966); andAntoine Prost,"Les Gravesde Juin 1936, Essai d'lInterpretation,"in LdonBlum:Chefde Gouvernement1936-1937 (Paris:PFNSP,1967), P. Renouvinand R.
Remond,eds. Despite these and numerousother studies, thereis still a paucityof works on specific industrialsectors.This is especially the case with the Parismetalindustry,which constitutedboth
the axis of the strikemovementand the axle upon which the futurelabormovementwould turn.I
have triedto rightthis imbalancesomewhatin EvenrFactoryA Fortress:The FrenchLaborMovement in the Age of Ford and Hitler (Athens:Ohio UniversityPress, 1999).
7 Pierre Monatte, La Lutte Syndicale (Paris: Maspero, 1976), 226; Saloman Schwarz, "Die
Okkupationsstreikin Frankreichim Sommer 1936"(TypescriptMS, Hoover InstitutionArchives,
n.d.), 28.
8 This point is bound to be challenged, for the reigning orthodoxyholds that the strikes were
purely spontaneous.Given the paucityof Frenchlaborstudies and the scant knowledge of specific federations,most historianshave examinedthe Juneoccupationswithoutreferenceto earliersitdowns and without recognitionof the real forces involved. For a correctiveto this view, see my
"FromGuineaPig to Prototype:CommunistLabourPolicy in the ParisMetal Industry,1922-35,"
Journal of ContemporaryHistory, 34 (October 1997). Cf. BertrandBadie, "Les Greves du Front
Sociale, 81 (October-December 1972); Herrick
Populaire aux Usines Renault,"Le Mouvemnent
Chapman,State Capitalismand Working-ClassRadicalismin the FrenchAircraftIndustry(Berkeley: Universityof CaliforniaPress, 1991); and Michael Seidman,WorkersAgainst Work:Labor in
Paris and Barcelona duringthe Popular Fronts (Berkeley:Universityof CaliforniaPress, 1991).
9 MauriceMoissonnier,"1936:Les Greves d'Occupationdes Usines,"Les Cahiersde l'lnstitut
CGTd'Histoire Sociale, 19 (September 1986), 13-14. If the Paris metal industrywas the storm
center of the subsequentoccupations,the Renaultauto works formed its eye. A key work on Renault and one of the best treatmentsof French Communistunionism is Jean-PaulDepretto and
Sylvie V. Schweitzer,Le Communismea l'Usine: VieOuvriereetMouvementOuvrierchez Renault
1920-1939 (Paris:EDIRES, 1984).
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
PARIS
1936,
FLINT
1937
327
metal workersspontaneouslyresumedthe battlepositions abandonedjust days
before. By nightfall, 150,000 metallos, half the industry'sworkforce,had occupied their factories. Carriedout in a calm and disciplined mannerby workers who took a festive view of the novel work stoppage,the strikesat this stage
began to affect othertradesandregions, takingon the dynamicof a mass movement. Significantly,the movement'sextension was neitherinitiatednor authorized by the CGT leadershipbut proliferatedthroughcontagion, as workers
sensed the propitiousnessfor remedyingdeep-rootedgrievances.
By the time Leon Blum's PopularFrontgovernmentwas installedon June5,
morethana half million Frenchworkerswere on strike,most ensconcedin their
factories and work sites. From the first, the new premierresisted rightist demandsfor force and committedhimself to a peaceful resolutionof the conflict.
This left employers,who were beginningto fear thatthe strikeswere assuming
a revolutionarydimensionwith little choice but to settle. On the evening of the
7th, government,CGT, and employer representativesdrew up what was to be
known as the MatignonAgreement,grantingunion recognition,a hefty wage
hike, a system of shop stewards,as well as the principleof the forty-hourweek
and the two-week paid vacation, both of which the Chamberof Deputies was
aboutto enact.The unprecedentedagreement,accordingFrenchworkersrights
andbenefits enjoyedby no otherworkingclass, failed, however,to haltthe burgeoning movement.The strikewave in fact continuedto swell. By the 9th, the
work stoppageembracedtwo million workers,a quarterof the Frenchworking
class. While the strikes at this date had extended well beyond the Paris metal
industry,its auto, aircraft,and mechanical-engineeringworkersremainedthe
vanguardof the movement.Everyattemptby the CGTMetalUnion to persuade
these workersto accept a compromisefailed, spurringstrikersin othersectors.
Finally,as the governmentfounderedandthe crisis deepened,the top PCFleadership, worriedthat the strikes were startingto underminethe PopularFront,
the centerpiece of its concerns, decided to intervene against them. On the
evening of the 11th,partychief MauriceThorezorderedCommunists,the only
ones with any authorityin the occupied plants, to push for a cessation of the
conflict.'? The next day, in direct responseto Thorez's appeal,delegates from
the occupied metal plants agreed to evacuate the factories on the basis of the
employers'latest concessions. While the settlementin the Parismetal industry
did not immediatelyhalt the movementin other sectors, it signaled the beginning of the end. By the time the remainingconflicts were resolved, well over
half the Frenchworkingclass had flocked to the CGT;its unionshad been for'o L'Humanite(PCF), June 12 and 13, 1936. Thorez'sorderscandalizedthe far left. As one Socialist lamented, "The Revolution, which was there within arm's reach, has just been betrayed."
See MauriceJacquier,SimpleMilitant (Paris:Denoel, 1974), 98. The PCF's left wing felt a similar sense of betrayal.See Ole Faire?, July 1936. Also PierreBroue and Nicole Dorey, "Critiques
de Gauche et Opposition Revolutionnaireau Front Populaire,"Le MouvementSociale, 4 (January-March 1966).
328
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
mally recognized by the employers;and the labor confederation,transformed
from a pariahgroupinto a power structure,was henceforthacknowledgedas a
majorplayerin the nation's affairs.
The Flint occupations(or sit-downstrikes)were somewhatdifferentin character but had an analogouseffect on labor relations.Priorto the formationof
John L. Lewis's Committee of IndustrialOrganization(CIO) in November
1935, U.S. industrialworkershad lacked a truechampionand organizedlabor
remainedan "arrestedmovement."" Lewis' CIO changedall this, releasingan
energyunknownin U.S. laborhistory.12In the summerof 1936, the CIO'sUnited AutomobileWorkers(UAW) hiredfifteen organizersand mobilized several
hundredrank-and-fileactivistsin a concertedeffortto unionize the auto industry.13The principaltargetof the union's organizingcampaignwas GeneralMotors (GM), the largestand most importantof the auto makers.Like CIO efforts
in other industries,the effort in auto focused on the upcomingelection.'4 The
presidentialand state-wide races of 1936 assumed, as a result, a significance
similarto the greatpolitical mobilizationsof the PopularFront.Following the
November election, in which Roosevelt won a landslidevictory and a pro-laborDemocrat,FrankMurphy,capturedMichigan'sgovernor'smansion,the organizing campaignbegan to pay dividends. Buoyed up by the triumphat the
polls and the feeling that labor had friends in Washingtonand Lansing, auto
workersbegan making their way to the UAW. 5 Although still only a fraction
of the industry's500,000 productionworkers,the union's expandingmembership reflectedthe evolving power relationson the shop floor thatcame with the
CIO's participationin the New Deal. With recruitmenton the rise, one movementafteranotherstartedto convulse the industry.16In late November,the first
overnightauto occupationoccurredat the Bendix Corporationin South Bend,
where, aftera seven-daystruggle,the UAWforcedthe companyunionfromthe
plant and won exclusive bargainingrights. This was followed by sit-down
strikesat Midlandand Kelsey-Hayesin Detroitandat FisherBody plantsin Atlanta and Kansas City. These occupations imbued unionists with the sudden
confidence that they had discovered the ultimate organizingweapon. At this
point, as "the situationheated up,"the UAW asked GM for a "generalconference" to discuss a nationalcontract.Unwilling to abandonthe open shop, GM
' David Brady,Workersin IndustrialAmerica:Essays on the 20th CenturyStruggle(New York:
OxfordUniversityPress, 1980), 82.
12
BenjaminStoberg,"TheCIO Moves On," TheNation, February20, 1937.
13 The UAW was
formally constitutedby the AFL in August 1935, but only in May 1936 did
the membershipgain control of the union's executive offices. On the formationof the UAW, see
WalterGalenson,TheCIOChallengeto theAFL:A Historyof theAmericanLaborMovement(Ithaca: Instituteof InternationalIndustrialand LaborRelations,CornellUniversity, 1961). 31
14 EdwardLevinson, Labor on the March(New York:
Harperand Brothers,1938), 143.
15 WilliamWeinstone,TheGreatSit-DownStrike(New York:WorkersLibrary,1937), 25; Daily Worker,December 26, 1936.
16 Union News Service (CIO), December21, 1936,
February15, 1937.
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
PARIS
1936,
FLINT
1937
329
referredunion officials to local plantmanagers,refusingto negotiateat the national level. It did not, however,realize thatlargerforces had shifted againstit:
By late 1936 the fledgling UAW was buttressedby the considerableresources
of the CIO, supportedby the ruling party,and equipped with a novel strike
weapon againstwhich the corporationhad not yet devised a strategy.
Then, on December28, 1936 at the ClevelandFisherBody plant,on the 30th
at Flint Fisher Body Plant 1, and on the 31st at Flint Fisher Body Plant 2, sitdown strikeswere launchedin the hope of making the UAW the workers'national bargainingagent.17In seizing these factories, unionists claimed they
were embarkingon a strugglethatwould pit "theCIO againstdowntownNew
York,"working-classAmerica against the Easternfinancial oligarchy.18But
unlike Paris strikers,who also challenged the monied interestsin the name of
"thepeople,"the sit-downersrepresenteda mere fractionof the workforce.At
FisherBody Plant 1, the heartof the conflict, less than 1,000 of its 7,000 workers participatedin the occupation,and of Flint's 43,000 auto workers,barely a
tenthbelongedto the UAW.In additionto theiridentificationwith the New Deal
and the union's ascending prospects,these unrepresentativestrikerswere encouragedand emboldenedby their power to cripple the highly integratedcircuit of auto production.19Because the Cleveland and Flint factories were
"motherplants,"upon which three-quartersof GM's 69 Americanplants depended for body parts,a small numberof strikerswas able to exert a force out
of all proportionto their actual strength.The ensuing parts shortage consequentlyforced GM to halt productionelsewhere, idling 135,000 of its 150,000
productionworkers.20Given that the Cleveland local was strong enough to
keep its plantclosed withoutoccupying it, the occupationtherelastedbut a few
17 There is some
controversyover whetherthe Flint workersspontaneouslyinitiatedthe strike,
forcing the UAW to accept their fait accompli, or whetherthe strike was the result of a premeditatedunionplan.Two Communistparticipantshave left the impressionthatit was a productof their
strategicintervention.See HenryKraus,The Manyand the Few: A Chronicleof the DynamicAuto
Workers,2nd ed. (Urbana:Universityof Illinois Press, 1985), andWyndhamMortimer,Organize!
MyLife as a UnionMan (Boston:Beacon, 1971).Against this view, two Trotskyist(or formerTrotskyist) historianshave arguedthat the turbulentcharacterof the UAW ruled out the possibility of
any long-termplan and that union leaders were forced to marchto the step of the ranks.See Art
Preis, Labor'sGiant Step: TwentyYearsof the CIO (New York:Pathfinder,1972), 53-54, and Bert
Cochran,Laborand Communism:The Conflictthat ShapedAmericanUnions (Princeton:Princeton UniversityPress, 1977), 115-19. Fine's view is closest to the spontaneitythesis. See Sit-Down,
142-7. Certainpress accounts also favor this thesis, such as The Chicago Daily Tribune,January
2, 1937. I tend to favor the argumentof the pro-Communisthistorian,Roger Keeran,who contends
that even if the sit-downs broke out spontaneously,it hardlynegates "the existence of a strategy,
preparation,and a general deadline." See The CommunistParty and the Auto WorkersUnion
(Bloomington:IndianaUniversityPress, 1980), 19.
18 Cited in Frank Cormier and William J. Eaton, Reuther (Engelwood Cliffs: Prentice Hall,
1970), 79.
19 TheNew YorkTimes,January15, 1937.
20 UAW membersin seventeen otherGM plants,anxious to join the fray,staged walkoutor sitdown strikes of their own, but given the natureof the Cleveland and Flint operations,these additional strikeswere almost superfluous.See Levinson, Laboron the March, 153.
330
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
days. The sit-down strike at Fisher Body Plants 1 and 2, in the capital of the
GM empire, henceforthconstitutedthe frontline in what was to be a 44-day
strugglebetween the forces of organizedlabor and those of the open shop-a
strugglewhose outcome was destined to shape the fate of the CIO and industrial labor.21While Flint strikersbottleneckedthe GM system and Detroit's
Catholicbishop denouncedthe "illegal sit-downsborrowedfrom the Communists of France,"violence brokeout in several auto centers,a massive back-towork movementwas set in motion;courtinjunctionswere served on the strikers; andvigilantesthreatenedmayhemagainstunionorganizers.22The violence
marringthe strike and the various forces mounted against it contrastsharply
with the peaceful Frenchoccupations,which were enthusiasticallysupported
by the workerinhabitantsof Paris'red suburbs.The contentionsurroundingthe
Flint occupationstemmed from several sources but was mainly derived from
the fact thatthe GM strikewas a minoritymovement,led by a mere handfulof
militantsand carriedout againstthe wishes of a sizeable numberof workers.23
In Francetherewas no back-to-workmovement;conservativeworkers,such as
those associatedwith the CatholicCFTC,participatedin the occupations;and
far-rightgroups,unlike theirAmericancounterparts(such as the FlintAlliance
or the Black Legion), rallied to what was considered a justifiable rebellion
against the anomic and exploitative conditions of the liberal order.Moreover,
the Frenchoccupationswere led by strikecommitteesmadeup of skilled workers and rank-and-filemilitants, while the Flint occupation was left solely in
union hands.The Parisand Flint strugglesdifferedin otherways as well. Most
notably,the Parismetal strikeprovokeda massive class upheavalthat quickly
escaped union controland assumednationaldimensions,while the Flint occupation,despite its industry-wideimplications,remainedessentially a localized
contestbetweenthe UAW andGM. Yet in this confrontationbetween the fledgling labororganizationandthe giantautocorporation,which consideredthe occupationsa revolutionaryform of trespassand refusedto negotiate,the UAW
held most of the trumps,for it succeeded in attackingthe auto makerat one of
its most strategicallysituated salients, while the corporationlacked the legal
and extralegalmeans of forcing the strikersfrom its plants.24The Flint strikers
also capturedmost of the favorableheadlines and influenced the public's image of the conflict.25But above all they enjoyed the supportof elected officials
21
WorkersAge, February20, 1937.
New YorkTimes,January23, 1937; ClaudeE. Hoffman,Sit-Downin Anderson: UAWLocal
663 (Detroit:WayneState UniversityPress, 1968), 38-59.
23 New York
Times,January27, 1937; Fine, Sit-Down, 117-8, 142.
24
If GM managershad had "the guts to be ruthless and piraticallike the old timers thirtyor
forty years ago or the brainsto recognize changingconditionsand meet them,"as did HenryFord,
these thingsmight not have matteredas much-or so Paul Gallico claims in his novella "Sit-Down
Strike,"Cosmopolitan(April 1938), 163.
25 FrederickH. Harbisonand RobertDubin,Patternsof Union-Management
Relations: UAWGM-Studebaker (Chicago:Science ResearchAssociates, 1947), 3.
22
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
PARIS
1936,
FLINT
1937
331
in WashingtonandLansing,who declinedto use theirpolice powers andsought
a pro-laborresolutionof the conflict.
On February11, aftera prolongtest of wills in which the union was the last
to blink, the UAW finally emergedwith an agreement,the first ever negotiated
between an American union and a majorauto producer.Yet however significant, this was not a categoricalvictory.GM stoppedshortof grantingexclusive
recognition to the UAW; the contractcovered only seventeen of GM's sixtynine productionfacilities; and no significantconcessions were made on wages
or conditions. The Flint settlementnonetheless preparedthe way for both the
closed shop at GM and the unionizationof other mass-productionindustries,
for the retreatof the world's largestmanufacturingconcern could not but signal the inevitable decline of managerialhegemony in other sectors. Following
the strike,U.S. Steel, withoutany struggleat all, signed an agreementwith the
CIO's Steel WorkersOrganizingCommittee,just as otherautomakers(notably
Chrysler)and othermass producerspreparedto negotiateunion agreementsof
theirown.26The CIO surgeat this pointbecame a wave, sweeping the most importantbranchesof Americanindustryinto its nets.27It is thus no exaggeration
to claim, as MatthewJosephsonhas, thatthe Flint strikeconstituted"thegreatest, and by all means, the most strategicvictory ever won by Americanlabor
and, in effect, opened all of America'sheavy industryto unionization."28
PREVIOUS
LABOR
OCCUPATIONS
While the factoryoccupationsin Parisand Flint representedthe most successful applicationof the sit-downtactic, they were neitherthe first nor the last example of this form of laborstruggle.In 1936 and 1937, as the occupationmade
headlines aroundthe world,journalistsand scholarsprobedits history.Some
were able to tracethe occupationback to the work stoppagesof medievalcathedral builders, and others went as far back as the ancient Egyptian pyramid
builders.Less-hyperbolicroots were located in severalprewarwork stoppages
carriedout by Wobbliesand syndicalistsemploying the "folded-armstrike."29
Despite these antecedents,most commentatorsagreed that the World Depression had popularizedradicalideas and methods, such as the sit-down, and
26 Some ratherclassic works (such as
IrvingBernstein,TurbulentYears:A Histor, of theAmerican Worker1933-1941 [Boston: HoughtonMifflin, 1970] and Galenson, The CIO Challenge to
the AFL) attributethe CIO breakthroughto the U.S. steel agreement,which in fact came afterthe
Flint settlementandwas very muchinfluencedby it. A key correctiveto this view is Melvyn Dubofsky and WarrenVanTine, John L. Lewis:A Biography(New York:Quadrangle,1977), 273-6.
27 Cochran,Laborand Communism,127.
28 Matthew
Josephson, Sidney Hill. Statesmanof American Labor (GardenCity: Doubleday,
1952), 412. In Labor'sGiant Step (p.50), Art Preis called the Flint strikethe "Gettysburgof the labor movement."
29 For example, Joel Seidman, "Sit-Down""
(New York: League for IndustrialDemocracy,
1937); Georges Saloman,Les Occupationsd'Usines devant la Loi a les Tribunaux(Paris:Libraire
techniqueet economique, 1938).
332
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
was thus attributableto no single source.30In 1934 and 1935, there were, for
example, mine occupationsin Yugoslavia,Hungary,Poland,Spain, andWales,
andin Minnesotain 1933 a three-daystay-in strikeat the HormelPackingCorporation.These occupations,though, bore little direct resemblanceto the imposing movementsassociatedwith Parisand Flint. The Hormel strike,like the
prewarsit-downsby Wobbliesand syndicalists,was a relativelyisolated action
without subsequentrepercussion.The Europeanmine occupations,somewhat
more dramaticin character,were waged underdesperateconditions by workers who soughtnothingotherthana subsistencewage. The only earliercase that
standscomparisonwith the FrenchandAmericanoccupations,at least in its amplitude and formidableextension, was the strike wave that swept throughthe
North Italianmetal industryin September1920, begun afterthe Federationof
ItalianMetalWorkers(FIOM),in a wage disputewith intransigentemployers,
orderedits membersto occupy theirfactories.
Because the Italianoccupationstranspiredin a periodof political and social
upheaval,they quickly transcendedcorporateissues, engulfing nearly a halfmillion metal workersin a strugglethattook on the characterof a violent revolutionarystandoff.Againsta backdropof bloody clashes andsome deaths,factory councils attempted to resume production under worker control and
pro-Communistmilitants agitated for a sovietization of industry,while the
ranks armedthemselves, formed Red Guardunits, and turnedtheir factories
into barricadedfortresses.31Given the stakesinvolved, the Italianoccupations
more closely resembledthe St. Petersburgmetal strikesof 1917, which helped
preparethe way for the Bolshevik coup of thatyear, thanthe conflicts of 1936
and 1937. By contrast,the Americanand Frenchoccupationsposed no challenge to the existing order,respectedprivateproperty(which was violated only
in the name of a higherproprietyrightto one's jobs), avoidedviolence, and focused on social-economic demandsentirely compatiblewith a marketeconomy.32
More thanthe above examples, the inspirationfor the Parisand Flint strikes
is perhapsbetter sought in the prehistoryof earlier auto and metal conflicts.
While the first overnightoccupationin the Paris metal industryoccurredonly
in May 1936, the Metal Union had a historyof sit-down strikes(greves sur les
tas), for its Communistleadershipbegan calling such strikes shortly after the
WorldDepressionreachedFrance.33In March1931, at the Chenard-et-Walker
30 Keeran,The Communist
Party and the Auto Workers,155.
31 Paolo
The Occupationof the Factories: Italy 1920,
Gwyn A. Williams,trans.(LonSpriano,
don: Pluto Press, 1975); Daniel L. Horowitz, The Italian LaborMovement(Cambridge:Harvard
UniversityPress), 142-53; MauriceF. Neufeld, The Italian Labor Movementin Its Political, Social, and EconomicSetting(Ithaca, 1961), 371-9.
32 Danos and Gibelin, Juin 36, 145; Fine, Sit-Down, 174.
33 The CommunistInternational
began calling for sit-down strikesas early as its Second World
Congress (1920)-but with little success. After the Citroenstrikeof 1933, the greatestFrenchlabor upheavalsince the "two red years"of 1919 and 1920, it formallyrenewed its call. See Corre-
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
PARIS
1936,
FLINT
1937
333
auto works in the suburbanindustrialtown of Gennevillier, 800 body-shop
workers,in responseto a union appeal,carriedout the first organizedsit-down
in metal.34After police forcibly evacuatedthe plant,these strikerswere forced
back on employer terms.But this did not deterthe union from resortingto sitdowns in subsequentconflicts. At least thirty such strikes were conductedin
1931, mainly in small shops or factories,where the union had gained the leadershipof workerswilling to defend their standards.35Then in November 1931
at Renault,in the springof 1933 at Citroen,and in late 1935 at Fiat, the Paris
Metal Union waged long, bitter strikes against major auto producers,all of
which began with sit-downs. In none of these conflicts, however, did strikers
remainin their shops overnight,for they were usually evicted by the police or
locked out the next day. Nevertheless,priorto the greatwave of occupationsin
June 1936, the sit-downhad become a common featureof the union's organizing arsenal.The subsequenttransformationof the sit-down into an overnight
occupation,in its most elementaryexpression,was simply the developmentof
an alreadyestablishedtactic.
If the genesis of the Paris occupationslay in the Metal Union's prehistory,
the same is roughlytrueof the UAW.As noted above, the Flint strikehad been
precededby occupationsat Bendix, Midland,and Kelsey-Hayes, all of which
validatedthe tactic for the leadershipand sent workerconfidence soaring.The
sit-down tactic, however, originatedneitherwith the UAW leadershipnor its
ranksbut was borrowedfromAkronrubberworkers.Like theircounterpartsin
auto,rubberworkerswere situatedin a highly mechanizedsystem of mass production, subject to gruelling speedup,deterioratingconditions, and high rates
of unemployment.Firstin mid-1934, thenmore seriouslyin late 1935 and 1936
they began using "quickiesit-downs"to defend victimized unionistsand resist
eroding standards.Devised to circumvent company violence against picket
lines, these strikes,whose effectiveness was almostimmediatelyapparent,soon
became a regular feature of labor-managementdisputes. Not coincidentally,
they made a lasting impressionon unionistsin rubber,a sister industry,where
the sit-down would achieve its most consequentialapplication.36
While the prehistoryof the Parisand Flint strikespoints up the origins of the
factory occupations, there is a danger of losing sight of their extraordinary
uniquenessif too much is made of theircomparisonwith earliersit-downs, for
their vague exterior likeness conceals profound differences. The form of a
spondenceInternationale(CI),August 26, 1933. The tactic,however,hadbecome partof the union
arsenalas early as 1931. See L'Humanite,August 21, 1931, January26, 1932, September15, 1932.
34 The first spontaneousmetal occupation occurred several weeks earlier at the Talbot auto
works in Suresnes.See L'Humanite,January16 and February8, 1931. For the Chenardstrike,see
L'Humanite, March 7-12,
35
1931.
Cahiersdu Bolchevisme (PCF), July 15, 1932.
36 Daniel Nelson,
"Originof the Sit-Down Era:WorkerMilitancy and Innovationin the RubberIndustry,1934-38," LaborHistorv, 32 (Winter1982); also LouisAdamic, "Sit-down,"TheNation, December 5, 1936.
334
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
strike,as I thinkmost laborhistorianswould agree,is ultimatelyless important
thanthe natureof the organizationthatsponsorsit or the ends to which it is applied.37The Paris and Flint strikes,representingan aspect of the evolving labor movement as it pursued union goals within the context of the FordistTayloristfactory system, fundamentallydiffered from the desperatemine occupationsof the early 1930s, as well as from the insurgentRussian and Italian
occupationsof 1917 and 1920. In utilizing the occupationto facilitateindustrial unionization,the Paris and Flint strikes took on a significance, a character,
and an effect quite unlike anythingthat had previously occurredand thus deserve to be treatedsui generis.
THE HISTORICAL
AND
FLINT
SPECIFICITY
OF THE PARIS
OCCUPATIONS
Until the era of the sit-down,the mass-productionsector,with its highly mechanized and integratedmethods of large-scale manufactureand its Taylorist
forms of parcelized labor, posed a nearly unsurmountableobstacle to unionization. Traditionalcraft workers,who still dominatedthe ranksof organized
labor,occupied a secondarytier in the new factories, lacked the labor-market
protectionthat formerlybuffered them from employer threats,and had little
influence over the productionprocess. More consequentially,the numerous
trades and occupationsmaking up the industrialworkforce,with their different jurisdictionaland workshopconcerns, made workerunity unfeasible and
industry-wideorganizationnearly impossible. As a result, auto and metalfabricationplants in the boom years of the 1920s were almost entirely free of
union activity. Withoutthe advantagesaffordedby the sit-down strike-and
this gets to the core of my argument-it is doubtfulif the labormovement,even
afterit shiftedto an industrialmodel of unionism,would ever have established
itself in the Fordist-Tayloristfactory system.
Two reasons, I believe, lend credence to this argument.The first relates to
the characterof the workforceand the natureof the laborprocess. The Fordist
system of productionmade it difficult for unionists not only to contact those
they soughtto organize,it tendedto employ workersresistantto unionism.The
semi-skilled machine-tendingand assembly-lineworkersof the new factories,
often of ruralor immigrantbackgrounds,lacked the tradeassociationsand laboringtraditionsthathad given craftsmentheirsolidarityandbargainingpower; they were recruitedfrom diverse and disparateelements without cultural
fragmentinglaborprocesses thatnurturedindividualisticsensibilitiesand were
subjectto social and managerialinfluences which unionistswere powerless to
counter.38In the face of these organizingobstacles, union efforts rarely tran37 ArthurM. Ross, "TheNaturalHistoryof the Strike"in IndustrialConflict,ArthurKornhauser,
RobertDubin, andArthurM. Ross, eds (New York:McGraw-Hill,1954), 23.
38 ForFrance,see GaryS. Cross,ImmigrantWorkersin IndustrialFrance: TheMakingof a New
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
PARIS
1936,
FLINT
1937
335
scended factory-gatespeeches or evening meetings, both of which were vulnerableto police raidsandcompanyintimidation.FrenchandAmericanunionists throughoutthe 1920s and the early years of the depression were thus effectively excludedfromthe mass-productionsector,persecutedandblacklisted.
The occupation,by contrast,would situate them in the heartof the manufacturing process, profile their visibility, and give workers a greaterfeeling of
strengthand security.Barricadedbehindthe high protectivewalls of theirfactory, inspiredby a history-makingexperience, and throwntogetherin a novel
form of collective action, previously diffident workersbecame primedfor recruitment,while employerswere powerlessto counterunioneffortsandresume
production.39
The second reasonthe occupationwas key to unionizationwas thatindustrialists in the mass-productionsector,buttressedby richly endowedcorporations
and linked in variousways with the public powers, were always able to deflect
union assaults, while craft organizationsand newly founded industrialunions
lacked leverage of any sort.Therewere thus no impedimentsto the employers'
ability to equip their factories with internalsystems of security,weed out and
victimize potential "trouble-makers,"and muster the state's police powers
whenever it was necessary to disperse picket lines or introducenon-unionlabor.Even on those rareoccasions when strikesspontaneouslybrokeout-and
it was always difficult to shut down the numerousdepartmentsof the Fordist
factory-employers were able to dispersepicket lines, recruitscabs, and continueproduction.Traditionalwork stoppagesby skilled workers,no longercentral to production,or mass walkouts by semi-skilled machine-tenders,who
were easily replaceable,were, in these circumstances,without significant effect. Only the sit-down strike,which gave a minorityof activists the means to
bottleneck the highly integratedprocesses of Fordist manufactureand bring
productionto a definitive halt, offered the possibility of balancingthe scales in
labor's favor.As John L. Lewis put it, "the stay-in strikewas beyond a doubt
the only methodby which the workers. . . could have forcedthe employers...
into enteringinto real collective bargainingrelations."40
While the structuralobstacles to unionization,specifically the disparityof
Laboring Class (Philadelphia:Temple University Press, 1983); Annie Fourcault,Femmes i l'Usinledans l'Entre-Deux-Guerres(Paris:Maspero, 1982) and Bobigny.Banlieu Rouge (Paris:Eds.
Ouvrieres,1986);Michel Colinet,L'OuvrierFrancais: Essai sur la ConditionOuvriere(Paris:Eds.
Ouvrieres,1951). For the United States, see Joyce Shaw Peterson,"AutoWorkersandTheirWork,
1900-1933," LaborHistory,22 (Spring 1981);Fine, Sit-Down,54-63; StephenMeyers, "ThePersistence of Fordism:WorkersandTechnology in the AmericanAutomobileIndustry,1900-1960,"
in On the Line: Essays in the Histonrof Auto Work,N. Lichtensteinand S. Meyers, eds. (Urbana:
University of Illinois Press, 1989); and Robert Blaumer,Alienation and Freedom: The Factora
Workerand His Industtr (Chicago:Universityof Chicago Press, 1964), pp. 89-123.
39 John Barnard,WalterReutherand the Rise of the Auto Workers(Boston: Little, Brown and
Co., 1983), 41.
40 David F.
Selvin, The ThunderingVoiceof John L. Lewis (New York:Lothrop,Lee and Shepard, 1969), 120.
336
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
forces and the difficulties organizingworkers, suggest why unionists readily
embracedthe stay-in strike,they do not explain why it was suddenlypossible
to carry out such demandingand illegal forms of action. Circumstances,it is
importantto stress, had to be favorable,for only in situationswhere the state
had been neutralized,employer authorityundermined,and workersmotivated
by rising expectationswas the sit-downfeasible. Not coincidentally,these contingencies were presentin both PopularFrontFranceand New Deal America.
STRUCTURAL
IMPERATIVES
During the boom years of the 1920s, when Paris metal producersemployed
nearly a half-million workers, Catholic, reformist, anarchist,and especially
Communistunionistsmade repeatedattemptsto organize the industry.Yet as
late as 1934, after the depressionhad massively underminedworkeracquiescence andmanageriallegitimacy,no more than4 percentof the total workforce
had been unionizedandcollective agreementstoucheda merehandfulof firms,
mainly in the artisanalsector.41The industry,moreover,was rife with discontent. In addition to pervasive unemploymentand job insecurity,Paris metal
workerswere plagued with speed-up,favoritism,deplorableconditions,company espionage, as well as a highly authoritariansystem of supervision.Every
unioneffortto exploit this discontentwas quashedby autocraticemployerswho
jealously guardedtheir prerogatives,resisted collective agreements,and carefully monitoredtheir plants for the slightest sign of union affiliation.42The
union was also stymied by the "individualism"of Paris workers,who thought
little of defendinga revolutionarybarricadebuthad not the slightestinclination
for organizationalactivity.Long exhaustingshifts and the need to keep on the
good side of foremen,responsiblefor hiringand firing duringthe periodiclayoff, furtherdiscouragedunion affiliation. But the most dauntingobstacle to
unionizationwas to be found in the characterof the Fordist-Tayloristproduction. In the large-scale metal-fabricationplants of the Paris Region, workers
were subjectto high ratesof turnover,dividedby variousascriptivedifferences
(especially relatedto ethnicity)and isolated by an awesome arrayof fragmenting and alienatingtechnologies.43To complicate matters,these workerswere
impossible to reach, once they left work; for most commutedto distant,geo41 The best sourceon the quantitativeaspect of Frenchunionismin this periodis Antoine Prost,
La CGTh l'Epoch du FrontPopulaire 1934-39 (Paris:ArmandCollin, 1964).
42 See Louis
Bergeron,Les Capitalistesen France (Paris:Julliard,1978); FrancoisSellier, La
ConfrontationSociale en France 1936-1981 (Paris:Presses Universitairesde France, 1984); Ingo
Kolboom, Frankreich Unternehmerin der Periode der Volksfront1936-1937 (Rheinfelden:
SchaubleVerlag, 1983); MarcMauriceand FrancoisSellier, "SocietalAnalysis of IndustrialRelations:A Comparisonbetween Franceand West Germany,"BritishJournal of IndustrialRelations,
17 (November 1979).
43 In theirstudyof Frenchstrikes,EdwardShorterandCharlesTilly foundthatlarge-scalefirms
with an averageof 1,200 workershad 75 percentfewer conflicts thanthose with an averageof 130
workers.See Strikesin France 1830-1968 (Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress, 1974), 219.
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
PARIS
1936,
FLINT
1937
337
graphicallydispersedcommunities,where the relationsbetween work andresidence had been severed. Unionists, as a result,had difficulty connectingwith
them either on the job or in their neighborhoods.44
While union militantshad little to show for their efforts before June 1936,
the Communist-ledMetal Union did manageto establishthe skeletonof a clandestine factory organizationin a numberof strategicallysituatedParis plants.
Then, when the political climate changedafterthe legislative elections and the
stateassumeda neutral,if not supportivestance,these implantedunionistswere
favorably situated to carry out an exemplary action.45A few daring occupations, instigatedby a handfulof militantsin severalkey plants,was practically
all it took to enflame the workforce.As these occupationsspreadin Paris'politically charged Red Belt, metal workers discovered what the elections had
made possible and the rest followed almost as a matterof course.46Encamped
in their barricadedfactories, there were no picket lines to defend or police to
worryabout;it was impossibleto introducescab labor;andthe "sit-downcommunity"fostered forms of solidarityinvulnerableto outside pressure.At this
point, union organizerswere able to enter the plants and recruittheir workforces, which had quite literallybecome captive audiences.This is not to argue
thatthe metaloccupationssuddenlyinstilledstrikerswith syndicalistprinciples
and sentiments,but the novel experience did create a situationin which inaccessible workers-formally cowed by authoritariansocial relations,isolatedby
fragmentingtechnologies, and divided by various ascriptivedifferences-became accessible and recruitable.47
Althoughthe Flintoccupationslackedthe massive, spontaneouscharacterof
the Paris strikes, the obstacles confrontingUAW unionists and the means by
which they overcame them were nearly identical. Managementat GM and
throughoutthe auto industryhad long kept the unions out of the plants, even
after Roosevelt's first Administrationhad set up a legal frameworkfor collective bargainingand developed the bureaucraticmachineryto adjudicatelabormanagementdisputes. American auto workers were also subject to the same
alienating technologies affecting Paris metal workers, divided by similar ascriptive differences, and equally difficult to reach.48Like the French case, it
44 Antoine
Audit, Les Federations Confeldrees et Unitaires des Metaux. Lieu d' emission
d'Anal,ses SocioEcotnoniiques1922-1935 (Universite de Paris 1: Memoire,1986) 86; Collinet,
L'OuvrierFranfais, 109-16.
45 Benoit Frachon, "Juin 1936 ... Histoire et Enseignements,"Les Cahiers d'lnstitut CGTd'Histoire Social, 17 (March 1986).
46 Jean Coutrot,Les
Leoons de Juin 1936: L'HumanismeEconomique(Paris: CPEE, 1936);
MauriceC. Charvardes,Ete 1936: La Victoiredu FrontPopulaire(Paris:Calman-Levy,1966), 132.
47 S. Galois
Metallos,"La Revolution Prole[Simone Weil], "LaVie et la Greve des Ouvri&res
tarienne,10 June 1936. For the analogous situationin the United States, see Weinstone,The Great
Sit-Down Strike,29-33; and Daily Worker,January16, 1937.
48 Steve
Babson, WorkingDetroit: The Making of a Union Town(New York:Adama Books,
1984), 23-33, 41-50, 70-71; Irving Howe and B.J. Widick, The UAWand WalterReuther(New
York:RandomHouse, 1949), 3-46.
338
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
was the election euphoriaand Roosevelt's pro-laborneutralitythat gave the
UAW unioniststhe opportunityto launchthe occupations.Withoutfear of state
interference,they realizedthatthe interdependentnatureof Fordistproduction
made GM prone to such strikes,that by tying up a few strategicdepartments,
they could force the closing of an entire factory, and that if a shut-downoccurredin a key plant,it would threatenthe entirecorporatesystem. In the words
of one Detroit auto worker:"Puta crimp in the belt at one spot and the whole
belt freezes."49As union-instigatedstrikesin Cleveland and Flint put a crimp
in the GM system and forced the closing of otherproductionfacilities, unionists had only to mobilize a minorityof strategicallysituatedworkersto freeze
the entire system. This gave them a bargaininglever differentfrom the mass
upheaval in the Paris metal industry,but one that worked to similar effect.
Moreover,as in the Frenchcase, the Flint occupationenabledunioniststo turn
the massive complexityof the Fordistfactorysystem againstmanagement,preventing it from attackingstrikers,recruitingscabs, or resumingoperation.50
CONTINGENT
FACTORS
While the factory occupationhad the potentialto surmountthe structuralobstacles to organization,its employmentnonethelessdependedon a numberof
highly contingentfactors.Normally,employerswould have brokensuch strikes
by appealingto the state;but in both nationalcases the staterefusedto employ
its police powers and unionistswere able to hold their factoryfortresseswithout threatof forceful eviction. In Francethe CGT's affiliationwith the Popular
Front automaticallyneutralizedthe state. Following the election, one worker
highlightedthe significance of this affiliationby declaring,"L'Etat,c'est nous
maintenant"5--and this made all the difference.The New Deal, a politically
more complicated formationthan the PopularFront, developed a somewhat
similar relation to labor, even though this had not been the case under Roosevelt's firstAdministration.Only in 1936, afterthe failureof the NationalRecovery Administration(NRA) and the entrance of the CIO's Non-Partisan
League (LNPL) into the Democraticcoalition did Roosevelt embracea decidedly leftist versionof the "managerialrevolution"andtakeup an explicitly prounion agendato offset employer advantage.52Withoutstate neutrality,the oc49 NewvMasses, May 4, 1937.
50 Melvin J. Vincent,"TheSit-Down Strike,"Sociology and Social Research,21
(July-August
1937), 27
5' RobertMoss6, L' ExperienceBlum: Un An de Front Populaire (Paris:Sagittaire,1937), 33.
52 All the greatstate-alteringmovementsof the 1930s, in my view, representsome formof what
JamesBurnhamcalled TheManagerialRevolution(New York:JohnDay, 1941), the New Deal and
the PopularFrontbeing left-liberalvariantsof what the Nazis did in Germanyand the Bolsheviks
in Russia. See also JohnA. Garanty,"The New Deal, National Socialism, and the GreatDepression,"TheAmericanHistoricalReview,78 (October1973). Not unrelatedly,both the New Deal and
the PopularFrontattemptedto incorporatethe new industrialunions into the meshingsof the managerialstate.
FACTORY OCCUPATION: PARIS 1936, FLINT 1937
339
cupationsin Franceandthe United Stateswould neitherhave been possible nor
had such a favorableoutcome for labor.
Political circumstanceswere no less responsiblefor fosteringthe necessary
social-psychological conditions. In both countries, the election campaignsof
1936 galvanizedthe labor movement,leading workersto expect a new deal in
the factories.In France,these politicalinfluencesbegan affectingworkerseven
before 1936. The general strikeof February12, 1934, inspiringthe formation
of the PopularFront,bridged many of the rifts dividing labor and the left.53
Subsequent street mobilizations under the republicanbanner continued the
process; in alliance with the unions, the PopularFront held over a thousand
demonstrationsand public meetings between February1934 and the elections
of 1936. These politicalmobilizationsgave unionorganizersan access to workers they lacked in the factories, opening in effect a backdoorto shopfloororganization.54Finally,as workersbegan to feel powerfulin the streets,they became more assertivein the factory.Union activity escalatedin 1935; the strike
rate doubled;and recruitmentin the Paris metal industryclimbed from a few
thousandto 14,000. More than any other factor,the demonstrationsand electoral agitationsof the PopularFrontroused the unorganizedand generatedin
them a new vision of industrialrelations.55
While these activities helped nurturethe demandfor laborreform,the Popular Front's installationfacilitatedthe use of the factory occupation.56When
conservatives and employers demanded government action to suppress the
strikes,Blum committedhimself to a peaceful settlementandrefusedto muster
the police. This automaticallydisarmedthe patronat. Then, as the sit-downs
spreadand employers agreedto union recognition,Blum played a key role in
setting up negotiations and finalizing the MatignonAgreement.At the same
time, his governmentexploited the situation to introducelegislation codifying the forty-hourweek, the annualtwo-week paid vacation, and a variety of
social reforms.Finally, the PCF, representing"the ministryof the masses" in
Blum's cabinet,was instrumentalin channellingthe strikesinto institutionally
amenableforms and consolidatingthe long-rangegains of the movement.
The political context sustainingthe Frenchstrikeswas furtherbuttressedby
economic developments,anotherof the crucialcontingentfactorsaffectingthe
occupations.The WorldDepression had taken an extremely high toll on em53 Verite,
July 1934; L'Union des Metaux,October 1935.
54 Danielle
Tartakowsky,"Strategiesde la Rue: 1934-1936," in La France en Mouvement
1934-1938 (Paris:ChampVallon, 1986), JeanBouvier;ed., La Voixdu Peurplede Paris (CGTU),
June 1935.
55 Le Proldtaire(PCF),
May 16, 1936; Le Peuple (CGT), May 5, 8, 14, and 22, 1936; L'Ouvrier Metalluraiste(CFTC),September1937.
56 TristanRemy,La GrandeLutte(Paris:Eds. Sociales Internationales,1937), 108; RobertDurand,La Luttedes Travailleursde chez Renault:Racontepar Eux-Meme1912-1944 (Paris:Eds.
Social, 1971), 63; Julien Jackson, The Popular Front in France: Defending Democracy. 19341938 (Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress,1988), 92.
340
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
ployment,wages, and conditionsthroughoutthe Parismetal industry.Nearly a
thirdof the workforcewas permanentlyeliminatedbetween 1931 and 1935; and
anotherthird,reducedto shorttime. This heightenedworkerinsecurityand increasedthe level of grievance.Paradoxically,though,the depression'simpacton
the labormovementwas not entirelynegative.The severe dropin employment
closed off immigration(then the world's highest), discouragedruralmigrants,
limitedthe access of women andyouth,curbedturnover,gave marriedmen and
skilled workersa preferencein employment,and helped, for the first time in a
generation,to homogenize the workforce.As metal workers became "more
French,more skilled,moremature,moreurban,andmore stable,"they not only
began to see themselves as a collectivity in need of representation,they were
betterableto forgethoseties necessaryfor collective struggle.57The depression,
in a word,increasedworkercomplaint,as well as the possibilityfor laboraction.
But there was another,equally consequentialeconomic factor at work. In response to the rise of Hitler,the Frenchstate in mid-1934 began rearming.The
Parismetal industry,particularlyits auto, aviation,andmechanical-engineering
sectors, constitutedthe principalbeneficiaryof the government'srearmament
program.By 1935, the troughin unemploymenthad bottomedout, hours increased, and metal workers experienced a graduallyimprovingjob market.
Combinedwith the on-going republicanmobilizationsin the streets, the economic upswing did much to heightenworkers'confidenceand stiffen theirwill
to struggle.58
In the United States, a comparableset of circumstancessurroundedthe GM
strike.The genteel opportunistelected in 1932 was wont to portrayhimself as
"the greatest friend that labor ever had," but as Francis Perkins' naively revealing account indicates, Roosevelt had no specific plan to empower the
unions and remainedorientedto alliances with powerful interestgroups supportive of the Democratic party.59The famous Section 7a of the MussoliniinspiredNationalIndustrialRecoveryAct recognizing labor'sright to bargain
was a mere afterthought,and Roosevelt was contentto allow company unions
to act as the workers'designatedrepresentative,except in cases where already
powerful unions, like the United Mine Workersor the Ladies GarmentWorkers, were able to impose theirwill.60While the surge in unionrecruitmentand
57
G6rardNoirel, Les Ouvriers
ldaons la Societe Francaise:XlXe-XXeSiecle (Paris:Seuil, 1986),
175.
58 Evident on
every page of the industry'stwo main union papers:L'Uniondes Metaux(COT)
and Le Metallo (CGTU).
59 Frances Perkins, The Roosevelt I Knew (New York:The Viking Press, 1946), 303. Also
WilliamE. Leuchtenberg,FranklinD. Rooseveltand the New Deal 1932-1940 (New York:Harper andRow, 1963), 184;MurrayEdelman,"New Deal Sensitivityto LaborInterests,"in Laborand
the New Deal), M. Derberand E. Young,eds. (Madison:Universityof Wisconsin Press, 1957.
60 Fine, Sit-Down, 31; "Why Did the Auto WorkersStrike?,"Social Action 3 (February15,
1937). In fact, collective bargaininghad been legalized by the Norris-LaGuardiaAct of 1932providedlabor was able to force the employersto engage in it.
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
PARIS
1936,
FLINT
1937
34I
activity in 1933 and 1934, even among traditionally docile and anti-union migrants from the South and immigrants, testified to the widespread desire to
unionize, a desire that continued to go unsatisfied, especially in auto.61 Then,
with the failure of the NRA, the dawning bankruptcy of the first New Deal, and
the January 1936 Gallup Poll indicating his sinking popularity, Roosevelt began turning leftward.62 In light of his concerns about his own numerous failures and his fears that business and the Republicans were favorably situated to
wage a formidable campaign against him, Roosevelt entered the 1936 presidential race ready to adopt the language of radical reform, denounce "economic royalists," and offer the common people a qualitative improvement in their
material conditions ("a chicken in every pot"). Like the campaigns and demonstrations of the Popular Front, Roosevelt's reelection efforts, along with Frank
Murphy's bid for the government's mansion in the motor state, were carried out
as if labor's future was at stake. At the same time, conspicuous segments of the
employer class, led by Alfred P. Sloan and the top GM management, associated themselves with the Republican ticket and its traditional defense of high finance and heavy industry.
Labor's links with the Rooseveltian state were further enhanced by its participation in the election campaign. While the political conservative, John L.
Lewis, distrusted the "country squire in the White House," he was nonetheless
convinced that the unionization of the mass-production industries required a
supportive state. Unlike the leaders of the American Federation of Labor (AFL),
Lewis not only endorsed Roosevelt but treated the election as labor's foremost
concern.63 The LNLP's intervention and its unprecedented donation of
$770,000 to the Democratic party war chest would represent the CIO's major
contribution to the campaign, but its organizing efforts in industry were no less
steeped in electoral issues. When UAW organizers went into the field in the
summer of 1936, they concentrated almost entirely on rallying workers to the
Roosevelt coalition and getting them to the polls.64 Not surprisingly, the campaign assumed a class character almost unique in American political history,
with labor playing "a role more distinct, more important, and more decisive
than in any previous election struggle."65 Significantly, it was only after the decisive victory of November that the UAW began augmenting its membership
rolls and making headway on the shop floor.66 When union organizers told
workers "You voted New Deal at the polls and defeated the Auto Barrons61 Keeran,The Communist
Partyand the Auto WorkersUnion, 77.
62 John T. Flynn, The Decline of the AmericanRepublic (New York:Devin-Adair, 1955), 50.
62
Dubofsky and Van Tine, John L. Lewis, 248-52; RobertH. Zieger, John L. Lewis, Labor
Leader (Boston: Twayne, 1988), 88-90.
64
Cochran,Laborand Communism,107.
65
WorkersAge, January23, 1937; Nelson Lichtenstein,TheMost Dangerous Man in Detroit:
WalterReutherand the Fate of AmericanLabor (New York:Basic Books, 1995), 61-63.
66
Fine, Sit-Down, 111.
342
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
Now get a New Deal in the shops," they simply played on the pro-Roosevelt
sentimentthey had done so much to nurture.67
If the 1936 election affected workersin ways analogousto the various mobilizationsof the PopularFront,the reelectedpresidentalso mimickedBlum in
his response to the sit-down strikes. Following the occupation of the Fisher
Body plants, Roosevelt refused to interveneagainstthe strikers,acted behind
the scenes to set up negotiations,and got LaborDepartmentofficials involved
in establishingthe frameworkfor a settlement.He also leanedon the GM management, already"in Dutch with Washingtonover the last election;"kept the
National Labor Relations Board, which would have verified the UAW's minority status, out of the strike;and at several stages in the conflict threatened
the corporationwith new federal statutesthat would have imposed additional
limitationson it and other businesses.68At the same time, his labor secretary
declined to characterizethe strikesas illegal and did everythingpossible to coerce the reluctantGM managementinto negotiating.69The Administration's
stance led William Green,the AFL chief, to complainthatRoosevelt was "doing everythingfor [the CIO strikers]but call out the Marines."70Michigan's
newly elected governor,FrankMurphy,played an equally significantrole in resolving the strike in the union's favor. When he sent the National Guardinto
Flint on January12, following a bloody confrontationbetween strikersand the
local police, he did so not to crushthe strikebut to maintainthe peace, a strategy that prevented GM and local authoritiesfrom forcibly evicting the sitdowners.Later,he refusedto apply a courtinjunctionthatwould have emptied
the plants. Murphyalso allowed strikersto collect state relief and helped negotiate the agreementthat terminatedthe dispute.7' In the end, these governmental efforts in Washingtonand Lansing compelled GM to retreatfrom its
hard-line opposition and recognize the union. As one Republicanpolitician
quotedby TheChicagoDaily Tribuneclaimed,the state'spivotalrole was glaringly evident in the fact "thata single word from Roosevelt to his fellow New
Dealer in Michigan would have been sufficient to break up the sit-down
strike-but no such word was forthcomingfrom the White House."72It is in
fact highly unlikely, given the UAW's minority status, that the union would
have defeated GM without this assistance.As one writerfor The New Masses
67 JohnL.
Lewis, "TheNext FourYears,"TheNew Republic,December23, 1936; WorkersAge,
March 13, 1937; RobertH. Zieger, The CIO 1935-1955 (ChapelHill: Universityof NorthCarolina Press, 1995), 39-41.
68 New YorkTimes, February5, 1937; Chicago Daily Tribune,January27 and February13,
1937;Alfred P. Sloan, Jr.,My Yearswith GeneralMotors (GardenCity: Doubleday, 1963), 393.
69 New YorkTimes,January28, 1937; Chicago Daily Tribune,January28, 1937; George Martin, MadamSecretary:Francis Perkins (Boston: HoughtonMifflin, 1976), 401-2.
70 Cited in Kraus,TheMany and the Few, 270.
71 J. Woodford
Howard,Jr.,"FrankMurphyand the Sit-Down Strikesof 1937,"LaborHistory,
1 (Spring 1960).
72 Chicago Daily Tribune,January18, 1937.
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
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1936,
FLINT
1937
343
put it: "If [Republicanpresidentialcandidate]Landonwas in the White House
and a Republicanin Lansing, GM would be feeling a lot more confident."73
The Americansituationalso resembledthe Frenchone economically.Massive auto unemployment(falling 75 percentbetween 1929 and 1932), deterioratedconditions(mainlyin the form of speed-up),low annualearnings,andjob
insecurity accompanied the initial onset of the depression, removing those
"reefsof roastbeef and applepie" thatWernerSombartthoughtresponsiblefor
workeracquiescence.Then, in 1935, after Roosevelt poured22 billion dollars
into the economy as partof his gropingeffort to counterthe crisis, the market
revived. Unemploymentdropped50 percent;the GNP grew at a similar rate;
and GM had its best year since 1929. While the recoverywould be short-lived
(endingin late 1937), it neverthelesserasedmemoriesof earlierNew Deal failuresandencouragedworkersto contemplatea struggleagainstthe autogiants.74
The final contingent factor that needs mentioning is the labor movement,
which led and sustainedthe great struggles of 1936 and 1937. Again, though
theAmericanandFrenchsituationsarenot perfectlyanalogous,they were comparableenough to producesimilareffects. In France,the principalobstacle to
unionizationhad been the ideological fissures dividing the labor movement.
The two largestFrenchconfederations,the reformistCGT and the Communist
CGT-Unitaire,had split in 1921 and remainedbitterlydivided until the advent
of the PopularFront.Then, with the birthof the left coalition in 1934 and 1935,
there arose a unity mystique in the organized and unorganizedwings of the
workingclass that fostered a powerful sentimentfor reunification.75Once the
rival confederationssuccumbedto this mystique, it had little initial impacton
the objective conditions of labor; but its subjective repercussionswere immense, for in mirroringthe unity of the left parties in the PopularFront, the
CGT-CGTU mergermade it easier for workersto believe the tide of history
had turnedin their favor.This inevitablyenhancedtheir confidence, strengthened their sense of common purpose,and made them rethinktheirrelationship
to unionism.76But perhapsthe most significantaspect of the trade-unionunity was that the Communist-dominatedMetal Union-made up of militants
steeped in a cultureof anti-capitaliststruggle, accustomedto radicalforms of
collective action, andinfused with a conceptionof unionismthatmadefew distinctionsbetween corporateandpolitical realms-gained an unprecedentedlegitimacy for its variousorganizingmethods.
73 New Masses, January19, 1937.
74 ArthurM. Schlessinger,Jr.,ThePolitics of Upheaval(Boston:HoughtonMifflin, 1960), 571.
75. Benoit Frachonand Gaston Monmousseau,Pour une CGT Unique! Pour l'Action de Masse!
(Paris:Les PublicationsR6volutionnaire,1934); L'Etincellede Boulogne-Billancourt(PCF), June
1935; L'OuvrierM6tallurgiste,September1937.
76 Le TravailleurParisien (CGT), October 1936; PierreMonatte,"LaClass Ouvri6reReprend
Confiance en elle," La RevolutionProletarienne, July 10, 1936; Raoul Dubois, Au Soleilde 36
(Paris:Messidor, 1986), 80-88.
344
MICHAEL
TORIGIAN
In the United States, it was not the unificationbut the division of the labor
movementthathelped set workersin motion. Contraryto what is often argued,
the conflict between craft and industrialforms of unionism,however significant, was, as David Brady contends, not the sole nor probablyeven the greatest obstacle to mass-productionorganization.Rather,the major impediment
was the AFL's inertia, its reluctanceto seize the moment and act decisively.
When the AFL modified its craft principles in 1934 by establishing federal
unions in the basic industries,it failed to invest the money and energy that
would have made these unions viable, even though they attractedlarge numbers of recruitsand broadenedunion prospects.77For the AFL, it was thus less
a matterof being opposedto the principleof industrialorganizationper se than
being simply too conservativeand too entrenchedin the old ways to take advantage of the organizingopportunitiesopened by the New Deal. The federation's craft unionistswould laterchange theirtune, but it was John L. Lewis's
willingness to breakwith the AFL, adopt an adventurous-even an "evangelist"-approach to organization,andformthe CIOthatfiredthe imaginationof
industrialworkersand spurredthe insurgence of mass-productionunionism.
"Firmlywithinthe structuresand traditionsof the mainstreamAmericanLabor
movement,"the formationof the CIO enthusedand emboldenedauto workers
in a way analogousto the CGT-CGTU unification.78Fromthe first, the newly foundedCIO distinguisheditself by addressingthe burningquestionsof the
moment,championingthe cause of industrialunionism,and attractinga broad
layer of rank-and-filemilitants.79Moreover,throughits alliance with the New
Deal, the CIO embracedthe "progressive"politics thatthen infatuatedAmerican workers,identifying itself with political principlesthat mirroredpopular
aspirations(andillusions).80At the same time, it expected to collect a substantial returnfor its electoralsupport.Duringthe Flintoccupation,when Lewis announced that the CIO had "helpedRoosevelt lick industry[in the elections];
now let Roosevelt help us lick industry[in the GM strike],"he was roundlyrebuked in the establishedpress for urgingthe Administrationto repayits political debts;but his remarkput the New Deal on notice thatlaborwould hold the
Democrats to their promises.81In this way also, the CIO's alliance with the
Roosevelt coalitionresembledthe COT's affiliationwith the PopularFrontand
led to rathersimilarresults.
Finally, the CIO was willing to rely on Communistand militantworkersto
carryout its essential organizingtasks.82Like the CGTMetalUnion, the UAW
was made up of Communist,radical, and rank-and-fileactivists receptive to
Brody, Workersin IndustrialAmerica,93, 130; Fine, Sit-Down,66-69.
Ziegler,John L. Lewis, 85. 79 Daily Worker,May 11, 1936.
80 Melvyn Dubofsky, "Not So 'TurbulentYears': Another Look at the American 1930s,"
Amerikastudien,24 (January1979); Zieger, The CIO,44-45.
81 Chicago Daily Tribune,January22, 1937; New Masses, February9, 1937.
82 David J.
Saposs, Communismin AmericanUnionism(New York:McGraw-Hill,1959), 119.
77
78
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
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345
new techniques,willing to utilize the sit-down strikeand take the big chances
to overcome the odds stackedagainstthem.83As WyndhamMortimer,the most
prominentof the CommunistUAW leaders,put it: "Wehad a confidence and a
spiritof sacrificethat ... enabledus to accomplishwhat many had thoughtimpossible."84By 1936 these unionistshadcome to realizethatonly an audacious
and intransigentaction, like a factory occupation,held the key to breakingthe
open shop and forcing uncommittedor intimidatedworkersto take notice of
the union. They, not the top CIO leadership,were in fact the ones responsible
for occupying the Flint plants and seeing the strugglethroughto the end.85
CONCLUSION
The Paris and Flint occupationstook place in differentcontexts and assumed
somewhatdifferentforms. Originatingin the auto and metal-fabricatingworks
of the Paris Region, the French strikes were largely spontaneousin character
andnationalin dimension;they were entirelypeaceful;they encompasseda majority of workersin the new mass-productionindustries;and they pursueddiffused, often unspecifiedgoals, althoughunionrecognitionwas foremostamong
them.The GM strike,by contrast,was almost entirelyunion-controlledand local in dimension,even if it ultimatelyaffected a greaternumberof workersin
differentpartsof the country;it also involved a minorityof the workforceand
limited itself to specific union demands.Despite these admittedlysignificant
differences,the Paris and Flint occupationsappealedto similartypes of workers, who had been withoutrepresentationand burdenedby similargrievances;
they were supportedby a comparablearrayof economic and political forces
that allowed the strikersto engage in what were normallyillegal forms of action; and these workerswere instigatedby small groupsof militantswilling to
use radicalmethodsbut limit themselves to goals wholly compatiblewith existing institutionalarrangements.
These similarities,in my view, suggest thatthe two occupationswere essentially a response to organizationalchallenges which conventionalunion practices had failed to meet. The extremeconcentrationof employerpower,the inauspicious natureof Fordist-Tayloristproduction,the weakness of the labor
movement, and the ineffectiveness of traditionalactions meant that the only
way unionistscould possibly organizethe mass-productionsector andwin collective bargainingrights was by employing radical and innovative methods.
83 Earl Browder,"TheAmericanCommunistPartyin the Thirties,"in As WeSaw the Thirties,
Rita James Simon, ed. (Urbana:Universityof Illinois Press, 1967), 230. HenryKraus,who played
a key role in the Flint strike,claims UAW leaderswere deeply impressedwith the Frenchsit-downs
and drew the properlessons from them. See Heroes of UnwrittenStory: The UAW 1934-39 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993), 205-6. This view, however, was not sharedby all observers.For example, Levinson, Labor on the March, 169-71.
84 Mortimer,Organize!, 103.
85 Dubofsky and VanTine, John L. Lewis, 259; Galenson,The CIOChallengeto the AFL, 124.
346
MICHAEL TORIGIAN
And this is what made the Paris and Flint movements distinct from earlier occupations and imbued them with such historical significance. Unlike the revolutionary occupations in Italy and Russia, the French and American strikes
avoided political objectives and focused on union issues, even though Communists played a leading role in each of them; in fact, in both Paris and Flint,
Communists viewed the strikes solely as a means of building the union movement and doing so within the parameters of capitalist society.86 And unlike the
desperate mine occupations of the early 1930s, the Paris and Flint strikes transcended immediate grievances and attempted to alter power relations throughout the production process. In a word, the French and U.S. occupations were
essentially social rather revolutionary or bread-and-butter movements.87
That the occupations were preeminently a matter of socially institutionalizing unionism in the new factory system and achieving rather traditional union
goals is further borne out by the subsequent history of the sit-down strike. Following the breakthroughs in Paris and Flint, a rash of occupations erupted in
auto and other industries. The Communist leaders of the Paris Metal Union, as
well as the radically disposed UAW leaders, both of whom had risen to power
on the basis of the sit-down strike, generally frowned on these occupationsbecause they left undue power in rank-and-file hands, alienated the public,
fumed the state against the unions, and, most importantly, jeopardized their new
bargaining role.88 Communist and radical unionists in both countries were more
than ready "to play by the rules" once their bargaining role had been recognized.
But even if these unionists had not decided to play by the rules, the various
contingent factors that made the occupations possible began to give way in late
1937 to conditions that ruled out their continued use. After the Supreme Court
accepted the constitutionality of the Wagner Act in March 1937, which protected unions from employer interference and enabled the National Labor
86
Virtuallyevery public statementby the Paris Metal Union, as well as the UAW leadership,
emphasizedthe social and corporatenatureof the strikers'demands.See Deprettoand Schweitzer,
Le Communismea l'Usine, 192-7; Kraus,Heroes of UnwrittenStory, 205.
87 Onlabor's
propensityto act as a social movement,see Alain Touraine,The Voiceand the Eye:
An Analysis of Social Movements (Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity Press, 1981), and Alain
Touraine,Michel Wieviorka,and FrancoisDubet, Le MouvementOuvrier(Paris:Fayard, 1984).
88 Kraus,TheManyand the Few, 46; J. Barrue,"Le Syndicalismeau Tournant,"
La Revolution
Proletarienne,January10, 1937; Benoit Frachon,Le Role Sociale des Syndicats (Paris:CCEO,
1937). Unlike the union hierarchy,the rankscontinuedto resortto the sit-down-highlighting the
difference between the problems of institutionalizationand those of routine conflict resolution.
There were also differences between the Weinstone leadershipof the Michigan state CP, which
played a majorrole in the UAW, and the CP nationaloffice underEarl Browder,with the former
prone to engage in actions, such as disruptivesit-downs, frownedon by the more "conservative"
nationalleadership,which was reluctantto rock the boat,especially afterOctober1937, when FDR
in his "quarantinethe aggressors"speech signed on to the Soviets' collective-securitypolicy. See
Harvey Klehr and John Earl Haynes, TheAmerican CommunistMovement:StormingHeaven Itself (New York:Twayne, 1992), 81-84. Also BenjaminStolberg,TheStoryof the CIO (New York:
Arno, 1971), 160.
FACTORY
OCCUPATION:
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1937
347
Board to conduct certifying elections, U.S. sit-downs drasticallydroppedoff,
as unions pursuedtheir goals throughproceduralmeans.89Then, in 1939, the
SupremeCourtruled the sit-down strikean "illegal seizure."More importantly, the criminalizationof the sit-down was precededby the "RooseveltRecession,"which caused employersto trimtheirworkforcesand unions to focus on
defense and consolidation,ratherthan aggressive organizingcampaigns.90In
France,sporadicrank-and-filesit-downs persisted afterJune 1936, usually in
cases where employers attemptedto circumventor sabotagethe new bargaining machinery.But except for the Paris metal strikeof MarchandApril 1938,
which Communistscarriedout againsta governmentthathad turnedon them,
the occupationceased to be an acceptableform of union action.91The looming
threatof especially afterthe AustrianAnschlussof March 1938, waningpublic
tolerance,as well as an increasinglyconservativestate, furtherdiminishedthe
possibility of such strikes.In both countriesthen, it was as if the historicalrationale, as well as the opportunityfor the factory occupationhad ceased to be
viable by late 1937. After servingas the midwife to mass-productionunionism,
the sit-down almost immediately yielded to institutionalprocedures,92suggesting thatthe ParisandFlint occupationswere historicallysignificantless for
popularizing radical forms of collective action, as some contemporaryobservers feared,93than for introducinga novel means of pursuing traditional
union goals within the frameworkof the Fordist-Tayloristfactory system.
89 The MonthlxLabor Review, 18
(August 1938), 360-2.
90 The UAW claimed that of the
industry's517,000 productionworkers,320,000 were unem-
ployed by late 1937 and 196,000 on shorttime. See Bernstein,TurbulentYears,562-3.
91 See Michael
Torigian,"The Defeat of the PopularFront:The Paris Metal Strike of MarchApril 1938" (forthcoming).
92 P.K.
Edwards,Strikesin the UnitedStates 1881-1974 (New York:St. Martin'sPress, 1981),
142-3; Lefranc,luin 36, 267, 294.
93 For example, Henri Prouteau,Les Occupationsd'Usines en Italie et en France (Paris:LibraireTechniqueet Economique,1938), 243; Henridu Passage,"L'Occupationdes Usines,"Etudes
(September5, 1936), 595.