A timeline of major general strikes in the U.S.

On Friday, Jan. 23, an estimated 50,000 people in Minneapolis participated in an “ICE OUT” day general strike following an intense immigration crackdown in the city and the killing of Renee Macklin Good by federal officers. 

Following the killing of another Minnesotan, 37-year-old Alex Pretti, by immigration enforcement, many have called for a National Shutdown on Friday, Jan. 30. The general strike effort asks participants nationwide to stay home from work and school and not go shopping — a collective attempt by Americans to show opposition to the Trump administration’s current ICE tactics and funding. Some businesses across the country plan to be closed, as well.

General strikes have been around in the U.S. for a long time. But how strikes are organized and what participants are trying to achieve has shifted over time.

1860s - Civil War 

In his 1935 essay “Black Reconstruction in America,” sociologist W.E.B. DuBois argues that one of the first general strikes in the U.S. was enacted by enslaved people toward the end of the Civil War.

As the war raged on and the Union Army got closer to Southern plantations, many enslaved people escaped to join Union forces.

“It was a general strike that involved directly in the end perhaps a half million people,” DuBois wrote. “They wanted to stop the economy of the plantation system, and to do that they left the plantations.”

“[Slaves] were withdrawing their labor in a way that both showed their opposition to slavery and really deprived the Confederacy of its key labor force,” said William Jones, a professor and Associate Chair of History at the University of Minnesota. “It shifted the balance of power in the Civil War in a really important way.”

1872 - New York City General Strike

Coming out of the Civil War, as the U.S. economy moved away from agriculture and toward manufacturing and production, workers in industrial sectors often faced long, grueling days.

In 1872, builders and furniture-makers in New York City allied together to demand the enforcement of an eight-hour workday, a law that was adopted by New York State but only enforced in a limited capacity. Roughly 100,000 workers across building and manufacturing trades went on strike, and 20,000 workers participated in a collective march. 

It helped propel the labor movement forward in New York City, said Sarah Seidman, Puffin Foundation Curator of Social Activism at the Museum of the City of New York. “It's one battle in a longer war around labor, but definitely draws on all kinds of union organizations to come together.”

Trades, including carpenters, stonemasons, bricklayers, painters, plumbers, and more, secured the enforcement of the eight-hour workday — for a while. Employers eventually chipped away at that win, and Seidman said the strike is largely looked back on as unsuccessful.

1892 - New Orleans General Strike

In October, between 2,000 and 3,000 workers affiliated with the so-called Triple Alliance — the Teamsters (whose members were predominantly Black), the Scalesmen, and the Packers — in New Orleans went on strike to demand overtime compensation, a 10-hour workday, and union shop recognition.

The Triple Alliance comprised dock and factory workers, but printers, clerks, carpenters, musicians, utility workers, and more across New Orleans walked off the job in solidarity. On Nov. 8, some 30,000 workers went on strike, and the economy of New Orleans largely ground to a halt.

“There is no newspaper to be printed, no gas or electric light in the city, no wagons, no carpenters, painters, or in fact any business doing,” strike leader Samuel Gompers wrote in a letter to the head of the American Federation of Labor.

Employers and the press alike tried to stoke divisions between strikers along racial lines, but to no avail.

“Workers actually came together, despite the rising of Jim Crow, to promote each other's labor interests, and they successfully resisted the attempts to break that labor movement up by dividing on race,” said Erik Loomis, a professor at the University of Rhode Island and author of “A History of America in 10 Strikes.”

After three days, employers caved to most of the strikers’ demands. While the closed shop recognition was denied, the Triple Alliance secured higher wages, overtime pay, and a ten-hour day.

1919 - Seattle General Strike

Coming out of World War I, workers in shipyards demanded a raise following government-imposed wartime wage freezes in war industries. 

In February, when 35,000 shipyard workers in Seattle went on strike in response to unmet demands, 101 AFL unions — comprising 25,000 workers across multiple industries — voted to strike in solidarity. Roughly one in five Seattleites participated. Streetcars stopped running, and stores were shuttered. 

While the strike lasted roughly six days, some shop and restaurant employees returned to work early, as the city’s mayor employed scare tactics to quell the strike, and political factions within the striking unions caused splinters. Eventually, the strike collapsed.

Organizing during the strike led to an impressive show of collective action used to coordinate essential services. Strike kitchens were set up to feed hungry city residents, and union members saw that supply deliveries continued to hospitals. In that sense, it showed the transformative power of solidarity. However, worker demands were largely unmet by employers, and “in the 10 years after that, the Seattle labor movement is more or less eviscerated,” said Erik Loomis.

1934 - San Francisco, Minneapolis

There was a wave of general strikes that took place in 1934. 

In Minneapolis, workers in and related to the trucking industry in the Upper Midwest struck for union recognition. After the city’s North Loop trucking facilities were brought to a standstill, police opened fire on strikers, shooting 67 unarmed workers and killing two.

San Francisco’s general strike came about after police killed two striking longshoremen. The longshoremen were joined in solidarity by 150,000 Bay Area workers in July — including Teamsters, seamen, laundry workers, butchers, and more. After four days, partial victories on wages and hours were secured.

The shows of solidarity, and the bloodshed, helped move forward the passage of the National Labor Relations Act, which was signed into law by Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

“For the first time ever in U.S. history, workers had a very clear and unambiguous federal right to organize unions and to engage in collective bargaining with employers. Employers were legally obligated to deal with recognized unions,” explained John Logan, a professor and the director of Labor and Employment Studies at San Francisco State University. “It's difficult to imagine that that would have taken place absent the general strikes and the labor militancy that we saw throughout 1934 and 1935.”

1946 - Oakland, other cities

In Oakland, on Dec. 3, striking department store workers demanding higher wages — principally women, a sign of the changing makeup of labor organizing — were joined by 100,000 workers across 142 AFL unions. Dubbed a “work holiday,” strikers shut down all stores, except grocery stores and pharmacies. Bars were allowed to stay open, but, according to trade union activist Stan Weir, “could serve only beer and had to put their juke boxes out on the sidewalk to play at full volume and no charge.” 

The strike had a carnival-like atmosphere as couples danced in the streets. On Dec. 5, a compromise agreement was reached and, following the strike, four labor-sponsored City Council members were elected.

1946 was a major year for general strikes across the country. In Rochester, New York, after close to 500 municipal workers were fired after trying to form a union, an estimated 30,000 workers went on strike. (The municipal workers were reinstated and their right to unionize was recognized.) Similar labor actions took place in Stamford, Connecticut, and Lancaster, Pennsylvania. 

1947 - The Taft-Hartley Act

Following the strikes coming out of the end of World War II, Congress enacted the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947. It curtailed many of the powers unions previously held — including solidarity strikes (or general strikes). 

“[It] made it more difficult for unions to engage in certain types of strikes, what's called secondary boycotts. Economic actions that are not against their immediate employer, you made them legally liable. You allowed states to pass so-called right-to-work laws, which you made union-organizing even more challenging in places in the South and Mountain States and so forth,” said John Logan.

Many union-protected workers are covered by contracts that include no-strike clauses, meaning that participation in a general strike could qualify as a breach of contract. As a result, many of the general strikes that have taken place in recent years have had less labor-oriented aims and are aimed at drawing attention to political and social causes.

20th Century

On May 1, 2006, for example, thousands of workers participated in a sort of general strike to protest U.S. immigration policy. We saw one just last Friday in Minneapolis in response to recent ICE raids and killings, too.

These are not general strikes that intend to put pressure on employers for specific policies. During Minneapolis’ general strike on Jan. 23, hundreds of small businesses even closed in solidarity with protestors. In that instance, it wasn’t employee versus employer; it was one community against federal policies. And that’s a major shift.

“They effectively closed down the city, closed down the economy. They had huge, broad support from the community, including some support from some of the business community” in communicating a distinctly political message, said SFSU’s John Logan. “So what we might be seeing is the rise of a different kind of strike.”