Mushroom Workers Want a Union counterpunch.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from counterpunch.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Harvest at Hiyu Wine Farm, Hood River, Oregon / Photo by Nate Ready
In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) into law. It allowed employees to unionize and negotiate competitive wages and working conditions. Agricultural workers, however, were not included.
The treatment of agricultural workers in the United States is “deep in the shadows of slavery,” says Elizabeth Strater, director of strategic campaigns for the United Farm Workers of America (UFW), the country’s largest union for agricultural workers.
A precursor to the UFW, the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA) was created in 1962 by labor activists Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta. The NFWA advocated for workers in California’s most lucrative agricultural industry: grape growing. After years of boycotts and community organization, the NFWA secured the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act (ALRA), which guaranteed the rights of farm workers to organize and coll