Joe Hill SLC

  • Home
  • Joe Hill
    • Joe Hill Biography
    • Execution Site
    • Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
    • Joe Hill Songs
      • Casey Jones—the Union Scab
      • The Preacher and the Slave
      • The Rebel Girl
      • There Is Power in a Union
  • About
    • Contact
      • Email List
    • Monument
  • Events
    • Concert
      • Schedule
        • Performers
        • Side Stage
        • Union Sponsors
        • Business Sponsor
    • Contest
      • Songwriting Contest Rules
      • Oh, Please Let Me Dance This Waltz with You
      • Come and Take a Joy-ride in My Aeroplane
      • The Guitar
  • Blog

Why Celebrate Joe Hill?

September 3, 2015 by JoeHillOC 2 Comments

Joe HillOne hundred years ago this coming November, legendary songwriter and Wobbly Joe Hill was executed by the state of Utah. To celebrate the life and spirit of Joe Hill, we have created an all-day concert in Salt Lake City at Sugar House Park (a few hundred yards from where Joe was killed) with fine musicians in a variety of styles and with creative activism. The all day festivities will be held Saturday, September 5th, from 11:30AM – 10PM.

During the past hundred years since Joe Hill’s death, we have seen significant improvements in labor rights and protections. But, with the advent of big money into big politics, these basic reforms such as the 8-hour day, fair wages, and worker protections are now under threat of total obliteration by today’s monied politicians.

Which is why Joe Hill’s story remains significant and relevant for today. He addressed the concerns that are now plaguing the 21st century: a new economic order that brings rising inequality and the myth of a classless society; the consequences of free speech and dissent; the separation of church and state; the right to a fair trial; the definitions of patriotism and democracy. Hill wrote about all of these critical issues in a manner that reached millions of workers and that has made him, in the words of the New York Times a day after he was killed in 1915, “much more dangerous to social stability than he was when alive.”

Contributing to this post:
Nancy Snyder
Recording Secretary Emeritus, SEIU Local 1021

Filed Under: Labor Unions Today Tagged With: 21st century, dissent, fair wages, free speech, inequality

What is Right to Work?

April 24, 2015 by JoeHillOC Leave a Comment

Series: Labor Unions Today

Labor unions today right to work

The right to work and “right-to-work.”

When we juxtapose the terms, it points out that they do not mean the same thing.  In fact, since the political concept of right-to-work was introduced in 1936, Americans have misunderstood it to the full degree that was intended.  Right-to-work laws make it illegal to require employee support for the union that negotiates a contract, even though the union contract must benefit every employee.  Even as we notice how unfair this is, right-to-work is creating a separation of views – those who uphold union membership and those who look only for benefits.  Right-to-work, aka right-to-freeload, destroys the strength of employees’ united voices, exactly as desired.  These laws are devised to corrode employee solidarity and leave every individual with a diminished and disregarded view about workplace safety, fair pay, work hours, and every other condition we have come to expect in a job.

Free bargaining laws preserve our real right to fair, safe work.  When statutes support union security with 100% affiliation, everyone has a role in the contract and, therefore, the quality and safety of the work.  Currently, American worker solidarity assures an average of $5971 in higher annual wages, higher health benefits, lower poverty rates, and less than half the risk of workplace fatality in right -to-work states.  Union secure laws promote a healthy balance of workplace authority and vigorous environments for ideas, standards, and regulations.

A hundred years ago, Joe Hill may have envisioned the potential of free bargaining laws.  He definitely understood the power of a united workforce to achieve the kind of safe work and fair income now on the decline with lower union membership.  A Joe Hill song about right-to-work would likely portray the clever anti-labor politician, Vance Muse, who successfully dupes a working class caricature with another “pie in the sky.”

This guest post was written by

Elizabeth Weight
American Federation of Teachers Utah

Secretary-Treasurer, Central Utah Federation of Labor

Filed Under: Labor Unions Today Tagged With: guest post, labor unions today

  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2025 · Minimum Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in