Bring the Catholic Worker Back To The Picket Line
In 1936, following the encouragement of the Archbishop of Detroit, Dorothy Day traveled to Flint, Michigan to cover the famous sit-down strikes at the General Motors factories for the Catholic Worker newspaper. It was a time of historic, militant worker rebellion in the United States; many of the massive strikes of the mid 30s took on a revolutionary character resulting in mass violence and shuttered cities. The workers in Detroit had physically occupied the factories to halt production so Day had to climb into one of the buildings through a barricaded window to interview them. Explaining why she was allowed in, Day writes, “The Catholic Worker is generally recognized as a labor paper, as well as a religious one. Many of the men were familiar with the paper, so it was easy to get permission to go into the plant.” Day went on to write passionately about the strikers plight: “It was the speedup [of the assembly line] which bothered the men most. The workers packed tightly around the cars