Union by Law: Filipino American Labor Activists, Rights Radicalism, and Racial Capitalism

Michael W. McCann; George I. Lovell

Published by University of Chicago Press 2020

Union by Law

Filipino American Labor Activists, Rights Radicalism, and Racial Capitalism

Michael W. McCann and George I. Lovell

In the series Chicago Series in Law and Society

https://doi.org/10.7208/9780226680071

Overview
Contents

About this book

laborers in American West Coast agricultural fields and Alaska salmon canneries. There, they found themselves confined to exploitative low-wage jobs in racially segregated workplaces as well as subjected to vigilante violence and other forms of ethnic persecution. In time, though, Filipino workers formed political organizations and affiliated with labor unions to represent their interests and to advance their struggles for class, race, and gender-based social justice.

Union by Law analyzes the broader social and legal history of Filipino American workers’ rights-based struggles, culminating in the devastating landmark Supreme Court ruling, Wards Cove Packing Co. v. Atonio (1989). Organized chronologically, the book begins with the US invasion of the Philippines and the imposition of colonial rule at the dawn of the twentieth century. The narrative then follows the migration of Filipino workers to the United States, where they mobilized for many decades within and against the injustices of American racial capitalist empire that the Wards Cove majority willfully ignored in rejecting their longstanding claims. This racial innocence in turn rationalized judicial reconstruction of official civil rights law in ways that significantly increased the obstacles for all workers seeking remedies for institutionalized racism and sexism. A reclamation of a long legacy of racial capitalist domination over Filipinos and other low-wage or unpaid migrant workers, Union by Law also tells a story of noble aspirational struggles for human rights over several generations and of the many ways that law was mobilized both to enforce and to challenge race, class, and gender hierarchy at work.

Author / Editor information

Michael W. McCann is the Gordon Hirabayashi Professor for the Advancement of Citizenship in the Department of Political Science at the University of Washington. He is the author, coauthor, editor, or coeditor of eight books, including, most recently, Injury and Injustice. George I. Lovell is professor and chair in the Department of Political Science, the Harry Bridges Endowed Chair in Labor Studies, and adjunct professor in Law, Societies, and Justice at the University of Washington. He is the author of Legislative Deferrals and This Is Not Civil Rights, the latter also published by the University of Chicago Press.

Reviews

“This is a powerful book, covering a long history of labor mobilization in the face of a racialized labor regime and a frequently exclusionary and hostile legal system. It clearly shows the power of the law to support the claims of less powerful groups from time to time as it is mobilized by social justice advocates, as well as the inevitable slippage and failure of the law to accomplish these ends at other times. It expresses both despair and a resurgent hope that the institutions of American law and politics might live up to their ideals.”

— Sally Engle Merry, New York University

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Abbreviations Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
Preface Publicly Available Download PDF	xv
Notes on Terminology Publicly Available Download PDF	xxiii
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
Part I. American Capitalist Expansion, Colonialism, and Empire
Prologue to Part I: The American Colonial Project in the Philippines Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	35
1. Filipino Migration to the Metropole: Racism, Resistance, and Rights Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	67
2. A Cannery Workers’ Union by Law: The Formative Years Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	119
3. Rights Radicalism amid “Restrictive” Law: The War Years Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	161
Part II. Challenging Empire: Transpacific Rights Radicalism
Prologue to Part II: The Cold War Era: Global Empire, the Rise of Marcos, and Civil Rights Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	199
4. LELO, ACWA, and the Politics of Civil Rights Mobilization Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	225
5. The Trials of Tragedy: Turning Anguish into Anger Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	271
6. Wards Cove v. Atonio: The Execution of “Good” Civil Rights Law Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	305
Conclusion: Theorizing Law and Legal Mobilization in Racial Capitalist Empire Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	355
Appendix: Official Legal Texts Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	401
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	405
References Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	423
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	465

Language: English
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 512
Illustrations
- Other: 24 halftones
Keywords: legal mobilization; rights consciousness; racial capitalism; repressive law; empire; labor union; hierarchy; colonial; violence; Wards Cove v Atonio

eBook

Published: April 17, 2020
ISBN: 9780226680071