Steel strike of 1959

The steel strike of 1959 was a labor union strike by the United Steelworkers of America (USWA) against major steel-making companies in the United States. The strike occurred over management's demand that the union give up a contract clause which limited management's ability to change the number of workers assigned to a task or to introduce new work rules or machinery which would result in reduced hours or numbers of employees. The strike's effects persuaded President Dwight D. Eisenhower to invoke the back-to-work provisions of the Taft-Hartley Act. The union sued to have the Act declared unconstitutional, but the Supreme Court upheld the law.

The union eventually retained the contract clause and won minimal wage increases. On the other hand, the strike led to significant importation of foreign steel for the first time in U.S. history, which replaced the domestic steel industry in the long run. The strike remained the longest work stoppage in the American steel industry until the steel strike of 1986.

USWA founding president Philip Murray died in November 1952, and David J. McDonald was named acting president by the USWA executive board. Although observers felt that Murray had intended to push McDonald out of the union, his sudden death left McDonald in a position to take control. In 1953, the USWA executive board named McDonald president.

McDonald emphasized enhanced fringe benefits. The election of Dwight Eisenhower as US president and Republican majorities in the United States Congress (at least from 1952 to 1954) made expansion of social programs unlikely, but Eisenhower indeed would extend many of Roosevelt's programs.

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