The 1968 Florida Teachers' Strike: Public Sector Unionism and the Fight Against Sunshine State Conservatism

"In early 1968, more than 27,000 teachers across Florida mailed in their letters of resignation, creating the country's first statewide teacher strike. By going on strike, Florida's teachers fought for and gained improvements in education and their profession. Teachers won a monumental victory and gained collective bargaining rights for all public sector employees. While historians have often viewed the late 1960s and 1970s period as a period of declension for the American labor movement, Jody Noll's "The 1968 Florida Teachers' Strike" challenges this notion by extending the focus to teachers and public sector unionism. Through the Florida teacher strike and teacher militancy that swept across the country during this period, it becomes clear that a vibrant labor movement remained that helped reshape the country's political and social structures, even as industrial labor saw a decline in membership and power. Noll's study explores the political and social factors that led to the strike. In doing so, he examines how a population boom led to a rise in modern conservatism in Florida, serving as a bellwether for the South's switch to the Republican Party. Led by Republican Governor Claude Kirk, the first Republican governor elected in the Deep South since Reconstruction, Florida played an instrumental role in forming modern conservatism and helped create a blueprint for Republicans to build a New Right powerhouse throughout the country. While much attention has been paid to the ascendancy of the New Right, Florida has often been on the periphery of this scholarship. "The 1968 Florida Teachers' Strike" addresses this oversight and demonstrates that Florida's diversity from transplants moving to the state from across the country offers a better lens than other southern states into how modern conservatism gripped the country. Noll examines the strike and the following years to analyze teachers' vital role in shaping political and social policy within the United States. As an interracial work stoppage in the Deep South, the Florida teacher strike provides insight into how interracial unionism was possible in the South and a potent weapon for labor movements. Moreover, as a predominantly female-led workforce, teachers challenged notions of passivity and used their union to fight for gender equality"--