Patrick Chambers

Pat Chambers (born John Ernest Williams; September 13, 1901 – May 8, 1990) was an influential labor organizer and Communist Party member in California in the 1930s. He was a key figure in some of the largest California agricultural strikes of 1933. Chambers was the inspiration for the character "Mac" in John Steinbeck's 1936 novel, In Dubious Battle.

Early years Little is known of Chambers prior to his appearance in California in the late 1920s. Prison records give his birthplace as both Ohio and Massachusetts. In a 1972 interview, he alluded to having spent time in the Navy. His San Quentin intake card from April 27, 1935 describes him with a U.S. Navy tattoo of a flag and eagle.

Union activism Pat Chambers was an anarchist before he joined the Communist Party. Chambers had a philosophical interest in anarchism, and during the Sacco and Vanzetti trial encountered some of the “old Wobblies” who steered him towards union activities. Chambers was frequently arrested for his union activities and “was taken into custody twenty-five times between 1929 and 1936 as a result of his participation in strikes.

By 1931, Chambers moved to San Jose, where the Agricultural Workers Industrial League had changed its name to the Cannery and Agricultural Workers Industrial Union. The CAWIU operated under the leadership of the Communist party, and Chambers worked as the District Organizer for $5 per week while Caroline Decker, district secretary, was paid $7.50 a week.

Chambers was present during the Imperial Valley lettuce strike of 1930, though he described his initial work there as mostly observation.

Tagus Ranch strike of 1933 In the late summer of 1933, workers at the Tagus Ranch near Tulare, California were receiving 15 cents an hour to pick peaches, with “wages paid in scrip rather than legal currency." Chambers had spent weeks organizing workers to prepare for a strike. Workers demanded an end to scrip payment and an increase to 35 cents an hour. They also demanded an end to the requirement that they buy “at a company store that charged prices 25 to 30 percent higher than those outside the ranch. When 750 workers walked out on August 14, 1933, “Chambers...felt confident of victory.” Chambers reportedly disliked the characterization that Steinbeck created, and in 1971 when Marc Grossman, then an aide to Cesar Chavez, met Chambers, “Chambers responded with a cascade of swear words” when asked if he had ever met Steinbeck.

Cotton strike By 1933 cotton was the second most valuable crop in California, That year, in contrast to the past 4 years, “an abrupt improvement in the nation’s agricultural economy…[sent] …the price of California cotton, steadily upward."

A fact-finding committee appointed by California Governor James Rolph convened in Visalia to hear testimony from the strikers about the violence initiated by the farmers. The strikers insisted on having Chambers brought from jail where he was held to testify, and when he was brought to the hearing, he was “given an ovation by the striking workers." A few days later, the motion to reduce his bond was denied and trial was set for November 21. Chambers’ trial took place in Visalia and the evidence was so weak that “even with a jury decidedly hostile to the defendant, a conviction could not be obtained."

Criminal syndicalism trial

In 1934 as labor battles continued in California, the Associated Farmers of California spearheaded ongoing arrests of union leaders, and “effectively ended the organizing capacities of the CAWIU. CAWIU headquarters in Sacramento had been infiltrated by undercover operatives who sent information back to the Associated Farmers as well a to the Sacramento County district attorney. While the initial arrest cited Chambers for vagrancy, on August 15 Chambers, along with Caroline Decker and others, was indicted by a grand jury on charges of criminal syndicalism.

While waiting for the trial to begin, Chambers “was a representative of the Communist Party at the Socialist Party Convention."

The “Sacramento Conspiracy” trial began in January 1935. Both Chambers and Caroline Decker acted as their own attorneys, with assistance from attorney Leo Gallagher. Lasting for over four months, the trial was then the longest trial in California history. While the jury deliberated for sixty-six hours, and reportedly took 118 ballots to reach the verdicts, Chambers passed the time “reading a book entitled ‘Fascism and the Social Revolution.’ On April 1, the jury presented a verdict of guilty, and Chambers was sentenced to five years in prison.

Appeal and release

The Third District Court of Appeal reversed the Sacramento verdict on September 28, 1937. The court essentially ruled that evidence presented of a speech made by Chambers in 1930 that was used to convict him of “criminal syndicalism” in 1934 was inadmissible as too remote in a trial in 1934.” Chambers was released from San Quentin on October 13, 1937.

Later years Chambers mostly vanished from the labor movement after his release from San Quentin. The inability of the American Communist Party to bring its trade union policies into the line required by the Comintern had effectively forced the demise of the Trade Union Unity League and the CAWIU by March 1935.

Chambers effectively dropped out of the party and the labor movement and worked as a laborer, ultimately spending his last years as a member of the International Pile Drivers’ union in San Pedro, CA He came to United Farm Workers (UFW) headquarters near Delano in 1971 to talk with Cesar Chavez, telling him that he had “avoided coming to Delano during the five-year grape strike...out of fear that Chavez would be red-baited because of CAWIU’s Communist ties. Chavez had wanted to meet Chambers “for years...but nobody knew where he was.” During their meeting, one of Chambers’ old bodyguards, Gonzalo Flores, came and the two men “embraced and started recalling the strikes.

Chambers died in San Pedro, California, on May 8, 1990.