New York, NY
October 11, 2023
Maria Rivera [International Vice President of Workers United/SEIU and Regional Manager, WSRJB Workers United-SEIU]: Thank you for that kind introduction.
Hello, New York City! It’s great to be here with you today.
Let me begin by recognizing the workers who are here and the families of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire workers present. Thanks for taking the time to be here. It’s an honor to share today with you.
And of course, thanks to the Remember the Triangle Fire Coalition, who made sure today was possible. Thank you for the keeping the story of the Triangle fire alive.
Many of us have heard about how the fire that broke out at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory claimed 146 lives in 18 minutes, many of them young immigrant women, and some as young as fourteen.
We’ve heard about the billowing black smoke in the sky; the flames spreading through floor after floor; the panicked workers encountering locked exit doors and broken fire escapes; the cries for help as they began clamoring onto ledges. And finally, the thud of bodies as one person jumped, and then another, and another.
I’ve read accounts that one young woman gave a speech before jumping, but no one could hear what she was saying.
Soon, dead bodies were splayed across the sidewalk, as hundreds of people on the ground looked on in horror.
Among the bystanders was a young woman. Her name was Frances Perkins. The terrifying images she saw that day changed the trajectory of Frances’s life.
Today, we know her as the first woman to serve as United States Labor Secretary – and widely regarded as the most consequential and the first woman to serve in the Cabinet of any President in U.S. history. And personally, I know Frances Perkins as one of my heroes. I even keep a portrait of her above my desk, in the building named after her that’s home to the Department to Labor.
From this spot, to Albany, and then to our nation’s capital, Frances turned the horror of what happened here – and the voices of those immigrant women who were not heard on March 25, 1911 – into a call to action:
She was the driving force behind programs that generations of Americans have relied on for economic security and dignity, including state-level health and safety standards for factory workers, a nationwide minimum wage, social security, unemployment insurance, and restrictions on child labor.
Eighty-four years after the Triangle fire, I was the lead attorney for our own generation’s version of the Triangle factory fire, with the El Monte garment workers’ case.
The El Monte garment workers were trafficked here from Thailand and held against their will in an apartment complex. They were forced to sew clothing from the crack of dawn until the wee hours of the morning, until their fingers bled, and their vision blurred.
Just like the Triangle factory workers, the El Monte workers were overwhelmingly young immigrant women who came to the United Staes in pursuit of the American dream – only to find themselves confronting the same kinds of injustice that the Triangle workers encountered decades earlier: Long hours. Little pay. Unsafe working conditions.
Eventually, the El Monte workers filed a first-of-its-kind lawsuit against the companies up the chain that they were sewing for—not just the contractors—launching a historic campaign for corporate accountability.
Again, just like the Triangle fire, the legacy of the El Monte garment workers is still being felt today. It expanded manufacturer and retailer responsibility for the conditions in which their clothes are made; it helped launch anti-sweatshop movements across the country; changed our immigration laws; and shone a light on human trafficking.
Most importantly, it demonstrated to the world what is possible when workers come together to organize, to demand better, and to lead the change they want to see.
Just last month, I had the privilege of inducting of the El Monte garment workers into the Department of Labor’s Hall of Honor so that they could take their rightful place in labor history.
Our country has made important strides to protect workers’ rights. But we have much more to do.
Each generation has a duty to take the baton of progress from those who came before us.
That’s why we can’t stop fighting. Until every worker gets a just day’s pay for a hard day’s work, until every worker comes home healthy and safe at the end of the workday, and until every worker’s sacred right to join a union is protected.
Now, one more thing that Frances Perkins and I had in common: we both had the privilege of serving transformational Presidents who embrace the fight for workers’ rights and who believe in rewarding work, not wealth.
As someone who has fought to protect workers’ rights for my entire career, I can tell you that having a champion for working people like “Union Joe” in the White House makes all the difference.
That’s why I’m proud to lead the Labor Department during the most pro-worker, pro-union administration in history. This administration isn’t afraid to talk about “collective bargaining,” “workers’ rights,” and “organized labor.” And we’re not just saying the words; we’re delivering results.
You can rest assured: we are using every tool at our disposal to empower workers.
The Department of Labor isn’t just back in the enforcement business – we are leading a new era of enforcement to protect workers’ rights across the country.
In just the past few months, we’ve issued the first-ever heat hazard alert; We’ve restored and extended overtime protections for 3.6 million working people; We’ve prioritized health and safety for coal miners, and we’ve modernized the Davis-Bacon Act to update prevailing wage rates so construction workers on federally funded projects across the country get the pay they deserve.
That’s the Labor Department in action: empowering working people, enforcing the laws that protect them, and fighting to make sure that the voices of all workers are heard loud and clear.
You know, years ago, I took my own daughters to see this very site, and shared with them the story of the Triangle garment workers – the workers who perished here, but who didn’t have to.
And I thought of the one young woman who gave a speech to the crowd gathering below her, before jumping to her death. No one could hear her – because her voice was drowned out by fire. What was she saying?
I’m sure that question haunted all who witnessed that horrific event. It’s a question that should linger on our minds too, and it should remind all of us that we can and we must do better – and we must always listen to the voices of workers.
If only we had heard the Triangle workers’ cries for justice sooner, when they were marching in the streets years before, demanding better wages and conditions, the story of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory workers could have been a much different one.
But I’m glad to know that from this day onward, all the young girls like my daughters – and people of all ages – who travel here to pay their respects will know their story and the tremendous legacy of reform they inspired. This memorial serves as a reminder to all of us that we must stay vigilant and never let up in the fight to advance worker rights.
I’m honored to be in that fight with you and to keep the memory of the Triangle fire alive, together. Thank you.