Research Library

Research Library C.L.E.A.R. Hawaiʻi Labor History Archive

Center for Labor Education & Research
University of Hawai‘i - West O‘ahu
James and Abigail Campbell Library
91-1001 Farrington Highway, Kapolei, HI 96707
(808) 689-2760 - FAX (808) 689-2761

The Center maintains two research collections, a labor law library and a labor history archive. Materials in these collections are for use at the Center only and will not be loaned out. However, a copy machine is available and materials (within reason) may be duplicated there at no cost to the user.

To access the labor history archive or the CLEAR labor law collection, an appointment must be arranged in advance with with the CLEAR director [call 689-2760]. In addition, researchers must follow CLEAR's CLEAR Archive Access Rules.

CLEAR Archive & Law Library

CLEAR also maintains article files on a wide variety of labor-management issues. CLEAR staff can preview the topical index to these articles which are culled from the local papers, the National Law Journal and many other sources.

Union Density Statistics: State by State Comparisons

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CLEAR Hawaiʻi Labor History Archive

The Reference and User Services Association (RUSA) of the American Library Association selected CLEAR's Labor History Archive as the 2016 winner of RUSA's John Sessions Memorial Award, sponsored by the Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO, to recognizes a library or library system which has made a significant effort to work with the labor community and by doing so has brought recognition to the history and contribution of the labor movement to the development of the United States.

The labor history archive contains clipping files on each local union in Hawaiʻi as well as an ever-growing collection of contracts, union newsletters, books and pamphlets focusing on Hawaiʻi's labor history.

Among the most highly prized components of this collection are:

The research files of renowned scholars John Reinecke and Edward Beechert

The Honolulu Record - see also online version, in progress.

The correspondence file of the Hawai‘i office of the AFL-CIO from 1940 to 1982.

The files of the Honolulu Central Labor Council

Complete Arbitration Decisions of Hawai‘i's foremost Labor Arbitrator, Ted Tsukiyama.

Production files and tapes from our Special Research Projects:

The Great Hawaii Dock Strike

1946: The Great Hawaii Sugar Strike

The authors' notes and research files for CLEAR's publications:

Edward Beechert's Aupuni i La‘au: A History of Hawai‘i's Carpenters Union, Local 745 (1993)

William Puette's The Hilo Massacre: Hawaii's Bloody Monday August 1st, 1938 (1988)

Bernard Stern's Rutledge Unionism: Labor Relations in the Honolulu Transit Industry (1986) and The Aloha Trade: Labor Relations in Hawaii's Hotel Industry 1941-1987 (1989)

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