Joan Baez singing an earlier version of this song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWkVcaAGCi0
As we come marching, marching in the beauty of the day,
A million darkened kitchens, a thousand mill lofts gray,
Are touched with all the radiance that a sudden sun discloses,
For the people hear us singing: “Bread and roses! Bread and roses!”
As we come marching, marching, we battle too with men,
For they are in the struggle, And together we will win.
Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes;
Hearts starve as well as bodies; Give us bread, but give us roses!
As we come marching, marching, unnumbered women dead
Go crying through our singing; their ancient cry for bread.
Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew.
Yes, it is bread we fight for — but we fight for roses, too!
As we come marching, marching, we stand together tall.
For the rising of the women means the rising of us all.
No more the drudge and idler — ten who toil where one reposes,
But a sharing of life’s glories: Bread and roses! Bread and roses!
Words by James Oppenheim; Music by Mimi Farina
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“Bread and Roses” is an expression of women’s call for justice. The phrase was first was coined by Helen Todd, a factory inspector in Illinois, in a speech she gave in 1910 advocating for women’s right to vote. It expresses women’s desire for both economic security, money and a home (bread) as well as the finer things of life such as music, nature, education & being appreciated for one’s contributions (roses). Women’s suffrage was necessary to ever achieve equality and justice for women. The slogan soon became a rallying cry in the fight for workers’ rights as well. In 1912 in Lawrence, Massachusetts, 20,000 workers walked out of textile mills to protest a cut in their weekly pay when a state law made 54 hours the maximum work week for women and minors. After 10 weeks, the strikers won important concessions from the woolen companies, not only for themselves, but also for the 250,000 textile workers (largely immigrant women) throughout New England. During the strike, the banner being carried by girls and women proclaiming, “We want bread and roses too!” inspired James Oppenheim to write the poem Bread and Roses in 1911.
Decades later, it was put to music by Mimi Baez Farina, an American activist and singer-songwriter (and younger sister to Joan Baez). In 1974, she also founded Bread and Roses, a nonprofit co-operative organization designed to bring free music and entertainment to institutions: jails, prisons, hospitals, juvenile facilities, and nursing homes. Initially active in the San Francisco Bay area, it spread nationally, producing hundreds of shows a year over many decades.
Today, this song is sung by feminists, workers and students as the demand for bread and roses has come to symbolize the hope for justice in our lives. It has become the de facto anthem of the women’s movement, sung around the world on March 8th of each year on International Women’s Day.