What better way to honor an institution’s anniversary than to stomp on the misguided words of its founding speech. In honor of its 70th anniversary, Cornell’s ILR School hosted a showing of The Hand That Feeds, a recent documentary about an effort to unionize a New York sandwich shop, which was led by its predominantly Hispanic employees. During the film’s introduction, one of the two ILR professors hosting the event reflected on the speech Governor Dewey (yes, that Dewey who most definitely defeated Harry S. Truman in the 1948 presidential election) delivered when the school was founded. It was essentially a thinly veiled diatribe against gains in worker’s rights. Sadly, Dewey would probably be rather content (or at least not irate) with the state of American labor as illustrated by the film.

The Hand That Feeds is ultimately an optimistic film. After months of struggle, the employees of the sandwich shop  succeed in forming a union with unprecedented bargaining powers.  The film and its subjects are jubilant with this result and are quite explicit with how remarkable it is. But then again, this result is exceptional. Lurking in the margins of the film are all of the similar movements and struggles that went nowhere or backfired spectacularly. To the film’s credit, it is completely aware of the need for more work to be done. The film actually closes with scenes of protests in favor of raising the minimum wage for fast food employees. But while the film’s final message is “It can be done”, pessimists may walk away with the addendum “…but it’s really, really hard”.