Now, if you want higher wages let me tell you what to do   You got to talk to the workers in the shop with you   You got to build you a union, got to make it strong   But if you all stick together, boys, it won't be long   You get shorter hours, better working conditions   Vacations with pay. Take your kids to the seashore      It ain't quite this simple, so I better explain   Just why you got to ride on the union train   'Cause if you wait for the boss to raise your pay   We'll all be a-waitin' 'til Judgment Day   We'll all be buried, gone to heaven   St. Peter'll be the straw boss then      Now you know you're underpaid but the boss says you ain't   He speeds up the work 'til you're 'bout to faint   You may be down and out, but you ain't beaten   You can pass out a leaflet and call a meetin'   Talk it over, speak your mind   Decide to do somethin' about it      Course, the boss may persuade some poor damn fool   To go to your meetin' and act like a stool   But you can always tell a stool, though, that's a fact   He's got a yaller streak a-runnin' down his back   He doesn't have to stool, he'll always get along   On what he takes out of blind men's cups      You got a union now, and you're sittin' pretty   Put some of the boys on the steering committee   The boss won't listen when one guy squawks   But he's got to listen when the union talks   He'd better, be mighty lonely   Everybody decide to walk out on him      Suppose they're working you so hard it's just outrageous   And they're paying you all starvation wages   You go to the boss and the boss would yell   "Before I raise your pay I'd see you all in hell."   Well, he's puffing a big cigar, feeling mighty slick   'Cause he thinks he's got your union licked   Well, he looks out the window and what does he see   But a thousand pickets, and they all agree   He's a bastard, unfair, slavedriver   Bet he beats his wife      Now, boys, you've come to the hardest time   The boss will try to bust your picket line   He'll call out the police, the National Guard   They'll tell you it's a crime to have a union card   They'll raid your meetin', they'll hit you on the head   They'll call every one of you a goddam red   Unpatriotic, Japanese spies, sabotaging national defense      But out at Ford, here's what they found   And out at Vultee, here's what they found   And out at Allis-Chalmers, here's what they found   And down at Bethlehem, here's what they found   That if you don't let red-baiting break you up   And if you don't let stoolpigeons break you up   And if you don't let vigilantes break you up   And if you don't let race hatred break you up   You'll win. What I mean, take it easy, but take it