People Before Profit blog

Photo essay: Migrants toil to put food on our tables

Sat, 28 Feb 2009 12:04:00 +0000

SANTA MARIA, Calif. — Guillermina Arzola, a Mixtec immigrant from San Sebastian del Monte in Oaxaca, Mexico, works in a crew of indigenous Mixtec and Zapotec farmworkers from Oaxaca and Guerrero, Mexico, picking strawberries here. The crew foreman is Eugenio Cardenas of the Central Coast Company, and the berries will be marketed by Green Giant. It is the beginning of the strawberry season here in Santa Maria. Workers stand in line to bring the berries they’ve picked to the checker. He inspects them and then punches a ticket that keeps track of the number of boxes each worker has picked. Three Zapotec farmworkers from Santa Maria Sola in Oaxaca walk out of the field, after having asked if there was any work.

Many Mixtec and Zapotec families live in an apartment complex here, and children play in the yard in front. Most are new migrants with very low income, and haven’t yet found much work. In the apartment of Samuel Ramirez, his wife Juana Lopez, and their children Adela and Maria, there is little furniture besides mattresses, a table and a couple of chairs, and a TV. Leobarda Hernandez is the oldest, most respected woman in the Hernandez family next door.

Three Zapotec farmworkers from Santa Maria Sola in Oaxaca walk out of a field, after having asked the foreman of a crew picking strawberries if there was any work for them. Copyright David Bacon

For more articles and images on immigration, see

Just out from Beacon Press: Illegal People—How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants,

See also the photodocumentary on indigenous migration to the US: Communities Without Borders (Cornell University/ILR Press, 2006)

See also The Children of NAFTA, Labor Wars on the U.S./Mexico Border (University of California, 2004)

David Bacon, Photographs and Stories

Struggling workers, Biden and Solis to be part of AFL-CIO gathering

Sat, 28 Feb 2009 10:05:00 +0000

MIAMI — Hilda Solis, the former Latina congresswoman from East Los Angeles and now the U.S. Secretary of Labor, south Florida workers reeling from the tanking economy, and national labor leaders will kick off a four day meeting of the AFL-CIO executive council March 2 in a Miami church. Solis will hear from workers about how the “Bush crash” has hurt them and she will take their suggestions about what needs to be done.

Solis will then join the executive council the following day when it moves to IBEW Local 349’s union hall here where she will meet with more workers – this time, workers who are involved in almost all of the construction-related trades.

Solis and the unions are saying that the second meeting is a direct response to January jobless figures released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, one of the Labor Department’s agencies. Those figures peg construction unemployment at 18.2 percent, as opposed to a national 7.6 percent jobless rate.

When the public meetings at the IBEW hall conclude the leaders of the federation’s 56 member unions will meet in executive session. According to an AFL-CIO statement, that session will address “the economic crisis sweeping America’s working families through a variety of angles including bargaining, legislative, organizing and political work.”

Vice President Biden will address the gathering on March 5. Both Biden and Solis are expected to join workers and labor leaders at press conferences.

On March 5 the federation will launch a major push for passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, its top legislative priority.

President Obama, Biden and Solis all strongly support the measure, which would simplify procedures for workers seeking union representation and strongly penalize employers who violate labor laws.

Larry Cohen, president of the Communication Workers of America, said last week that businesses are spending at least $1 million a week to campaign against the law. Their goal is to get 41 senators, mostly Republicans, to filibuster the bill. The Chamber of Commerce and others seek to deny labor and its supporters the 60 votes they need to prevent the filibuster.

The executive council will outline plans for a concerted effort by labor to counter the drive against employee free choice. It is expected those plans will include major union mobilizations in 16 or more key states.

The federation is also saying that it will release, during the executive council meeting, results of a new study, documenting heightened company attacks against workers who try to form unions.

In addition, the federation plans to discuss bargaining in this “extremely challenging” climate and how to create good-paying “green” jobs.

Sources in the labor movement say it is possible that the federation may, while it meets, try to resolve a major labor dispute in the south Florida area. The Coalition of Immokalee Workers reports that they have yet to receive raises they negotiated last year with tomato growers and that Republican Gov. Charlie Crist is helping to block those raises. They also report that there has been little or no improvement in the working conditions they face in the fields. The AFL-CIO has given strong support to those workers.

One womans battle: Why a nation changed course

Fri, 27 Feb 2009 05:53:00 +0000

EFFINGHAM, Ill. — Gail Warner, 39, lives in her southern Illinois “dream house,” a few miles from here. Her husband is a loan officer at a local bank. Her son, who will turn 15 in June, is a high school freshman and her daughter, 3, has been through nine surgeries to correct a birth defect.

“Up until 2005 we both voted Republican, I voted for Bush twice,” Warner told the World in an interview Feb. 23. “We always believed that we little people wouldn’t have jobs unless it was for big business and the rich providing those jobs. Everyone seemed to believe that in Effingham, a very Catholic and very Christian town. Many people, even when I was in my 20s, didn’t use credit cards. My parents never used one. It was just something you never did.”

Warner said her grandfather was a major mover in her “conservative” upbringing. She admired his “wisdom,” she said, and, as a youngster, listened to stories of how he, as a returning World War II vet, had only 25 cents in his pocket. She was proud of “grandpa’s” success as a small farmer in the region.

Warner said she always had a “gift for the gab” and was able to put her talent to use on local radio talk shows, where she was “the Republican on there supporting Dr. Laura, Rush Limbaugh, and all the rest.”

All that was prior to 2005.

Today, Warner is a union organizer for AFSCME who has spent more than three years on a picket line. She voted Nov. 4 for Barack Obama and she travelled to Chicago this month to speak to 3,000 workers who packed the Plumbers’ Hall to demonstrate support for the Employee Free Choice Act. Why the big change?

“It was a lot of things that did it,” Warner said.

“The medical bills for my daughter’s surgery, the cost of caring for her as she suffered from the immune system deficiencies that resulted from the surgeries, and having to fight health insurance companies that reject ‘pre-existing’ conditions made my blood boil. I realized how ridiculous the claims were that our private insurance system was the best in the world. If it were not for public assistance programs available, we couldn’t have taken care of my daughter.”

Warner said her job as an outpatient secretary at Heartland Human Services in Effingham was another major contributor to the shift in her thinking. “This is an agency that is supposed to be doing good works. Yet in October of 2005 they removed our benefits and made us work more hours with no extra pay. I realized that only with a union could we fight back and we won an election for representation by AFSCME in 2006. Since then, the company has refused to negotiate. After a year we went on strike and a year later we were locked out. We’ve been on the picket line ever since.”

Then she had trouble finding work. She was qualified for five positions that opened up at a new theater. The pastor of the church that funded the theater, however, was on the board of Heartland Human Services. Secretarial positions with local doctors were out of the question because of their connections to the human services agency she was trying to organize.

Another factor in her political shift was watching the effect all of this had on her husband. “He gets up at 3 a.m. and works more than a 12-hour day, enabling us to pay our mortgage. Even though he loves his job, he has to work hard to pull us through. He lies awake at night, worrying – how do we pay for the braces or for this or for that?

“I began to realize that the whole ‘trickle down’ thing was a lot of nonsense. The rich are not going to let go of anything unless there’s a fight. I understand now how Ronald Reagan’s move to bust the air controllers was the start of a whole downward spiral for workers. And I started to think about my own father in a new light.”

Warner explained that her father was a union bricklayer. “I realize now that it was his union job that made it so good for us in our childhood. He could work six months, be out the other six, and there was still enough money to give us the good living and education we got. He used to tell me that, but I wasn’t as receptive as I should have been. Now, there’s no union jobs left around here, so we have to fight.” (It was typical for bricklayers and other construction trades to be out of work during the cold winter months.)

“What about all those things grandpa taught you?” Warner was asked. “First, he got out of farming just in time – before he would have lost everything. He’s 87 now and I talked to him just before the election. He said the economy was going down the toilet and that a vote for McCain would do nothing for me. He said I should go out and vote for what’s good for me and do what’s good for me.”

After eight years of Bush, can OSHA be fixed?

Fri, 27 Feb 2009 01:50:00 +0000

Original source: The Bush administration left a lot of wreckage in its wake. The crumbling economy, the home foreclosure crisis and a broken health care system are getting most of the recent headlines and calls for immediate repair.

But for the men and women who get up and go to work every day—and want to come home alive and without injury—there is something else the Bush administration trashed that needs fixing and fixing fast—the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

A special edition of the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health’s (NYCOSH’s) newsletter “Safety Rep” asked nearly three dozen safety and health experts from the union, scientific and academic worlds this question:

After eight years of Bush can OSHA be fixed?…During the last eight years, tens of thousands of workers died or were injured on the job—a direct result of the failure of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to promulgate new standards and stringently enforce the law.

Writing in the special edition’s introduction, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka says the first major step must be bringing in new leaders, including

the administrators of OSHA and MSHA [Mine Safety and Health Administration] who are actually committed to a strong federal role in worker safety and health and who see their roles as advocates for worker protection.

And in stark contrast to the Bush administration, the new leaders should bring workers and their unions and safety and health professionals, as well as employers, into the process of developing agendas and setting standards.

The U.S. Senate took a first step toward that goal yesterday when it finally confirmed Obama’s nominee for labor secretary, Hilda Solis.

Denis Hughes, president of the New York State AFL-CIO, says growing worker power through unions is a key factor in the health and safety fight.

The first and foremost thing workers can do to protect their safety and health is to join a union. Without a union to protect them, rights to safe and healthful working conditions are a legal abstraction.

Hughes says workers now have the best opportunity in years to fight for stronger enforcement of workplace safety laws and tougher penalties for safety and health violations. But he adds:

Our demands for safer workplaces will be met with stiff resistance from the business community. Passage of the Employee Choice Employee Act and increasing our numbers is a necessary first step in the fight for safe and healthful workplaces.

Several of the special edition’s contributors—including those outside the union movement—wrote that the Employee Free Choice Act and its resultant growth of workers’ unions will be a major factor in improving worker safety.

AFT President Randi Weingarten says the new Obama-led OSHA should restore the ergonomics standard the Bush administration wiped off the books in the first few months after Bush took office.

That standard, which was the product of painstaking work, was an important step in combating work-related musculoskeletal disorders that now affect 1.8 million U.S. workers each years.

Public employees are not covered by federal OSHA’s standards, although some states have extended coverage to public employees. A number of the writers call for bringing public-sector works under OSHA’s umbrella.

Among other issues the health and safety experts discuss are:

* The immediate need for a mandate from the Obama administration to issue standards already in the pipeline; * Increased funding for worker training programs; * Programs to aggressively reach out to immigrant workers and the organizations that work with them; * Strategies to protect worker safety and health during disaster response; * New requirements to prevent underreporting of injuries and illnesses; and * The need to establish mandatory labor-management safety and health committees.

NYCOSH, is a non-profit coalition of 200 local unions and more than 400 individual workers, physicians, lawyers, and other health and safety activists dedicated to the right of every worker to a safe and healthful job.

Plymouth foundry workers trying to survive four months of being locked out

Thu, 26 Feb 2009 04:50:00 +0000

(Reposted from Workday Minnesota) DULUTH - When Nick Hill decided to come to Duluth to talk to the Duluth AFL-CIO Central Labor Body about his union being locked out for four months at Progress Casting Group’s foundry in Plymouth, he was amazed at what he found out when he visited Bruce Lotti in USW Local 1028’s office.

“Their scrapbook about their lockout at the foundry here was exactly the same as what we’re going through,” Hill said.

“There’s definitely a game plan that is followed in these attempts at union-busting,” said USW Local 1028 President Lotti.

Hill is like a lot of the members of Glass, Molders, Pottery, Plastic and Allied Workers (GMP) Local 63B at Progress Casting. He has worked there for 16 years, but he’s low on the seniority list.

“We’ve got a lot of guys who have worked there for 30 years or more, one’s been there for 47 years,” said Hill, who has been Shop Chairman for 10 years. “45 percent of the workers have 10 or more years.”

Now all 200 of the AFL-CIO-affiliated members are out of work as scab replacement workers do their jobs. It’s been that way since Oct. 27, 2008.

“We all got called by management on Sunday, Oct. 26 and were told we didn’t have jobs anymore,” said Hill. “Their replacement workers were working the Monday we were locked out.”

GMP unionized the aluminum foundry in 1946. There have been ownership changes but current owner Bill Berber has had Progress Casting, one of seven A-Tek companies, since the mid-1980s.

“Berber hires managers to run his company, and we’ve had our disagreements, but never went on strike,” Hill said. “We were told the company lost $10 million in three to four years recently so Tim Metder was brought in from Michigan to manage in 2007 and that’s when things went to hell. The first year we had 70 grievances.”

Nick Hill speaking at Duluth Central Body meeting Nick Hill addressed union members at a meeting of the Duluth Central Body.

Labor World photo In May 2008 in an informal meeting, Berber told workers “our current financial situation is not the union’s fault but we need some flexibility in the union contract.” Then the company proposed taking away seniority, reduced vacation time, forced overtime, forced holiday work, and a two-tier pay scale.

“Any place the contract mentioned that the union and management would work together, they took out,” Hill said. “They said they wanted a safe plant but wouldn’t even work with us and OSHA to try to make it better.”

It does sound a lot like USW Local 1028’s problems at MEI, now ME Electmetal. Foundries are hot, dirty, unsafe, brute force work environments by nature, regardless of what type of castings they produce. Even the aluminum at Progress must be heated to 1,500 degrees to be poured, Hill said.

Progress has a lot of big-time clients, including Harley Davidson, Hobart, GE Medical, Rolls Royce, Polaris, Bombardier, Teledyne, and Lennox transmissions.

“We’ve been writing letters to the customers and unions at their sites to let them know that the shoddy work they’re receiving is not being done by GMP members,” said Hill. “They can track the castings stamped from Oct. 27, 2008, and we’ve heard about quality problems and scrap parts.”

GMP filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board but withdrew them, knowing how they’d be treated by the Bush administration’s NLRB. With the Obama administration in place, the union will refile Feb. 20 and hope to find a more sympathetic NLRB.

“We’re also going to sue them in federal court for $2.1 million for using a lockout to violate the WARN Act,” Hill said.

The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act has protected workers and communities since 1989 by requiring a notice of a plant closing 60 days in advance if over 100 workers are employed at the site.

In these tough economic times, work is hard to come by for anyone who has lost their job. Being locked out is as bad as it gets.

“Our members that are eligible can get unemployment, but that all will end in April, so we’re hoping for the stimulus package to have extensions,” Hill said. “My family is like most in that we can’t afford COBRA payments to keep medical benefits. We’re finding resources to help like food banks, but we’re all dealing with our bills and trying to heat our homes.”

Duluth Central Body delegates made a nice donation to the GMP workers. If you’d like to contribute, send donations to:

GMP Local 63-B 2520 NE Kennedy St. Minneapolis, MN 55413

Larry Sillanpa edits the Labor World, the official publication of the Duluth Central Body, AFL-CIO. Visit the Labor World website, www.laborworld.org

Leading economists: Employee Free Choice key to rebuilding economy

Thu, 26 Feb 2009 03:38:00 +0000

Original source: In a statement delivered today to Capitol Hill and published as a full-page advertisement in The Washington Post, more than three dozen of the nation’s top economists call on Congress to pass the Employee Free Choice Act to help restore an economy that works for everyone, built on a sustainable, wage-based growth.

The statement, signed by 39 of America’s top economists, including two Nobel Prize winners, points to the failure of U.S. labor laws to protect employees’ freedom to form a union and bargain as a major factor in our economic crisis. The statement says in part:

Indeed, from 2000 to 2007, the income of the median working-age household fell by $2,000—an unprecedented decline. In that time, virtually all of the nation’s economic growth went to a small number of wealthy Americans. An important reason for the shift from broadly shared prosperity to growing inequality is the erosion of workers’ ability to form unions and bargain collectively.

These economists, representing respected universities and policy institutions from across the nation, point to the corporate-dominated system for forming unions—and the coercion and anti-union campaigning by management—as the causes for declining wages and a gravely weakened economy.

A rising tide lifts all boats only when labor and management bargain on relatively equal terms. In recent decades, most bargaining power has resided with management. The current recession will further weaken the ability of workers to bargain individually. More than ever, workers will need to act together.

Although current headlines are dominated by the crises in the stock market and the financial sector, working families have been struggling for years under the weight of an unbalanced economy. These economists say that restoring bargaining power and ensuring working people have a voice in their workplace, and in their health care, pensions and wages, is critical to rebuilding our economy.

James K. Galbraith of the University of Texas, one of the economists who has signed on, says the freedom to form unions and bargain has many benefits for the economy and the country.

I support the Employee Free Choice Act for two reasons. First, it levels the playing field after a generation of anti-union policies, and in a world where far more workers are in decentralized, hard-to-organize workplaces than was true a generation back. Second, unions are a proven ally of progress, not only in politics but also in economics: unionized workforces promote technical change and productivity growth, because they make it possible to distribute more fairly and less brutally the costs of change.

You can view the ad as it ran in today’s Washington Post here. It includes a full list of the prominent economists who have signed on.

Six Chicago schools spared closing, fight continues

Wed, 25 Feb 2009 11:47:00 +0000

CHICAGO – Local grassroots efforts by parents, teachers, students and community supporters here has paid off, for now, after Chicago Public Schools Chief Ron Huberman announced that six schools will be spared from a list of 22 schools the Board of Education is expected to close or reorganize.

Huberman said it was community input from parents and teachers at public hearings that helped him and school officials in its decision to keep the schools open.

One of the more outspoken groups fighting to keep its school doors open were supporters from Peabody elementary, a school in the West Town neighborhood. Local School Council member Lillie Gonzalez has put three generations of her family through the school.

“It’s like a dream. Oh God, I’m very happy,” said Gonzalez to Breaking News reporters from the Chicago Tribune’s website. “Peabody is so family oriented. We’ve come a long way,” she said.

Other schools that will remain open include two high schools, Global Visions and Las Casas Occupational, and three elementary schools, Holmes, Yale and Hamilton.

“Closing a school is not an easy task, nor is it popular,” said Huberman to reporters. “But it is our responsibility to be inclusive and open-minded so that we achieve and end result that benefits the students, parents, and community.”

Only one of the 62 schools recommended by the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) for closure in the past eight years has managed to remain open, prior to Huberman’s recent announcement. Unfortunately that school was recommended for closing the following year.

At the Jan. 28 rally, where the World reported hundreds of parents, students and teachers protested the school closings, it was clear that these school communities were organized and fighting mad. (see related story )

Dozens of parents argued at last months board meeting that schools like Hamilton should remain open due to its high student performance, diverse racial makeup and increasing parental involvement. Compared with the CPS average state testing standards at 64 percent in 2008, supporters of Hamilton point out their students met or exceeded that number at eighty-one percent. School officials argue that more needs to be done to address under-enrollment at the school.

One parent at Hamilton, Aaron Baar, told the Chicago Journal that he was surprised that Hamilton was spared.

“A victory is a victory,” said Baar. “A victory against a bureaucracy like the CPS system is an even better victory. I went down to the meeting. I read my speech and posted it on my Facebook account, but even I thought that I was tilting at windmills,” he said.

Stacey Paradis is the Local School Council chairperson at Hamilton and told the Journal she is very excited that her school will stay open. “We’re going to continue to improve this great school, which never deserved to be phased out in the first place,” said Paradis.

Las Casas is the only high school in the district that serves special needs students and was allowed to remain open after parents were concerned with having to send their children to four privately run schools in the area.

Ladwanna Harrison is a teacher at Holmes elementary where prior to the announcement by Huberman the school was scheduled for “turn-around” meaning the entire staff and every worker at the building was going to be laid off and expected to reapply.

“You stand up for what you believe in, and I think we all believe that we’ve been doing the right thing,” said Harrison to Chicago Public Radio. “We believe in our students, we believe in Holmes. And we stood up for that,” she said.

Despite the six schools that will remain open a coalition of parents, teachers, labor leaders, students and community activists are still outraged that other schools are slated for closing and reorganizing. They are expected to protest at the boards meeting Feb. 25 where a final decision will be made about the remaining schools slated for closure or reorganization.

The school district contends that many of the schools in question have low enrollment and are failing academically.

Many critics charge that Mayor Daley’s Renaissance 2010 plan is part of long-term privatization scheme of public education that targets poor neighborhoods where populations are decreasing due to destruction of public housing and skyrocketing rents.

The majority of students enrolled in Chicago’s public schools are Black and Latino.

Meanwhile, State Rep. Cynthia Soto (4th District) and other lawmakers in Springfield have introduced legislation that would place a moratorium on school closings, phase-outs, turnarounds and consolidations. House Bill 363, which recently made it out of committee with a 20-0 vote, would require a committee of experts to assemble and review cases of shutdowns and develop criteria for evaluating proposals.

The extraordinary life of Marvel Cooke

Wed, 25 Feb 2009 09:17:00 +0000

Women’s History Month fittingly opens with International Women’s Day, March 8.

On March 8, 1908, 15,000 women workers marched through New York’s Lower East Side demanding shorter hours, better pay, a needle trades union, and the right to vote. Their bold action was noted two years later at an International Conference of Working Women, where German socialist Clara Zetkin proposed commemorating it on March 8 every year. That’s how International Women’s Day got started.

Below is a brief biography of an extraordinary woman who broke many barriers, Marvel Cooke, offered here as a celebration of International Women's Day.

At the intersection of African American History and Women's History months is a long list of Black women who have made history as civil rights, labor and peace activists, educators, scientists, elected officials, physicians, astronauts, artists and much more.

Prominent among them, and combining several of those roles, is the journalist and activist Marvel Cooke. In her long life (1903-2000), Cooke participated in such crucial and often interrelated developments as the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s, the intense upsurge of labor organizing in the 1930s and decades of work for world peace, civil rights and civil liberties.

Along the way she, too, achieved 'firsts' first woman journalist at the Amsterdam News, participant in organizing New York City's first Newspaper Guild chapter, first African American or woman reporter at the white-owned daily Compass.

In fact, Marvel Cooke's life began with a 'first' the first African-American baby born in Mankato, Minn. Her father, Madison Jackson, son of a free Black farmer in Ohio, had graduated in law from Ohio State University. But in the turn-of-the-century Midwest, he could not find work in his profession, and became a Pullman porter. Her mother, Amy Wood Jackson, had served as a cook and teacher on a Native American reservation before her marriage. The family later moved to Minneapolis.

During those years the foundations were laid for Cooke's later activism. As a member of the first African American family to move into the upper middle class Prospect Park neighborhood near the University of Minnesota campus, Cooke experienced initial hostile reactions from neighbors. (They were later won over by her father's astute decision to create an irresistible children's playground in their yard for Marvel and her two sisters).

Cooke characterized her parents as 'Eugene Debs socialists. She credited her father, in particular, with helping her to develop many of the ideas that underlay her activism. Late in life, interviewed by Kathleen Currie for the Washington Press Club Foundation's Women in Journalism series, she recounted her father's thoughts about voting for Debs as he ran for president from a prison cell. Cooke said her father told her, 'I'm voting for him as a protest against the way things are going in this country. The bigger protest vote we can get in this country, whoever goes in will listen to this great group of people out here that don't agree.'

Though her mother was less active politically, she was equally supportive of Cooke's activities; Cooke told how much later, during a visit to New York City, Amy Jackson joined a picket line protesting injustices faced by tenants in the apartment building where Cooke's younger sister lived.

Cooke's husband, Cecil Cooke, a former college star athlete and a longtime member of the New York City Recreation Department staff, also consistently supported his wife's activities.

Cooke's journalistic career began when, on invitation of legendary civil rights leader Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois – who had dated her mother – she went to work at the Crisis, the magazine Du Bois had founded in 1910.

Arriving in New York City during the Harlem Renaissance, over the years Cooke became friends with such cultural luminaries as authors Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen and Richard Wright, artist Elizabeth Catlett and legendary actor, singer, civil rights and peace leader Paul Robeson.

After Du Bois left the Crisis, Cooke joined the staff of the Amsterdam News, first as secretary to the women's editor, and later as the paper's first female reporter. It was during this period that she joined the Newspaper Guild's organizing drive at the paper, walking picket lines and being jailed at least once during the paper's 11-week lockout of its workers.

It was also at this time that she joined the Communist Party. As Cooke told the story, Communist leader Benjamin Davis, then editor of The Liberator and later a New York City Councilmember, was participating in the workers' picket line one day. 'Why aren't you a member of the Communist Party?' he asked her. Cooke replied, 'Because no one ever asked me.' And she joined on the spot, remaining a member the rest of her life.

During this period Cooke and fellow civil rights activist Ella Josephine Baker collaborated on an essay for the Crisis, revealing the desperate plight of African American women who gathered on street corners to seek hourly domestic work. As 'The Bronx Slave Market' told their story, 'Rain or shine, cold or hot, you will find them there Negro women, old and young sometimes bedraggled, sometimes neatly dressed but with the invariable paper bundle, waiting expectantly for Bronx housewives to buy their strength and energy for an hour, two hours, or even for a day at the munificent sum of fifteen, twenty, twenty-five or if luck be with them, thirty cents an hour.'

The two journalists told how the Great Depression had forced the women to seek such a livelihood, and how they were often cheated out of their meager earnings.

In 1950, while working for the progressive daily newspaper, the Compass, Cooke returned to the subject, going undercover as a domestic worker to gather material for a five-part expose. 'Hundreds of years of history weighed on me,' she wrote then. 'I was the slave traded for two truck horses on a Memphis street corner in 1849. I was the slave trading my brawn for a pittance on a Bronx street corner in 1949. As I stood there waiting to be bought, I lived through a century of indignity.'

In the early 1950s Cooke served as New York director for the Council of Arts, Sciences and Professions, a progressive organization of workers in the arts. During that time, Cooke participated in an international peace conference in the German Democratic Republic, substituting for Paul Robeson, whose passport had been lifted during the post-World War II anti-communist witchhunts. 'Up to that point in my life,' Cooke later said in an interview, 'it was the most exciting thing I had ever done.'

On the last day of the conference, Soviet composer Dmitri Shostakovich singled her out for special attention as the only American to attend the conference, presenting her with gifts for herself and for Robeson.

Not long after her return home, two FBI agents appeared at her door, demanding that she, too, surrender her passport. Though she ultimately yielded the document, she recalled asking them, 'Didn't your parents have anything better to do with their money than to send you through college to become spies?'

Later, as she appeared before a Congressional witchhunt hearing, Cooke's response to a question about her birthplace 'I was borne in Minnesota, across the St. Croix River from where Sen. McCarthy comes, but we're not all the same out that way' brought the house down. Cooke said that ended the questioning.

In the early 1970s Cooke played a leading part in organizing the broad nationwide movement to defend African American educator and activist Angela Davis, who was accused of murder and kidnapping.

After Davis was acquitted, Cooke served for many years as national vice-chair of the National Council of American-Soviet Friendship, which emphasized building person-to-person ties with individuals and organizations in the USSR as an avenue to world peace. During that time she dedicated substantial volunteer time to the work of the magazine New World Review, which reported on developments in the socialist countries and national liberation movements.

Talking with interviewer Kathleen Currie in 1989, Cooke summed up her life: 'I think I've been inordinately lucky ... I wouldn't have wanted to be born in any other period. I would have wanted to have produced more, have done more myself, but I got so involved in unions and things of that sort, that I didn't do the creative writing that I thought I was going to do when I was young.'

**************** Marilyn Bechtel is California correspondent for the People's Weekly World. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, she worked with Marvel Cooke at the National Council of American-Soviet Friendship and at the magazine New World Review.

Special thank you to Michael Nash, Erika Gottfried and Meredith Davidson of The Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives for their assistance in these historical photos and the photos from last week’s article on Eddie Carthan.

Tamiment Library is located on the campus of New York University, Elmer Holmes Bobst Library, 10th Floor, 70 Washington Square South (West 4th btwn LaGuardia and Greene Streets), New York City. The library is host to the photo collections from The Daily Worker and The Communist Party, USA. The collections at the Tamiment are considered to be among the best sources of information in the U.S. on the history of radical politics.

Visit their website: http://www.nyu.edu/library/bobst/research/tam/index.html.

Workers Correspondence: Making it all the way for employee free choice

Wed, 25 Feb 2009 08:35:00 +0000

LOS ANGELES -- I started the march a little late that day. Me and two friends of mine, Hector and Juoaquin, began our March to catch up from our local office on Virgil where we parked our cars.

We could have taken the easy way out and driven to the midpoint of the march but I felt a little guilty and thought we should march to reach them instead. At least it would feel like we did the whole march from the beginning.

That day we three forgot to bring umbrellas in case of rain and, as we marched, the clouds began to gather. My two friends and I joked and talked about the many things we shared in common. We never figured it would take that long to reach the marchers ahead of us but we stuck to our plan and asked people along the way if any marchers had passed.

One gas station worker acknowledged that marchers had just passed him. After two hours we saw the purple SEIU shirts coming our way and we thought it was all over.

It wasn’t over, it was the scheduled break at a park just across from the Los Angeles High School. The mobile bathrooms were a welcome sight and the park was nice too. We were just as tired and hungry as the rest of the marchers, so we got us some lunch boxes that were given out.

Speakers were on a truck with banners on each side of it. The truck played music to inspire us and the workers were from many locals. Many wore signs supporting the Employee Free Choice Act.

During this break we ran into many SEIU organizers and workers, including a retired long-time friend, Ricardo, originally from El Salvador. Smiling as always, he was there to support the cause.

People were all over the park, eating and resting, and, then, it began to rain.

The well prepared organizers broke out the rain gear of plastic ponchos which saved the day, or so I thought. It was noon now and we knew a long march still lay ahead of us.

The stop was a bathroom break and rest stop at the Wilshire Movies where all the marchers were able to order their favorite popcorn, drink or snack.

I was somehow cut off from my other two friends, probable because I had moved ahead of the march to take pictures and do some filming.

A young gentleman said, “Here, take this, I am going now so you take it from here.” What he handed me was an old home depot pail, with rope tied to it and a stick to bang it with, to use as a drum. And so I had a new task.

As the march wore on the rain began to come down. We were now on the main boulevard of Wilshire and police on bikes ran alongside, moving us to the side of the street and onto the side walks.

As we passed the many people and businesses we saw waiters, school teachers, janitors, sales people, and workers of all types waving at us in solidarity. Cars, trucks, and vans honked their support. All the while, I played little drummer boy. Even when I really was a boy, I had always wanted to play drums. Back then, I used old pots and pans.

Now I had an audience, as I played in the pouring rain, in the middle of Beverly Hills, without a permit and loving every minute of minute. It was my debut as an amateur drummer for the working class.

Did you ever see that movie about the 300 Spartans who braved the onslaught of their attackers? It wasn’t quite as rough for the 400 of us but it did bring out some of our bravery.

I saw many a marcher struggling to catch up. Those 10 miles in the merciless downpour were tough. We walked and walked and, sometimes, even ran. The rain came down hard and cold. Those plastic covers did not shield our entire bodies and it was getting pretty cold and wet. My feet ached as they soaked in my shoes and, at times, I was ready to give up.

But the marchers pushed on. I played the drum, keeping up the beat as they chanted, “We are the union, the mighty, mighty union,” and “What do you want? Employee Free Choice Act!”

The enduring power of each of us carried over to all the others of us. We made it to the end that day and the fight continues.

Richard Castro Jr. is SEIU 721 union steward.

Workers ready for green collar jobs

Wed, 25 Feb 2009 03:26:00 +0000

(Reposted from Workday Minnesota) ST. PAUL - With both the state and federal governments putting new emphasis on “green” economic development, Ray Zeran is one of many workers ready to fill the ranks of a new “green collar” workforce.

Zern recently completed training on solar panel installation at the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers’ new facility in St. Michael. But the Coon Rapids electrician has yet to find work and, like thousands of other construction workers, is currently unemployed.

So he joined 150 other IBEW members at the union’s Day on the Hill to urge lawmakers to take action to create the new green economy. “I’m ready to go to work,” Zeran said.

Federal aid, state plans Last week, a Green Jobs Task Force chaired by two state legislators released its report of recommendations. At the same time, Minnesota learned it will receive more than $9 billion in tax cuts and new federal aid through the $787 billion economic stimulus bill passed by Congress and signed by President Obama.

The stimulus package includes $170 million to weatherize low-income housing, $67 million to promote renewable power sources and energy efficiency, an estimated $73 million for sewage treatment projects and $35 million for clean drinking water.

These and other projects meet the definition of “green jobs,” according to the state task force. “Green jobs are the employment and entrepreneurial opportunities that are part of the green economy . . . including the four industry sectors of green products, renewable energy, green services and environmental conservation. Minnesota’s green jobs policies, strategies and investments need to lead to high quality jobs with good wages and benefits, meeting current wage and labor laws.”

During the legislative session, lawmakers will consider measures to spend the money appropriated to Minnesota through the stimulus bill and to implement the recommendations of the task force.

And that could mean jobs for people like Zeran – as many as 70,000 new or retained jobs, according to state Senator Ellen Anderson, DFL-St. Paul.

Anderson, who co-chaired the Green Jobs Task Force, presented the group’s finding to a Senate committee Wednesday as Zeran and other IBEW members looked on. She said the 70,000 figure is conservative and was calculated before the stimulus package was proposed – so it does not include jobs that would be created through the stimulus funds.

“If we implement the action steps we are proposing, we know the number can grow beyond that,” Anderson said.

Linking policy and job growth Under the leadership of Anderson and other lawmakers, Minnesota leads the nation in passing strong environmental and energy policies – such as the requirement that one-quarter of Minnesota’s electricity come from renewables by 2025.

But the state has lagged others, including neighboring Wisconsin, Iowa and North and South Dakota, in linking energy policy to job creation, Anderson said.

“We felt we weren’t doing enough to capture the economic growth . . . and align these strategies . . .to maximize job creation,” she told the Senate committee.

The Task Force recommends numerous steps to build a green economy – from providing incentives to industry to supporting more research and development. It recommends the creation of one agency, a “Green Enterprise Authority,” to coordinate marketing and business assistance; streamline grants, loans and permitting processes; and coordinate workforce training opportunities.

Task force members included representatives from organized labor. On Thursday, the task force’s subcommittee on Workforce Education and Training completed its recommendations. They focus on training workers for the green economy by building on the current system and not duplicating services offered through existing programs, such as union apprenticeships. Union representatives on the subcommittee noted that facilities such as the IBEW training center in St. Michael – which cost $250,000 – were built entirely with private dollars.

Anderson said she hoped lawmakers will move quickly to implement the opportunities identified in the task force report.

“We are going to try to introduce as many of these (recommendations) as we can in legislation” this session, she said.

New possibilities Unions are excited about the possibilities presented by green development, said Bill Heaney, IBEW legislative director. For example, hundreds of energy auditors will be needed – jobs that could be filled by current or new IBEW members.

Heaney said his union has members who have been sitting “on the bench” for as long as 22 months. “We’ve got people unemployed, trained and ready to work,” he said.

Zeran, a member of IBEW Local 292, said many of his friends and neighbors know about the promise of wind power – but they assume that solar power is out of the question in a state like Minnesota.

“I tell them this is a great place to do solar,” he said. “We have just as many sunlight hours on average as northern California.” And Minnesota gets less sun – on average – than most of Germany, where solar power is huge, he said.

For more information Learn more about the recommendations in the Green Jobs Task Force report at the website, www.mngreenjobs.com

Media Matters turns its lens on medias portrayal of labor, economy

Wed, 25 Feb 2009 02:47:00 +0000

Original source: The non-profit Media Matters for America has earned a nationwide reputation for tracking media integrity on a variety of issues, earning the wrath of Rush Limbaugh and others along the way. Now it will apply its same scrutiny of reporters, pundits and self-proclaimed “experts” on cable talk shows to determine how they portray unions, wages and the Employee Free Choice Act.

The organization’s newly launched American Workforce and Labor project is aimed at cutting through dishonest or misinformed spin and getting out the facts about the critical economic issues facing the country.

As Media Matters notes at this new website, the mission in creating an American Workforce and Labor project is critical:

Americans everywhere are feeling the effects of a towering unemployment rate, inequity in pay, and myriad other issues. As Congress and the administration work to lift our country out of the recession and achieve workplace equality, Media Matters for America is holding the media accountable for their coverage of these vital issues.

Media Matters is well-positioned to keep a close eye on whether key media figures have their facts straight or whether they’re repeating misleading spin from corporate front groups.

Check out the American Workforce and Labor project—a valuable tool to correct the record and cut through corporate talking points.

OPINION: Solis and employee free choice both key to fixing the economy

Tue, 24 Feb 2009 11:39:00 +0000

Union members have been on the phone and all over the internet pushing for Senate confirmation of Hilda Solis, President Obama’s choice for Secretary of Labor and for the Employee Free Choice Act. The two battles are really part of one big effort.

Republicans mobilized fully to defeat the Solis nomination because they, and their big business backers, see it as the first battle over the Employee Free Choice Act, labors top legislative priority. Solis and Obama both support the bill, which would level the playing field between workers and bosses in organizing and bargaining.

At her confirmation hearing in January, Republicans repeatedly attempted to question Solis about her support for the legislation, hoping to use her strong pro-labor record against her.

Throughout the short history of the new Obama administration the far right has been consistent in its opposition to anything that benefits the working class – including the $787 billion stimulus package, the Solis nomination and the Employee Free Choice Act.

The right-wing dominated Republican Party continues to push the failed approach of tax breaks for the rich and it rejects any programs that pump funds into public works or any other efforts that help the people. They and their big business backers heap scorn on the Employee Free Choice Act because they recognize that it will help the economic recovery, not at the expense of workers but by making workers stronger.

Solis as labor secretary will also boost the economy because the pro-worker program she puts forward will result in more money in the hands of workers and therefore more money pumped into the economy.

During the Great Depression President Roosevelt considered his appointment of a pro-worker Secretary of Labor and the Wagner Act as central to his plan to rebuild the ruined economy.

By winning the right to organize and bargain collectively for a better life, workers pulled the entire nation out of the depression.

The famed economist n John Maynard Keynes noted in the 1930s that several of Roosevelt’s moves helped the recovery – solving the credit problem, relief for the jobless and massive public works programs. He credited Roosevelt for these things, but in a letter to the president, said, “I regard the growth of collective bargaining rights as essential” to restoring economic prosperity.

Today, the appointment of Solis and passage of the Employee Free Choice Act are just as essential to any recovery from the disaster we face.

This is what makes much of the big-business opposition to both Solis and the EFCA so incredible. Despite all evidence about how key Solis and the EFCA are to economic recovery, big business says “no.” What they are really saying, of course, is that they can’t tolerate workers rights, contract bargaining, or even free speech for anyone but themselves.

Bank of America Corp. hosted a teleconference for top corporate executives only three days after getting a $25 billion handout from American taxpayers.

The topic discussed was not what the executives would do to help the economy out of the disaster but methods to persuade corporations to send “large contributions” to groups fighting employee free choice.

AIG, the insurance mogul that was bailed out to the tune of $40 billion did the same thing – use bailout money it got from workers to plan use of those funds to deny those same workers their fundamental human rights.

And then, of course, there was the now-famous Bernie Marcus, the founder of Home Depot, who called the Employee Free Choice Act “the demise of civilization.”

Marcus reportedly put off a pleasure cruise on his 350 foot yacht in the Mediterranean to attend a meeting of corporate bigwigs plotting against both the Solis appointment and the Employee Free Choice Act. At that meeting he said that shareholders of any companies that had CEOs who weren’t fighting against employee free choice should “sue the sonofabitch.”

The efforts by labor and its allies for Solis and for employee free choice are enormous.

Those efforts have the corporate lobbyists, the Chamber of Commerce and other employer front groups running scared because they know that the labor movement and its allies are on a path which, one way or the other, will lead to a pro-worker labor secretary and passage of the Employee Free Choice Act.

One of the many aces in the hole, of course, is that workers have the active support and encouragement of the President of the United States – the man who nominated Solis and who has pledged to make employee free choice a reality.

John Wojcik (jwojcik @ pww.org) is labor editor of People's Weekly World.

Republic Windows workers come to Connecticut

Tue, 24 Feb 2009 09:48:00 +0000

NEW HAVEN, CT -- UE Local 1110 president Armando Robles and other officers recently toured the country to make public their sit-in at Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago which won a severance package.

The Connecticut leg of the tour was sponsored by Jobs with Justice chapters to let workers know if companies don’t abide by the law you must make them do the right thing.

While in Connecticut they told their story at a press conference at the state capitol and at a community and labor meeting at the First and Summerfield Methodist Church in New Haven.

Workers at Republic Windows and Doors refused to accept the owners closing of the plant without getting their due advance notice and benefits. Several weeks before the plant closing was announced workers discovered that equipment had been leaving the facility. Some of the workers decided to follow the truck driver to find out where they were taking the equipment. They spoke to the driver and he said he was told to move the equipment. Workers realized that the plant would be closing very soon.

About 240 workers were employed there at the time. Disregarding the law requiring a WARN notice, Republic Windows called the workers and told them the plant was going to close and this is your last pay check.

Robles and Local 1110 vice president Melvin Macklin said they responded, “no way, the workers are going to get what is due to them.” They went to the union office and did a little strategy. They decided to sit in for as long as it takes to get what’s due to them and their respect.

They began a 24 hour sit-in in early December. The company called the police to tell them they had to exit the building. Robles stated to the police this is not your fight, it is between the company and the workers. The police went back to their cars. Worker brought their children to help in the protest. Numerous visitors come into the shop to bring food, sleeping bags, and music.

Robles said that when his shift was over he would go home, take a shower, and then quickly return. The Rev. Jesse Jackson was there in support of the workers.

Macklin said when he told his wife about the plan to sit in, she said “no, you will be arrested.” He replied, “ what do you have to lose?” Once President Obama threw his support to the workers, his wife said it was okay. Some workers didn’t want to take part in the sit-in. Once seeing their co-workers on tv they decided to join their co-workers.

Sit-ins in America don’t happen that often. Since the 1930's we haven’t had many. When you’re forced to sit-in for your bread and butter workers realize it’s the right thing to do.

As a result of the sit-in the workers achieved a victory. They got a severance package, but knowing how the economy is today that won’t last long.

UE Local 1110 has been in negotiations with a California company to see if they could re-open the plant. They are hoping that if this happens all the workers will be hired back. They will have to go through bankruptcy court to get it approved. They are hoping that by March they will have confirmation for the company to re-open.

Labor rallies against racist editorial cartoon in New York Post

Tue, 24 Feb 2009 09:08:00 +0000

Hundreds of angry protestors recently gathered in mid town Manhattan for a noon time rally protesting an editorial cartoon that ran in the previous day’s edition of the notorious New York Post newspaper.

The cartoon depicted two white police officers, guns drawn, standing over the bullet riddled corpse of a chimpanzee, saying, “I guess we’ll have to get someone else to write the next stimulus bill.” On an adjacent page the paper carried a photo of President Barack Obama signing the economic stimulus bill.

Obama Press Secretary Robert Gibbs declined to comment directly but said that he doesn’t consider the New York Post to be a serious news source and doesn’t spend a lot of time reading it.

Post editor Col Allan and cartoonist Sean Delonas defended the cartoon, but many New Yorkers felt differently, and many hundreds of them demonstrated their outrage outside the posh 6th Ave. headquarters of News Corp, the Posts parent company, noisily protesting what they saw as a racist smear of Obama and an incitement to violence against him.

Some protestors remarked that the appearance of this particular cartoon during Black History Month added insult to injury, some saw the attack as a part of the right wing assault on labor and people’s forces in general. In any event, the demonstration, originally called by Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, produced a turnout of substantial size and breadth.

In addition to members of the National Action Network multitudes of outraged citizens turned out spontaneously. The NAACP, One Hundred Blacks in Law Enforcement and other civil rights and community organizations had organized presences. As the demonstrators chanted, “boycott the Post” drivers of cars, trucks and busses raised their fists and honked their horns in solidarity.

Organized labor was particularly well represented at the rally and, at least once, representatives from the various unions present marched together as a unified labor contingent. The labor turn out included, among others, members from TWU Local 100, SEIU 32 B-J, 1199 and 371, DC37, PEF and IBEW. TWU Local 100 and SEIU 32B-J had major organized presences, with leading members among their contingents. In addition to the organized labor turn out union members, both active and retired, who had come to the demonstration on their own greeted and joined their union brothers and sisters on the line.

Numerous public and political figures also turned out for the noon demonstration. These included New York City council representatives John Lu and Charles Barron and state Senator Eric Adams.

Barron supported calls for a boycott of the paper and said that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder should investigate the Post for threatening the life of the president. Adams, a former NYC Police detective and former head of One hundred Blacks in Law Enforcement, also called for an investigation, saying that the justice department needs to look at the cartoon as an incitement to assassinate the president. Earlier, councilwomen Letitia James called for the editor of the Post to be fired and for an apology to be printed on the papers front page. James called the cartoon an example of a “racist mind at work.”

In addition to calling for a boycott of the paper Sharpton called for an investigation of the waiver granted by the FCC to News Corporation boss Rupert Murdoch which allowed him to own a newspaper and two TV stations in the same market.

On Friday, following several more protests plus torrents of outraged phone calls and emails and calls for the dismissals of Delonas, Allan or both, the Post issued what has been described as a half-hearted apology. Surprisingly though, the Post choose to use the “apology,” buried inside the paper, to attack what it called “opportunist” critics, a veiled reference to Sharpton. This apology has done little to silence the calls for the heads of Delonas and Allan and the calls for a boycott of the paper.

Famed movie director Spike Lee and R&B artist John Legend have said they will refuse to grant interviews to Post reporters. They asked other entertainment and sports figures to do likewise.

As of this writing it appears that the firestorm generated by the cartoon is far from subsiding. On Saturday, following the initial street demonstrations, national NAACP president Benjamin Jealous said that the cartoon was an invitation to assassination and called for the firing of cartoonist Delonas and editor Allan. The national chair of the NAACP, Julian Bond, referred to the cartoon as, “thoughtlessness taken to the extreme.”

Meanwhile, regional civil rights leaders like Wilbur Alridge of the NAACP and Ernest Prince of the Urban League have joined the call for a boycott. What’s more the New York Times has reported that some Post employees were themselves dismayed at the papers decision to run the cartoon.

The National Association of Black Law Enforcement Executives and the National Association of Black Journalists have also weighed in, with members and officials from the organizations registering their outrage and disgust.

Free choice and small business

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 10:14:00 +0000

Original source: Americans today are working harder than ever, and too often finding that the secure and stable middle-class life their parents counted on is falling further and further out of reach for them and their children.

Story after story remind us just how much in the past working Americans have fallen behind in the past eight years. For those who have struggled during this difficult period, it comes as no surprise that median household income in 2007 was $1,175 less than it was in 2000, while basic family expenses rose $4,600 in that same period. These families don’t need to be lectured with statistics — they feel the middle-class squeeze every day in their paychecks and checkbooks.

Now — with a new president and a new, strong progressive majority in Congress — these workers are hoping that Washington will at last be an incubator of good policies that create opportunity, reward work not just wealth, and help restore the middle class. That’s why it’s so important that the 111th Congress pass the Employee Free Choice Act.

We know that one of the lessons of the Greatest Generation remains that when workers can join a union, the middle class is strengthened. The gains workers made in the last century would never have been possible had union organizers not marched and pushed and gone door to door, shop to shop, to stand up for their fellow workers.

Workers in unions earn 30 percent higher wages on average, and are 60 percent more likely to have employer-covered health insurance. The question is what we will do to empower workers in this new century — and it should begin with The Employee Free Choice Act’s common sense, fundamentally fair mission of making it easier for men and women to join a union in their workplace. The legislation would give workers a fair and direct path to form unions through majority sign-up, help employees secure a contract with their employer in a reasonable period of time and toughen penalties against employers who break the law.

Powerful, entrenched opponents of the legislation have made a variety of false statements, arguing that the bill will take away workers’ right to a secret ballot election, expose workers to intimidation and harassment or hurt the economy.

These arguments are untrue and especially dubious because they have no reliable data to back them up. Too often, these objections come from the same people and groups that have enriched and protected Wall Street over Main Street — among them those who opposed ideas like minimum wage increases and family medical leave, which history has proven are mainstream, commonsense policies.

Still, let’s not let this debate spiral downward into name-calling. Consider the source, but also consider the facts.

Honest and well-meaning people can differ, and many small business owners in particular have asked me how this legislation would affect their businesses. I don’t think they have much to worry about, for three key reasons.

First, in the decades when our labor laws protected workers’ free choice to join unions, small businesses thrived and America built the strongest middle class in the world. The evidence shows that our nation’s economy and overall productivity grew when American workers had an ability to share in the prosperity of our country and their companies. Second, the Employee Free Choice Act makes no changes to the small business exemptions under our nation’s labor laws. Small businesses employing an estimated four million American workers would still be exempt and completely unaffected.

Third, the economic benefits of unions to all businesses, large and small, are well-established. Unions help reduce costs associated with turnover because they give employees a voice in the workplace to speak up for changes, rather than simply quitting or being fired. Employment security fuels collaboration and information sharing, leading to higher productivity.

The research also shows that union firms are just as productive and successful as non-union firms. A U.S. Small Business Administration report, for example, indicated that small business bankruptcy rates are lower in states with high unionization rates than they are in states where fewer workers have a voice.

In an ironic twist, the actual threat to small businesses may come from the groups fighting the Employee Free Choice Act most vigorously — the big corporations whose very business strategies have consistently hurt small businesses across the country by squeezing small businesses out of the marketplace.

I believe that by helping put more money in working people’s pockets, the Employee Free Choice Act will strengthen our economy for everyone, including workers and customers of America’s small businesses.

Americans spoke powerfully on Election Day, demanding that Washington find bipartisan solutions to our economic problems. On Main Street, we need to do the same with policies that restore opportunity in our country and work for everyone. Passing the Employee Free Choice Act would be a big downpayment on that fairness agenda.

John F. Kerry is the junior senator from Massachusetts and former chairman of the Senate Small Business Committee.

94 Years after Ludlow Massacre, site now national historic landmark

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 09:58:00 +0000

Original source: On April 20, 1914, in Ludlow, Colo., one of the bloodiest chapters in the nation’s labor history was written. Thugs hired by several coal companies and the Colorado militia attacked a peaceful encampment of striking miners and their families. By the end of the day, 20 were shot or burned to death, including 14 women and children.

It has long been a hallowed site: In 1918, the Mine Workers (UMWA) erected a monument there. Yet for decades, despite the efforts of historians and labor activists, there was no state or national commemoration of the site.

But last month, the U.S. Department of the Interior designated Ludlow a National Historic Landmark. Says UMWA President Cecil Roberts:

This is the culmination of years of work by UMWA members, retirees and staff, as well as many hundreds of ordinary citizens who recognize and have fought to preserve the memory of this brutal attack on workers and their families.

The tragic lessons from Ludlow still echo through our nation, and they must never be forgotten by Americans who truly care about workplace fairness and equality. With this designation, the story of what happened at Ludlow will remain part of our nation’s history. That is as it should be.

In 1913, southern Colorado miners and their families walked out of the mines and mining camps striking for adequate wages, enforcement of state mining laws and union recognition. For more than a year, they lived in tent colonies near the mines. According to UMWA history of the Ludlow Massacre:

Upon striking, the miners and their families had been evicted from their company-owned houses and had set up a tent colony on public property. The massacre occurred in a carefully planned attack on the tent colony by Colorado militiamen, coal company guards, and thugs hired as private detectives and strike breakers.

They shot and burned to death 20 people, including a dozen women and small children. Later investigations revealed that kerosene had intentionally been poured on the tents to set them ablaze. The miners had dug foxholes in the tents so the women and children could avoid the bullets that randomly were shot through the tent colony by company thugs. The women and children were found huddled together at the bottoms of their tents.

Roberts says Ludlow hallowed ground for the UMWA and also for

union members and working people worldwide. We have preserved the site from that terrible day to this, and we are extremely gratified that the U.S. National Park Service has agreed to preserve it from now on, so that future generations can learn the lessons of this dark chapter in our nation’s history.

Since erecting the monument, the union has maintained the site, including installing interpretive markers and displays, as well as building a shelter where the annual Ludlow Memorial is held. A dedication ceremony is planned for late June.

Number of U.S. workers age 65-74 is increasing

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 09:48:00 +0000

Original source: According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, fewer workers are retiring when they hit 65. By 2016 the number of senior workers between the age of 65 and 74 are expected to rise by 83.4 percent. At the end of last year 68 percent of workers between the ages of 50 and 70 had no plans to retire. The deepening recession is expected to accelerate those numbers.

Rally in Pittsburgh, roundtable in Madison and more action on employee free choice

Sat, 21 Feb 2009 13:27:00 +0000

Original source: This week, state and local unions around the country mobilized to pass the Employee Free Choice Act to restore the freedom to form unions and bargain and make the economy work for everyone.

In Pennsylvania, workers gathered in Pittsburgh to support the Employee Free Choice Act and highlight a new report that shows how much workers in each state would stand to gain in wages if the act passed and how more workers could form unions. In Pennsylvania, an increase in the rate of union membership of just 5 percent would increase total wages by $852 million.

Economist Mark Price spoke at the Pittsburgh rally, where he pointed out that restoring bargaining power to workers was essential to creating a balance between workers and corporations and rebuilding the middle class. During the midcentury expansion of the U.S. economy, Price said, strong levels of union membership ensured that ”when workers were more productive,” their work generated more wealth, that wealth would show up in their paychecks.

The Pittsburgh rally also featured workers like Keli Vereb, a member of United Steelworkers (USW) Local 1408, who talked about what union membership has meant to her family: a fair wage, good benefits and the opportunity to send her daughter to college.

In Madison, Wis., U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin was the featured speaker at a roundtable event in support of the Employee Free Choice Act organized by the South Central Federation of Labor. Ryan Wolfe, a member of Sheet Metal Workers (SMWIA) Local 565 in Madison, was among union members taking part. He said a seat at the bargaining table is vital to allowing workers a better life and a fair share of the economy:

Every employee should have the right to do what I have done. Through my union I have been able to negotiate with my employer for things that have made my family better off. The Employee Free Choice Act will extend that opportunity to more Wisconsin workers.

(You can watch streaming video or listen to audio of the entire event at Wisconsin Eye TV.)

In Maine, a rally for the Employee Free Choice Act featured U.S. Rep. Mike Michaud as well as leaders from the state House and Senate. Michaud was a 30-year paper mill worker before winning his seat and currently is a member of USW Local 4-00037.

At a Wednesday event in Lincoln, Neb., state federaton President Ken Mass said the Employee Free Choice Act would “restore the broken link between productivity and pay.” Nebraska unions members have begun a letter-writing campaign to their state’s U.S. senators in support of the Employee Free Choice Act.

In Virginia, the state AFL-CIO legislative conference focused on the Employee Free Choice Act, and union members wrote letters to their senators as well urging them to support the Employee Free Choice Act.

Workers and their allies also held rallies in support of the Employee Free Choice Act in Chicago; Montana; Raleigh, N.C.; and Sacramento, Calif.

Union members also are working hard to raise funds for the Turn Around America Media Fund, to counteract the multimillion-dollar anti-worker disinformation campaign run by corporate front groups. State federations in Nevada, North Carolina and Minnesota all successfully raised funds this week

Iraq vet faces new battle worker rights at home

Fri, 20 Feb 2009 07:22:00 +0000

CHICAGO — “The irony of it all – Bush got on TV and said we were in Iraq because we had to get rid of weapons of mass destruction, stop terrorism and spread democracy over there. I served my country honorably over there only to come back home to a place where, as a worker, I don’t even have the right to union representation. The companies hold all the cards. They do us serious hurt if we try to exercise our rights.”

The words were those of former U.S. Army Sgt. Jose Hill, 30, a resident of this city’s South Side and a Comcast technician who belongs to Local 21 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. Hill, interviewed by the World, was among thousands of workers who rallied here Feb. 17 for a stronger labor law that would give workers a chance to exercise their rights to bargain collectively for better pay, health care benefits and retirement plans.

They packed the Plumbers Hall, Feb. 17, at a town hall style rally where they were joined by national labor leaders, elected officials, grassroots community and religious groups to support the Employee Free Choice Act, legislation that would simplify matters for workers who want to join unions.

Speakers told the cheering, chanting and foot-stomping crowd of 3,000, representing almost every union in Chicagoland, that the bill would also stimulate economic recovery by pumping more money into the economy. Union members earn, on average, 30 percent more than their non-union counterparts, are 59 percent more likely to have employer-provided health care coverage and four times more likely to have pensions.

Gail Warner, a speaker at the rally who is fighting for a union at Heartland Human Services in Effingham, Ill., told the World her story in an interview.

Warner, 39, is married and has a 14-year-old son and a 3-year-old daughter. She worked as a secretary at her company’s outpatient center when the workers there, in a 49-5 vote, won an election for representation by AFSCME.

“We decided to go union,” she said, “because they would always get rid of long-term workers in favor of newer people for less pay. In October of 2005 they took away benefits, made us work more hours and said ‘If you don’t like it, there’s the door.’ So we went union in January of 2006.”

Warner described how the workers spent the next 15 months trying to negotiate a contract and how the company refused to budge. “After all those months, in June, 2007, 36 of us walked out onto the picket line. They hired less qualified scabs to fill our jobs and they paid the scabs more than they paid us. That went on for a year.”

Warner described how, during that year, even some of the scabs started to suffer the same mistreatment that had been doled out to the original workers – rollbacks in pay, increases in hours and other abuses.

A year later, in June 2008, the striking workers decided to go back, hoping to continue negotiations from the inside. The company locked them out, however, and they remain on the picket line. “Heartless Human Services is what we call them,” Warner said.

“I think our case is one of the most compelling to be made for the Employee Free Choice Act,” she said. “If it were to become the law, when workers form a union, both sides would have 120 days to come to an agreement. If they couldn’t, we would go to binding arbitration. The hardships we face in Effingham would never have happened.”

At the rally and at a press conference earlier in the day, union leaders warned that business interests are spending, and will spend “many millions of dollars” to thwart passage of the Employee Free Choice Act and that they will portray union support for it as an attempt to take away the right of workers to cast a secret ballot.

“Nothing could be further from the truth,” declared Roberta Lynch, a member of AFSCME, District Council 31, at the press conference. “Right now unions can be formed by card check or by secret elections but the company makes that choice. With the EFCA it will be the same but it will be the workers who make the choice.”

She heaped scorn on what she called “company concern for democracy. Do they consult workers on investment policy or on planned layoffs? Do they consult workers on even where the water cooler should be placed? Why do they have any business, whatsoever, telling workers whether they want a union.”

jwojcik @pww.org

Detroit honors sit-downers, new and old

Thu, 19 Feb 2009 10:28:00 +0000

DETROIT — Sit-downers past and present were honored here recently during a “workers’ victory tour” by members of United Electrical Workers (UE) Local 1110 who last December staged a successful sit-down at the Republic Windows plant in Chicago. The workers beat back attempts by the company and its Bank of America financiers to cheat them out of back pay, severance pay and health insurance benefits.

Also honored were Geraldine Blankenship and Olen Hamm, two surviving sit-downers who in 1937 occupied General Motors plants for more than six weeks to win the first United Auto Workers union contract with GM.

The celebration, held at the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 58 hall, was sponsored by the Detroit Metro AFL-CIO, Jobs with Justice, United Steelworkers District 2 and other labor and community organizations. The rally also highlighted the importance of passing the Employee Free Choice Act. Renowned jazz performer Bill Meyer, and Detroit Councilperson and Motown legend Martha Reeves provided music.

Referring to the sit-downers, old and new, Metro Detroit AFL-CIO President Saundra Williams, said, “They saw what they had to do, they built a plan and they started a movement.”

Local 1110 President Armando Robles and UE Director of Organization Bob Kingsley retold the story of the Chicago sit-down. Robles explained how it came about.

“Early in December, Republic started to move some of the machinery out of the plant,” he said. “We followed the trailers and found them. Some workers wanted to hook up a tractor and move them back. But we realized this was not a good idea.” Meanwhile the company told the workers not to report to work, announcing the immediate closing of the plant without the required 60 days’ notice. “But we showed up and decided after much discussion to stay at work and not go home,” Robles said.

“We set up kitchen crew, security, clean up committees and had rules about no alcohol or drugs so the sit-down would be orderly,” he said. “We patrolled the plant in shifts to guard the remaining machinery.”

The company reported that Bank of America had refused to extend its line of credit (though the bank had just received $25 billion of taxpayers’ money from the federal government).

The situation spurred an outpouring of support for the workers from organized labor and the faith-based community and a public statement of support by then-President-elect Barack Obama. Finally a meeting was arranged with the company and the bank. UE’s Kingsley described it:

“On one side was the president of the Chicago Chamber of Commerce, who said ‘We have to stop this now before it spreads throughout the country.’ On the other side were representatives of the state of Illinois, Republic and the bank. The bank spokesman was visibly shaken when the state of Illinois said they planned to move their money out of Bank of America. ‘Our good name is being ruined,’ he said.”

After mass picketing at Bank of America offices in several cities, including bank headquarters in Charlotte, N.C., the local branch in Chicago received a call from Charlotte to “cut a check.”

Robles said that when union representatives and the company’s owner met with the bank, the owner wanted his quarter-million-dollar salary included in the loan package, along with payments for his $120,000 car.

In the end, the union won $2.3 million from the company to cover severance and vacation pay and health insurance for the workers, who were entitled by law to 60 day’s notice.

Robles told a press conference earlier in the day that some of the Republic Windows and Doors workers are now going to school for training, others have gotten small jobs, doing maintenance work and the like. Some have gone to see their families in Mexico and some are getting unemployment benefits.

There is a potential buyer for the factory — a California window manufacturer who has a patent for high efficiency “green” windows. He says his company would respect the current union contract. The UE local is keeping the workers updated on the situation.

Responding to a question, Robles said that while his kids don’t exactly consider him a hero for the sit-in, his 12-year-old son was very involved, going back and forth with information, and seeing the place where his father worked.

Both UE leaders gave credit for the victory to the mass support of organized labor and the community.

Robles noted that the Chicago workers’ story has inspired others — jewelry workers in Providence, R.I., occupying a non-union plant, Chicagoans protesting school closings, high school students sitting in to protest mistreatment by their principal.