LABOR TUESDAY! for January 21, 2003

Entnommen aus der wöchentlichen Ausgabe von Labor Tuesday

Mainstream Press Reports on USLAW

By Charles Walker

It's not clear that the hundred or so trade unionists that gathered in Chicago on Jan. 11 to form an anti-war committee expected to get much attention from the mainstream press. But two mainstream papers have sat up and taken notice that a relatively small number of unionists have organized to oppose the government's looming attack on Iraq.

True, the press reports aren't on the front page, but they're not buried with the obituaries either. It would be nice if the friendly press accounts indicated an anti-war stance in the papers' editorial rooms, but whatever it means, we can be sure the papers recognize the inherent social power of organized labor - and the power of the strike. Sure the new anti-war group can't yet claim to speak for a majority of labor, but then most majorities start out a minority.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Jan. 14) ran a relatively comprehensive report about the new anti-war labor group and its intention to "put organization and money behind what have been mostly spontaneous, grass-roots activities." The paper reported that, "union contingents from California, Seattle, New York, Washington, and Florida, as well as labor activists from St. Louis and other cities raised $30,000 to set up a group called U.S. Labor Against War [USLAW]. They passed a resolution against an ‘unprovoked war with Iraq,' and they plan to send protestors to anti-war Marches in Washington and San Francisco. They also hope to enlist the support of 200 local unions in the next few weeks."

The paper reported that Herb Johnson, secretary-treasurer of the 260,000-member Missouri AFL-CIO said that if USLAW "ask to do something, we'll endeavor to get people together and join some kind of concerted effort. It's going to be an unprecedented thing for the United States to go and initiate an armed conflict. We're all red-blooded Americans, but I have not read any evidence that this lousy fellow over there is the one who attacked us on September 11."

The San Francisco Chronicle (Jan. 16) reported that, "Saturday's rallies in San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and other cities come a week after 100 labor leaders from around the country -- including several from the Bay Area -- met in Chicago to plan how to sway their memberships toward opposing a possible war with Iraq and assume a bigger role in the anti-war effort. So labor union banners will be a highly visible presence at Saturday's march and rally afterward at the Civic Center."

The paper estimated that the Bay Area "march down Market Street and to the Civic Center will include representatives of more than 50 Bay Area labor unions -- twice as many as attended October's big anti-war demonstration along the city's main drag."

"Labor's support is a boon to peace activists, who know that the image of longshoremen and nurses speaking out against a possible war in Iraq puts a 'real people' face on their message."

While the Chicago group won't find their task an easy one, David Moberg reported in Z Magazine (Dec. 6) that already there is substantial anti-war feeling among unionists. "But opposition to the Iraq war has drawn more mainstream labor backing, including the Washington State Labor Council, United Electrical Workers, New York state nurses, the Wisconsin SEIU, the California Federation of Teachers, Pride at Work (the AFL-CIO gay workers organization), New Mexico carpenters, and central labor councils from such cities as San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland, California; Albany, Troy and Rochester, New York; and Duluth, Minnesota." Since the Chicago meeting several union organizations have adopted anti-war resolutions, including the National Executive Board of the American Postal Workers Union.

Jerry Zero, the principal officer of Teamsters Local 705, which hosted the Chicago gathering, told the Post-Dispatch that the degree of anti-war feeling is "quite unusual. It's early, it's very early, no military action has started yet, and people are really organizing against this thing. "