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Grassroots Organizing Does the Trick – Missouri Workers Win Big

If your only source of news is CNN, FOX, MSNBC, or other corporate-owned (and corporate-oriented) media outlets, you would not know much about the organized peoples’ struggles in this country, and around the world, that are, in some cases, making real advances. The recent union victory in Missouri is a case in point. Workers have achieved something really remarkable, with long-range implications.

The labor movement in Missouri galvanized voters to strike down anti-union, and anti-worker “right to work” legislation in an August 7th referendum. The legislation was defeated with a 2-1 margin. 100 out of 114 counties voted it down, with St. Louis voting 88 percent “no.”

“Right to work” is a policy that is designed to take away workers’ rights. By making union membership optional in unionized workplaces, the power of the union is weakened, tilting the scale in favor of big corporations.

The strength or weakness of unions affects all workers, not just union members. This is born out by the fact that – in “right to work” states like Louisiana and Mississippi – workers have lower average wages, more workers uninsured, and higher rates of on-thejob injuries and deaths. In other words, overall conditions for workers are lowered for workers, and poverty is exacerbated, in states with these anti-union laws.

What is, perhaps, most remarkable, is the ways that the unions went about organizing. Over the course of six months, the unions sent out over 1,000 volunteers (mostly rank and file union members) across the state to collect the 100,000 signatures needed to call a referendum. They actually collected over 300,000.

Almost anyone active in movements today understands the need for having a digital media presence. But these recent union campaigns show that meeting people face to face is still one of the most effective ways to organize. Union volunteers knocked on 770,000 doors (think about that for a moment!) and went wherever workers were gathered.

As Labor Notes reported (labornotes.org), “Robert W. Shuler II, a forge operator and president of IUE-CWA Local 86821 in Centralia, recruited 35 members to go to poker runs, the state fair, bike runs, and festivals all summer.”

Shuler says that these efforts have fundamentally changed his union local for the better. “We have more attendance at meetings. People are asking about stuff to do. Something like this gives people hope.”

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Coastal Alabama and Mississippi: Coca-Cola Workers Go on Strike

In August, Coca-Cola workers in coastal Alabama and Mississippi carried out a multi-day strike. The strike – organized by the 250-member Teamsters Local 911 union – has affected four Coca-Cola distribution plants. Workers organized work stoppages in Robertsdale, LeRoy, and Mobile, Alabama, as well as in Ocean Springs, Mississippi.

This has certainly gotten the attention of the Birmingham-based Coca-Cola Bottling Company United Inc. Since the start of the strike, the company has resorted to the classic union-busting tactic of hiring replacement workers, also known as “scabs.” But, the union has stuck to its guns.

On August 13, protesters gathered along U.S. 90 at Coca-Cola Road in Mobile. Picketers carried signs expressing union solidarity and denouncing the company’s scab-hiring maneuvers.

According to the union, the main complaint is starting pay. New hires could see a pay cut of $5-$7 an hour. Union representatives say that with new hires making so much less than current employees, workplace relations will sour. Workers in the same operation will be divided. And, of course, the company will want want to bring in more of the lower wage employees and force out existing employees who are in the $19 an hour range

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Puerto Rico Teachers Fight Against Privatization and Low Wages

Members of the Puerto Rico Federation of Teachers marching through San Juan

The people of Puerto Rico (or Borinquén, in the indigenous Taíno language) are in a situation all too familiar to New Orleans. The island is still in a state of crisis nearly a year after Hurricane Maria made landfall, thanks to the criminal negligence of the U.S. colonial government. On top of that, the working class is under intense attack in the form of budget cuts imposed by the federally-appointed Fiscal Control Board.

As with other spheres of life in Puerto Rico, the education system is threatened by the budget cuts. If the Fiscal Control Board has its way, the public educational system will be completely gutted and replaced by private schools.

Educators are resisting, however. They are demanding an end to the school closures as well as increased pay and an overall better allocation of resources to education. On August 15, the Puerto Rican Federation of Teachers carried out a work stoppage and marched through old San Juan. The march started at the Plaza Colón and went to the governor’s office.

According to the union president Mercedes Martinez Padilla, “The public education system,… the students and their teachers, have suffered the most brutal attack in history. Secretary of Education Julia Keleher has decreed the closure of some 450 schools in two years and has reduced the number of educators from 31,000 in 2016 to around 22,500 today. The government is poised to push the creation of dozens of private charter schools, subsidized with public funds.”

So far, over 250 schools have already been closed, including many that were in perfectly functional condition. Instead of keeping these schools open, Keleher is having them spend millions on FEMA trailers for classes that each cost over $42,000. Many special-needs children have not been given assignments. Many children are meeting in gazebos and buildings/trailers without AC and have not been provided with transportation for their new school assignments.

Given these extreme attacks, the educators have much to fight for.

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Sewerage and Water Board Continues Assault on Orleans Parish Residents

Rate-Payers Have No Voice in Board Decisions

The New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board (S&WB) continues to add insult to injury. The latest moves include granting retroactive pay raises of $20,000 – $45,000 to S&WB managers. Protest was so loud, even by the daily ruling-class papers, that the recipients of the raises were forced to resign on August 20. Mayor Cantrell had acting Executive Director Jade Brown Russel demand the resignations. Then on August 21, Russell was forced to resign and was replaced by retired US Coast Guard Rear Admiral David Callahan who will run the S&WB for two weeks until Ghassan Korban, former Milwaukee Public Works Commissioner, arrives in the first week of September.

Meanwhile the S&WB ordered the resumption of water cut-offs on August 13 despite knowing that the billing system has not been fixed. They claim that more than 7000 people are more than a year delinquent and that the S&WB desperately needs money. Yet they have money to grant raises to the big wigs and to hire legal teams to fend off lawsuits stemming from the August 5, 2017 flooding.

Mayor Cantrell is attempting to show concern and decisiveness in dismissing the latest mis-leadership team while taking no responsibility although she is the President of the Sewage and Water Board. This is same way Mayor Landrieu tried to duck responsibility. This is just for show as we know that the root of the problem is the lack of local control of the S&WB. True leadership would admit and denounce the dysfunction and refuse to cut-off anyone’s water until actual meter reading is done and exorbitant bills resolved.

Also on August 21, the S&WB refused to attend a scheduled meeting with the Public Works sub-committee of the City Council where they were to present a progress report. Since the S&WB is an independent state agency there is little the council can do but complain. Facing more public anger, it finally appeared at a Council meeting. The Council had passed a resolution (which has no teeth) against cutting anyone off. The new Board members arrogantly dismissed this demand.

The S&WB must come under popular control of the residents who struggle to pay bills, not the rich who are there to sniff out opportunities for their friends to have an inside track to lucrative S&WB contracts. It must also pay reparations to the victims of the Augusts 5, 2017 floods who suffered damages. This of course will not happen unless we organize and force these changes

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Department of Public Works Employees Walk Out!

“IF YOU WORK IN NEW ORLEANS YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO AFFORD LIVING HERE.”

On August 13, Department of Public Works employees said enough is enough. They left work and marched into City Hall and demanded a meeting with Mayor Cantrell. These workers are underpaid and overworked. No matter the weather, they are out there trying to do whatever they can with a limited workforce to patch potholes and clean drains.

The important city workers were demanding $18 an hour, hiring more workers, safety and training. They pointed out that residents suffer too with unfilled potholes and clogged drains.

Toinette Johnson, a dump truck operator for DPW, told WDSU: ““That’s why our streets are not being repaired. That’s why they constantly complain about the drains and the water. We don’t have enough manpower to (do the work).” Kennan Mitchell operates a vacuum truck for DPW. He said contractors are hired to do the same work that he does, cleaning catch basins, for more than twice the pay.

Johnson further explained how while they are required to live in Orleans Parish, they don’t make enough to afford the rising rents. “I think if you want to work for the city of New Orleans, you should be able to afford to live in the city of New Orleans.”

The city spends 63% of our tax dollars on prisons and cops but is ignoring the fact that these workers and other city workers are not making enough to get by. With rents, taxes, food, utilities, and cable costs rising, studies have shown you need to make $19 an hour to get a two bedroom apartment in Orleans Parish.

The city has given out grants and tax exemptions to real estate developers and other companies while ignoring how the important people who keep everything running are making out. The city has allowed $140 million in city mandated hotel taxes to be given to big capitalist-controlled commissions. But city workers, like these Department of Public Works employees, are ignored. Salaries of the executives in this and other departments like Sewage and Water Board keep going up, while hiring and workers salaries and benefits are inadequate. The Mayor and City Council should make it a priority to immediately give living wages to all city workers, rather than outrageous salaries and perks to commissioners and executives

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100 Years Later: Workers of the World Celebrate the Russian Revolution

By Quest R.

In October and November, workers and oppressed people on every corner of the globe celebrated the 100-year anniversary of the first Socialist Revolution: the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution of Russia. The downtrodden people of the Earth have looked to the Russian Revolution for inspiration since 1917, and in 2017, we have proven that the revolutionary legacy is still alive in the hearts of the masses everywhere.

The New Orleans Workers Group held a public celebration of the Bolshevik Revolution on October 29. Speakers gave talks regarding the historical context and significance of the Revolution and its implication on our struggles today. After brief talks, we celebrated with food and drinks and we sang the “Internationale”, the song of working class revolution.

Russian Revolution 100 year anniversary celebrations in South Africa, Russia, Bangladesh, Venezuela, and Italy.

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The Brotherhood of Timber Workers (BTW)

By Malcolm Suber

Many of our readers will be surprised to learn the history of a militant, multi-national, anti-capitalist, industrial union active in Louisiana over 100 years ago. At its high point the BTW had 30,000 members who openly challenged the capitalist class and fought to achieve working class unity. The BTW was a union of sawmill workers from east Texas and southwest Louisiana that was organized by Arthur Lee Emerson and Jay Smith in 1910. The BTW was best remembered for the Grabow uprising when the workers went on strike against the Galloway Lumber Company in Grabow, Louisiana. The BTW was also notable for the fact that they were an anti-racist union in the deep South, where segregation and Jim Crow were the order of the day.

The BTW was created because of the terrible working conditions at the sawmills in the southern piney woods region. The sawmill work was dangerous and depended on the ability of the worker to keep up with the machinery. In 1909, there were a reported 125 deaths and 16,000 accidents in the southern lumber industry.

In 1910, Emerson and Smith began to recruit members for the BTW. They moved from camp to camp to recruit hundreds of black and white sawmill workers. Interest grew rapidly and workers flocked to the BTW. The BTW held its first convention in Alexandria, La. At the conference they adopted their constitution that extended membership to all races and sexes.

The creation of the BTW immediately drew the attention of the capitalist owners of the Southern Lumber Operators Association. They vowed to kill the BTW in its infancy. In 1911, the SLOA shut down 11 mills in De Ridder, LA. Members of the BTW were blacklisted. In order to work again, they would have to sign an anti-union card. Most workers refused and the BTW became stronger.

In 1912, the BTW held its second annual convention in Alexandria, LA. “Big Bill” Haywood of the International Workers of the World (IWW) was the main speaker. Haywood noticed that the black and white workers were meeting separately in accord with Jim Crow law. He called for breaking the segregation law and having one joint meeting. It was here that the BTW voted to affiliate with the IWW.

The SLOA criticized the BTW as an anarchistic, race-mixing organization in an attempt to weaken support among white workers. After affiliation with the IWW, the BTW presented the lumber operators with a list of demands concerning higher wages and improved safety that led to more lockouts and the importation of scab labor. The SLOA brought armed guard along with the local sheri s to protect the scabs. This set the stage for the Grabow uprising.

On July 7, 1912 A.L. Emerson led a group of strikers toward the King-Ryder Mill. Upon hearing about an assassination attempt on H.G. Creel, a socialist organizer, they changed course toward the Galloway Mill in Grabow , LA. On arriving, Emerson began to speak to the strikers when shots were red from the company office. This sparked a gun fight between the company gunmen and the armed union members. It was reported that 4 workers were killed and 37 others wounded as a result of the battle.

Following the incident, 49 union men and their officers were arrested and faced charges of rioting. After a vigorous campaign to declare their innocence, all 49, including Emerson, were acquitted. This victory was the high point in the history of the BTW. However, the trial depleted their finances and drained their membership.

The BTW was a step forward for the working class struggle against the capitalist class. It was a fundamental challenge to the rule of capital as it championed working class unity, racial and sexual equality in a time when racism and sexism were widely accepted by the US working class.