LABOR CALENDAR
Union City Radio: Weekdays, 7:15am – 7:20am
WPFW-FM 89.3 FM; click here to hear
Play: “Sweat”: Fri, February 28, 8:00pm – 10:30pm; Sat, February 29, 8:00pm – 10:30pm
UUCF Sanctuary 2709 Hunter Mill Rd Oakton, VA 22124
Buy tickets here
African-American Radicals and the American Labor Movement: Sat, February 29, 3pm – 6pm
Embassy of Nicaragua, 1627 New Hampshire Ave NW, Washington, DC 20009
Rally with Holmead Rent Strikers and the Campaign to Reclaim Rent Control: Sat, February 29, 3:30pm – 5:00pm
3435 Holmead Pl NW, Washington, DC 20010
Got EWL ads? Today's the deadline! Reserve your space in the 2020 Evening with Labor program guide by emailing [email protected] or call 202-974-8153. Download the order form here.
Transit union opposes bus route cuts, calls for end to budget cap
ATU Local 689 earlier this week announced that it “strongly opposes” the bus service cuts proposed in WMATA’s next budget. “At a time when we need to be expanding public transit offerings and working to get people out of their cars, WMATA seems to be moving in the wrong direction,” the union said. Local 689, which represents transit workers throughout the region, also called for the elimination of WMATA’s “arbitrary” 3% budget cap. “The budget cap pits all riders against each other,” the union said. In addition, the cap prompted WMATA to hire Transdev to run its Cinder Bed Bus Garage as a way to restrict budget growth, and the private contractor “was so cruel in its treatment of the workers there that they went on strike for 85 days, shutting down bus service for thousands of passengers in Northern Virginia.”
Click here to download a sample script and the numbers for your local representatives. photo: WMATA budget hearing
AFGE blasts FLRA’s latest union-busting move
Calling it “just another step toward the administration’s goal of busting unions,” the American Federation of Government Employees – the largest federal union – last week blasted the Federal Labor Relations Authority’s recent decision regarding union-dues deductions. The union said the decision will make it “even harder for rank-and-file federal employees to speak up, defend their rights, and serve the American people” adding that “It’s part of a pattern of behavior by this administration that shows no respect for federal employees’ voluntary choice, their union contracts, or their rights under the law.” “They may try to silence us,” AFGE National Secretary-Treasurer Everett Kelley said, “but they can never stop organized federal employees from standing up and speaking out for a better life for their families and the public we serve.”
photo: at AFGE's recent legislative conference
Carol Rosenblatt retires from CLUW after two decades
Coalition of Labor Union Women Executive Director Carol Rosenblatt retired on February 14 “After twenty incredible years fighting for women, families and labor rights.” Rosenblatt’s tenure at CLUW spanned six presidents of the organization, from Gloria Johnson through current president Elise Bryant. “It has been a privilege working with such a dedicated group pursuing economic and social justice,” Rosenblatt said, adding that “I am not leaving my love for the labor movement or the women's community (and) hope we will see each other again.” Reach her at [email protected]. During CLUW's transition, contact Tiana Outram, CLUW's Labor/Women's Rights Advocate at [email protected] or 202-508-6965.
photo: Rosenblatt (center) at a rally in front of the Supreme Court for CLUW, this one having to do with the class action pay discrimination case at Walmart.
Today's Labor Quote: Bruce Springsteen and Willie Nelson
In December 1985, Springsteen and Nelson wrote a letter to 3M, the Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Company, asking them not to shut down the company’s video and audio tape facility in Freehold, New Jersey, Springsteen’s hometown.
″We know that these decisions are always difficult to make,” Springsteen and Nelson wrote, “but we believe that people of good will should be able to sit down and come up with a humane program that will keep those jobs and those workers in Freehold.″
3M went ahead with their plans and on February 28, 1986, in response to the layoff of 450 union members at the factory in New Jersey, every worker at a 3M factory in South Africa, walked off the job in sympathy.
Today's Labor History
This week’s Labor History Today podcast: African American Lumber Workers in the Jim Crow South
William P. Jones on “The Tribe of Black Ulysses: African American Lumber Workers in the Jim Crow South,” plus a letter from Eleanor Roosevelt to AFL-CIO urging the formation of a “Committee on Inquiry Into the Administration of Justice in the Freedom Struggle.” Interviews by Chris Garlock and Alan Wierdak. (Show originally released 2/24/2019)
2020 Bonus: Patrick Dixon on Chaplin’s “City Lights” as a labor film.
Last week’s show: Striking Images: Labor on Screen and in the Streets
February 28
U.S. Supreme Court finds that a Utah state law limiting mine and smelter workers to an eight-hour workday is constitutional - 1898
The minimum age allowed by law for workers in mills, factories, and mines in South Carolina is raised from twelve to fourteen - (Actually Leap Year Feb. 29) 1915
Members of the Chinese Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union in San Francisco’s Chinatown begin what is to be a successful four-month strike for better wages and conditions at the National Dollar Stores factory and three retail outlets - 1938
February 29
Screen Actors Guild member Hattie McDaniel becomes the first African-American to win an Academy Award (see video), honored for her portrayal of “Mammy” in “Gone with the Wind” - 1940
March 1
The Granite Cutters National Union begins what is to be a successful nationwide strike for the 8-hour day. Also won: union recognition, wage increases, a grievance procedure and a minimum wage scale - 1900
Joseph Curren is born on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. At age 16 he joined the Merchant Marines and in 1937 went on to lead the formation of the National Maritime Union. He was the union’s founding president and held the post until 1973. He died in 1981 - 1906
IWW strikes Portland, Ore. sawmills - 1907
CIO president John L. Lewis and U.S. Steel President Myron Taylor sign a landmark contract in which the bitterly anti-union company officially recognized the CIO as sole negotiator for the company's unionized workers. Included: the adoption of overtime pay, the 40-hour work week, and a big pay hike - 1937
- David Prosten
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Published by the Metropolitan Washington Council, an AFL-CIO "Union City" Central Labor Council whose 200 affiliated union locals represent 150,000 area union members.
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