| CORRESPONDENCE
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From J. KEOGH, Warilla, Australia.
"Dear Comrade:
"We are sending a donation to your strike fund.
Forgive us for the small donation as we are a very small branch. If the
strike does not eventuate keep the money for your RUSTY HOOK publication.
Yours fraternally,
J. KEOGH,
Port Kembla, Maritime Union of Australia, (MUA.)"
Many thanks to you brother KEOGH and your fellow union
brothers in Port Kembla. It is your kind of spirit that keeps the good
things in the world from destruction by the bad guys!
From all indications, as you may have already heard we
have reached a pretty good settlement without a strike in spite of Mr.
Miniace's (PMA.) lock out and other under handed schemes. When they take
on the ILWU they take on more than they can handle! "An Injury to One
Is An Injury to All!
From JOHN EHLY, Tacoma. WA.
Del Castle,
This is the money for the RUSTY HOOK. We will be paid
up through the next edition.
Yours truly, John Ehly
Secretary - Local 23 Pensioners"
Thank you JOHN. We are especially anxious to have Local
23 subscribers in the tradition of solidarity.
From MURRELL R. LEE, Seattle Local 19 Pensioner.
MURRELL gave us a copy of the Readers Digest, March, 1937 by Frances
Newman. It is an interesting look at how far anti-union propaganda went in
those days. Its opening paragraph sets the tone:
"You transact business in Seattle today by
courtesy of the longshoremen. You exist there by kindness of the
longshoremen. Ever since Mayor John F. Dore, the bluntest man in American
politics, took office last June, Seattle has been under a sort of martial
law by longshoremen and teamsters. ... in Seattle, transportation
overshadows other activities, and hence the transportation unions -
teamsters and longshoremen - have no rivals.... They have become extremely
active in organizing new unions, and their aim "is to make Seattle a
100 percent closed-shop town."
"In Seattle the labor machine is enmeshed with the
political machine. With their influence over votes, the labor leaders are
natural political leaders, some of them take advantage of their
opportunities. ...
"Instead of seeking to destroy capitalism, Seattle unionism seeks
to marry it and settle down, setting up labor-and-capital alliances that
have two dominant policies - a soak-the-consumer policy and kill-the-
independent competitor policy. "
The article goes on and on in the same anti-union
diatribe. But it does show the great strength of the ILWU when it points
out that:
"The Seattle Newspaper Guild could not have closed
the newspaper" (the famous guild strike in 1936 that unionized the
Seattle Post-Intelligencer) without the longshoremen who picketed the
plant.... The Post" Intelligencer strike was settled by a Hearst
capitulation that included the hiring of Franklin D. Roosevelt's young
son-in-law, John Boettigerr, as new publisher." The article grossly
overstates the strength of labor's so-called stranglehold on business. But
it does show labor's strength as in the PI strike. Also, many unions did
join with business in the period under the old AFL craft unionism, but
distinctly as a very weak partner to be dumped at the earliest
opportunity. Only when the AFL-CIO took a militant policy on labor
relations after W.W.II was such an agreement partially reached. It was
canceled by industry in the 1973 oil crisis when profits took a slump.
We are now back in a full fledged anti-union industrial policy
exemplified by the hard line policy pursued at the beginning of West Coast
ILWU-PMA negotiations by Mr. Miniace. It didn't succeed because our union
is the strongest on the West Coast and nationally with some exceptions. It
didn't succeed also because were able to bring considerable political
pressure to bear. We must remember that from now on. Political
organization is as important as union organization! |
