Labor Historians & Academics Protest The Use Of Police To Quash Peaceful Campus Protests

On April 26, the Board of Directors of the Labor and Working-Class History Association (LAWCHA) unanimously issued a statement condemning the use of police to quash peaceful campus protests. Since issuing that statement, we have been horrified to learn that a number of LAWCHA members have been arrested while engaged in peaceful protests and that at least one of those -- Annelise Orleck of Dartmouth -- was thrown to the ground and arrested on May 1 and has now been banned from the campus where she has taught for 34 years. In light of these disturbing developments and on behalf of LAWCHA, the Executive Committee has added the language in bold below to our original statement:

The elected board and officers of the Labor and Working-Class History Association (LAWCHA), the majority of whose members work and study on college and university campuses, is alarmed by the recent deployment of uniformed officers to forcefully break up peaceful demonstrations on multiple campuses around the country. We strongly condemn the deployment of law enforcement officers to shut down and disperse nonviolent protests and we urge campus officials to respect the free speech rights of students, faculty, and staff. Furthermore, we demand that colleges and universities immediately rescind bans of faculty, students, or staff from their campuses as a result of their exercising rights to free speech and assembly.


This statement was unanimously approved by the LAWCHA Board of Directors

Joseph A. McCartin, Georgetown University, President
Eileen Boris, University of California at Santa Barbara, Vice President
Cindy Hahamovitch, University of Georgia, Immediate Past President
Erik Gellman, University of North Carolina, Secretary
Liesl Orenic, Dominican University, Treasurer
Janine Giordano Drake, Indiana University, Bloomington, Board Member
Danielle Phillips-Cunningham, Rutgers University, Board Member
Kim Phillips-Fein, Columbia University, Board Member
Aldo A. Lauria Santiago, Rutgers University, Board Member
Colleen Woods, University of Maryland, Board Member
Natanya Duncan, Director of Africana Studies and Associate Professor of History,
Queens College, CUNY, Board Member
David “Mac” Marquis, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of South Carolina, Board Member
Verónica Martinez-Matsuda, University of California, San Diego, Board Member
Samir Sonti, CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies, Board Member
Jane Berger, Moravian University, Board Member
Keona K. Ervin, Bowdoin, Board Member
Aimee Loiselle, Central Connecticut State University, Board Member
Gordon Mantler, George Washington University, Board Member
Joel Suarez, Harvard University, Board Member

Liat Spiro, College of the Holy Cross
Faith Bennett, UC Davis
Rebecca Jean Emigh, UCLA, Sociology
Emily E. LB. Twarog, University of Illinois
Omari Averette-Phillips, UC Davis
Paul Ortiz, University of Florida
Harry Targ, Purdue University. Retired
Joan Flores-Villalobos, University of Southern California
Nate Holdren, Drake University
Bill Barry
Alan Wierdak, University of Maryland
Tamar Carroll, Rochester Institute of Technology
Cathy Brigden, University of Tasmania
Dennis Deslippe, Franklin & Marshall College
Tom Alter, Texas State University
Laura Murphy, Dutchess Community College
Erik Loomis, University of Rhode Island
James Young, Pennsylvania Labor History Society/National Writers Union
David Brundage, University of California, Santa Cruz
Aaron Jesch, Washington State University Vancouver
Anne Lewis, UT Austin, TSEU-CWA 6186
Lois Helmbold, San Jose State U, emerita professor
Lorenzo Costaguta, University of Bristol
David Brody
Rosemary Feurer, Northern Illinois University
Greg Kealey, University of New Brunswick
Michael Pierce, University of Arkansas—UAEA/Local 965
Naomi R. Williams, Rutgers University
Anita Rupprecht, University of Brighton, UK
Lisa Phillips, Indiana State University
Thai Jones, Columbia University
Heather Ann Thompson, University of Michigan
Miriam Cohen, Vassar College
Jon Bekken, Albright College
Peter Rachleff, Macalester College (Emeritus)
Eladio Bobadilla, University of Pittsburgh
Brian Greenberg, Monmouth University
Peter Cole, Western Illinois University
Lane Windham, Georgetown University
Cristina Groeger, Lake Forest College
Michael Kazin, Georgetown University
Andrea Taylor
Ruth Needleman, Indiana University
Aaron Jaffe, The Juilliard School
Beth Robinson , Texas A&M University - Corpus Christi
Shannan Clark, Montclair State University
John Enyeart, Bucknell University
Eric Fure-Slocum, St. Olaf College (emeritus)
Rick Halpern, University of Toronto
Robert Bruno, University of Illinois
Michael Lansing, Augsburg University
Jeff Schuhrke, Harry Van Arsdale Jr. School of Labor Studies, SUNY Empire State University
Priyanka Srivastava, Department of History, University of Massachusetts Amherst
Greta de Jong, University of Nevada, Reno
David Vaught, Texas A&M University
Sean Ahern, UFT
Michael Damien Aguirre, University of Nevada, Reno
Ian Rocksborough-Smith, University of the Fraser Valley
William Jones, University of Minnesota (past LAWCHA president)
Jacob Dorman, The University of Nevada, Reno
Michael Honey, University of Washington (past LAWCHA president)
Julie Greene, University of Maryland (past LAWCHA president)
Miriam Frank, retired professor of Humanities at New York University
Dan Graff, University of Notre Dame
James Bearden, SUNY Geneseo
Barbara Walker, UNR
Donna Haverty-Stacke, Hunter College, CUNY
Maggie Gray, Adelphi University
Deborah Cohen, University of Missouri-St. Louis
Robert Woodrum, Perimeter College of Georgia State University
Christopher Martin, University of Northern Iowa, United Faculty AFT/AAUP
Nelson Lichtenstein, University of California, Santa Barbara
Joe Berry, retired U of IL and City College of SF
Elizabeth McKIllen, University of Maine
Mary Reynolds, Reflective Democracy Campaign
Arman Azimi, College of the Holy Cross
David Zonderman, NC State University
William Keach, Brown University
Alex Miller, University of Washington Tacoma
Jeannette Estruth, Bard College and the Harvard Berkman-Klein Center
Kirsten Schultz, Seton Hall University
Edwin Rubel, University of Washington
Benjamin Goldfrank, Seton Hall University
Grace Reinke, University of New Orleans and United Campus Workers of Louisiana
Lynn Thomas, University of Washington
Raya Fidel, University of Washington
Dexter Arnold
Jana Lipman, Tulane University
Jacquelyn Hall , Emeritus UNC Chapel Hill (past LAWCHA president)
Leslie Bunnage, Seton Hall University
Margot Canaday, Princeton University
Rudi Batzell, Lake Forest College
Renata Keller, University of Nevada
Jennifer Brooks, Auburn University
James Kollros, retired
Emily Hobson, University of Nevada Reno
Kimberly Enderle, University of Massachusetts Amherst
Alyssa Ribeiro, Allegheny College
Jennifer Guglielmo, Smith College
Thomas Guglielmo, George Washington University
Shelton Stromquist, University of Iowa (past LAWCHA president)
Lizabeth Cohen, Harvard University
Jillian Jacklin, University of Wisconsin-Green Bay

‘The working class can’t afford it’: the shocking truth about the money bands make on tour

The Guardian has done a great story on the exploitation of musicians that will up-end many of the notions most people have about the working lives, incomes and difficulties faced by the musicians and bands we follow and pay to see. Please read the article and support The Guardian and support efforts to organize musicians!

When you see a band playing to thousands of fans in a sun-drenched festival field, signing a record deal with a major label or playing endlessly from the airwaves, it’s easy to conjure an image of success that comes with some serious cash to boot – particularly when Taylor Swift has broken $1bn in revenue for her current Eras tour. But looks can be deceiving. “I don’t blame the public for seeing a band playing to 2,000 people and thinking they’re minted,” says artist manager Dan Potts. “But the reality is quite different.”

Post-Covid there has been significant focus on grassroots music venues as they struggle to stay open. There’s been less focus on the actual ability of artists to tour these venues. David Martin, chief executive officer of the Featured Artists Coalition (FAC), says we’re in a “cost-of-touring crisis”. Pretty much every cost attached to touring – van hire, crew, travel, accommodation, food and drink – has gone up, while fees and audiences often have not. “[Playing] live is becoming financially unsustainable for many artists,” he says. “Artists are seeing [playing] live as a loss leader now. That’s if they can even afford to make it work in the first place.”

Potts, who works at Red Light Management – home to everyone from Sabrina Carpenter to Kaiser Chiefs and Sofia Kourtesis – feels like there is an industry equivalent of the Spider-Man meme in which they are all pointing to one another. “People who work at labels think bands make loads of money touring, while booking agents think they make loads of money on publishing and so on,” he says. “Everyone thinks artists make money from the other side of the industry they’re not involved in.

“Artists are the biggest employers in the industry. They pay for the tour manager, session musicians, agent, manager, crew, insurance, travel, accommodation, equipment, rehearsal space, production. Everything. I don’t think people know this is all the stuff that the artist pays for and does.”

Read more here.

More Wins For Workers & Our Families

Source: Fight For Progress

 

May Declaration From The World Federation of Trade Unions

Please note that the following declaration does not represent the views of the AFL-CIO, the Oregon AFL-CIO, or the Marion-Pok-Yamhill Central Labor Chapter. The World Federation of Trade Unions and the AFL-CIO are not allied with one another.

26 Apr 2024 The World Federation of Trade Unions, the militant, class-oriented voice, representing over 105 million workers who live, work, and struggle in 134 countries of the 5 continents, honors the 138th anniversary of the struggle of workers in Chicago in 1886. A struggle that constituted a lasting milestone of the working class and a bright beacon for the struggles of today and tomorrow, a beacon of the uninterrupted class struggle for stable work with rights, social security, free public, and universal health and education, dignified life. This year’s May Day anniversary will go down in history as a bloody anniversary. Because while millions of workers around the world organize themselves, demand against the anti-people’s policies of the capital, its governments and the EU, our colleagues in Palestine will be burying the dozens of bodies murdered every day in the genocide that is carried out by Israel. Workers in every corner of the globe will not remain silent in the crime being committed. They will turn every May Day activity into a demonstration of solidarity with the struggling Palestinian people, and of condemnation of the murderous state of Israel and its imperialist allies who in one way or another support the massacre. Similarly, the workers do not remain silent on every other crime committed against the peoples, for the profits of the imperialists and the monopolies. At a time when the planet is dripping blood in various places from military interventions, the international class-oriented trade union movement, organized and decisively, is fighting for peace. We say no to imperialist plans and military conflicts. The struggle for peace has a specific content. It means first and foremost a struggle for the dismantling of NATO and all military coalitions, a struggle to defend the right of every people to choose the path of their economic and social development without interventions, sanctions, blockades, and economic wars. Against the double-standards policy where international law ends up being in practice the law of the powerful ones. The messages and demands of the Chicago pioneers of 1886 remain relevant today. The crisis of capitalism is generalized and deepens. Social inequalities are widening dramatically. Democratic freedoms and trade union rights, are under attack all over the world. The high cost of living and inflation are brutally undermining workers’ and pensioners living standards. Τhe right to organize and collective bargaining and the sacred right to strike are under attack. Individual contracts, privatizations, outsourcing, teleworking and “service leasing” are just some of the forms taken by this harsh neoliberal attack. Major social achievements such as social security and public health care are being privatized while the authoritarian and arbitrary increase of the retirement age methodically continues. It is obvious that the burden of the capitalist crisis, is being attempted once again to be put on the shoulders of the working people and the weak popular strata in general. The workers all over the world do not passively accept the capitalist anti-grassroots, and anti-worker attacks. They refuse to pay the bill of the capitalist crisis. With militant struggles and mobilizations in all corners of the globe, they demand the satisfaction of their contemporary needs. The WFTU and its affiliates are, and will continue firmly being in the vanguard of this struggles! In this year’s May Day celebrations and demonstrations, the Palestinian flag will wave proudly next to the WFTU’s and its affiliates’ flags. In a spirit of solidarity and internationalism, we firmly stand beside the people of the heroic Cuba, and the peoples who struggle against the murderous sanctions, interventions, imperialist aggression, blockades and economic wars. On the occasion of May Day 2024, the WFTU calls the class and militant trade unions around the world to organize this year’s campaign and activities under the slogan: AGAINST THEIR PROFITS, WE RISE UP FOR OUR LIVES! More Massive and Militant For the workers’ contemporary needs, against the exploitation! For democratic and trade union freedoms! In solidarity with Palestine, against imperialist wars and interventions! For the class-oriented Trade Union movement, for the workers who resist, who do not compromise with oppression, discrimination and exploitation, there is only one path of dignity: the path of the struggles! The struggles that have taken place signal hope, show the enormous power of the organized working class, illuminate the path of perspective against capitalist exploitation.

ESPAÑOL Declaración de la FSM sobre el 1º de mayo de 2024 26 Abr 2024 La Federación Sindical Mundial, la voz combativa y clasista, que representa a más de 105 millones de trabajadores que viven, trabajan y luchan en 134 países de los 5 continentes, honra el 138 aniversario de la lucha de los trabajadores en Chicago en 1886. Una lucha que constituyó un hito duradero de la clase obrera y un faro luminoso para las luchas de hoy y de mañana, un faro de la lucha de clase ininterrumpida por el trabajo estable y con derechos, la seguridad social, la sanidad y la educación públicas, gratuitas y universales, la vida digna. El aniversario del Primero de Mayo de este año pasará a la historia como un aniversario sangriento. Porque mientras millones de trabajadores en todo el mundo se organizan, reivindican contra las políticas antipopulares del capital, sus gobiernos y la UE, nuestros compañeros en Palestina estarán enterrando las decenas de cuerpos asesinados cada día en el genocidio que lleva a cabo Israel. Los trabajadores de todos los rincones del planeta no permanecerán callados ante el crimen que se está cometiendo. Convertirán cada actividad del Primero de Mayo en una demostración de solidaridad con el pueblo palestino en lucha, y de condena al Estado asesino de Israel y a sus aliados imperialistas que de una u otra forma apoyan la masacre. Del mismo modo, los trabajadores no callan ante cualquier otro crimen cometido contra los pueblos, en beneficio de los imperialistas y los monopolios. En un momento en que el planeta chorrea sangre en diversos lugares a causa de las intervenciones militares, el movimiento sindical clasista internacional, organizado y con decisión, lucha por la paz. Decimos no a los planes imperialistas y a los conflictos militares. La lucha por la paz tiene un contenido específico. Significa ante todo una lucha por el desmantelamiento de la OTAN y de todas las coaliciones militares, una lucha por la defensa del derecho de cada pueblo a elegir el camino de su desarrollo económico y social sin intervenciones, sanciones, bloqueos y guerras económicas. Contra la política de doble rasero donde el derecho internacional acaba siendo en la práctica el derecho de los poderosos. Los mensajes y reivindicaciones de los pioneros de Chicago de 1886 siguen siendo actuales. La crisis del capitalismo se generaliza y profundiza. Las desigualdades sociales se amplían dramáticamente. Las libertades democráticas y los derechos sindicales, están siendo atacados en todo el mundo. El alto coste de la vida y la inflación están socavando brutalmente el nivel de vida de los trabajadores y pensionistas. El derecho de sindicación y de negociación colectiva y el sagrado derecho de huelga están siendo atacados. Los contratos individuales, las privatizaciones, la externalización, el teletrabajo y el "arrendamiento de servicios" son sólo algunas de las formas que adopta este duro ataque neoliberal. Importantes conquistas sociales como la seguridad social y la sanidad pública están siendo privatizadas mientras continúa metódicamente el aumento autoritario y arbitrario de la edad de jubilación. Es evidente que el peso de la crisis capitalista, una vez más, se intenta hacer recaer sobre los hombros de los trabajadores y de las capas populares débiles en general. Los trabajadores de todo el mundo no aceptan pasivamente los ataques capitalistas antipopulares y antiobreros. Se niegan a pagar la factura de la crisis capitalista. Con luchas combativas y movilizaciones en todos los rincones del planeta, exigen la satisfacción de sus necesidades contemporáneas. La FSM y sus afiliados están y seguirán estando firmemente a la vanguardia de estas luchas. En las celebraciones y manifestaciones del Primero de Mayo de este año, la bandera palestina ondeará con orgullo junto a las banderas de la FSM y de sus afiliados. En un espíritu de solidaridad e internacionalismo, estamos firmemente al lado del pueblo de la heroica Cuba, y de los pueblos que luchan contra las sanciones asesinas, las intervenciones, la agresión imperialista, los bloqueos y las guerras económicas. Con motivo del Primero de Mayo de 2024, la FSM llama a los sindicatos de clase y combativos de todo el mundo a organizar la campaña y las actividades de este año bajo el lema: ¡CONTRA SUS BENEFICIOS, NOS LEVANTAMOS POR NUESTRAS VIDAS! Más masivo y militante Por las necesidades contemporáneas de los trabajadores, ¡contra la explotación! ¡Por las libertades democráticas y sindicales! En solidaridad con Palestina, ¡contra las guerras e intervenciones imperialistas! Para el movimiento sindical clasista, para los trabajadores que resisten, que no transigen con la opresión, la discriminación y la explotación, sólo hay un camino de dignidad: ¡el camino de las luchas! Las luchas que han tenido lugar son una señal de esperanza, muestran el enorme poder de la clase obrera organizada, iluminan el camino de la perspectiva contra la explotación capitalista.

Boycott Coors & Miller

The Coors family, executives, and stockholders are living the high life while refusing to negotiate a fair contract with workers who make the beer. Teamsters Local 997 in Fort Worth, the workers behind the Molson-Coors brand beverages and record profits, were forced onto the picket line Feb. 17 after the company refused to offer more than 99 cents an hour in new wages.

Support the Teamsters who are holding the line for a strong contract. Boycott Molson Coors until workers get the job protections and wage increases they deserve! Take part in a bit of history, renewed by Texas Teamsters, and join us in supporting the long-running Boycott!

Support the Boycott and circulate the flier, here!

What the UAW Won At Daimler

 From Portland Jobs with Justice:

After making a credible threat to strike, the UAW reached a historic deal at Daimler Trucks. Thanks to our labor and community members who supported UAW Daimler Global Day of Solidarity at the North American HQ (right here in Portland) to put the company on notice!

The tentative agreement includes:

- 25% raises
- Abolishing wage tiers
- COLA for 1st time
- Profit sharing for the first time

Total worker compensation will go up as much as 67%!

Portland Workers' Assembly To Discuss Organizing At "Progressive" Employers

 

The American Federation of Musicians International Executive Board Endorses Joe Biden

“Stand faithfully by your friends and elect them. Oppose your enemies and defeat them.”

That is the political policy of the AFL-CIO, and one that the AFM has subscribed to for decades. The unquestionable truth of it motivated the AFM International Executive Board (IEB), in its first quarterly meeting of 2024, to endorse US President Joe Biden for re-election.*

Not since the administration of Franklin Roosevelt has any US president shown the level of support for working Americans as from the Biden-Harris administration. With Joe Biden’s leadership:

* Congress passed the American Rescue Plan. As a result, the AFM’s US pension plan (and other union pension funds that also got hammered by the Great Recession of 2007) will be able to maintain benefits for the membership into the future;
* The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) committed to a prevailing wage requirement for musicians and other performers hired by NEA grant recipients;
* All departments of the executive branch were instructed to wake up to the looming dangers of unregulated machine-ingested generative artificial intelligence and develop policy proposals to curb abuse;
* The slashing of federal funding of the arts stopped;
* The National Labor Relations Board was retooled to support workers’ rights both in employment and collective bargaining;
* Cabinet and executive posts have been filled with actual professionals who understand the missions of their departments and the citizenry that they serve.

This is not an exhaustive list, but it does provide a taste of the level of friendship musicians now enjoy in the Biden-Harris administration. It’s why the IEB, aware that political endorsements are always controversial within the membership, determined that an endorsement of Joe Biden for president is unequivocally in the best interests of professional musicians.

*In conformity with US election law, the Canadian members of the IEB recused themselves from participating in the endorsement vote.

Rural Post Offices Are Disappearing. We Found Out Why.

 

Some important news from the labor movement!

 

Marin workers hold first strike since 2019: More than 100 medical technicians

at MarinHealth Medical Center struck for one day as they fight to protect their

 health benefits and win strong raises. Read more here.

Dolores Huerta statnds in solidarity when Sutter workers strike again in 

Sacramento: NUHW members at Sutter Health’s Sacramento psychiatric hospital 

held a three-day strike as they continue to fight for a first contract with fair wages 

and no healthcare takeaways. Read more here.

The National Council for Occupational Safety & Health is celebrating 20

 years of activism and leadership and everyone is invited. Read more here.

Labor leaders honor Key Bridge victims on Workers Memorial Day. An article in The Baltimore Sun under the date of April 28 has the photo above and says the following:

Father Ty Hullinger echoed the words of labor activist Mary Harris “Mother” Jones during a Sunday ceremony honoring the lives of workers killed on the job: “Pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living.”

The pastor of Transfiguration Catholic Community in Pigtown proceeded to offer a prayer for the six workers killed just over a month ago after the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed below them. Joined by labor leaders and local officials at a solemn ceremony at Baltimore’s Middle Branch Park, Hullinger went on to call for the protection of all laborers facing unsafe working conditions.

Sunday was Workers Memorial Day, an annual day of remembrance for laborers killed or hurt on the job, started in 1989 by the AFL-CIO. Thousands of workers nationwide are estimated by the organization of labor unions to be injured or killed on the job each day, and the issue became front and center in Baltimore on March 26 after the six men, all employees of Brawner Builders, died while working an overnight shift filling potholes on the bridge that was struck by a cargo ship early that morning. Read more here.

Alabama AFL-CIO President Says Out-of-Touch Lawmakers Are the ‘Real Leeches.’ The AFL-CIO has provided the following copy on an op-ed piece written by Alabama AFL-CIO President Bren Riley in response to some southern governors recently publicly opposing the United Auto Workers' successful organizing campaign in Tennessee.

Top Cut:
Alabama AFL-CIO President Bren Riley gave a powerful response to recent aggressive attacks on the International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America (UAW) and the larger labor movement in the South made in the media by Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey and Alabama Speaker of the House Nathaniel Ledbetter.

Why It Matters:
Last week, both state politicians called the UAW a “dangerous leech,” just days after Ivey released a joint statement with five other Southern governors claiming unions are special interest groups that threaten jobs and regional values. President Riley, a third-generation union member born and raised in the state, pushed back against these outright lies and pointed out that lawmakers on taxpayer-funded salaries that do nothing for their constituents were the real leeches on the South. He also wrote about his family’s connection to the labor movement, what union membership provides to both workers and our communities, and how union values of good wages, quality benefits and job security are Alabama values.

“Corporations and the politicians they bankroll want to keep workers divided and afraid of demanding the rights and freedoms we deserve. They’re working overtime right now to spread fear and lies so bosses can keep paying poverty wages while they rake in record profits,” Riley said in the op-ed. “But the Alabama AFL-CIO sees right through this charade, and I know the honest, hardworking people of Alabama can see through it, too. When workers stand together in unions to bargain for good wages, quality benefits and their fair share of corporate profits, we have the power not just to change our own lives, but the lives of our neighbors and communities, too.”

Read all about it here.