Union leaders say jail corporate lawbreakers

By Wally Kaufman

This article was reprinted from the March 21, 1998 issue of the People's Weekly World. For subscription information see below. All rights reserved - may be used with PWW credits.

MARIETTA, Ohio - The Washington County Fairgrounds here resounded with cheers and chanting as 5,000 workers streamed in from Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, West Virginia and Kentucky last Sunday.

They came to demonstrate solidarity with 150 Magnetic Specialties Inc. (MSI) workers who have been on strike for more than a year to win recognition of their union, the United Steelworkers of America (USWA).

The workers packed the main fairground building as Ohio USWA District Director Frank Vickers welcomed the crowd. Dozens of local union presidents presented the MSI strikers with checks totaling $58,000 during the rally. It was followed by a march through the downtown, the workers chanting "What time is it? Union time!"

USWA Secretary-Treasurer Leo Girard told the rally "A perverted set of values allows freedom for corporate lawbreakers and jails workers for exercising their legal right to organize unions!" He pledged the entire $200 million USWA strike and defense fund to win the M.S.I strike.

AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka accused corporate executives like Gary Murphy, CEO of MSI, of squeezing "profit from the labor of their workers." They then illegally "proceed to destroy their livelihood."

The issues involved in the MSI strike "go beyond Marietta," Trumka said, "into every community in the United States as workers fight for their rights and for economic justice."

Ohio AFL-CIO President Bill Burga said, "Gary Murphy is the criminal here and the 150 striking MSI workers are the real heroes."

"Workers are fed up," said Burga, as he called for labor to "get involved in politics. We need legislation outlawing striker replacement," he said. "Measure all politicians by 'Whose side are they on? - theirs or ours.'"

"There is no free labor in our country," said West Virginia AFL-CIO President Jim Bowe. "We are being treated like slaves, and we have no freedoms except what we win for ourselves!" he said. "The only real freedom that exists is for a corporate criminal like Gary Murphy to rob 150 workers of their rights."

"Gary Murphy is done!" shouted Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President Lefty Palm. "Coming after Wheeling-Pitt, I say to these corporations they have awakened a sleeping giant!"

Political leaders headed by Rep. Ted Strickland (D-Ohio) pledged their support for the Marietta strikers. "To Gary Murphy I say, 'Observe the law,'" said Strickland, "and grant MSI workers their right to organize."

Mary Boyle, running for U.S. Senate, said, "Workers' rights to organize unions must be written into laws by the U.S. Senate. No more scabs!" she said to a standing ovation as she pledged support for anti-scab legislation.

Michael Coleman, candidate for Ohio Lt. Governor, was in attendance as were the Mayor of Marietta and other public official.

Steelworkers from small towns like Logan, Zanesville, Fremont, Rosewood and Beltona traveled to the rally by the busload. There was a contingent of Laborers from West Virginia, Bakers, Painters, and State County and Municipal Employees from Cleveland. Steelworkers Organization of Active Retirees (SOAR) organized busloads from Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and elsewhere, including large numbers of African American steelworkers, led by SOAR leaders Oliver Montgomery and George Edwards.

Widely distributed to the crowd were copies of a United Auto Worker pamphlet exposing "Rent-a-Goons," strikebreakers used against striking workers across the nation, including the MSI workers who were terrorized in a shooting incident linked to the goons.

The pamphlet denounces what it calls "private armies of mercenaries operating inside our country, a clear and present danger to the living standards of American workers, a challenge to the liberties of all citizens."

Trumka drew cheers when he told the rally, "Do we want an America where decent, law-abiding workers and their families are subjected to violence and harassment inflicted on them by armed thugs, when all they want to do is to join unions and win economic justice for themselves and their families? Are we going to tolerate it any longer?" The crowd roared, "No!"

Later, the crowd assembled on the fairgrounds and marched two miles into the center of town ending in front of the MSI plant. The rent-a-goons, usually strutting at the company gates, were nowhere to be seen.

A pamphlet signed by the strikers thanking the labor movement for its solidarity was handed out to the crowd.

The labor movement drew a line in the sand in Marietta March 15. Whenever corporate CEOs try to deny basic rights and economic justice, the full organized might of the U.S. labor movement will be thrown into the battle, a battle which workers will win.