'National Working People's Day' rally set for Louisville on Feb. 24
By BERRY CRAIG
AFT Local 1360
Bluegrass State union members will gather in Louisville for a “Working People’s Day of Action” rally on Feb. 24, two days before the U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to hear the first oral arguments in Janus v. AFSCME Council 31.
The Saturday rally is set for 11 a.m. to noon at the UAW 862 hall, 3000 Fern Valley Rd. Dozens of similar rallies are planned across the country.
“The main focus of our rally is to stand against the war on working people, which includes the attempt by Gov. Bevin to gut public pensions, the repeal of prevailing wage, so-called ‘right to work’ and the attacks on public education, which include establishing charter schools,” said Tim Morris, a spokesperson for the Greater Louisville Central Labor Council, which supports the rally.
The Janus case could, in effect, force all public employee unions under a “right to work” scheme, warned Bill Londrigan, president of the Kentucky State AFL-CIO.
AFSCME has many members in Kentucky.
Federal law requires a union to represent all hourly workers at a unionized job site. Under RTW laws in Kentucky and 27 other states, workers can enjoy union-won wages and benefits without joining the union and paying dues or paying the union a fair-share fee to represent them.
“Since all the workers benefit from the union’s gains, it’s only fair that everyone chip in toward the cost,” argued Roberta Lynch, AFSCME Council 31 executive director, in a Springfield, Ill., State Journal-Register guest column. “That’s why 40 years ago a unanimous Supreme Court [in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education] approved the kind of cost-sharing arrangements known as fair share.”
Added Londrigan: “Janus is part of the whole effort to turn back the clock on workers and unions by undermining our ability to represent our members by shutting off our financial resources. Now with Janus, the focus is primarily on the public-sector, which has been the fastest growing part of the labor movement.”
The plaintiff, Mark Janus, is an Illinois state government employee. He is suing AFSCME because he doesn’t want to pay the union a fair-share fee. Rabidly anti-union groups like the National Right to Work Committee and the State Policy Network are helping to fund the suit.
Organizations like the NRTWC and SPN insist they support “worker freedom.” Their real aim is busting unions. The SPN admits its goal is to “defund and defang” public employee unions.
Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner, a fiercely anti-union Republican like Bevin, wanted to make Illinois a RTW state but he didn’t have the votes in the state legislature, added Morris. “So he got behind the Janus case.”
Council 31 represents 100,000 active and retired public service workers, including Janus.
While the high court is about to consider Janus, a pair of national RTW bill awaits action in the Republican-majority Congress. Republican Rand Paul, Kentucky’s junior senator, introduced the senate measure and Republican Reps. Steve King of Iowa and Joe Wilson of South Carolina are co-sponsoring the House bill.
The Supreme Court has a 5-4 conservative majority. If Janus wins, Congress may move on the RTW legislation.
President Donald Trump’s solicitor general has filed an amicus curiae brief in support of Janus. On the campaign trail, Trump said he preferred RTW states to non RTW states.
Sponsors of the “Working People's Day of Action" programs include the AFL-CIO, AFSCME, NEA, AFT and Jobs With Justice.
“The rallies were also scheduled to coincide with AFSCME’s ‘I AM 2018’ national campaign commemorating the 50th anniversary of the deaths of Memphis sanitation workers Echol Cole and Robert Walker,” Morris said.
Cole and Walker were killed at work on Feb. 1, 1968. When it started raining hard, they sought shelter in the back of a garbage truck. The trash compactor malfunctioned and crushed them.
The tragedy sparked a strike by Memphis’s 1,300 sanitation workers for better pay and working conditions, recognition of their AFSCME union and an end to racial discrimination.
“They had warned the city about dangerous equipment but were ignored,” according to the “I AM 2018" website….They walked off the job and marched under the banner: I AM A MAN.”
AFSCME called for a moment of silence on Feb. 1, the 50th anniversary of the accident that claimed the lives of Cole and Walker. Part of the union's "I AM" campaign, the observance was “to honor their memory and sacrifice, as we pick up the mantle from the 1968 strikers in the ongoing fight for racial and economic justice.”
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. came to Memphis in solidarity with the strikers. He was assassinated in the city on April 3, 1968. Ultimately, the city recognized the union, and AFSCME Local 1733 was born.
“The 'Working People’s Day of Action’ is also designed to remind workers of their collective strength and the importance of standing together against a rigged system and fighting back against those who try to silence worker voices,” Morris also said.
More information is available from Morris via email at tim.morris@glclc.com.