By BERRY CRAIG
AFT Local 1360
Every Labor Day I dust off my framed copy of The Toiler.
The all-but-forgotten newspaper was published in Fulton by the Knights of Labor, an early union which I've often written about, especially on Labor Day.
The Knights “tried to teach the American wage-earner that he was a wage-earner first and a bricklayer, carpenter, miner, shoemaker, after; that he was a wage-earner first and a Catholic, Protestant, Jew, white, black, Democrat, Republican, after,” historian Norman Ware wrote.
The Knights stressed that whatever else divided working people, work itself was what we all had in common. Work was, by far, the most important factor in our lives. Thus, it behooves workers to unite as members of the working class, the Knights urged.
Active in the late 19th-century, the Knights were among the pioneers in our labor movement. There were even Knights in western Kentucky, where I was born, reared and still live.
The paper and the Knights are long gone.
But the union’s basic principle still rings true: No matter what jobs we have, we are wage earners first. “An injury to one is the concern of all,” was the Knights’ famous motto.
I spent twenty-four years as a teacher. I was a newspaper reporter for almost 13 years before that.
My jobs made me a member of the working class just like a factory worker, construction worker, dock worker, miner, truck driver, carpenter, painter, plumber, electrician, firefighter, garbage collector, grocery clerk, secretary and every other worker. We all belong to the working class.
Anyway, Labor Day has been a federal holiday since 1894. A Labor Day stamp was issued in 1956 that featured part of the "Labor is Life" mural from AFL-CIO headquarters in Washington.
Dwight Eisenhower was president. "Today in America, unions have a secure place in our industrial life," he said. "Only a handful of reactionaries harbor the ugly thought of breaking unions and depriving working men and women of the right to join the union of their choice. I have no use for those -- regardless of their political party -- who hold some vain and foolish dream of spinning the clock back to days when organized labor was huddled, almost as a hapless mass. Only a fool would try to deprive working men and women of the right to join the union of their choice."
Ike was a moderate Republican. But the "handful of reactionaries" of which he spoke now dominate his party. Led by Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell, they're hellbent "to deprive working men and women of the right to join the union of their choice."
Labor Day is supposed to honor working people. But "too many of our country’s leaders haven’t honored us," AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said of this year's annual end-of-summer holiday. "They haven’t served us well. They haven’t protected us. They’re letting our country crumble and our people suffer."
Trumka put Trump and McConnell atop the list of pols who have dishonored labor. Under Trump and his chief enabler, we've got another anti-labor Labor Day.
Added Trumka: "Remember what Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats did to make America whole. They passed the HEROES Act on May 15....It would protect our paychecks and pensions and public services. It would save lives. But Mitch McConnell and his anti-worker colleagues in the Senate have refused to act.
"American workers are sitting awake at night—worrying, suffering, mourning. Our bills are mounting up on kitchen tables because that bill sits on Mitch McConnell’s desk."
Hence, the AFL-CIO endorsed Joe Biden for president and the Kentucky State AFL-CIO endorsed Amy McGrath for senator.
History, the subject I taught, is plain about what has been the biggest boon to the working class: unions and New Deal-style government action on our behalf. A big part of the New Deal guaranteed our right to organize unions and bargain collectively for better wages, hours, working conditions and benefits.
That's the Biden and the McGrath way.
Concluded Trumka: "...It's clearer than ever that for working people to defeat the coronavirus, economic inequality and systemic racism, we’re going to have to remove this dangerous president from the White House (and Ditch Mitch)."
"Working people are ready to keep pushing America forward. We’re ready to organize and form new unions. We’re ready to mobilize and pass the HEROES Act and the PRO Act so workers can join a union freely and fairly. We’re ready to elect Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and union members and allies from coast to coast. We’re ready to get out the vote and then protect those votes. There is still nothing stronger than a united American labor movement!"
Those allies include Amy McGrath here in the Bluegrass State.