I want to make clear that there are other things going on in the labor movement.
And so I found something that struck me as very important, thanks to some
listeners and watchers of this program who sent this material to me.
I'm talking about the Western Massachusetts
Area Labor Federation.
That's a part of the AFL-CIO.
It's the area of western Massachusetts, which has a federation of all
the local unions across all industries,
manufacturing services, all of it.
And they get together on a regular basis.
And they voted on January 9th of this year
to condemn- I'm going to quote now because I want to get it right-
to “condemn in the strongest possible terms the Biden administration's
conduct of December 2nd, 2022.”
And here the resolution was real clear.
And to make it clear to all of you that’s when Mr.
Biden enforced the return of railway
workers, thousands of them that were on strike
or threatening to go on strike, to deny them the right to strike.
They'd been negotiating with the company.
They'd been doing what those Fort Worth journalists have done,
what the Starbucks workers have done, what the Yale grad students have done.
They were doing the same thing, exercising the right to strike,
to improve their working conditions and their pay.
And the Biden administration came in- didn't have to- came in
and threatened them with being arrested and put in jail
if they exercised the right to strike, which used to be thought
of as a basic part of anything calling itself a democracy.
So let me read to you the resolution that was passed,
by the way, unanimously by the Western Mass
Area Federation of Labor.
Quote, “The right to strike is a fundamental human right.
Any legislation that denies workers’ right to strike-
whether the bill that Biden signed on December 2nd, 2022,
the Railway Labor Act of 1926
or Section 9A(a) of the Massachusetts
Public Employee Collective Bargaining Law-
Any abridgment of that right to strike they go on to say,
quote, “serves the interests of the bosses
over the interests of the working class and should be deemed illegitimate.”
They then ask their fellow workers
to support the following four point program.
One: union should stand in solidarity
via our voices and our union resources with the railway workers’ demand
for the right to paid sick time- that was a big issue for them-
and reasonable work schedules.
Two: we should organize our members to resolve problems
by taking collective action in our workplaces.
Number three, we should build a democratic union where workers desires
and needs are immediately taken seriously and acted upon.
And fourth and final, we should deepen Labor's commitment
to hold elected officials accountable, to represent the interests
of working people.
And if and when they don't, we should withhold our labor and our donations.
Take heed Democratic Party.
Your reliance on the labor movement with giving
so little back is coming to an end.
And that's led by the folks in western Massachusetts.