By WILLIAM ALLAN

Be CAGO — A great new,

a and file movement, from
ass roots American labor, be-

8an here in this historic city.

oe 875 people from hun-

oe of local unions, gathered

Pee uional rank and file action

a erence. They came from

ad Part of the United States,

A Ounding the belittlers who
Id it couldn’t be done.

pee above the conference
aah in the labor and com-
. an center of the United
: Inghouse Workers Union,
ae. stretches a 45-foot
in €r with these historic words
a letters, “National Rank
ss File Action Conference —
ar peank and File Rights, Peace.
ther Equality”. Flanking it on ei-
ine pee in great bold letters
: Sout words, “Stop Aggression
a peest Asia, Stop Repres-
Home—For a Politically

dent Labor Movement”.

Pere notes in this packed con-
Steely were a black. woman
reta orker, Ola Kennedy, sec-
Bee easurer, _ National Ad
Steet Committee of Concerned
ers: and Will Parry,
P Dict Washington and Alas-
Sociati rict Council, Western As-
A 10n of Pulp and Paper
€rs of America.
eed Ola Kennedy, “From this
" €rence must go back into
H ved roots of American la-
tell'thie movement that will
y 1S man in the White House
smash. have power, power to
noive : his anti-labor program,
this wy to do something to stop
3 as and to let him know we
ing ata about the grow-
eight €ssion. I recently saw a
tom ee _son brought back
- to be War in Southeast Asia
the Ge uried in the back lots of
had metery. What a price he
« ae pay.
he ikewise about racism — in
Sere Steelworkers where
commi Tom we have an Ad-Hoc
‘Our Ittee. We saw I. W. Abel,
fa ccent, he made promises
Boy € got nothing. In the USW

but} a the members are black

inte S than 10% of the \1500

Tational officials are black

an
oe that three-fourths are
te Toms. We want black

houscntatives to be black 24
alll a day-or we will put them
Abe} : the street, along with
mang n District: 31, Joe Ger-
Quote director, says we have a
and ee blacks on the staff
ee it. We will change
nea with such great con-
Ment, ae rank and file move-
ing of | € this one we are start-
here today. —

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“We of the working class,
who are part of every struggle,
we don’t need to be underdogs.
Our labor, our sweat, blood
made this country. Racist ideas
don’t belong here nor among the
workers, we carry enough of a
burden without fighting each
other while the Nixons, Agnews,
Thurmonds come in for the kill.

'“Key in our work has to be
the fight against the Nixon anti-
labor drive. Therefore while we
wage this fight, there can be no
place in our own ranks or la-
bor’s ranks for racism, scabbing,
strikebreaking—we got to be to-
gether.

“The Nixon drive against labor
is one of the things that prompt-
ed this conference, Nixon’s bill
for compulsory arbitration, to
destroy real. collective bargain-
ing, to legislate wage cuts and
wage freezes, using the military
to shoot down people from pic-
ket lines, campuses and demon-
strations ... Today is D day for
us all, here in this rank and file
conference, back in our locals
and in all U.S. labor. This great
meeting has put us on the right
road—you’ve got what it takes
to put labor on the right road.”

Nixon’s Record

Said Will Parry, “I spent eight
hours yesterday in a hot fac-
tory in Seattle making corrugat-
ed boxes, that’s my credentials.
They are just like yours. As the
sister said, we face war, racism,
depression, and repression under
the Nixon administration. This
administration has left a trail
of bleeding bodies from South-
east Asia all the way to cam-
puses in the United States. Next
he wants the bleeding bodies of
organized labor members and a
stacked Supreme Court, an em-
ployer-dominated NLRB, a Con-
gress to break the labor move-
ment.

“This historic conference is
part of labor’s fightback move-
ment against this offensive by
the employers’ man in the White
House—Nixon. We have to have
an active labor movement to
combat Nixon. We know on top
there is oppression among the
labor leaders towards the rank
and file, but there is great move-
ment down in the ranks. The
recent convention of ithe
AFSCME called for getting out
of Cambodia. This marks a
spring thaw. In the Furniture
Union, they elected for the first
time a black vice-president and
four black members to the Inter-
national Executive Board. We
must do this in the Steelworker-
ers, the Teamsters and other
unions. Labor is in trouble with
the Meanys, the Boyles and the

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Gleasons . . . The rank and file
need a different leadership. We
defend the principle of leader-
ship in labor, but we also call
for a united rank and file union
to make that leadership carry
out a militant program for the
benefit of the rank and file...

“To fight the employers and
their man in the White House,
you have to have a coalition of
all people against the boss. ’

Wildcat Strikes
“What must be done to move

the union membership? Trans- ’
‘form the local unions into’ in-

struments of power. The rise of
‘wildcat’ strikes in industry has
been attacked by labor leaders
and employers alike. These ‘wild-
cat strikes’. put dignity and self-
respect of the workers ahead of
the sanctity of the contract.
Workers are not slaves, won’t
be treated as such any more.

“An example is the growing
number of black caucuses in
every union in the country fight-
ing for dignity and respect for
the black workers as well as
conditions. There can be no dig-
nity, self respect for anyone as
long as white workers don’t see
that fighting for dignity for
black workers is in their own
self interest.

“Other rank and file move-
ments, like 30 and out, are .ris-
ing in the UAW and will be in
the forefront of the coming 1970
negotiations of that union. We
must leave this conference with
an established rank and file
movement that will leave room
for such movements down be-
low, in all forms and with all
types of programs for the meg-
bership of local unions. - -

“We must find means for
unity. Like against racism, for
peace, against regression, for
women’s rights. We can’t dis-
pense with women workers in

-our struggles fighting this sys-

tem.” .
Black Mayor Speaks

The new black mayor of
Newark, N.J., Ken Gibson, visit-
ing in Chicago, came to the great
rank and file gathering, with
Jesse Jackson, director of Opera-
tion Breadbasket. Said Mayor
Gibson:

“J am no stranger to organiz-
ed labor. I worked in Swift &
Co.’s plant and am a member
of the United Packing House
Workers Union. My father still
works there and is a member of
the union. I want to compliment
you on being here. Unions mean
getting together. But there are
some in labor who have forgot-
ten whence they came — that
unions used to meet in back
rooms when organizing. Now
some of the union halls are like
owners’ mansions. Take the
toughest day you had in the

shop, get someone to take a pic- -
ture of how you look that day, |

hang it up on the wall and every
time you feel like leaying the
struggle take a look at that pic-
ture. Never forget from whence
you came and the many of us
that are still there. Right On!”

As for all the other speakers
in this thrilling opening session
a great, roaring, stomping, dem-
onstration by the delegates was
given Mayor Gibson.

What is being developed here
in the Packinghouse Workers
Union hall by the delegates is
not a structural organization,

S =not a* dues collection organiza-

tion, but a developing movement

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Drawing the Nixon curtain on workers’ rights

to move American labor, not
take it over or substitute for it.

The National Rank and File
Conference for Action saw 556
delegates attending, 288 obser-
vers, 81 visitors for a total of
875. There were 628 men and
241 women. About one-third of
those attending were black,
Chicano and Puerto Rican. They
came from 26 states, 26 local
union officers, 157 came from
rank and file caucuses, including
black caucuses. Unorganized
groups were present, as were
unemployed, students and
groups of striking workers.

Plan of Action

The conference adopted a 12-
point program for action that
included drafting by the 110
member Continuations Commit-
tee of a Labor Bill of Rights and
a national campaign for its en-
actment by Congress, State and
local committees. Also that
Labor Day, 1970 shall be dedi-
cated to the fight against the
Nixon-Big Business anti-labor
program, and that all delegates
shall return and work in Central
Labor Councils to organize La-
bor Day parades, to bring back
marching Labor Days.

Resolutions are also to be
urged in all locals calling on
the leaders of organized labor
to convene a massive demon-
stration of working men and
women in the nation’s capital
in October against the anti-labor
laws, for repeal of the Taft-
Hartley,. McCarran, the anti-riot
and ‘detention camp _ laws,
against the Nixon anti-labor
program and against repression
in general. A, petition drive for
one million signatures is to be
launched on the above questions
and presented to the AFL-CIO
Executive Council, the ALA and
unaffiliated independent unions.

The program to revitalize the

ae

Teamsters,

labor movement also calls for
the right to organize, for collec-
tive bargaining on wages, for
the right to sell “our labor power
or withhold it in one or another
form of work stoppage . . . with-
out these rights there is slave
labor and enslaved unions.”
Also, American workers as a
whole, white and black and of

‘every national origin and race,

never had these rights granted
to them from on high but
through struggle, said the pro-
gram.

The program calls for strug-
gle against the Nixon program
of wage restraints and greater
productivity in the name of
fighting inflation. The confer-
ence pointed out prices have
risen twice as high as wages. A
short work week was also set
as one of the goals of the con-
ference’s work.

Caucuses were held by the
delegates industry by industry:
auto, building trades, electrical,
teachers, social
workers, meatcutters, bakers.
miners, ILGWU, and others. :
_ The Teamsters caucus brought
in a resolution calling for the
granting of a pardon for Team-
sters’ president James R. Hoffa.

The Building Trades caucus
speaking as “hard hats,” sent
out a communication to the

_ trades leadership calling on them

to dissociate themselves from
Nixon’s legislation that would
deny rank and file workers the

‘right to vote on contract: ratifi-

cation. It called on building
trades councils all over the na-

_ tion to demand utilization of

war funds for construction of
houses and schools, instead of
for killing people. Also, the
building trades caucus demand-
ed the trades leaders wipe out
the image of the building trades
as being a stronghold of racism.

USSR SPACE PROGRAM
FOR ORBITING WORKSHOPS

MOSCOW — The Soviet Union will launch many more spa

ships in a drive to create orbiting scientific workshops “in the ee
seeable future,’ according to Alexei Leonov, first: cosmon o
walk in space. Leonov assessed the achievements. of the Ses A
mission in an interview in the Communist youth paper. a
kaya Pravda. “In the coming decade,” said Leonov, “there will be
a qualitative leap in space exploration and its use for the need
of earth. Large orbital space stations that will be veritable os.

fic institutes in space will be set up in the near future. The Soyuz :

9 flight was a good school for all of us.”

> 96 60.06 got RAGIFICTRIBUNE-+FRIDAY, JULY 3, 1970-Page 5 |