NEW YORK CITY, January 23 — A steady winter rain couldn’t dampen the spirit of 75 workers and students as we picketed the federal building in lower Manhattan this evening in support of dockworkers in Longview, Washington. Representing a half-dozen unions and college campuses, the protesters challenged the Obama administration’s support of EGT, a union-busting grain consortium. The U.S. Coast Guard has deployed boats and helicopters to escort tankers making deliveries to EGT’s newly constructed grain terminal, which is being operated by scab labor.
EGT made $2.5 billion last year, but it plans to make a lot more by opening its Longview terminal without hiring workers from the ILWU, the longshoremen’s union whose members have worked this port for 70 years. Instead, it brought in a scab union, Operating Engineers Local 701. This is a crude attempt on the part of a major corporation to break the back of the ILWU. If EGT succeeds, port companies all along the West Coast will smell blood and look to hire non-union workers.
The longshoremen have some formidable enemies. The police have arrested hundreds of protesting workers. The corporate media have attacked their struggle. The national AFL-CIO — led by sellout Richard Trumka — has refused to support their cause, calling the matter a “jurisdictional dispute.” The National Labor Relations Board has filed an injunction against the union to prevent further protests.
Despite these obstacles, the workers are fighting hard, realizing that losing would be devastating. In July, after workers blocked train deliveries to the terminal and one hundred were arrested. In September, 500 dock workers and supporters defied the police and took over the port, stopping deliveries and dumping grain.
Many of us at the picket line this evening — transit workers, teachers, professors — are working without a contract. Others have had concessionary contracts forced down their throats. We were there tonight because we understand that our local struggles are part of a larger class war between between the small ruling class of owners on the one hand (along with the politicians and union sellouts who serve them), and the working class on the other. Progressive Labor Party brings to the struggle the understanding that this war can only be resolved by workers taking state power and running society — not for the obscene profit of a few, but for the benefit of all.