PHILADELPHIA, June 30 — This afternoon about 175 retired and working Local 1199C union hospital workers gathered at the union hall to see if the Jefferson Hospital bosses would retreat on taking health benefits from retirees and part-time workers. Over 50 retirees were called to the union hall at the last minute and hoped to confront the Jefferson negotiators. The negotiators never came, and to our cheers, the announcement came that Jefferson had backed down and an agreement had been reached! As the hospital day-shifts ended in waves, the hall filled with a mixture of working and retired union members full of anger, determination, solidarity and comradeship.
While celebrating this victory, CHALLENGE readers and friends of PLP should turn to the wise words of the 1970s-era Scottish funk band AWB: “Got work to do, got so much work, yeah yeah.” Storm clouds are still gathering on the horizon, both for Jefferson Hospital retirees and workers everywhere.
The union mis-leadership and liberal Democrats often portray attacks like the ones at Jefferson as disconnected from similar attacks happening across town or in other cities, let alone happening to workers worldwide. Workers are saturated with the lies spread by these vipers, which can take their toll and spread cynicism on the most battle-hardened among the Jefferson Hospital workers. “Here we go again,” was one retiree’s observation when a group of 1199C retirees invaded a hospital administration office in May. She referred to the 40-50 years of history that her and her fellow union members created by proudly fighting first to unionize, and then to win the benefits that we’re now desperately trying to keep.
In reality, attacks like the ones on retirees here are being waged against workers in many forms all across the U.S. Such attacks are necessary for the U.S. ruling class to discipline the workers as the bosses prepare for potential wars with their Chinese and Russian capitalist rivals.
The Progressive Labor Party fights to get us off this losing “Merry-Go-Round” of fighting tooth-and-nail for reforms which the bosses can just take back later, but to end ALL wars for profit by destroying the profit system itself.
The fight at Jefferson Hospital is one hot spot in the class war between the capitalists and workers. Under capitalism, workers are exploited for profit, and every organ of the capitalist state serves the bosses to help maintain this status quo. We are limited to fighting by laws, courts and legal decisions made by these bosses. Now and again, workers succeed in organizing and winning reforms. However, as long as capitalism exists, we stand to lose the victories it took us decades to win, amidst growing racism, sexism and eventually world war.
PLP stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the workers and retirees of Jefferson Hospital. We believe that an injury to one is an injury to all! Through CHALLENGE networks and new readers gained from this struggle we are building an international, multi-racial movement, a class war to overthrow capitalism once and for all with communist revolution. The more readers of CHALLENGE who see the bigger picture, the sooner we can become a real game changer in the battles that loom ahead.
The power and spirit we could bring to a fight for this bigger picture was present all day among these union members. PLP fights to direct this energy to the battles ahead. We have two years to build for our contract fight and we can be sure the bosses and union hacks will demand more cutbacks. In the short- and medium-term, we have the tremendous task of using CHALLENGE to raise political awareness and build study groups to understand our fight in the global context of coming imperialist war. When the Jefferson bosses refuse to back down next time we can be strong enough to march four blocks from the union hall to the hospital and shut it down.
Win or lose the next contract battle with the bosses, through building workers’ power among the rank-and-file and building on the power and spirit felt in that hall today, our struggle over the next two years will show even more workers that fighting back is possible and that a communist world — a world run by the working class — can be won.