US workers move against anti-union laws and labor

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Based on a report from the St. Louis corresponen of Labor News, paper of the Socialist League (DC The 25-block long Labor Parade through central St. Louis St. Louis Labor Tribune -the official AFL-CIO newspaper.

It was the largest march in St. Louis history. But this success was not due to the efforts of the labor bureaucrats, who made no serious efforts to turn out the rank and file.

With the Missouri Secretary of State having certified in August the so-called "Right to Work" proposition to appear as a referendum on the November ballot, the labor leaders are running scared.

They hoped at first that the September 9 mobilisation would frighten the Missouri ruling class into finding a legal technicality to keep "Right to Work" off the ballot.

If successful in the November referendum, the misnamed "Right to Work" law would outlaw the closed shop in the state of Missouri.

The legislation is a part of the anti-union TaftHartley Labor Act, and is operative in 20 states, mainly in the south of the But in the weeks before the St. Louis parade, labor officials did little to build the march.

No press conference was called, nor was there any real effort to get radio, television, OI newspaper publicity.

Yet thousands of workers did show up for the parade. Many units wore "Right to Work is a Ripoff" caps and shirts.

But both the leaflet handed out by the American Socialist Workers Party and Tim Kaminsky's article in their paper, The Militant, failed to criticise the role of the conservative labor bureaucracy.

Fat cats

The SWP plainly hopes to become the respected "left" advisors for the union fat cats.

It fails to point out that the bureaucrats' material privileges, sweetheart deals, and undemocratic methods have opened the door to the bosses' current right wing offensive.

The bureaucracy's conservatism has alienated the ranks from unions, and their refusal to organise the unorganised has actually produced a decline in union membership in both absolute terms and as a percentage of the work force.

But the SWP's literature, revolving around favourable questions from a speech by Auto workers' leader Doug Fraser, in'no way poses the need for an alternative fighting leadership in the unions.

To defeat the "Right to Work" law in November. the left forces in the unions must offer a serious alternative. programme.

Instead of joining the bureaucracy in debating abstract constitutional rights and talking about "freeloaders", , labor must clearly show the class war origins of the "Right to Work" campaign.

Offensive

It must openly say that it is part of big business' right wing political offensive linked to the defeat of labor reform 1 legislation and cutbacks in social services.

It is linked to massive unemployment, inflation, the dollar decline, the rebirth of racist groups and the jailing of striking teachers, city workers and firemen.

Labor must tell working people that the ripoff campaign's chief aim is to destroy the union shop.

Even though the union shop's benefits are limited by the continued treacherous deals of the bureaucrats, it has set a higher wage standard for all Missouri workers.

Moreover, in union shop states labor organisations have often led or joined in fights for expansion of democratic rights and progressive worker protection rostal workers aelegates jigni ISNW SAMRI MAI DATSSPTAT 18001950 + met. =41i4An ena == m d ha anlad in susar, nitre erthinan ut vautu in every chly wnere rank and file speakers will point out the class war nature of the union-busting campaign.

An emergency Conference of Labor, open to all working people, should map frol aper jorrejection of the bosses. offer vul a sirdlegy incluging n11T aponta march on Jefferson City. maunt an Inffranna Mite, Fear of ranks But the union leadership fails to do this out of fear of the rank and file mobilisation.

• SC EVERTSOOY MUST VOTE NO OR BLOA Militant/ The September 9 Labor Parade in St. Louis, by drawing thousands, showed the enormous potential of workers if the unions start to mobilise independently and in the streets.

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"exceeded all expecta- tions" according to the

WE NEPUDIATE THIS DISGRACEFUL CONTRACT