California Fighting Back on Colombia Free Trade Act

by: California Labor Federation

Mon May 23, 2011 at 14:57:43 PM PDT

By Tim Robertson, California Fair Trade Coalition

Since 2005, more than half the trade unionists murdered in the world have been killed in Colombia. That's more in Colombia alone than in the other 190+ countries combined. Just last year, 51 more trade unionists were murdered bringing the total since 1986 to over 2700. Unfortunately, President Obama is ignoring these facts to push for the long-stalled Colombia Free Trade Agreement, a relic of the Bush Administration, in a move that can only be seen as an affront to his union base.

Not only is Colombia the most dangerous place in the world for union activity, an implied complicity with Colombia's government, in particular the Department of Administrative Security (DAS), has led to an approximate 96% impunity rating. Could you imagine the U.S. response if over the course of 2010, there were one CEO murder per week in Colombia with little investigation and few convictions or punishments? It certainly wouldn't be to liberalize trade rules.

Sadly, the President knows and understands the plight of unionists, peasant leaders, Afro-Colobians, and other organizers in Colombia. He even campaigned against the FTA because of such violence.

Since then, nothing has changed in Colombia, with 47 union assassinations in 2009 in addition to the 51 from 2010, more than even in 2007 when the FTA was initially negotiated (ironically, some view FTAs as incentives for good behavior). The President shouldn’t support a corporate-first FTA with Colombia, while glossing over the violence he lamented during the election.

That's why the AFL-CIO, the California Labor Federation, the California Democratic Party, and most major unions are calling on their members to stand up and fight to stop the President's free trade expansion plans. Along with FTAs with South Korea and Panama, the Colombia FTA constitute the President's extension of the Bush-era trade agenda which is poised to cost more American jobs, and endanger the lives and livelihoods of our brothers and sisters around the world.

California, with its 53 Members of Congress, is key to stopping these FTAs and protecting worker power both in the U.S. and abroad. Unfortunately, they will easily pass if our representatives don't hear from us, which is why the California Fair Trade Coalition is hosting two organizational calls this Tuesday, May 24, and distributing info and lobbying guides to arm activists to stop the corporate takeover of trade.

Joining the call will be Sacramento Central Labor Council Secretary-Treasurer Bill Camp, to discuss his personal experiences with union violence in Colombia. Other speakers include a brief guide to lobbying and organizing on trade issues by the California Fair Trade Coalition.

All three FTAs could be introduced to the House within weeks. If we're going to stop them, now is the time.

Please RSVP for the calls, Tuesday, May 24, so that we can ensure we have enough lines. Can't make it? Sign up here and we'll send you an info and lobby guide.

Remembering Cesar Chavez

by: California Labor Federation

Wed Mar 30, 2011 at 21:05:12 PM PDT

by California Labor Federation Legislative Advocate Caitlin Vega

The Napa I grew up in is probably not the place you'd come to spend a long weekend winetasting. Real Napa, as we call it, is not glamorous or exclusive. In the old days, my dad says, "it used to be a place where poor kids could grow up in the country."  Today, even with the fancy restaurants and expensive tourist shops, Napa is still an agricultural town at heart, which means it is a farmworker community.

The wineries that have made Napa famous are also workplaces. The workers in the vineyards work long hours in freezing cold and sweltering heat. Most have no health care and no pension. Wages are low and workers are often paid piece rate.

Farmworkers are routinely exposed to dangerous pesticides. The cancer rate is very high, as are birth defects among the children whose mothers work in the fields. Heat stress has caused not only serious illness, but also deaths.

But it hasn't always been this way. My mother-in-law, Emma, started working as a farmworker at the age of 19. The daughter of a bracero, she joined her father in Napa to work beside him in the fields.

A few years in, everything changed. A young organizer named Cesar Chavez came to town. At first workers were scared but they were soon inspired to make a better life by joining the farmworkers union.  As longtime worker advocate Aurelio Hurtado recalls, “He had a simple message: we're people and are not afraid of anything when it comes to our future. We're here to work, not to beg."  

When Emma tells me the stories, her face lights up and she says, "me encanta con la union." She loves the union. Throughout her 35 years working in the vineyards, my mother-in-law and her compañeras rode buses up and down the state to wave their union flags in support of labor organizing and union boycotts.

The Labor Movement from the Woman's Perspective

by: sjcdems

Wed Mar 02, 2011 at 11:23:55 AM PST

Some historical perspective:

Mary Kenny O'Sullivan was from a working class Irish background who became a dressmaker and then worked in a printing and binding factory in Missouri and several binderies in Chicago. She helped organize the Chicago Women's Bindery Workers' Union. What year was that? It was before 1892 - yep that's right 1892. Because of her work in the union, in 1892 she was appointed the first woman general organizer for the American Federation of Labor. That same year she helped form the Union for Industrial Progress to help study factory working conditions. She went on to organize rubber makers, shoe workers, laundry workers and garment workers. (Continued after the flip...)

The Lessons UHW's Rosselli Seems to Have Lost Sight Of

by: Mary Kay Henry

Tue Mar 25, 2008 at 05:29:46 AM PDT

I would like to thank Calitics for hosting this debate about the future of workers in this country.  

I have worked along side Sal Rosselli, the president of SEIU United Healthcare Workers West (UHW-W) for 25 years, starting when both of us worked on staff for SEIU Local 250 (which is now called UHW-W).  I was the organizing director and he worked in the East Bay as a union representative.

I also worked closely with him when I was in charge of SEIU's hospital organizing campaign in Southern California from 1999 to 2004 that ultimately resulted in 26,000 workers becoming members of UHW and gaining major improvements in pay and benefits.

So I am surprised by his recent actions. He has been attacking the democratic decisions made jointly by the huge majority of SEIU local unions across the country. In fact, he recently resigned from the SEIU Executive Committee, saying he could no longer abide by decisions made by "simple majorities" of elected SEIU leaders.