Milwaukee march hits racism, union busting

Milwaukee, April 4. WW photo: Jill Hill

In a historic merging of the union movement and the Civil Rights Movement, the Rev. Jesse Jackson Jr. and two leaders of the 1968 Memphis strike led “A March Fit for a King” down Dr. Martin Luther King Blvd. in Milwaukee April 2.

The march — which included people of various nationalities, ages, genders and sexual identities — was named in honor of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who was assassinated on April 4, 1968, in Memphis. Marching alongside Jackson were Baxter Leach and Elmore Nickleberry, sanitation workers who had invited King to Memphis to support their struggle for collective bargaining rights for their union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 1733.

“We were proud to invite Dr. King to support our sanitation workers’ strike in 1968; we are proud to be here with Rev. Jackson today in Milwaukee. Everybody deserves dignity and their basic rights and we are happy to lend our support,” said Leach and Nickleberry in a statement for the march.

Milwaukee is the most segregated city in the U.S., with many apartheid-like conditions for the Black community. One out of every two Black men in Milwaukee is currently unable to find living-wage employment. Infant mortality in the African-American community is 19 per 1,000 live births, higher than in the Gaza Strip.

“Segregated cities lead to segregated results,” said Rev. Jackson. “It’s no mystery why there is such a divide in the city’s economic and political structures, unemployment, health care, education, and affordable housing. It’s time to turn pain into power.” (www.rainbowpush.org)

Mass resistance stops anti-union law

The April 2 march is part of a struggle in Wisconsin which has been raging ever since Feb. 11 when Gov. Scott Walker — at the behest of the banks, corporations and the Pentagon — proposed his “budget repair bill,” which, if it took effect, would essentially eliminate collective bargaining for up to 200,00 public sector workers in the state.

Mass resistance — including the weeks-long occupation of the state Capitol by thousands of workers and youth as well as demonstrations of hundreds of thousands — meant Walker was unable to achieve his full budget repair bill. Walker and the legislature then attempted to carve out alleged non-fiscal items from the original bill, creating another illegal bill that the Wisconsin legislature rammed through on March 9 and 10 and that Walker signed on March 11.

But a state judge has ruled, not once but three times, that the legislative vote was illegal, and has issued an injunction barring implementation of the law. The governor and the Republican majority twice ignored the court order by proceeding to stop dues check-off and increase pensions and health-care costs for state workers. But on their third try the state judge threatened contempt charges if they ignored the court order again. The anti-union bill signed by Walker can’t be legally implemented under the injunction. The Walker administration appealed the judge’s injunction to the Wisconsin Court of Appeals, but this court declined to hear the case and sent it to the state’s Supreme Court.

During the hearings members of progressive organizations such as Wisconsin Resists packed the court. Other organizations are also putting pressure on the courts, including some unions which are suing the state on various grounds.

Across Wisconsin protest actions small and large take place daily. Worksite leafleting, town hall and neighborhood meetings and recall campaigns are in motion. Solidarity demonstrations with Wisconsin are taking place across the world. Delegations, such as the International Longshore Workers Union Drill Team, are visiting Madison, and a Poor People’s march is taking place there on April 4. Sick-outs are happening. And discussions of occupations and general strikes are on the agenda.

Ever-growing solidarity

From March 30 to April 2, a U.S./Cuba Labor Exchange tour visited organizations and places such as Voces de la Frontera in Milwaukee and the Rainbow Bookstore as well as the Labor Notes conference in Madison. The tour featured Gilda Chacon from Cuba, representing the World Federation of Trade Unions; Humberto Montes de Oca Luna, Interior Secretary of the Mexican Electrical Workers Union (SME); Teresa Gutierrez of the May 1st Coalition for Worker and Immigrant Rights in New York City; Ignacio Meneses of Labor Exchange; and Cheryl LaBash from the Moratorium NOW! Coalition in Detroit.

The Wisconsin Wave’s People’s Assembly will be held April 9 and 10 at Madison Area Technical College (http://wisconsinwave.org/). On April 9 Wisconsin Resists will host the forum “Understanding Austerity: Wisconsin in a Global Perspective” at 5 p.m. at the Georgia O’Keefe Middle School Auditorium, 510 S. Thornton Ave. A list of upcoming events in Wisconsin can be found at www.defendwisconsin.org.

Jill Hill of Workers World in Chicago has been in Wisconsin numerous times since early February, including participating in the occupation of the state Capitol in Madison and the April 4 action in Milwaukee. “I’m here to support the struggle of the workers to maintain their bargaining rights, their rights to negotiate contracts. We also need to get the money for education and social services, not off the backs of the workers, but from the banks and the Pentagon. There’s plenty of money in this country, but it needs to be used for meeting people’s needs, not as profits for the rich.”

Hill, who teaches at the City Colleges of Chicago, brought solidarity messages to Wisconsin from there. “The students and faculty are also being attacked by the education cuts in Illinois. What’s happening in Wisconsin is just the cutting edge of what’s happening around the country. So it’s very important to have solidarity, to have people gathered together to join in this fight together.

“The support that’s been coming in to Wisconsin from all around the country is really unbelievable,” said Hill. “You can feel the solidarity each day as more and more people are pouring in. There are workers from Michigan, North Carolina, Illinois, from all over the country. And there’s the solidarity demonstrations happening across the country. It’s been an amazing demonstration of solidarity with all the workers, students, community people who are feeling the economic crisis as their lives become worsened through unemployment, layoffs and other attacks by the rich.”

For more information and how to help, visit www.wisaflcio.org, wisaflcio.typepad.com or bailoutpeople.org.