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Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Feb.8, 1996
issue of Workers World newspaper
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[Following are excerpts from a Jan. 26 talk given by Trudy Rudnick--president of Federation of Teachers Local 3882, representing clerical and technical workers at New York University--at a Workers World meeting in solidarity with the strike by building workers in Service Employees Local 32B-32J.]
I'd like to extend my solidarity to the striking workers of Local 32B-32J in this fight--which is really not just the union versus the Realty Advisory Board in New York, but is a fight against all the bosses in this country who want to continue what has been a decades-long attack on the rights of workers.
The right to earn decent wages. The right to rise out of the depths of poverty and not live in fear of being laid off or having their hours cut.
The right to organize unions.
The eyes of the entire country are on this strike. And the workers have risen to the occasion.
They have stood up to very difficult circumstances. They have been out on the streets on their picket lines during the worst snowstorm in 40 years. They are living on a $50-a- week strike benefit.
They are up against the richest landlords in the country. Strike breakers are being brought in to do their work.
Even facing all these challenges, they have remained strong. Solid. They are the heroes that our children should be learning about in their schools.
My personal experience with the strikers comes from being president of the union that represents 1,600 clerical workers at NYU, where there are 300 striking maintenance workers.
They are doing a terrific job of not only fortifying the picket lines, but also leafletting the office workers and students so they'll know what the issues are. The sympathy is absolutely with the strikers.
On Jan. 17, my union and Local 32B-32J co-sponsored a rally. Over 200 people came. It was really quite exciting. As we marched through the streets around NYU, truck drivers honked in support, people raised their fists.
The next Monday, Jan. 22, the strikers were somewhat discouraged that no agreement had been reached in talks over the weekend. But it didn't take them long to get back into gear.
Every day since then, the workers have held two demonstrations--one for each shift--where they march from building to building.
The media have attacked the strikers, expressing disbelief that janitors could make $30,000 a year. Then they ran a flurry of articles attacking the local's president, Gus Bevona.
Well, first of all, it shouldn't just be janitors in New York who make $30,000 a year--it should be janitors everywhere. And they shouldn't just make $30,000--they should get more.
As for Gus Bevona, he is the leader of a strike in which 30,000 workers are defending themselves against a harsh assault by the ruling class. Attacking him doesn't strengthen the strike; objectively, it amounts to siding with the bosses in an attack on the strike since it can only weaken and divide the union in the midst of battle.
Come on--since when does the New York Times or the Daily News or the Village Voice care about the internal affairs of a union, unless it's to attack and subvert the union? The bosses' and media's sole purpose is to distract the public from the real issue--union busting and landlord greed--and to turn sentiment against the union.
We're not going to buy into that. As for the workers, they are saying that they want to win this strike. And they can do it--in a united fight back, not just in the ones and twos but joined by the rest of the unions and progressives and the communities, all of whom have so much at stake in this strike.
This struggle is not just about this union. It's part of an offensive to push down the wages of all workers.
The workers of Local 32B-32J pose a real threat to the ruling class. They are service workers who earn decent wages because they are unionized. They are women. Immigrants. Black and Latino workers. They show tremendous unity.
The realtors and their Wall Street backers want to send a message to the labor movement, which has become invigorated by the influx of new workers who want to organize into unions--workers like these strikers who represent the future for labor and whose emergence has already forced changes in the AFL-CIO.
The bosses want to kill the mood of hope and promise emerging in the unions, which are turning toward organizing the new, vast and exciting work force.
But they can't sabotage this movement. Two weeks ago, we celebrated the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. You know, he was killed when he was in Memphis supporting striking sanitation workers.
He knew the meaning of the word solidarity. He put his life on the line for it. Now it's time for us to take a stand.
I want to thank the strikers for their tremendous show of solidarity and courage. No matter what happens now, they have blazed a path for all of us in the labor movement and in the fight for justice.
Victory to the strikers! Solidarity!
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