When the Journal of Commerce, the mouthpiece of the shipowners and stevedore companies, starts praising ILWU officials, it’s time to watch the game. The JoC in its May 15 editorial “A Winning Approach” lauds the newly elected officers of Locals 13 and 63 for their “innovative” approach to reduce port congestion and encourages employers to form closer relationships with these ILWU locals. Sounds like PMA’s Professor Miniace lecturing us about the “spirit of cooperation”, especially when the JoC editorial opines “Changing more than 60 years of adversarial tension will not be easy.”
The trade off will be that these ILWU locals won’t participate in anymore social justice actions. Too bad because I thought the LA longshore workers and clerks did a helluva a job supporting the wharfies in Australia a couple of years ago when the Columbus Canada came in with scab cargo. The editorial goes on to attack the ILWU for shutting down West Coast ports in solidarity with Seattle WTO protestors, boycotting South African cargo to protest apartheid and grapes in solidarity with the Farmworkers’ organizing struggles.
We just finished our ILWU Convention and Caucus in Portland and I don’t remember one word being said about this new “trend-setting direction” – changing the ILWU into a business union with no social consciousness. Ken Riley, the Charleston longshore president, got a standing ovation when he delivered a rousing speech about their militant fight against the union-busting global shipper Nordana. I’m sure if our brothers in South Carolina had asked for solidarity actions on the West Coast ports if that was necessary, they would have gotten it.
The editorial crudely tries to pit the “college-educated” LA leadership’s “policy of cooperation” against us implicitly dumb San Francisco longshoremen who are taking on the employers over working conditions. If the JoC is manipulating Local 13 and 63 officers and misquoting them, then they need to disavow this editorial. If they embrace PMA’s “spirit of cooperation”, then we have a major fight on our hands.
Jack Heyman #8780
