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MORNING MESSAGE
Leo Gerard
I was raised in a company house, in a company town, where the miners had to buy their own oilers – that is, rubber coveralls – drill bits, and other tools at the company store. That company, Inco Ltd., controlled my hometown, but never succeeded in owning the souls of the men and women who lived and worked there. That’s because these were union men and women: self-possessed, a little rowdy, and well aware that puny pleas from individual workers fall on deaf corporate ears. As I prepare to retire in a couple of days, 54 years after starting work as a copper puncher at the Inco smelter, the relationship between massive, multinational corporations and workers is different. Unions represent a much smaller percentage of workers now, so few that some don’t even know what a labor organization is – or what organized labor can accomplish. That is the result of deliberate, decades-long attacks on unions by corporations and the rich. They intend to own not only workers’ time and production but their very souls. Now, for labor to secure gains, in the United States and everywhere in the world, workers must mobilize. We have to bring everyone together, women, men, poor people, people of color, gay people – all working people. None of us is big enough or developed enough to win this fight alone. If we fight together, I can’t guarantee we will win. But if we don’t fight for justice, I can guarantee we will lose. Since none of us is willing to owe our souls to the company store, we’re going to have to find ways to continue building coalitions robust enough to confront capital and win the battle for economic and social justice.
Leo Gerard, a longtime contributor to Progressive Breakfast, retires Monday after 54 years as a union man and 18 as the International President of United Steelworkers (USW). We thank Leo for his leadership and tireless efforts for working people everywhere.
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