BY DAVID MARSHALL
DECATUR, Illinois - Trade unionists in Decatur will hold a solidarity march and rally on June 25 to support workers involved in three long-standing labor disputes in this city. Some 8 percent of the workforce here is or has recently been on strike or locked out.
The action will mark the two-year anniversary of A.E. Staley Mfg. Co.'s lockout of 760 corn processing workers, and comes five days after the one-year anniversary of the nationwide strike by United Auto Workers (UAW) members against Caterpillar. It has been called by UAW Local 751, United Paperworkers International Union (UPIU) Local 7837, and United Rubber Workers (URW) Local 713. The URW members recently ended their 10-month strike against Bridgestone/Firestone without winning a contract.
"We want to let CAT know we're as strong as we've ever been and that we're never going to weaken," UAW Local 751 vice president John Boedtman told the Militant. "This struggle with CAT and Staley is still going on, and the rally will help to spread the word all over the country."
Unionists from across the U.S. are planning to attend the June 25 action said Dike Ferris, UPIU Local 7837's bargaining committee chairman. "Our Campaign for Justice office gets calls every day," Ferris said. "I just talked yesterday with a group of union nurses who are sending a vanload down from New York. We even have confirmations from Toronto and from a group of flour millers who work at ADM- Ogilvie in Montreal."
After assembling at 10 a.m. at the three union halls, participants will march through Decatur to the civic center, where Rev. Jesse Jackson and other speakers will address a rally. Organizers are encouraging union members and others to come to Decatur to participate and show their support.
"These attacks you see on labor here - the rotating shifts, lack of safety, gutting seniority rights - all this is right around the corner for the entire labor movement," Ferris warned. "People should come here and see what these companies are doing to the labor movement."
For more information on the June 25 events in Decatur, call UPIU Local 7837's Campaign for Justice office at (217) 872-2205.