The press here reports that the Co-Op mine is operated by C.W. Mining Co. and is owned by the Kingston family. This family has drawn considerable notoriety in recent years after being accused of sexual abuse of young women through polygamous activity. The mine is located near Huntington, Utah, some 35 miles south of Price in the heart of the state’s coal-mining area.

The bosses responded to the workers by saying, “There is already a union here, and what you are doing is illegal,” referring to the company-organized “union.”

The workers at Co-Op recently decided they needed a real union and enlisted the support of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA).  
 
Miner’s firing sparks walkout
Safety issues and the attempt to victimize workers are at the heart of this struggle that erupted into a walkout by the mostly Mexican-born workforce after William Estrada, a worker born in El Salvador, was “suspended with intention to dismiss” by the company.

“This has been a long time coming,” said José García, a miner at Co-Op. “We have been discussing, preparing and uniting for some time. We have elected representatives in all production crews to defend ourselves. We had decided we would not let the bosses get us one by one and that we would deal with their harassment and the safety problems together. We now approached the UMWA to help us with whatever steps are needed to get a union bargaining election here and eventually get a contract.”

Earlier that morning the company had suspended Estrada, an equipment maintenance worker, for refusing to sign a disciplinary warning the week before. This was the third attempt to victimize a UMWA supporter in recent weeks.

The company had tried to suspend another worker four days earlier. Some 15 workers found out about this, stopped production, and went together to talk to the bosses.

According to the miners involved, the company was attempting to suspend that worker for doing some “fire-bossing”—that is, carrying out the mine safety inspections that are scheduled before every shift. These are duties his immediate foreman is responsible for. But this foreman was ignoring his responsibility and had instructed the worker to carry out the inspection. The mine supervisor then threatened to discipline the worker.

The miners demanded not only to reverse the suspension of the worker, but also to send home the boss who forced him to break the rules. “Twenty times the big boss told us he was not going to go back on his decision to suspend our co-worker,” said a miner. The miners told the bosses they would not go back to work and they would pull out the rest of the workforce if the company did not do as they said.

The production boss who serves as representative of the company “union” convened a meeting of the bosses present. Management then announced that the worker would not be suspended and that the boss who forced the worker to do fire-bossing duties would be sent home instead.

The company had been successful in suspending another supporter of the UMWA organizing drive the previous week. Workers negotiated his job back and vowed that no one would be victimized.  
 
Bosses call in sheriff
On the morning of September 22, the workers tried to negotiate with the company to get Estrada ’s job back. The bosses refused. When the workers made it clear no one was returning to work until Estrada got his job back, the company called the sheriff’s department. The sheriff proceeded to tell the workers to leave.

“Take them all out of here,” one of the bosses ordered the policeman, according to participants.

“We don’t have enough room for all these people,” responded the sheriff. “Do you want me to call the INS?” he asked, referring to the immigration police.

The workers evacuated company property and met at a local park in Price.

Day shift workers were joined by coworkers from the other shifts who were called on the way to the park. After much discussion, workers reiterated their decision that they either would go back together or that nobody would go back. They organized a representative delegation to accompany Estrada next morning to negotiate his return. A meeting of all workers was set to follow in order to hear a report on the company’s response.

The company allowed only one worker to accompany Estrada. After much discussion on the merits of their disciplinary note, the company told Estrada and the other worker that they would give them an answer the next day.

The miners have been told that everyone who participated in the union action the previous day was fired.

At the meeting later that morning with some 75 workers present, the unionists heard a report on the meeting with the company.

Workers reported that a UMWA representative joined them. “We were very happy to hear from the union representative that the UMWA would file an unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board with the union seal on our behalf,” said Fermín Pérez. The workers also decided that it was time to organize press conferences to tell the world they were fighting for union representation.

The workers elected a representative who would negotiate their return back to work. Knowing that the company is in need of getting production out, and that it will try to break their ranks one by one, they decided that dealings with the company need to be carried out through this elected representative of theirs. The workers acknowledged that the company succeeded in getting some workers to come into work on the day shift. A list was made along with assignments for contacting those workers to discuss the situation with them.  
 
Spouses’ auxiliary initiated
The miners also decided that it was time to involve their spouses into the struggle. A special women-only meeting for all the spouses was called for that afternoon. The meeting would be led by the three female workers in the mine.

They proceeded to document all the unsafe conditions that had led the workers to walk off the job, along with all the incidents of harassment. Discussion was initiated on possible participation in the upcoming Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride sendoff rally in Salt Lake City.

Miners reported that after the meeting had broken up and some leaders were talking, a group of three workers approached them. They said they were part of the dozen or so Mexican-born workers who are employed by the Kingston family at the Railco coal loading facility down the road. They said they had heard from close friends in town about the struggle at Co-Op and wanted to join the fight for a union. After some discussion, these workers were warmly invited to participate in a meeting of all the workers, families, and friends the next day in the local park.

The owners of the Co-Op mine are notorious not only for the exploitation of their employees but for accusations of abuse of young women in their family.

According to an August 28 Associated Press article, Mary Ann Kingston, now 22, and her attorneys filed a suit in a state court August 1, naming 242 family members and 97 businesses operated by the Kingstons. “The suit seeks more than $110 million from what Mary Ann Kingston and her lawyers called a ‘secretive religious society and economic organization’ that teaches and promotes sexual abuse of young girls through illegal and underage marriages, incest, and polygamy,” the article said. “The Kingston clan, also known as the Latter-Day Church of Christ, is believed to have more than 1,000 members and a $150 million business empire in six Western states, based mainly in the Salt Lake valley area. Marriages of half-sisters, first cousins, nieces, and aunts are part of their religious beliefs.”

According to the article, Mary Ann Kingston was born into the family and was told by her father, John Daniel Kingston, that she would become the 15th wife of his brother, David Kingston, when she turned 16. She was indeed forced to marry David Kingston and was later beaten by her father for attempting to flee.

A related story in the August 14-27 Salt Lake Observer said, “One of Kingston’s most profitable enterprises is a bituminous coal and lignite mine in Huntington (Carbon County), which at one time brought in revenues of $1 million a month, according to the Observer’s sources.”

Workers at this mine are now determined to give these bosses the best fight possible to win their jobs back and organize with the UMWA.

“Because they have been able to smash attempts that have been made in the past to take them on,” said García, “the company thinks it will be able to scare us and make us beg for our jobs. But we have never come this far and we are going to finish what we started here.”  
 
 
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