Inside the building the Pennsylvania Supreme Court was hearing arguments on a legal move by Vlasic Farms, a unionized grower purchased by Money's Mushrooms of Canada, to try to strip all mushroom workers in this state of the right to organize under the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Act.

In another effort to break the union, Money's announced shortly before the court hearing that it was closing the unionized mushroom picking part its Pennsylvania plant, while keeping open the nonunion packaging department. They admit they will be getting their mushrooms from Kaolin Mushroom Farms, another plant where the employers are attacking the union, and from another company, Giorgi, but claim their move is for financial reasons, not to bust the union.

Demonstrators at the bilingual rally were welcomed by Luis Tlaseca, president of the union's Kaolin local, and Antonio Gutierres, president of the Vlasic local. Unionists who expressed their solidarity at the rally were Tom Cronin, president of District Council 47 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represents city workers; John Myerson of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1776; John Braxton from Jobs with Justice, and a representative of the Screen Actors Guild, which has been on strike against the producers of television commercials.

"Some of the justices seemed to like the idea that workers making anything you can eat shouldn't be able to organize," Art Reed, the lawyer representing the mushroom workers, told the crowd. He added, "Mushrooms are a half-billion dollar industry in Pennsylvania, employing thousands of workers."

Tlaseca noted that most of the mushroom workers are immigrants, mostly from Mexico and Central America. "But we deserve the right to unionize and fight for a decent life like everybody else," he said.

Demonstrators marched around City Hall. The rally concluded with testimony from mushroom workers describing the conditions in area plants.  
 
Workers meet MST leader of Brazil
After the rally, Tlaseca convened a meeting in Spanish of mushroom workers to hear from Gilmar Mauro, a leader of the Movement of Landless Rural Workers (MST) of Brazil, who was on a two-week visit in the United States and had been invited to the rally by leaders of the mushroom workers.

Mauro described the conditions facing landless peasants in Brazil and the efforts of the MST to mobilize to win land, legal rights, and political freedoms. He explained that they had recently conducted a national plebiscite, called the "Cry of the Excluded," where more than 6 million people cast ballots at voting sites set up by the MST in favor of canceling Brazil's foreign and national debt.

Mauro expressed his solidarity with the mushroom workers, and presented them with resolutions and other documents adopted at the last national convention of the MST. After exchanging information on how to remain in contact, the mushroom workers said they would follow the MST's campaigns and support their brothers and sisters in Brazil.