When Newt Gingrich came up with his "Contract on America" program of cutbacks and attacks on peoples' rights, they had a labor component in mind: Attack the unions in the heartland of organized labor, the newspaper unions in Detroit.
Rep. John Conyers of Detroit, a leader of the Black Congressional Caucus, has called the strike/lockout "political" . . . the companies and their backers wanted a battle that would set back unionism both in publishing and the media and in the country as a whole.
So was born the companies' plan. Thousands of goons, club-wielding police with tear gas, an army of scabs and a huge slush fund of hundreds of millions of dollars were used to attack the workers at the Detroit Free Press and the Detroit News, owned by Knight Ridder and Gannett, the two largest newspaper publishers in the U.S.
Thirty two months later the outrage, solidarity and support from other unions and the community has pushed the losses by the companies from this union busting to between $500 million and $1 billion. Consumer and advertising boycotts and pickets and campaigns by the strikers have prevented the companies from ending the strike without justice.
What these companies didn't count on was how hard these workers would fight for their rights, their unions, and their livelihoods, and how much solidarity they would receive in their struggle to survive.
These newspaper managements have a shambles on their hands: convicted after a six month trial of multiple unfair labor practices, the two newspapers saw circulation and advertising revenues plummet as the level of journalism has been reduced to a mere shadow of its former self; shorter, no-news articles, and many more errors.
Media managements have marched in lockstep and given the silent treatment to this bitter and brutal story of corporate greed and union busting which has destroyed the lives of 2,000 newspaper workers, from journalists to drivers. Most of the country doesn?t even know this strike exists, much less the trail of lies and brutality that led up to it.
These workers need your support in their hour of need . . .
Protest At Gannett
Thurs. Apr. 2, 5 pm, 57 & Madison
Rally & March from the Freedom Forum
(formerly the Gannett Foundation)
to the Gannett-owned USA Today offices at
54th & Madison Avenue
New York Working Group to Support the Detroit Newspaper Strikers
For more info or to endorse or volunteer to help: 212-522-4050
Typeset and Printed by Members of the Newspaper Guild/CWA and the Typographical Union/CWA, Labor Donated
Snailmail: 39 West 14th St., #206; New York, N.Y. 10011.
pvnnyc@peoplesvideo.org