Bad time to Strike?

[jonathan flanders <jon_flanders@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Some Workers Are Finding It a Difficult Time to Strike

STEVEN GREENHOUSE, NY Times
ST. PAUL, Oct. 2- There is never good time to go on strike, union often
say, but the walkout on by by nearly 28,000 Minnesota employees seems to
have come at an especially inopportune time.

Gov. Jesse Ventura, business lead-ers, editorial writers and many other
Minnesotans have condemned the strikers for walking out during a national
crisis. When so many Amer-icans are talking about the need for shared
sacrifice and unity, it has suddenly become difficult, even risky for
unions to use their most potent weapon.

"This strike comes at a most unfortunate time," Mr. Ventura, an
in-dependent said. "Our citizens are  hurting from the devastating attack
on Sept. 11, we are coping with the possibility of along and difficult war
and we are facing the prospect of an economy that is on the brink of
recession."
For unions, public sympathy can crucial in trying to outmuscle and outlast
management in a strike. With the public showing less support for strikers
after the attacks, labor ex-erts say unions might become more reluctant to
walk out.

In North Carolina, where state employees threatening their first strike
ever, many state officials say economic problems, made worse by he Sept. 11
attacks, make it harder for the state to meet the union's demands. When 200
teachers in Granite City, Ill., went on strike five days after the attacks,
they were widely denounced as being selfish.

The local newspaper, The Belle-ville News-Democrat, wrote: "They lost
credibility when they walked out days after the worst terrorist attacks in
our nation's history. Beyond that, the attacks Sept. 11 weakened our
nation's already shaky economy -and made the union demands even more
unreasonable."
Michael LeRoy, a professor of la-bor relations at the University of
Illinois, predicted that there would be fewer strikes as a result of the
new mood across the nation. Mr. LeRoy conducted a study on how various
administrations, including those of Presidents Harry S. Truman and Dwight
D. Eisenhower, sometimes accused unions of being unpatriotic when they went
on strike during the Korean War and the cold war.

"A time of national emergency makes it more difficult for unions to
engineer public support," Mr. LeRoy said. "And I wouldn't underestimate the
importance of public sympathy in conducting a successful strike."

The shift in the collective bargaining terrain, coming when unemployment is
soaring and corporate profits are falling, could weaken labor's hand at the
bargaining table. But many union leaders assert that they should not shrink
from striking.

"We sacrificed back in 1993, when we took a 0 percent raise," said Murray
Cody , communications director of Minnesota Association of Profess onal
Employees, one of the two uni ons that went on strike on Monday. " We were
told back then to sacrifice to help the state out, and they prom sed that
when times got better, the they'd take care of us. But they never came
through on that."
Mr. Cody rejected some criticism that his union was being unpatriotic,
noting that members had contribut-ed more th m $10,000 to the victims of
the terrori t attack in New York. He said the union whose contract expired
in June originally planned to strike on ;ept. 17, but delayed the walkout
for two weeks because of the Sept.11 attacks.

Some union and business representatives forecast a decline in strikes
because of the national mood. Patrick Cleary , senior vice president for
human resources policy at the National A ssociation of Manufacturers, said,
"I believe that, barring some gargantuan problems, labor and management
will find a way to make peace or defer battle."

New York City's teachers union which has been without a contract for more
than a year has asked for two month delay in contentious hear ings in its
salary dispute. Leaders that union say it is not an appropiate time to
battle over wages.

But Patrick Lynch, president New York City's main police union the
Patrolmen's Benevolent Associ tion, said the Sept. 11 attacks only
strengthen the hand of uniform unions, like police and firefighters because
the public had come to a predate all the more the importan of those
workers.
Some union strategists fear that managers of some companies a government
bodies will seize on the national crisis to take advantage their workers,
knowing that it is difficult time to strike.
Ron Blackwell, the A.F.L.-C.I.O director of corporate affairs,predict ed
that strikes would decrease, but that labor relations might remain tense,
partly because executive p has skyrocketed while rank-and-f wages
languished.

"Patriotism is a very important feeling in the country," Mr. Bla well said.
"But that doesn't change the relationship people have with their employers.

"No one Is saying, 'Let's stop I American economy.' They're saying 'Let's
get some equity back in the employment relationship.'"
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