Marchers hit NLRB rulings by Bush-named majority

By Mark Gruenberg
Press Associates, Inc.

WASHINGTON -- Chanting and waving signs--and promising they'd be back again before November 2008--more than 1,000 unionists marched Nov. 15 on the National Labor Relations Board headquarters in Washington, protesting a slew of anti-worker rulings by its 3-person majority installed by anti-worker GOPPresident George W. Bush.

The protest, organized by the AFL-CIO, drew unionists, religious allies, a wide range of supporters and sympathetic honks from D.C. drivers, cabbies and truckers all along the parade route. The Washington protest was one of more than 25 nationwide, including in Chicago and Los Angeles.

Workers carried yellow umbrellas with the word "Shame" emblazoned in red, and signs with a closed door for the NLRB. Change to Win signs echoed Bush's praise of his emergency director in Hurricane Katrina, saying "You're doing a good job, Battista!" referring to Bush-named NLRB chair Robert Battista, a management-side labor lawyer.

Chants included "What's disgusting? Union-busting!" and "Hey, hey, ho, ho! Bush's board has got to go!"

"We're here because the Bush NLRB has made broken labor law even worse," declared Voice@Work Director Fred Azcarate before the marchers started off from AFL-CIO headquarters for the half-mile parade.

"This is not the NLRB. This is George Bush's board. This is Dick Cheney's board. This is the Chamber of Commerce's board. This is the National Association of Manufacturers' board. And it sure as hell ain't the Labor Board!” declared Mine Workers President Cecil Roberts.

The marchers protested 61 NLRB decisions, virtually all by party-line 3-2 votes, starting in late September and continuing, that stripped away many workers' rights. They included rulings making it easier to oust unions through what are called "decertification petitions” -- rulings making it harder for workers illegally fired for pro-union work to get back pay, and rulings making it easier for firms to break labor law.

Other NLRB rulings the unionists protested weakened the already weak right to strike, opened the door to retaliatory lawsuits by companies, let employers get away with illegal threats to workers, and let employers evade the law's mandate that they must bargain with the union once it is certified to represent the workers.

The stream of anti-worker rulings is so bad that last month, the AFL-CIO formally filed a complaint about the NLRB with the International Labour Organization. The marchers said the board is so bad it should be shut down.

Speakers at the march, led by Roberts and Metropolitan Washington Central Labor Council President Jocelyn Williams, also made it clear the real solution to Bush's board will come next November--at the ballot box.

Roberts talked about "a midnight train" that took former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) and "his big fat Radical Right Wing ass" and shipped him out of office. "That train's about to run again and we're going to put George Bush and Dick Cheney and this whole Right Wing crowd on it and ship them out of Washington, D.C.," he declared.

And harking back to the Old Testament, Roberts, a preacher, called Bush "Pharaoh." He said "Moses didn't wait for a fax" to confront the Egyptian ruler
and workers would continue to confront the Bush board.

"We're going to take back our country," he added.

"We march on the NLRB but the enemy is not the NLRB, but a party right across Lafayette Park," said Williams, gesturing towards the White House, Bush's residence, two blocks away from the AFL-CIO headquarters where the protest began. "It's been taken over by a bunch of squatters, and in November 2008, we can deliver them a piece of paper that says: 'This is an ejection notice.'"

The Rev. Ron Stief, organizing director for Faith in Public Life, said the marchers "know who to give thanks for" in the holiday season, including unions,
organizers, civil rights groups, and religious groups "who stand between us and this (NLRB) behavior.

"And we know who the turkey is," Stief added, to laughter.

Unions in the march included AFL-CIO members, such as the Communications Workers, The Newspaper Guild/CWA, the American Federation of Teachers, the Seafarers, the Machinists, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, AFSCME, and AFGE. Change to Win unions marching included the Laborers, the United Food and Commercial Workers, the Service Employees and the Teamsters.

Members of two independent unions, the National Education Association and the United Electrical Workers, also marched. So did representatives from the Coalition of Labor Union Women.