Tacoma and Seattke rank-and-file members of the the International
Longshoremen and Warehousemen’s Union (ILWU) are showing us the way.
Faced with arrogant bosses and a boss-controlled legal system, they
have declared that the only way to effectively fight back is to fight
back HARD!
When bosses at EGT (a multi-national joint venture) decided they would
ship grain from their Longview, Washington facility without using ILWU
labor (which has been used for 70 years), they probably assumed things
would take what has become the traditional path: legal filings,
complaints and counter-complaints to the National Labor Relations
Baord, etc. They were certainly not thinking of what would happen on
Thursday, September 8. On that day between 500 and 1000 Longshoremen
and supporters crashed their way into the new EGT $200 million
Longview terminal, brushed aside the resistance of security guards,
and then proceeded to smash the place all to shit with baseball bats!
Later in the day, 1000 more workers shut down the ports of Seattle and
Tacoma when they refused to work. ILWU leaders have declared the
action “a wildcat strike”, and have claimed no knowledge of the
actions in Longview.
According to the police chief of Longview: “The terminal’s security
guards were outnumbered by people with baseball bats. People were
busting windows out of the guard shack. They took a security guard out
of his rig and drove it into a ditch.”
Tons of grain were dumped from railroad cars and the cars brake lines
were cut. In the end 19 arrests were made .
This is a message to the bosses: you will all get the same treatment
soon, and the sooner the better.
Resistance, it’s never futile!