Coal companies owned by Murray have counterattacked with a substantial propaganda blitz, taking out full-page ads in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and Tribune-Review as well as in the Uniontown Herald-Standard and the Washington Observer-Reporter, both published in the southwestern Pennsylvania coalfields. Murray has run the ads nearly every day since September 11.

The first round of ads was billed as "An important message to the residents of Western Pennsylvania," and purported to be "the truth" about Robert Murray and Maple Creek Mining. Similar material has been distributed in Ohio by the Ohio Valley Coal Company.

The ad claims that "many (union) employees at Maple Creek earn as much as nearly $100,000 a year." It accuses the union of attempting to "bully" Murray and states that "the UMWA must not be successful in these clandestine efforts."

The second round of ads ask the question, "Why is the UMWA attacking and bullying Bob Murray?" and answers, "Desperation!" This ad is published under the name of Maple Creek Mining, Inc. and the Ohio Valley Coal Company, the only union-organized mines out of the nine that Murray owns through various family-held companies.

The thrust of the ad is that the UMWA is on its way down and is a thing of the past. Graphs in the ad show a declining union membership and a drop in the percentage of coal produced by union members. Under the headline "The UMWA is being rejected!" the antilabor ad says the union suffered a decisive loss in a union certification vote in Virginia.

The coal boss also makes great play of a column in a southern Illinois newspaper written by a former coal miner. This miner attacked the UMWA in the wake of a union rally at the Murray-owned Galatia mine in Illinois. Excerpts from the column assert the UMWA "is past its prime--attempting to make an ill-fated comeback." It also states, "The days of bullying people to get their way are over--forever."

While coal operators like Robert Murray hope that the UMWA is on its last leg, the record of the last two years instead illustrates growing resistance among coal miners to the bosses' offensive. More miners are seeking to join the UMWA, such as in union-organizing efforts in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Virginia over recent months. Miners at Murray-owned Maple Creek and Powhatan No. 6 mines have mobilized in their hundreds to defend their union, attending union meetings on memorial days and a July 24 rally of more than 400 at Powhatan Point, Ohio.

The UMWA international has begun public campaigns against Peabody and Massey Energy, two of the biggest coal companies, in an effort to strengthen union membership. In May, 100 miners rallied outside Massey subsidiary Elk Run Coal in southern West Virginia. In September, a similar rally was held in front of Black Beauty Coal's Francisco mine in Indiana, in which Peabody has a majority stake.

Last year two major actions demonstrate the resistance that is taking hold among miners and in coalfield communities. In May, 8,000 working and retired miners, family members, high school students, and others from coal-mining regions held a national demonstration in Washington in defense of lifetime health-care benefits. This followed five UMWA-initiated regional rallies the previous year. And in July, two Western locals of the UMWA, through strikes that lasted more than two months, beat back an effort by Pittsburg and Midway Coal to exact concessions that included cutting overtime pay, lengthening the workweek, and reducing benefits. In the wake of this resistance, union contracts at nearby Peabody mines were settled without concessions in August.

Tony Lane is a member of United Mine Workers of America Local 1248.
 
 
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