There are big stakes involved in this battle for both the coal miners’ union in the West, and for the employers. If the company wins, the bosses will have a field day in diminishing the effectiveness of the miners’ union in that entire region of the United States. If the workers succeed in getting their jobs back and winning union recognition, the road will be open to the renewal of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA). Retired coal miners in the West and elsewhere, who are veterans of previous union struggles going back to the 1970s, have been among the first to see this fight as a step toward the potential revitalization of the entire union.

The workers at Co-Op, most of whom were born in Mexico, have turned to and won the backing of the UMWA as they have drawn the line against the bosses’ push to operate the mine under increasingly dangerous conditions, with a pay scale of $5.25 to $7 an hour.

According to an October 6 UMWA press release, 75 percent of the mine’s 83 hourly workers have signed a representation petition with the union. At the union’s recent special convention in Las Vegas, Jesús Salazar, a leader of the Co-Op fight, addressed the delegates and said: “We are here looking for the UMWA’s indispensable support because we were unjustly fired for defending our rights and protesting the mine’s unsafe working conditions. We are determined to fight until this mine becomes UMWA territory and we can put an end to the abuse and extreme level of exploitation we have endured.”

The union responded with financial and other aid. “We stand with these workers in solidarity as they fight for justice and dignity,” UMWA president Cecil Roberts told the 500 convention delegates. “We call on all American workers to support their struggle because we believe ‘an injury to one is an injury to all.’”

As this week’s Militant and previous issues have reported, UMWA locals in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming have pitched in with food and other donations. The UMWA has made available to the Co-Op fighters a trailer to organize picketing outside the mine in the cold winter weather, and has assigned full-time organizers to assist the struggle. Solidarity has begun to spread beyond the labor movement to community, religious, and immigrant rights groups in Salt Lake City and nearby areas.

This solidarity can be extended across the country as knowledge spreads of the battle of these workers against the Kingston family. This is a well-known polygamous clan. It is infamous for a suit brought last August by one young woman from the family who has accused 242 clan members of operating “a secretive religious society and economic organization that teaches and promotes sexual abuse of young girls through illegal and underage marriages, incest, and polygamy.” This wealthy family has a $150 million business empire in six western states and has raked in as much as $1 million per month from its Co-Op mine, one of its most profitable operations.

Solidarity activities can include raising funds for the workers and their families; collecting food donations; sending messages of support; and “adopting a family” among the strikers to help pay bills, make sure the kids can go to school, and put food on the table for the duration of the battle.

Most trade unions are likely to show interest in this struggle. Broader support can be solicited, however, from immigrant rights organizations, groups that support the right of miners and widows to receive black lung benefits, campus and other student and youth organizations; and many others.

The fact sheet the Co-Op miners have produced about their struggle says: “We call on all workers and all democratic minded people to support our just struggle.”

Heed the call! Organize solidarity with the Co-Op miners!
 
 
Related articles:
Salt Lake City unionists donate food and funds to locked-out Co-Op miners  
 
 
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