The New York Post labeled the strikers “You Rats” in a full front-page headline for the supposed chaos the walkout caused. In fact, most working people dealt with the inconvenience of no train and bus service, getting around by other means. Capitalist politicians and the big-business media expressed hopes the employers and the government taught these workers a lesson after the executive board of the Transport Workers Union (TWU) Local 100 called off the strike before any of the demands workers struck around were met. “This was a strike that never needed to happen, and we hope that message reverberates in the future,” whined an editorial in the December 29 New York Times.

But large numbers of working people cheered on the transit workers for standing up to the MTA in spite of the Taylor law, which bans strikes by public employees. They identified with the determination of transit workers eager to use union power to fight concessions, even after returning on the job December 23. As Anthony Dejesus, a bus driver, told the Militant January 2, “I’d go on strike again, right now, for a better contract.”  
 
‘Thugs’ and ‘selfish’?
The wealthy capitalists, their kept politicians, and the big-business media grew more frenzied in their attempt to defeat the strike and then tie the union in red tape with behind-the-scenes negotiations with union tops, followed by demands for binding arbitration—all of which is intended to turn the affected workers into spectators. But every time Mayor Michael Bloomberg or New York governor George Pataki labeled Local 100 members “thugs” and “selfish,” they made their contempt for all working people clearer to millions, boosting support for TWU members.

Picket lines were large and spirited during the walkout. While in battle workers changed themselves. “The strike was effective, it made people less relaxed,” said Steve Shaw, a subway car mechanic in the Bronx. “They were paying more attention to what was going on. It affected the voting on the contract, too.”

On January 20 bus and subway workers voted down a settlement recommended by the majority of the union executive board. Many workers were angry at being asked to make concessions—first-ever payments for medical coverage—while the MTA is sitting on a $1 billion budget surplus. To a large degree, however, TWU members rejected the deal to say no to the abuse by the mayor, governor, and the MTA bosses. Some Local 100 members sported buttons saying, “Union thug”—standing up to the degrading depiction the mayor and the capitalist media made of them.

While transit workers were fighting uncompromisingly, Local 100 officials treated the strike as a negotiating tactic. After calling off the walkout, they entered into closed-door talks with the MTA and government mediators. While doing so, they called no solidarity rallies to tap into the huge reservoir of public support that could bring to bear not only the voice of the local’s members but that of the millions who identified with the TWU’s cause.  
 
Cops and the ‘line of duty’
The TWU officialdom also presented Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association (PBA) president Patrick Lynch as a leading “union” backer of the transit workers, and the cops as fellow “public workers.” This undermined support for the fight among working people and youth who hate the cops for countless acts of brutality.

Furthermore, it flew in the face of the class interests of transit and other workers. The cops are paid to protect capitalist property and defend capitalist rule. They are not part of the labor movement, and any difficulties they may face with their employers don’t elicit compassion from working people. Their duty is to take orders from their capitalist masters, which means breaking strikes and carrying out racist beatings of Blacks, Puerto Ricans, and others. The New York cops are not asking for an end to these duties. That would mean an end to their jobs.

In a December 27 statement announcing the TWU had reached a deal with the MTA, Local 100 president Roger Toussaint urged union members to back the tentative contract. One of the reasons he gave is that the deal “provides for increasing the death benefit for members who die in the line of duty.”

This argument disarms workers in any confrontation with the employers, for two reasons. First, terms such as “the line of duty” are used for the military and police—bodies of armed men and women the capitalists use to fight the workers and prevent them from defending their interests as an exploited class. Second, unionists can’t be proud of increasing “death benefits” for relatives of those killed on the job—especially when the bosses’ profit greed is claiming more and more lives of coal miners and other working people. Instead unions can enforce safety and ensure no worker dies on the job. They can do so by insisting their members and other workers won’t toil under unsafe conditions and will walk out the minute bosses refuse to resolve any safety problem.  
 
Drop fines and jail threats
The transit workers still face the draconian provisions of the Taylor law, which call for $1 million a day fines against the union, and penalties of two days’ pay per member for each day on strike. A state supreme court judge is to hold hearings on the fines and the possible jailing of union officials.

The MTA is also seeking binding arbitration to ram down the throats of the workers a concession contract worse than the one they rejected—including cuts in health care and pensions and more leeway for the bosses to impose disciplinary actions.

Working people should stand with the transit workers and their union as they attempt to defend themselves from these attacks by the MTA and the city and state governments. The labor movement must demand all fines, and all charges against union officials, be dropped. The transit workers’ cause is the cause of all labor.
 
 
Related articles:
On the Picket Line
Greece: Seamen end 8-day strike
Tyson shuts down two Nebraska plants  
 
 
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