Vol. 76/No. 44 December 3, 2012
December 11, 1987
JAY, Maine—Unfazed by sub-freezing weather, 3,000 striking paperworkers and their supporters staged a militant march past International Paper Co.’s Androscoggin mill here November 21 to show the unity of their strike against IP, now in its sixth month.Hundreds of strikers—members of United Paperworkers International Union Local 14 and Firemen and Oilers Local 246—were joined by family members, community supporters, and unionists from around New England.
UPIU Local 14 Present Bill Meserve described the paperworkers’ decision to strike when IP refused to back off from the concessions it demanded, including an end to Sunday premium pay, elimination of Christmas as a shutdown holiday, and a plan to boost productivity. IP’s current stance is that the 1,000 scabs who now work in the mill are permanent employees.
December 3, 1962
Puerto Rican pro-independence pickets demonstrated Nov. 12 at Fort Brooke in San Juan, under heavy intimidation by police and U.S. military personnel. The demonstrators, carrying Puerto Rican flags, a banner of the Federation of University Students for Independence, and placards, marched to the Antilles Command Headquarters Building. Among the slogans carried during the two-hour demonstration were, “We Are Peaceful People; Go Home Warlords,” “Latin American Goodwill Is Not Possible Without Independence of Puerto Rico,” and “We Protest Atomic Weapons in Puerto Rico.”The civilian cops were joined by over 100 combat-ready military police in an effort to intimidate the pickets. An army helicopter hovered over their heads, reportedly taking motion pictures.
December 4, 1937
MINNEAPOLIS—The atrocious murder of Pat Corcoran, Secretary-Treasurer of the powerful Teamster’s Joint Council, has once again brought the turbulent labor movement of Minneapolis into the center of national attention. Once again the keenest interest and concern of progressive labor circles from coast to coast have been aroused in this stormy outpost of labor in the Northwest, the pace-setter for the country. The forces of organized labor cried out with one voice for the apprehension of Corcoran’s assassins.The dark forces of reaction and their dubious agents and stooges couldn’t wait for the body of the martyr to be lowered into the grave before they began to sing in chorus—with a suspicious unanimity and enthusiasm, as though the song had been rehearsed—for a police investigation of the trade union movement of Minneapolis.
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