25, 50 and 75 Years Ago

November 1, 2021

November 4, 1996

PARIS — Nearly two million public workers struck and some 200,000 demonstrated throughout France against government austerity measures on October 17.

France is in the midst of a worsening economic crisis. Economic activity has declined in three of the last five quarters. Official unemployment is 12.5 percent and still rising.

Medical workers made up large contingents in the demonstrations. “There’s too much work in the hospital — there’s too much unemployment outside — hire, hire the unemployed,” shouted demonstrating hospital workers.

The demonstration in Paris was joined by 50 Air France workers who work at Narita Airport in Japan. “Liberty and Human Rights for the Japanese personnel of Air France” read their banner. One of the contingents was made up of several hundred undocumented workers and their supporters.

November 5, 1971

SAN FRANCISCO — A new wave of antiwar opposition is sweeping the armed forces today. One example is the petition signed by more than 1,000 crew members of the aircraft carrier U. S. S. Coral Sea, asking Congress to halt the ship’s scheduled return to Vietnam.

Seaman Larry Harris, a former Coral Sea crew member now stationed at the Treasure Island Navy base here, and others began circulating the petition after hearing about the drive in San Diego by members of the crew of the U. S. S. Constellation and the San Diego antiwar movement to keep that aircraft carrier from sailing to Vietnam.

Harris and several others typed up a petition and circulated it. They gathered more than 300 signatures in a few days. They expected to get many more from the 4,500-man crew, but the executive officer and two chief petty officers seized the petition.

November 2, 1946

Headed by the organized labor movement, the masses in the American-controlled section of Korea are fighting back with powerful demonstrations against the oppressive rule of the American Military Government.

The Koreans demand the independence they were promised by [President] Roosevelt in 1944, as well as freedom of trade union activity and an end to the terror regime which is depriving them of elementary democratic rights. The demand for greater distribution of food to the starving masses was answered by the calling out of troops. Bloody struggles followed in many centers.

Last May the Korean Federation of Trade Unions with a membership of 800,000 appealed to the CIO in the United States to aid the Koreans in throwing off the yoke of AMG, whose anti-labor decrees it characterized as “worse than the cruel laws of Japanese imperialism.”