5,000 march in Boston

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Boston - Rank-and-file ATU members have spontaneously organized a citywide support campaign with the full approval of the ATU leadership. Working out of a floor of offices donated by the Hotel and Restaurant Employees Union, the strike committee organized a labor solidarity rally for November 16.

Greyhound strikers, who a few days earlier had been confronting the giant corporation alone, greeted 500 supporters at the rally. Speakers included Arthur Osborne, Chairman of the Massachusetts State Labor Counci and a broad range of representatives from the Boston labor movement.

The rally called a mass picket line for the following day. With banners flying and picket signs held high, 500 supporters joined the pickets and attempted to discourage the scabs from driving the buses out of the terminal.

The picket line was faced with the full power of the Greyhound Corporation, which had hired scab drivers and had the Boston police department at its disposal. Fearful that this "special cop force" would not be enough to stop the strikers, the mayor of Boston, Democrat, had supplied increased city police to lend the company goons a hand and protect the scabs. At the Greyhound garage, strikers reported that the canpany • had importea a notorious private police force, PRIDE USA, to protect scabs. Wearing flak jackets and carrying long batons, they ape regular police tactical squads. Instead of ordering Greyhound to back down in the interest of public safety, the city police smashed any resistance to the buses coming through. Strikers reported that the cops' use of force was so unrestrained (mounted police and motorcycle cops had ridden directly into the crowd) that pickets resorted to the tactic of sitting down in front of the moving buses. The Boston police moved in with full force, arresting 51 pickets, including the entire Executive Board of the Carmen's Union--and 14 more carmen were arrested the next day. All demanded a jury trial. On November 24 another sit-in took place at the Greyhound terminal. Forty more carmen were arrested including Black community leader Reverend Hagler and Dominic Bozzotto, President of Local 26, Hotel and Restaurant Employees Union. They, too, demanded a jury trial.

Workers of Boston, aroused by the police and the company goon-squad violence, held a citywide rally on November 25 in suppport of the strike. The rally drew 5,000 people.

Support for the Roston strikers is growing. It is reaching beyond the unions into the community and the campuses, where eight strike-support committees have been formed. At Boston University over 60 students turned out to hear a striking Greyhound worker.

Not a day passes on the picket line without the word PATCO (Professional Airlines Traffic Controllers Association) being heard. Two years ago the government set out to show the bosses that it intended to break unions. The resulting PATOO defeat has become a symbol of union busting. Boston workers have shown they will not stand by while the bosses try to smash the ATU. O December, 1983 Editorial Board: Les Evans, Dianne Feeley,. Jeff Mackler, Jim Richter, Nat Weinstein Staff: Kate Curry, Sean Flynn, May May Gong, Ann Menasche, Don Mahoney, Linda Ray, Jim Richter, Shannon Sheppard, Jan Snipper, Marion Syrek, Sylvia Weinstein Published monthly by the Socialist Action Publishing Association, 3435 Army Street, No. 308, San Francisco, CA 94110, Phone: (415)821-0458.

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Signed articles by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Socialist Action. These are expres sed in editorials. strike notes No amount of Dial soap, the largest selling deodorant soap in tris country (owned by the Greyhound Corporation), can cover up the stench of union-busting and scab-herding by Greyhound. When the company claims it's not making enough, what it means is it's not making as much as it would like. In its drive to squeeze more profits from their hides, Greyhound aims to starve the workers out.

Far from being poor, the Greyhound Corporation actually made a profit of $19.6 million on their transportation