Labor learned from Vietnam War

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Canadians condemn complicity with U.S. militarist policies Yet union members continued loading war material for Southeast Asia.

That showed a contradiction. The union had taken a stand against the war, but was not willing to do anything in practice to oppose it because support for the leadership's position did not exist among the rank and file. The rank and file of the ILWU gave the leadership a lot of leeway when it came to taking political positions as long as contracts were being negotiated and enforced.

Rise in antiwar sentiment That core of dissent against U.S. policies in Southeast Asia existed within the labor movement, but so long as there 1964, when I was a rank-and-file member of the union, I spoke up at a Local 6 meeting. Some escalation had happened that day—I don't remember exactly what—and the next day when I went to work somebody had scrawled "punk commie" on my time card.

The leadership was very upset that I had raised the issue of Vietnam. Not that they disagreed with me-they just felt that it was rocking a boat that did not need to be rocked at that point.

But then things changed. In 1968 more than 450 Bay Area labor leaders placed an ad in The Chronicle and The Examiner which condemned the continuing U.S. involvement in the war. It had a big headline: "We've had enough."

In Washington, D.C., where I was based, a similar ad came out in The Washington Post. Its headline was rich man's war and a poor man's fight.

On that ad, The Washington Post was so nervous that it insisted on printing the signers' addresses as well as their names-which made us nervous.

At that point a variety of labor people had come around Martin Luther King's Poor People's Campaign and had formed a labor support committee for that. A natural outgrowth of that coalition, as tentative as it was, was National Labor for Peace. A lot of unions were able to plug into it, although not necessarily officially.

Eventually National Labor for Peace came together with unions representing duced on this issue to help forge links between the anti-intervention and anti-apartheid movements.

Reports from Santa Clara, Sacramento, Santa Cruz, Sonoma, Marin, Contra Costa, and the other surrounding areas of San Francisco indicate a larger response to April 20 than for any other recent event. Buses and trains are being organized by three AFL-CIO Central Labor Councils in these areas in TORONTO-Over 1600 people demonstrated on March 17 in Quebec City to protest the highly publicized visit of Ronald Reagan to Canada. Reagan came to this provincial capital to meet with Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney."

The themes of the protest included opposition to U.S. nuclear arms buildup, to the testing of cruise missiles, and to the U.S. war in Central America and the Caribbean.

Reagan's visit was marked in Toronto on March 16 as over 300 people picketed the U.S. Consulate. The protest, organized by the Toronto Association for. Peace and co-sponsored by the Toronto Disarmament Network and the Toronto Anti-Intervention Coalition (TAIC), demanded that the federal government break with U.S. military and foreign policy.

The TAIC is a broad-based, mass action-oriented movement formed to protest U.S. intervention and Canadian complicity in Central America and the Caribbean.

A multi-faceted Week Against Intervention is planned for April 13-20. Films, religious services, educational and cultural events will precede the mass march and rally at Toronto's City Hall on April 20.

Demonstrations against U.S. policy and Canadian complicity are also particular coalition. And they know full well today that the labor movement must work in coalitions with others if it is going to win the battles before it Some people say that we will not have a peace movement in this country until we have body bags returning with the sons of the American people in them. I don't think that is true and I think that it is a cynical view.

I think that people have learned a lesson from Vietnam. A generation of labor leadership has internalized a lesson and is determined not to see us repeat mistakes. Fifteen years ago the head of the AFL-CIO would not have gotten up, as Lane Kirkland did several days ago, and said he opposed any increases in the military budget at the expense of social programs. That declaration was a direct result of the election of a new generation of unionists to union office.

cooperation with the Nuclear Freeze and other peace and community groups.

Excited by what has been accomplished so far, coalition supporters are not letting up in the final push to make April 20 as large as possible. But even before the demonstration, and regardless of its actual size, most activists feel that the broad coalition put together in San Francisco can and should be repeated in other cities. planned for Ottawa; Winnipeg, Manitoba; and Vancouver, B.C., to coincide with demonstrations in the United States on April 20.

If you'd like to work on any of the five subcommittees building the April 20 demonstration in Toronto, contact TAIC at 99 Tyndall Ave. Apt. 706, Toronto, Ontario M6K 2G2 or call (416) 535-8779.—BARRY WEISLEDER L SEATTLE-The Spring Mobilization for Peace, Jobs and Justice Coalition, which is building the April 20 demonstration in Seattle, has received a large number of endorsements from labor, church, and community organizations.

Since December, 50 activists, representing solidarity groups, unions, socialist and peace organizations, have been meeting regularly to build the April 20 march and rally in Seattle.

General meetings are scheduled for April 1 and 15 at 7:30 p.m. at the Postal Workers Union Hall in Seattle.

For more information call (206) 2824540 or 525-4540.

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was a consensus of support for the war, that dissent was muted. For instance, in

Support widens in Seattle