Interview with Molly Yard

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Helen Grieto, Executive Director, San Francisco NOW: BOSTON-After the March 14 rally in solidarity with the Eastern Airlines workers, Molly Yard was kind enough to grant me a brief interview for Socialist Action newspaper. I commented on the significance of her presence at the rally and asked her what else N.O.W. would be doing to help the striking Eastern workers. She said that some N.O.W. members had joined picket lines, and that the Executive Board would be calling for a total boycott of Eastern at its next meeting. She indicated that there would be a notice in the next issue of the N.O. W. newspaper asking for donations to their strike fund. When asked what labor could do to help build the April 9 march, Yard expressed disappointment that more Internationals had not offered their endorsement, though she was very pleased to report that the Minnesota State AFL-CIO had just come through. "Lots of big locals are supporting us," she noted, mentioning District 65 of the United Auto Workers, the Hospital Workers Union Local 1199 in New York, and others. "We need to get the trade-union movement to recognize that their need to organize for decent wages and working conditions is the same struggle as that of women," Yard said. "We're being pushed back by the same lousy people. The Supreme Court that ruled against us on the Missouri law is the same court that works against labor. We're in the same fight." Finally, I asked her why the focus of the April 9 march had been expanded from the Equal Rights Amendment (the initial focus) to include abortion rights. She noted the increasing attacks on women's right to choose coming from the Reagan and Bush administrations. "If Roe v. Wade is overturned, rich women will still be able to fly to Sweden or wherever to take care of their abortions," she said. "But most women, poor women, will be forced into compulsory pregnancy or unsafe, illegal abortions. What kind of choice is that in a free society?