Union Perspectives

Some times having nothing is an easier way to win. If a person or group have no home, no family, no job, no money or no hope, what do you have to lose? When your opposition finds this out then having nothing becomes a game changer. This is what the IWW or Wobblies found when they were fighting for free speech in Fresno, Calif., in the year of 1911. They won when law enforcement came to understand that people who have nothing to lose really can’t lose anything except their lives; and some in those days didn’t care for life was not very good when you have no family, job, home, money or hope. So, just like the 99%ers, the Wobblies outnumbered and outlasted the establishment to bring about change -- with nothing but their bodies and uncompromising determination. This is pointed out in the “Art of War;” when you have nothing else to give but your life, that’s when you fight the hardest. Wall Street big banks, corporation-led GOP and their Machiavellian strategy is actually playing into ...

The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) was formed to fight the harden, brutal corporations in the Twentieth century. There was a big difference in the way the unions fought against the giant corporations. The AF of L called for a fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work. This sounds good but the AF of L had to get a contract with the employer. This usually ended up in courts and with lots of lawyers. You can see how this is working for us (membership down). Now the IWW Wobblies played for keeps. They wrote in their preamble to their constitution: The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of working people and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things in life. Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the world organize as a class. The Wobblies (IWW) never had more than 60,000 members, but it shook up the nation as had no other orga...