http://www.uniondemocracy.org News & updates from AUD: new articles, links, resources and events. Tue, 02 Jun 2009 07:21:42 GMT ListGarden Program 1.3.1 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss http://www.uniondemocracy.org/AUDLinks/blogroll.htm The AUD Blogroll from our bloglines page is now on the AUD site. Thanks to <a href="http://grazr.com/">Grazr</a>, the blogroll from our AUDFeeds page is now on this website. What does this mean? Frequently updated information from over fifty rank-and-file sites. Please check it out and let us know if you like it. We welcome suggestions for feeds to add. http://www.uniondemocracy.org/UDR/192-Can_local_union_elections_be_run_more_democratically.htm Kevin Condy, active CWA member and AUD supporter, recently wrote a report for his senior project at the George Meany Center for Labor Studies, "Local Union Elections-Can They Be Run More Democratically?" (Fall, 2008). Condy surveyed fellow union members' knowledge of their democratic rights, focusing on two specific groups of workers - "outside technicians," -- union members that respond to problems onsite, and "inside technicians" or union members who do most of their work from a company's office. Condy's discoveries are interesting, but troubling. Here are a few excerpts from his paper... http://www.uniondemocracy.org/UDR/191-Solidarities_forever.htm "Three years ago Sal Salerno, Archie Green, Franklin Rosemont, and I scrambled to send The Big Red Songbook, a giant compilation of Industrial Workers of the World songs (Charles H. Kerr Company) to press. In putting final touches on my small introductory contribution to the book, I recalled the title of the 2000 AUD Thirtieth Anniversary conference, "When the Workers' Inspiration Through the Union's Blood Shall Run." The title played, of course, on a line from Ralph Chaplin's classic 1915 labor anthem "Solidarity Forever." That line ran, "When the union's inspiration through the workers blood shall run"... http://www.uniondemocracy.org/Home/specialgift.htm#scannerdonation Special Request: The AUD office contains the text of numerous substantial labor law cases, and hundreds of issues of the Union Democracy Review and its predecessor, Union Democracy in Action. We want to make this rich source of information available and easily accessible by creating a searchable digital archive -- a kind of mini Google for AUD. <br><br>The first step is to digitize our stores of newsletters and court cases. The good news is that the best archival software available, Evergreen, is open-source and totally free (http://evergreen-ils.org/). The less good news is that we need a better scanner that can process multiple scans and convert the digitized documents into a single file. The cost of such a scanner is between two and three hundred dollars. <br><br>Please give to help us make this terrific resource available to unionists, researchers, students and anyone interested in the history of union democracy. http://bensonsudblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/at-seiu-harassing-dissidents-lawyers.html On his trips to China, Andy Stern may have learned how to hone his union managerial skills. The authoritarian rulers of China go beyond simply punishing critics; they go after the victims' lawyers to teach other lawyers the painful consequences of helping dissidents. Stern can pay well to hire an army of his own lawyers to harass lawyers who represent his opponents... http://www.uniondemocracy.org/UDR/188-Nurses_now_for_sale_and_trade.htm By combining into a new 150,000-member national union affiliated with the AFL-CIO, the California Nurses Association, the United American Nurses, and the Massachusetts Nurses Association seemed to have taken a giant step toward creating the kind of united force so many nurse unionists are hoping for. Meanwhile, the move has triggered a swift and dizzying realignment among the many unions that aspire to represent registered nurses. Most notable and unexpected is the sudden love affair between top officials of the Service Employees and the California Nurses Association. From bitter competition over who shall represent nurses, they have shifted to an amicable agreement over dividing up the territory... http://www.uniondemocracy.org/UDR/189-How_to_eviscerate_the_LMRDA_but_quietly.htm The federal law, LMRDA, has all those fine provisions designed to strengthen union democracy. But over the years union officials, guided by their attorneys, have learned how to immunize themselves against its effects and cut the heart out of some sections of the law. The latest egregious example is in the SEIU where Andy Stern used the law's trusteeship provisions to take over a 150,000-member local... In that case, trustees invaded explosively, massively, with all financial guns blazing, all in defiance of public protests. But, more representative than these events, are trusteeships imposed without public fanfare, quietly, unobtrusively, and routinely. For that we point to one small example, Pipefitters Local 211 in Oklahoma... http://www.uniondemocracy.org/UDR/190-In_the_Transit_and_Transport_unions.htm ATU Local 241 in Chicago -- Never a dull moment in this 6,700-member local of city bus drivers...; ATU Local 1181 in New York City - Members for Change win two of three top spots...; TWU 225 in New Jersey -- members barred from seeking AUD's advice...; TWU Local 100 in New York City -- the big union of New York City subway and bus workers is about to hold elections wrapped in confusion,... challenger John Samuelson gets boost from former New Directions leader Steve Downs... http://uniondemocracy.org/UDR/187-Jane_LaTour_on_her_Sisters_in_the_Brotherhoods.htm "...sadly, it seems that most unions have a hard time delivering support for women in nontraditional, blue-collar jobs. ... But the point of all the stories is to show that the women themselves became a force for democracy within their unions. Every woman featured in the book was an organizer-trying to change conditions for themselves and their co-workers/fellow union members." http://uniondemocracy.org/UDR/186-New_democracy_battles_in_Musicians_Union.htm By Robert Levine.<br><br>"The most transformative event in the history of the American Federation of Musicians was a revolt in the 1950s by musicians against an autocratic AFM administration... It is ironic, then, that the achievements of that rank-and-file revolt are at risk because of a conflict between a new generation of recording musicians and what they believe to be another autocratic AFM administration..." http://uniondemocracy.org/UDR/182-Can_Staff_Unionism_Advance_the_Cause_of_Union_Democracy.htm Guillermo Perez is a member of the AUD Board of Directors and is currently the chief steward for the United Union Employees of New York (UUE-NY), a staff union that represents 120 union staffers employed by AFSCME Local 1000 based in Albany, New York. Guillermo conducted this interview with AUD founder and Secretary-Treasurer Herman Benson as part of an AUD-sponsored initiative to encourage union staffers to support the work of AUD.