June 20, 2004

Fairness needs community support

Workers’ rights boards can help employees and management understand one another.

Several years ago I got a call from a group of workers in an industrial laundry in eastern Kentucky. The 65 workers had voted for union representation 10 months before, but negotiations had stalled in securing a first contract. The union wanted some church people to listen to the workers because it recognized Catholic teachings on workers’ rights.

The plant launders bed linens and uniforms, especially from hospitals and nursing homes, as well as fire-retardant garments from heavy industry. Started as a family business, it had been sold years before to a national firm. The family atmosphere of the early days had changed to more standard and impersonal work rules.

The testimonies at the hearing covered a range of topics, from wages to work conditions. One worker with more than 40 years’ employment at the laundry still made only $6.25 an hour, a wage that kept a family of three in poverty. Another worker testified that when summer temperatures outside reached 90 degrees, she recorded a 118-degree temperature at her workstation in the plant. Other workers complained of rigid work rules, crowded conditions, and unclean bathrooms. After two hours of roundtable discussion, I puzzled over my next step.

Labor law currently favors the employer. Nationally, one-third of workplaces that unionize never negotiate a first contract, and one-fourth more never get a second contract. The law requires employers to bargain in good faith, which essentially means meeting on a regular basis. The only correction for bargaining in bad faith—however defined—is a flimsy order to bargain in good faith. No fines, no penalties, no punitive damages.

As a sympathetic listener, I had no legal power. But as a person of faith, I could use moral suasion. I discovered the owner of the laundry business was a devout Catholic living in New York, so I wrote a letter outlining the social teachings of the church, emphasizing the dignity of every worker and the right to a just wage. Next I contacted his bishop and asked him to hand-deliver the letter, which he did—on the golf course. Ten days later the negotiating team came to the meeting, letter in hand, and negotiated a contract, giving everyone a raise of $1 an hour.

The hearing that I and other church representatives convened instinctively at the industrial laundry reflects a major program of Jobs With Justice (JWJ), a community organization dedicated to improving workers’ standard of living. JWJ organizes “workers’ rights boards” composed of community and religious leaders, academics, elected officials, and other prominent members of the community to review workers’ complaints.

With no legal authority, yet with great moral authority coming from upright community members, these boards invite employers to the public hearings, then seek follow-up meetings with management to discuss the findings. If talking and mediation prove ineffective, the WRB may pursue publicity through letter writing to customers, newspapers, and stockholders or more direct action, through picketing and demonstrations. Such boards are operating in 20 cities and have helped janitors, factory workers, food-service employees, and immigrant laborers affirm their dignity in labor struggles.

Maintaining a vibrant middle class depends on protecting and advancing workers’ rights. Unfortunately, anti-union sentiment appears pervasive, and the right to organize must fight an increasingly hostile legal system. Union-busting represents a $500 million industry that plays the system to ensure property rights over human rights.

Workers’ rights boards offer communities a way to affirm justice until labor law is reformed. No workplace is off limits. Developing a just society demands involvement, and fairness needs community support.

Father Rausch lives in Stanton, Ky.