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President Roberts’ prepared remarks for the National Press Club

On September 4, 2019, UMWA International President, Cecil E. Roberts spoke at the National Press Club about the future of the coal industry and what effect he believes proposed climate change legislation and initiatives will have on the jobs outlook for coal producing regions. He also discussed energy and coal issues and how they will affect the 2020 election.

“I speak for the more than 100,000 who have died in this nation’s coal mines since the founding of our union in 1890, and the more than 100,000 who have died from Black Lung, an occupational disease caused by breathing too much dust in the mine atmosphere…I speak for those who work in the coal mines today, and who only seek to provide a decent, middle-class lifestyle for their families…And I speak for all of those who did the hard work — including many who made the ultimate sacrifice — to form our union and those who still do the hard work in local union halls across America to keep our union strong.”

You can watch the entire press conference here.

Warner, Kaine request fix for miners’ healthcare

Source: Augusta Free Press

September 16, 2019

U.S. Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine (both D-VA), along with Sens. Joe Manchin (D-WV), Doug Jones (D-AL), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), and Bob Casey (D-PA) wrote to House and Senate leadership advocating for the inclusion of a permanent fix for miners’ health care and pensions in the short-term spending package that is currently being negotiated to keep the government open after September 30th, 2019.

“In July, we were alarmed to learn that 1,200 retired coal miners, their widows and their dependents would lose their health care benefits at the end of the calendar year. If we don’t take action now, these families in Virginia, West Virginia, Wyoming, Alabama, Colorado, North Dakota and New Mexico will begin receiving health care termination notices at the end of October. Without congressional action to keep this from happening, they will spend their holiday season worrying about whether or not they will have to choose between their life-saving medications and putting food on the table,” wrote the Senators.

Currently, the 1974 UMWA Pension Plan is on the road to insolvency due to coal company bankruptcies and the 2008 financial crisis. Earlier this year, Sens. Warner and Kaine introduced the American Miners Act of 2019 to shore up the 1974 UMWA Pension Plan to make sure that 87,000 current beneficiaries and an additional 20,000 retirees won’t lose the pensions they have paid into for decades. In Virginia alone, there are approximately 7,000 retirees who are at risk of losing their benefits if Congress does not act. Additionally, the legislation would protect the 500 Virginians affected by the Westmoreland bankruptcy that has endangered health care benefits for additional miners and dependents.

In their letter, the senators also request that congressional leadership extend the Black Lung Disability Trust Fund that finances medical treatment and basic expenses for miners suffering from black lung disease. 

“We are proud to cosponsor the American Miners Act (S. 27) which would protect and preserve not only these healthcare and pension benefits in perpetuity, but restore the Black Lung Trust Fund contribution rate to a much more sustainable level. During Senate consideration of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the entire Democratic caucus cosponsored this bill. Unfortunately, we were blocked from even having a vote on that amendment,” continued the senators.

Sens. Warner and Kaine have continued to advocate on behalf of Virginia’s coal miners and their families. In August 2018, they introduced and passed into law legislation to improve early detection and treatment of black lung disease among coal miners. The Senators also introduced legislation to make it easier for miners to access federal black lung benefits, make the benefit claims process fairer, and strengthen the benefits miners receive.

A copy of the letter can be found here

Miners’ union president Cecil Roberts talks climate change, pensions, and more in D.C.

Source: People’s World

September 5, 2019

WASHINGTON—Never let it be said that Cecil Roberts met a written speech he really likes.

Instead, the veteran United Mine Workers president produced a detailed, free-form, interesting discourse on climate change, politics, and coal’s future at a talk to a crowd of reporters, UMWA members, and retirees at Washington’s National Press Club. His 13-page prepared speech? Uh…

Roberts is really a preacher, not a button-down president. He likes to rev up crowds, and he got applause during his remarks. But also got his points in during the September 4 NPC Newsmaker session. Among them, few of which were laughing matters:

The Mine Workers aren’t against coping with climate change. They know it’s occurring, and they know the U.S. must do something about it.

But miners have two big domestic problems with the Green New Deal. One is its utopian goal of no U.S. dependence on fossil fuels, including coal, oil, and natural gas, by 2050. That’s not doable without developing clean coal technology to scrub carbon out of power plant emissions, Roberts says.

Otherwise “you’ll never—write that down—solve climate change,” he ordered.

UMWA advocated that for years, but the last legislative effort, in 2009, was filibustered. And abolition puts former coal miners who became natural gas pipeline builders out of jobs.

“We never denied climate change. But how we deal with it is the question…and we want to be part of the discussion.”

The other is involved and affected workers—coal miners, utility workers, and oil workers among them—weren’t considered or consulted when the sprawling Green New Deal was crafted. And that includes crafting replacement jobs. “Any politician who says ‘I’ll take away your jobs’ will never get workers’ votes.”

Except for the unionized pipeline jobs, any jobs they can grab in the coal regions of Appalachia pay half of what miners now earn, and often lack pensions and health insurance, Roberts pointed out.

 

Watch video of UMWA President Cecil Roberts address to the National Press Club.

 

Interestingly, Roberts praised Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., the prime mover of the Green New Deal, for offering a start to the solution, when she visited and talked with miners in coal country earlier this year. She said that can start with solving the miners’ pension problems, which he discussed at length.

His other solution: Five years of guaranteed income and health insurance for the miners and other energy workers who lose their jobs in the transition to clean energy, “just like in Germany…but we could never get that passed.”

Coal’s big foreign problem is there are now 52,000-54,000 coal miners in the U.S. and coal-fired electric power plants are closing every day. But there are five million coal miners in China, out of seven million worldwide, and thousands of current coal-fired plants, with 1,600 more under construction. Many will be in China. And there are no carbon controls on those plants, he said.

“China burns four billion tons of coal every year,” Roberts noted. Though he did not say so, U.S. coal users burned 691 million tons last year, federal data show.

“There’s a word in front of the words ‘climate change’ that I haven’t heard a lot. That word is ‘global,’” Roberts said. “We can still figure out how to burn coal cleanly in the U.S.” with scrubbers. “I want to see us take the lead on that.”

The miners and other workers don’t trust Congress or other politicians to do what’s right. They’ve seen too many broken promises in the past. What’s worse, he said, some of the politicians just wish the miners would disappear.

“So when the president says ‘Don’t worry’ and talks about ‘how wonderful you have it,’ we don’t believe him.”

As for Trump’s promise to revive the coal industry, “It’s not back,” Roberts declared. After years of continual decline, coal mine employment leveled off in the last two years, but it’s also shifted from the “steam coal” underground mines of Appalachia to strip mines in the West.

“And now people are saying ‘It’s going to be better, we’ll have legislation’” to fix miners and other workers’ problems “when the Democrats regain power.“ “It’s not going to happen.” (his emphasis).

Roberts pinpointed two reasons: Political lack of memory and corporate opposition. He said many Democrats often forget about the Mine Workers, Steel Workers, Auto Workers, and other unionists who, led by UMWA in the 1930s, “built the middle class.”

And it took 35 years of agitation—and a horrific fatal mine explosion in 1969 that killed dozens—to force passage of the Mine Safety and Health Act.

“It’s really hard to get Congress to move. There’s a lot of money being spent against stopping people from being killed in the mines.”

As for one big blockader of everything, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kent., “We’ve probably been his biggest pain in the ass,” Roberts said.

Money held true when Congress rewrote federal bankruptcy laws to put workers last, behind company CEOs and chief financial officers who make millions, followed by banks and bondholders. Though Roberts didn’t say so, the 2005 Newt Gingrich GOP-run Congress passed that measure. “It’s just wrong,” he said.

Such backward bankruptcy’s also the reason non-union miners blocked the last coal train from their now-closed mine in Harlan County, Kent., for three weeks, Roberts noted. They’re sitting down and camping out on the railroad tracks after their last paychecks either never arrived, or bounced, and their employer shut.

UMWA President Cecil Roberts speaks at the National Press Club in Washington, Sept. 4. | UMWA

To their credit, Democratic presidential hopefuls are receptive to UMWA’s invitation to come visit and tour an underground unionized coal mine, Roberts reported. UMWA’s site says five have committed to do so. Democratic nominee John Kerry did in 2004, Roberts said. So did First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt in 1935. Hillary Clinton didn’t.

The coal companies, however, may not be willing to let the candidates in, Roberts admitted. “They don’t want critics there,” he deadpanned.

The politicians’ wish that miners weren’t there arises in the key issue affecting Mine Workers right now: The health, or lack of it, of the miners’ pension plans, both dependent on per-ton taxes collected on coal.

But with coal companies going broke since the Great Recession, the two pension funds—one created in 1947 and the other in 1974—are shelling out millions of dollars more to retirees than they’re getting in revenues. Without action on Capitol Hill, at least one of the two funds may be insolvent by the end of 2020. UMWA members have repeatedly lobbied lawmakers about the issue.

Yet Congress keeps kicking the can down the road about solving the problem, which the federal government took responsibility for in a 1947 pact between legendary UMWA President John L. Lewis and U.S. President Harry S. Truman, Roberts reminded the crowd.

Some “34,000 participants in our 1974 plan alone have died in the last seven years,” Roberts explained since the firms’ bankruptcies started. “It’s just like when people die from black lung disease. We’re starting to think the government is just waiting for us to die.”

Written by: MARK GRUENBERG

UMWA makes trek from Marmet to Racine to remember the Blair Mountain Battle

Source: WOWK

September 2, 2019

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (WOWK)- On Monday UMWA International President Cecil Roberts and 14 others made the trek from Marmet, West Virginia to Racine, West Virginia, all to honor those who came before them.

The 11 mile hike is one miners made almost 100 years ago during the March and Battle of Blair Mountain. To kick-off the UMWA’s two-year remembrance of the battle, the group marched for hours along Route 94 to honor those union miners’ sacrifice.

That battle included 12,000 union miners who marched under the leadership of Bill Blizzard, Cecil Roberts Great Uncle. The group was met by an organized private army under the control of non-union coal companies and a five-day battle ensued.

Along with Roberts, Delegate Mike Caputo, (D) Marion and UMWA Secretary Levi Allen also made the trip. According to Roberts 15 people started the walk with all 15 finishing at the UMWA’s Annual Labor Day Picnic in Racine, West Virginia.

Written by: Adrienne Robbins

UMWA March Commemorates the Battle of Blair Mountain

Marchers were met at Blair Mountain in Logan County by an army of men, fighting on behalf of anti-union mine guards and local law enforcement. The battle was so heated that then-president Warren Harding called in Army troops to restore order.

This Labor Day, present-day members of the United Mine Workers of America marched from Marmet in Kanawha County to Racine in Boone County, to commemorate what they say was one of the greatest events in the nation’s labor history.

UMWA International President Cecil Roberts speaks to attendees of the 2019 UMWA Labor Day Picnic.
CREDIT EMILY ALLEN / WEST VIRGINIA PUBLIC BROADCASTING

“This is the greatest insurrection in the history of these United States of America, other than the Civil War,” UMWA International President Cecil Roberts said. “We should be teaching this in every classroom in America.”

Unlike the reception union miners received nearly a hundred years ago at Blair Mountain, Monday’s march ended with a celebratory picnic at John Slack Park. Folk music played and veterans and union members alike removed their caps for the national anthem.
But Monday’s picnic wasn’t all about history. Roberts had much to say about the state of the country’s coal industry today, and his group’s concerns with mining jobs leaving the country.“We don’t make anything here. We import things from China and every third-world country in the world,” Roberts said. “I say, make what we need in America.  Protect coal mining jobs.”
Much of Roberts’ speech related to the upcoming 2020 election. He said elected officials should be held accountable for promises they’ve made regarding development of “clean coal” technology, which would reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from burning coal.
“We have to develop the technology that we need to burn coal cleanly in America,” Roberts said. But despite substantial federal investment, technology has not been adopted by the electric utility industry, which has instead opted for cheaper, cleaner natural gas and other alternative fuels.
Roberts also spoke against the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, a law restricting some labor activity.“It needs to be abolished,” Roberts said. “When I hear one of these candidates say they are for that, then I will know that they really support organized labor.”

Roberts will speak Wednesday at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Topics include legislation on climate change, and the “Green New Deal” proposal adopted by several Democratic presidential candidates, which envisions a large-scale transition from fossil fuels.

Written by: Emily Allen

The passing of Brother Marty Hudson

August 29, 2019

 

It is with great sadness to relay to you the passing of Brother Marty Hudson, Trustee of the UMWA Health and Retirement Funds and former UMWA Chief of Staff . 

 

Marty Donald Hudson, of Stafford, VA., died suddenly on August 25, 2019 while vacationing in Myrtle Beach, S.C.. A lifelong member and leader of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), Marty was serving as a Trustee of the UMWA Health and Retirement Funds at the time of his death.

Marty was born in Charleston, WV, on September 18, 1956. Growing up on Coal River in Boone County, Marty was active in athletics – especially baseball – and a Golden Gloves boxer while attending Sherman High School. While at Sherman, he met his future wife, Georgia Lynn (Bonz) Hudson.

Following graduation from high school, Marty went to work in the coal mines, starting at Kessler Coal. He quickly became involved in his UMWA Local Union by serving as Recording Secretary and on the Safety Committee. His talent and strong support for the Union were soon recognized by Union leadership in District 17, especially by then-District 17 Vice President and now International President, Cecil Roberts. Roberts recruited Marty to work in the “Why Not The Best” UMWA leadership campaign that concluded with the election of Richard Trumka as President, Roberts as Vice President, and John Banovic as Secretary-Treasurer.

Marty came with Cecil to Washington, D.C. in 1982, working as his Executive Assistant. When the Pittston Coal Company forced its workers to strike in 1989, Marty was selected to be one of the on-the-ground strike leaders. After he refused to tell miners to stop using nonviolent civil disobedience as a tool in the strike, Marty was jailed for several weeks.

As Roberts became International President in 1995, Marty became the Chief of Staff for the UMWA. He took a position as a Trustee of the UMWA Health and Retirement Funds in 1997 before returning to the Union as Chief of Staff in 2004. He retired from the UMWA in 2012, going back to the Funds as a Trustee.

“Marty was sometimes like a son to me, sometimes like a little brother,” Roberts said. “Carolyn and I consider the Hudsons like family. I will miss him terribly, and so will the thousands of UMWA members he helped during his incredible career. Our hearts go out to Lynn and Jordan, and we will be with them every day through this difficult time.”

Marty is remembered by his family and friends as a fierce advocate for workers and their families, and as a staunch ally to those whom he loved and served. He never walked past a person in need; he never backed down from a bully.

Marty was predeceased by his beloved son, Adam Lyndon Hudson, by just over a year, his mother, Thelma Stewart, his mother-in-law, Shirley Bonz and his grandparents, Okey Stewart and Angie Stewart. He is survived by his wife of 40 years, Georgia Lynn Hudson, son, Jordan Bonz Hudson (Yessica), sisters, Joda Browning (Fred), Robin Discenzo, and Gina Bonz Barnes; brother, Stanley Stewart (Mindi); father-in-law, George Bonz; nieces, Terri Beller and Crystal Discenzo; nephews Ethan Barnes and Andrew Discenzo; and great-nephew, Ian Beller.

Marty also loved each and every man and women in his Union brotherhood, which he considered to be an extension of his own family.

 

Donations may be made to UMWA Miners Aid Fund, 18354 Quantico Gateway Drive, Suite 200, Triangle, VA 22172 to the attention of Bob Scaramozzino.

 

 

 

Service Information:

 

Viewing:

Date: Tuesday, September 3, 2019

Time: 11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.

Location: Sylvester Church of God – 22814 Coal River Road, Sylvester, WV 25193

 

Memorial Service: 

Time: 12:00 p.m.

Location: Sylvester Church of God – 22814 Coal River Road, Sylvester, WV 25193

 

Grave Side Service:

Time: Immediately following the memorial service

Location: Pineview Cemetery – 21557 Coal River Road in Orgas, WV 25148

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UMWA Labor Day Events

The United Mine Workers of America has several Labor Day celebrations this year and we would love for you to attend!

If you have any questions about a particular event reached out to the District offices. Their numbers can be found here. 

 

Coal Workers Fight for Benefits as Industry Struggles Under Trump

Source: NBC News

Coal workers have been among the president’s strongest supporters, but their pensions remain at risk as industry barons thrive.

WASHINGTON — Dozens of retired miners, some in wheelchairs and using oxygen tanks to manage black lung disease, recently visited the Capitol seeking federal help for their failing pension plans.

A day later, President Donald Trump traveled to the miners’ home state, West Virginia, to raise an estimated $2.5 million for his re-election campaign at an event hosted by Robert Murray, who owns America’s largest underground coal company.

As an insurgent candidate in 2016, Trump promised miners he would restore the industry — and their jobs — after years of steady decline.

But as the president gears up his 2020 re-election campaign, coal magnates like Murray, whose company has a history of labor violations, have been among the biggest beneficiaries of his agenda.

The rank-and-file miners Trump showered with attention as a candidate have been less fortunate as their job prospects dwindle and their communities languish.

The year 2018 was second only to 2015 for coal plant retirements this decade, as the industry contends with strong competition from natural gas and renewable energy. At the same time, safety protections for miners, enacted after deadly mine collapses, have been weakened. Waves of retired and retiring miners concerned about failing pension plans have become a fixture on Capitol Hill, often holding vigils to gain attention.

At issue is the Miners Pension Protection Act, legislation that would transfer public funding into the miners’ troubled pension fund in order to guarantee their pensions and health care. Estimates suggest Congress would need to increase its appropriation by $260 million annually to keep the fund solvent.

Every day for the last seven months, Sen. Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, has tweeted at Trump asking him to help protect the retired coal miners living in fear of losing everything.

Trump hasn’t publicly responded, while Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, whose state of Kentucky employs over 6,000 miners, has blocked a separate measure that would shore up miner pensions.

“The President is committed to all Americans, including our great hardworking coal miners,” White House spokesperson Judd Deere told NBC News. “It is because of President Trump’s economic policies of tax cuts, deregulation— including rolling back the previous administration’s harmful and unlawful so-called Clean Power Plan — and energy independence that coal miners are winning.”

Mine owners are Trump’s fifth biggest source of individual/family contributors, directing at least $6.1 million toward joint fundraising committees, his inauguration and related super PACs, according to an NBC News review. And they’ve won plenty of regulatory breaks in return, most notably a rollback of the Clean Power Plan, which President Barack Obama enacted in 2014 to help curb carbon emissions.

The Trump administration has also loosened rules governing coal ash disposal and mercury pollution from power plants. A former coal lobbyist, Andrew Wheeler, now leads a shrinking Environmental Protection Agency.

Manchin’s office says Trump has been privately supportive of the miners, yet the president has said nothing publicly to pressure McConnell to act. While McConnell has sought a broader fix to shore up the federally chartered Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., the miners have said they don’t have time to wait for it.

That pension program covering union workers in transportation, mining, construction and hospitality is facing insolvency as several individual plans struggle to stay afloat.

“We’ve worked years in the coal mines. It was promised to us,” said Tom Phillips, a miner who voted for Trump in 2016. Phillips, who has numerous disabilities, said he believed Trump’s promise of a coal revival.

“I’m kind of up in the air” on Trump now, Phillips told NBC. “I don’t know what to do anymore.”

Tom Gibson, who worked as a miner for 33 years, has been walking the halls of Congress.

“I don’t like doing this, but we have no choice,” Gibson said. “Somebody needs to do something.”

David Popp, a McConnell spokesman, said the majority leader met with miners this year but believes the looming pension insolvency “is best addressed through a broader bipartisan and bicameral pension reform effort” that includes other industries.

Meanwhile, under Trump, coal executives thrive.

Among those beneficiaries are Joe and Kelly Knight Craft of Alliance Resource Partners, the largest coal donors to Trump. The Crafts, who are worth from $1 billion to $1.2 billion, according to a public disclosure form from 2017, contributed over $2 million to Trump’s joint fundraising committees, his inauguration and related super PACs. Alliance Resource Partners, of which Joe Craft is president, did not respond to requests for comment.

Trump named Kelly Craft the U.S. ambassador to Canada, where she served for 20 months. This month she was confirmed as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Other mining executives have reaped millions in retention bonuses as their companies undergo the bankruptcy and restructuring process.

“Many of the coal miners recognize there is a distinction between them and their bosses,” said Art Sullivan, a mining consultant and former miner.

Murray, who hosted the Trump fundraiser in late July, has donated $1.4 million to Trump and related super PACs. Since his company is privately held, he discloses little about his wealth.

A Murray spokesperson said the premise that coal executives are faring better than miners is “false.”

“Coal miners make up the coal industry. Coal miners, and the coal mining industry, have been, and are continuing to be helped by the Trump administration,” the spokesperson said.

“Draining the Swamp”

The state of coal country illustrates how Trump’s 2016 mantra of “draining the swamp” in Washington has, in many cases, yielded the opposite — windfalls for donors and lobbyists.

“I will never put the special interests before the national interest. I will never put a donor before a voter, or a lobbyist before a citizen,” he said at a campaign event in Charlotte, North Carolina, in 2016. “I am the change candidate. Hillary Clinton is for the failed status quo to protect her special interests, her donors, her lobbyists and others.”

Three years later, hedge fund companies continue to gobble up bankrupt mines and miners lose their jobs while their bosses get lucrative “retention” bonuses during bankruptcy proceedings. Coal mine closures are forecast to continue, particularly in the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic regions, according to BloombergNEF, a research service covering energy.

In early July, two coal mines in Wyoming’s Powder River Basin, which has provided most of the nation’s thermal coal in recent decades, shuttered and abruptly put 700 individuals out of work. That was months after Westmoreland Coal Co., another large coal company in the state, filed for bankruptcy and agreed to sell its Kemmerer mine to investor Tom Clarke, who’s purchased several iron and coal mines out of bankruptcies.

Much like other mine bankruptcies, Clarke was able to stop paying retiree’s health and pension benefits.While Congress in 2017 acted on a permanent fix for health care coverage for miners, it has not acted on pensions.

Meantime the miners interviewed by NBC said their communities, many hard hit by the opioid crisis, are reeling, and include “grandmas and grandpas” raising grandchildren on as little as $300 per month.

“I’m not just saying this,” Gibson said. “That’s just the way it is.”

By Heidi Przybyla

Unions stick up for the whole working class

Source: Kentucky State AFL-CIO

August 7, 2019

We’re used to union-haters lying about us.

One of their standby falsehoods is the bogus claim that all unions care about is ourselves.

Tuesday‘s rally in support of the protesting Harlan County miners is more proof—as if it were needed—that organized labor sticks up for more than our own.

The miners don’t belong to a union. But Kentucky State AFL-CIO President Bill Londrigan, Secretary-Treasurer Jeff Wiggins and National AFL-CIO Senior Field Representative Dan Justice, were at the rally.

Londrigan spoke from the back of a pickup truck.  So did United Mine Workers of America Secretary-Treasurer Levi Allen.

Steve Earle, UMWA international District 12 Vice President, and District 12 Representative Tim Miller came to the rally as did several dozen UMWA rank-and-filers and members of other unions.

The aggrieved miners worked at the Blackjewel mine. The company “filed for bankruptcy and issued miners cold checks for their last weeks of work, leaving many of them and their families in severe financial stress,” Londrigan said.

He added that the miners “have committed to remain at the mine site and block any coal trains from leaving the property for as long as it takes for them to get what they are owed.”

Meanwhile, family and friends ”have been bringing food and supplies to the miners,” but “they continue to need financial assistance to get them through this difficult period,” Londrigan said.

A bank account is open for those  who wish to send the miners money. Checks should be made payable to “With Love From Harlan” with “Coal Miner Fund“ on the check’s memo line. Checks may be mailed to PO Box 1621, Harlan, KY 40831.

Said Londrigan: ”This is another in a long line of coal companies that have declared bankruptcy and have denied miners the wages, health care and pensions they are owed. The UMWA has been fighting these unscrupulous mine operators for decades and have stood shoulder to shoulder against bankruptcy courts that routinely protect the pay of CEOs, executives and bankers.  With adequate financial assistance these miners can withstand this attack and they value the assistance provided by organized labor.”

Indeed, the “long line” goes back a long way.

History records the bloody “Harlan County War” of the 1930s when wealthy coal barons stubbornly and violently fought to keep the UMWA at bay.

The miners’ struggle inspired “Which Side Are You On,” the famous union song.

Unions are on the side of the whole working class.

Written by: Berry Craig – AFT Local 1360