Anti-War Resolution

By Administrative Staff, California Labor Federation. Posted December 13, 2002.

California Labor Federation

July 24, 2002

Oppose the Bush Administration's Attacks on Working People

Resolution No. 9-Presented by Letter Carriers Branch 214, San Francisco.

WHEREAS, After the horrific events of September 11, President Bush and Congress began implementing a program with bad consequences for working people:

*Open-ended wars across the globe

*An anti-worker domestic program

*Laws like the USA Patriot Act curtailing civil rights, union rights, civil liberties and the Bill of Rights

*Legitimization of racial profiling

*Wiping out environmental protections

*Threats to unions and the right to strike

*Huge giveaways to corporations; and

WHEREAS, A global economic crisis gathers momentum:

*Millions lose their jobs

*Hunger and homelessness spread, while corporate cronies of the court-appointed President are feeding at the public trough; and

WHEREAS, The Bush program offers nothing for laid-off workers, the tens of millions without health care, or the 25% of U.S. children living in poverty, while the only "public housing" Bush wants to build is more prisons; and

WHEREAS, Bush's war has already killed thousands of innocent civilians, directly by bombing and indirectly by war-related starvation and disease. These are people, mostly women and children, who had nothing to do with terrorism or 9/11. Do any of us really think this will make us "more secure" here at home? Now the Pentagon, with troops already in over 100 countries, is expanding its military forces in Colombia and the Philippines; and

WHEREAS, War is not free: it is the workers and their children who pay for it. By 2007, Bush projects a military budget exceeding $500,000,000,000, devouring virtually all remaining social programs- meanwhile raiding the workers' Social Security Trust Fund to pay for his endless wars-so that for our children, the "social safety net" will be gone; and

WHEREAS, On March 9, an ominous Nuclear Policy Review was leaked to the media, detailing Pentagon plans for nuclear war targeting seven countries . contemplating U.S. "first strike" use of nuclear weapons, even against small nations; and

WHEREAS, On April 20, 100,000 marched on Washington, 35,000 in San Francisco, and many thousands in other cities, against Bush's program of endless war, racism and poverty, including labor contingents and speakers-visible opposition to the extraordinarily dangerous course Bush & Co. have embarked upon-since only a reinvigorated people's movement, and labor movement, can hope to change this course; therefore be it

RESOLVED, That the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, gathered here in Convention, stand firmly opposed to the Bush Administration's program which hurts working people at home and in other countries, and stands committed to building unity and cooperation among unions and all workers, in defense of, and to advancing Labor's fundamental interests.

July 24, 2002

Looking Ahead on AFL-CIO Policy Abroad

Resolution No. 20-Presented by Executive Council of the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, Oakland.

WHEREAS, The impact of economic globalization on American working families and workers everywhere is causing more job dislocation, impoverishment of working families, division among workers and a huge economic gap between rich and poor in the U.S. and among nations, with power shifting more and more into corporate hands; and

WHEREAS, An effective strategy to serve our members' interests and counter the corporate economic globalization agenda is to build solidarity and unity among unions and workers' organizations worldwide based upon mutual respect and our common needs, with mutually determined labor standards based on social justice and human rights based on International Labor Organization (ILO) Fundamental Principles On Rights At Work; and

WHEREAS, While we recognize and applaud the many changes in the international policy and practice of the AFL-CIO, we recognize that serious questions have been raised regarding the past role played by the AFL-CIO in countries such as Chile during the Cold War era; therefore be it

RESOLVED, That this 24th Biennial Convention of the California Labor Federation, call upon the AFL-CIO to convene a meeting with the State Federation and interested affiliates in California to discuss their present foreign affairs activities involving government funds. The aim of the meeting will be to clear the air concerning AFL-CIO policy abroad and to affirm a policy of genuine global solidarity in pursuit of economic and social justice with attention to domestic and international labor standards that include the right to organize and strike, an adequate social safety net, living wages, the right to health care and education, elimination of mandatory overtime, protection of the rights of immigrant workers, prohibitions on strikebreaking and the pursuit of peace among nations and peoples.







Operation TIPS

http://www.calaborfed.org/contacts/Resolutions%20paginated%20for%20Web%20Sit e.pdf

California Labor Federation

July 24, 2002

Oppose TIPS-Support Freedom

Resolution No. 23-Presented by Communications Workers of America Local 9423, San Jose.

WHEREAS, The Bush Administration has announced the Terrorism Information and Prevention System "A national system for concerned workers to report suspicious activity"; and

WHEREAS, As proposed, Operation TIPS-the Terrorism Information and Prevention System is intended to blanket the Nation giving millions of American truckers, letter carriers, train conductors, ship captains, utility employees and others a formal way to report suspicious terrorist activity; and

WHEREAS, Operation TIPS, involving one million workers in the ten-city pilot stage will be a national reporting system that allows these workers whose routines make them well-positioned to recognize unusual events, to report suspicious activity beginning in August 2002; and

WHEREAS, Workers who interact with the public routinely, hold the public's interest at heart. Emergency situations of all types have been responded to by workers without legislation; and

WHEREAS, The perception by the public that certain workers may be spying on them regardless of guilt is reason for grave concern, for this tactic is an attack on our freedom; and

WHEREAS, As seen in Nazi Germany, with workers encouraged to spy on each other, neighbors on neighbors and even family members to spy on their own kin, the government utilized these tactics more for their self-preservation, they must be opposed; therefore be it

RESOLVED, That this 24th Biennial Convention of the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, oppose this program and encourage our elected leaders in Congress, State Government and City and County levels, to oppose this draconian TIPS program; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we call upon the AFL-CIO to join us in demanding that President Bush and Congress cease and desist any development of this program, which is an attack on our freedom. In addition, employers affected should be advised of organized labor's opposition; and be it finally

RESOLVED, That this resolution be submitted to all locals, unions, councils and other organizations affiliated with the California Labor Federation for its adoption and subsequent action notifying Congress and the President.


Colombian Trade Unionists
July 24, 2002

We Stand in Solidarity With Besieged Colombian Trade Unionists and We Shall Not Be Moved

Resolution No. 4-Presented by Plumbers, Steamfitters and Refrigeration Fitters Local 393, San Jose; South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council, San Jose and San Francisco Labor Council, AFL-CIO, San Francisco.

WHEREAS, With $1.6 billion in aid to "Plan Colombia," supposedly to fight drugs, our government is now involved financially and militarily in a 38-year old conflict that has taken the lives of tens of thousands of people and, according to the Central Unitaria Trabajadores (CUT) (largest Colombian labor federation) since 1985, over 3,800 trade unionists have been killed, and in 2001 there were 169 assassinations of union workers, 30 attempted assassinations, 79 unionists were "disappeared" and over 400 reported threats and intimidations; and

WHEREAS, Colombia's unions are the nation's leading advocates against transnational corporate (TNC) and International Monetary Fund (IMF) domination, the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) and for peace, human rights and economic justice, facts which make trade unionists targets for assassination, torture and dismemberment by the rightwing paramilitary AUC (Colombian United Selfdefense) often acting in league with TNCs and official government forces and with almost absolute impunity from prosecution or court action according to reports of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, the Organization of American States Human Rights Commission, Human Rights Watch and the U.S. Department of State; and

WHEREAS, At present, in Colombia there are at least 400 U.S. military "advisers" and in 2002 U.S. aid to Plan Colombia amounts to $1.5 million per day, mostly to the military, whose personnel and resources are supportive of and sometimes interchangeable with the paramilitaries who terrorize unionists, human rights activists, journalists, campesino and indigenous groups and, as of February 7, 2002, President Bush is asking for $98 million more for a new initiative to "protect" an oil company pipeline, although this will openly escalate the so-called war on drugs into a counterinsurgency intervention, not unlike the steps which led to the Vietnam War; and

WHEREAS, The terror used against workers in Colombia coincides with a government/corporate union busting campaign to break organized labor's unanimous resistance to IMF demands for "structural adjustment," amounting to privatization of public services and industries, cutting the eight hour day and overtime pay, undercutting the minimum wage, the system of benefits for low income workers and protections against unjust firings and wholesale reductions in public employment and benefits; and

WHEREAS, The lethal violence against unionists and the impunity of the paramilitary perpetrators denies Colombian workers the right to freely associate, organize and function in unions in violation of internationally recognized standards of the International Labor Organization (ILO); therefore be it

RESOLVED, That this 24th Biennial Convention of the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, call upon Congress to deny all future funds to the Bush Administration for the Colombian military, and call upon Congress and President Bush to stop present funding until the military ceases all ties to the AUC paramilitaries in actual practice at every command level, and until clear progress is made in bringing to justice the paramilitary perpetrators of the thousands of heinous crimes against the people and the trade union movement and until Colombians freely enjoy the internationally recognized workers' rights spelled out by the ILO and their condition satisfies an ILO Commission of Inquiry; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we call upon the AFL-CIO to join us in these demands upon Congress and the President as energetically as possible and to use its publications and correspondence to all unions and labor councils to generate a groundswell of action that will inform officials from Washington, D.C. to Bogota, Colombia, that American workers stand in absolute solidarity with our sisters and brothers in Colombia and we shall not be moved; and be it further

RESOLVED, That we urge the AFL-CIO to continue its praiseworthy initiative in offering relief and sanctuary in this country to Colombian trade unionists under imminent threat by paramilitary death squads, and to expand that fine work to endorse and call upon all affiliates to support public demonstrations of solidarity with the workers and people of Colombia-such as the April 19-22, 2002 days of teach-ins, lobbying, vigils and marches in Washington D.C., and the July 22, 2002 demonstration at Coca Cola headquarters in Atlanta, GA in support of the human rights lawsuit against Coca Cola brought by the United Steel Workers of America in conjunction with the besieged Colombian unionists who work for that giant transnational corporation; and be it further

RESOLVED, That this resolution be submitted to all local unions, councils and other organizations affiliated with the California Labor Federation for its adoption; and be it finally

RESOLVED, That we forward this resolution to President Bush and our representatives in Congress urging their action, and to John Sweeney, General President of the AFL-CIO, for adoption and support as provided for in this resolution.

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