ILWU plans May Day stoppage

The West Coast dockers union, set to begin contract negotiations sometime in March, are planning a one-day work stoppage on May 1 to protest U.S. involvement in Iraq and in honor of International Workers’ Day.
   The 42,000-member International Longshore and Warehouse Union, which represents dockworkers on the West Coast and recently approved a negotiating platform for the upcoming contract talks, is calling on AFL-CIO affiliates to join in the day-long celebration.
   ILWU head Robert McEllrath wrote directly to AFL-CIO president John Sweeney to inform the national trade union that the dockers would not be working on May 1. The ILWU’s May Day stoppage occurs each year and is usually announced well in advance allowing marine terminals to plan ahead.
   International Workers' Day is the commemoration of the Haymarket Riot in Chicago in 1886, where a peaceful rally calling for an eight-hour work day turned violent when an unknown person threw a bomb at Chicago police trying to break up the rally. The blast killed a police officer and the ensuing gunfire and resulting melee ended with six additional officers and at least four civilians killed in the square. Sixty officers and an unknown number of civilians were injured. Many of the injured civilians avoided medical treatment out of fear of arrest, and police estimated that the number of civilians injured was “largely in excess of that on the side of the police.” The dead workers eventually came to be seen as martyrs in the international labor movement.
   In 1888, the AFL adopted May 1 as an annual commemoration when members would strike for one day in support of the national push for an eight-hour work day. It would be 1917 before the U.S. Congress officially adopted the Eight Hour Law.