A group of AT&T Mobility employees, including Jeff Schmidt, a retail sales consultant in Fairfax, VA, briefed members of Congress on Sept. 6 about their ongoing dispute with their employer. "We asked them to call [AT&T CEO and President] Randall Stephenson or send him a letter to ask them to come back to the bargaining table and give their workers a fair contract," Schmidt said. "They're not providing information to our bargaining team so we can negotiate a fair contract, and it goes from wages to our benefits, days off, things like that. They’re not offering really anything for us." The workers met with Sens. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) in person and talked to staffers for several other congressional representatives, including Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.). On the eve of their union’s convention, the Seafarers celebrated the 50th anniversary of the founding of their industry-leading training school, the Paul Hall Center for Maritime Training and Education. The name honors the union’s second president, who combined four regional schools into one and located it at Piney Point, MD., just off Chesapeake Bay. Union president Michael Sacco called it "one of the keys to our future," and "the hub of the ship’s wheel." “The Emancipation Proclamation, as we know it today, was issued on January 1, 1863,” writes Laurent Ross. “September 22 (9/22 Labor History) is the anniversary of the Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation which announced that all slaves held in states that had seceded from the Union would be legally considered free as of January 1, 1863. So consider it more like a press release than the actual Emancipation Proclamation.”
“They gave him his orders at Monroe Virginia Said Steve you’re way behind time This is not the 38 this is ‘ol 97 You must put her into Spencer on time” - from Cash's version of "Wreck of the Old 97 |