Cross the Line

A judge in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan on Monday ordered striking Central Michigan University (CMU) faculty back to work. Some 600 instructors had walked out that morning against concessions demanded by the school’s administration.

An Isabella County circuit court judge ordered the faculty to return to the job, pending a court hearing Friday morning. The university administration claims the work stoppage is prohibited by the Michigan Public Employment Relations Act, which makes it illegal for public employees to strike. A lawyer for the university asserted in court Monday that the tenured faculty’s “refusal to teach classes would cause irreparable damage to the university and its students,” according to the Mt. Pleasant Morning Sun.

The CMU Faculty Association (FA) argues that the walkout is a protest against unfair labor practices, a protected activity.

The union immediately announced its compliance with the reactionary court ruling.
~ from Court Grants Injunction Against Central Michigan University Faculty Strike by David Walsh ~

As I read the first few paragraphs of this article, I thought I would write this post about how public workers are being assaulted on all sides. Not only are they being assaulted economically by their overlords of the state, but the judicial system seems to be lining up to limit their abilities to take any kind of meaningful stand. My focus changed, however, when I came across the following paragraph,

CMU’s 439 fixed-term [temporary] faculty, who belong to a separate union, and 591 graduate assistants were told by the unions to cross picket-lines Monday.

While the overall concept of labor unions is a good one, in general, trade unions have proven time and again to be problematic. Like so much else in our society, far too often trade unions zero in on what is the most beneficial for their members, while not giving a damn about everybody else!

For unions to be effective -- particularly in our austerity-crazy world -- labor solidarity is key. When one or more trade unions decide to cross another trade unions picket line, they undermine the thrust of the strike. By crossing the line, they give the appearance of siding with management and not with their union brethren.

I'm not specifically blaming the unions of the temporary faculty or the graduate assistants. If one of them was striking, it wouldn't surprise me in the least to find the tenured-faculty union crossing the picket line either. This more has to do with the overall mentality of the trade union movement in modern day America.

Until workers realize they share a common bond as well as a common adversary, true solidarity is impossible. Until workers -- both public and private -- realize that looking out for only their group's singular interests hurts the overall strength of labor, they will remain largely impotent.