Long Weekend Honors Labor and Relaxation

Americans flocked to beaches, relaxed at back yard cookouts and attended parades and ceremonies Sunday to honor labor on the last summer holiday weekend.

In Pennsylvania’s Westmoreland County, officials of the United Mine Workers and the United Steelworkers participated in ceremonies designating the grave of murdered labor organizer Fannie Sellins as a historic landmark.

Sellins was 49 when she was killed in August, 1919, by a shotgun blast from a deputy sheriff as she tried to intervene to stop a fight between steelworkers and deputies, according to a coroner’s inquest that said deputies were justified in the shooting.

In nearby Blair County, the formal Johnstown Flood Centennial wrapped up its summer-long celebration with fireworks, walking tours, an ethnic festival and museum visits.

The long holiday weekend also meant that thousands of motorists would be on the nation’s highways. A citizen’s group in Chicago urged drivers with cellular telephones to report drunk drivers.

Legion Convention

In Baltimore, more than 20,000 delegates and guests arrived for the 71st annual American Legion National Convention. The veteran’s organization planned a parade through downtown Baltimore.

In the Chicago area, Cook County Forest Preserve Police geared up for large numbers of holiday revelers at the county’s 200 forest preserves.

“We expect big crowds tomorrow,” Officer Sylvester Wilson said Sunday. “We’ll boost our patrols by 30%. You know, those people get intoxicated and try and go swimming.”

In New Jersey, thousands were expected to jam the Garden State’s beaches, popular again after several were plagued for the last two years by pollution and medical wastes. The summer of ’89 saw only 11 beach closings and none for more than three days.

Florida’s beaches also were crowded over the weekend, despite predictions of some late afternoon thunderstorms. Alligator hunters were also out in numbers there in search of their quota of 15 gators. The monthlong alligator hunt is the second in Florida since the 1960s.

Barbecue Contest

In other holiday events, gourmet cooks from 25 restaurants in Pennsylvania and other states competed in Pittsburgh for top barbecue honors at the Allegheny County Rib Cook-Off.

In St. Paul, Va., the Rev. Jesse Jackson told more than 10,000 cheering members of the UMW and their supporters Sunday that workers in the 1990s will no longer accept government symbolism without good pay and benefits.

“The ‘80s was a decade of great symbolism rather than substance,” Jackson told a noisy UMW rally in a vacant field. “(Former President Ronald) Reagan came in to save the coal miners from the welfare queens--symbolism. (President) Bush came in to save the coal miners . . . from Willie Horton--symbolism.”

Now, the legal issue of burning the American flag is being used to divert attention from the issue of labor justice, Jackson said.

“Bush wants to fight for flags made in Taiwan, not by textile workers,” the civil rights leader said.

Labor Solidarity

UMW President Richard Trumka, whose union is embroiled in a 22-week-old strike against Pittston Coal Group principally over benefits and work schedules, told the crowd that air traffic controllers who struck in 1981 fought alone, and that “was wrong.”

But now, he said, mine workers, communications workers and Eastern Airlines employees have stuck together through strikes.

Jackson agreed that things are changing. “Workers are just coming to grips with the schemes that have given them cotton candy,” he told reporters after his speech.