September 20th, 2009 in Pittsburgh, the (USW) United Steel Workers Union and (U.E.) United Electrical Workers have endorsed and will be mobilizing for the March for Jobs.
Dear Union Friends, We urge you to join a broad cross section of community, labor, religious and progressive activists in Pittsburgh for a National March for Jobs to help revive Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream of a movement for full employment. The March will assemble after church services at 2 p.m., Sunday, Sept. 20, in front of the Monumental Baptist Church, Soho and Wylie Streets, in the historic Hill District of Pittsburgh. Buses, cars and vans will be coming from all over the country  from as far away as Los Angeles and the Bay area and as near as Warren and Youngstown, Ohio. Please endorse the March for Jobs. More importantly, encourage your members to participate. Bring your union banners and signs. Help those hardest hit: the jobless and homeless by donating funds for transportation and food.
Today we need a movement for the right to a job more than ever. New York Times columnist Bob Herbert wrote that rising unemployment and underemployment are “by far, the nation’s biggest problem and should be its No. 1 priority,” in a recent piece entitled “A Scary Reality.” Union advocates have rightfully pointed out two major facts: the official unemployment figures do not include workers who have given up looking for jobs and a huge number of higher-paying union jobs will be permanently lost.
As we get ready for Labor Day let’s recommit ourselves to organizing and mobilizing for all things that are important to working people — both organized and un-organized. The enemies of labor have been doing just that this summer. We cannot allow them to drown out our voices. Health care, the Employee Free Choice Act, a moratorium on home foreclosures, and Dr. King’s vision of a world where peace and justice triumph over war and greed must be put clearly on the agenda. Dr. King devoted the final months of his life to opening what he called the second civil rights movement: the fight for the right to a living wage job. This vision is more urgently needed now than at any other time. It was the central goal of the poor people’s campaign and the reason that brought him to Memphis where he was cut down on that terrible day. We implore the labor movement with its tremendous resources, traditions and experience to extend its hand to the community and the unorganized. Join us on Sept. 20, in remembering and renewing the dreamer’s final cause that all will have a right to a living wage job. In the spirit of unity, justice and peace, Rev. Tom Smith, Monumental Baptist Church
Sharon Black, Union coordinator, March 4 Jobs
Call us at 412-780-3813 or 410-218-4835
Email March4Jobs@gmail.com
