By Clyde Rucker
Former Verizon Wireless senior customer representative 

As part of International Human Rights Day, Dec. 10, workers across the United States and around the world are mobilizing to demand workers are guaranteed a fundamental human right: The freedom to have a union voice on the job. At rallies, town hall meetings, candlelight vigils and teach-ins across the nation, union members and their allies will highlight the obstacles workers face when seeking to join a union at work and showcase strategies for the overcoming those obstacles.

International Human Rights Day commemorates the anniversary of the ratification of the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, which established the right of people in every nation to come together into unions and bargain contracts.

Although the U.S. government has recognized those rights, many employers routinely deny their employees’ freedom to form a union through illegal firings, threats and intimidation. To strengthen protections for workers’ freedom to choose a union, the union movement worked with a bipartisan coalition in creating the historic Employee Free Choice Act. Introduced into Congress in April 2005, the act (S. 842 and H.R. 1696) would require employers to recognize a union after a majority of workers signs cards authorizing union representation. It also would provide for mediation and arbitration of first-contract disputes and authorize stronger penalties for violation of the law when workers seek to form a union

Clyde Rucker, 59, knows firsthand how employers thwart workers’ freedom to join a union. He was fired from his job as a senior customer representative at Verizon Wireless’ facilities in Laurel, Md., in 2003 after speaking up in favor of unions.    

Rucker, who now works with the Communications Workers of America, spoke about his experiences in a November 2005 interview with the AFL-CIO.

“The majority of workers where I worked want a union, but because of the intimidation by management, they are afraid. They are even afraid to take a piece of literature from a union worker when they leave the parking lot.

I started with Verizon Wireless in 2000 and almost immediately, I knew we needed a union because of the way workers were treated. People were getting promotions who weren’t qualified and employees were disciplined without any due process. Without a union, you don’t have any due process, so if you have a grievance you’re on your own.

They changed work schedules at any time. Many of our workers were single mothers with children, changing schedules was a problem. Even with the [federal] Family and Medical Leave Act, many of my co-workers were fired because they claimed the workers were misusing that particular benefit. And without a union, no one has anywhere to go for a fair grievance hearing

Management held captive audience meetings, telling us things like the union wouldn’t be good for our workplace, it would slow us down, it wouldn’t be as profitable. All of that was nonsense, of course, and I spoke up in those meetings. Many of the workers are young and they didn’t know anything about unions. But I knew better because I grew up in a union household. My father was a Steelworker and my mother was a Garment Worker, so I grew up with unions and I knew the value of unions in the American enterprise. As a result of my parents being in the union, all my siblings––all five of us––were able to go to college, get college degrees and provide a decent quality of life for our own families.

Unions are about quality of life for America. Unions provide decent wages, quality lifestyle, benefits in the workplace that families today need. I used to explain to my younger co-workers that all the benefits they enjoyed today in this country—the 40-hour work week, time-and-a-half for overtime, Family and Medical Leave Act, Americans with Disabilities Act, 15-minute breaks in the morning or afternoon and even more—all of these benefits were put in place by the union and the partnership with Democratic America.

Franklin Roosevelt put these things in place after the Depression and the country got off on the right foot. However, today, corporate America is trying to scale back the gains that unions have won in the workplace. I also tried to explain to them that people fought and died for these benefits and we still need to do the same things. Sacrifices need to be made.

I was fired because I stood on the principle that it is your right as an American citizen to petition for a union in your workplace.

But that hasn’t deterred me. I’m fighting even harder for the union today. It’s a quality of life issue. Americans need to understand that whether you are in a union or not, all of the benefits that you receive in your particular workplace were put in place by the brothers and sisters who fought back in the 1930s, 40s and 50s to have these benefits. 

“Everybody needs a job. Most of the workers at Verizon Wireless where I was located are single mothers, so you know they need their job. But they also wanted a union. Every customer service rep generates about $500,000 for the company, but they are only paid $30,000 a year. I used to remind my co-workers that the CEO and his lieutenants at Verizon Wireless are under contract. But we didn’t have a contract and they could terminate us at any time for any reason.

That’s how it is in the American workplace. America is the richest nation on the planet and there’s no reason for the majority of American workers to be underpaid. The federal government is doing everything it can to stifle the people from organizing. Corporations in this country have more rights than a human being. Corporations are running the federal government and it’s getting worse. American workers need to step up to the plate and bring about a change.”