Mode of Program Participation
Academic Scholarship
Participation Type
Paper
Presentation #1 Title
Local 1199 at Clinch Valley: Justice Unionism in a Right-to-Work State, 1972-1974
Presentation #1 Abstract or Summary
By 1969 Local 1199, a union representing health care workers, had begun to organize beyond its base in New York City. The union, represented by West Virginia-born organizer Larry Harless, won a few victories in small private hospitals in West Virginia in the early 1970s. Local 1199 commanded wide attention in Appalachia in 1973 with a campaign at the Clinch Valley Clinic Hospital, a private facility in Richlands, Virginia, owned by Bluefield Sanitarium, Inc. Pro-union Clinch Valley service and maintenance workers faced heavy odds. Virginia had been a Right-to-Work state since 1947, meaning that “union security” agreements such as automatic dues checkoffs from workers covered by a union contract were illegal. Moreover, there was a possibility that the workers would be chastised for pushing traditional gendered boundaries of women working in “helping” occupations. Failing for five months to secure voluntary recognition from the hospital, over 85% of Clinch Valley employees struck early in 1973. In February 140 workers, mostly women, were arrested for violating a picketing injunction. Their jailing mobilized public opinion in their favor and prompted five thousand local UMWA miners to stage a one-day sympathy walkout. Unable to control the public’s perception of the strike, the hospital finally signed a one-year contract recognizing 1199. Hospital management immediately began a new campaign to undermine the contract, and successfully “decertified” the union (by one vote) when the contract expired in 1974. This paper addresses three themes: the expansion of the civil rights and social justice foundations of an urban-based service workers' union into an Appalachian context; the mobilization of union and anti-union sentiment in Tazewell County; and American labor law since 1970. The paper will rely on Tazewell County Circuit Court documents, contemporary newspaper and periodical reporting, oral history, and secondary works on working-class issues in the 1970s. The presentation will include a few slides. Topics: Appalachian labor history; labor law; democratic unionism
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #1
John Hennen taught Appalachian, Latin American, and American working-class history for twenty years at Morehead State University. He is now living in Craig County, Virginia and teaching Appalachian Studies at Virginia Tech. His most recent article, entitled 'Toil, Trouble, Transformation: Workers and Unions in Modern Kentucky' appeared in the Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 113:2&3, Spring/Summer 2015.
Local 1199 at Clinch Valley: Justice Unionism in a Right-to-Work State, 1972-1974
By 1969 Local 1199, a union representing health care workers, had begun to organize beyond its base in New York City. The union, represented by West Virginia-born organizer Larry Harless, won a few victories in small private hospitals in West Virginia in the early 1970s. Local 1199 commanded wide attention in Appalachia in 1973 with a campaign at the Clinch Valley Clinic Hospital, a private facility in Richlands, Virginia, owned by Bluefield Sanitarium, Inc. Pro-union Clinch Valley service and maintenance workers faced heavy odds. Virginia had been a Right-to-Work state since 1947, meaning that “union security” agreements such as automatic dues checkoffs from workers covered by a union contract were illegal. Moreover, there was a possibility that the workers would be chastised for pushing traditional gendered boundaries of women working in “helping” occupations. Failing for five months to secure voluntary recognition from the hospital, over 85% of Clinch Valley employees struck early in 1973. In February 140 workers, mostly women, were arrested for violating a picketing injunction. Their jailing mobilized public opinion in their favor and prompted five thousand local UMWA miners to stage a one-day sympathy walkout. Unable to control the public’s perception of the strike, the hospital finally signed a one-year contract recognizing 1199. Hospital management immediately began a new campaign to undermine the contract, and successfully “decertified” the union (by one vote) when the contract expired in 1974. This paper addresses three themes: the expansion of the civil rights and social justice foundations of an urban-based service workers' union into an Appalachian context; the mobilization of union and anti-union sentiment in Tazewell County; and American labor law since 1970. The paper will rely on Tazewell County Circuit Court documents, contemporary newspaper and periodical reporting, oral history, and secondary works on working-class issues in the 1970s. The presentation will include a few slides. Topics: Appalachian labor history; labor law; democratic unionism
