The Union Press

March 2023

Welcome to the Union Press

Editor’s note

History of Labor Unions in the U.S.

Where they came from, and where they’re going

Judge Bans Starbucks from Firing Union Supporters

Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services Announce Additional Steps to Tackle Child Labor Vioations

LEADERS IN HISTORY 1 2 7 9

Mother Jones: “The Most Dangerous Woman in America”

CURRENT UNION LEADERS

The Tragic Derailment of Train 32N

A freight train carrying toxic chemicals derailed 50 miles outside Pittsburgh, forced thousands to evacuate, and created a toxic cloud.

Liz Shuler: AFL–CIO’s First Female President So you want to form a union...

For the first time in history, AFL–CIO is being led by a female union activist. A step-by-step of the two most common ways of organizing a workplace. What union busting is, and how to identify the signs.

Rachel McGuire is a recent college graduate who works as a barista at her local coffee shop. In the midst of trying to unionize her workplace, Rachel decided that unionization is something that most people don’t know enough about. Rachel and her best friends Bethany Li and Zachary Peterson, both recent graduates from Mizzou’s School of Journalism, got to work to publish The Union Press.

The trio wanted to bring something fresh, new, and inspired to the world. The Union Press is a different labor union magazine. It is meant for union workers and curious minds alike, and features workforce news, historical backgrounds, guides for workplace organization, and more! With the help of many wonderful people, The Union Press is here.

Workers of the world, unite!

The History of Labor Unions in the U.S.

For starters...what is a labor union?

Labor unions have a democratic structure, holding elections to choose officers who are charged with making decisions that are beneficial to the members. Employees pay dues to the union and, in return, the labor union acts as an advocate on the employees’ behalf. Labor unions are often industry-specific and tend to be most common today among public sector (government) employees and those in transportation and utilities.

To form a union, a locally based group of employees obtains a charter from a national-level labor organization. Two large organizations oversee most of the labor unions in the U.S.—the Change to Win Federation (CtW) and the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO). The AFL-CIO was formed in 1955 after the two groups merged. The CtW spun off from the AFL-CIO in 2005.

Nearly all unions are structured and work in similar ways. U.S. law requires an employer to actively bargain with a union in good faith; however, the employer is not required to agree to any specific terms. Multiple negotiation rounds are conducted between the union’s bargaining unit—a group of members whose duty is to assure that its members are properly compensated and represented—and the employer.

A collective bargaining agreement (CBA) is eventually agreed upon and signed. The CBA outlines pay scales and includes other terms of employment, such as vacation and sick days, benefits, working hours, and working conditions.

After signing the CBA, an employer cannot change the agreement without a union representative’s approval; however, CBAs eventually expire, at which time the labor union and management must negotiate and sign a new agreement.

The Rise of Labor Unions in the U.S.

Labor unions have existed in the United States since the birth of the country, tracing their origins back to the 18th-century Industrial Revolution in Europe.

The first recorded instance of a worker strike in America occurred in 1768 when journeymen tailors protested a wage reduction. In 1794, Philadelphia shoemakers formed a union called the Federal Society of Journeymen Cordwainers; its establishment marked the beginning of sustained trade union organization in the U.S.

From this point forward, local craft and trade unions proliferated in major American cities. Industrialization resulted in the aggregation of workers in large factories, creating fertile ground for union growth. Large factories also put multiple trades under one roof, eventually leading to alliances among unions. Achieving a shorter workday was one of the unions’ major accomplishments.

Excluding Women, Black Workers, and Immigrants

After the Civil War and the end of slavery, the need for both skilled and unskilled labor increased. Union members in the skilled trades remained overwhelmingly native-born White Protestant males throughout the 19th century. These higherpaid workers had the funds to pay union dues and contribute to strike funds. They were reluctant to organize unskilled Irish and Italian immigrants, and also excluded women and Black workers. Black workers were often paid lower wages, which made White workers fear they would be replaced by cheaper labor.

Excluded groups organized their own unions. Black caulkers in the shipbuilding industry held a strike at the Washington Navy Yard in 1835.

Women tailors, shoe binders, mill workers, and Black laundresses formed their own unions.

In 1867, the National Union for Cigar Makers was the first union to accept women and Black workers. And in 1912, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, which had been organizing in the telephone industry, accepted telephone operators who were primarily women.

Protecting Workers’ Rights

Winning gains for all workers and citizens—such as a shorter workday and a minimum wage—has been a key part of union activity. In 1866, the National Labor Union was created with the goal of limiting the workday for federal employees to eight hours. However, the private sector was much harder for unions to penetrate.

With a continual flood of immigrants coming into the country, the price of labor declined. One group was often pitted against another to keep wages down. When Irish workers won raises in pay from the railroads, for example, Chinese workers were brought in to replace them. In 1867, thousands of Chinese workers, who were grading and digging tunnels for the transcontinental railroad, simultaneously threw down their picks and shovels, protesting their lower pay compared with White workers. Their strike failed after the railroad owner cut off all food and supplies.

Poor pay and working conditions led to work stoppages by the Pullman Railroad Workers and the United Mine Workers, but both strikes were broken up by the government. Eugene Debs, leader of the American Railway Union in the 1894 strike against the Pullman Company, was unable to convince members of his union to accept Black railroad workers. Black workers in turn served as strikebreakers for the Pullman Company and for the owners of Chicago meatpacking companies whose stockyard workers struck in sympathy.

In 1925, A. Philip Randolph began his successful 12-year fight to gain recognition for the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters by the Pullman Car Company, the American Federation of Labor (AFL), and the U.S. government. Randolph ultimately succeeded in his quest in 1937.

Labor Reform Legislation

Unions worked not only for improvements in pay and working conditions but also for labor reforms. The Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions was formed in 1881 and

the AFL was founded five years later. Their combined organizing force led to the act of Congress that created the Department of Labor (DOL) in 1913.

The Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914 allowed employees to strike and boycott their employers; it was followed by the Walsh-Healey Public Contracts Act (PCA) of 1936 and the Fair Labor Standards Acts of 1938, which mandated a minimum wage, extra pay for overtime work, and basic child labor laws. Later on, the AFL-CIO played a crucial role in helping to pass civil rights legislation in 1964–1965.

Impact of the Depression and War

From the Civil War through World War I, labor unions grew in power and number. During the 1920s, they lost some influence, but the Great Depression quickly reversed this trend, with workers turning to their local trade unions to find employment and protection.

Union membership grew exponentially as the Depression wore on. The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), established in the 1930s, organized large numbers of Black workers into labor unions for the first time. There were more than 200,000 Black workers in the CIO in 1940, many of them officers of union locals.

“I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change.... I’m changing the things I cannot accept.”

– Angela Davis

During World War II, the influence of labor unions was somewhat curtailed. Some unions, such as those in the defense industry, were forbidden by the government to strike because of the impediment it would present to wartime production. But the end of the war saw a wave of strikes in many industries; union power and membership (as a percent of employment) reached a high point during this period, from the 1940s to the 1950s. The AFL merged with the CIO–becoming the AFL-CIO in 1955–in order to influence policies that would impact the American labor force.

Some of the founding trade unionists were socialists, communists, or anarchists interested in leveraging union organization into broader revolutionary change. Others focused solely on bread-and-butter issues. Federal legislation known as the Taft-Hartley Act, passed in 1947 over President Truman’s veto, required all union officials to file an affidavit and take an oath that they were not communists. This and many other provisions of the act (such as the ban of sympathy strikes or boycotts) led to a weakening of the union movement.

Organizing Lower-Paid Workers

The next decades brought unionization to some of the lowest-paid workers in the nation’s hospitals, nursing homes, and farms. Hospital workers in New York City were organized by 1199, a mostly White and Jewish union of pharmacists led by Leon Davis. In the late 1950s, during the first flush of the civil rights movement, 1199 mobilized the largely Black and Latinx workforce.

An unprecedented 46-day strike at seven of the city’s most prestigious hospitals ended with the workers winning union recognition and better pay and working conditions. In the 1990s, 1199 organized thousands of nursing home and home care workers, and later merged with Service Employees International Union (SEIU) to become 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East.

From 1965 to 1970, Filipino and Mexican American farmworkers, led by Philip Vera Cruz, Cesar Chavez, and Dolores Huerta, organized a grape boycott that succeeded in rallying national support.

After five years, it brought grape growers to the table to sign a first union contract granting better pay, benefits, and protections. However, agricultural workers today still have a very low rate of union membership.

In 1979, the number of union members reached a peak of 21 million. As additional laws were passed outlawing child

labor and mandating equal pay for equal work regardless of race or gender, workers were able to rely on federal laws to protect them. Despite the erosion in labor unions’ member numbers, power, and influence since that time, they continued to prove their importance, particularly in the political sphere.

Unions Today

In 2008, unions were instrumental in getting President Barack Obama elected (and re-elected in 2012). Union leaders were hopeful that Obama would be able to pass the Employee Free Choice Act, legislation intended to streamline and shorten the process of bringing new members into unions. But Democrats were unable to garner enough support to pass the law.

Union membership decreased during the Obama administration, which may have led some union members to switch their support to Republican Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential election. Current President Joe Biden then worked to get unions back on board with the Democrats by vowing to be the “most pro-union president leading the most pro-union administration in American history.”

Today, the highest rates of union membership are in the public sector and specifically in local government, which covers the heavily unionized occupations of police officers, firefighters, and teachers. Private-sector industries with high unionization rates include utilities, motion pictures, and sound recording, and transportation and warehousing.

In 2021, non-union workers had median weekly earnings of $975, which is $194 less than the $1,169 recorded for union members.

Organized labor is now more diverse than ever before. In 2021, 14 million people employed in the U.S. belonged to unions, representing about a tenth of the working population. Representation was fairly evenly divided among genders and races, with Black workers, at an enrollment rate of 11.5%, the most likely of all races to be part of a union.

Less encouraging for unions is the gradual decline in membership rates—in 1983, about 20% of the working U.S. population was part of a union. Still, there are some signs that the popularity of unions is improving.

Approval for labor unions is at its highest point since 1965, according to a Gallup Poll, with 68% of Americans said to be in favor of them in 2021. COVID-19 is one of the reasons labor unions are winning over Americans again. Key themes that have emerged during the pandemic include employees being forced to work without protective gear, having no access to sick pay, and being subjected to mass layoffs.

Employees have successfully organized unions recently at some Amazon, Starbucks and Apple facilities and stores. A tight labor market in 2022 is also increasing membership.

Younger generations are also helping to boost union membership. Some reports claim the biggest gains in union membership in recent years have been among workers aged 34 and under. Young people are unionizing in new sectors, too, such as art museums, cannabis shops, digital-media brands, political campaigns, and tech companies.

When Did Unions Start to Form in the U.S.?

The first strike to be recorded in the U.S. took place in 1768 when journeymen tailors protested their wage getting slashed Twenty-six years later, in 1794, The Federal Society of Journeymen Cordwainers was formed, marking the beginning of sustained trade union organization among American workers.

Why Were Unions Created?

Labor unions were created to protect employee rights and stop exploitation. Members fight together for better pay and working conditions and collectively can be influential enough to engineer change.

What Tools Do Labor Unions Use to Enforce Change?

Two powerful tools that unions use to promote their members’ interests are strikes, which essentially involve refusing to work as a form of protest, and collective bargaining, which is the negotiating of employment terms between an employer and a group of workers.

The Bottom Line

Labor unions have a long history in the United States and have broadly influenced politics and the economy over the years. Some of the benefits of unions for workers have included higher wages and better working conditions.

Union membership reached a peak in the 1940s and 1950s. After declining in recent decades, younger generations, the impact of the pandemic on workers, and a tight labor market are helping to boost union membership.

Interesting fact:

In 2021, about 92% of union members in the United States had access to paid sick leave. On the other hand, about 77% of non-union members in the country had access to paid sick leave.

“Labor is not fighting for a larger slice of the national pie — labor is fighting for a larger pie.”

– Walter Reuther

Organized labor and civil rights activist, United Automobile Workers (UAW) from 1946–1970

Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services Announce Additional Steps to Tackle Child Labor Violations

The U.S. Departments of Labor and Health and Human Services today announced a Memorandum of Agreement to advance ongoing efforts to address child labor exploitation.

The department’s Wage and Hour Division and the Health and Human Services Department’s Administration for Children and Families signed the agreement to formalize a partnership between the agencies, and outline procedures the agencies will follow as they work together to deepen information-sharing, coordination, training and education. The MOA seeks to maximize the division’s enforcement of the child labor protections of the Fair Labor Standards Act, to enhance the ability to protect children from exploitation and to connect individuals to needed benefits and services.

The agreement will do the following:

- Help identify geographies and employers where children are likely being exploited.

- Aid investigations by providing information to help identify circumstances where children are unlawfully employed.

- Facilitate coordination to ensure that victims or potential victims of child labor trafficking have access to critical services.

The agreement will also support the efforts of the interagency child labor task force announced on Feb. 27, 2023.

“Our partnership with the Department of Health and Human Services will help us

continue to combat illegal child labor and protect the most vulnerable,” said Solicitor of Labor Seema Nanda. “Our economy cannot — and will not — rely on the illegal hiring of vulnerable children. We will work across the federal government and with local and state partners to fight child labor exploitation.”

Since 2018, the Department of Labor has seen a 69 percent increase in children employed in violation of child labor laws. On Feb. 17, 2023, the department announced the resolution of one of the largest child labor cases in its history against Packers Sanitation Services Inc. LTD. Currently, the department is investigating more than 600 child labor cases.

“Child labor exploitation can disrupt a youth’s health, safety, education and overall well-being, which are unacceptable consequences for any child,” said Assistant Secretary for the Administration for Children and Families January Contreras. “This partnership with the Department of Labor provides further opportunity

to carry out our mission of protecting the well-being of children by arming ourselves and our partners – inside and outside of government – with the information and tools needed to help us all be a part of preventing and responding to child labor exploitation.”

In addition to the MOA, the two departments have announced steps to further strengthen collaboration to combat child labor. The Department of Labor is holding employers like PSSI accountable for systemic abuses of child labor and launched a strategic enforcement initiative on child labor, now underway. It is also enhancing scrutiny for all employers to target labor violations at all steps in a supply chain. Finally, the department is calling on Congress to strengthen protections for all child workers and increase civil monetary penalties for child labor violations.

For its part, HHS is expanding postrelease services for children and sponsors after children have left their care. The departments are collaborating on training materials to be deployed to relevant HHS programs and partners, and for unaccompanied children and their sponsors to educate them about child labor laws in the U.S. and their rights. Both departments will continue to collaborate on the creation of materials that are clear, easily accessible, and available to children, sponsors and other stakeholders.

Judge Bans Starbucks From Firing Union Supporters

A federal judge in Michigan is banning Starbucks from firing U.S. workers over unionization efforts

A federal judge in Michigan issued an injunction on Friday banning Starbucks from firing U.S. workers because they seek to form a union or engage in other collective activities.

The move is the first nationwide judicial mandate related to the labor campaign that has led to the unionization of more than 275 company-owned Starbucks stores in little more than a year. Starbucks said it would appeal the decision.

Experts said the injunction would allow the National Labor Relations Board to come before the judge and seek more rapid reinstatement of workers who it believed had been terminated for union organizing. Normally, the process could take months or even years.

The union organizing Starbucks stores, Workers United, has accused the company of firing more than 200 workers because of their involvement in the campaign. It is illegal for a company in the United States to fire workers for so-called protected concerted activity such as seeking to unionize.

In a court filing, the labor board said it was prosecuting the illegal firing of roughly 50 workers after finding merit in their accusations. The agency is still investigating other cases and is likely to bring more of them.

Starbucks has denied the accusations.

The injunction was sought by the labor board’s regional office in the case of Hannah Whitbeck, a shift supervisor who was involved in the union campaign. She was fired in April. “I’m happy that my case is being viewed at a higher level and bringing attention to Starbucks illegally firing partners for unionizing,” Ms. Whitbeck said in a statement.

The judge, Mark A. Goldsmith, ordered Ms. Whitbeck reinstated whilethe National Labor Relations Board in Washington was deciding her case.

Wilma Liebman, who was chairwoman of the labor board under President Barack Obama, said the judge could eventually hold Starbucks in contempt of the order and could fine the company if there was compelling evidence that it wasn’t complying. “This definitely adds a layer of protection and recourse for future violations, and it definitely speeds up the ordered reinstatement of anyone alleged to have been unlawfully discharged,” she said.

Starbucks said in a statement that the facts of the case didn’t merit such an order.

“We feel the extraordinary measure for injunctive relief prior to a full legal review of the matter is unwarranted and maintain that actions taken were lawful and in alignment with established partner policies,” the company said. Starbucks said it had fired Ms. Whitbeck because she left the store early during a shift, effectively forcing a co-worker

to manage the store alone for roughly 20 or 30 minutes. That violated a company rule requiring at least two employees to be on hand.

Ms. Whitbeck didn’t dispute the facts of the case but contended that the violation would not have led to a firing absent her involvement in the union campaign, which included wearing a pro-union button.

The labor board found merit in her charge and issued a complaint, and an administrative judge ruled in her favor in October. Starbucks has appealed that decision to the full labor board in Washington.

The company noted in its statement that it had offered, and that Ms. Whitbeck had accepted, temporary reinstatement before the federal judge’s order.

But the judge concluded that reinstatement without a court order would leave her vulnerable to retaliation as her case unfolded.

Mother Jones

She was a school teacher, a mother, and the most dangerous woman in America.

The most famous female labor activist of the nineteenth century, Mary Harris Jones—aka “Mother Jones”—was a self-proclaimed “hell-raiser” in the cause of economic justice. She was so strident that a US attorney once labeled her “the most dangerous woman in America.”

Born circa August 1, 1837 in County Cork, Ireland, Jones immigrated to Toronto, Canada, with her family at age five—prior to the potato famine with its waves of Irish immigrants.

She first worked as a teacher in a Michigan Catholic school, then as a seamstress in Chicago. She moved to Memphis for another teaching job, and in 1861 married George Jones, a member of the Iron Molders Union. They had four children in six years. In 1867, tragedy struck when her entire family died

in a yellow fever epidemic; she dressed in black for the rest of her life.

Returning to Chicago, Jones resumed sewing but lost everything she owned in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. She found solace at Knights of Labor meetings, and in 1877, took up the cause of working people. Jones focused on the rising number of working poor during industrialization, especially as wages shrunk, hours increased, and workers had no insurance for unemployment, healthcare or old age.

Jones first displayed her oratorical and organizing abilities in Pittsburgh during the Great Railroad Strike of 1877. She took part in and led hundreds of strikes, including those that led to the Haymarket riot in Chicago in 1886. She paused briefly to publish The New Right in 1899 and a two-volume Letter of Love and Labor in 1900 and 1901. A beloved leader, the workers she organized nicknamed her “Mother Jones.”

Beginning in 1900, Jones focused on miners, organizing in the coal fields of West Virginia and Pennsylvania. For a few years, she was employed by the United Mine Workers, but left when the national leadership disavowed a wildcat strike in Colorado. After a decade in the West, Jones returned to West Virginia, where, after a violent strike in 1912-1913, she was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder. Public appeals on her behalf convinced the

governor to commute her twenty-year sentence. Afterward she returned to Colorado and made a national crusade out of the tragic events during the Ludlow Massacre, even lobbying President Woodrow Wilson. Later, she participated in several industrial strikes on the East Coast between 1915 and 1919 and continued to organize miners well into her nineties.

Despite her radicalism, Jones did not support women’s suffrage, arguing that “you don’t need a vote to raise hell.” She pointed out that the women of Colorado had the vote and failed to use it to prevent the appalling conditions that led to labor violence. She also considered suffragists unwitting dupes of class warfare. Jones argued that suffragists were naïve women who unwittingly acted as duplicitous agents of class warfare.

Although Jones organized working class women, she held them in auxiliaries, maintaining that—except when the union called—a woman’s place was in the home. A reflection of her Catholic heritage, she believed that men should be paid well enough so that women could devote themselves to motherhood.

In 1925, she published her Autobiography of Mother Jones. She is buried in the Union Miners Cemetery in Mount Olive, Illinois.

Liz Shuler

AFL–CIO, for the first time in history, is being led by a female union activist.

In the late 2000s, Liz Shuler joined AFL–CIO, the largest federation of unions in the United States, which works with more than 12.5 million members at 57 unions, including those representing strikers at Kellogg’s and John Deere. When Richard Trumka, the secretary treasurer of the AFL-CIO, tapped Shuler as his running mate in the election for the labor federation’s presidency in 2009, the team emerged triumphant.

Trumka then named Shuler head of the AFL-CIO’s youth outreach efforts, where she spent more than 10 years heading up outreach to workers under the age of 35, using digital engagement methods to connect with workers and supporters alike.

After the unexpected death of longtime leader Trumka this year, Shuler made history as the first woman to helm the federation after being elected in August. She plans to serve the remainder of Trumka’s term until June 2022.

Since “Striketober,” Shuler has penned op-eds for The Washington Post, NBC, and others in support of the workers across industries on the picket lines during the pandemic.

“The coronavirus pandemic, coupled with our country’s prolonged shortage of jobs that provide living wages, good benefits, and adequate working conditions, has created momentum for our movement on a scale we’ve never seen before,” Shuler tells BAZAAR.

With an electrical lineman and union member father and

a secretary mother, both of who were employed by Portland General Electric (PGE), Shuler, a Gladstone, Oregon, native, was destined to be a formidable advocate in the labor movement. After attending the University of Oregon, where she worked summers at PGE, Shuler first became active in union work as an organizer for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 1245, ironically contributing to a campaign to organize clerical workers at PGE. By 1997, she was working as a lobbyist for the IBEW, where she was able to overcome a bill to deregulate Oregon’s electricity market.

Shuler rose through the ranks at IBEW, quickly going on to teach in the union’s education and training programs, serve on the State of Oregon Management-Labor Advisory Committee on Workers’ Compensation, and be appointed an IBEW international representative. Her work took her to Washington, D.C., where she worked in the IBEW’s Political and Legislative Affairs Department. In 2004, Shuler became the executive assistant to IBEW President Edwin Hill, effectively making her the highest-ranking woman in the union’s history. The role would allow Shuler to oversee many of the IBEW’s most crucial departments, including education, policy, public relations, and workplace safety divisions.

Now, one of her main focuses is advocating for the advancement of President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better Act, which purports to invest billions of dollars into

improvements in childcare, including raising child and home care workers’ pay to a minimum of $15 an hour and providing money to upgrade childcare centers.

“For too long, women have been underpaid, undervalued, and expected to take on most of the unpaid care work,” Shuler says. “That’s why on the national level, we’re working to pass the Build Back Better Act, which will put gender equity at the center of our economic recovery where it belongs.”

The Tragic Derailment of Train 32N

A freight train carrying toxic chemicals derailed 50 miles outside Pittsburgh, forced thousands to evacuate, and created a toxic cloud.

Workers knew the train had safety issues.

On the evening of February 3, Norfolk Southern train 32N derailed just outside of East Palestine, Ohio, 50 miles northwest of Pittsburgh. Thirty-eight of the train’s 150 cars plowed into each other and thundered to the ground. Some of the cars then burst into flames, and the flames damaged another 12 cars.

Of those dozens of derailed cars, five were tankers containing vinyl chloride, an industrial chemical used to make hard plastic. Breathing in vinyl chloride, which can happen if it gets into the air or water supply, is a known risk for various types of cancers.

Initially, the tankers containing the vinyl chloride did their jobs, protecting the dangerous chemical from leaking. But a rapid temperature change made Norfolk Southern worried the tankers wouldn’t hold, which would produce a massive explosion and release the known carcinogen into the air and ground just outside a town where thousands of people live. They chose to burn it instead, creating a giant smoke cloud that rose high into the air.

It is too early to say what the long term impacts of 32N’s derailment will be. It is also too early to say what caused 32N to go off the rails. But it was not a surprise to some people who work for Norfolk Southern.

The workers have been warning that something like this, or even much worse, was inevitable.

Motherboard has been reporting on the freight rail industry for two years, during which time we have interviewed dozens of Norfolk Southern employees across the company’s service area about how a change in management philosophy has made working conditions worse and jeopardized safety in exchange for supposed gains in efficiency. This article includes many details about the company’s safety practices Motherboard has previously reported on.

In the past week, Motherboard has also interviewed two workers with direct knowledge of 32N. Those workers have provided additional details about 32N included in this story that shed light

on the train’s reputation in the months before its derailment. Motherboard also reviewed documents showing details of the train’s weight distribution by car and broken down by sections of the train. Motherboard is not revealing the names of those workers because they are fearful of retribution for speaking publicly.

For years, Norfolk Southern, like many other freight rail companies, has prioritized moving trains as quickly as possible out of terminals and rail yards over safety as part of a wider move across the freight railroad industry towards a management philosophy called Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR) intended to move more freight for lower costs. Safety inspection times and personnel have been slashed, hindering efforts to ensure trains are safe before they leave yards or terminals. Crews are dissuaded from reporting safety issues. Workers that persist in raising red flags are often ignored. Norfolk Southern spokesperson Jeff DeGraff previously told Motherboard for a story in 2021, “Norfolk Southern is firmly committed at all levels to operating

safely, protecting our employees and the communities that we serve.”

“Two years ago SMART [a transportation union] President Jeremy Ferguson warned your publication and anyone that would listen that something like this was going to happen,” one of the Norfolk Southern employees this week said. “They’re going to keep happening if regulators continue to allow this business model to ravage our nation’s freight rail system in the pursuit of profit. My fear is that these corporations have so much money and political influence that nothing is going to change.”

Notorious 32N

In past years, Motherboard has reported that Norfolk Southern’s lax safety practices have been applied to its entire network, reflecting a trend happening across the freight rail industry. But the two workers Motherboard spoke to this week said 32N in particular was a known safety risk. Like airline flight numbers, railroads assign the same train number to different physical trains that run the same routes on a repetitive schedule. 32N, which travels from outside St. Louis to the edge of Pittsburgh, has a reputation.

On the run that ended abruptly on the outskirts of East Palestine, multiple red flags, including two mechanical problems, about 32N went undetected or were ignored in the hours leading up to the crash, according to the two workers familiar with the train. These red flags were especially concerning, said these workers, because 32N is widely known among workers as a difficult train to run, not because of especially difficult terrain or equipment, but as a result of management decisions about how the train would be put together.

As a result, 32N has a nickname among some rail workers. It is common for trains to have nicknames in the railroad industry, but, as one worker told Motherboard, the nicknames are given “for a reason.” They call this one “32 Nasty.”

In a statement, Norfolk Southern spokesperson Connor Spielmaker told Motherboard that “Assigning a ‘reputation’ to a train that fluctuates by thousands of tons on a regular basis is inaccurate” and that whatever the size of this particular run of 32N, it used to be bigger. “More importantly, this train previously ran as one longer and heavier train before

being split into two shorter, lighter trains in the past few months as part of a regular review of our network plan—where we adjusted a significant number of our trains and their schedules.”

Spielmaker also disputed the assertion that the train’s weight was unevenly and their schedules.” Spielmaker also disputed the assertion that the train’s weight was unevenly distributed.

Three days after the derailment, with the tankers containing vinyl chloride in a critical state, the Ohio National Guard as well as the governors of Ohio and Pennsylvania forced thousands of people from the town and surrounding areas to evacuate. Norfolk Southern conducted a “controlled release” of the tankers. This involved blowing holes in the tankers, leaking the vinyl chloride into a trench, and setting it on fire. The operation created a gigantic smoke cloud that garnered apocalyptic comparisons. Officials warned, according to the Associated Press, “the controlled burn would send phosgene and hydrogen chloride into the air.” Phosgene was one of several toxic chemicals used in World War I as a chemical weapon. Hydrogen chloride has strict exposure limits because overexposure can result in chemical burns, respiratory failure, and death.

Authorities insisted the operation was a success and the air was safe enough for residents of the town and nearby areas to return three days later, even though some residents said the air smelled strange and, according to local media reports, animals started getting sick and dying.

“I’ve talked to crews in other areas who know of this train,” said Clyde Whitaker, the Ohio state legislative board director for SMART Transportation, a rail worker union, who specializes in safety issues, referring to 32N. “It’s a notorious train.”

“Safety Fourth”

In 2021, Motherboard reported there was an increasing likelihood of a catastrophic freight train derailment due to the implementation of Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR), a management philosophy its defenders argue uses technology to improve

promising investors it would improve its “operating ratio”—how much it spends to run trains as a percentage of how much it makes running trains—by more than five percent in two years. It would do that, in part, by reducing its workforce by a minimum of 3,000 people. Under PSR, the industry as a whole has slashed its workforce by more than a third in less than six years, according to data collected by the Surface Transportation Board. As Motherboard reported in 2021, “Across the different crafts, workers highlighted the same general problem: in the push for efficiency, fewer workers are being tasked with more, rushed through safety-critical inspections and repairs, and are pressured not to report defects or potential safety issues that will take cars out of service and require manpower to fix.”

The warnings expressed by industry insiders in Motherboard’s reporting, Congressional hearings, proposed regulation change comments, and other forums have not changed working conditions for rail workers. The House

transportation committee requested the Government Accountability Office study the issue, which has no regulatory power, resulting in a 57-page report published at the end of last year. The report did little more than summarize existing talking points.

The precise impact of PSR on railroad safety is difficult to say because it has been implemented gradually across the industry at the same time as other safety initiatives, In the time PSR has been implemented, a legally-mandated backup train control system called positive train control intended to prevent trains from going too fast has come into effect, as have regulations around tank car valves carrying hazardous materials, reducing the number of reported spills.

Whitaker, SMART’s Ohio legislative director, worked for 20 years as a conductor and engineer for CSX, the first of the large railroad companies to commit to PSR, but says he has seen the impacts of PSR rattle the industry. He told Motherboard the safety implications of PSR is a “very complex issue because it involves so much,” the tentacles of the management philosophy reaching every aspect of the organization. This sentiment was matched by every employee Motherboard spoke to over the last two years, the two Norfolk Southern employees we talked to this week, and has been widely reported in both industry and mass media in recent years particularly last fall during the labor dispute that briefly made national headlines. A key aspect of the labor dispute last fall was the eroding patience of rank-and-file workers across the industry being tasked with doing more with less, with obvious safety implications, while reading about record profits and stock buybacks every quarter.

“As a railroad Engineer, I’m a highly trained and professional operator of the largest land vehicle known to man,” an engineer from Norfolk Southern told Motherboard in September during the height of the labor dispute. “I’m constantly fatigued and sleep deprived and usually get called at all times of the night. I love my craft and I’m very good at it. However, the draconian system that we work under currently is sub-human and not sustainable.”

Car inspections have experienced some of the biggest cuts. Norfolk Southern management has gradually reduced the amount of time workers are allowed to spend inspecting trains for defects before they leave rail yards. About seven years ago, according to Motherboard’s previous reporting and confirmed by Whitaker, management set a “recommendation that workers spend no more than two and a half minutes per car. In recent years, that time limit has dwindled to less than 90 seconds per car—not enough time, workers say, to actually inspect anything, when cars can be up to 100 feet in length. Norfolk Southern did not answer Motherboard’s question about the issue of car inspections in its response.

Because of staff cuts, workers who used to inspect hundreds of cars a day now have to inspect a thousand or more, according to multiple Norfolk Southern employees Motherboard interviewed in 2021. They said that managers will pressure workers not to report safety defects they discover, because fixing them will hurt PSR metrics such as the amount of time trains spend in the terminal, which, under PSR’s philosophy, is supposed to be as little as possible. But, if they don’t report a defect and something catastrophic happens on the rails, workers feel vulnerable,

unofficial intended to keep trains moving. In this sense, one mechanic who worked for Norfolk Southern for 13 years, said that workers can “kind of be screwed one way or the other.” After PSR’s implementation, two Norfolk Southern employees in 2021 told Motherboard they were given a safety presentation by the company that listed on-time performance, train speed, and the duration of time trains spend in the yard as more important metrics than safety. Afterwards, the shop developed a running joke that, to the workers, felt in keeping with the company’s emphasis: “Safety fourth.” At the time Motherboard reported on this presentation, a Norfolk Southern spokesperson said the company was “firmly committed at all levels to operating safely.”

But PSR has been good for shareholders; Norfolk Southern reported record profits of $4.8 billion from operations in 2022. In March 2022, it announced a $10 billion stock buyback program.

“I’m constantly fatigued and sleep deprived and usually get called at all times of the night. I love my craft and I’m very good at it. However, the draconian system that we work under currently is sub-human and not sustainable.”

It is too early to say if these car inspection

Heavy Loads

One consequence of PSR has been longer trains to save money on staffing. All trains have the same number of workers on board, so running one longer train with more cars on it is more profitable for companies than running two shorter ones. 32N, with its 150 cars, was almost two miles long. It was also heavy, weighing more than 18,000 tons, according to two people familiar with 32N and documents obtained by Motherboard showing the train’s weight distribution.

But it is not just the overall length and weight of a train that matters for safety, but the distribution of that weight. According to the train’s load profile, confirmed by two workers familiar with 32N’s load profile and reported by the cross-union worker solidarity group Railroad Workers United, 40 percent of the train’s weight was in the rear third of the train’s length, and the back half was the heavier half.

If the heavier load is at the back, trains experience unintuitive and dangerous dynamics, especially during braking. In extreme scenarios, those forces can be so high that they push cars up and off the rails, resulting in derailment. If a derailment happens, heavier cars plowing in will be more likely to result in explosions and ruptured tankers due to the extra force.

because of the way it’s built. A seasoned engineer is typically not going to get a knuckle unless there’s something wrong there. I’ve had to operate trains like it myself and when you have loaded tank cars on the end sloshing around, you can feel that slosh in your seat on those cars. It can catch up to you kinda quick.”

This is the opposite of long standing railroad best practice, which calls for trains to be frontloaded with the heaviest cars and the lightest at the back. But rearranging train cars takes time and manpower, both of which have been cut under PSR. Trains are routinely sent onto the tracks in violation of these century-old best practices in order to save time and labor costs. The longer the train, the tricker it is to control, because cars could be in different situations.

There is no evidence that the load profile of 32N was a contributing factor to the derailment. But it’s possible it made the derailment worse than it otherwise would have been. The weight distribution of a train matters, Whitaker explained, because of the forces it exerts while accelerating and decelerating. Freight trains have slack between cars. When the train is moving, it stretches as it is pulled from the front, and when it brakes it comes together.

“In looking at various accidents—and I’ve looked at over 100 of them at this point— these cars,” Cothen told Motherboard, referring to ones with cushion draw bars “tend to be over-representative, it appears, in the derailment that involves significant pileups, or where those cars were a triggering mechanism.”

Before PSR, railroads would take the time to re-arrange the cars of a train to ensure the heavier cars were towards the front. Now, with an emphasis on speed and profitability, they often don’t, according to the two workers. This is how 32N earned the nickname “32 Nasty.”

“This train is notorious for breaking knuckles or drawbars or some other malfunctions,” Whitaker said, referring to the mechanical elements that link cars together or provide extra slack between them. This was confirmed by the two Norfolk Southern employees familiar with 32N. Before this particular run of 32N derailed, it suffered what is called a broken knuckle, referring to the joints where two rail cars connect, according to Whitaker and confirmed by the two Norfolk Southern employees familiar with 32N.

Broken knuckles are not uncommon, and it occurred long enough before the derailment it is unlikely to have been a contributing factor, Whitaker said. Broken knuckles can be caused by several things, one of which, according to the white paper, is “poor train makeup or poor train handling.” In such cases, a broken knuckle may be an indicator the train is harder to control. He said, “It goes to show the train is hard to operate

Concerns

The makeup of this particular 32N was so heavy at the back that even employees who have worked under Norfolk Southern’s PSR regime for years remarked on it. The two workers with direct knowledge of 32N told Motherboard they were aware of concerns being raised to managers about its load profile. They said those concerns were dismissed, which workers say is a consistent pattern since PSR has been implemented. They also said that, as bad as 32N was, they’ve seen worse.

Workers dealt with their concerns the same way they have ever since PSR took over the industry: by using gallows humor. The two employees told Motherboard they’re aware of other workers familiar with this particular run of 32N remarking that if any train was going to make headlines, it was going to be this one.

So you want to form a

There are 2 main ways to do it

METHOD 1

NLRB ELECTION

1 Contact a union organizer or start your own

2 Have at least 30% of your coworkers sign union authorization cards

3 File a petition for a union election with the NLRB

The National Labor Relations Board (NRLB) is an independent federal agency that protects the rights of private sector employees to join together, with or without a union, to improve their wages and working conditions.

4 If the union wins 50% +1 vote, your employer must bargain in good faith over working conditions.

METHOD 2

VOLUNTARY RECOGNITION

1

2

Contact a union organizer or start your own

3

Have a majority of your coworkers sign union authorization cards

4

Ask your employer for voluntary recognition

5

If your employer recognizes the union, you can begin bargaining

If your employer refuses to recognize the union, you can strike for recognition or file a petition for an election with the NLRB

The Union Buster’s Playbook

HIRE A UNION-BUSTING CONSULTANT

Lawyers and “labor-management” consulting firms get paid to help employers keep workers from exercising their right to form a union.

SEND LETTERS TO YOU AND YOUR FAMILY

After ignoring employees’ concerns for years, your employer may take a sudden interest in you. This is designed to mislead or divide the organizing committee and other workers, and to play on your emotions and natural desire to be a good employee.

TELL YOU TO WAIT AND SEE

The Wait and See argument is very common when employers hire union busting attorneys. Often when workers try to form a union, management will make some improvement to convince people that we don’t need to join together into a union. And when the union talk dies down, management eventually goes back to their old ways.

Union-busting is any action by management to prevent employees from exercising their right to organize. Union busting attorneys train supervisors on what to say to persuade workers to vote down a union. The “script” doesn’t change much. Whether you are a bus driver, a nurse, a tech, or a call center worker, employers will hire union busters who will train supervisors in this anti-union script, or “playbook.” 1 3 2 4

GET A FEW EMPLOYEES TO CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE UNION

In many campaigns, “Vote No” or “No Union” committees spring up. The material they circulate presents the employer’s perspective, even though it generally has a “homemade” appearance so it won’t look like the employer is paying for it (which is against the law).

HOLD MEETINGS TO SWEET-TALK—OR BROWBEAT—YOU

You may be required to attend “captive audience” meetings in which managers make empty promises or try to scare you. Management doesn’t tell you they’re worried having a union will mean having to treat workers better; instead, they say they’re worried about “what will happen to you.”

Employers usually order supervisors to take the lead in campaigns against unions. Supervisors typically hold one-on-one meetings with workers, often because their employers have pressured the first-line supervisors to do all they can to eliminate any talk of unions. 5 6 7 8

DENY YOUR RIGHTS THROUGH DELAYS AND LAW-BREAKING.

Union-busting consultants often advise employers to delay every step of the way, and find loopholes in the law to delay union elections or contract negotiations. Sometimes they cross legal lines.

SPRING A LAST-MINUTE SURPRISE ON YOU

Just before workers are scheduled to vote on the union, union-busting consultants often urge employers to hold a special event or go on the attack because it will be too late for union supporters to respond. These can include a captive-audience meeting with a company executive who flies in from out of town, an unfounded charge about the union, or anything else designed to place doubts in workers’ minds about the union.

PRESSURE SUPERVISORS TO PRESSURE YOU

dol.gov

nlrb.gov aflcio.org nytimes.com