The 5,000 union women who gathered in Chicago under the AFL-CIO banner celebrated their diversity and pursued their common mission to improve their lives as workers, family members, and citizens.

At the second and largest conference organized by the AFL-CIO's Working Women's Department, participants sharpened organizing and political skills and educated themselves on issues at workshops and roundtables.

GCIU women plan their workshop and roundtable schedules for the Chicago conference. From left are Jessica Martinez of Milwaukee-Madison 577M; Pat Chabot of Chicago 458M; Lauren Baker of Local 577M; and Barbara Pollard of St. Paul 1M.

Participants heard from working women around the nation who are fighting unfair employers to win union representation and contracts. They joined in solidarity with union sisters who attended from Canada, Indonesia, Brazil, South Africa, and Italy. They planned action campaigns and cheered AFL-CIO leaders and lawmakers who endorsed their goals.

After an enthusiastic greeting from participants who stood on chairs, cheering and waving signs declaring "working families for Gore," Vice Pres. Al Gore received a standing ovation when he endorsed equal pay – working women's top legislative priority, according to the latest "Ask a Working Woman" survey by the AFL-CIO Working Women's Department. According to studies, women's pay is still less than three-fourths that of men.

". . . If you join with me, we will put the concerns of working women right at the top of America's national agenda . . . and try to take the next step forward for fairness and full equality. It's time for an equal day's pay for an equal day's work," Gore said.

Pledging to work toward paid family and medical leave, Gore took a shot at the Republican Bush-Quayle administration for twice vetoing unpaid family leave, which was signed by Pres. Clinton. "There are some people who like to talk about families and then completely ignore them when it comes time to establish rights under the law to balance family and work. Is it a priority or is it just rhetoric?" Gore asked.

Citing examples of employers' illegal anti-union tactics during organizing campaigns, Gore said: "I don't care what your views, politics or ideology are, that is unfair and un-American and has to be changed . . . we have to have a level playing field and a fair approach to organizing."

In Chicago, AFL-CIO Pres. John J. Sweeney, left, addresses the 5,000 participants at the second working women conference – the largest U.S. meeting in history dedicated to working women. At right is Margaret Blackshere, recently elected president of the Illinois State Federation of Labor.

AFL-CIO Exec. Vice Pres. Linda Chavez-Thompson urged participants to fight the "right-wing rascals" who want to keep working women silent.

AFL-CIO Secy.-Treas. Richard L. Trumka, left, asks women to join the Voice at Work campaign on June 10-17 to level the playing field in organizing campaigns. At right is U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.).

Indonesian union leader Dita Sari urges global solidarity. At left is Gloria Johnson, president of the Coalition of Labor Union Women.

AFL-CIO Pres. John J. Sweeney said working women, who "have long been the hidden heroes of our political system," were the prime movers in helping Gore sew up the Democratic presidential nomination on Super Tuesday, the week before the conference.

"Now it is our job at this conference today and tomorrow to translate that same power into an action plan that begins to make the world work for working women," Sweeney urged.

AFL-CIO Executive Vice Pres. Linda Chavez-Thompson urged political activism through the Working Women's Vote Campaign. She cited an AFL-CIO poll that found that union members who don't hear from their unions will vote for pro-worker candidates 58 percent of the time. But members who do hear from their unions go for pro-worker candidates 76 percent of the time.

Chavez-Thompson said union political action can counter the "right-wing rascals out there that smile at us and court us and try to buy us off while what they really want is to keep us silent and powerless. They have the money, but guess what, we have the people." What union women do today, she said, "will assure that our daughters will not have to fight the same battles, and our granddaughters for sure will not have to fight the same battles."

AFL-CIO Secy.-Treas. Richard L. Trumka urged women to get involved in the AFL-CIO's Voice at Work campaign through international unions, state federations, and central labor councils. The campaign enlists elected officials, religious leaders, and civil rights and women's groups to work toward reducing employer interference in union organizing campaigns.

Trumka noted that 82 percent of respondents in the "Ask a Working Woman" survey said they want the backing of an organization that gets results for working women. More women would join unions, he said, if not for the fact that employers "routinely, illegally and legally interfere with their employees' freedom to chose a union to improve their lives."

"There is a dirty, not-so-little secret war going on in the workplaces of America – one that was begun by employers over 25 years ago," Trumka said. "It's a war designed to depress wages and benefits so corporations can compete in the global marketplace – and public employers can pander to wealthy taxpayers – not through ingenuity and innovation but by lowering living standards for working families."

Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said organizing and political action are the most effective way to impact work and family issues. He added: "The year 2000 offers significant opportunities in both these arenas, and we must seize the advantage in order to make progress for working families."

Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) warned that the next U.S. president is likely to appoint three Supreme Court justices who can impact women's and minorities' rights. "This is a year of testing for us when we decide if we can keep the values" that have meant progress for the nation, he said.

Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro (D-Conn.), sponsor of the Paycheck Fairness Act (H.R. 2397/S. 74), said the wage gap "leaves women shortchanged and undervalued." She said her bill would put teeth in the Equal Pay Act by allowing compensatory and punitive damages and facilitating class action lawsuits.

Noting that nearly two-thirds of working women provide half or more of their household income, DeLauro stressed that ensuring "equal pay for equal work is about improving the lives of families, because the wage gap doesn't just shortchange women."

Margaret Blackshere, the new president of the Illinois State Federation of Labor, pledged to bring the pay equity fight to the legislative forefront. She noted that unions and their allies won fights to create public school systems, establish the 40-hour workweek, and ban child labor. She said working women can win the fight for quality health care, pay equity, and other family issues. "We must act, and we will in this year's election," she said.

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), a member of UNITE, said electing more union members to Congress is the only way to pass legislation important to working women and their families. "It makes me sick to go down to the floor [of the House] fighting for a measly 50 cents an hour" increase in the minimum wage. "I want to be fighting for a living wage."

"We're still fighting over crumbs when it comes to families," Schakowsky said. "We are powerful women. Let's sit down and talk strategy so we can make this 21st century the century of the woman."

Maggie Carlton underlined Schakowsky's point. Carlton, a Culinary Workers shop steward, defeated a multi-termed incumbent with 64 percent of the vote thanks to union political action. "Women like us need to be in Congress to remind our politicians who put them there," she said.

The AFL-CIO also reached out to working women around the world. Gloria Johnson, vice president of the International Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers (IUE) and president of the Coalition of Labor Union Women (CLUW), said low wages and domestic and other violence are a pandemic for women. "There is something wrong when women have to suffer violence and poverty," she said. "We have to let the folks out there know that it is wrong."

Johnson urged women to participate in the "largest mobilization in history" for global economic and social fairness in events from March until October. Included are demonstrations and lobbying efforts in April in Washington, D.C., to support debt relief for developing nations and to protest the United States' proposal to grant permanent normal trade relations with China, which unions and human rights groups say is a flagrant abuser of worker rights.

Dita Sari, a union leader who had been imprisoned by the Indonesian government and was released only after an intense, three-year campaign by the AFL-CIO, Canadian Labour Congress and other labor and human rights groups around the world, received a warm welcome at the conference.

Sari said the austere economic programs imposed by the banks and their corporate allies in Indonesia have hit women workers the hardest with massive unemployment, steep increases in food prices, and deep cutbacks in health care and other social services.

Urging solidarity with workers around the world suffering from the same corporate and capital-imposed conditions, Sari said the massive demonstration in Seattle against the World Trade Organization "was a wake-up call for working people all over the world that a hard express train is going to hit us. It has already hit us in Indonesia."

Conference participants took home bags of materials from more than 50 workshops and roundtables on topics related to mobilizing around issues, organizing and bargaining skills, and political and mobilizing skills.

Karen Nussbaum, director of the AFL-CIO Working Women's Department, urged the union women to carry on their work after the conference to win on the issues that the federation's survey identified as most important – equal pay; paid leave for family and medical purposes; child care and after-school care; control over work hours to balance work and family; and affordable, quality health care. Organizing, bargaining, and political and community action are the keys to achieving those goals, she said.

Union women "shake their cheese" – boxes of low-cost macaroni and cheese symbolizing the need for higher wages and pay equity.