Gentle Reader: Mark this month, April of 2024, as a special month in Tennessee, and Southern, history. You may not yet recognize the significance of this month, but take it from the old curmudgeon, who has observed more history than most of the people you know, and he says, and he certifies that this month is, for Tennesseans, extra special!
Everybody knows that there are such historic national events as the criminal trial in New York of our former President, Donald John Trump, but that has no special impact on Tennessee. But while mentioning the Trump trial, as an ancient trial lawyer, I am impressed with the way and manner with which the New York trial judge is conducting these proceedings. The concurrent death of O.J. Simpson brings to mind the altogether different manner in which one of these celebrity criminal trials can be handled (or mishandled, as the case may be). We should all be grateful that so far everything seems to indicate this this judge knows his business, and is carrying it out with dignity and dispatch.
Likewise, we have all seen that for a few days at least, House Speaker Mike Johnson, Republican Representative from Louisiana, has risen above personal self-interest, and has shown that he can be the Speaker of the whole House, and accept the help of both parties to do what is the right thing for his country, for which he should be lauded by all, but won’t be. But once again this has no special effect on Tennessee.
No, Gentle Reader, that special event, the local occurrence, our own distinguishing happening, took place just some miles south of Roane County, in Hamilton County, Tennessee, over a few days, terminating on Friday, 19 April, 2024, when the voting terminated, and the ballots were counted on the question of whether employees of the Volkswagen plant at Chattanooga, Tennessee, are to be represented by the United Automobile Workers of America Union.
Previously neither they, nor any other southern-based auto company has had union representation of its employees. And Governor Lee of Tennessee, as well as five other Southern Governors had issued strong statements, or made addresses opposing the approval of the voting in favour of the union. And all previous efforts at unionization of any southern automobile plants had been fairly easily defeated.
However, and this is what makes it so historic, this time it wasn’t even close. The pro-union ballot totaled 73%, while the anti-union vote was only 27% of the ballot, or well over two to one, almost three to one, in favour.
Just to have won a pro-union vote in a southern state would hitherto have been regarded as bordering on the unbelievable, but to have won by a vote of better than two to one would rank as nothing less than miraculous. Yet it has now been done. The question is whether the same outcome can be achieved in a few weeks when the Mercedes auto plant in Alabama is going to hold a similar election.
If this Alabama vote turns out to be pro-union, it will mark the end of an era.
If the Alabama vote is not only pro-union, but is by a large margin, it will not only mark the end of an era, but it will mark the beginning of an economic revolution by the Southern working class such as has never been seen.
In any event, as said at the beginning, we are witnessing history being made.
On more than one occasion in the past, I have written of my mother’s brother, Grant McGlothin, working as an organizer with the Reuther Brothers in the UAW back in the “30s”. If there’s an afterlife, no doubt Uncle Grant, is celebrating this organizing triumph, which he was unable to accomplish during his lifetime. Probably he’s saying, ‘Better late than never!’
The opinions expressed in this column do not reflect the views of this newspaper.
