It is a pleasure today to come back to the heart of the Democratic Party. Professional palestras, newspaper columnists and smug republicans have, many times before, written off the candidates of our Party. But, every time, our strength has been with the working families of America -- and, every time, American working families have turned out for their Party on election day.
I’m especially glad to be with members of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Union today. For I remember -- and George McGovern remembers -- that on May 3 -- more than a month before the California Primary -- your President, Al Grasperin, publicly endorsed the McGovern candidacy. I remember -- and George McGovern remembers -- that your Executive Board held special meetings and issued formal endorsements of the Democratic Ticket. And I remember, as does George McGovern, the resolution adopted by your Executive Board on August 9 that called, as we are now calling, for a “new coalition of progressivism” -- a building of a new coalition just as strong and just as committed to American working families as FDR’s “New Deal” Coalition.
With your Union -- and other strong unions -- behind us, we cannot be defeated in November.
Those of you in the Chemical Division of this Union know about health and safety hazards on the job. You work with hundreds of different chemicals every day. Neither you nor I know exactly what is in them. Not even the management -- not even the chemists themselves -- know what breathing these chemicals year after year will do.
But you know about your friends who finally retire, after years on the job, only to become horribly sick or to die a year later. You know what it’s like to come home from work, able only to fall asleep watching television. You know what it’s like to feel your heart pounding and to feel short of breath, after playing for just a few minutes with your children or grandchildren.
You know that the chemicals you and your follow workers breathe day in and day out must have something to do with the way you feel. And you know that the executives who buy and sell the chemicals, sitting in air conditioned offices, do not smell the fumes and do not feel as you do.
There are over 12,000 chemicals used in American factories; But the Government has set standards governing the use of only 450 of them.
And even these few standards are often grossly inadequate or way out of date. The Government’s “standard” for sulphur dioxide use in factories allows nearly 12 times as much exposure to the chemical than the Environmental Protection Agency allows for the general public. And Government’s “standard” for carbon monoxide use in factories allows 5-1/2 times as much exposure to that chemical than the EPA allows for the general public.
And how does the Labor Department enforce even these inadequate “standards?” After the passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act in 1970, the Labor Department’s hired a few factory inspectors. But they hired so few that it would take them 150 years even to visit every American factory once. Here in Pennsylvania, there are only 90 inspectors -- compared with 262 fish and game wardens.
Several hundred well-qualified trade Unionists -- who know something about job hazards -- applied for jobs as Federal inspectors. But do you know how many of them were hired? None!
And when these inspectors do get around to visiting a factory, what do they do? Oh, they look around the factory and workers are allowed to accompany them. But workers not allowed to the opening conference before the inspection -- a conference in a closed room with only the Labor Department inspector and management present. And workers are not allowed into the closing conference at which the extent of violations are finally decided upon -- again, a conference held in a closed room with only the inspector and management present.
So, the only chance workers have -- the only chance for the people whom the 1970 Act is supposed to protect -- their only chance to get inspectors to eliminate health and safety hazards is when they walk around the factory with the Labor Department inspector. But many workers are deterred even from doing that much. For most companies refuse to pay their employees for this time spent accompanying the inspector.
Twice, the Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers Union has gone to the Labor Department and asked for a ruling that workers must be paid while they accompany inspectors. And, twice -- in March of this year -- the Labor Department has ruled against the Union.
Now, workers with a Union treasury to pay them may be able to afford joining in an inspection. But what about the 75% of American workers who have no union? They cannot afford even to talk to the federal inspectors. And the inspectors wind up talking to no one but the company executives about the health and safety hazards to workers.
And if by chance the Labor Department inspector is so bold as to find a violation of health or safety standards, what does he do? The 1970 Act authorizes fines of up to $10,000 plus a prison sentence for violations. But, during the first year of the Act’s Enforcement by the Nixon Administration, the highest fines were around $500 to $1000. The average fine was only $22. That makes it cheaper for the company to violate the law -- at the expense of the workers -- rather than to correct health and safety hazards.
The disgraceful total breakdown in the Nixon Administration’s enforcement of the Safety and Health act is powerfully illustrated by what happened to one of your unions only a few months ago -- in the Mobil Oil plant in Paulsboro, New Jersey, just across the river from Philadelphia.
In December and January of 1971-1972, Federal inspectors came to the Mobilo Oil Plant. They spent a total of 25 working days inspecting the plant. Workers accompanied them -- even though the management refused to pay them. And, finally, the inspectors found a total of 354 safety and health violations. 354 violations. And what was the fine they finally imposed on Mobilo Oil Corporation, after their closed meeting? The total fine was only $7,350. Only $20.76 per violation!
And, even then, the inspectors didn’t cite every violation. There was one gas leak that the management had roped off to cars and inspectors said it was no violation of law. Four months passed. Gas kept leaking. And in May, 1972 there was an explosion. One worker was killed in the explosion.
The Union demanded that the Labor Department officials come back and cite the company -- at least after the fact -- for this gross violation. The Government inspectors came back. And they imposed a little fine -- $1,215. $1,215 for the life of a worker! That’s all you are worth to Richard Nixon and his Department of Labor.
Last Friday, Senator McGovern condemned the Nixon system of wage and price controls. He said it is Nixon’s grossly unfair meddling with wages and prices -- not the criticism of Democrats -- that is truly “radical.” And he called for the scrapping of Nixon’s wage and price policy, and the substitution of a new, fair one. We can all say “Amen” to that.
President Nixon’s pay board was rigged from the very start. Although it originally had four Labor members to balance the business members, the swing vote was held by so-called “public” members. And who were they? Let’s look at two of them. One was William Caples, a former Vice President of the Inland Steel Corporation and still a high official of the American Iron and Steel Institute -- an association of steel corporations. The other was Neil Jacoby, a conservative professor of Business Economics who had repeatedly opposed even minimum wage laws.
No wonder, then that in March, 1972, George Meany and two other Labor members quit the Pay Board, saying that it was “heavily loaded against the workers and the consumer, in favor of the profits of big businesses and the banks ...”
Thus it was inevitable that this Pay Board would become a “Low Pay Board,” serving the interests of the empalers. The Board set a flat ceiling of 5.5% on wage increases. It applied this standard rigidly. And it applied it across the board -- so that a corporate executive making $100,000 is allowed a $5,500 raise while a worker making $10,000 is allowed only a $500 raise.
The Chemical Division Bargaining Policy Committee is meeting in Philadelphia this week to plan for upcoming negotiations in the chemical industry. But your hands are tied. You know that a Board, stacked with business representatives, is sitting in Washington, anxious to roll back a significant wage increase you might win at the bargaining table.
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...in the price of cotton undershirts!
Meanwhile, consumers have not only been frozen off the “High Price Commission,” but they also are given no access to the Commission’s decision-making process. Tens of thousands of complaints have been sent to the Commission by ordinary Americans. But the Commission -- inadequately staffed -- has done nothing to respond to almost all of these complaints.
That’s why I agree with Senator McGovern that it’s high time that we threw out the “Low Pay Board” and the “High Price Commission.”
