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USW@Work - National College Players Association - United ...

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In 1992, the permanent replacementswere fired and Steelworkers returned totheir jobs at Ravenswood. It was a victoryboth for workers in the small town ofRavenswood and for the entire labormovement, proving that unions couldstill win, and win big against a large corporation.Immediately following the mergerwith the Rubber Workers union, Mr.Becker led a similar 28-month worldwidecampaign against Bridgestone/Firestone, which had fired 6,000 workers.That campaign also resulted in anew contract and the return to work ofthousands of our union's members.Mr. Becker shifted more of theunion's resources into organizing andplayed a leading role in promoting the1995 election of John J. Sweeney aspresident of the AFL-CIO. Who ran on acampaign to revitalize the labor movement.Championed fair tradeNowhere was Mr. Becker's voicemore powerful, though, than in thestruggles against unfair trade, an issuethat held his interest into retirement asan appointed member of the U.S.-ChinaEconomic & Security ReviewCommission. Mr. Becker also served onthe U.S. Trade Deficit ReviewCommission and during the Clintonadministration was a member of thePresident's Export Council and the U.S.Trade and Environmental PolicyAdvisory Committee.In the continuing fight for the survivalof the steel industry, Mr. Beckerwas instrumental in establishing StandUp for Steel, an alliance of the unionand steel producers that fights unfairtrade practices, including the illegaldumping of foreign steel on U.S. markets.Mr. Becker was a tireless opponent ofthe North American Free TradeAgreement (NAFTA), which he relentlesslyindicted for wiping out hundredsof thousands of family-supportive U.S.jobs. He led the union's executive boardmembers on trips across the border towitness Mexican workers living inabject poverty while working in state-ofthe-artplants owned by U.S.-based companiesin the maquilladoras."NAFTA was the greatest betrayal ofworkers in my lifetime," Mr. Beckersaid while president. "NAFTA wasnever intended to protect workers —NAFTA was intended to protect industrialistsand bankers. The only institutionthat protects working people is the unionmovement."Up from the shop floorHe got an early look at industrial lifeand unionism. As a boy, Mr. Beckergrew up yards from his father's employer,Granite City Steel in Illinois, wherethe heat was so intense it penetrated thedoorway to the family home. In 1944,at 15, he took a job on an open hearthlabor gang.His early work background alsoincluded stints of employment as a craneoperator at General Steel Castings andas an assembler at the General MotorsFisher Body plant in St. Louis.He twice served the country in itsarmed forces, first as a Marine towardthe end of World War II and again duringthe Korean War, when he was draftedinto the U.S. Army, owing to a criticalshortage of light weapons infantryleaders.On July 21, 1950, he married JaneGoforth, who supported him in hisadvocacy for workers for more than 56years, along the way establishing herselfas an accomplished political organizer.6 winter 2007 • <strong>USW@Work</strong>

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