Word: farah
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...Willie Farah swore with 19th century capitalistic fervor that he would never allow a union in his Farah Manufacturing Co. plants and kept that vow through not only a 93-week strike but a nationwide boycott against his products: men's slacks. Yet last week he sat down to breakfast with officials of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America in New York City and capitulated totally. He agreed to recognize the union as sole bargaining agent for all employees of the El Paso-based firm, rehire all strikers, and begin immediate negotiations for a wage-and-benefit contract. Said...
What changed his mind? The boycott, organized by the A.C.W.A. and vigorously supported by high-powered politicians and even the Roman Catholic bishop of El Paso, turned Farah's 1971 profit of $6 million into losses of $8.3 million in 1972. Farah stock, soaring at $56 the day the strike was called, closed at $8 the Friday before the settlement. Quite as important, National Labor Relations Board and court decisions during the long battle consistently favored the strikers. When the NLRB ruled early last month that Farah must let union organizers enter his plants (TIME, Feb. 11), he apparently...
...classic knuckling under to a classic labor confrontation. As company president, the 54-year-old Farah originally saw no reason why his workers needed a union. After all, he claimed, he paid well ($1.70 an hour to start, lO? above the federal minimum wage) and provided a clean, bright, air-conditioned factory. On the other side, the Amalgamated was eager to organize Farah Manufacturing as an opening wedge to crack the dozens of clothing manufacturers in the Southwest that bask in a non-union atmosphere. Union organizers were able to capitalize on a genuine labor grievance. Farah's mostly...
...equal rights under law. A doctor in Roxbury would make a good hero. So would the people raising money for the Attica Brothers. Those who run half-way houses for men and women who otherwise would be in reformatories, prisons, or insane asylums are heroes. So are the Farah strikers and the California farm workers. All these people deal with suffering. All these people open possibilities for the future. They are heroes even if only on one cold night they defy the prevailing paranoia and help a suffering human being...
...major clothing manufacturers based in the Southwest should follow Farah's lead and give all their laborers-- Chicano, Indian, black and white--the right to unionize freely. This especially applies to those firms that were lucky enough to have escaped the Amalgamated boycott and have prospered, perhaps unfairly, at Farah's expense. Unionization will prevent large companies from moving from one region of the country to another in order to exploit cheap labor in runaway shops...