Word: truckers
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...trucker strike wanes...
Another element of the story, the strike of independent truckers, proved equally elusive. Washington Correspondent Jonathan Beaty knew enough of the arcane ICC regulations to know that, say, raisins are exempt from regulation and any trucker is perfectly free to carry them, unless they happen to be covered with chocolate. Such knowledge helped, but Beaty found that the old rules and conventions are under serious attack. Says he: "The independent truckers are trying to blow apart a time-honored system, and that drives the Teamsters, the trucking industry and various politicians and lobbyists right up the wall-all for different...
...Alabama, one trucker was killed when he was shot in the leg and his rig swerved off the road. The wife of another driver was shot in the chest and critically wounded. Governor Fob James angrily ordered National Guard tankers to transport fuel and considered putting some parts of the state under direct military rule. "The people who commit these crimes are outlaws," he declared. "I hope to put them in the electric chair, and if we had a hanging...
Teamster-baiting, in fact, has become a way of life for I.T.A. President Mike Parkhurst, 46, a burly, boisterous former trucker who started organizing the independents almost a decade ago. His monthly magazine, Overdrive (circ. 51,000), is the main trade publication of the independents. Parkhurst freely admits that one of the goals of the present strike is to weaken the Teamsters. He wants the independents to carry freight at the same rate as the Teamsters, clearly a challenge to the monopoly that has benefited the nation's biggest union for so long...
...independents are also fragmented. "A trucker is definitely independent," says Roy Woodworth, an operator in Wilton, N. Dak. "He likes to do his own thing, so he is kind of hard to organize. We banded together out of necessity." Across the nation, hard-pressed Governors tried without success last week to find someone who could speak for the owner-drivers in their states. In Minnesota, Governor Al Quie gave up, declared a state of emergency, and called out the National Guard. About 100 representatives of small operators met in Washington to draw up plans with William Hill, chairman...