Labor Justice….Is It Just?

                                            Sermon by Pastor Dan Wilkie

                          First Congregational Church United Church of Christ

                                               Grand Junction, Colorado

                                                   September 4, 2011

 

                                            Scripture Matthew 20: 1-16

 

 

            Labor Day in the United States for most people is that last long weekend, the end of summer celebrated with barbecues, fishing trips, camping trips, time at the beach, or time in the mountains.  For many groups it is often the kick-off to the fall season, the time for fall festivals, and the time when people start planning for the upcoming winter.  Sadly, very few people remember it as the holiday established by President Grover Cleveland to honor organized labor after the Pullman Strike of 1882, during which almost a hundred striking Pullman workers were killed.

And while I, like most people love celebrating this last long weekend of summer, I can’t help but think of reason for the beginning of the holiday, and the many sacrifices of all those often unnamed individuals and groups who worked so hard for the rights of workers who for years had no rights within their workplaces.  I also believe it is also a perfect time to reflect on the present status of workers in this country and around the world, to celebrate the many accomplishments of workplace justice.  I also think it is a fitting opportunity to be thankful to God for the many diverse gifts that allow us to do the kinds of work we do, and to celebrate the dignity of work and the way it so often blesses us and makes a difference in the lives of so many people. 

            Perhaps it was the way I was raised, or perhaps it is the nature of the many types of work I have done thus far in my life, but I have come to believe that all work we do is important, and that while we need Doctors, and Lawyers, Ministers and Teachers, nurses and the like; we also need gas station attendants, hotel maids, chefs, and construction workers, farm hands and people working in food processing factories and assembly lines; and that all jobs are interdependent on others.  For example, doctors and nurses have amazing gifts, but without the builders, the electricians, the plumbers building the hospital, or the truck drivers hauling supplies to the hospital it would be tough to practice modern medicine.  

            Unfortunately throughout the years such was not the case, workers in menial jobs were taken advantage of, forced to work long hours without even so much as a bathroom break, a meal or other down times.  Workers were often considered expendable, working for brutal bosses on dangerous equipment and if they complained they were fired, beaten, and in some cases even killed for complaining about working conditions.  When workers began organizing in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s government more often than not took the side of business owners.  In fact right here in Colorado workers paid an extremely high price for labor when miners began organizing in 1901 and went on strike in Leadville and Telluride in 1902[1].  Many miners had been beaten, their families attacked by security personnel hired by the mine owners, and when they retaliated against the mine owners, Federal Troops were called in at the request of mine owners and Governor Carr.  During the ensuing attempts to bring an end to the strikes many miners and their families were killed which ultimately ended the strikes.  Yet despite all this violence, Colorado had been one of the first five states to honor the newly declared Labor Day Holiday in 1882[2]. It wasn’t just Colorado where workers paid the prices they did, workers in the coal mines of Appalachia, the steel mills of Pennsylvania and the meat packing plants in Chicago all paid high prices as well.

            Finally after years of labor struggles Congress and the president began to act and for the first time in our country’s history laws began to be passed that supported workers rights.  These laws regulated child labor, established basic work hours, established set breaks and lunch times, and regulated the way that workers were paid.  Today we not only have expansions of these laws, but we have the creation of the Occupational Safety and Health act (OSHA) to insure worker safety, we also have the Mining Safety and Health Act (MSHA) insure the health and safety of Coal, Hard Rock, Strip Mine and other Miners. We also have workman’s compensation insurance so that in the event of on the job accidents workers hospital expenses as well as their living expenses are paid while they recover.  There are also such things as Vocational Rehabilitation in the event they must be retrained for other work, so that people can once again become productive members of society after an accident. 

            Also with the advent of labor unions came negotiated contracts which determined working conditions over and above the minimums established by law, and for thousands of workers; things like seniority, hours of work, promotions, grievance procedures and a host of benefits like health insurance, mileage guidelines etc.  And, because of the work of organized labor, almost all workers have benefitted whether or not they belong to a bargained for work group. 

            It is probably because of these many benefits and the protections we enjoy that we have a certain view of labor, most of us are paid by the hour with overtime pay, we have certain holidays that we are paid for when we take them off, we are promoted on the basis of seniority, or on our production, or abilities, or we are hired based on the basis of qualifications and/or affirmative action.  We also have laws to prevent discrimination on the basis of race, gender, sexual orientation, age, and others. 

            So it is easy for us to take for granted the benefits we have and forget the many sacrifices of those who went before us.  These same benefits would also make it very difficult for us to see justice for the workers in our Scripture passage today.  Imagine you are working at Murphy’s Mule Barn, and you have been working since early in the morning, cleaning stables, feeding mules, and helping customers with their purchases.  Your boss George Murphy, comes in at noon with some temporary employees from the work force center, and puts them to work helping you since you had so much to do.  Later he comes back with more employees to help harvest he hay that was recently baled so that it can be put in the barn before the rain storm hits that has been building up in the West all day.  When Murphy’s closes for the day, Murphy pays each of his employees, and pays the temps he hired at 3:00 pm the same amount you are paid for the whole day.  Most of us, just like the farmers employees would be complaining loud and hard about the injustice of it all.  After all we had been toiling since daylight while the others had only worked for a couple of hours.  And based on the system of laws in this country and what we know we would be right and even perhaps just in our complaints. 

            But I ask you to consider the farmer’s actions from a different point of view, because his actions are based on not only his context, but on tradition and history: First, he is correct, it is his money and his farm and he should be able to pay what he likes, for in this day, it was a perfectly acceptable opinion. Second, he is obeying a Jewish law that workers must be paid before sundown on the day the work is done.  As it turns out there are several reasons for this tradition and the farmers actions.  In this time people lived a very day-by-day hand to mouth existence, workers would get paid, and then stop by open air markets to purchase grain, vegetables, and sometimes meat as there were no real means of refrigeration.  Lastly, it is also interesting to note that many people paid as the farmer did, regardless of the number of hours worked.  Workers would often have to walk many miles to get to locations like the center of town where the farmer hired his workers and it was a very common practice to do this many times a day as workers were needed and so rather than trying to break down pay, farmers, shop keepers, and tradesmen simply paid the full day’s wage in essence paying workers for the time it also took them to get to work.  In essence as the Scripture says making the last first, and the first last.

            While I don’t want to take anything away from the work and sacrifice of so many who have labored for justice in the workplace, perhaps there is something to what the farmer did and the entire idea of the last being first and the first being last that could have significant impacts on our workforce of today.  What if a new employee was hired, and the day he or she signed on they were automatically given health insurance, profit sharing, clothing allowances, mileage and then on the first pay day were paid a full wage even though they had been hired part way through the pay cycle?  Let’s consider the case of the person who has been job hunting for a year or so, and living on unemployment, maybe they had not had a chance to go to the doctor, now with health insurance they could go, perhaps they had struggled to pay their house payment, or make a car payment, or purchase groceries or school supplies, now with a full wage they could begin catching up a little more, they could buy food, or school supplies or clothes for their children.  What would this do for worker dignity, worker loyalty?  I am not certain, but it sure could make a difference in how they felt, and wouldn’t they also feel some reason to support the business owner?  What about people hired on after them, perhaps there might even be a different attitude, a greater willingness on the part of the older workers who themselves had not that long ago been looking for work to support new workers. 

            So the question for us is whether our present system of labor justice with all its laws, regulations and focus on seniority, is truly just or whether or not there might be another way?  Perhaps in human terms it is, but I am not so sure about the God part and how it might look from God’s perspective.  After all it was God who created us, our world and in essence all work, and then gave each of us the talents and abilities to do that work so wouldn’t it also follow then that all are important? And in God’s eyes, does it really matter when someone was hired, or how much experience they had, or exactly how much they produced?  I am not sure that it does as much as we might think it does. 

            So as we think about this example of labor justice and perhaps some other ways to think about what work places might be like, I think we also need to understand that while a great deal has been accomplished in the quest for labor justice, there is still a great deal more to be done.  Workers here in this country and abroad are still being exposed to unsafe working conditions, children are still being forced to work long hours in factories without breaks and lunches, people are still being denied equal pay for equal work on the basis of gender, race and sexual orientation, thousands more are laid off and jobs transferred to other parts of the world to take advantage of lax labor and environmental laws.

            For us a people of faith the many decisions about work and labor justice and other issues of everyday life are not always clear cut and easy as we heard in Pastor Sharyl’s sermon series in August, nor are the choices we have to make, and the actions we need to take, but being mindful and conscious of the many impacts our lives have on others through these choices and actions can be a great start.    

            Perhaps we begin with the way that we see work, by recognizing the value of all work and the dignity of all workers, maybe we see it in God’s perspective of the first being last and the last being first and what that implies when we think about worker treatment and employment.  Perhaps it is in the recognition and sacrifice of all who labor everyday to provide goods and services that make our lives and the lives of others better.

            So I invite you today, Labor Sunday 2011, to say thank you. Say thank you to God for the many gifts that allow you or have allowed you to do the work you have done in your life.  I invite you to thank God for the diverse nature of work and those who labor in that work.  I invite you to thank all those who have sacrificed for labor’s sake and justice for all workers.  I invite you to thank all those who continue to work for equality, safety, and dignity of all workers here and around the world. And, lastly I invite you to remember that this day is not just the last day of summer or a day to have a barbecue, but it is also a day when each of us as a child of God can make a difference in the ways in which we think, live, and act.

            May God continue to bless each of us with incredible gifts, and may God bless each person who labors.  Amen.