CORNELL LEWIS GIVES A SPEECH ABOUT CLASS DIVISIONS & THE DCF - CJTS PLANTATION

The purpose of publishing this speech is to highlight class divisions in state agencies. It is also serving notice to Department of Children & Families plus Connecticut Juvenile Training School that their attempts to silence me [ through job loss & making it impossible to work with youth ] is not going to work. People in the community are listening to a voice the oppressor is afraid of. The packed room erupted in applause after the speech.

GREATER HARTFORD CENTRAL LABOR COUNCIL
 Speech given January 8, 2014 Hartford, Connecticut -- 77 Huyshope Avenue

Introduction: I want to thank the Greater Hartford Central Labor Council for the privilege of speaking here today. In America the Union has helped millions of workers earn a decent living and overcome management abuse of employees. However, some state agencies is seeking to erode gains using a tactic of class division.  Let us consider three things today: struggles to overcome management employee abuse, management within state agencies creating class divisions, the need to continue fighting management and raise uncomfortable questions.

In point number one I read Philip Foner’s book History of the Labor Movement in the United States volume I [ from colonial times to the founding of the American Federation of Labor ]. Foner describes the embryonic beginnings of Unions. He describes the struggles of people losing jobs, the sacrifices of enduring long strikes, how a group called the factory girls fought for less work and equal pay. Foner wrote how our present educational system was established by the Union plus workers seeking a better life for their children. Foner then highlighted that Unions sought to destroy class divisions in workplaces. Union workers described management was the upper class [ with resources & power ], workers the lower class with no power or resources. A herculean struggle took place by the masses to end class divisions. However, it seems as if now we are satisfied with past victories while class divisions are making in roads in workplaces. In Greek mythology Argus is depicted as a giant with 100 eyes who was made guardian over Io.We [ Union members]  must be Argus eyed [ observant; vigilant ] about class divisions.

My second point is how management within state agencies creates class divisions.  I obtained through Freedom of Information request, documents showing how the Department of Children & Families plus Connecticut Juvenile Training School created class divisions among workers. Management at both agencies favored one group over another; at CJTS you have a hierarchy of administration, clinicians then Youth Service Officers [ line staff ]. CJTS gave clinicians power over YSO’s thus creating class divisions. This is strange seeing how clinicians... YSOs should work in tandem. The administrators and clinicians receive top pay, while YSOs receive lower pay  with more disciplinary actions. My final point is the need to continue fighting management and raise uncomfortable questions. Please do not stop fighting management about their divisive policies. Those FOI documents I obtained describe how 66% of DCF / CJTS disciplinary actions target black – Latino men. Such unfairness causes divisions in the workplace. State agencies are not feudal European kingdoms with serfs. There is a need to “agitate / educate” employees about class divisions.
The Union in 2014 cannot think past strategies will or can work against employers in this society. Where are new tactics? One man said “it is one thing to shout slogans and sign manifesto statements. It is another thing to spend long days / nights seeking solution to problems.”  I am out of time. Let me move swiftly, finally but reluctantly to a conclusion. If Union members fail to curtail employer’s tactic of class division then those words of T.E.Lawrence will come back to haunt us:
 “Yet when we achieved and the new world dawned,
  The old men came out again and took our victory,
   To remake in the likeness of the former world they knew.”