SECOND DAY Monday, September 9, 2013 MORNING SESSION The Convention was called to order at 8:31 a.m., Secretary-Treasurer Shuler presiding. SECRETARY-TREASURER ELIZABETH SHULER: Good morning, everyone. Thank you for being here on time. Let’s give it up for the band for greeting us this morning, Enderby. Thank you. (Applause) Please take your seats. The convention will now come to order. Now for our invocation. Are you ready? We are joined by Rabbi Jonathan Klein, executive director of Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice, CLUE, of Southern California; Shakeel Syed, executive director of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California; and Minerva G. Carcano, resident bishop of the Los Angeles Episcopal Area of the United Methodist Church. Please come to the dais. INVOCATION RABBI JONATHAN KLEIN Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice Good morning, and welcome to everyone who’s gathering here this morning. We are very excited to join you as a faith community that has had a long history of working together here in Los Angeles. All of us in the faith community have really committed ourselves to partnership to bring about a better, more just, more sacred society. So we are so honored to join you. We pray. Dear God, we gather as a loving family of justice seekers who are keenly aware of an unjust world. We pray together as more fully developed human beings whose eyes are committed to remaining wide open to the suffering of our neighbors and who shout out and scream, (addressing convention in Hebrew), “We will not stand idly by the blood of our neighbors.” You taught us, O God, to put our faith into action, to pray with our feet, to open our hearts, to serve you in truth. While the opponents of compassion may organize against us, let our conviction, our zeal, our love, be a powerful force against their callousness, and may we bring all hands on deck to change the hearts of our opponents so that one day, speedily in our days, every man will stand with dignity, every woman celebrate with song, all of us praising with joy your Holy Name. (Addressing in Hebrew) Blessed are you, Adonai, our God, ruler of the universe who gives us life, sustains us and brings us together at this auspicious time. SHAKEEL SYED Islamic Shura Council of Southern California In the name of God, the most compassionate, the most merciful and the creator of all of us, we thank you, dear God, and we glorify you for bringing us together for a cause that’s greater than all of us. We ask for your grace, for the delegates and the unions, for our allies and partners, that they remain united in pursuit of the common good. For our brothers and sisters working in factories and in schools, in hospitals and in hotels, may they be driving taxis on the street or flying planes in the sky. At the time when fairness and equity has become an exception, we ask that you bless us with courage and with steadfastness, to reverse this exception to a norm. Dear God, we ask that you open the hearts of our politicians and the policy makers, of our business owners and the corporate executives, to look at each worker as a priceless human being and not merely a number and a name. Dear God, we know that you do not ask for any papers from anyone, but the ungodly people do. We pray that you guide our leaders to fully repair our completely broken immigration system, and they do it today and not tomorrow. Dear God, grant us your wisdom and empower us to go back to our communities and keep on working and keep on fighting to build a world that shares and that cares for all people. Amen. MINERVA G. CARCANO Los Angeles Episcopal Area of the United Methodist Church And, finally, O Creator God, we thank you for this day of life and pray that we may use it wisely in ways that are pleasing unto you. As these men and women, our brothers and sisters, gather to advocate for and protect the rights of workers who serve across this country, we pray that you would guide them with great wisdom. May their efforts look beyond personal interest to the common good, may they look within their efforts and strengthen their commitment to justice for all workers, men and women workers, young and old, workers of every race and every culture, native-born and immigrant workers. In a time of ongoing recession, joblessness and underemployment, we come before you, O God, asking that you would give courage to these union leaders that they may speak the word of truth. The truth that there is indeed enough for all of us, enough food and enough work and its benefits, enough for all of us if we will but be just and compassionate towards each other. Out of the work done in these days of this AFL-CIO National Convention, do bring forth courageous leaders who will speak for the right of every person to a job at a living wage, the right of every man and woman to work with the assurance of physical and mental safety, the right of every worker to grow in knowledge in their field and be able to bring their creative ideas to the workplace, and every worker’s right to rest and renewal from their labors. Above all, we pray that we may all be a people of justice, committed to the sacred value and worth of each person above economic profits. Be merciful, O God, to these, your sons and daughters who labor day in and day out. Be their comfort. Be their strength. Be their joy on this day and always. Amen and amen. (Applause) SHULER: Thank you for that inspiring start to our day. I’d like to now call on the vice chair of the Credentials Committee, Fred Redmond, to give a credentials report. Fred. REPORT OF THE CREDENTIALS COMMITTEE (Resumed) VICE PRESIDENT FRED REDMOND, United Steelworkers: Thank you, Liz. Good morning. Since the Credentials Committee last reported, 39 additional delegates and eight additional delegates whose credentials had previously been approved by the Credentials Committee have registered. In addition, in the interest of full participation at this convention, the committee has approved the credentials of four delegates whose credentials were received late. The Credentials Committee recommends the additional delegates and alternates be seated. The complete list of delegates and alternates is being submitted for the record at this time. On behalf of the committee, I move adoption of the Credentials Committee report. ...The motion was seconded by several unidentified delegates. SHULER: Thank you, Fred. It is moved and seconded to adopt the report of the Credentials Committee. Is there any discussion? The chair seeing none, the question is on the adoption of the report of the Credentials Committee. Those in favor of the report, say aye. Those opposed, say no. The Credentials Committee report is adopted. Thank you, Fred, I appreciate it. So is everybody ready for another good day? All right. Yesterday we got a good start, and here we are again this morning. We have important business to take up, and we’ll start by hearing from our president, Richard Trumka, and meeting some inspiring workers from the front lines of our movement. We will then turn to the Committee on Community Partnerships and Grassroots Power and consider a resolution geared toward deepening our relationships with allies and strengthening our movement at the state and local level. After that, the Committee on Growth, Innovation and Political Action will present resolutions from our discussion on opening up our movement’s doors and large-scale organizing. Again and again in our pre-convention listening sessions, we heard how important it is for the future of unions and working people to find new ways to broaden and expand our labor movement. As one person said, and I quote, “We will have to change our structures just in order to survive as meaningful working-class institutions. We need a labor movement that can engage all working people.” How we do that is our primary topic for this morning. To introduce our next speaker, I’d like to welcome one of the emerging leaders in our movement. I’m so proud to see one of our young workers here today, Keith Richardson of APWU, Chicago Local 1. Keith. (Applause) KEITH RICHARDSON Postal Workers Local 1, Chicago Good morning, delegates. My name is Keith Richardson. I’m a clerk in the United States Postal Service and a proud member of the American Postal Workers Union. I also serve my local union as the clerk craft director of the Chicago-area Local No. 1. Any other Postal Workers in the house? (Applause) Now, if you follow the news lately you probably heard a lot about Chicago, and I bet it hasn’t all been good. You probably heard stories of violence among young people, youth that are uneducated, probably about kids that simply don’t care. Well, I’ve lived in Chicago my whole life and I’m here to tell you a different story, a story where my mother who before me served in her union, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Local 743, first as a shop steward and later as an E-Board member, in a city where it’s possible that a young, black man like myself with only a high school diploma in hand managed to carve out a niche for myself.