Historical Events of the Revolutionary World Movement

"No Pay - No Mail" US Postal Strike 1970

Workers of the United States Postal Office Department had been struggling for decades due to low wages and terrible working conditions, with the offices in New York City being described as "dungeons, dirty, stifling, too hot in summer, and too cold in winter." By 1970, the initial salary was $6,176.00 (approximately $41,175.14 in 2020) and it would take workers 21 years to receive maximum salary of only $8,442 (about $56,282.47). As a result, several postal employees were forced to either work second jobs or live off food stamps and every year, about one in four workers would quit their jobs and African-American workers filled the ranks of the USPOD as whites left in pursuit of better jobs.

To make matters worse, it was illegal (and still is) for federal government workers to go on strike and they didn't even have collective bargaining rights and efforts by the postal unions to improve their pay and working conditions were useless. Postal service workers were becoming increasingly angry and militant, especially the African-American workers who were empowered by the many victories gained through the numerous strikes, protests, walk-outs and marches they and their brothers and sisters had done throughout the previous decade.

While anger was rapidly brewing, the bourgeois US Congress granted the postal workers a 5.4% increase in pay (which wasn't enough to adapt to the inflation rates) while they awarded themselves with a 41% raise, driving the members of the Branch 36 of the National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC) to meet in Manhattan on March 17th, 1970 where they voted to go on strike without the approval of the yellow union leaders.

The strike began on March 18th at midnight and postal workers throughout New York City expressed solidarity with Branch 36 and joined the strike.

Fascist President Nixon responded on March 21st by appearing on national television, telling the postal workers to stop their "illegal strike" and threatened them by saying "we have the means to deliver the mail and we will use those means."

His efforts backfired. The workers became even more angry and expanded their strike, which had now spread to 14 states. Other federal workers threatened to go on strke as well if Nixon attempted to take legal action against the striking postal workers. Several yellow union leaders, including NALC leader and Nixon's faithful lackey James Rademacher, denounced the strikers and begged them to go back to work. The striking postal workers responded by hanging effigies of Rademacher and shouting "RAT-emacher must go!".

Two days later, Nixon made a second appearance on national television, telling the strikers to go back to work and announced that the US National Guard was being sent to New York to distribute the mail and break the strike and threatened to enact the same measures on other major cities. He also signed Proclamation 3972, declaring the strikes as a "national emergency". 23,000-25,000 army personnel were sent to revive the mail system, but achieved little success because the soldiers were only given a few hours of training in order to cope with sorting through millions of letters and packages daily.

Eventually, after 8 days of striking, the postal workers reached an agreement with the government on March 25th, granting the workers collective bargaining rights as well as a 6% wage increase and were able to receive the maximum salary within a few years. In the following summer, Nixon signed the Postal Reorganization Act, which granted the workers an additional 8% raise and disestablished the USPOD and replaced it with the more corporate and profit-driven US Postal Service.

Although the strike had only lasted 8 days, it had grown to over 210,000 workers and took place in 631 locations nationwide. It crippled the flow of mail, causing the stock market to fall dramatically, with some being worried that the stock market would have to close down entirely, and prevented over 9,000 young men from receiving their draft notices. It inflicted a deep blow upon the bourgeoisie to the point where they had to helplessly cave into the demands of the workers.

Sadly, if there's one thing that the history of the labor movement shows, it's that concessions that are won through great struggle can quickly be disregarded and trampled underfoot by the bourgeoisie. Since 1972, postal workers have been given lower and lower wages and by 2000 made 7.7% less than they did in 1972 and 13% less than in 1978. In addition, they are forced to deal with dangerous working conditions (the US Postal Service has the highest serious injury rate out of any company in the US) and the constant fear of losing their jobs via rationalization. Therefore, temporary concessions "from above" are never enough.

Only the replacement of the yellow unions with revolutionary proletarian unions led by the Stalinist-Hoxhaist Party and the revolutionary overthrow of the world dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and its replacement by the world dictatorship of the proletariat will guarantee rights for the workers.

Only the revolutionary seizure of the US Postal Service and all other postal companies (FedEX, Amazon, UPS, etc.) as part of the world socialist revolution will bring freedom to the postal workers.