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March 2, 2010
EDITORIAL
A growing injustice: Farm workers' rights need Senate vote, not sham
hearings
State Sen. Darrel Aubertine - the chief opponent of equal rights for
The supposed objective was to hear perspectives on a bill to extend
basic labor protections to the men and women who pick our food. To give
them overtime pay, an unpaid day off per week and the right to organize
and bargain collectively - protections enjoyed by everyone else but
denied this one group of workers since field hands were excluded from
labor rights in the 1930s.
The real goal of farmer-legislator Aubertine: To stymie and stall a
measure that has been bottled up for decades thanks to special interest
lobbying - and kick off even more decades of delay.
The Agriculture Committee was the perfect stage for the farce. It has no
jurisdiction over labor bills. But Aubertine got the bill diverted
there, with the connivance of Senate Democratic boss John Sampson, in a
typical
True to form yesterday, Aubertine pretended to consider the bill - with
his thumb on the scale.
Of the invited witnesses, 14 were against the bill and five spoke in
favor. The only farmworker Aubertine invited - to a hearing on
farmworkers' rights - was the brother of a supervisor at a notorious
duck farm. The witness opposed the bill.
Telling the truth was left to advocates, including human rights
campaigners like Kerry Kennedy. They were gracious and yielded some of
their time to the powerless and exploited people who work the fields to
provide us food.
Stop the cynical delays. End the shameful shenanigans. Put the bill on
the floor and vote.
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