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Moreover, the figures presented here are based on

reported injuries.  These figures dramatically understate

the actual volume of strike-related acts of violence.

To illustrate:  In the Daily News strike, the number

of reported incidents was 71.  Yet in that strike alone,

the New York Police Department recorded more than 500

incidents and the Tribune Company recorded over 1,000.  In

the Detroit News strike, there were more than 200 misde-

meanor complaints filed--more than double the 83 incidents

reported in local newspapers.  In the International Paper

strike, NILRR collected 21 accounts of violence.

International Paper reported 111 separate incidents of van-

dalism.  In the Ravenswood strike, the Institute document-

ed 71 acts of violence by Steelworkers militants.  The

company reported over 2,500--a ratio of 35 to 1.

Many towns have just one daily newspaper and perhaps

a weekly paper or magazine covering local news.  The few

reporters assigned to a strike cannot be expected to wit-

ness every rock hurled at the plant or cars of nonstriking

workers.  Not every obscene threat delivered to nonstrik-

ing employees can be overheard by the few reporters who

cannot be at the picket line all day.  Journalists cannot

follow every worker home to witness the vandalism there.

Nor can they be present to hear every threatening phone

call late at night.  And without legal action to provide a

"peg" for reporters to follow up, there will be no final

accounting of the violence associated with the strike.  In

short, the epidemic of union-related strike violence far

exceeds the ability of local news media to fully chronicle

it.

FUVA: Is It Constitutional? Is It Necessary?

The Freedom from Union Violence Act (FUVA), S. 230,

sponsored by Sen. Thurmond, adds federal anti-extortion law

to the arsenal of weapons available for prosecuting unions

engaged in strike violence.

The provisions of FUVA respond to a Supreme Court

bent on carving out exceptions for union violence.  As

reported earlier, the Court held in Local 807 that the

exception in the 1934 Anti-Racketeering Act for payments

to "bona fide employees" barred prosecuting union members

for extortion.  The Hobbs Act tried to remove that excep-

tion by deleting the clause pertaining to bona fide

employees.  But the act specified that only "wrongful"

violence was subject to prosecution.  On that one word,

the Court hinged its ruling in Enmons that violence in the