wfn.org | Seeking End to Sweatshops

[George Conklin <gconklin@igc.apc.org>]

"UNITED METHODIST DAILY NEWS" by SUSAN PEEK on Aug. 11, 1991 at 13:58 Eastern,
about FULL TEXT RELEASES FROM UNITED METHODIST NEWS SERVICE (3252 notes).

Note 3252 by UMNS on Oct. 23, 1996 at 16:40 Eastern (4540 characters).

SEARCH:   Labor, sweatshops, Reich, Pharis Harvey, Fassett

Produced by United Methodist News Service, official news agency of
the United Methodist Church, with offices in Nashville, Tenn., New
York, and Washington.

Contact:  Joretta Purdue                         538(10-71B){3252}
          Washington, D.C.  (202) 546-8722           Oct. 23, 1996

Religious groups, labor secretary
join in call to end worker abuse

     WASHINGTON (UMNS) -- Robert B. Reich, secretary of the U.S.
Department of Labor, praised religious organizations here Oct. 22
for their work to eradicate sweatshops around the world.
     At least six United Methodist board staff members were among
the representatives of religious groups meeting with Reich to
express condemnation of exploitive labor practice and to urge the
buying public to choose their clothing purchases carefully.
     "The religious leaders joining us in this effort have pledged
to do everything possible to remind Americans that this is a moral
issue and that Americans have a moral responsibility to do
everything they can to ensure that workers are treated fairly and
with dignity," Reich told the press after the consultation.
     He said the Labor Department is the "enforcer" of the
nation's labor laws but the congregations are the "reinforcers."
Reich added, "The government cannot do it alone."
     The Rev. Pharis Harvey, a United Methodist missionary who is
executive director of the International Labor Rights Fund, also
spoke at the press conference together with leaders from four
Jewish, Baptist and Catholic organizations.
     Representing the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries,
Harvey observed, "Our historic faith journey began in a general
strike against the sweatshops of Egypt. Our Methodist societies
got their start as the conscience of the early industrial
revolution in England."
     He continued by pointing to efforts of the Methodist Church
during the Depression to make working conditions a top priority,
as expressed in the denomination's Social Creed. It said:
     "We stand for reasonable hours of labor, for just wages, for
a fair day's work for a fair day's wage, for fair working
conditions for periods of leisure for those who work, and for an
equitable division of the product of industry."
     Harvey's quote also included the church's expression of
support for the right to collective organizing and bargaining.
     Now, as the world prepares for a new century, Harvey said,
sweatshop conditions have returned to America and to labor in much
of the global economy.
     "We ignore these conditions at the peril of our own well
being, our own moral integrity, our own faith and calling to be
'our neighbors' keepers,'" he said.
     The United Methodist Church is beginning a quadrennial
emphasis on workers, he reported, and that affords the
denomination an opportunity to educate members about "the scourge
of sweatshop labor."
     Addressing the labor secretary, Harvey said that church
members look forward to working to reform trade policies, restore
budgets for enforcement of labor laws and ratify "international
conventions that protect the rights of workers [to bring] our laws
into compliance with international standards."
     The labor secretary also recognized the denomination's work
for justice, naming United Methodist Board of Pension and Health
Benefits as an entity that is using its leverage as an investor to
have "a powerful and dramatic effect on the garment industry."
     The Rev. Thom White Wolf Fassett, general secretary of the
United Methodist Board of Church and Society, in a statement
distributed at the press conference, mentioned the pension
agency's NIKE shareholder resolution concerning working conditions
and reports that the agency is considering action against Walt
Disney, WalMart and Reebok.
     Fassett noted that the denomination has been calling for the
eradication of sweatshops and advocating "safe and decent working
conditions" since its 1908 Social Creed. He said the Board of
Church and Society is part of several coalitions and campaigns
working against sweatshops and child labor.
     Other United Methodists who attended the 45-minute meeting
with Reich were L.J. Hopkins of the Board of Global Ministries
Women's Division, and three Board of Church and Society staff
members, who also advocate on this and related issues -- Jane Hull
Harvey, Mark Harrison and the Rev. Eliezer Valentin-Castanon.
                              #  #  #

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