How is it that North Carolina has become a toss up / blue state the past few years?

[Starry Messenger]

44. Those fights with J.P. Stevens are incredible.

http://www.laboreducator.org/stevens.htm

Even after getting the union, it took years to get the company to work with labor.

Real Life vs. Reel Life

Actually, the Stevens workers didn't get the fruits of their victory — a contract — until six years later. The company stopped resisting the union only after ACTWU (the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers, formed by the 1976 merger with the smaller TWUA) made Stevens the target of the first corporate campaign by organized labor.

Today, the abuses of corporate power are multiplying as rapidly as the lists of lawless acts by Stevens back in the '60 and '70s. Community, public interest, environmental and religious groups, as well as labor unions, want to challenge irresponsible corporate behavior. How to do this, and greatly increase the chances of success, will be the subject of this column in The Labor Educator.

The J.P. Stevens Corporate Campaign, which I directed for ACTWU, was not the only reason for the happy ending that occurred with labor's victory over Stevens in 1980. But it did provide irrefutable evidence that there are methods other than long and costly traditional strikes and boycotts to challenge powerful institutions and force them to behave responsibly.