SMART members and labor unions across the world have been fighting for workers’ rights throughout their history. Case in point: The January–February 2000 issue of the Members’ Journal, which covered sheet metal workers’ participation in now-famous rallies at the World Trade Organization’s 1999 meetings in Seattle.
“Hundreds of sheet metal workers and their families from Local 66, Seattle; Local 16, Portland, Oregon; Local 280, British Columbia, Canada; and France constructively and peacefully demonstrated labor’s concerns about the practices and policies of the World Trade Organization during a massive Labor Rally and March in Seattle, Washington, November 30, 1999,” the Journal reported. “Prominent union leaders from the United States and around the world spoke at the Labor Rally, outlining some of the anti-worker practices and policies of the World Trade Organization, which in reality is a comprehensive system of corporate-managed trade.”
SMART members are continuing this legacy — fighting for policies that prioritize workers — to this day.
