Calendar

March 08
Thousands of New York needle trades workers demonstrate for higher wages, shorter workday, and end to child labor. The demonstration became the basis for International Women’s Day - 1908

March 09
The Westmoreland County (Pa.) Coal Strike – known as the "Slovak strike" because some 70 percent of the 15,000 strikers were Slovakian immigrants – begins on this date and continues for nearly 16 months before ending in defeat. Sixteen miners and family members were killed during the strike - 1912

March 10
United Farm Workers leader César Chávez breaks a 24-day fast, by doctor’s order, at a mass in Delano, California’s public park. Several thousand supporters are at his side, including Sen. Robert Kennedy. Chavez called it “a fast for non-violence and a call to sacrifice” - 1968

March 11
Fabled railroad engineer John Luther “Casey” Jones born in southeast Missouri. A member of the Railroad Engineers, he was the sole fatality in a wreck near Vaughan, Miss. on April 29, 1900. His skill and heroics prevented many more deaths - 1863

March 12
The Lawrence, Mass. "Bread and Roses" textile strike ends when the American Wollen Co. agrees to most of the strikers’ demands; other textile companies quickly followed suit - 1912

March 13
A four-month UAW strike at General Motors ends with a new contract. The strikers were trying to make up for the lack of wage hikes during World War II - 1946 

March 14
The Movie "Salt of the Earth" opens. The classic film centers on a long and difficult strike led by Mexican-American and Anglo zinc miners in New Mexico. Real miners perform in the film, in which the miners’ wives – as they did in real life – take to the picket lines after the strikers are enjoined - 1954 

Leadership Schools - Metro II
See brochure  / Register online

• Speaking with Authority
• Introduction to Labor Law
• Advanced Grievance Handling
• Labor History 1: From Colonial Times to the Great Depression

Co-sponsored by the Oregon Public Employers Labor Relations Association and the Oregon Labor Employment Relations Association.

Since 1979, LERC has hosted the Public Employment Relations Conference (PERC), a gathering of public sector labor relations professionals from across Oregon, including attorneys, neutrals, and representatives from both unions and management. LERC coordinates the conference in even years, and the Oregon chapter of the Labor and Employment Relations Association assumes coordinating duties during odd years.  

Attendees discuss recent developments in public sector labor law (PECBA) and labor relations in both plenary sessions and workshops. The highlight of the conference is a review of leading labor law cases by members of the Oregon Employment Relations Board (ERB). This unique and popular segment of PERC features discussion of decisions rendered by the ERB during the past year and allows board members, management, and union representatives to offer their perspectives on major developments in Oregon’s public sector labor law.

In conjunction with the PERC the Labor Education and Research Center publishes a LERC Monograph Series, a collection of volumes providing in depth analysis of specific topics affecting Oregon’s public sector workers and managers, with special emphasis on the PECBA. Written by leading labor law professionals in Oregon’s public sector, the series has become a standard reference source for labor, management and neutral practitioners. To date there have been eighteen volumes of the Monograph. The latest edition of the Monograph [June 2007] is:

Public Employees and Oregon’s Scope of Bargaining, by Akin Blitz and Liz Joffe

For more information on LERC events go to the University of Oregon’s Labor Education and Research Center’s website at http://www.uoregon.edu/~lerc/ or call 541-346-5054.