Union Tries to Unite Blacks, Latinos

Smithfield is a formidable adversary for labor organizers. North Carolina, a right-to-work state, has the second-lowest union membership rate (2.9 percent of workers) in the nation. And the company stirs the economy in a region with high unemployment, employing 5,000 and paying out $120 million a year. Its taxes amount to 10 percent of Bladen County's budget.

So far, Goliath has trounced David in every battle. Smithfield has aggressively thwarted two union elections since 1994, according to the National Labor Relations Board, an administrative law judge, federal court documents and congressional testimony by its workers. But black and Latino workers think they have just found their slingshot.

"There has to be a bonding that's taught," said the Rev. Graylan Scott Hagler, pastor of the Plymouth Congregational Church of Christ in the District and president of a ministerial alliance that is helping the workers. "The plant is a giant. It threatens a lot of people's livelihood. To organize this way becomes an equalizer."

Once upon a time, most Smithfield employees were black. But as the new century dawned, that changed. Now 47 percent of workers are Latino, compared with about 38 percent black, Smithfield officials said.

Nearly all of the top supervisors are white. The kill floor is mostly filled with black employees, and the staff on the cutting line is mostly Latinos.

The ethnic divide goes beyond the plant. At the potluck, Latinos dominated. There were no white or Native American workers present, even though they make up nearly one-sixth of the staff.

More black people turned out earlier, at a meeting at an NAACP building. Many Latinos left that meeting before the speeches were done. Farther down the road, where workers gather at a gas station to get rides to the plant, nearly all faces were black. Latinos, said a black union organizer, mostly carpool among themselves.

Andreas Smith, a black worker, grabbed extra protest T-shirts at the station to give to other workers who clamor for them. "We need to organize, because Smithfield cheats every time," he said, adding that workers need better conditions.

Company executives denied that they treat workers poorly and said there is no need for a union. Smithfield Packing's president, Joseph W. Luter IV, said the union is waging a smear campaign. "A lot of accusations that we don't believe are accurate are tainting our organization in a way that's unfair," he said in an interview at the plant.

Smithfield pays $7.50 to $12 an hour -- more than most jobs here pay. Even in Fayetteville, the region's economic engine, there are signs of a weakened economy. Stores at the local mall have closed, and several adjoining lots are empty.

But not all plant workers are eager for a union.

"A union speaks on your behalf," said Barbara Lee, who weighs meat at Smithfield. "I can speak for myself."