By Orin Langelle and Martin St. John, Industrial Worker, July 1990
In Sonoma County California, San Francisco, Chicago, St. Louis, and Ann Arbor, Michigan, Wobblies in conjunction with other labor and environmental activists rallied and demonstrated during the week of June 18, 1990 to protest the attempted murder of EF!-IWW activists Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney and to publicize Redwood Summer activities for saving the last of the ancient forests…
In Ann Arbor Michigan, on June 20, local Wobblies sponsored a 90 person demonstration at the Federal Building to rally solidarity for the environmental-worker coalition and to support Bari and Cherney. Despite a downpour in the middle of the rally, the audience was attentive when speakers talked about the need for more coalition work to forward worker and environmental concerns. Local media coverage in the student newspaper and on radio stations was good. S. E. Michigan Wobblies worked closely with the local Rainforest Action Movement and Earth First! to host the rally, and this was the first time in Ann Arbor that the IWW had sponsored any type of joint activities with these environmentalist groups.
Also on June 20, three dozen IWW members and friends held a two hour demonstration at the Federal building in Chicago. Speakers, songs and hundreds of leaflets distributed to passersby called for Solidarity with Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney and Redwood Summer actions. The night before a benefit had been held at a local bar raising money to send Wobbly volunteers to the Redwoods.
On Saturday, June 2nd, 1990 St. Louis Industrial Workers of the World, Workers Democracy, and Big River Earth First![1] held a rally for justice and demanded an investigation into who was responsible for trying to murder two nonviolent EF!-IWW organizers, Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney. Almost 40 people converged on the St. Louis Federal Building.
The event featured chants such as “Things are really Weird” and “The FBI did it—Don’t you for-get it!” Passers-by to the Federal Building were greeted with banners, slogans and the American flag draped around a visiting Canadian who vehemently retorted, “Smash all States.”
Under the premise of “No Death Squads in the USA” the rally-goers questioned the concept that nonviolent organizers would actually blow themselves up.
In a related incident, the following Friday, June 8, in Carbondale, IL a group of Shawnee EF!ers held a press conference at the Federal Building there and then proceeded to the office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and turned in all EF! weapons at their disposal, which included: stress tabs, aspirins, a telephone and phone book, and their toy water pistols. The FBI was unavailable for comment.
EF! members and Wobblies continue to emphasize across the country that Judi and Darryl were targeted by the logging corporations and the FBI. EF!-IWW Local #1 member Anna Marie Stenberg said in a recent interview, “We believe that Georgia-Pacific, Louisiana Pacific, their company-union lackeys and FBI cohorts are the ones behind this bombing. They weren’t trying to kill Judi—the ballistic evidence that our experts have gathered is conclusive—they wanted to maim her, make her an example for others who might consider not only speaking out against the atrocities they commit, but actually take action against them. They wanted to silence the movement and discredit it to others who might look this way for hope. And—most of all—they wanted to do it in such a way as to make us look like the terrorists in the situation.”
Footnote:
[1] These groups worked together so often and their members overlapped so much that they became known as Earth First! – IWW Local #2.