Seeking Energy, Unions Join Protest Against Wall Street

STEVEN GREENHOUSE and CARA BUCKLEY

The New York Times

October 6, 2011 ET

Stu­art Ap­pelbaum, an influ­ential union lead­er in New York City, was in Tunisia last month, advis­ing the fledgling la­bor move­ment there, when he received a flurry of phone calls and e-mails alerting him to the rumblings of some­thing back home. Protesters united under a provocative name, Occu­py Wall Street, were gath­ering in a Lower Manhattan park and rais­ing issues long dear to orga­nized la­bor.
And gain­ing at­tention for it.
Mr. Ap­pelbaum recalled ask­ing a col­league over the phone to find out who was behind Occu­py Wall Street — a bunch of hippies or perhaps trou­blemakers? — and whether the move­ment might quickly fade.
            

So far, at least, it has not, and on Wednesday, sev­eral prom­inent unions, struggling to gain traction on their own, made their first effort to join forces with Occu­py Wall Street. Thou­sands of union members marched with the protesters from Foley Square to their encamp­ment in nearby Zuccotti Park.
“The la­bor move­ment needs to tap into the energy and learn from them,” Mr. Ap­pelbaum,       

pres­ident of the Retail, Wholesale and De­part­ment Store Union, said. “They are reach­ing a lot of people and exciting a lot of people that the la­bor move­ment has been struggling to reach for years.”

In fact, the un­expected success of Occu­py Wall Street in lev­el­ing crit­icism of corporate America has stirred some soul-search­ing among la­bor leaders. They have noted with envy that the new move­ment has done a far better job, not only of cap­tur­ing inter­est, but also of attracting young people. Protests have spread to dozens of cities, including Boston, Chicago and Los An­ge­les.
Sev­eral union leaders complained that their own protests over the past two years had received lit­tle at­tention, though they had put far more people on the streets than Occu­py           

Wall Street has. A la­bor rally in Wash­ington last October drew more than 100,000 people, with lit­tle news me­dia coverage.

Behind the scenes in re­cent days, union leaders have debated how to respond to Occu­py Wall Street. In internal discus­sions, some voiced worries that if la­bor were perceived as trying to co-opt the move­ment, it might alien­ate the protesters and touch off a backlash.
Oth­ers said they were wary of be­ing embarrassed by the far-left activists in the group who have repeatedly de­nounced the United States govern­ment.
Those concerns may be re­newed af­ter a dis­turbance about 8 p.m. Wednesday as the march was breaking up. The po­lice said they arrested eight protesters around the inter­section of Broadway and Wall Street, af­ter