AH QUON McELRATH

In November 2008, just weeks before her death, AQ sat down with us for a series of interviews. The following is an excerpt from one of these sessions. AQ always expressed the belief that the union was a way for “working people to take control over their own lives and contribute to the welfare of the larger community.” We asked her about practical ways the ILWU helped make this a reality. In 1954, Ah Quon was hired as a full-time social worker by the union. At the same time her friend, David Thompson, was hired as education director. Ah Quon now had an opportunity to help shape rank and file education, turning theory into practice and strengthening the union.

Throughout her life, AQ was a fighter for the rights of women. Her consistent message was that through the trade union movement women can win parity with male colleagues. Our director/editor, Joy Chong-Stannard has found an interview with Ah Quon from 2008. She talks about how she helped educate wives and women friends of longshoremen about how union membership benefits the entire family. AQ started working as a volunteer with the labor movement and the ILWUas early as 1932. Her story illuminates a time of dynamic change in Hawai‘i’s political and economic system.

Claire Shimabukuro, shares her insight into AQ’s philosophy about needing to “smell the roses”!

Our moving image archive continues to provide a look at history with excerpts from Rice & Roses programs. We were surprised and happy to find a treasure trove of material from film reels that were discovered at the Bishop Museum. Today we feature an excerpt from a program that was produced sometime in the late 1970’s. Many of our interviewees report that the efforts of organized labor often go far beyond narrow collective bargaining issues and often benefit the entire community, not just union members. AQ relates numerous examples of this, one of the most significant examples was the 1974 Prepaid Health Care Act.

In a round table discussion on a Rice & Roses studio show (circa 1978), hosted by Max Roffman, AQ informs us that in both ‘49 and ‘71 the ILWU provided for alternatives whereby vital goods would be available to meet public need.

At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th Centuries, Hawai`i like many jurisdictions enacted specific laws aimed at crushing the rising labor movement. These laws restricted rights of assembly and rigged the Grand Jury system to exclude the working class, by creating “Blue Ribbon” jury panels. In advance of the 1909 sugar strike, the Japanese Higher Wage Association was formed by four journalists, Nippu Jiji editor, Yasutaro Soga, reporter Yokichi Tasaka, and Frederick Makino (future Hawaii Hochi publisher) and writer, researcher Motoyuki Negoro. They sought to promote better wages and working conditions for ethnic Japanese plantation workers. As leaders of the movement, these journalists documented oppressive conditions and editorialized for change. As a result, their newspaper offices were raided by law enforcement, they were arrested and charged among other things with “impeding sugar plantation operations”! The four were sentenced to 10 months in prison and fined $300 each. So much for First Amendment rights to freedom of the press! The 1946 sugar strike likewise saw application of these oppressive laws, when picketing workers were charged with crimes under the Unlawful Assembly and Criminal Syndicalism Acts. Jail sentences included felony charges that could result in 10 year sentences! ILWU attorney, Harriet Bouslog, successfully appealed these convictions. In a discussion on a Rice & Roses program (circa 1978), AQ reminds us that this action by the union benefitted both striking workers and the entire community.

You may be familiar with the history of racial segregation of schools that was practiced on the Continent and the landmark 1954 U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1954, Brown v. Board of Education, that found the practice unconstitutional. Hawai`i residents, unless of a certain age, are probably unaware that for years Hawai`i schools were segregated, not by race, but by language! In 1924, the Department of Public Instruction created a system of English standard schools in Hawai`i. This decision was the result of pressure by the Haole elite, who felt that their children’s education would suffer if they were instructed in classrooms with local children for whom English was not their first language. This objective was coupled with the desire that their children would learn “American rather than Asian values”. From the very beginning there was opposition to this “undemocratic” system, opposition that would grow and that finally resulted in the end of English standard schools in in 1960. In an appearance on the Rice & Roses television show, hosted by Max Roffman (circa 1978), AQ observes that the labor movement helped mobilize support in opposition to the English standard school system. For an excellent overview of this history see the 1993 paper by Judith Hughes, The Demise of the English Standard School System in Hawai`i. AQ felt that a strong, united labor movement had the ability to address issues benefitting the entire community, not just narrow issues of wages and working conditions. Our documentary about AQ, The Struggle Never Ends, will utilize our substantial film and video archive and feature: AQ, her rank and file brothers and sisters, academics, and political figures.

Former Governor John D. Waiheʻe III was born and raised on Hawai’i Island in Honoka`a, a working class community. He was born just after the end of WWII in 1946 and was exposed to the importance of labor unions while growing up. As a kid, he remembers going with his parents to the school gymnasium when they brought food to striking workers. He later became a political activist and a leader at the 1978 Hawai’i Constitutional Convention. He remembers the ILWU (International Longshore and Warehouse Union, Local 142) and AQ for progressive advocacy that went beyond traditional collective bargaining re: wages and working conditions.