Union Supporters Protest Against Stone

Chanting and carrying signs reading "Stone is a Stain on Harvard," demonstrators gathered outside Mass Hall yesterday to protest the involvement of Corporation member Robert G. Stone '45 in "economic violence" against striking Appalachian coal miners.

Stone, who has served on Harvard's primary governing body since 1975, is also a member of the board of directors of the Pittston Company, which has recently cut back health care and other benefits for its retired and disabled employees and their widows.

The United Mine Workers of America [UMWA] has been on strike against Pittston since April 5, and was responsible for initiating yesterday's protest at Harvard.

UMWA spokesperson Kenneth Zinn said the Connecticut-based company's board has "taken away health coverage from senior citizens, widows, people with black lung disease, men whose backs were broken in its own coal mines."

About 70 demonstrators--mostly members of the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers [HUCTW] and other sympathetic unions--demanded at the noon rally that Stone cut the University's ties with the mining company by resigning his post either at Harvard or at Pittston. Stone is one of seven members of the Corporation, which owns all Harvard property and which is responsible for University policy decisions.

"Mr. Stone is legally one of the owners of Harvard University," Bliss Professor of History John Womack told the assembled protesters. "If you talk about corporate responsibility at Pittston, you've got to talk about corporate responsibility at Harvard."

Protest organizers said Stone--who attends about 15 board meetings a year--has rejected opportunities for a settlement with the strikers. They said they may take further action at Harvard if Stone does not accede to their demands.

"Robert Stone works in a luxury corporate office in Manhattan," Zinn said. "He doesn't have to look into the eyes of coal miners who have black lung disease because their health benefits have been cut off by his company. If he isn't going to come down to the coal fields, we'll come up here."

Other unions involved in the rally included the AFL-CIO and Local 26, the Harvard dining hall workers' union. Representatives of both those groups and HUCTW said their organizations would continue to lend support to efforts against Stone.

The president of the United Steel Workers union, Lynn Williams--father of a member of the Class of '89--also added his voice to the protest. As he entered the Yard with his wife and son, he joined the demonstrators, and later gave an impromptu speech.

During the protest, the seven-member Corporation was holding one of its regular meetings at 17 Quincy St., across the Yard.

The protesters marched and distributed leaflets for nearly an hour in the rain, while hundreds of graduating seniors and their families gathered nearby for yesterday's Class Day ceremonies.

Stone could not be reached for comment yesterday. A Pittston spokesperson Tuesday called the demonstrators' tactics "character assassination" and "corporate vilification."