Educator Resources Educator Resources

Court Records, Berkshire County Courthouse Great Barrington, Massachusetts Inferior Court of Common Pleas May 28, 1781 Volume 4A, page 55, Number

Brom & Bett vs. J. Ashley Esq.

“…After a full hearing of this case the evidence therein being produced, the same case is committed to the Jury Jonathan Holcom Foreman and his fellows who being duly sworn return this verdict that in this case the Jury find that the aforesaid Brom & Bett are not and were not at the time of the purchase of the original writ the legal Negro servants of him the said John Ashley during their life and [assess] thirty shillings damages wherefore it is considered by the Court Adjudged and determined that the said Brom & Bett are not, nor were they at the time of the purchase of the original writ the legal Negro of the said John Ashley during life, and that the said Brom & Bett do recover against the said John Ashley the sum of thirty shillings lawful silver Money, Damages…”

“One of the most unique and interesting speeches at the convention was made by Sojourner Truth, an emancipated slave….she came forward to the platform and addressing the President said with great simplicity:

‘...I want to say a few words about this matter. I am a woman’s rights. I have as much muscle as any man, and can do as much work as any man. I have plowed and reaped and husked and chopped and mowed, and can any man do more than that? I am as strong as any man that is now. As for intellect, all I can say is, if woman have a pint and man a quart–why can’t she have her little pint full? You need not be afraid to give us our rights for fear we will take too much, –for we can’t take more than our pint’ll hold. The poor men seem to be all in confusion, and don’t know what to do. Why children, if you have woman’s rights and you give it to her and you will feel better….’”

[In Camp Saxton, 1863]

“I taught a great many of the comrades in Company E to read and write, when they were off duty. Nearly all were anxious to learn. My husband taught some also when it was convenient for him. I was very happy to know my efforts were successful in camp, and also felt grateful for the appreciation of my services. I gave my services willingly for four years and three months without receiving a dollar. I was glad, however, to be allowed to go with the regiment, to care for the sick and afflicted comrades.” (21)

“While the fighting was on, a friend, Lizzie Lancaster, and I stopped at several of the rebel homes, and after talking with some of the women and children we asked them if they had any food. They claimed to have only some hard-tack, and evidently did not care to give us anything to eat, but this was not surprising. They were bitterly against our people and had no mercy or sympathy for us.

The second day, our boys were reinforced by a regiment of white soldiers, a Maine regiment, and by cavalry, and had quite a fight. On the third day, Edward Herron, who was a fine gunner on the steamer John Adams, came on shore, bringing a small cannon, which the men pulled along for more than five miles. This cannon was the only piece for shelling. On coming upon the enemy, all secured their places, and they had a lively fight, which lasted several hours, and our boys were nearly captured by the Confederates; but the Union boys carried out all their plans that day, and succeeded in driving the enemy back. After this skirmish, every afternoon between four and five o'clock the Confederate General Finegan would send a flag of truce to Colonel Higginson, warning him to send all women and children out of the city, and threatening to bombard it if this was not done.” (23-24)

“I learned to handle a musket very well while in the regiment, and could shoot straight and often hit the target. I assisted in cleaning the guns and used to fire them off, to see if the cartridges were dry, before cleaning and reloading, each day. I thought this great fun. I was also able to take a gun all apart, and put it together again.” (27)

AUNT CHLOE (excerpt)
I remember, well remember, That dark and dreadful day, When they whispered to me, “Chloe, Your children’s sold away!”

It seemed as if a bullet Had shot me through and through, And I felt as if my heart-strings Was breaking right in two.

And I says to cousin Milly, “There must be some mistake; Where’s Mistus?” “In the great house crying— Crying like her heart would break.

“And the lawyer’s there with Mistus; Says he’s come to ’ministrate, ’Cause when master died he just left Heap of debt on the estate.

“And I thought ’twould do you good To bid your boys good-bye— To kiss them both and shake their hands, And have a hearty cry.

“Oh! Chloe, I knows how you feel, ’Cause I’se been through it all; I thought my poor old heart would break, When master sold my Saul.”

The Civil Rights Documentary Project Oral History/Interview with Ella Baker (1968)

A [PARTIAL] Transcript of a Recorded Interview with Miss Ella Baker, Staff-Member-Consultant with SCEF, Southern Conference Educational Fund. By John Britton, Interviewer, Washington, D.C. June 19, 1968

Britton: So, what you're saying, then, is that the genesis of the idea for SCLC [the Southern Christian Leadership Conference] started in the minds of the people in the North, not in Montgomery?

Baker: That's correct. You see, if you recall, after the [Montgomery Bus Boycott] there was almost sort of a complete let down. Nothing was happening. In fact, after I had become associated with the leadership from Montgomery, question was raised about why there was this not-knowing, why there was no organizational machinery for making use of the people who had been involved in the boycott?

I think, to some extent as it seems to have been my characteristic in raising certain kinds of questions, I irritated Dr. King in raising this question. I raised it at a meeting at which he was speaking. I think his rationale was something to the effect that after a big demonstrative type of action, there was a natural let-down and a need for people to sort of catch their breath, you see, which, of course, I didn't quite agree with. But, nevertheless, this was what took place.

So, I don't think that the leadership of Montgomery was prepared to capitalize, let's put it, on the projection that had come out of the Montgomery situation. Certainly, they had not reached the point of developing an organizational format for the expansion of it. So discussions emanated, to a large extent, from up this way.

Shirley Chisholm, Speech on the floor of the House of Representatives, “I Am for the Equal Rights Amendment.” (1970)

It is time we act to assure full equality of opportunity to those citizens who, although in a majority, suffer the restrictions that are commonly imposed on minorities, to women.

The argument that this amendment will not solve the problem of sex discrimination is not relevant. If the argument were used against a civil rights bill, as it has been used in the past, the prejudice that lies behind it would be embarrassing. Of course laws will not eliminate prejudice from the hearts of human beings. But that is no reason to allow prejudice to continue to be enshrined in our laws — to perpetuate injustice through inaction.

The amendment is necessary to clarify countless ambiguities and inconsistencies in our legal system. For instance, the Constitution guarantees due process of law, in the 5th and 14th amendments. But the applicability of due process of sex distinctions is not clear. Women are excluded from some State colleges and universities. In some States, restrictions are placed on a married woman who engages in an independent business. Women may not be chosen for some juries. Women even receive heavier criminal penalties than men who commit the same crime.

…The time is clearly now to put this House on record for the fullest expression of that equality of opportunity which our founding fathers professed. They professed it, but they did not assure it to their daughters, as they tried to do for their sons.

The Constitution they wrote was designed to protect the rights of white, male citizens. As there were no black Founding Fathers, there were no founding mothers — a great pity, on both counts. It is not too late to complete the work they left undone. Today, here, we should start to do so.

Condoleezza Rice, Speech to National Council of Negro Women, December 8, 2001 - Washington, D.C.

I could not be more honored than to receive the Bethune Award because I feel a great kinship with Mary McLeod Bethune and I think we all do. …It's extraordinary that a young, black woman from South Carolina could found a college and be its president for almost four decades.

…I also feel a great kinship to Dr. Bethune and to this organization because we share a passion for education. There is no more important element for the United States of America than the promise of education. I'm a living example of what education can mean, because it goes back a long way in my family. I very often tell people that I should have been able to accomplish what I accomplished because I had grandparents and parents who understood the value of education.

Maybe some of you've heard me tell the story of Granddaddy Rice, a poor sharecropper's son in Ewtah – that's E-W-T-A-H - Alabama, who, somehow, in about 1919 decided he was going to get book learning. And so he asked people who came through how a colored man could get to college. And they said to him, "Well you see there's this college not too far away from here called Stillman College, and if you could get there, they take colored men into college." And so he saved up his cotton and he went off to Tuscaloosa, Alabama to go to college. He made it through his first year having paid for it with his cotton, but the second year he didn't have any more cotton, and they came and they asked him for tuition. And he said, "Well you see the problem is, I don't have any money." And they said, "Well, you'll have to leave." So he thought rather quickly and he said, "Well how are those boys going to college?" And they said, "Well, you see, they have what's called a scholarship and if you wanted to be a Presbyterian minister then you could have a scholarship too." And Granddaddy Rice said, "You know, that's exactly what I had in mind. And my family has been Presbyterian and it has been college-educated ever since.

My grandfather understood something, and so did my grandmother and my mother's parents, and that is that higher education, if you can attain it, is transforming. You may come from a poor family, you may come from a rural family, you may be first-generation college-educated, but once you are college-educated, the most important thing about you, in many ways, is that you're a college graduate and you are transformed. And I have to tell you that if I have a concern at all today in America, it is that we have got to find a way to pass on that promise to children, no matter what their circumstances, because it's just got to be the case in America that it does not matter where you came from, it only matters where you're going.

“SEC. 2. And be it farther enacted, That if any person shall write, print, utter or publish, or shall cause or procure to be written, printed, uttered or published, or shall knowingly and willingly assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering or publishing any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States, or to stir up sedition within the United States, or to excite any unlawful combinations therein, for opposing or resisting any law of the United States, or any act of the President of the United States, done in pursuance of any such law, or of the powers in him vested by the constitution of the United States, or to resist, oppose, or defeat any such law or act, or to aid, encourage or abet any hostile designs of any foreign nation against United States, their people or government, then such person, being thereof convicted before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.”

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

1. JUSTICE HOLMES delivered the opinion of the court.

“We admit that, in many places and in ordinary times, the defendants, in saying all that was said in the circular, would have been within their constitutional rights. But the character of every act depends upon the circumstances in which it is done. ..The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic. It does not even protect a man from an injunction against uttering words that may have all the effect of force. …The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent. It is a question of proximity and degree. When a nation is at war, many things that might be said in time of peace are such a hindrance to its effort that their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight, and that no Court could regard them as protected by any constitutional right.”

Roth v. United States, 354 U.S. 476 (1957)

1. JUSTICE BRENNAN delivered the opinion of the Court.

“All ideas having even the slightest redeeming social importance -- unorthodox ideas, controversial ideas, even ideas hateful to the prevailing climate of opinion -- have the full protection of the guaranties, unless excludable because they encroach upon the limited area of more important interests. But implicit in the history of the First Amendment is the rejection of obscenity as utterly without redeeming social importance. …We hold that obscenity is not within the area of constitutionally protected speech or press. It is strenuously urged that these obscenity statutes offend the constitutional guaranties because they punish incitation to impure sexual thoughts, not shown to be related to any overt antisocial conduct which is or may be incited in the persons stimulated to such thoughts….

The fundamental freedoms of speech and press have contributed greatly to the development and wellbeing of our free society and are indispensable to its continued growth. Ceaseless vigilance is the watchword to prevent their erosion by Congress or by the States. The door barring federal and state intrusion into this area cannot be left ajar; it must be kept tightly closed, and opened only the slightest crack necessary to prevent encroachment upon more important interests. It is therefore vital that the standards for judging obscenity safeguard the protection of freedom of speech and press for material which does not treat sex in a manner appealing to prurient interest.

[The Court suggests] this test: whether, to the average person, applying contemporary community standards, the dominant theme of the material, taken as a whole, appeals to prurient interest.”

Mr. Justice FORTAS delivered the opinion of the Court.

“First Amendment rights, applied in light of the special characteristics of the school environment, are available to teachers and students. It can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate….

…In our system, state-operated schools may not be enclaves of totalitarianism. School officials do not possess absolute authority over their students. Students in school as well as out of school are 'persons' under our Constitution. They are possessed of fundamental rights which the State must respect, just as they themselves must respect their obligations to the State. In our system, students may not be regarded as closed-circuit recipients of only that which the State chooses to communicate. They may not be confined to the expression of those sentiments that are officially approved. In the absence of a specific showing of constitutionally valid reasons to regulate their speech, students are entitled to freedom of expression of their views…

…A student's rights, therefore, do not embrace merely the classroom hours. When he is in the cafeteria, or on the playing field, or on the campus during the authorized hours, he may express his opinions, even on controversial subjects like the conflict in Vietnam, if he does so without 'materially and substantially interfer(ing) with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school' and without colliding with the rights of others.”

“...Go to any university campus, and there you'll find an open, sometimes heated discussion of the problems in American society and what can be done to correct them. Turn on the television, and you'll see the legislature conducting the business of government right there before the camera, debating and voting on the legislation that will become the law of the land. March in any demonstrations, and there are many of them - the people's right of assembly is guaranteed in the Constitution and protected by the police.

But freedom is more even than this: Freedom is the right to question, and change the established way of doing things. It is the continuing revolution of the marketplace. It is the understanding that allows us to recognize shortcomings and seek solutions. It is the right to put forth an idea, scoffed at by the experts, and watch it catch fire among the people. It is the right to stick - to dream - to follow your dream, or stick to your conscience, even if you're the only one in a sea of doubters.

Freedom is the recognition that no single person, no single authority of government has a monopoly on the truth, but that every individual life is infinitely precious, that every one of us put on this world has been put there for a reason and has something to offer.”

SNYDER v. PHELPS

Chief Justice Roberts , Opinion of the Court (March 2, 2011)

“Simply put, the church members had the right to be where they were. Westboro alerted local authorities to its funeral protest and fully complied with police guidance on where the picketing could be staged. The picketing was conducted under police supervision some 1,000 feet from the church, out of the sight of those at the church. The protest was not unruly; there was no shouting, profanity, or violence.

…Given that Westboro’s speech was at a public place on a matter of public concern, that speech is entitled to ‘special protection’ under the First Amendment . Such speech cannot be restricted simply because it is upsetting or arouses contempt. ‘If there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment , it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.’ Texas v. Johnson, 491 U. S. 397, 414 (1989) . Indeed, ‘the point of all speech protection … is to shield just those choices of content that in someone’s eyes are misguided, or even hurtful.’ Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Group of Boston, Inc., 515 U. S. 557, 574 (1995).”

HOUSE BILL 2670 (2022-03-31)

BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF TENNESSEE:

SECTION 5.

(a) A public institution of higher education shall not:

(1) Conduct any mandatory training of students or employees if the training includes one (1) or more divisive concepts;

(2) Use training programs or training materials for students or employees if the program or material includes one (1) or more divisive concepts; or

(3) Use state-appropriated funds to incentivize, beyond payment of regular salary or other regular compensation, a faculty member to incorporate one (1) or more divisive concepts into academic curricula.

(b) If a public institution of higher education employs employees whose primary duties include diversity, then the duties of such employees must include efforts to strengthen and increase intellectual diversity among the students and faculty of the public institution of higher education at which they are employed.

SECTION 6.

(a) Each public institution of higher education shall conduct a biennial survey of the institution's students and employees to assess the campus climate with regard to diversity of thought and the respondents' comfort level in speaking freely on campus, regardless of political affiliation or ideology. The institution shall publish the results of the biennial survey on the institution's website.

(b) This section is repealed on July 1, 2028

President Calvin Coolidge, Address at the Annual Session of the American Medical Association, Washington, D.C., May 17, 1927

Ladies and Gentlemen:

“...Those who have witnessed the general paralysis which prevails when even a moderate epidemic breaks out can not help but realize that one of the most important factors of our everyday existence is the public health, which has come to be dependent upon sanitation and the medical profession. We are constantly in receipt of the beneficial activities of these efforts in the disposition of waste, the water we drink, the food we eat, and even in the air we breathe. This great work is carried on partly through private initiative, partly through Government effort, partly by a combination of these two working in harmony with the science of chemistry, of engineering, and of applied medicine. In its main aspects it is preventive, but in a very large field it is remedial. Without this service our large centers of population would be overwhelmed and dissipated almost in a day and the modern organization of society would be altogether destroyed. The debt which we owe to the science of medicine is simply beyond computation or comprehension….

If there is any one thing which the progress of science has taught us, it is the necessity of an open mind. Without this attitude very little advance could be made. Truth must always be able to demonstrate itself. But when it has been demonstrated, in whatsoever direction it may lead, it ought to be followed.”

President Lyndon B. Johnson, Special Message to the Congress on the Nation's Health (1964)

To the Congress of the United States:

The American people are not satisfied with better-than-average health. As a Nation, they want, they need, and they can afford the best of health:

--not just for those of comfortable means.

--but for all our citizens, old and young, rich and poor.

In America,

--There is no need and no room for second-class health services.

...Too many Americans still are cut off by low incomes from adequate health services. Too many older people are still deprived of hope and dignity by prolonged and costly illness. The linkage between ill-health and poverty in America is still all too plain.

In its first session, the 88th Congress made some important advances on the health front:

--It acted to increase our supply of physicians and dentists.

--It began a Nation-wide attack on mental illness and mental retardation.

--And it strengthened our efforts against air pollution.

But our remaining agenda is long, and it will be unfinished until each American enjoys the full benefits of modern medical knowledge.

Part of this agenda concerns a direct attack on that particular companion of poor health--poverty. Above all, we must see to it that all of our children, whatever the economic condition of their parents, can start life with sound minds and bodies.

My message to the Congress on poverty will set forth measures designed to advance us toward this goal.

In today's message, I present the rest of this year's agenda for America's good health.

1. Everett Koop, Surgeon General's Report on Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (1987):

“Every person can reduce the risk of exposure to the AIDS virus through preventive measures that are simple, straightforward, and effective. However, if people are to follow these recommended measures-to act responsibly to protect themselves and others-they must be informed about them. That is an obvious statement, but not a simple one. Educating people about AIDS has never been easy.

From the start, this disease has evoked highly emotional and often irrational responses. Much of the reaction could be attributed to fear of the many unknowns surrounding a new and very deadly disease. This fear was compounded by personal feelings regarding the groups of people primarily affected-homosexual men and intravenous drug abusers. Rumors and misinformation spread rampantly and became as difficult to combat as the disease itself. It is time to put self-defeating attitudes aside and recognize that we are fighting a disease-not people. We must control the spread of AIDS, and at the same time offer the best we can to care for those who are sick.”

What is to be Done?

Martha Bensley Bruere in Life and Labor (1911)

Well, the fire is over, the girls are dead, and as I write, the procession in honor of the unidentified dead is moving by under my windows. Now what is going to be done about it?

Harris and Blanck, the Triangle Company, have offered to pay one week's wages to the families of the dead girls--as though it were summer and they are giving them a vacation!

Three days after the fire they inserted in the trade papers this notice: “NOTICE, THE TRIANGLE WAIST CO. beg to notify their customers that they are in good working order. HEADQUARTERS now at 9-11 University Place.”

The day after they were installed in their new quarters, the Building Department of New York City discovered that 9-11 University Place was not even fireproof, and that the firm had already blocked the exit to the one fire escape by two rows of sewing machines.

And still as I write the mourning procession moves past in the rain. For two hours they have been going steadily by and the end is not yet in sight. There have been no carriages, no imposing marshals on horseback; just thousands and thousands of working men and women carrying the banners of their trades through the long three-mile tramp in the rain. Never have I seen a military pageant or triumphant ovation so impressive; for it is not because 146 workers were killed in the Triangle shop-not altogether. It is because every year there are 50,000 working men and women killed in the United States-136 a day; almost as many as happened to be killed together on the 25th of March; and because slowly, very slowly, it is dawning on these thousands on thousands that such things do not have to be!

LABOR OUTRAGES DUE TO OLD LAWS (1912)

Such Is the Opinion of Jane Addams, Famous Sociological Student

CHICAGO, Jan. 2. -- Application of old laws to new conditions has a tendency to develop men of the McNamara type in the opinion of Miss Jane Addams, who returned to the city after presenting a petition to President Taft asking for the appointment of a commission to study the relations between employers and employees.

"It seems to me that all our laws dealing with labor unions are in need of [revision]," said Miss Addams. "The trusts are being prosecuted for violating laws, which they assert are not applicable to modern industrial conditions. So with the labor unions. Like the trusts, the labor unions are of recent origin, and laws enacted at a time when conditions were entirely different are being applied to them. The result is a growing distrust in the judiciary among large groups of labor, as they see employers appeal to the courts to thwart every movement made to improve the status of the worker. There is no denying the fact that the courts have shown a willingness to serve the interests of the employers and have placed property rights higher than human rights. The courts are following traditions and precedents that do not fit into the modern scheme of things.

…I have, of course, no idea what President Taft will do about a commission, but he received us very cordially and appeared to be much interested in the question. I am hopeful that such a commission will be created and I feel confident that it would accomplish good results."

Mary Church Terrell, "Solving the Colored Woman's Problem" (1933)

Address Delivered by Mary Church Terrell at the World Fellowship of Faiths, Chicago, Ill., Wed. Aug. 30, 1933.

Solving the Colored Woman's Problem.

Colored Women in the United States have more, larger and harder problems to solve than do those of any other racial group. One had only to know the conditions under which they lived for 250 years during slavery and those which obtain today to understand why this is so.

When a small but noble band of women began an agitation in Seneca Falls, New York in 1848, by which colleges were opened to women and numerous reforms inaugurated for the improvement of their condition along all lines, their sisters who groaned in bondage had little reason to hope that these blessings would ever brighten their crushed and blighted lives.

For in those days of oppression and despair colored women were not only refused admission to schools, as a rule, but the law of the States in which the majority lived made it a crime to teach them to read. Not only could they possess no property, but they did not even own themselves. So pernicious were the customs, so gloomy were their prospects, so fatal the laws only seventy years ago.

But, from the day their fetters were broken and their minds were released from the darkness of ignorance in which they had been held nearly three hundred years; from the day they could stand in the dignity of womanhood, no longer bond but free till this minute, colored women have forged steadily ahead in the acquisition of knowledge and in the cultivation of these graces of character which make for good. To use a thought of the illustrious Frederick Douglass, if judged by the depths from which they have come, rather than by the heights to which their more favored sisters have attained, colored women need not hang their heads in shame. The work they have accomplished and the progress they have made will bear favorable comparison, at least with that of more fortunate women from whom the opportunity of acquiring knowledge and the means of self culture have never been entirely held.

THE EQUAL PAY ACT OF 1963 DECLARATION OF PURPOSE:

• (a) The Congress hereby finds that the existence in industries engaged in commerce or in the production of goods for commerce of wage differentials based on sex-
  1. (1) depresses wages and living standards for employees necessary for their health and efficiency;
  2. (2) prevents the maximum utilization of the available labor resources;
  3. (3) tends to cause labor disputes, thereby burdening, affecting, and obstructing commerce;
  4. (4) burdens commerce and the free flow of goods in commerce; and
  5. (5) constitutes an unfair method of competition.
• (b) It is hereby declared to be the policy of this Act, through exercise by Congress of its power to regulate commerce among the several States and with foreign nations, to correct the conditions above referred to in such industries.

Dolores Huerta, NFWA march and rally (1966)

“..Today our farm workers have come to Sacramento. To the governor and the legislature of California we say you cannot close your eyes and your ears to us any longer. You cannot pretend that we do not exist. You cannot plead ignorance to our problems because we are here and we embody our needs for you. And we are not alone. We are accompanied by many friends. The religious leaders of the state, spear-headed by the migrant ministry, the student groups, the civil rights groups that make up the movement that has been successful in securing civil rights for Negroes in this country, right-thinking citizens and our staunchest ally, organized labor, are all in the revolution of the farm worker.

...The day has ended when the farm worker will let himself be used as a pawn by employers, government, and others who would exploit them for their own ends. La huelga and la causa is our cry, and everyone must listen. Viva la huelga! Viva Cesar Chavez!”

LAS VEGAS'S SERVICE INDUSTRY WORKERS HIT THE JACKPOT WITH UNION CONTRACTS By Lou Cannon The Washington Post

November 30, 1997

A decisive union victory in the nation's longest strike and the signing of a visionary contract at the world's largest hotel-casino have boosted the fortunes of service workers on the lower rungs of the work force in this gambling mecca.

"Las Vegas, whatever else anybody says about it, has become a city where maids can own their homes and raise their families," said Hattie Canty, president of Culinary Workers Union Local 226, a former maid and widowed mother of 10 who has done just that. Her union has claimed victory in a bitter labor dispute at the Frontier Hotel-Casino, where workers have been on strike since Sept. 21, 1991.

….Today, Local 226 has a squeaky-clean reputation and an image of diversity reflective of the industry. It maintains two training centers for workers, originally opposed and now financially supported by the hotels. More than half of the union's members are women. Slightly more than a third of members are Latino, 30 percent are white, 12 percent black, 11 percent Asian and the others of mixed race.

Canty, an African American who raised her large family after her husband died of cancer 24 years ago, says the union has demonstrated that service workers can live in dignity.