University of Virginia Library

Tom Gardner

Birdsong's Hospital

This column could just as well
have been entitled "Why won't
the Rulers talk to the Ruled?". Is it
because by doing so they fear that
they would yield some of their
absolute power to the "constituents"
affected by that power?

William Birdsong is on our
Board of Visitors. He is also a
Vice-President of the Louise Ob
Memorial Hospital in Suffolk, Va.
Mr. Birdsong's Hospital refuses to
rehire the more than 80 striking
employees seeking to regain their
jobs, and the Ob administration
refuses to recognize and bargain
with the union (Local 26 of the
Distributive Workers of America).

When you ask people in Suffolk
who Mr. Birdsong is, the usual reply
is, "He's one of the guys who owns
this town." When you try to
determine who owns and runs the
University, most will agree that it's
the Board of Visitors. Since Mr.
Birdsong is involved in the control of
at least two different groups -
workers and students - it may be
useful to examine the parallel
techniques of control employed to
keep those who are controlled in
their proper place.

One technique in constant
operation in both cases is the
exclusion of those affected by the
decisions from the decision-making
process. Nansemond County where
the hospital is located is over 80%
black in population, yet the Hospital
Board is totally white (as is the
Board of Visitors). There are no
students on the Board of Visitors.

When the constituents are
denied representation on the policy-making
bodies, the next alternative
is to work through an agency
elected by the constituents to
represent them to the decision makers.
The employees elect their
union leaders and ask that the
company deal with the union as
their bargaining agent. Students
elect representatives and ask that
the Board of Visitors discuss issues
with the Student Council.

No Communication

The response is the same in both
cases, at least in Mr. Birdsong's case
- he won't talk to "his" workers
and he won't talk to "his" students.
In both cases the refusal to
communicate is calculated to
weaken the legitimacy of the
bargaining agent with its own
constituents. The rationale is clear:
Why talk to the subjects? - they
only represent their own personal
interests; only we, the authorities,
truly understand the policy requirements
of long-term investment and
planning.

The other parallel here is that in
both instances of non-communication,
i.e., in the refusal to
recognize the union and the recent
"dis-invitation" and in the refusal
to discuss issues with Student
Council representatives at tomorrow's
Board of Visitors meeting,
this rigidity can only backfire and
explode in the face of the pompous
authorities.

Another tactic with obvious
interconnections is the use of
racism. Management has always
been willing where possible to use
racism to divide and defeat union
efforts. In Suffolk, where the high
schools are almost totally segregated,
racial overtones have run
through the entire history of the
strike. Birdsong's Hospital
administration has played on the
racial tensions in the importation of
white scabs and the police harassment
of the predominantly black
strikers.

For Mr. Birdsong and the other
proprietors of Ob Hospital who
make their profit from the sickness
of others, racism is the most
profitable sickness of all. As was
shown last year in the case of Chase
Stuart Wheatley (an architect of
Virginia's massive resistance to
school desegregation), men who
profit from racism and have fought
all their lives to prevent a "mixing
of the races" (Gov. Mills Godwin)
cannot now be expected to take the
lead in integrating the University.

Strike Information

Since I don't have space here to
go into the background of the Ob
Hospital strike and the use of
racism in the strike, I strongly
recommend that interested readers
attend the speech and discussion
with strikers from Suffolk at 7:30
tonight (Thursday) in the South
Meeting Room of Newcomb Hall. I
would also urge everyone to come
out to the Rotunda at 2 p.m. in
support of the VCHR ray and to
demonstrate our support of the
Ob strikers to Mr. Birdsong. Let
us also insist that when terms on
the Board, such as Mr. Birdsong's,
expire this coming year, they be
replaced with new, enlightened
blood and certainly not reappointed.