Today, Roger Toussaint, the president of the transport workers union, begins his ten-day jail sentence in the infamous Tombs in NYC. Yours truly will be among a large crowd of unionists who will gather in Brooklyn and march with Touissaint across the Brooklyn Bridge. John Sweeney, the president of the AFL-CIO, will apparently also be there–and good for him. (For those of you who want to join, assemble at the Brooklyn Supreme Court, 360 Adams Street, on the Court
Street side).

The march will certainly be a sign of support for Toussaint (there will also be vigils in front of the jail over the next few days). But, it is likely to be as much a rally to denounce the vile Taylor Law, which prohibits public workers from striking and allows the imposition of penalties against strike leaders (witness the jail sentence meted out to Toussaint), sanctions against the workers (who still face three days of lost pay for striking) and penalties against the union as a whole (which has lost, at least temporarily, the right to have dues automatically deducted from its members’ paychecks).

Steve Greenhouse of The New York Times has a “news analysis” piece on the recent developments in the struggle between the transit workers, the transit authority and the legal system.