My mother did not have a price or a color or anything like that in her fight against what was wrong. My grandmother came to Detroit to work for Ford because she could make more in a factory than as a schoolteacher. My mother’s dad made 50 cents a day in the mines and when he lost his hand, he never got anything from the employer. My mother was raised in the South and she followed the whole labor story. I remember when Hoffa was giving a speech at a union rally, my mother followed a reporter who was phoning in his story and said: “I just want to know that you are telling the truth.”

I was looking at the FBI files and saw that my mother had written protesting the government’s witch-hunt of the labor unions. She lived for what was right every day and in every way. Here’s the thing about my mom and what I think is important for today’s world: consequences never dictated her actions.

The original purpose of the unions was a revolution by the people and not only in America. The unions went from being organizations formed for fair treatment of workers to ones of personal gain for the leadership. Labor unions and their business agents began working for contractors. Fairness and equality were replaced by inequality and supremacy. Things not only degenerated for our family but for much of the population. My dad became an untouchable in the union. Our story has a certain parallel to the problems in this country and in the world.Īfter my mother’s death, we were caught in limbo. A certain loss of innocence and the discovery of truth. I think Paola’s film and our family’s story mirror the story of the working people. Civil rights, social rights, family, country, motherhood. The goal of all the people in high places is personal gain.Įverybody who sees the film pulls from it a variety of issues-like a kaleidoscope. If you want to start counting the bad guys, start at the top.

Tony and many of us have sought to find people who care about right for righteousness’ sake and not for personal gain or power. He was overjoyed that the film managed to have the impact that he had fought for since his mother’s death. My brother Tony was not at the Sundance Film Festival because he had not experienced any success in his attempts to defend his mother’s legacy and his country’s legacy. There have been strong responses to the film everywhere. Mary Liuzzo Lilleboe, the daughter of murdered civil rights activist Viola Liuzzo, made the following comments to Joanne Laurier of the WSWS in a telephone interview from her home in Oregon.

Home of the brave viola liuzzo