American Notes LABOR

Ebenezer Scrooge would have liked the executives at the Okonite Cable Co., an electric-cable manufacturer in North Brunswick, N.J. According to plant workers, a senior manager was leading a group of newly hired salesmen on a shop-floor tour when someone took umbrage at the sight of laborers wearing Santa Claus caps. Though the festive headgear had become something of an annual tradition at the plant, management ordered three offending workers to get rid of their caps. When they refused, they were promptly suspended for three days without pay.

By the following morning some 120 workers had donned red-and-white caps in protest, and they were consequently kicked out into the cold. Most of the suspended Santas held a rally outside the plant, singing Jingle Bells and flaunting signs that read OKONITE, HUMBUG!

Union leaders finally persuaded the protesters to serve out their suspensions and quietly return to work -- without their controversial caps -- pending an arbitration hearing. "So we looked silly, so what?" said one worker. Slamming management, he added, "This just proves you can wear a three-piece suit and still act like a clown."