United Airlines agrees to offer domestic-partner benefits to employees and retirees worldwide - 1999

A majority of the 5,000 textile workers at six Fieldcrest Cannon textile plants in Kannapolis, N.C., vote for union representation after an historic 25-year fight - 1999

The International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union halts shipping on the West Coast in solidarity with Mumia Abu-Jamal, a Philadelphia journalist whom many believed was on death row because he was an outspoken African-American - 1999

United Paperworkers International Union merges with Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers International Union to form Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical & Energy Workers International Union, itself later to merge with the Steelworkers - 1999

Bakery, Confectionery & Tobacco Workers Int’l Union merges with American Federation of Grain Millers to form Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers & Grain Millers Int’l Union - 1999

National Basketball Association cancels regular season games for the first time in its 51-year history, during a player lockout. Player salaries and pay caps were primary issue. The lockout lasted 204 days - 1998

Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union merges with United Food and Commercial Workers International Union - 1998

New York City’s Union Square, the site of the first Labor Day in 1882, is officially named a national historic landmark. The square has long been a focal point for working class protest and political expression - 1998

Northwest Airlines pilots, after years of concessions to help the airline, begin what is to become a two-week strike for higher pay - 1998

73,000 Bell Atlantic workers end a successful two-day strike over wages and limits on contracting out of work - 1998

Some 500,000 people participate when a two-day general strike is called in Puerto Rico by more than 60 trade unions and many other organizations. They are protesting privatization of the island's telephone company - 1998

Up to 40,000 New York construction workers demonstrated in midtown Manhattan, protesting the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s awarding of a $33 million contract to a nonunion company. Eighteen police and three demonstrators were injured. "There were some scattered incidents and some minor violence," Police Commissioner Howard Safir told the New York Post. "Generally, it was a pretty well-behaved crowd." - 1998