The Split Deepens in the Trade Unions
Widick, B. J.
CHISMS WITHIN the trade unions reflect the fragmentation of American politics. Sooner or later policy differences, personal ambitions, and personality antagonisms were bound to set George...
...A second focal point will be the 1.9 million members of the teamsters' union, its growth unimpaired by being cast out from the AFL—CIO...
...Fluidity will replace the monolithic facade of American labor and will seriously challenge George Meany's claim that he speaks as the voice of unionism...
...On the American scene Reuther has viewed with tolerance some peace movements, including labor's Assembly for Peace in which Emil Mazey, secretarytreasurer of the UAW, and Victor Reuther, head of the UAW's international affairs department, have been active...
...It was a refreshing incident in these times of race polarization and hysteria...
...The winds of discontent upon which Kennedy seeks to capitalize are just those Reuther sees as driving toward a new direction in American politics and in the trade unions...
...Even a simple calculation in respect to the Michigan delegation should have persuaded McCarthy that it was worth his time talking to a convention of the largest and most progressive trade union in the country...
...Labor leaders, including Reuther, really thought Senator McCarthy would get only 10 to 15 per cent of the New Hampshire vote, a reflection of how distant they have become from grass-roots attitudes...
...On the other hand, Reuther called for an end to the bombing of North Vietnam...
...No one was more shocked by the abdication by President Johnson than the AFL-CIO leaders...
...Reuther feels this acutely...
...3. In the big population states, where there are decisive blocs of electoral votes, important statewide elections, and a cobsiderable number of close House races, there is a good deal of lethargy and factionalism within the unions...
...Perhaps the high point of the UAW convention—revealing the difference between the UAW and most other unions-came when Reuther fervently replied to some white racists within the UAW who criticized him for marching in Memphis and giving the garbage workers $50,000 for their strike fund...
...But in times of change, this isn't enough: new social forces and problems appear, with which the old-line unionists are ill-equipped to deal, and therefore the sympathies which the unions once found among students, intellectuals, and middle-class liberals are all but evaporated...
...Slowing or discounting such progress can, in turn, only increase the desperation and alienation of impoverished minorities...
...The two largest and perhaps most significant unions would then be outside the AFL— CIO...
...During the past decade Meany has totally isolated Reuther in the AFL—CIO hierarchy, which is another way of saying that Reuther was foiled in every attempt, whether adequate or not, to recast the AFL—CIO in a more liberal and dynamic direction...
...Meany is for Humphrey, and that settles that...
...After resigning from the AFL-CIO council Reuther remarked, "I couldn't do anything in that prison...
...Detroit Free Press, May 10, 1967) . America's trade unions now have a voice of dissent, one that is too powerful to be dismissed or ignored...
...Meany hardly cares...
...The combination of Southern Democrats (it's not considered polite to call them Dixiecrats anymore), the trade-union bureaucracy, the party machinery and delegates are supposed to be the basis of Humphrey's nomination...
...For Meany "unconditional support" of President Johnson's war policies wasn't debatable, and AFL—CIO conventions were dominated by that theme...
...Now I am talking to the whole labor movement...
...It's a pity that Senator McCarthy turned down the invitation to speak to nearly 3,000 UAW delegates, for it indicates a blind spot in his understanding of American politics...
...if he continues his aid to agricultural and other low-paid workers—then his split with Meany may release some of the potential in the unions for both social renewal and organizational growth...
...GENUINE UNITY BETWEEN Meany and Reuther is impossible for many reasons, but the basic one is a difference in judgment on the role of American trade unions...
...Martin Luther King's death...
...For Meany, the AFL—CIO is "a more vital, more vigorous and effective force for progress today than ever before in its history...
...But the future, if labor is again to play a vigorous social role, may belong to the man from Detroit...
...Nor has Reuther forgotten how Meany and the AFL-CIO council refused to endorse the historic March on Washington in 1963, just one of the major decisions Meany made against Reuther's pleas for more sensitivity and support to the struggles of Negroes...
...For Humphrey is considered a man in Johnson's political camp, and Meany believes firmly in all the Johnson policies, including those which made the President so unpopular...
...However, the excellent showing Kennedy made in working-class areas in Indiana and Nebraska suggests that the union leaders have even less political influence among the ranks than before...
...A more typical AFL-CIO reaction would be first to deny the extent of racism, and then to handle the issue more cautiously...
...As it happens, both Humphrey and Kennedy did poorly when they spoke, and McCarthy might have been able to make some unexpected political gains...
...Now I am a free agent...
...In Reuther's analysis the AFL-CIO has become "the comfortable, complacent custodian of the status quo...
...Reuther's vigorous statement in support of the poor, the exploited, and of the Negro struggle for human rights and jobs was given a standing ovation by the delegates...
...Clearly this is his aim...
...Meany, in a ghastly statement, denounced the November meeting of over 500 American trade unionists as "Hanoi-inspired...
...This is more than a mere power struggle...
...I can say what I choose and do what I choose...
...Sfanley Plastrik...
...The rubber workers, chemical workers, and the American Federation of Government Employees might also join Reuther...
...The May convention of the UAW gave its leaders carte blanche to go it alone...
...IF WALTER REUTHER uses his new independence to revitalize and strengthen the liberal wing of the Democratic party...
...2. Public hostility toward legitimate civil-rights progress will almost certainly stiffen as a result of urban violence...
...Sooner or later policy differences, personal ambitions, and personality antagonisms were bound to set George Meany and Walter Reuther on a collision course...
...It was in keeping with Reuther's character and views that he would march in Memphis after Dr...
...Not that unionism as usual, the Meany approach, has been unsuccessful...
...While Reuther seeks a probing dialogue with delegations from Eastern European countries and UAW officials explore contacts with restive unionists behind the Iron Curtain, Meany bristles with hostility over any such ideas...
...Unquestionably, most of the votes in the AFLCIO belong to George Meany...
...To ignore unions with millions of members is to neglect one of the most powerful forces in American society...
...I tried for 11 years to persuade them to march and I couldn't...
...Reu ther, by contrast, belongs more naturally to the Kennedy wing of the Democratic party...
...I don't think something quite like this could happen at any other large union convention, with delegates from shops throughout America...
...There is the difference...
...By 1969, barring a completely unexpected turn of events, there will be three power centers in the trade unions...
...The challenge of Reuther's programs or ideas can no longer be buried beneath votes of the AFL-CIO council...
...More than nuances are involved in the different approaches to the Democratic-party Presidential race...
...Reuther denounced the local unions who threatened a walkout because companies had placed the American flag at half-mast to mourn Rev...
...if his programmatic challenges to AFL-CIO complacency shakes up the union movement...
...And Kennedy's entry into the Presidential race has shaken them up even more...
...The unions are richer, have better contracts, and are more thoroughly integrated into the working of society than ever in the past...
...Working within the framework of an AFL—CIO hierarchy dominated by Meany has been as frustrating to Reuther as life is for Bobbie Kennedy under the Johnson Administration...
...In temperament, outlook, and philosophy George Meany fits into the Johnson camp...
...Meany, a few years ago, demanded that the U.S...
...The report cited three factors: 1. Unless there is a dramatic change in the situation in Vietnam, the war will continue to be a divisive issue...
...King's assassination, and aid the garbage strikers, while Meany simply sent an assistant to represent him...
...By contrast, the UAW stance of "neutrality" was calculated to give Kennedy indirect encouragement...
...The UAW invited McCarthy, Kennedy, Humphrey, and Nelson Rockefeller to address the recent convention—a good democratic idea...
...The UAW's 1.6 million members will be bolstered by another 500,000 unonists almost immediately...
...Meany downgrades efforts to seek feelers in the East, while Reuther understands why Western European unions want to lessen cold-war hostilities...
...It was natural for Reuther to provide substantial help to the agricultural workers long before the AFL-CIO leaders recognized the valuable work of Cesar Chavez...
...resume nuclear testing, while Reuther missed the meeting of the AFL— CIO council which adopted that policy...
...CHISMS WITHIN the trade unions reflect the fragmentation of American politics...
...The Meany forces wouldn't consider such a proposal...
...The unions are in far more disarray than Meany is willing to concede—although it must be said that the political action report at the 1967 AFL-CIO convention candidly discussed why labor's role in the 1968 elections would be more difficult than in previous elections...
Vol. 15 • July 1968 • No. 4
