A TALK WITH VICTOR REUTHER
Reuther, Victor & Howe, Irving
The Automobile Workers Union (UAW) will be holding its convention this May in Dallas; we expect to have a report in our next issue. Meanwhile, we print below excerpts from a conversation recently...
...Mind you, there is a strong case for the "local contents bill" that the UAW is supporting...
...Isn't there a loss...
...And there were pressures from the top CIO leadership...
...And I think Doug would be the first to admit that he had to yield in a number of situations to local pressures from regions of the union, and this has resulted in the kind of leadership that's called "noncontroversial," which means non-leadership...
...The desperateness of the situation makes it hard to engage in the basic education that's required for keeping alive the early UAW tradition—people are scrambling for survival, and some sections of the union are succumbing to a crude protectionism...
...it had to become a political force...
...but it clearly marked your whole life...
...There seems no way out of these new difficulties through traditional union strategies...
...Isn't there a way to establish harmony, or at least détente, between the democratic socialists and the progressive unionists...
...You'll recall that when Doug was elected he said his main job would be to prepare a transition of leadership...
...YR.: Yes...
...But the trade unions now are moving toward greater political effectiveness...
...Such a school is badly needed by the unions...
...But it needs clear ideas of how to cope with structural economic problems...
...And everyone anticipated that it would...
...But he was swamped by this terrible economic situation and couldn't give enough time to the inner life of the union...
...V.R.: To be honest, not at present, but potentially, yes...
...VA.: It was more than just a formative influence...
...I expect Owen Bieber to get along well with the new social democratic leaders of Western Europe...
...but I hope it's more than that...
...It would be a way of keeping the tradition alive and cementing new alliances between the democratic left and the unions...
...I.H.: The new UAW leaders seem to be good, serious, talented people...
...And the reason is that the UAW, as everyone knows, is simply overwhelmed with the difficulties caused by recession—in Michigan it's no recession, it's depression...
...When Douglas Fraser retires as president this spring, it will mark the end of the immediate presence of what has come to be known as the Reuther group—that is, those who were around Walter Reuther in the days when he helped organize the UAW and later when he became president...
...Now you, Victor, and some of the others have rejoined it—but only after retirement...
...The labor movement is strong in numbers and material resources...
...This requires a much higher degree of socioeconomic planning (with, I hope, popular democratic controls) than most unionists conceived of in the past...
...I grant you that a kind of socialist sectarianism in the late '30s, when the Socialist party was trying to be "revolutionary," drove unionists out of the movement...
...The Solidarity Demonstration was a big step forward...
...The truth is that the American auto industry, which refused for years to make small cars, is more responsible for the mess we're in than the Japanese...
...I.H.: One last question, maybe one that's a little irksome...
...But I think that if economic concessions are unavoidable, then efforts should be made to press for noneco141 nomic gains that would enlarge the union's role in corporate decision-making, so as to protect our members from plant runaways and corporate investments overseas...
...A certain amount of the union's early idealism has been lost—inevitably...
...V.R.: Yes, some of that is inevitable...
...It would be good if a Brookwood labor college were on the scene today...
...I.H.: Would you say that this outlook is as strong in the UAW today as it was some years back...
...V.R.: Yes, people from the garment and the mine workers' unions...
...But that requires a political movement with greater vision than either Republicans or Democrats are now showing...
...Look, you fellows in the Reuther tendency began in the socialist movement...
...YR.: You can sweeten welfare-state provisions, but there's no substitute for a vigorous jobs program and meaningful tax reform programs to build up investments that would create new industries and jobs...
...Still, there's the fact that when the current Spanish Socialist leader Felipe Gonzalez came to the United States he was hosted by the UAW—this tells you that a certain framework of relations has been set...
...I'm not trying to second-guess Doug Fraser, who is a fine and able man...
...The money for it is there, all that's needed is someone to give it a push—a new center for training union leaders, for exchanging political and social ideas, for bringing unionists and intellectuals together—a center for broadcasting our political coalition, so essential for democratic political gains...
...I.H.: It's happened...
...While we may not have found much help from whatever little remained of the socialist movement in America, we were able to maintain strong contacts with the European social democrats, whose gains kept our hopes alive...
...I don't mean to suggest that American socialism serves as a kind of prep school for people who then do things in unions and politics—well, of course, it has served as that...
...And it takes time to create a new secondary leadership: you don't acquire the kind of influence needed for leadership in such an enormous organization in just a few years...
...I.H.: The new UAW leadership faces terrible problems—I can almost imagine Doug Fraser is relieved to be getting out...
...From the early 1930s on it was clear to the UAW leadership that it had to become something more than just an agency for collective bargaining...
...It ought to be possible for good trade unionists publicly to be socialists as for many decades, from the time of Debs to the time of Norman Thomas, it was possible...
...Meanwhile, we print below excerpts from a conversation recently held in Washington, D.C., between Irving Howe and Victor Reuther, one of the pioneer leaders of the union...
...VICTOR REUTHER: The customary, and correct, answer is: a commitment to social unionism, a break with simple nickel-and-dime bargaining...
...I.H.: So it looks as if the idea of social unionism has to be picked up again and given a stronger social democratic component...
...In any case, isn't there a loss, a certain narrowingdown of experience...
...I mean, the way you talked and worked, the way Walter made a speech...
...What would you say has been the main characteristic or outlook of this group...
...I.H.: Yes, it was started pretty much by people on the left...
...V.R.: Progressive unionists today are not inclined to shy away from a democratic socialist relationship...
...It won't just survive on its own, I.H.: You fellows—the Reuther brothers, Emil Mazey, George Edwards, other UAW leaders— left the socialist movement in the late 1930s...
...But we do not Start from scratch...
...I look back on my early involvement with the socialist youth movement as a tremendous training experience, a marvelous opportunity to open my eyes to broader social horizons...
...I RVING HOWE: The UAW seems to be approaching a major turning point...
...So I'd say, yes, the tradition is still there, but special efforts will now have to be made to keep it alive and strong...
...Both Doug Fraser and his likely successor, Owen Bieber, are committed to that outlook...
...But a new generation is coming along— with some socialist inclinations...
...The success of our union brothers in Canada in the New Democratic party (a socialist party), 142 the victories of European socialists in France, Sweden, Austria, Spain, and Greece, plus the fact that a new generation of union leaders is searching for answers that they have not found in the old parties —all this creates a new and more favorable climate for a democratic socialist education...
...EDS...
...But if that's the pattern, we're never going to get anywhere—socialism only for the young and the retired...
...It had to be a social force identifying itself with minority groups, it had to play an aggressive role in fighting for social legislation...
...YR.: Absolutely...
...I.H.: I think you're suggesting that with the sheer passage of time, as a result of inevitable erosion and not because it's anyone's fault, there's been a weakening of the Reuther tradition...
...And then its graduates went right into CIO organizing...
...In a sense, it had to turn the union movement into a segment of a larger, progressive movement...
...The UAW leadership has been so overwhelmed and distracted by the current crisis, it hasn't, perhaps, presented its case to the public as forcefully as it could...
...But they don't, they can't have your kind of background...
...V.R.: It's happened...
...they were valuable people...
...but I think it's bad when a UAW member in Flint publicly smashes up a Japanese car—or those bumper stickers that some auto workers are showing...
Vol. 30 • April 1983 • No. 2
