Labor's Stand on McGovern: Two Views 2. STEVEN KELMAN
2. Steven Kelman It is painful to see George Meany and the AFL-CIO executive council disregarding in 1972 the very valuable lessons they taught some of us in the '60s. During those difficult times,...
...And it is noteworthy that the South Dakotan is the first serious Presidential contender in recent memory to talk about improving the work environment in factories and offices...
...And, given the frequent tensions between white trade unionists and blacks, strictly racial issues would have to be subordinated to general programs for income redistribution and job creation...
...Thus each would have to try to forge an alliance with the others based on their common interests...
...This only increases the chances that we will have another four years of Richard Nixon, the man whose first political campaign was centered around a pledge to break the power of the "labor bosses...
...McGovern's course, his effort to instill a greater concern among new pols for the problems of working people, deserves a more positive response from labor than the AFL-CIO's executive council has given it...
...McGovern's approach has the potential for allying the U.S...
...Nevertheless, his desire to withdraw America from certain commitments to unsavory governments does have its positive side...
...While he remains far ahead of his activist supporters in this regard, one mark of his influence is that the more grotesque distortions about "honky workers" and "hard hats" are no longer heard from the new pols...
...The Democratic party will have trouble winning future elections without it...
...Nor should it be forgotten that McGovern has always shown far more interest in cooperating with the traditional sources of Democratic support than is customary for New Politics purists...
...Granted that many labor leaders will disagree with some of McGovern's views on foreign policy, it is still hard to understand why they do not find him, on domestic matters, clearly preferable not only to Nixon but to his erstwhile Democratic rivals as well...
...Others who felt less enthusiastic about his Vietnam outlook, including myself, were similarly disturbed by the sectarianism of those purists who were unwilling to see that the Democratic candidate, though by no means perfect, was far preferable to Richard Nixon...
...with non-Communist reform forces in Third World countries...
...aid to the colonels now running Greece on the grounds that we need bases there to protect Western Europe and Israel...
...McGovern would be free to break this vicious circle, thus increasing the likelihood of our being able to retain Greek bases whenever a new government takes over...
...In Vietnam, President Nixon has staked America's prestige on his insistence that we will not be defeated, thereby creating the conditions for a self-fulfilling prophecy: What happens to our credibility if America is defeated, or if the South Vietnamese regime collapses...
...This prospect, in turn, is used to justify the continuation of our current policy, for it is argued that the colonels could not survive without our support...
...Moreover, it is on basic social questions at home that we have always been told the labor-liberal-minorities coalition must be formed...
...Shoring up nondevelopment-oriented Right-wing oligarchies, or even conservative dictatorships like Brazil that promote development but not the fair distribution of its fruits, are not in my opinion viable long-term solutions...
...Building such a coalition was difficult, but those who propagated and supported the notion saw it as the only possible road to social progress...
...During those difficult times, the relatively few students and other activists who refused to join in the radical-chic denunciation of the country's institutions, including the labor movement, accepted the unions' argument that only through coalition politics could progressive forces in America obtain a national majority...
...The accusation that McGovern is antilabor, because of one or two votes many years ago, seems strained and bizarre...
...This year, by not endorsing George McGovern, the AFL-CIO national leadership is refusing to make the same sacrifice...
...In the '40s Lyndon Johnson led the Congressional battle to override President Truman's veto of the Taft-Hartley Act, yet labor was able to endorse him in the '60s...
...In the 1970 campaign, for instance, he sponsored a fund-raising drive among liberal Democrats that gave money to doves and hawks alike-to the distress of many antiwar McGovernites...
...Overall, McGovern's foreign policy pronouncements betray tendencies toward both isolationism and liberal moralism (that is, intervention, but only on behalf of "good" regimes...
...McGovern could disengage without any loss of national face: He could simply announce that the previous policy was wrong-that we have more than met our commitment to Saigonand pull out without incurring serious strategic repercussions...
...has not yet found an effective non-military strategy for dealing with the threat of Communism in the Third World...
...Their departure, though, would be a serious loss for the Democrats...
...If the junta is ever overthrown, however, we will probably be kicked out for having backed the unpopular military dictatorship...
...nor did organized labor or any ethnic group command a decisive share of the vote by itself...
...It was McGovern who spearheaded the party's dedication to tax reform and income redistribution, long priority items on the AFL-CIO agenda...
...In evaluating his new pro-Israeli stance, the question is whether McGovern, as a first-term President subject to reelection, is to be trusted more than Nixon, whose historical commitment to Israel is weak and who will not have to worry about 1976 but will remain obligated to the powerful oil interests in the Republican party...
...Workers during that union's 1969 strike, and last year he was the first and most outspoken critic-short of Meany himself-to attack the pro-business bias of the Administration's economic controls...
...it will take a President strongly committed to "new priorities" to push them through...
...Since labor and many young liberals disagreed about foreign policy, it was understood that in this area they would have to work out an "agreement to differ...
...For example, the present Administration justifies U.S...
...Many labor leaders apparently feel that it would be a good thing to get rid of "the kids," and that a big McGovern defeat would force or disgrace them out of the party...
...By withholding its endorsement, the Federation is encouraging workers who have doubts about McGovern to view him as a dangerous extremist...
...Their defection was especially galling to labor leaders who genuinely supported Humphrey's domestic and foreign policy stands...
...Some of his foreign policy positions-such as unilateral troop withdrawals from Western Europe-are risky, although he seems to be backing away from the more extreme statements he made to attract attention earlier in the campaign...
...His past record on the Mideast, in particular, is far from admirable...
...For me, the answer is not clear either way...
...More to the point, McGovern was the only senator to join the Citizens Committee to Support the G.E...
...A fight to the death between workers and New Politics liberals, or between workers and blacks, would be a tragedy for the labor movement and for social progress in America...
...Within his own New Politics movement, too, McGovern has played an important educational role in generating concern for the problems of the American worker...
...Equally important, since McGovern is not identified with our past policies elsewhere either, he could more easily change their direction without harming our strategic position...
...To be sure, Humphrey and Muskie also took up these issues as time went on, but Wall Street's reaction to McGovern's nomination indicates that America's corporate rich are genuinely alarmed by his pledges to eliminate their favorite tax advantages and other special privileges...
...The college-educated and professional sector of the population is growing, making the New Politics constituency a numerically significant one...
...In 1968, of course, many New Politics people refused to back Hubert Humphrey...
...New programs such as tax reform, national health insurance, and job creation are going to meet stiff resistance in Congress...
...Certainly the logic was sound: The "conscience constituency" of middle-class people concerned about war and poverty was hopelessly outnumbered at the polls...
...The U.S...
...Like Humphrey, McGovern is not an ideal candidate...
...Yet it must be recognized that in urging the antiwar forces to rally behind Humphrey, we were asking them to sacrifice deeply held principles for the sake of the broader imperative of a labor-liberal-minorities alliance...
Vol. 55 • September 1972 • No. 17
