By Charles Walker
Barbara Ehrenreich ("Nickel and Dimed") and Thomas Geoghegan ("Which
Side Are You On?") lay out in the Nation (Dec. 23) some strategies for turning the
labor movement around, or as they might say, putting the movement back in the labor
movement. They say that their ideas are not the last word on the subject and encourage
others to make their own proposals. Far be it for us to discourage anyone from doing some
brainstorming about our declining labor movement; but we hope that others have a clearer
grasp of the enormity of the problem, the extent of the degeneration of organized labor.
For seemingly Ehrenreich and Geoghegan don't understand that our unions need a
thoroughgoing transformation.
For decades now, the bosses have been rolling back many of the gains made by rebellious
labor during the 1930's and 1940's, without much challenge from organized labor. Why the
two writers think that one answer to the bosses' anti-labor tidal wave is to take the
bosses to court is astonishing. Perhaps the authors need to recall what it was that has
led workers to organize unions; and in this country, almost ignited a civil war over the
right to unionize. What workers want is a union that can raise their living standards and
that can bring stability and security to their lives.
Without claiming to be able to do more than read between the lines, our guess is the two
authors are making an attempt, a desperate attempt at that, to get the attention of
AFL-CIO president John J. Sweeney. "We would love to see the AFL-CIO take up the
reforms we've proposed," they say in conclusion. "But ultimately, the labor
movement is too important to be left to the AFL-CIO, however much we may admire John
Sweeney and his administration. It's up to all of us, not just them, to bring the labor
movement back."
But that statement is only partly true. It's not Sweeney's job to bring the labor movement
back (to what, they don't say); if it were, Sweeney would be leading a street fight with
whatever weapons he had at hand to stop the travesty that's about to befall the thousands
of union members at United Air Lines. Sweeney would tell the West Coast shippers that it
was time to hire more dockworkers, not de-skill the ILWU workforce. He'd be telling
everyone that the New York transport workers are going to strike and Gov. Pataki can take
the Taylor Law and shove it.
And if Sweeney were not doing these things and more, after four or five years as head of
the nation's major labor federation, workers would understand that it was the time that
wasn't right, not the leadership. That's because he would have demonstrated his intentions
not to see our labor movement misled any longer. He would have moved to kick out the
thieves, who have pocketed millions from the ULLICO schemes. He would have kicked out the
craven bureaucrats who golf with the bosses on Saturday, after selling their union members
a concessionary contract on Friday. He would have kicked out every official he could lay
his hands on that stuffed ballot boxes, intimidated opposition candidates, told the
members to sit down that they were out of order; and he would start that process in the
SEIU, his own home union. He would have done all that and more by leading the ranks where
they want to go, wherever that is.
The pair say that the "underlying reason for organized labor's decline is that our
labor laws do not let people join unions, freely and fairly, without being fired."
Yes, it's true that the bosses haven't passed laws to make a union organizer's job easy;
and it's true that the labor laws that were passed under immense mass political pressure
during the 1930's have been rendered mostly toothless by amendment and judicial
interpretation; but the answer is not to sign up members for services, no matter how
useful the services might be: "Two hours a year of free legal services, i.e., a
consultation with a real lawyer."
Nor is the answer to the nation's "roaring inequality" that the authors rightly
bemoan to be found in any other of the authors' proposals, singly or collectively. They
include: have an ACLU operate within the AFL-CIO; have an "international-solidarity
membership", whose dues "could help support strikes and organizing drives in
other parts of the world;" "do a few Tammany-type things for the poor,"
e.g., help them figure out their earned-income tax credit; start ten Labor Colleges"
in ten cities; since "unions can't raise wages very much," connect union
membership, they say, "with a lifetime program of learning."
The two writers also have proposals that lead to political action, but not independent
political action by workers, unionized or not. In fact, they try to sell their program to
the labor tops by pointing out all the new members "labor can mobilize on Election
Day," if proposals such as they propose are adopted. They imply that the labor
movement's tops' collaboration with some of their corporate counterparts through the
Democratic Party wasn't a part of the problem.
The writers' suggestions aren't wacky, but tacked on to what is left of organized labor,
their proposals will not drive the labor movement forward. The pair says that
"workers now are angrier and more willing to take on their employers." But are
the Machinists, presently recommending that their United Airlines members take wage and
benefits cuts, or the Teamsters that just settled an "historic contract" on the
backs of their UPS part-time members, or the Steelworkers or the Mineworkers that are on
their knees begging for pension protection, or the Autoworkers that lose members every
time they bargain for a new auto deal the answer that the angry workers should be looking
to for help?
The American labor movement doesn't need a band-aid; it badly needs resuscitation. And the
place to look for help that matters is not in the chambers and corridors of the AFL-CIO.
Real friends of labor, that is workers themselves who have advanced to the point that they
realize, as do Ehrenreich and Geoghegan, that labor solidarity is the key to the future,
but unlike Ehrenreich and Geoghegan, really feel the extreme seriousness of the fix we're
in need to turn to one another. Union reformers and militants going their separate ways
are not going to slow down the overarching trend of trade union retreat and defeat. To
think otherwise is to be dumb, deaf and blind.
To resign oneself to waiting for the economy to fall off a cliff (ala the Great
Depression), when, presumably, U.S. workers will once again mobilize their social power is
to ignore the present opportunity to begin to assemble and put in place an experienced
corps of activists, dedicated to turning the labor movement into a fighting machine.
That's the job that needs to be done right now, if organized labor is to survive and not
slowly and agonizingly wither into dust.
The overriding task always is to organize, yes. But the gear that will turn the larger
gear needs to be organized first. In other words, today's job is to organize the
organizers, the militants and the activists around a program designed to replace what the
writers call the "overbearing bureaucracies" with dynamic, workers democracies,
that is, trade unions that fight!