The Militant(logo) 
    Vol.59/No.23           June 12, 1995 
 
 
AFL-CIO Shakeup Shows Rising Discontent- Socialist Steelworkers Assess Moves By Labor Tops To Defend Their Positions  

BY GREG McCARTAN

TORONTO - "There is a turn under way in the top levels of the AFL-CIO officialdom that is most sharply demonstrated in the moves to replace Lane Kirkland as president of the labor federation. The public discussion and pressure for him to resign is a reflection of widespread discontent among working people," said Greg McCartan in a report to socialists who are members of the United Steelworkers of America (USWA).

The presidents of six of the biggest unions in the AFL-CIO are part of this campaign, he noted, including the Teamsters; United Auto Workers; International Association of Machinists; American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME); Service Employees International Union; and the Laborers International Union. Top officials of the USWA are also part of this. Recognizing this shift is a way to get at what is happening in the ranks of labor today, McCartan said, and the openings that exist for doing communist work in the labor movement.

Members of the USWA who belong to the Socialist Workers Party in the United States and the Communist League in Canada held a one-day meeting here May 20, centered on the report by McCartan, a recent member of the union who has now taken on full-time responsibilities in the SWP.

McCartan pointed to the pressure on the union officialdom to protect the dues base from which they derive their privileges and social position. "Part of the rumblings also come from their lack of any leverage in bourgeois politics, which is part of the breakup of the liberal-labor coalition in the Democratic Party," he explained.

"Little of the labor officials' legislative program was adopted when Democrats controlled both the Congress and the White House. Now, officials of the USWA, Machinists, and others focus their fire on the `right-wing' Republican agenda, rather than the ongoing bipartisan offensive."

Kirkland is criticized for his supposed focus on foreign policy questions. His detractors point out that he was abroad last year while the Senate was debating legislation to ban the use of permanent strike replacement workers, and again during the November elections. "This was a theme of Clinton's campaign against George Bush two years ago," McCartan said. "In some ways it's like the Clinton team fighting to get into the top leadership of the AFL-CIO two years after the election."

Labor tops sense resistance will grow
"A layer of union officials sense that the signs of resistance coming from the ranks of labor to the continued assaults by the employers today are a harbinger of the future. They know the current leaders of the AFL-CIO can't keep a lid on the battles to come. They want the rank and file under their control, and workers doing what they are told by the union tops," explained McCartan. "Kirkland's opponents have a real instinct for self-preservation, not struggle."

The resistance can be seen on a world scale, form France to South Africa to the Philippines, and to the United States. McCartan pointed to opportunities for unionists and socialist workers to get out to picket lines of UAW members on strike against Caterpillar, including a June 25 rally planned in Decatur, Illinois.

"Because the union leadership refuses to make any effort to mobilize working people to fight for jobs or to protest capitalist assaults on the social wage," McCartan said, "there is little identification among millions of union members with the top layers of the AFL-CIO. Kirkland's opponents say he has a bad image, doesn't pay attention to the rank and file and union organizing, can't talk workers' language, or even say something positive about workers."

AFSCME president Gerald McEntee says of the Kirkland team that "working people don't see them as championing their cause," adding, "anything is better than the status quo." This is echoed by the head of the Machinists union, George Kourpias, who says, "We're talking change." According to the May 9 New York Times, only Richard Trumka, president of the United Mine Workers of America, has publicly said he will consider running against Kirkland.

McCartan further noted that these officials try to tap into the restiveness in the union ranks and draw militants into official posts. They hope to take these unionists' eyes off others in the rank and file, pretty up their own image, and make it appear that the union structures are changing for the better. This was reflected in the recent Labor Notes conference in Detroit, with about one-third of those in attendance indicating they were union officials.

An unofficial "rank-and-file" election for Kirkland's replacement was held as part of the conference. Mine Workers president Trumka received the most votes, with Kirkland getting only five.

President Bill Clinton has also made some moves to shore up his image with workers, by speaking in favor of the striker replacement bill and increases in the minimum wage. "Of course, bourgeois politicians will only institute far- reaching measures that benefit working people as a concession to a rising social movement that challenges their class rule," McCartan noted. "But Clinton's only hope for re- election is to refurbish his own image among workers and for leaders of the AFL-CIO to do likewise so that they can pull workers in behind their electoral strategy, to try to be in a position to head off bigger class battles down the road."

McCartan said that socialist workers must have a stance toward the developments in the AFL-CIO bureaucracy, as with any developments in the unions. Is this an expression of rank-and-file desire to fight? Is what these officials are advocating a step forward? Are they any better than the ones currently in office? These are the questions socialist workers and other fighters in the unions will have to answer, he said.

Many of the union tops organizing to oust Kirkland support anti-import legislation and aggressively going after markets around the world, applauding moves by the U.S. ruling class to sharpen trade conflicts, especially with Japan. McCartan pointed to the threatened imposition of 100 percent tariffs on luxury autos made in Japan as an example.

They know U.S. industry is in a strong position right now relative to its rivals and they support the bosses' efforts to utilize this advantage to bash their competitors.

"This is the union tops' jobs program, and to the extent they draw fight-minded workers into this trap, it creates further obstacles to mounting resistance to the employers' assault," McCartan said. He noted the anti-Japanese campaign organized by the United Rubber Workers union in the midst of the recent Bridgestone/Firestone strike as an example.

Steelworkers president talks tough
Socialist steelworkers at the meeting took up how points made by McCartan are reflected in the leadership of the USWA. In an article in the Wall Street Journal, the current president, George Becker, is described as a "Harley-riding steelworker, who fits every stereotype of a.-union man with his gruff talk, rough grammar and keys on his belt."

McCartan noted that Becker came to prominence in the union during the 20-month strike against Ravenswood Aluminum Corp. He was the international vice president put in charge of the USWA's campaign that ended with a contract and the 1,700 strikers getting their jobs back.

Since taking office he has appointed more Blacks and women to head internal departments and says this is to appeal more to the membership and those the union seeks to organize.

The USWA's declining dues base has forced Becker to lead a fight in the bureaucracy to downsize and consolidate the union's 18 districts into 9. The USWA now has a budget surplus, after being in the red for a number of years. The Journal article notes some of the problems the union faces: A 50 percent decline in membership since 1980, down to 564,900, and a number of failed organizing drives in the last year.

One of these was at AK Steel in Ohio, which is currently organized by a company union, the Armco Employees Independent Federation (AEIF). While the National Labor Relations Board ordered AK Steel to hold a new representation election because of misconduct in last year's vote, the Steelworkers have opted to work out a merger agreement with the AEIF rather than try to take on the company head on again.

The USWA officials have also moved to increase membership through a merger with the United Rubber Workers union (URW). The URW membership has fallen from nearly 200,000 in 1960 to about 94,000 now. While contracts for nearly half of its members are up in 1996, a 10-month strike against Bridgestone/Firestone has left the union's strike fund dry. "All the workers in our union are going to be involved, this is our struggle," Becker is quoted as saying in the Journal.

But shortly after Becker's tough talk the Rubber Workers strike went down to defeat as top officials of both unions pushed for an unconditional surrender to the company. With the strike called off workers are now at the mercy of Bridgestone/Firestone management waiting to be called back one at a time.

New move by LTV Steel
Fighting talk is now being revved up in response to LTV Steel's plans to open a new mini-mill somewhere in the South. Rebuffed in attempts to discuss the status of the union at the new plant, union officials have suddenly "discovered" that LTV is at war with the union on this issue. Johanna Ryan, who works at an LTV plant in East Chicago, Indiana, described the cynicism that many of her co- workers have expressed toward union tops leading any fight to organize this new mill. "The union officials come off sounding like jilted brides, whining about how much they did to save LTV, and this is the thanks they get." She pointed out though that union members are still anxious for a fight. Sheila Ostrow, who works at an LTV mill in Pittsburgh, said that the union plans to have meetings to lay out a response to LTV's intransigence. "We need to attend those meetings, participate in the discussions, and cover them for the Militant," she urged.

McCartan explained that the more militant talk among the officials comes not out of responding to a big upturn in workers' struggles as in the 1930s when a split occured in the AFL which led to the formation of the CIO, but rather their belief that it is now the only way to have any influence on the future and hopefully maintain their dues base. "They sense the coming fights and the mood of the ranks and want to get themselves in the best position to control it," he said.

More opportunities to talk socialism
McCartan noted that what has opened up for socialists in the labor movement today is more opportunities to talk socialism with workers who want to fight and to bring experiences in politics outside the unions to co-workers. Central to this activity is what socialist workers can do to build local coalitions in solidarity with working people in Cuba, as they fight to defend their sovereignty, dignity, and revolution. McCartan pointed to the August 1-7 "Cuba Lives" Youth Festival and October 14 regional actions against U.S. policy toward Cuba as important activities that unionists should build both on and off the job.

Participants at the meeting noted that struggles taking place outside the workplace reinforce the fights of working people for better conditions on the job. Ostrow explained the response women had at her plant when they found out she was going to Washington, D.C., for the April 9 rally in defense of abortion rights and against violence against women. Many were disappointed that they hadn't learned about the demonstration sooner so they could make arrangements to attend.

Part of the new developments in the labor movement will be a step-up in union organizing drives, which is reflected in the fact that the absolute number of union members has stabilized over the last two years. "We should also expect that part of this left turn among union officials will be a greater variety of conferences held with official blessing," said McCartan. "While they are reaching out to bring militant workers in behind them, we need to be going to these meetings and doing the same. We need to get to the picket lines where fights are going on to discuss and debate our views with workers who are looking to fight. We need to clearly pose a working-class alternative to the class collaborationism of the union tops in both the work place and in the voting booth."

Socialist workers at the Toronto meeting also discussed proposed changes in how local branches of the Socialist Workers Party organize their political work. These are aimed at strengthening the ability of all members to participate in social and political struggles, revitalize the party's work in the unions, and win young people to the communist movement.

The proposals include moving off second-shift jobs to free up time to attend political meetings and activities in the evenings; maximizing the number of workplaces where two or more members of the party work together; moving party branch meetings and public forums to weeknights to allow socialist workers time on the weekends to get involved in protest actions, organize informal discussions with youth and co- workers interested in socialism, and to get out in their regions to developments in the labor movement or other social protest activity.

"By doing this, we can better organize ourselves to carry out campaigns collectively, and we can be more effective," McCartan said. "And if we are right about what underlies this turn at the top levels of the unions, and can make these shifts in how we organize ourselves, then the best way we can revitalize our work in the union movement is to go out as communist workers to participate in broader political activities such as events in defense of the socialist revolution in Cuba, the fight against war, racism, the death penalty and for women's rights and bring that experience back to our fellow unionists."

This has been the job of communist workers since the inception of the modern working-class movement, he said. Bringing politics into the working class and its mass organizations is an essential part of fighting to transform the unions into revolutionary instruments of struggle for the entire working class.

The day's discussions were wrapped up by attending a Militant Labor Forum on "Cuba and the Special Period - How Workers Use Their Socialist Revolution to Fight the Effects of the International Crisis of Capitalism," with a talk given by Mary-Alice Waters. Through this discussion socialists in the Steelworkers union and other activists in attendance were able to gain a sharper understanding of the position of the Cuban revolution in the world today and the increased openings to win young people and workers to its defense.

 
 
 
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