Yesterday, Monday, 26 September 2005, marked a turning point in the history of the trade union movement in the United States. Or it didn’t. It all depends on who you talk to.
Yesterday marked the opening of the founding convention of the Change to Win Coalition, a federation uniting seven unions — the Teamsters, Service Employees International Union, Carpenters, Laborers, Farm Workers, United Food and Commercial Workers, and UNITE HERE (clothing, hotel and restaurant workers).
According to some leaders of the AFL-CIO, the split which tore apart the “House of Labor” this summer had nothing to do with differences over organizing or politics or anything that really matters. Addressing the British Trades Union Congress (TUC) two weeks ago, one AFL-CIO officer denounced the unions which had broken away as “splitters”. It reminded me of a scene in the Monty Python film, “Life of Brian”.
According to the leaders of the unions which have left the AFL-CIO, today marks a new dawn. T-shirts being distributed to participants in today’s conference in St. Louis proclaim “New hope for American workers”.
I am in St. Louis now to see for myself what is going on.
Last night began with a “celebration” held in the St. Louis Convention Center, across the street from the (unionized) hotel where today’s proceedings will begin. The opening speaker was the Reverend Jesse Jackson, who had just returned from New Orleans. Jackson delivered a powerful address in the style made famous by Southern civil rights leaders like his mentor, Dr. Martin Luther King. And it revealed just how close the new federation would be to the traditions of the civil rights movement.
Jackson was followed by a group of four Missouri state representatives who read aloud a resolution the state legislature had passed welcoming the convention to Missouri. The mayor also spoke. OK, it was a bit of a time-waster, but when Jim Hoffa came forward to speak, everybody woke up. Hoffa really had only one point to make, and it was to ask participants to avoid drinking beer. Not all beer — after all, this was a union convention — but the beer distributed by a St. Louis company locked into dispute with the Teamsters union. The company was trying to reduce the workers’ wages, cut their health benefits and so on. Hoffa called on delegates to join the Teamster picket line on Wednesday, after the conference adjourns.
But what struck me was how ineffective unions still were in getting their message across. For example — today, I am scheduled to meet up with a local trade union activist, someone who is not a Teamster but belongs to another union, and in the emails we have exchanged, he’s offered to buy me a beer. And the beer he’s mentioned is the one the Teamsters are boycotting. Obvously, this is not the grapes boycott of the 1960s. Even trade union activists here in St. Louis don’t seem to know about the boycott.
Hoffa also boasted of the union’s success in convincing the hotel in which the conference would be held to stop buying the boycotted beer. But he added — for the next 30 days. After that, the hotel is free to go on buying the boycotted beer. I can remember a time when the aim of a boycott was to stop people buying a product until the dispute was over, and not only for the next month. I guess we live in an age of diminished expectations.
Hoffa and other speakers made reference to both the size of the organization and its name — and the more I listened, the more confused I became.
In a handout given to journalists, the coalition claims to have “more than 5 million workers”. But several speakers referred to “6 million members”. A million members is nothing to be sniffed at — and it’s about time unions were honest about how many members they really have. Back in 1973, at the founding convention of the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee, St. Louis-born author and activist Michael Harrington announced that this organization would be the first in the history of the American left to be honest about its membership figures. Change to Win could learn something from Harrington, and tell everyone how many members it really has. If the number is closer to five million than six, all the better — it will make growth seem even more impressive.
Some critics of the new federation claim that only a couple of its unions actually grow — usually citing the SEIU as the only one that really does know how to organize new members. But most of the Change to Win unions brag about growing. For example, the smallest of the unions here — the United Farm Workers — claims that “union membership has grown with fresh election and contract victories” since the new president came into office eleven years ago. And every one of the affiliated unions has put organizing on the very top of their agendas.
As for the name, it seems to be “Change to Win” — without the “coalition”, or anything else. But one of the speakers last night — I think it was Hoffa — made reference to the change of name, saying that it would from now on be the “Change to Win Federation”. Anna Burger, the chair of the coalition, told me that the name would simply be “Change to Win”. This really ought to be sorted out before the business cards are printed …
But all of that is secondary. What really matters is the issue that divides Change to Win from the AFL-CIO and that issue is organizing.
Two things came to mind while reading through the material and listening to the first speeches.
First, even though Change to Win will actually charge lower dues — only $0.25 per member per month — they will spend more (much more) on organizing than the AFL-CIO unions. The coalition (or federation) is committed to spending 75% of its income on organizing. According to one handout, which claimed Change to Win had 5.4 million members, it would be spending far more money in absolute terms than the much larger AFL-CIO. In fact, it was claimed that “the collective organizing expenditures of our affiliates and the federation at all levels will easily approach $750 million per year.” That’s a staggering sum, and if unions can’t pick up new members after spending $750 million a year, then we’re really in trouble.
Second, the union seems to have an utterly different approach to politics than that of the AFL-CIO. Ask the AFL-CIO what they want to achieve in politics and you get a long shopping list, including stopping free trade agreements, fighting to defend social security and pensions, health care, and so on. But Change to Win has one and only one concern. “The new federation’s role in politics will be centered on growing the American labor movement,” they say.
And this goes to the very core of the thinking behind the new federation.
Here’s the basic idea, as I understand it. If unions represent around 8% of the private sector workforce today, that means that their ability to influence legislation, elections, and so on is severely limited. With such a tiny percentage of the workforce unionized, unions barely exist. So the question is not what unions shall do, but a more existential one — shall there be unions at all?
Change to Win is starting from the assumption that the very survival of the trade union movement is at stake. What is needed is not to decide on a agenda for unions, but to actually create those unions to begin with.
Without a strong trade union membership, nothing else can be done.
Now, I can see the arguments on both sides of this question. I mean, it is certainly important to defeat Bush’s social security agenda, for example. And it is probably important for unions to back Democratic politicians who would promise to do that. But the days when powerful unions could decide elections seem long gone. And Change to Win’s argument does seem to make sense: first, build the unions. Then, everything else.
Today begins the formal convention, which lasts for only one day. Blogger Jonathan Tasini has already pointed out that this too is remarkable — unions traditionally hold week-long affairs in resort towns like Las Vegas. (St. Louis, for all its charm, is not Las Vegas.)
Today will focus on organizing campaigns, including the Houston janitors, Advance Demolition, Cintas, school bus drivers, Smithfield Foods, DHL and hotels. It will be addressed by all the key leaders of the coalition, including Jim Hoffa, Andy Stern, and Bruce Raynor. Eight hours after it begins, it will all be over. Delegates will head back to their homes and the real work will begin.
Eric, WE are all watching and hope,that it will bring out the best for us Union people.
RON
P.S. Don’t Drink and Drive LOL
Without a dream of equality Unions are papertigers. We need a new communist movement that dreams and builds for an egalitarian future.
what happen to the article about Stalin in Norway?
H.Bell
We are witnessing history in the making, and I’m proud to be a part of it. I agree that if unions don’t grow, unions will fail – and that means we fail the working woman and man.
This is indeed an historic moment for the labor movement in the US. As a member of the Carpenters I hope that my own leadership takes to heart the talk of this move being for and of the rank and file. Without democratic reforms I fear the money committed to organizing will not be nearly as effective as it could be. When business leaders start throwing terms like “union bosses” around we do not help our case if the slur sticks.
I don’t know how serious the previous comment was … Stalin in Norway? Perhaps he meant Trotsky …. but the need for political independence for the US worker’s movement ought to be obvious.
You have had over 50 years of “friends” in and out of office who refuse to repeal Taft-Hartley, for starters. You need to forget the Democrats and build your own party, from the ground up. When Stern, Hoffa etc. start talking about independent working-class political action, then I’ll know they’re serious.
—
B. R. Ashley, local 1.on, SEIU
Glad to see the blog. I’m checking it frequently. Technology is wonderful!
Although we all believe organizing is germain to creating socially responsible legislative change, it seems to me spending hundred of millions pouring new members into a bucket with a gapping hole at the bottom will surely please the right. Without political and legislative change first, which creates a fair playing field for labour and its organizing efforts, the money will soon run out, and then what? Without political activism for legislative change, their organizing efforts, no matter how much is spent, will never get off the ground.
Question:
If we accept the $750 million for organizing as real and presume it will organize new members … how much will be spent educating the newly organized so they can make the most of their new status as union members?
2nd Question:
Any mention of rank and file, r&f democracy, etc?
As an SEIU public sector union activist, I’m torn, as are many of my colleagues, between the obvious need to organize a meaningfully comprehensive labor movement & the equally pressing responsibility to ensure decent working conditions for those who are already unionized. It’s hard to convince rank & file members that they should simply wait for the bright future, when they need contract improvements right now. Like most workers in California, they’ve been watching their benefits erode & their take home pay diminish over the past 3 years. Our city’s living wage ordinance is useless: management points to the salary charts while ignoring “voluntary” furloughs (“volunteers” trying to stave off layoffs), loss of shift differentials, freezing of positions that once offered opportunities for promotion, etc.
How do we serve today’s workers while building a future? SEIU International is entranced by the notion of do-it-yourself for union members, an idea that overlooks workplace realities. As a steward, I get minimal release time for committee meetings & direct representation of members. The notion that I can take on complete responsiblity for 100 workers in my “spare” time is, shall I say, quaint? Like most activists, I already give up plenty of off-work hours to union business. There’s nothing left to give the people who brought me the weekend (what weekend?).
Yes, white-collar public sector workers are relative fat cats, & infamously self-centered. Yes, I’m proud to be part of the union that has been organizing shockingly exploited health care workers, janitors, child care workers, & farm workers. But you have to be able to offer workers something after you organize them, or they’ll pour through your fingers.
At least give us information. Since the AFL-CIO convention, CTW has offered a paltry 2 or 3 e-mail updates, nothing on the convention, nothing on future initiatives, nothing to quell panicked rumors of locals shutting down, reps being laid off, representation being shifted to as yet unestablished offices in as yet to be determined distant towns. Yoo-hoo, St. Louis: your workers are real people in the here & now. Talk to us.
This is, for me, an amazing thing to watch and read. I am so grateful to Eric for making it possible.
I can’t join a union, being self-employed, but have proudly called myself a union man for years. Whenever I hear someone ask “What time is it?” I automatically respond “It’s UNION time!”
I am therefore not qualified to say what these unions should do or not do.
I am however qualified to ask those of you who read this to look at the Green Party as being the Labor Party so many seek. It’s a harder road to travel in some ways, but I’ve been told that doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results is a sign of insanity.
Is there anything at all to suggest that a newly elected Democratic Congress and President would do anything that threatens the position of their corporate backers?
The entire national Green Party, which has elected hundreds of people to local and state offices, runs on less than one million dollars a year.
Legislative change does require working in the political system, and many will want to stay inside the Democratic Party in hopes of small steps forward. But for those of you who don’t think that’s enough, look at we Greens. http://www.GP.org
BTW, we seek to repeal Taft-Hartley, and always have.
Hi Eric,
Really glad you’re blogging this convention! I’m finding the comments on your’s and Jonathan’s blogs almost as interesting as the coverage you are providing.
Regarding the comments, there seems to be a common thread of responses,with an emphasis on the need for a set of labor values (including a worker-based political agenda), a concern about rank-and-file democracy within the unions (with some skepticism), and some weighed impatience to begin fighting back against the bosses.
I figure if this process (CtW) bares any fruit, it will have to inspire and galvanize legions of shop floor union activists. All of this won’t happen though if we can’t create a thriving culture of social justice and economic liberty inside the labor movement itself.
Thanks again for blogging this event! Watching with great hope and some well-placed fears regarding squandered opportunities in the past.
Chuck Wynns
Hi Eric,
I’m really glad you and Jonathan Tasini are blogging the CtW convention. The wonders of technology, eh?
Thought I’d let you know that I am finding readers’ comments to be about as interesting as the coverage itself. Comments on both your’s and Jonathan’s blogs seem to have some distinct common threads. The common threads being a concern for some articulated labor values and principles (including concerns regarding a real labor politics), lots of concerns about rank-and-file democracy (with a fair amount of skepticism), and an impatience to begin the process of fighting back against the corporations and their other powers that be.
I’m figuring this process of re-inventing labor will only succeed if it includes the involvement of legions of inspired and galvanized activists. Thus, the importance of the comments… These are those activists!
Thanks again for covering the CtW event! I am reading with a great deal of hope, and some well-founded fears regarding squandered opportunities in the past.
Chuck Wynns
PS: This has nothing to do with the CtW convention, but, can you relay some sense as to what’s going on with the Gates Gourmet?T&GW fight at Heathrow? Lots of good coverage, then, the whole fight seemed to drop off the face of the earth a couple of weeks ago.
If the new union can convince members to actually vote, 5 or 6 million votes should get anyone over the line.
Maybe the states do need their own party – a labour party?
Maybe the unions here in Australia need one too?
SB
To Eric Lee,
Briefly, It makes no sense to keep trying to “organize” if the same old ideas of what and who and why you are organizing still remains
unchanged! Insanity is to keep doing the same things over and over again and expect a different result!
1. Organized labor with some money set aside for “organizing” should set up a new organization dedicated to promoting the interests of working people – especially those who are not in unions at the present time. Let us call this organization the National Organization for Working People (NOWP) for right now.
2. The first purpose of the NOWP is educational. The working people of this country has NO MEDIA at all that promotes their interests in
reporting the news for example. NOWP must create a national news network that presents the news and information vital for working people to understand what is happening to them as they are being destroyed by the class war being waged against them continuously.
For example, on every front, living standards are plummeting. There
is no national health care system, prescription drugs are unaffordable, hospitals are closing, Social Security is threatened, housing costs are skyrocketing. In the building where I work, a Latino works there who has to work two full time jobs 16 hours a day(!) at minimum wage pay, to support his family with two small children. He only sees them asleep during the week, gets about 4 hours sleep a night, has done this for two years!
3. The war(s) of the Bush Project for a New American Century are
bankrupting the economy. Tax cuts for the wealthy, massive corruption at the Federal level, etc. All this is rapidly causing a huge shift in wealth towards an ever smaller portion of the population.
4. The most crucial element that this new NOWP organization must make is this: it must become anti-capitalist (what we have now is actually
“capitalism run amok” with no checks and balances at all). The current conservative trade union movement in U.S. has always tried to “partner” with businesses — which are continually destroying the unions. The last remaining unions are surviving only at the convenience of capital. The unions remaining are a discipline of labor, and collaborate with capital to maximize profit. Corporations are constantly throwing out benefits, pensions, slashing wages, until finally they close-up and go overseas.
5. The NOWP now has a news information program worthy of engaging
working people. It must now take this program to PBS TV and threaten to sue them if they do not allow a half hour program every night to counter the corporate control and indoctrination on PBS (I refrain from ranting on about the class-war character of PBS!). Of course a national radio program or radio network must be developed.
6. The NOWP starts soliciting for members. No great demands or
requirements to join! (Something like AARP does for senior citizens).
NOWP members start with a national monthly newspaper, or national email news releases, etc. Educating, informing, showing the economics of what is happening, etc.
7. The NOWP now has the nucleus of informed people nationwide to start the creation of a National Working Peoples Party (whatever name)… We have an agenda and a platform that we have developed nationally and locally. Local groups can be formed to run local and state candidates who all support and agree to the platform.
8. The NOWP can also be a PRECURSOR to organizing union(s) nationally
and locally where possible.
9. Two essential characteristics: FEEDBACK and MEMBERSHIP INVOLVEMENT and ultimate CONTROL FROM THE BOTTOM. NO BIG FAT CATS AT THE TOP TO GET INTO BED WITH CORPORATIONS.
10. It is essential finally to maintain an anti-capitalist point-of-
view. The US Government was found of, by and for the people. It has been totally taken over by big business, military-industrial complex, etc.
The US Government was founded as a secular government with freedom of
religion for all (NO TO PAT ROBERTSON— being paid millions as a
“faith-based” organization!) NOWP must cut through the indoctrination of several generations about the glory of capitalism. Capitalism “as we now know it” is destroying the planet, millions of people abroad and at home!
Thanks if you actually read all this stuff!
jeremy@infowells.com
Santa Monica, CA , USA
A few remarks, Ok, Jesse Jackson speaks at your convention so that means you are coming from the traditions of the civil rights movement? Perhaps the make up of your executive board, President and staff gender-racial makeup would be tangible proof of endorsing these values.I don’t recall the AFL-CIO tying the hands of affiliate Unions in organizing or limiting the spending funds on organizing in the past.The Teamsters, SEIU and other were/are free to engage in many of these strategies pre-split off.Granted,not paying the AFL-CIO dues will put more money for organizing, but the option to put more into organizing was always there. These are not poverty stricken organizations. At least most of them. Have a look at each Union budget and see how much is dedicated to organizing. There might be few that still dedicate very low amounts, nothing to do with the AFL-CIO. Plus if you just shift what you were paying into the AFL-CIO and keep your budget on track and not commit more of your organizational budget to organizing, what do these Unions have to lose? They were paying it formerly( those that did) to the Federation anyway….not too risky with your members.Haven’t the Teamsters only been BACK in the AFL-CIO for ten years or so?? Too bad the press has just printed the pre concieved sound bites of the split off leaders instead of investigating past expenditures of each Union on organizing,which Unions failed to pay AFL-CIO dues( or at least were behind for years) in the past, and The difference in organizing new shops/plants and mergers/raids and employer sweetheart deals that do not empower workers. Basically I see a group of Unions that can save money, and mainly two big Unions can now use that money for organizing as they see fit. I would have felt different if the Unions came to the Federation Convention, made the case, engaged in debate, then walked if no resolution was made. This is about control. If the AFL CIO really wanted to sling mud there is tons of less than positive issues to bring up on the spintering Unions. But, I think they have kept silent as maybe they should be to try and maintain some decencey about this split in the public eye.Both sides are in the labor movement.To organize with no political education or development is not practical. Organizing new Unions is a priority, but if all of your members, love and shop at WAL-MART, Vote Republican, and do not engage in politics to benefit self interest, the very laws of the land and enforcement of the laws could prove huge obstacles even with millions spent on new organizing. We must engage on both levels.I think if Kerry had won, these guys( and I do mean guys) would not have just picked up their toys and gone home as they have. The CTW convention only lasted a day? Well, when several people completely control the agenda and the pre-determined outcome it shouldn’t even require a meeting…window dressing I think. Everyone agrees the US labor movement needs to organize more workers or die. But Gender issues, civil rights,migrant worker rights,trade,globalization,health care all are important and need to be addressed as part of a winning organizing strategy. If organizing by sector is the real solution how come SEIU and CNA fought like cats and dogs for years in California, yet Union density continued to rise in the healthcare sector? Both Unions won most elections and grew.Many new Health care workers enjoyed the protection of a collective bargaining agreement. Eventually they agreed to cooperate on a certain level and stop fighting each other, but this proves that having several Unions in a sector or industry itself is not necessarily an obstacle as Hoffa and Stern claim. Maybe who “controls” certain sectors and industries if and when they Unionize is the splinter groups interest.It would be nice to see the upper levels of control of the splinter Unions to reflect the dynamic, mixed memberships they represent. I still see “male stale and pale”.Both sides have great leaders and dedicated staff. It is a damn shame to see this split.My sincere hope is that something good someday comes of it. And if not fences are mended and we all go together forward. We are all on the same team folks…….organize! organize! organize!
Lets see… SEIU staff as chair of the new “coalition”, SEIU staff as organizing Director of the new organization, SEIU President as founder…wow sounds real diverse new and dynamic………SEIU is so giving…..Huh? Wonder who will maintain the power to make all decisions in this new Coalition? Maybe a rallying cry can be “white male leaders of Trade Unions Unite!” Wow..phones on the net and blogging..pretty high tech man!! Lookout corporate America
very good
I can’t help feeling that the battle to maintain a decent standard of living for working people can no longer be won in one country. Better organizing in the US alone won’t be enough to solve the problems. Globalization is the dominant economic reality for our era. Wages are equalizing across rich and poor nations. The battle is over whether they equalize at a relatively high level or a relatively low level — and that battle has to be fought across national borders. The struggle for decent pay, and health benefits, and the 40 hour work week, and compulsory education for children, and safe working conditions has to be fought all over again at a global level — or US workers will see their past gains steadily erode. “Workers of the world unite,” indeed.
As a participant in the functions on Tuesday in St. Louis I was more than gratified to see the the thoughtful Resolutions brought forward framed by ‘walking the talk’. Diversity,no beauracracy, and a enthusiasm to actually organize people around something with teeth.
I am not easily bowled over and not spouting the line here but I was impressed with the start of the new movement and ready to get on with the work.
how does the colition plan to pick up new members? HAS this been Addressed? you cant buy members.
i suggest that the right to work law be removed from all states that have it. we must attack laws that weaken the labour movement. a national tv show about how important it is to be in the labor movement would help.osha and the nlrb are all out of date. they need to be updated toward the labor
movement.
The credibility of the “change to win” organization is not very much when it includes carpenters union dictater Doug McCarron who also is on the board of directors of Perrini construction. He also is responsible for taking away the rights of members to vote on contracts or representatives. I would not trust anyone who associates themselves with this criminal. He also was involved in personally profiting in a stock trading scandal at ULLICO that cost union pension funds to lose billions of dollars.
I think this coalition will be seen as another lame attempt to rob workers by corrupt officials like McCarron.