Some thoughts on the state of American Labor

(This of mine is from a friendly discussion on RBB regarding American labor.  It's mostly Sam Friedman and myself and Ken Hill.  Sam and I have a more"radical" view and Ken, no stranger to Labor, has a more immediately pragmatic perspective. Sam is the author of Teamster Rank and File, Columbia University Press, 1982 -- a very solid work which he kindly presented to me a few years ago.)
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We're going in circles.  This started as a discussion of an ITT article, subsequently posted by Portside, on "Fading" in the copper country.   I'm going to repeat something I wrote in this little discussion that seems to have gotten lost:

"Mine-Mill was an extremely democratic and militant union and thoroughly egalitarian in its ethos -- organizing all workers in the industry together.  It steadfastly fought racial and ethnic discrimination of any kind.  In that sense, it was a civil rights movement in its own right.  Very basically, too, it was a multi-faceted community organization in the oft isolated hard rock metal mining, milling, and smelting towns.  Mine-Mill meetings could last forever and no union in history used the rank-and-file referendum vote any more freely.  In 1960, the Fund for the Republic ranked it as one of the most democratic unions in the country. [Business Week called it "lean, tough, and dangerous.'] Its officers and staff were paid a pittance compared to many of the "mainline" union salaries -- including those of Steel.

The Steel union runs things from the top down.  And it's a shallow "business union" at best.  Those sorry qualities lost the Phelps Dodge strike in the early '80s and functionally lost the ASARCO strike just a few years ago."

Those latter examples are very recent history.

The Western metal miner [and by extension, the mill and smelter and refinery worker] wants his own union.  Mine-Mill had been his union for generations and he had a sense of personal "ownership" that's much missing with the Steel union.  Mine-Mill members spoke of their respective locals with a strong sense of pride.  The Steel union has absorbed a number of other unions -- but Big certainly isn't necessarily Best. [The IWW's concept and practice of One Big Union always saw autonomy for its various industrial departments.]  I've mentioned before the comments I drew from Pullman porters on their perceptions since their own series of mergers into Big Labor. "It isn't the same," is something I consistently heard.  The same comments often followed the Mine-Mill merger with Steel.  And one can still hear those.

The Steel union was raiding Mine-Mill locals even before Mine-Mill was forced out of CIO.  In Alabama, Steel organizers in the late'40s and '50s consistently referred to Mine-Mill as the "n_____r union" -- since it had organized Black and white workers together in integrated locals. As with the constant red-baiting,  grassroots people remember these things.

The fact that Mine-Mill could retain most of its basic Western membership in the face of years of concerted attacks by the Federal government, the huge mining companies, and the Steel union says a great deal about the commitment of its members.  The flow of "legal" attacks on the union, which I briefly outlined in "Repression", took a huge financial toll which eventually led to the sad and ill-starred merger.  A top Mine-Mill official in Denver told me, in a long private discussion in late 1964, "We simply have no money."

American labor is in a deepening rut at this point and it's sad to see people and forces of left persuasion consistently taking the position that we have to "work with what we have" -- and that frequently means working uncritically -- and supporting mediocre unionism [along with mediocre politicians.] That may be "liberalism" but it sure as hell isn't trail-blazing. And that's precisely why the rut is getting deeper.  Ultimately, I see the Labor movement reviving and, hopefully, sooner than later.  The present all-around crisis in this country is a powerful stimulus.  And the positive traditions of American labor at its best -- grassroots democracy, militancy, social vision -- will, I am sure, ultimately prevail.  But there is a great big mountain to climb.

H

HUNTER GRAY [HUNTER BEAR/JOHN R SALTER JR] Mi'kmaq /St. Francis 
Abenaki/St. Regis Mohawk 
Protected by Na´shdo´i´ba´i´ 
and Ohkwari' 
www.hunterbear.org 
(much social justice material)

See the Stormy Adoption of an Indian Child [My Father]:
http://hunterbear.org/James%20and%20Salter%20and%20Dad.htm

For the new, just out (11/2011) and expanded/updated
edition of my "Organizer's Book," JACKSON MISSISSIPPI -- 
with a new and substantial Introduction by me.  We are close upon
the 50th anniversary of the massive Jackson Movement of1962-63.:
http://hunterbear.org/jackson.htm

Personal Background Narrative (with many links):
http://hunterbear.org/narrative.htm