Union Split Worries Dems

[Corlyss_D]

Teamsters, SEIU split from AFL-CIO
Federation's president says move is a 'grievous insult' to workers

The Associated Press
Updated: 6:43 p.m. ET July 25, 2005


CHICAGO - The Teamsters and a major service employees union on Monday bolted from the AFL-CIO, a stinging exodus for an embattled movement struggling to stop membership losses and adjust to a rapidly changing working environment.

In a decision that AFL-CIO President John Sweeney labeled a “grievous insult” to labor’s rank-and-file, the Teamsters union and the Service Employees International Union, two major federation affiliates, said they decided to leave.

“In our view, we must have more union members in order to change the political climate that is undermining workers’ rights in this country,” said Teamsters President James P. Hoffa. “The AFL-CIO has chosen the opposite approach.”

The Teamsters joined the Service Employees International Union, the largest AFL-CIO affiliate with 1.8 million members, in bolting. The SEIU is a union that AFL-CIO President John Sweeney once headed. They said they were forming a competing labor coalition designed to reverse labor’s long decline in union membership.

This was not an easy or happy decision, said Service Employees International leader Andrew Stern, once a Sweeney protege.

“Our world has changed, our economy has changed, employers have changed,” Stern said. “But the AFL-CIO is not willing to make fundamental changes as well. By contrast, SEIU has changed.”


The joint announcement, the largest schism in labor’s ranks since 1930, came as no surprise since weeks of publicly-aired dissension within the ranks preceded it. But it hit the AFL-CIO convention like a thunder clap, nevertheless.

In advance of the dissidents’ news conference, Sweeney had chastized them for their defection at a convention also marred by boycott.

“At a time when our corporate and conservative adversaries have created the most powerful anti-worker political machine in the history of our country, a divided movement hurts the hopes of working families for a better life,” Sweeney said in his keynote address.

Many union presidents, labor experts and Democratic Party leaders fear the split will weaken the movement politically and hurt unionized workers who need a united and powerful ally against business interests and global competition.

Two other unions — United Food and Commercial Workers and UNITE HERE, a group of textile and hotel workers — joined the Teamsters and the SEIU in boycotting the convention, a step widely seen as a sign that they are also poised to leave the AFL-CIO.

The four unions, representing one-third of the AFL-CIO’s 13 million members, are part of a coalition of labor groups vowing to accomplish what the 50-year-old labor giant has failed to do: Reverse the decades-long decline in union membership.

“This split is a deep concern to Democrats everywhere,” said Democratic consultant David Axelrod of Chicago

A few blocks away from where the seven-union Change to Win Coalition held its news conference, a downsized AFL-CIO met to hear Sweeney say he was “very angry” at the breakaway leaders.

“The labor movement belongs to all of us ... and our future should not be dictated by the demands of any group or the ambitions of any individual,” Sweeney said.

“But it is also my responsibility to hold our movement together — because our power is vested in our solidarity. So I want you to know I will overcome my own anger and disappointment and do everything in my power to bring us back where we belong — and that’s together,” he said.


Labor leaders urged to stand together
Earlier, Democratic lawmakers were careful not to take sides in the fight in their convention speeches, but urged labor leaders to stand together for workers at a critical time.

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said business interests may think the divide will make organized labor vulnerable.

“We have news for them. It’s not going to happen,” he said to cheers. “Our unity is our strength. We will stand together and fight for working families.”

After his speech, Durbin said it’s too early to tell what impact the rift will have on the Democratic Party, which relies on labor movement for money and manpower on Election Day. “I think the unions not participating in this convention are still deeply committed to working families,” he said. “I hope the separation in our union family is resolved very soon.

Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., made a glancing reference at the dispute, telling delegates: “There are questions of strategy and tactics of leadership and power and I can imagine many of you are anxious about labor’s future but, more importantly, you’re also anxious about your own futures.”

He urged labor leaders to adapt to the global economy, which is pressuring U.S. workers out of jobs. “There has never been a greater need for a strong labor movement to stand up for American workers,” Obama said.

“Our differences are so fundamental and so principled that at this point I don’t think there is a chance there will be a change of course,” said UFCW President Joe Hansen.

Leaders of the dissident unions demanded Sweeney’s ouster, said the AFL-CIO was beyond repair from within and demanded more money for organizing. They also are seeking power to force mergers of smaller unions and other changes they say are key to adapting to vast changes in society and the economy.

Rank-and-file members of the 52 non-boycotting AFL-CIO affiliates expressed confusion and anger over the action. “If there was ever a time we workers need to stick together, it’s today,” said Olegario Bustamante, a steelworker from Cicero, Ill.

It’s the biggest rift in organized labor since 1938, when the CIO split from the AFL. The organizations reunited in the mid-1950s.

Globalization, automation and the transition from an industrial-based economy have forced hundreds of thousands of unionized workers out of jobs, weakening labor’s role in the workplace.

When the AFL-CIO formed 50 years ago, union membership was at its zenith, with one of every three private-sector workers belonging to a labor group. Now, less than 8 percent of private-sector workers are unionized.

© 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
© 2005 MSNBC.com

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8682415/


Summary: AFL-CIO Split Worry Democrats


By The Associated Press
The Associated Press
Updated: 2:37 a.m. ET July 26, 2005


DIVISION: The defection of two large unions _ the Teamsters and the Service Employees International Union _ from the AFL-CIO could cause significant fundraising problems for the Democratic Party.

OPENING: The AFL-CIO has been a major supporter of Democratic candidates over the years. Some analysts say Republicans might reach out to the dissident unions.

FUTURE: "I think we work better when we're united," says Democratic strategist Jenny Backus. The leaders of the Teamsters and the SEIU say they will continue to support Democrats.

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
© 2005 MSNBC.com

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8707219/

[Ralph]

I wonder how the Teamsters who belong to CMG feel about this.

[Corlyss_D]

I wonder how the Teamsters who belong to CMG feel about this.

He left.

[Corlyss_D]

To quote that important 20th Century philosopher, Lucy van Pelt, "Better to curse the darkness than light a candle."

Very Old Labor
Unions need a vision for the new global economy.

Tuesday, July 26, 2005 12:01 a.m.

The AFL-CIO, the giant union consortium formed in 1955 by George Meany and Walter Reuther, is breaking apart this week in a dispute over how to revive labor's lagging fortunes. The tragedy is that neither faction is offering an agenda that will make workers more prosperous in our increasingly competitive global economy.

Instead, we are witnessing a fight over who gets to preside over a declining labor movement. Two of the largest and more successful unions, the Service Employees International and the Teamsters, are rebelling against the leadership of AFL-CIO President John Sweeney. The irony is that it wasn't all that long ago, in 1995, that Mr. Sweeney won his job with his own coup against Lane Kirkland, the Cold War hero and more moderate labor voice.

In the wake of the GOP takeover of Congress the year before, Mr. Sweeney promised to pour hundreds of millions of dollars into electoral politics to stop the Gingrich revolution. He staffed AFL-CIO headquarters with activists from the political left--environmental groups, culturally liberal outfits--and made the union consortium a wholly owned subsidiary of the Democratic Party.

A decade later we can see how that turned out. Democrats remain in the House and Senate minority, and union membership continues to decline across the American economy. The unionized share of the total U.S. work force has been sliding steadily for years, and was down again last year to 12.5% from 12.9% in 2003. In the more dynamic private sector, only 7.9% of employees now carry the union label.
Service workers President Andy Stern wants to arrest this decline by diverting more labor resources into union organizing, especially at such large employers as Wal-Mart. One of his rebel allies, Terence O'Sullivan of the Laborers International Union, wants to more aggressively use union pension funds and financial assets to influence corporate decisions and gain seats on corporate boards. Mr. Sweeney doesn't oppose either idea, but he also wants to pour cash into Congressional lobbying and Democratic coffers. Mr. Stern replies that this money will largely be wasted until unions increase their member ranks, and for our non-union money he's probably right.

What's missing on both sides, however, is a vision of economic opportunity that might actually make workers want to join a union in the first place. Tactics aside, both factions continue to believe in the idea of unions that arose in the Industrial Age: Greedy management versus the exploited working man, seniority over flexibility, fixed benefits and strike threats over working with management to keep a U.S.-based company profitable and innovative in a world of growing competition. On the political front, both factions favor trade protection, higher taxes and government help to enforce restrictive work rules. This is the agenda of Old Europe, where jobless rates are above 10%, and it merely offers more economic insecurity in the U.S. as well.

What the labor movement really needs is a new generation of leaders who understand the emerging competition to U.S. workers from the likes of India and China. Rather than oppose imports to protect textile jobs that can't be saved, such leaders would work to reform education so future Americans can compete in the knowledge industries that will grow the fastest. They'd also work to make pensions and health insurance transportable from company to company, so a worker wouldn't be trapped by benefits in a job or industry he didn't like. They'd be partners with management, not antagonists.

Without such a new vision, Big Labor will only continue its slide. All the more so given new Labor Department rules, recently upheld in court after an AFL-CIO challenge, requiring that unions disclose more details about how they spend hard-earned member dues. Some of the nation's largest unions will now have to disclose their spending by specific categories, such as political donations, grievance proceedings, or organizing. This sunshine will expose just how much labor money is being wasted on political activities that have little to do with improving workers' lives.
Union leaders seem genuinely to believe that their glory days will return if only they can defeat President Bush, or oust Tom DeLay as House Majority Leader. But their real obstacle is the reality of the modern global economy. Until they offer workers something more than class warfare, circa 1955, they will continue to decline.


Copyright © 2005 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

[Ralph]

Unions are boring subjects (to me).

Let them eat bagels!

[Corlyss_D]

Unions are boring subjects (to me).

Let them eat bagels!

I think they are subversive agents myself. I don't like them, never have, never will. My favorite story about unions is when Reagan busted PATCO. I cheered for weeks. Somebody should have done it to the mail carries decades before. My second favorite story is one dear to the heart of a CMGer - the outfit he worked for was struck by the Teamsters and the next day the company went out of business by way of saying "Fu*ck you!" to the union. I really like that story. None of the non-Teamsters suffered because they all either retired or went to work for the parent company. My third favorite I read just last week - Walmart's meat cutting department was threatened with unionization so they closed the department. It really warms my heart to watch the Dems and the unions sink slowly in the west locked in each other's embrace completely baffled about what to do to save themselves.

[Ralph]

I wonder how the Teamsters who belong to CMG feel about this.

He left.

*****

Who was that?

[Corlyss_D]

I wonder how the Teamsters who belong to CMG feel about this.

He left.

*****

Who was that?

Mike Sweeney. He was a trucker - probably still is. His screen name was "Mozart."

[Ralph]

I wonder how the Teamsters who belong to CMG feel about this.

He left.

*****

Who was that?

Mike Sweeney. He was a trucker - probably still is. His screen name was "Mozart."

*****

Yes, I remember him.