130

p Manifesting itself ever more clearly in the 1960s was the trend toward a further swing to the Right by the reactionary 131 labour leader clique united around George Meany. At the same time, however, activity among rank-and-file union members also grew as dissatisfaction with the labour bureaucracy’s policy of class collaboration mounted.

p In the United States, where there is no influential conciliatory Social-Democratic party to speak of, the reactionary union bureaucracy has been and still is the main carrier of opportunism in the labour movement. It is utilised by the monopolies and the state as a force for stunting the growth of class-consciousness among workers and for ensuring “ cooperation” between labour and capital.

p Explaining the emergence of a rather large labour bureaucracy in capitalist countries, Lenin wrote back in 1917: "Under capitalism, democracy is restricted, cramped, curtailed, mutilated by all the conditions of wage slavery, and the poverty and misery of the people. This and this alone is the reason why the functionaries of our political organisations and trade unions are corrupted—or rather tend to be corrupted—by the conditions of capitalism and betray a tendency to become bureaucrats, i.e., privileged persons divorced from the people and standing above the people.

p “That is the essence of bureaucracy; and until the capitalists have been expropriated and the bourgeoisie overthrown, even proletarian functionaries will inevitably be ‘bureaucratised’ to a certain extent.”  [131•1 

p In pursuing their reactionary labour policy objectives, the US ruling circles bank heavily on the labour bureaucracy, using a variety of means to bribe and corrupt it. In recent years, particularly during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, the fusion of the labour bureaucracy with management, with government apparatus and with the entire system of state-monopoly capitalism, has grown even stronger. Top labour leaders have been drawn considerably more frequently into co-operation with the government and big business in all kinds of federal, state and local agencies and in various committees and panels that spring up in increasing numbers in connection with the government’s mounting intervention in labour relations. "Through their relationship to the federal administration,” Gus Hall noted in a report 132 to the National Committee of the Communist Party on June 10, 1967 "these labour leaders have become instruments within the state-monopoly capitalist set-up. This relationship has become a means by which labour leaders can be used in the interests of monopoly. Labour leaders who would not want to serve the interests of the big corporations directly do so nevertheless by becoming closely tied to the administration—to a state apparatus that serves the interests of these very same corporations. The same applies to labour leaders who serve monopoly interests by working with their direct instrument, the CIA.”  [132•1 

p The Rightist labour leaders are open supporters of the capitalist system. As noted in a special report by a mission of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), "in contrast to numerous labour movements in Europe and other parts of the world, the US unions, far from advocating a profound reform of the system, do not even envisage it, despite the harsh conflicts that oppose them to the capitalists.”  [132•2  AFLCIO president Meany, in his testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee in 1963, openly outlined his credo, a credo which many other US labour leaders share. "I think to apologise for the capitalist system is probably the greatest sin that any American can commit....” he told the congressmen. "I believe in the capitalist system just as much as anyone in this room. This economy we have in this country is a capitalist economy and the trade union movement is part of this economy and is part of this system. I make no apologies for being part of this system.”  [132•3  Such oaths of loyalty and devotion uttered by labour bosses of Meany’s ilk are examples not so much even of reformism as of conformism with respect to capitalist society and its economic, political and ideological foundations.

p Defending the position of the ruling classes, labour leaders say that workers and capitalists have common interests. Repudiating class struggle and advocating “co-operation” between labour and capital, reactionary labour leaders 133 zealously support, and even propose, various plans for " establishing and maintaining industrial peace" through "mutual trust" and "human relations”. A view expressed more and more frequently in recent years is that strikes—the tested fighting weapon of the proletariat—have become obsolete, that they have lost their meaning and have become merely a “local” weapon. Steady advances in automation, introduction of new technology into production and changes in the nature of the labour process, says, for example, AFL-CIO vice-president Joseph A. Beirne, who is also president of the Communications Workers of America, make management "less susceptible to strikes”. Therefore, the unions, he says, "will be wise to use the strike less frequently".  [133•1  Many other leaders in the AFL-CIO take a similar stance. Speaking to reporters on his 76th birthday in September 1970, George Meany said: "We find more and more that strikes really don’t settle a thing. Where you have a well-established industry and a well-established union, you’re getting to the point where a strike doesn’t make sense.” Therefore, added the titular head of the AFL-CIO, "I can say to you quite frankly that more and more people in the trade union movement—I mean at the highest level—are thinking of other ways to advance without the use of the strike weapon.”  [133•2 

p Instead of using the strike weapon the top labour boss proposed relying on so-called "voluntary arbitration" to regulate labour disputes.

p One of the characteristic features of the cumbersome bureaucratic structure of American trade unions is the huge number (about 60,000) of paid functionaries. Figures compiled by Seymour M. Lipset of the University of California (Berkeley) show that while in the capitalist countries of Europe (for example, Norway, Britain and Sweden) there is one paid union worker for every 1,700 to 2,200 union members, in the United States the ratio is 1 : 300.  [133•3  It should be emphasised that the growth in the number of high-ranking 134 paid officials is coupled with a reduction in the number of shop stewards in many large industries. For example, while there used to be an average of one shop steward for every 25 workers in industry, the figure now is one for every 1.200.  [134•1  The labour bureaucracy, however, is by no means homogeneous. Functionaries in the locals and in on-the-job organisations are close to the masses and feel constant pressure from them. At the apex of the labour bureaucracy, however, are people who in their life style, income and ideology are far removed from those whose interests they are supposed to defend. Many top labour leaders, although they operate within the working class, in fact side with the bourgeoisie. Salaries of top-ranking labour leaders range between $50,000 and $100,000 a year. The magazine US News & World Report gave the following examples of annual income in 1964: president of the National Maritime Union Joseph Curran—$105,823; president of the United Steelworkers of America David McDonald—$74,973; president of the International Union of Operating Engineers Hunter P. Wharton—$74,099; president of the Brotherhood of Railway Clerks George Harrison—$63,522.  [134•2 

p AFL-CIO president George Meany, who until 1965 had a salary of $45,000 a year (not counting a several thousand dollar expense account), was granted a substantial salary increase by a decision of the AFL-CIO’s Sixth Convention. In 1968, this labour boss got $72,471.  [134•3  The annual salary of the new president of the teamsters’ union in 1971 was set at $125,000.  [134•4  Somewhat lower are the salaries of lesser union officials. For example, Anthony Provenzano, president of Teamsters Local 560 had an income of over $63,000 in 1963.  [134•5  On the average, the annual salaries of union officials in this category range from $15,000 to $30,000.  [134•6 

135

p Receiving disproportionately (compared with union members) high salaries, many labour leaders, writes University of Chicago Professor Albert Rees, though they stem from the working class, in time take on "middle class" views and manners. "They come to feel that they should be paid like others who do work of similar difficulty and importance."  [135•1  Indeed, having turned union treasuries into a source of their personal enrichment, some union bureaucrats unabashedly complain that their salaries are "too small”, merely falling "within the range of the second or third ranking officials of a middle-sized corporation".  [135•2 

p In his book, The Crisis of American Labor, Sidney Lens, author of a number of works on the US labour movement, explains the reasons for the widening gap between union rank-and-file and those of their leaders who have betrayed their class. Writes Lens: "Eventually the union leader draws so far from his members that he adopts the ethics of business; he still serves his workers, still wins wage increases and reductions in hours, but the union becomes for him a vehicle for personal enrichment as well. . .. The rank– andfile member now loses not only his right to oppose but his right to dissent as well, and the union is no longer ruled by its members but by the machine. The area of decision narrows. The broad decisions are no longer made by the local union members, but by their leaders. Eventually they are no longer made by the local union officials either, but by the national leaders. The base of the labour pyramid loses its important prerogatives, confining itself more and more to secondary problems, while an entrenched bureaucracy at the top is predominant.”  [135•3 

136

p Rightist labour leaders, tied ideologically and politically with the bourgeoisie and the whole system of state– monopoly capitalism, are a "millstone around the neck of the working class”; as far as they are able they impede the development of the class struggle and betray the fundamental interests of the working people. Violating basic principles of trade union democracy and supplanting them with a policy of dictation and pressure from above, Rightist AFLCIO leaders try to cultivate within unions certain attitudes that are alien to these class organisations of the proletariat. It is primarily the labour bosses who are to blame for the fact that the ranks of the working class are still split; that in many unions recruitment of new members has been sorely neglected, chauvinism and discrimination against blacks and other minorities are practised, progressive and militant elements are persecuted, corruption and strikebreaking have not been eliminated and the principles of worker solidarity and proletarian internationalism are all but forgotten. Stirred to active protest by the patently anti-labour policy pursued by Rightist labour leaders are not only many rankand-file union members, but also some high-ranking union officials. Albert F. Hartung, for example, retiring president of the AFL-CIO International Woodworkers of America, expressing his dissatisfaction with the collaborationist activity of the AFL-CIO leadership, told the 25th Convention of his union that "top leaders of the AFL-CIO are so far removed from the rank-and-file workers’ problems that they know nothing about their needs. They are more at home with the ’striped-pants diplomats’ and ’high society’ than they are with the workers. Some of the leaders have spent more time supporting the CIA than they have on the workers’ problems.”  [136•1 

p The close ties between conservative AFL-CIO leaders and the ruling circles—and, in particular, the support they give to the Department of State and the CIA in their pursuit of an imperialist foreign policy objectives—have received notoriety both within the United States and abroad. American writers have published a number of works in recent years citing convincing evidence that the more reactionary 137 segment of the trade union bureaucracy has long become an appendage of the huge anti-communist machinery of US imperialism.  [137•1  "From World War I to the present era of Cold War,” wrote American historian Ronald Radosh, "the leaders of organised labour have willingly offered their support to incumbent administrations, and have aided the Department of State in its pursuit of foreign policy objectives.”  [137•2  Rightist labour leaders became especially active along these lines immediately after the Second World War. Frightened by the growing successes and prestige of the socialist countries and by the renewed vigour of the workingclass struggle in the United States, the trade union bureaucracy of the American Federation of Labour and the Rightist leaders of the Congress of Industrial Organisations promptly joined the cold war.

p Using the slogan of anti-communism as a cover for its subversive activities in a number of countries throughout the world, the reactionary union bureaucracy headed by George Meany and his chief foreign policy adviser, Jay Lovestone,  [137•3  used every means possible to hamper the struggle of the international working class, to undermine its unity and to impede the activity of progressive labour organisations. With AFL-CIO funds, as well as with financial assistance coming from the CIA, the State Department and the monopolies, the Meany-Lovestone group through its emissaries, such as Irving Brown in Europe and Serafino Romualdi in Latin America, worked hard to persuade and 138 bribe trade union officials, split the trade union movement and win the support of national trade union centres and international trade union organisations for the policy of the US ruling circles.

p The Meany-Lovestone group has pursued, and continues to pursue, its subversive activity in the trade unions in developing countries through the militantly anti-communist Inter-American Organisation of Labour, as well as through such organisations under AFL-CIO jurisdiction as the American Institute for Free Labour Development, the African-American Labour Centre and the Asian-American Free Labour Institute. Through their ramified machinery, the reactionary leaders of the AFL-CIO for many years supported Batista’s corrupt regime in Cuba and waged struggles in the interests of US monopoly capital against progressive and democratic forces in British Guiana, Guatemala, Brazil and the Dominican Republic. On the whole, however, the successes of the Meany-Lovestone group’s postwar foreign policy have been highly questionable; despite all its efforts, its claims to leadership in the international workers’ movement are far from being realised.

p The reactionary policy pursued by Meany & Co. to the benefit of the monopoly bourgeoisie, the close co-operation of the trade union bureaucracy with management and government agencies, as well as expansionism abroad, have all been subjected to strident criticism by the trade union masses in recent years.

p Developments in the US labour movement clearly indicate that dissatisfaction with the conciliatory actions of labour leaders is mounting. General Secretary of the Communist Party of the USA, Gus Hall, spoke of the reasons for this discontent in his report to the Party’s 18th National Convention: "The critical eye which the rank-and-file are turning toward the Executive Council of the AFL-CIO becomes more sharply critical as the problems of job security, speedup, high taxes and high prices become more acute. They are beginning to press a number of questions:

p “When was the last time the Executive Council of the AFL-CIO gave consideration and leadership to any labour struggle?

p “When was the last time it used its powers and influence 139 to mobilise support for an economic struggle? In the New York transit strike it played its usual role of trying to get the struggle called off.

p “What, concretely, has the Executive Council done about the continuing bars against Negro workers in the affiliated unions? What has it done about breaking the imprisonment of Negro workers in the lowest job classifications and grades?

p “What has been the Executive Council’s leadership on questions of automation?

p “These are legitimate questions. They show that the distance between the Executive Council and the struggle of the workers is as great as it can be.”  [139•1 

p A significant progressive trend illustrating the growth of rank-and-file activity has been the development of a mass movement of union members, the development of open and organised opposition to the conciliatory policies of the trade union bureaucracy and worker efforts to rectify the situation in their unions. Coming out in defence of their own vital interests and rights, workers at the same time demand that their leaders take action on urgent problems facing the labour movement.

p It would be difficult to find an example in the history of the American labour movement over the last 25 to 30 years of an influential union president’s meeting any serious opposition within his union. Until recently, as Time magazine put it, it was as impossible for union members to remove a union boss as for a basketball player to get rid of the referee. Reformist leaders of American unions held so much power and had officially canonised such a dictatorial machine as to virtually exclude the possibility of their removal for doing a bad job or losing an election. For decades, any organised rank-and-file opposition to a given union’s top officials was categorised by the latter as splitting activity jeopardising the very existence of the union. However, along about mid-year in 1964 some substantial changes took place in quite a few unions, where many fairly prominent union officials lost their jobs.

140

p In the steelworkers’ union, David McDonald, who was the union’s president for 12 years, lost an election to I. W. Abel, the union’s former secretary-treasurer. In the International Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers, James Carey was defeated by Paul Jennings, a member of the union’s executive committee. In the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, where for over 30 years no one had dared to challenge the presidency of Arnold Zander, a new man, Jerry Wurf, stepped into the office. New leaders were elected in a number of other unions.

p The positions of long-entrenched trade union bosses were beginning to crumble. "For rarely in modern times,” wrote Washington Post, "has the leadership of the big international unions been so embattled as it is today. And the threat comes from within—from its own membership—rather than from without.”  [140•1 

p Of course, the reasons for ousting old leaders are specific to each individual case. But, on the whole, they reflect the general growing dissatisfaction felt by the great bulk of union members concerning the condition of the trade union movement.

p The end of 1964 and the beginning of 1965 saw an especially hot battle for power in the nation’s third largest union, the United Steelworkers of America. It all looked very much like a caricature of a national presidential campaign. Both candidates, McDonald and Abel, travelled extensively trying to visit as many as possible of the union’s locals in 46 states and also in Canada and Puerto Rico. They each had a staff of experts to write speeches, arrange radio and television appearances and send out "personal letters" to the rank-and-file. Wide use was made of buttons and hats carrying slogans such as "All the Way with David J.” or “I’m for I. W. Abel”. McDonald never missed a chance to kiss steelworkers’ babies and to shake as many hands as he could at factory gates. Nor did the campaign proceed without abusive language. At one point, for example, in a heated debate McDonald called Abel a "damn liar”. As The New York Times commented, it was "one of the 141 biggest and most intense [election campaigns] in the history of the labour movement.”  [141•1 

p The fight centred mainly around the activity of the Human Relations Committee, the organ for settling disputes between the eleven major steel companies, on the one hand, and the union, on the other. The conciliatory policy pursued by the union leaders and the fact that, because of the Human Relations Committee, representatives of the union’s locals were given no part in working out the terms of collective agreements, evoked widespread dissatisfaction among the union’s lesser officials. "There had been,” wrote The New York Times, "a growing feeling in the middle echelon of the union—district directors and local union leaders—that McDonald had become too authoritarian and arrogant, disregarding the opinions and problems of district leaders and rank-and-filers. In addition, they have charged, he had become more fond of his associations with company executives and Government officials than with union colleagues.”  [141•2  Demands to put an end to the leadership’s dictatorship and to establish closer contact with rank-and-file union members became increasingly insistent at union meetings. Workers everywhere were urging action to win higher wages, better working conditions and real guarantees against layoffs, and were demanding the right to carry out strikes in defence of their local demands. Opposition to McDonald’s policy grew as the time for negotiating a new agreement with the steel companies approached. And it was under these circumstances that Abel, criticising "tuxedo trade unionism" ( referring to McDonald’s fondness of mingling with the upper crust) and promising to "give the union back to the members" and "to get back on the track of solid trade unionism”, scored his victory.

p It is noteworthy that The New York Times, explaining the reasons for the struggle within the steelworkers’ union, wrote: "Ironically, the mutual trusteeship idea and the Human Relations Committee, which were hailed in some circles as major advances in labour relations, were at least partly 142 responsible for the present struggle.”  [142•1  Immediately alter the election, many observers noted that the Human Relations Committee had lost its former significance, had compromised itself and no longer played any noticeable role in the 1965 negotiations between the steel companies and the union.

p No less intense was the election battle that raged for several months in the 290,000-member United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers Union. At a stormy convention in September 1964, the forces opposing the re-election of president James B. Carey nominated their own candidate, secretary of the union’s New York-New Jersey area Paul Jennings. The election that took place a month later, however, ended in Jennings’ defeat: Carey claimed a victory by a majority of 2,193 votes. But six months later a big scandal broke out; a recount of the votes—made at the insistence of Jennings’ supporters—revealed serious irregularities. It turned out that there were 25,000 counterfeit ballots made out in favour of Carey.  [142•2  Thus, the career of James B. Carey, the so-called boy wonder of the American labour movement who spent 36 of his 53 years in top labour union posts, ended ignominiously.

p Major changes took place in the leadership of a number of other unions as well. At a convention of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees held in April 1964, pressure from below forced Arnold Zander, who had been entrenched in the presidency ever since the union was founded (1932), to give up his post to Jerry Wurf. The latter was well known for his many years of union battles with New York’s Mayor Wagner and other authorities.

p Former president of the American Federation of Teachers Carl Megel, who had strong backing from AFL-CIO leaders, lost out in that union’s election in 1964 to Charles Cogen, who had led a strike of 40,000 teachers in New York. Analysing the results of the election, Newsweek magazine called Cogen’s victory a "triumph for militancy".  [142•3 

p A prolonged internal conflict plaguing the Textile Workers Union of America was resolved in the summer of 1964 143 at the l.ith national convention ol that union. After a fierce struggle, Meany-champion Emil Rieve was stripped of his title of President Emeritus, which had enabled him to exert direct influence on union affairs. Many of Rieve’s supporters on the Executive Council were also removed.

p Another long and stormy conflict ended in July 1965 when the president of the International Association of Machinists, Albert Hays, who had violated union rules and illegally fired union staff members who did not suit him, was ousted.

p In September 1966, a convention of the United Rubber Workers of America expressed lack of confidence in president George Burden by electing Peter Bommarito. Burdon’s opposition charged that he had lost touch with the membership, had become indifferent to their needs and had misused union funds.  [143•1 

p Highly significant was the forced retirement in the summer of 1968 of James A. Suffridge, who for 24 years running headed the big Retail Clerks International Association. The opposition, with strong support in many locals, opposed Suffridge, Meany’s right-hand man and possible successor, with a programme to rebuild and revive the union. That reactionary labour leader and nine of his closest aides were officially accused of spending over $1,000,000 of union funds for purposes unconnected with union needs.  [143•2 

p An exceptionally sharp struggle for changes in leadership developed in the United Mine Workers union. Back in 1964, UMW president W. A. (Tony) Boyle was opposed by Steve Kochis, who had taken part that year in a “wildcat” strike of young miners protesting a contract that the union leadership had signed with the mine owners. This was the first time in 40 years that an open challenge was made to the bureaucratic UMW leadership, which had assumed almost dictatorial powers.  [143•3 

144

p Kochis justly accused the Executive Council of disregarding the interests of the membership, gross violation of trade union democracy, etc. When opposition supporters tried to criticise the leadership at the convention, they were brutally beaten right in the convention hall.  [144•1  In December, the results of a referendum were announced: Boyle had received a majority of the votes. Meanwhile, however, reports filtered into the press that there was evidence of ballot box stuffing in favour of the union leadership.

p A struggle to dislodge the UMW leadership broke out again in the second half of 1969. Opposing Boyle and his bureaucratic machine this time was Joseph Yablonski, former director of the union’s Western Pennsylvania district. Tens of thousands of rank-and-file UMW members in the Appalachian coal basin formed groups supporting his candidacy. Yablonski accused the leadership of collaboration with mine owners, corruption and embezzlement of union funds,  [144•2  and called for a special convention to strengthen democratic procedures in the union, mandatory retirement of officers at the age of 65 and greater militancy in contract bargaining.

p Once again, as in 1964, reprisals were taken against those who dared to openly criticise the union bosses. During the election campaign, Yablonski himself was beaten to unconsciousness by hired thugs. Resorting to various machinations (including the uses of tens of thousands of fraudulent ballots), Boyle and his cohorts got the election results they 145 wanted. But Yablonski did not give up the fight; he challenged the election results and continued to accuse the leadership of corruption.

p On January 5, 1970, courageous labour leader Joseph A. Yablonski, his wife and their daughter were found snot to death in their Clarkesville, Pennsylvania, home. "This coldblooded murder of a militant UMW leader bears the imprint of political reprisal,” noted a special statement by the Communist Party of the USA. Comparing Yablonski’s murder with the murders of prominent civil rights leaders and the murders of labour leaders in other states in recent years, the Communist Party pointed out that the reactionary forces in the country were using terrorist tactics in their effort to halt the American people’s struggle for progress. "Ultimate responsibility for the murder of Joseph A. Yablonski and his wife and daughter is to be found ’in the ranks of the rapacious coal barons’,” the statement emphasised.  [145•1 

p Struggles for changes in leadership have also taken place in recent years in the Insurance Workers International Union, the National Federation of Federal Employees, the National Postal Union, the American Federation of Government Employees, the National Maritime Union, the International Longshoremen’s Association, the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union, in some of the railroad workers’ unions and elsewhere. The movement also spread to AFL-CIO organisations on the state level. This trend was seen, for example, in the AFL-CIO’s New York state branch, the split of the New Jersey state branch into two organisations and the tense election struggle between two candidates at a convention of the Massachusetts branch.

p Important changes have also been taking place in recent years at the local level. Election of front-rank workers to union posts has now become standard procedure in many unions, especially when it comes to the election of shop stewards and presidents of locals. As The New York Times wrote in September 1970, "There has been more turnover at the local level than has ever been witnessed in the history of the labour movement".  [145•2  Indeed, in the United Steel– 146 workers of America, new presidents were elected in 1970 in 1,100 of that union’s 3,800 locals.  [146•1 

p Of course, all the personnel changes that have taken place at the highest level by no means signify that every newly elected official is a representative of his union’s rank– andfile. In some cases, as for example in the United Steelworkers of America and the International Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers, today’s rivals have for many years proposed the same programmes and pursued the same policy. But noteworthy is the fact that, on the whole, today’s opposition has shown a greater understanding of current problems and offers a programme that to a large extent meets the aspirations of the bulk of the union membership. And this is not accidental. The emergence of an opposition in such a short span of time in so many unions stems from the strong discontent observable among workers in recent years.

These events have made a marked impact on the American labour movement as a whole. Rank-and-file workers show greater boldness in criticising the conciliatory policies of their leaders and demand that the unions become an effective weapon of workers against the monopolies. A sign of the growing militancy of the great mass of rank– andfilers are the many instances where workers have rejected agreements signed behind their backs by their leaders and employers. In the words of secretary-treasurer of the International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union Louis Goldblatt, "the labour movement is getting sick and tired of a group of trade union officials who at their best can be called mediators or emissaries and at their worst a bunch of piecards and sellout artists. There is something pretty phony going on when you read almost any week a report about another agreement brought back by another group of trade union officials that is automatically rejected by the rank-and-file. That is the common news in labour today.”  [146•2  According to Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service figures, the number of agreements worked out by union officials and employers but rejected by union memberships has been consistently high in recent years.

147 Percentage of Collective Agreements Rejected by Workers, 1964–1970  [147•1  1964 1965 1966 1967 8.7 10.0 11.7 14.2 1968 1969 1970 11.9 12.3 11.2

p “Mediators and those who follow the national labour picture,” noted the magazine, The Nation, "maintain that if accurate records were kept of all contract rejections, the figure would be close to 15 per cent.”  [147•2  Such “obstinacy” on the part of the workers, according to W. Taylor, president of one of the locals of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, may be explained by the fact "that recommendations of union officials and negotiating committees don’t have the weight they had at one time with the rank-and-file".  [147•3 

p Concerned over the resolute attitude taken by rank– andfile workers in labour disputes and their increasingly frequent rejection of the conciliatory position of union bosses, the government and the monopolies, as reported in the US press, are seeking new anti-labour legislation to deny workers of their right to ratify contracts.  [147•4  Symptomatically, many Rightist labour leaders give their approval and support to the monopolies’ plans. George Meany, for example, speaking at a session of the AFL-CIO Executive Council in February 1970, said bluntly that "contracts worked out by labour leaders and management should be final and not subject to the approval of union members".  [147•5  As aptly put in a circular, "Nixonised Unions—Threat to the Rank-and-File”, put out in early 1971 by the independent labour magazine, Labor Today, "there is a word for Meany’s position against rank-and-file: Betrayal”.

p The activisation and radicalisation of the union masses 148 in recent years have served as a warning to Rightist labour leaders who, contrary to the interests of the working people, use their power to expand the policy of class collaboration. Anticipating the outcome of the election in the steelworkers’ union and the influence it would have on other unions, Washington Post wrote in November 1964: "If McDonald loses, the lesson will not be wasted on other labour leaders. What profiteth a man to assume the mantle of labour statesman, they will ask, to win the plaudits of Government and economists by negotiating two successive contracts well within the Administration’s anti-inflationary wage-price guideposts, to improve the bargaining atmosphere by maintaining year-around talks with management, to keep the industry free of strikes for five years, if in the end he loses his job.”  [148•1 

One of the demands union rank-and-filers have been making recently is for compulsory retirement of union officials at some specified age. These demands are aimed directly against the ruling clique of the AFL-CIO, whose Executive Council includes the presidents of many of the nation’s largest unions. In 1970, the average age of the 35 members of this council (the "Vatican Curia" as it is sometimes referred to in the press) was over 63 years, and there were many leaders of influential unions over 70 and 80 years of age.  [148•2  The rank-and-file workers would like to dislodge from high union posts people who have long impeded the growth of new forces. Reflecting this attitude was, for example, the batch of 371 resolutions introduced at the 1964 convention of the steelworkers’ union calling for a compulsory age limit for officers. A number of unions—- including the International Association of Machinists, the International Brotherhood of Pulp, Sulphite and Paper Mill Workers, the United Automobile Workers and the Brotherhood of Railway and Airline Clerks—have already amended their constitutions, setting 65 as the age limit for top union posts.  [148•3 

149 The reactionary AFL-CIO clique and the ruling circles in the country, alarmed at the growing movement for greater democracy in the unions, are doing everything they can to maintain the status quo. One argument they use, as frankly reported in The Christian Science Monitor, is that "in some instances the less democratic unions provide the more stable labour relations”,  [149•1  or, in other words, adopt positions that are more acceptable to big business. It was highly significant that in March 1965, immediately after McDonald and Carey were defeated,  [149•2  AFL-CIO president George Meany suggested that the referendum system of electing union officers which is used by a number of unions be changed. He said that ”. . .union conventions are the best places to hold elections" since "the referendum system hasn’t worked".  [149•3  This proposal, which reflected the views of many other members of the AFL-CIO Executive Council, was aimed at preventing a repetition of the "sad experience" of the elections in the steelworkers’ and electricians’ unions.  [149•4 

p As the movement of union rank-and-file against their reactionary leaders mounted, voices in Congress calling for stiffer control over union elections grew louder. Discussed in government circles in 1965 was a proposal to give the 150 Department of Labour special powers (in addition to those it already had under the Landrum-Griffin Act) which would enable it to intervene in any union election.

p Reports filtered into the American press in early 1967 that the Central Intelligence Agency continually interfered in the election process of labour unions in an effort to assure victory for candidates connected with that organisation. In February 1967, the World Journal Tribune gave an example of how this took place. "Not too many years ago, for example,” the paper wrote, "the CIA was directed to thwart... oil workers unions in the Mideast... . The CIA did what comes naturally. It contacted US labour leaders. There was— and is—one small national union which was just the outfit to move into the fight. It did.

p “But during this period its erudite president came up for re-election. He won. It takes money to run union campaigns. ... As a result of the victory of the CIA’s friend, reports flared that his campaign was financed by the ’ invisible government’.”  [150•1  Instances of the CIA’s supporting labour leaders it deems desirable are far from rare.

p The progressive trend in the labour movement that manifests itself in open opposition to the top union brass has been dubbed "the revolt of the union rank-and-file”. The monopoly circles do not conceal their alarm over the events taking place. Expressing their sentiments, The Christian Science Monitor wrote: "The most sweeping changes in more than a quarter century are under way in the leadership of American labour. Within several years, they are likely to bring shifts in the structure, policies, and behaviour of unions with millions of members. Shock waves of problems are possible in industrial relations.”  [150•2 

p The Communist Party of the USA has highly assessed the rank-and-file movement against the leadership of the AFL-CIO and many individual unions. A resolution "Labor and Trade Union Problems”, adopted at the 18th National Convention of the Communist Party of the USA, noted that the deposition of old reactionary leaders and their 151 replacement by new militant leaders creates important prerequisites for broadening and invigorating the working-class struggle. "Rank-and-file movements produce the fresh leadership necessary to replenish labour’s rank,” one of the resolutions of the 18th National Convention stressed. "They are a source of strength to militant trade union leaders, and a spur to the do-nothings, who either respond to the demands of the day or are discarded.”  [151•1 

p The growing dissatisfaction felt by union rank-and-file with the policy of class collaboration pursued by union bureaucrats stimulated the consolidation of the more active forces within the working class and gave rise to new forms of struggle at the lower level to revitalise the labour movement. Recent years have seen the formation of committees of one kind or another within a number of unions—in the steelworkers’ and miners’ unions, for example—for the purpose of exchanging views and working out action programmes to protect worker rights and interests. An event helping to unite these scattered forces was the National Rank-and-File Conference held in Chicago on June 27–28, 1970. Taking part in the conference were 900 delegates, all rank-and-file union members representing primarily Left and Centre forces in unions functioning in various branches of industry in 25 states. A statement issued in connection with the conference read: "We are a movement in the labour movement. We exist to help build, strengthen and unify it; to help defend it from attacks by the Nixon or any anti-labour administration and Big Business; to help democratise the trade unions through the elimination of racism in all forms and by supporting maximum control over the affairs of the unions by the membership.... The rank-and-file is the labour movement. There can be no revitalisation of the trade unions without the maximum involvement of the membership. Organised labour cannot decisively defeat the corporation anti-labour offensive without bringing the full power of its millionfold membership into motion. This is our aim: to move our unions into effective action in defence of the 152 best interests of the entire membership.”  [152•1 

p The Chicago conference unanimously adopted a number of declarations (on labour rights; on the rights of blacks and other minority workers; on combat against racism; for peace and against repression; on the rights of women workers; on the rights of working youth), which comprised an action programme for union rank-and-file. The conference set up a 130-man National Co-ordinating Committee for Trade Union Action and Democracy. In a matter of eight months after the conference, 17 chapters of this committee were set up throughout the country—in California, Illinois, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey and elsewhere.  [152•2 

The events of 1970 and 1971 were another step forward for the American working-class movement. They clearly demonstrated how wide the gap between the Rightist AFLCIO leadership and the mass of rank-and-filers had become. As auto worker Charles Wilson said at a conference of the New York Committee for Trade Union Action and Democracy, "nothing could be more right, or more timely, than this movement of ours. We are beginning to move. But these are only the beginnings. We have to move wider, deeper and faster... .”  [152•3  This growing determination on the part of rank-and-file union members to rid their organisations of the eroding rust of class collaboration provides an important stimulus for a fresh upsurge of the working-class movement and weakens the positions of the labour bureaucracy which impedes the development of the class struggle.