p Events in the United States during and after World War II made manifest the growing influence of the working class on the entire social and political life of the nation. This largely accounts for the heightened interest among bourgeois ideologists in problems relating to the class struggle.

p The dominant trend in the American historiography of the labor movement is based on bourgeois ideology. An idealist approach in assessing major social phenomena will be seen in most works by bourgeois authors. Many writers seek to underscore the non-class nature of their research and the independence of the concepts they set forth. However, their common ideological foundation is obvious.

p With the aim of justifying the dominance of the monopolies, bourgeois scholars evolve apologetic theories about the United States becoming an “affluent society”, the “democratization of capital”, or the onset of a revolution in distribution of incomes, all of which leads to a democratic “people’s capitalism”.

p The books put out by many of these writers are permeated with the spirit of anti-communism and cold war. Their distinctive feature is their promotion of nationalism, the so-called spirit of Americanism, whose aim is to cultivate the belief in American superiority to other nations. Typically, such books idealize the American monopolies, praise the leaders of big business, and underrate the active role of the working people in American history. The same approach also manifests 486 itself in the appraisals of the role of labor leaders and the union masses.

p In the postwar period, bourgeois historiography continued to conform to official philosophy and to follow a relativist approach in appraising historical events. This deviation from historical truth is one of the manifestations of the crisis of bourgeois ideology in general, and of reactionary historiography in particular. Lenin wrote that “to make relativism the basis of the theory of knowledge is inevitably to condemn oneself either to absolute scepticism, agnosticism and sophistry, or to subjectivism. Relativism as a basis of the theory of knowledge is not only recognition of the relativity of our knowledge, but also a denial of any objective measure or model existing independently of mankind to which our relative knowledge approximates.”   [486•1  Of course, materialist dialectics “does contain relativism, but is not reducible to relativism, that is, it recognises the relativity of all our knowledge, not in the sense of denying objective truth, but in the sense that the limits of approximation of our knowledge to this truth are historically conditional".  [486•2  Recent decades have given ample confirmation of the correctness of Lenin’s criticism of idealism and relativism in bourgeois philosophy and historiography. This has been made clear in a number of works by Soviet authors.  [486•3 

p American bourgeois historians also interpret various processes within the American labor movement from idealist positions. Here, too, the basic ideological principles and general approach have remained unchanged.

p The relativist thinking of bourgeois scholars has influenced their entire approach toward the study of the past. It is this methodological point of departure that causes the crisis of bourgeois ideology in general and historiography in particular. This manifests itself in the denial of the law-governed nature of social development and of the possibility of cognizing the 487 historical process as a whole. The interpretation of events and facts largely depends on the subjective views of the writer himself. Using this method of research, many writers regard history as an art.

p Some participants in the 13th International Congress of Historical Sciences held in Moscow in 1970 expressed the idea that the historian is an active factor in history, that he makes history just as much, if not more, than historical figures themselves. It was thereby stressed that the historian’s subjectivism and his personal arbitrary interpretation of facts set history further and further apart from all other “new social sciences”, as a consequence of which it lags behind them. This happens, they say, because history does not operate with scientific categories.  [487•1 

p This approach to history is due to a certain extent to an underestimation of theory and a disregard of the need to analyze qualitative changes and to identify both the common character and the specific features of events.

p The contemporary historiography of the American labor movement has been strongly influenced by pragmatism, an idealist trend in bourgeois philosophy. The distinctive feature of pragmatism is that it identifies truth with practical utility, with whatever is useful—from the standpoint of the bourgeois class, of course. Truth is whatever is good for the monopolies. Charles Wilson, former president of General Motors, once said: “What’s good for General Motors is good for the country."  [487•2 

p The pragmatists do not recognize the existence of objective truth; they believe that there are as many truths as there are points of view. For the pragmatist, the social and historical role of the diverse practical activity of mankind as the basis of the criterion of truth is replaced by the personal successful activity of the individual. In the latter activity the sense of satisfaction is regarded not only as the basic evidence of practical success but also as the criterion of truth.

p Pragmatism has had an influence on various branches of 488 knowledge. “Pragmatism’s great value to the capitalists,” writes William Z. Foster, “is that it robs the working class of a theory of society. It undertakes to substitute an idealist, rule-of-thumb practice for a scientific Marxian analysis of the laws of development. This cynical philosophy permeates not only capitalist ranks, but also the ranks of the bosses’ labor lieutenants.”   [488•1 

p “Union leaders,” say American economists Daugherty and Parrish, “are pragmatists and opportunists, focussing on what they hope will be the best short-run solutions to immediate problems. Continuous, relatively small advances instead of huge spectacular gains is the usual program."  [488•2 

p The trend in the American labor movement known as “business unionism" is also directly related to the philosophy of pragmatism. The typical features of “business unionism" are (a) its denial that the working class has any need for a proletarian ideology, political struggle or a party of its own, and (b) its extolling of private enterprise, individualism and attainment of personal success. The “community of interests" between labor and capital, “peaceful cooperation" between workers and employers, and mutual concessions and agreements are proclaimed to be the cornerstone of labor relations.

p The most vulgar manifestation of pragmatism in the labor movement was found in so-called “union capitalism”, when union leaders engaged in petty speculation, bought up stocks, and systematically took bribes and committed other abuses in securing employment for workers. Corrupt labor leaders such as Dave Beck and Joseph Ryan turned their jobs into a racket.

p As already mentioned, a characteristic feature of American bourgeois historiography is the tendency for most historians to stress their allegedly non-class and non-partisan positions in appraising the American labor movement. As far back as the beginning of this century Lenin revealed the class nature of such intentions. “That science is non-partisan in the struggle of materialism against idealism and religion is a favourite idea not only of Mach but of all modern bourgeois professors, who are, 489 as Dietzgen justly expresses it, ’graduated flunkeys who stupefy the people by a twisted idealism’.”   [489•1 

p This idealism permeates the works of many contemporary American historians and economists. They claim to be impartial, but in fact they pursue a bourgeois line in their treatment of the fundamental problems of the American labor movement. In his introduction to a collection of essays by prominent bourgeois ideologist Sumner H.Slichter, Professor John T. Dunlop asserts that Slichter “was nobody’s man and he belonged to no group or school".  [489•2  But Slichter himself reveals his class position when he says: “Today the process of exploitation in capitalist America is diametrically opposite to the process described by Karl Marx. Marx thought that capital exploited labor, but in America today, labor exploits capital."  [489•3  One has to read only a few of Slichter’s works to realize that his “impartiality” was in fact the usual apologia for the existing social system.

p The theory that technological progress has transformed American capitalist society into a “general welfare society" is supported by many American economists, Kuznets, Galbraith, Berle, Jr., and Lilienthal, to name a few.  [489•4  All depict America as an “affluent society”.

p The share of the national income going to the richest five per cent of the American population, writes Kuznets, has been falling since World War II.  [489•5  Contemporary capitalism, assents Galbraith, is far from the social antagonisms that were typical of it in the past; today, incomes are redistributed in favor of the working people, as a result of which the condition of the rich is radically altered and their power is increasingly restricted by 490 the growing influence of the government and the labor unions.  [490•1 

p This theory of American capitalism’s “transformation” is embraced by other American economists and historians. Sufrin and Sedgwick,  [490•2  Link,  [490•3  Garraty,  [490•4  and Lindblom, for example, trailing Kuznets, also refer to a metamorphosis of American capitalist society, which, they say, has brought about a levelling of classes. Link believes that “the years from 1945 to 1954 were a time of unparalleled material prosperity for the mass of the American people”. As Link exclaims, “in the period after 1939 the seemingly inexorable tide of concentration of incomes in fewer and fewer hands was at last reversed".  [490•5 

p Historian John Garraty, an adherent of the same apologetic theory, asserts in his thick book on American history that in America the poor are becoming richer, while rich people’s incomes represent a declining proportion of the national income.  [490•6  This historian is echoed by Hyman Bookbinder, Assistant Director of the Office of Economic Opportunity, who on December 29, 1966 sought to cheer up Black Americans. “The poor,” he said, “can stop being poor if the rich are willing to become even richer at a slower rate."   [490•7  But in fact the entire history of American capitalism shows that the rich want to become richer at a faster, not a slower, rate. The apologists for the bourgeoisie make use of the propaganda myth about “prosperous” workers. Accordingly, Garraty uses no other word than “prosperity” to describe the condition of the American working class during World War II.  [490•8  In an effort to corroborate this theory, he says that the war had no negative 491 effect on the living standard of the average American. American historian Frank Freidel said in a speech at the 13th International Congress of Historical Sciences in Moscow in August 1970: “As a side effect of the war, the Federal government was lessening the disparity between the incomes of the very rich and those of modest means. For the first time American abundance became available to very large numbers of people.”  [491•1 

p That the incomes and living standards of workers rose during the war cannot be denied. But one cannot take seriously the attempts made by these writers to represent this as prosperity. In the first place, they say nothing about what the condition of the workers was in the thirties. In the second place, they do not write about the fact that the growth of weekly earnings was largely due to more hours worked per week. Moreover, they say nothing about the great mass of low-paid workers, and prudently avoid mentioning the intense strike struggle in defense of collective bargaining contract provisions constantly violated by the monopolies.

p In this light, the assertions by Dallas M. Young that workers and capitalists have common interests look rather strange. He cites what in his opinion is the best definition of labor, given by Ralph H. Blodgett: “Labor is human effort which is expended for the purpose of acquiring income."  [491•2  This simplified interpretation would permit one to maintain that the capitalist is also a man of labor. And indeed, Young writes further on that difference between the millionaire and the worker is, in a sense, relative, because the former may be both a laborer and a capitalist.  [491•3  And this means that they are always merely “partners in production.”

p Something similar is evolved by Thurman Andrew, an exponent of the theory of “people’s capitalism”, who maintains 492 that every worker can become a capitalist and every capitalist a worker.  [492•1 

p Such then is the general idea of the widely current theory of the transformation of capitalism into an “affluent society" through the levelling of incomes.

p A fairly complete picture of what the “affluent society" and “income revolution" are in reality can be found in works by economist and historian Gabriel Kolko, a professor at the University of Wisconsin and later at Harvard.  [492•2  In his book Wealth and Power in America, Prof. Kolko—an exponent of a new, progressive trend in historiography—exposes, on the basis of a large body of factual material, the falsity of the theory expounded by Kuznets, Galbraith, Lilienthal and others. Kolko believes that the chief methodological fault in the studies by representatives of the dominant school in American economics is that they ignore new forms of reward and the concealment by the ruling elite of their actual incomes. Income concealment has become a significant factor especially in connection with the sharp increase in income tax rates during and after World War II.  [492•3  In the year 1957 alone, nondeclared, and hence untaxed, income amounted to $27.7 billion. “Nondeclaration of income to avoid taxes,” writes Kolko, “is illegal, but it is so widespread that no study of income distribution can ignore it."  [492•4 

p Kolko agrees that the Americans with the lowest incomes are better off than they were in 1939. However, while acknowledging that their real wages have increased, he concludes that their overall share of the national income has not changed because the profits and incomes of the richer part of the population have also increased. Social commentators, writes Kolko, have been “guilty of coloring their discussion of American society since 1939 with unwarranted optimism and complacency".  [492•5 

p He calls this “prosperity” propaganda a myth. The 493 fabricators of the myth, he writes, regard America as a “nearly classless society".  [493•1  Kolko stresses that conscientious and thorough research will reveal an enormous concentration of property in the hands of the tiny segment of the population in the top income brackets.  [493•2  He shows that in 1951, two per cent of all stockholders owned 58 per cent of all American corporation stocks; 31 per cent owned 32 per cent of the stocks; while the remaining 67 per cent held only 10 per cent.  [493•3  “Despite such conclusive data on stock-ownership concentration,” writes Kolko, “the public has been subjected to a widespread advertizing campaign alleging that the American corporation is owned democratically."  [493•4 

p Kolko cites numerous facts showing that part of the American population lives in poverty. In the spring of 1958, when Galbraith’s book, The Affluent Society, was published, the United States had 5.5 million unemployed, not counting the millions of partially employed.  [493•5  Kolko draws this conclusion from the results of his study: “American society is based on a class structure, and it pervades most of the crucial facets of life. More than any other factor, the American class structure is determined by the great inequality in the distribution of income, an inequality that has not lessened although the economy’s unemployment total has dropped."  [493•6 

p In the following years, it was poverty that aggravated the class struggle in the United States. One of its logical consequences were the Black disturbances in some American cities in 1964 and later, particularly in 1967 and 1968. They caused considerable alarm among the rich. It was not surprising that in this situation the ruling elite, with a fanfare of demagogic propaganda, set about elaborating “projects” to eliminate poverty. One of the initiators and inspirers was President Johnson, who solemnly announced his program for the creation of a Great Society free from poverty. In May 1965, 494 he set before Arthur F. Bentley, who ran a seminar on the subject at Syracuse University, a number of questions on ways of achieving the Great Society. These questions had to do with such things as how to ensure maximum local initiative in combatting poverty, how to draw private institutions (i.e., the monopolies) into the work of achieving this humane objective, what role the federal government should play in this effort, and what individual citizens could do to help.

p In late 1966, the economists in the Office of Economic Opportunity in Washington made their first projections for a program to end poverty by 1976. “Unfortunately,” observes Bertram Gross, the editor of a book called A Great Society?, “this was largely an idle statistical exercise.”   [494•1 

p Having escalated the war in Vietnam on which billions of dollars were being spent, President Johnson actually allocated only meager funds for combatting poverty. He said that the time had come when the nation must resolve the poverty problem. In fact, however, the war on poverty became in subsequent years a war against the poor. “As Commander-in-Chief,” wrote Gross, “President Johnson has already visited the front lines of our armed forces in Asia. But neither he nor the Vice-President has toured the poverty lines in our own country. Here a new urban battlefront has erupted."  [494•2 

p The ideological core of the bourgeois historiography of the American labor movement is Gompersism. As we know, Gompers’ entire activity and that of his followers in the labor movement was permeated with the policy of class peace between labor and management. Gompers developed a theory of adapting and subordinating the working class to the interests of big finance capital. Implanting disbelief in the effectiveness of political struggle by the proletariat, he called for steering the ship of labor out of the stormy water of revolutionary struggle, which, in his words, was fraught with the danger of smashing labor’s hopes for success.

p It is not surprising that some historians represent Gompers as a “great labor leader”, the leader of so-called democratic unionism, while calling today’s mass trade union movement 495 “coercive unionism" based on compulsory membership in accordance with the principles of the closed and union shop. A book by historian Maurice Franks, a supporter of Gompers, entitled What’s Wrong With Our Labor Unions? is only one of many examples of viewing the problems of the labor movement in the United States from the positions of Gompersism. Franks comes down hard on those who departed from the principles of building the AFL proposed by Gompers. He advocates complete freedom for employers in their relations with workers and unions, reserving for the latter only the right to bargain for higher wages.  [495•1  He disavows the successes of the organized working class in the struggle with the monopolies. In his view, it is capitalism, not militant unionism, that has enriched the life of workers.  [495•2 

p What Gompers put into practice in the AFL, historian John Commons tried to generalize and provide a theoretical basis for in his works. A discussion of his views may be found in the chapter on historiography in the first volume of the present work. Here it is fitting to note that, in the following decades, the basic propositions of the Wisconsin school of history which Commons founded were reflected in the works of bourgeois historians of the American labor movement.

p To this day some writers buttress themselves by citing the pronouncements of the Wisconsin historians.  [495•3  They reiterate the assertions about the conservatism of American labor unions, about the banefulness of political involvement for workers, about their lacking any theory of industrial society, about their not having the slightest wish to undertake the risk of managing production, leaving this prerogative to the “managerial class”, or, in reality, to the capitalist class.

p Contrary to generally recognized facts which testify to the 496 growth of the class struggle in the country in the last decades, they not infrequently advertize Commons’ unfulfilled prophecies concerning the inability of American trade unions to become mass organizations of the working class. Commons declared that “diffusion of corporate ownership, labor legislation and voluntary concessions by giant corporations have apparently rendered unionism unnecessary to many of the workers".  [496•1  It was already clear in Commons’ lifetime that his far-reaching predictions that the class struggle was without prospects had not been confirmed by the course of events. The eminent American economist and historian, Neil Chamberlain, rightly stressed in his work that the labor movement had “exploded into a militant mass movement in the 1930s".  [496•2 

p The propagators of the Wisconsinite theory of “social mobility”, according to which the door is open for all Americans to pass from one social class to another, try to prove that in the USA, unlike Europe, the labor movement is developing not as a proletarian movement but as a movement for turning the proletariat into a middle class.  [496•3  “If the wage-earning population of the United States looks more like a middle class than a proletariat,” writes Lindblom, “the achievement is partly the unions’."  [496•4 

p Another important feature of the bourgeois historiography of the labor movement in the United States is anti-communism and cold war propaganda. After World War II, there was an increased flow of books falsifying the history of the Communist Party of the United States and its role in the labor movement.  [496•5  497 Given wide distribution were such “treatises” as those which told Americans “100 things" they should know about Communism, or answered “200 questions" about Communist subversive activities.

p Of the great number of American authors who have devoted their efforts to “studying” the Communist movement, we might mention Theodore Draper, Max Kampelman, D. A. Shannon, David Saposs, Massimo Salvadori and Mark Sherwin. Their chief aim, however, is not to get at the truth, but rather to distort the character of the movement’as a whole and to represent the Communist Party as an alien organization “taking its cues from a foreign country”. This line is followed by a whole string of anti-communists working in the social sciences.

p Melvin Reder, for instance, repeats the insinuations about “the hand of Moscow" and “the Kremlin’s directives".  [497•1  Mark Sherwin declares the Communist Party to be the number one extremist organization, and presents it as “part of Russia’s drive to communize the world".  [497•2  Joseph Rayback takes up the widespread notion that Communist propaganda is “most effective where misery is deepest”,  [497•3  and totally ignores all the other social and political conditions which, in aggregate, may give rise to a revolutionary situation.

p David Saposs calls American Communism an “ultra-ideological opposition movement".  [497•4  His book, Communism in American Unions, is full of inventions about “Moscow’s orders" 498 to undermine the AFL.  [498•1  He makes wide use of the expression “Communist penetration”, declaring the Communists’ participation in the labor movement an unlawful act of extremists.  [498•2  Many writers distort the truth about the Communists’ activity in the CIO and their international ties. A prominent place among them belongs to M. M. Kampelman and T. Draper. They are overtly hateful of both the Communists, the Soviet Union and other socialist countries (see Kampelman’s The Communist Party vs. the CIO: A Study in Power Politics, and Draper’s The Roots of American Communism).

p Anti-communist writers make extensive use of a wide variety of epithets like “Red agents" and “dangerous radicals”. Adapting to the “spirit of the times" and the demands of official propaganda, such scholars easily master the terminology and other devices used to discredit the progressive trend which the Communist Party represents in the labor movement.

p At the same time, most of the books on the history of the American labor movement exude the spirit of “Americanism”, which is also one of the main features of American bourgeois historiography. How an author of a textbook or monograph deals with the principles of “Americanism” is becoming a standard criterion for assessing his loyalty and scholarship. It is easy to see that “one hundred per cent Americanism" is merely dressed-up nationalism, and it is aimed at cultivating in the working class a sense of American superiority over other peoples.

p Americans, it is proclaimed, have a supreme mission to perform. “Into our hands,” writes historian Bailey, “has been thrust the torch of leadership for a free world. If we fall, all the other democratic nations will fall."  [498•3  Enumerating the stellar virtues of Americans, he declares that the United States has elaborated its own special “American way”. The same idea of America’s leadership of the “free world" is propounded by Clarence B. Randall, President of the Inland Steel Co., one of 499 the major steel companies in the United States, in his book, A Creed for Free Enterprise.  [499•1 

p Under the banner of Americanism, some writers extol the monopolies, the “economic miracle" of the American nation. Harvey Wish asserts that it was the captains of industry who made the decisive contribution to the creation of the unique American way of life.  [499•2  David Lilienthal, exalting the big monopolies, regards big business as the fountainhead of human freedom.  [499•3  In this connection, mention should be made of the influence that the “school of business" continued to exert on the character of the historiography of the labor movement. In the view of such representatives of this trend as Allan Nevins and Joe Morris, history should serve the interests of big capital and help to educate American citizens in the spirit of loyalty to the idea of big business, in other words, loyalty to the big monopolies. The chief purpose of the social sciences should be to glorify the corporations as the economic basis of “prosperity” and the “American way of life”. Representatives of the “school of business" write fat books about the “greatness” of billionaires.  [499•4  The main thrust of the “school of business" is aimed against the American labor movement and all democratic forces seeking a way out of the social and political blind alley into which the monopolies have brought the country.

p In their coverage of the American nation’s past, most of the books by bourgeois authors on the general history of the United States tend to skip over or leave in the background the mass movements of the working people and labor’s strike struggle. Take for example the works by Nevins and Commager, Harry Carman, H. C. Syrett and Bernard Wishy, T. Harry Williams, Richard N. Current and Frank Freidel, Oscar Handlin, and John A. Garraty.  [499•5  These are major 500 university publications with extensive bibliographies. But it is impossible to find material in them about the life and struggle of the working class. An exception, to some extent, is Foster Rhea Dulles’ book, The United States Since 1865, which has a chapter on the labor movement. None of the other abovementioned historians deemed it necessary to tell about the struggle of the workers against the monopolies and anti-labor legislation.

p These books inform the reader about the activities of the ruling class, its parties and the politicians in the White House and Congress. Not surprisingly, their presentation of history is by presidencies and not by major stages of the nation’s history. Thus, history is broken down into periods depending upon which of the bourgeois political parties or what leader was in power at a particular time.

p This approach to the interpretation of the nation’s past is characteristic not only of many writers dealing with the general history of the United States, but also of many writing on the history of the labor and trade union movement. One example is Philip Taft, a prominent historian and economist and the author of a book on the history of the AFL,  [500•1  a major study based on documents. However, all this notwithstanding, he limits his history of the AFL to the activities of the executive council headed by Green, Woll, Hutcheson, Harrison, Dubinsky, Tobin and other leaders.

p Taft recounts the history of the AFL’s top leadership, virtually ignoring the working masses except for only rare references to the position of faceless workers who, it would seem, obediently followed their leaders. The reader will search in vain for an analysis of the unrest that gripped American workers toward the end of and after World War II in connection with the monopolies’ encroachment on their living standards. The author shows not the slightest interest in the 501 sentiments of the broad masses of working people, including that part of the working class that was organized in the AFL, or in the progressive role they played in the struggle against fascism during the war.

p The book shows neither the activity of the Federation as a whole, nor of its major national or international unions. The author does not touch on the work of the big state federations, and bypasses internal contradictions and the struggle of the progressive opposition against the central leadership. The history of the AFL is presented through the reports, speeches and statements of members of the executive council and its president, William Green.

p A similar approach and method of studying the key aspects of the economics and history of the labor movement are characteristic of Robert Leiter.  [501•1  Such a one-sided approach to the history of the labor movement is no accident. It is typical of many other bourgeois writers standing on idealist or Gompersist positions.

p During and after World War II, the attention of many American historians was drawn to the subject of the government’s role in labor relations. The relationships between the unions, the monopolies and the government’s mediation bodies were examined in detail, with special attention given to the legal and procedural aspects of these relationships.

p Mediation and conciliation, federal and municipal systems of settling labor disputes, the principles of arbitration used by government agencies—these were the questions dealt with most widely in many studies on the labor movement. The theme running through most of the books on the labor question of those years was industrial class peace. It was no accident that these works abounded in chapter and section headings like “Strikes and How to Prevent Them”, “Mediation and Conciliation”, “Arbitration”, “Labor-Management Cooperation”, “Labor and Industrial Peace”, etc. In examining such problems, the authors overlooked the struggle of the workers against the employers and failed to reveal the methods 502 and devices used by the authorities in suppressing strikes.  [502•1 

p Another group of writers chose as their main topic the economic policies of the unions in the sphere of employment, wages, and union participation in determining work loads, working conditions, the length of the workday, payment for overtime, etc. They also examined wage and price stabilization, cost of living and related government and union policies.  [502•2 

p Many economists maintain that with the beginning of the war industry boom the country entered a period of economic development in which there was virtually full employment. They also share the view that in those years a long period of prosperity began for American workers. Massimo Salvadori, for instance, says that it extended to all strata of the American people. In his words, the people can accept capitalism or reject it without the risk of subjecting their condition to radical change. “They have chosen to keep it as an instrument, but with a clear conviction that they are using capitalism, not that capitalism is using them."  [502•3  Frank Freidel asserted in his speech at the 13th International Congress of Historical Sciences in Moscow that the war had brought full employment and a rapid rise in the purchasing power of workers.  [502•4 

p The attention of economists is increasingly drawn to such subjects as employment, the growth of wages, income distribution, and government policy both in labor relations and in the sphere of legislation. Heron, Sufrin and Sedgwick, Hansen, Jacoby, Ginzberg and Herman say that during the war and in 503 some of the postwar years the United States had full employment, and the economy began to feel an acute shortage of labor power. As for the Employment Act of 1946, these writers consider it a Magna Charta of economic planning. They portray it as a full employment law ensuring a balance between supply and demand. Write Nevins and Commager: “Full employment came without special stimulants, and carried the total of wage earners well past the sixty million mark."  [503•1 

p We showed earlier the groundlessness of assertions made by some writers about full employment both during and after the war. Equally groundless was the talk about the disappearance of unemployment, whose growth in the postwar years caused serious alarm in the country’s ruling circles.

p Men of big business promote the idea that unionism is incompatible with a private enterprise economy. Industrialist Clarence Randall, quoted here earlier, declared that the root of the evil is “the all but irresistible pressure being brought to bear presently upon industry to pay wages that are not supported by equivalent increases in total product”, and that the nightmare of the unions’ persistent demands is with the employer “every day in the year. What may be theory for others is economic life and death for him."  [503•2  Exaggerating the role of labor unions in the struggle for higher wages in recent decades, Randall maintains that “the vast power of the nationwide unions is such that management lacks power to resist unreasonable demands".  [503•3 

p One cannot help noticing the similarity between the opinion of this representative of big monopoly capital and the views expressed by many researchers in the history and economics of the labor movement. Most of these writers also accuse the unions of making unreasonably high wage demands. They consider this policy to have been the main cause of “creeping inflation" both during and after the war. For instance, Prof. John M. Clark of Columbia University regards wages as a “more aggressive factor" in inflation than the employers’ desire to make big profits.  [503•4  Slichter, who holds the same view, 504 says that wages rise at a faster rate than the cost of living, that is, they grow faster than prices.  [504•1  Echoing Clark and Slichter, Maurice Franks writes that labor unions “revolve about unrealistic wage demands, the ‘more for more’s sake’, which has become the alpha and omega of union-leader economics, with no regard for inflationary impact".  [504•2 

p The idea that unionism is incompatible with a private enterprise economy is most clearly expressed by Lindblom in the introduction to his book, Unions and Capitalism.  [504•3  He asserts that the labor unions’ successes weaken the capitalist economy and lead to unemployment or inflation. The destructive effect of the labor unions, he says, manifests itself in their attack against the system of “free competition”,  [504•4  which they make through their battle for power against management and constant pressure for higher wages.

p Lindblom calls the unions’ pressure on wages their chief evil. Like his colleagues, he believes that with their excessive demands labor organizations disturb normal business relations between the workers and employers and thereby jeopardize the system itself. From this he comes to the conclusion that labor unions are monopolies. Their main method of struggle is the strike.  [504•5  The collective agreement, as the ultimate result of the strike struggle, becomes in the hands of the unions an instrument of monopoly power. On the basis of such accusations, writers like Lindblom rank the labor unions with the big monopolies in the economy. In drawing the analogy, they regard corporations as monopolies in commodity production and price fixing, and the unions as monopolies in supplying industry with labor power and determining wage levels.

p Lindblom and W. V. Owen, the author of a textbook called Labor Problems,  [504•6  develop the labor union monopoly thesis in an effort to convince their readers that in the struggle on the 505 economic front the unions have the same philosophy and use the same methods as the employers. They say that public opinion condemns the “labor monopolies" for ignoring the interests of the consumer, which, they allege, is not true of the industrial monopolies, and that labor unions come into conflict with society when they demand excessive wage increases.  [505•1 

p The “labor monopoly" myth has long been used by the more extreme union haters. It was often used by Slichter, Richberg, Chamberlain, Herbert Marx, Franks, Sufrin, Sedgwick, Tannenbaum and other writers.  [505•2  “All in all,” says Slichter, “labor monopolies are by far the most powerful monopolies to be found anywhere in the economy."  [505•3  Slichter and Richberg, in particular seek to divert public attention from the constant threat to society posed by the monopolies. “Today the greatest concentrations of political and economic power in the United States of America,” says Richberg, “are found—not in the over-regulated, over-criticized, over-investigated, and overtaxed business corporations.... The greatest concentrations of political and economic power are found in the underregulated, under-criticized, under-investigated, tax-exempt, and specially privileged labor organizations—and in their belligerent, aggressive and far-too-often lawless and corrupt managers."  [505•4 

p Finally, a third group of writers have devoted their works mainly to explaining the reasons for the “beneficial” influence of “American democracy" on the nature of industrial labor relations.  [505•5  They declare Roosevelt’s New Deal to be “people’s capitalism”, and describe the government’s activity and 506 “creative approach" to the needs and interests of the working people as the principal factor in raising their living standards.

p In many books and articles,  [506•1  the idea is advanced that the bourgeois government played a decisive role in the successes scored by the labor movement on the eve of and during World War II. This view found its most concentrated expression in Harold Metz’s book, Labor Policy of the Federal Government. Many of his propositions reflect the thinking of a number of American economists and historians. Among other things, Metz discusses labor legislation during the period 1926-1943. He lays emphasis on the role of the government, leaving the labor unions somewhere on the periphery of his research and not treating them as an active factor. He portrays the government as a humane force called upon to mitigate social conflicts.

p In attributing the leading role in labor relations to the government, Metz stresses the paramount importance of the labor policy of Franklin Roosevelt, who had embarked on a liberal course. But he passes over in silence the role of the working class, paying no attention, for example, to its strike struggle. Primary attention is centered on the “goodwill” of the administration and Congress and their various agencies. His examination focuses on the Wagner Act, which Metz assesses as a great gift from the government to America’s working people. The National Labor Relations Board, writes Metz, “attempts to make collective bargaining an immediate reality".  [506•2 

p While he idealizes the bourgeois state and its political 507 figures, Metz at the same time keeps silent about the numerous instances when the Wagner Act was sabotaged as a result of manipulations by monopolies seeking to nullify the potential of Roosevelt’s liberal legislation. Metz offers a biased treatment of the wages problem. Neglecting, in particular, the gap between nominal and real wages, he gives Roosevelt the credit for raising wages. “From 1933 to the spring of 1942,” he says, “the policy of the federal government was clearly that of increasing the wages of labor.”   [507•1  As can be seen from the Bureau of Labor Statistics figures he cited, hourly wages in manufacturing went up from 41.1 to 82.2 cents during that period. But the book leaves out the fact that not only that increase but also the further rise of hourly wages to 104.3 cents in May 1945 were the result of the special position of the United States during World War II and labor’s unremitting struggle for higher wages, rather than the result of the Roosevelt administration’s alleged constant concern for the workers’ standard of living.

p This becomes especially clear in the light of the fact that, as Metz himself informs us, President Roosevelt, worried about inflation, said on April 27, 1942: “Wages can and should be kept at existing scales."  [507•2  We have already mentioned in the present work the Little Steel formula, which was designed not to raise wages but to freeze them at the 1941 level. Was it not the Roosevelt administration that tried to curb the growth of wages with this formula? Metz confesses that in the chapter on wages he will consider “the efforts of the government to raise wages and to prevent them from rising too high".  [507•3  This admission reveals the true nature of the regulatory role of the government, which was interested in limiting the growth of wages. Of course the actual job of holding them down was taken care of mainly by the employers themselves.

p Far from all American historians were in agreement with the above explanations of the labor movement’s successes in the 1930s. We might take as an example Sidney Lens, a long-time participant in the labor movement who wrote a number of 508 books and articles about the American unions. To be sure, his works contain many contradictions, subjective assertions and misjudgements about the left-wing forces. He takes a hostile attitude toward the Communist Party and the left-wing unions in the CIO. However, unlike many other writers, Lens takes a realistic and objective approach to many issues, especially when dealing with the labor movement. Unlike the historians discussed above, Lens emphasizes the decisive role the mass labor movement played in bringing about congressional approval of Roosevelt’s liberal legislation. He illustrates this abundantly, using a large number of major events in the history of the American labor movement as examples. He shows the proletariat in the struggle for its class interests.

p In his book, Left, Right and Center: Conflicting Forces in American Labor, Lens says that Roosevelt’s reforms became possible only after millions of unemployed went out into the streets and launched a fighting campaign for their adoption. “The legal right to organize granted by the New Deal merely crowned a fait accompli with government sanction. The right had already been won in the many bitter picket-line fights.”  [508•1  Lens’ main point is that Roosevelt’s labor policy itself was the direct result of the pressure exerted on the government by the masses. A similar view is held by historian Joseph Rayback, who also believes that through their strike struggle, particularly in 1934, the workers themselves promoted the passage of improved labor legislation by bringing pressure to bear upon Congress and the administration.  [508•2 

p It is this obvious fact that so many writers tend to overlook, mainly because focussing public attention on the activity of the popular masses is not part of the bourgeois propaganda program. At the same time, any description of the development of the American labor movement in the 1930s would be one-sided if the government’s influence on the character and future of labor unions were denied. Roosevelt’s labor policy had an undeniable impact on labor’s struggle, promoting the activation and growth of its organizations. Actually, it was a 509 two-way process in which the developing labor movement influenced the Roosevelt administration’s policy and vice versa.

p It was no accident that in the late 1940s and early 1950s the bourgeoisie undertook decisive steps to overhaul Roosevelt’s policies and amend or repeal liberal New Deal laws such as the Wagner-Connery Act of 1935. First it imposed upon the working class the reactionary Taft-Hartley Act, later to reinforce it with other repressive laws. Increasingly persistent demands were voiced in bourgeois political party and big business circles to abolish concessions to labor and destroy the gains it had won.

p The need for such changes in labor policy was expressed, for instance, by Republicans Harold Stassen and Fred Hartley, and by Donald Richberg, a well-known legal expert in monopoly circles. All three set forth systematic programs on the labor problem.  [509•1 

p The need for repressive measures against the labor movement was formulated most clearly by Harold Stassen, a Republican presidential candidate. On February 7, 1947, appearing before the Senate Labor Committee, which was considering the bills proposed by Taft and Hartley, he said: “It appears to me that clearly in recent years too much power has been concentrated in the leadership of our labor unions and that power has been abused. New national legislation is needed to correct these abuses and limit excessive powers."  [509•2 

p Stassen proposed bringing “balance” into the Wagner Act because he felt that its provisions were formulated too much in favor of labor unions. “The unbalance of the Wagner Act toward labor,” he said, “has been one of the real difficulties in the last twelve or thirteen years."  [509•3  Insisting that strikes during negotiations be banned, he favored imposing “the penalty of the loss of rights" on those taking part in a strike under those conditions. When asked by Sen. Ellender whether this would apply to all employees, Stassen replied: “To all employees, but 510 a specific penalty against those who cause or who promote the strike"   [510•1 .

p As we can see, the chief demand made by Republican Party leader Stassen was to nullify Roosevelt’s liberal legislation and go over to repressive measures against those who would defend labor’s rights under the Wagner Act.

p Industrialist Clarence Randall spelled out some other ideological principles of his class. In his view, the time had come when the ideological struggle could no longer remain a monopoly of professional ideologists. Prominent businessmen should step into this field and take the shaping of policy into their own hands.  [510•2 

p Randall was up in arms against the labor unions for blocking the way to establishing a “fraternity” between workers and capitalists, prevented workers from seeing the social purpose of their work, interfered in production, and deprived employers of their right to hire men of their own choice and set wage levels at their own discretion.  [510•3 

p With the turn in the US domestic policy toward strengthening reaction in the late 1940s a sharp change occurred in the character of the bourgeois historiography of the American labor movement. Roosevelt’s economic policy during World War II, aimed at building government-owned enterprises, was now characterized as aggressive government control over a free economy, as almost socialization of capitalism. At the same time, the monopolies were in favor of government interference in the relations between labor and capital to the benefit of the latter.

p For this purpose, it was necessary to launch a drive against the Wagner Act, a, campaign for its amendment, and for new repressive legislation, of which the Taft-Hartley Act became the embodiment.

p Many writers justified the moves toward harsher anti-labor legislation. In 1947, when the Taft-Hartley bill was still in preparation, Slichter, for example, wrote an article entitled “Trade Unions in a Free Society,” which caused exultation in 511 the industrial community. Later, this article was included in a collection of Slichter’s works.  [511•1  In it, Slichter set forth propositions which were soon to be reflected in the anti-labor Taft-Hartley Act.

p Similar proposals were made at that time by Maurice Franks. Sen. Karl Mundt, a well-known reactionary, noted with admiration in his introduction to Franks’ book that during the New Deal period Franks had “protested vigorously against the philosophy underlying the Wagner Act" and “many of the reforms advocated by Mr. Franks were incorporated in the Taft-Hartley amendments, enacted in 1947".  [511•2 

p In the years that followed, historiography increasingly adjusted to “the spirit of the times" dictated by the monopolies. As we have shown, the frontal attack against communism was closely linked with refined promotion of various anti-labor theories.

p In the 1950s, it became fashionable to write about the “democratization of capital”. Some authors went to the extent of picturing Wall Street as representing millions upon millions of American stockholders. “Wall Street,” wrote Edward Dies, one of the experts on the subject, “is no longer a money lane ruled by a few lords of privilege, it is made up of millions of Americans who hold stock in corporations—merchants, doctors, lawyers, engineers, teachers, clerks, housewives, laborers, bankers and artists."  [511•3 

p What these writers were trying to prove was that the traditional oligarchic capitalism no longer existed, that it had been replaced, through the process of democratization, by a new “democratic people’s capitalism".  [511•4  According to Salvadori, this new capitalism offers society advantages that the “old” capitalism gave to only a few individuals, and as a consequence “reformed capitalism is a surer road to a better life than collectivism or corporativism".  [511•5  Some other writers were busy 512 looking for recipes for the peaceful reform of a “unique capitalism" supposedly capable of ensuring equal rights in the means of production for all citizens. The advocates of this kind of capitalism argued that society could avoid the private appropriation of profit on capital and that the worker could keep the whole product he produced. To guarantee these equal opportunities was proclaimed to be the function and duty of a “just government".  [512•1 

p Some economists and businessmen spread the idea that workers were interested in the growth of profits and their distribution through the purchase of stocks. Randall urged workers to buy stocks as a means of using their “free capital".  [512•2 

p Buying stocks is a profitable business for big stockholders, especially those having the controlling interest. The ordinary worker who owns a few stocks, however, is by no means a capitalist.

p As the class struggle in American industry intensified, the strength of collective rebuffs given by workers to corporations kept growing. In the many bitter confrontations with labor unions in the preceding years the industrialists learned that methods of violence used alone were futile. Many employers were now giving more and more thought to the question of how to run their enterprises under the new conditions in which powerful and influential labor unions had become firmly established in industry and the workers had accumulated experience in fighting the monopolies.

p Employers intensified the search for new forms and methods of achieving “class collaboration" between labor and management. The character of their propaganda among workers underwent noticeable change. The workers’ sentiments were studied, sociological surveys and investigations were made, and a whole system of measures aimed at increasing labor efficiency was elaborated.

p One of the means employers used to influence their employees was propaganda concerning human relations at enterprises. A new era had come, the workers were told, for along with the technological and structural changes in 513 industry, the psychology of employers and workers was also changing. Mutual courtesy, consideration and respect, and paternal concern about the workers’ needs had replaced the truculence of both sides.

p A considerable number of historians, economists and sociologists took an active part in the search for “humanism and magnanimity" in class relations, devoting books and articles to this subject.  [513•1  Underlying these studies was the denial of the existence in the United States of antagonistic contradictions that unavoidably lead to class struggle. David Lilienthal declared that class war between employees and owners was certainly “as dated and outmoded as the livery stable and the ’family entrance”’. He went on to say that “the spirit in which even the most hotly contested strikes are carried on shows, in many small incidents, how deep we have buried the class-war philosophy".  [513•2  The psychology of people, not class struggle, is what determines the character of relations in bourgeois society, these writers claim.

p The historians Faulkner and Starr believe that the days are gone when labor unions had to fight against the tyranny and exploitation of short-sighted employers who strove only for profit.  [513•3  Whenever managers forget about human relations, write Daugherty and Parrish, the workers become suspicious and refuse to cooperate.  [513•4 

p Osgood Nichols and T. R. Carskadon call for “More Hitman Treatment: A worker wants to be considered as a human being.... He doesn’t like to be thought of simply as a unit of work-energy....

p “Modern management agrees in general with labor that far more emphasis should be placed on the worker’s human problems on the job."  [513•5 

p In describing a strike at the Herbert Kohler enterprises in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, historian Adrian Paradis claims that “Kohler looked after its employees, for it was a highly paternalistic firm that had always felt responsible for its workers’ welfare”.  [514•1  One might have believed this were it not for the fact that the workers at the Kohler enterprises waged a bitter strike struggle for eight years (from April 1954 to October 1962) for a collective bargaining contract.  [514•2  Even George Meany admitted that this strike had become “a symbol of a bitter fight between a giant corporation and its workers".  [514•3 

p Many American writers regard collective bargaining not as a result of class struggle between the workers and capitalists but as a consequence of economic differences being resolved through improved human relations. This approach to a definition of labor’s economic struggle emasculates the class character of the struggle. Garfield and Whyte, in particular, take this approach in their paper, “A Human Relations View of Collective Bargaining."  [514•4  They lay strong emphasis on the need to influence the worker’s feelings, to evoke positive emotions in him. “We are not saying,” they write, “that human relations are more important than economic considerations, or vice versa. We are simply saying that a mutually satisfactory relationship depends upon a proper tying together of economics and human relations."  [514•5 

p The objective in promoting human relations between labor and management was to weaken the impact of class contradictions and abate industrial strife.

p Most historians and economists did not conceal their indignation at the growing strike movement. Authors like Heron, Northrup, Chamberlain and Lindblom wrote that strikes were doing harm to society. Heron, for example, held that strikes interrupted the marketing of output, which led to a fall in employment and a deterioration in the condition of the 515 workers and society as a whole. Chamberlain also maintained that strikes upset the balance in the economy and the division of labor, and interrupted commodity circulation. To protect society from these misfortunes, he suggested an arsenal of means to avert strikes, the chief among them being extensive government interference in labor relations. Mediation, arbitration and government control were the recipes Chamberlain recommended.

p Franks took an even more extreme position. He declared strikes to be “labor-czar machinations"  [515•1  and claimed that unions made excessive demands and workers thought only about getting more money and doing less work. It is hard to believe, as anti-labor Senator Karl Mundt remarked, that Franks became associated with the American labor movement in his early twenties and “came to know at ground level the sentiments and aspirations of the hourly worker, the organized and unorganized alike".  [515•2 

p The attention of a number of labor historians was drawn to the activity of prominent labor leaders in the CIO, such as John L. Lewis, Sidney Hillman, Philip Murray and Walter Reuther, and the AFL—William Green, David Dubinsky, D.Tobin, Dave Beck, J.Ryan, [.Brown and others.  [515•3  Ideologically, both groups of leaders supported capitalism and its two-party system. In this sense, they were in step with each other and objectively served the same purpose—to preserve and strengthen capitalist society. At the same time, the books by the writers listed above enable us to see not only this common 516 ideological position of the labor leaders but also the differences in their destinies and in the role they played in the labor movement.

p Most of the historians who write about individual labor leaders introduce a large dose of subjectivism into their appraisal of the role these leaders played. They focus on petty inessential particularities having little or no relevance to the social significance of the labor leaders. Too much importance is attached to personal relationships in the psychological vein, so that class and social relations are obfuscated.

p In such cases, the labor leaders are depicted in isolation from concrete conditions, with no account taken of the influence exercized on them by the rank-and-file union membership. This unrealistic approach can be seen, for example, in the books by Minton and Stuart, Wechsler, Alinsky, Danish, and Velie. On the whole, however, labor historians describe two large groups of leaders in a struggle for dominance in the labor movement. The opinion of most of the writers is essentially that AFL leaders like Green, Frey or Woll strictly adhered to the conservative trend, seeking to implant craft unionism and bureaucracy in the unions. They were true defenders of Gompersist principles. As for the other group of leaders, headed by Lewis, Hillman, Murray and Reuther, they appear in the works of many historians as proponents of a more flexible approach to the demands of the times. While also remaining on capitalist positions, these leaders contributed to the successes of the labor movement. The historians credit them with the important contribution they made in launching a mass movement for the creation of industrial unions and the CIO.

p However, most of the historical biographers are wont to idealize the labor leaders, with the only difference being that some express their sympathies for the Green-Woll group in the AFL, while others extol Lewis, Hillman, Murray and other CIO leaders. Particularly the biographers of Lewis and Dubinsky lose their sense of realism. Minton and Stuart call Lewis “Samson of Labor".  [516•1  Velie writes that Lewis “had a glorious time playing the role of Titan battling the gods of 517 Olympus”,  [517•1  while “David Dubinsky is forever taking on Goliath”, “this ... makes Dubinsky one of the most significant figures in labor”, etc.  [517•2  Thus, many writers handle the question of the role of the masses and the individual in social movements from idealist positions.

p But even so, far from all historians take this approach in their appraisal of the labor leaders’ activity. Charles Madison, C.Wright Mills, Wellington Roe arid Sidney Lens, among others, subjected many of the labor leaders to sharp criticism, exposing their bureaucratic methods of leadership and the conservatism in their thinking and actions.

p The most essential feature of the AFL and CIO leadership was, in Madison’s opinion, hostility to socialist ideas. Manylabor leaders were affiliated with conservative political circles. This applied above all to the AFL leaders, who, Madison points out, were as conservative politically and economically as any businessman. They were interested primarily in holding on to their well-paid jobs.

p C.Wright Mills noted a number of ways in which the CIO leaders were better than their AFL counterparts. At the same time, while not concealing his sympathies with industrial unions, he stressed the danger that the CIO leadership could become similar to the AFL top level bureaucracy, where leaders held on to their posts for decades and became almost unchallenged labor barons.  [517•3 

p Labor democracy, as these writers show, was subjected to constant blows from the AFL upper clique. Wellington Roe, who was a prominent labor union functionary for almost a quarter of a century, ruefully observed: “Our trade unions, which should be models of democracy, are often dictatorships in which labor barons are the autocratic rulers of the dues-paying members."  [517•4  Well acquainted with the top officialdom, Roe said that “the trade union movement has become largely the patronage machine of a choice group of autocrats who passed their usefulness".  [517•5 

p In his book, The Crisis of American Labor, Sidney Lens revealed the phony democracy of many AFL leaders.  [518•1  He showed the degeneration of union leaders living off labor’s purse. In the 1950s, the labor movement was going through difficult times, and it was, in Lens’ opinion, labor leaders like Green, Woll, Tobin and Ryan who were to blame for the crisis.

p The views of C.Wright Mills, Wellington Roe and Sidney Lens were not shared by most bourgeois historians and economists. The majority opinion was that American labor unions were models of “political democracy”. Labor union democracy was seen by many as an integral part of bourgeois democracy. Economist William Leiserson wrote that “labor unionism in the United States is an expression of the American democratic spirit".  [518•2  Supporting a similar appraisal of labor democracy given by the Maritime Union’s paper, The Pilot, Leiserson asserted that American labor unions were “the most democratic organizations in the world".  [518•3 

p Leiserson vulgarized the concept of labor union democracy, belittling the role of the rank and file, whom he pictured as obediently following their leaders. “The rank and file,” he wrote, “admire and rather prefer ‘strong’ leaders who win victories for the workers.... Such leaders ’bring home the bacon’, and the members are content to leave to them the determination of policies and actions of the union. So long as the leaders keep the union strong, raise wages, or secure other gains, the members are usually content to follow them in whatever direction they want to go."  [518•4 

p The general history of the major labor union associations is examined from the same angle. Actually, there are not very many works on the history of the AFL and CIO. Philip Taft, Walter Galenson and Art Preis were among those who wrote on this subject.  [518•5  Since the first two were discussed in the 519 chapter on historiography in Volume I of the present work, we shall dwell here only on the third.

p In the introduction to his book. Art Preis is presented as a long-time contributor to the weekly Militant, in which the first nine chapters of his book were published. The weekly was the mouthpiece of the Socialist Party, once influential in the American labor movement.

p In his book, Preis examines the twenty-year history of the CIO, whose existence he assesses as a major step forward by American labor, which it undeniably was. However, his analysis of the history of this association is one-sided and subjective. He is unable to rise above the numerous facts and events to make an objective appraisal of their historical significance: he is hampered in this by his political views and sentiments, which were formed under the influence of right-wing Socialists and avowed Trotskyites.

p Preis is overtly hostile to the democratic elements in the labor movement. He not only denies the positive contribution the progressive forces made to the creation of the CIO but also accuses them of subversive activities.

p Preis’ thick book gives a distorted and tendentious picture of the emergence of the CIO and the struggle of various trends within it. Primitively and slanderously he divides the CIO leaders into “Stalinists” and their opponents, putting the Communists and the leaders siding with them into the first category, and other leaders, who took a conservative position in the CIO, into the second. Even CIO leaders Joseph Curran and Mike Quill end up in Preis’ arbitrary classification among the “Stalinists”. He calls the tactical line of the Murray-Hillman group, which held a centrist position during the war, a bloc with the “Stalinists”. These were only some of the facts from the history of the American labor movement that Preis unceremoniously and crudely falsified.

p For a long time, American historians showed no particular interest in the international activities of the American labor unions, largely because the latter had only weak ties with labor movements abroad. Only in the last decade or so have some historians and economists given greater attention to the foreign relations of the American labor movement. Among the writers who devoted their works to an examination of the 520 internalional activities of labor organizations were John P. Windmullci, Lewis L. Lorwin, Everett M. Kassalow, George Lodge and Philip Taft.  [520•1 

p In the postwar period, the socialist countries arid the working class of a number of capitalist countries came to exert more and more influence on the course of history. The disintegration of colonialism imparted increasing importance to new states that were making their way to independent existence. Under these circumstances, the ruling circles of the United States placed special hopes on rightist labor leaders, such as Green, Meany, Woll, Dubinsky, Lovestone, Brown and Carey.

p The above-mentioned writers keep silent about the connection between American imperialism and the energized international activities of the rightist labor leaders. Windrnuller, for example, explains this increased activity as stemming from the transformation of the American people, once concerned primarily with domestic economic problems, into “a nation now convinced that its welfare is inextricably linked to the welfare of the world community".  [520•2  According to Lorwin, American labor unions have become more active in international affairs because of changes in their ideology and status in society. In his view, the country’s dynamic industrial development and national traditions tend to make American labor organizations reject the ultimate goals of the movement.  [520•3 

p Unlike these writers, George Lodge speaks of the connection between the government’s foreign policy and the international activities of the American labor unions.  [520•4  He believes that the labor leaders act in accordance with the government’s foreign policy, and take part in carrying out this policy by holding posts in State Department agencies, especially in US embassies as 521 labor attachés. However, Lodge and the other above writers hold common views on the necessity of promoting anticommunism in the international activities of labor organizations.

p Lorwin believes that the international activities of the American unions are the monopoly of a labor elite.  [521•1  And Windmuller notes that “probably no other area of labor’s activities has permitted labor leaders as much freedom of action as the relations with international labor movements".  [521•2  Some writers also point out that the competition between the AFL arid CIO leaders has manifested itself especially over international issues.  [521•3  Lorwin, Saposs and Steinbach pay much attention to this question, approaching it from three angles. First, they analyze the development of the international labor movement from the standpoint of internationalism and nationalism; second, they examine the changes taking place in the labor movements of individual countries; and finally, they trace the trends in the American labor movement.

p Steinbach holds that internationalism and solidarity are declining, a process that began, he says, on the eve of World War II. After a certain upturn, this weak tendency toward solidarity was reduced almost to nil.  [521•4  Lorwin is less categorical. On the one hand he asserts that in some countries internationalism conies into conflict with nationalism, but on the other, he says that there are opposing factors which make international cooperation a real necessity.  [521•5 

p There are obvious distortions of reality in some of the assessments of the changes in the labor movements of individual countries. Kassalow and Saposs, for instance, maintain that the European labor movement gradually abandoned socialist ideology. As for the French and Italian movements, these were, Kassalow feels, only a deplorable exception.  [521•6 

p Most of the writers admit that there are disagreements 522 between European and American labor unions, but rather than making a careful analysis of their causes they reduce, everything to differences in tactics. However, as is known, the differences between the American and the West European labor movement involve more than merely tactical differences. In a number of European countries the working people’s political awareness and activity are higher and their pressure on labor leaders considerably stronger than in the United States.

p Some writers make pessimistic assessments of the conditions in which American labor leaders operate in the developing countries. Especially indicative in this respect is George Lodge’s monograph, which criticizes not so much the policies of the American labor leaders as their methods and tactics.  [522•1  Lodge is ready to accept labor union collaboration with political parties in many cases, although he makes the reservation that this kind of collaboration is tolerable when it stands in the way of the Communists.

p Such historians often paint a deliberately distorted picture of the conditions under which the international activities of American labor unions are conducted. They seek to belittle the importance and distort the character of the World Federation of Trade Unions. Thus, Philip Taft calls it a “Communist instrumentality" supposedly aimed against the American labor movement, and especially against the AFL.  [522•2  He characterizes the Marshall Plan “as a means for enabling Europe to regain its economic well-being" and as providing “a basis for united action by the trade unions of the free world”, and approves of the splitting line pursued by the AFL in the international labor movement.  [522•3 

p There are other writers specializing in the study of the international activities of American labor unions, who march in step with Taft. They contrast the ICFTU, whose creation they consider a great victory of American labor unions, to the WFTU, and even represent the discord within the ICFTU as a sign of strength and democracy. In this respect, Lodge above 523 all expresses dissatisfaction with the tendency toward rapprochement between some trade unions in Western Europe and their counterparts in socialist countries. He and other writers press for the continuation of the cold war and retention of the bans on contacts with trade unions of socialist countries. All this is essentially an attempt to justify the splitting policies pursued by American labor leaders and the ICFTU leadership in the international labor movement.

p Among contemporary American historians, economists and sociologists there are substantial differences in views on the development of labor unions and their role in society.

p Earlier, we mentioned a whole group of writers who elaborated absurd notions about a “labor monopoly”. In the 1960s, these assertions were repeated even more often. It was claimed that labor unions were “irresponsible, aggressive and corrupt”, and that they intended to seize political power and create their own, labor, government.

p These inventions were aimed at setting the public against the unions. Exaggerating labor’s strength and fostering fear of the “labor monopoly”, historians sought to justify repressive measures against the labor movement.

p In contrast to this direction, the 1960s saw the emergence of a group of historians of a critical trend, associated mainly with the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions at Santa Barbara, California. We have in mind Clark Kerr, Paul Jacobs, Albert Blum, A.Ross, and Solomon Barkin.  [523•1 

p These writers subjected labor unions to strident criticism, emphasizing only the shortcomings in their activities. They argued that the organized labor movement was in a deep crisis and that labor unions were standing still in their development, while the situation was rapidly changing. The labor unions, Kerr maintained, were ideologically and organizationally in a blind alley. Paul Jacobs saw the crisis of the labor unions as 524 stemming from a breakdown of their main instrument, collective bargaining. The unions, in his opinion, have proved to be defenseless before the social consequences of the technological revolution.  [524•1 

p The sharp criticism of the labor movement prompted some labor union figures to take pen in hand as well. In his book, New Horizons for American Labor, Joseph Beirne, president of the Communications Association of America and a vicepresident of the AFL-CIO, does not set out to refute the criticism levelled at the labor unions. His aim, rather, is to find ways and means of correcting the shortcomings criticized. The labor movement, he says, needs a clear idea of its aims and tasks for the future. However, this is hampered by the conservatism and inertness of the top labor leadership, its inability or unwillingness to adjust to the rapidly changing situation both inside and outside the United States. “A continuation of the present course,” according to Beirne, “can only lead to paralyzing decline."  [524•2 

p Beirne sees the new horizons for the labor movement in the government’s policy. He believes that only the government can solve the numerous social problems brought about by the technological revolution, arid the task of labor unions is to get it to do so.

p In this connection, the labor leadership should, in Beirne’s opinion, shift the focus of its attention from private enterprise to the activities of federal government officials. He believes that organized labor has already got all it can from the corporations. “The area of possible improvement,” he writes, “in larger terms, no longer lies entirely with the employer."  [524•3  Now the workers’ living standards can be raised, in his opinion, only through measures taken on a national scale. On this basis Beirne argues the necessity and desirability of active government interference in labor relations.

p Events, however, refute his hasty conclusions. Time and again workers go out on strike to press their demands, and have no intention of closing their accounts with the employers. 525 On the contrary, as exploitation intensifies and corporation profits mount, the workers’ demands grow.

p Bourgeois historians of the moderate trend do not frighten their readers with allegations about labor’s monopoly power and are least of all inclined to criticize the labor movement along these lines.  [525•1 

p Thus, Daniel Bell praises labor unions for having been able to improve the workers’ condition without turning into a revolutionary anti-capitalist instrument. He sees in this the main reason for the absence in the United States of a mass labor movement bent on overthrowing the bourgeois system. This kind of assessment is not an end in itself for such writers. They have a broader aim—to prove the “groundlessness” of Marx’s revolutionary ideas under the conditions of American capitalism.

p Sufrin and Sedgwick go even further. For them, the ideas of class collaboration are too radical. They find neither class, nor economic, nor social causes in labor conflicts. Conflicts arise, says Sufrin, not between worker and employer but between man and nature. In this scheme of things, labor unions are assigned the modest role of maintaining “normal” relations in industry. All we need, it turns out, is to improve people’s moral qualities and industrial strife will disappear.  [525•2  This philosophy is aimed at the working class, especially in its simplified form as found, for instance, in the works of economist Dallas Young, where the capitalist and the worker are merely “partners in production" and the difference between them is regarded as being highly relative.  [525•3 

p The historians of the moderate trend try to examine the labor movement in its evolution. To one extent or another they admit the class character of labor conflicts. However, they never go beyond the framework of class collaboration in their 526 conclusions. The history of the labor movement and the vigor and militancy of labor unions are represented as being in decline from the 1930s onward.

p Ross Stagner, who acknowledges the existence of classes and class conflicts, does not see any grounds for “open war" between the classes in the United States, since labor disputes, in his opinion, are taking on a more peaceful character.  [526•1 

p In the opinion of Richard Lester, problems of mediation and compromise with employers have begun to occupy an important place in the affairs of labor leaders. The “rash” militancy of labor unions has been superseded by moderation and discipline. In the final analysis, he acknowledges that the evolution took place at the top, in the sphere of leadership. The rank-and-file masses supposedly remained inert, which gave the leaders a free hand. By strengthening the governing apparatus, they secured for themselves long tenure in key posts.

p Thus, Lester sees only two features in the development of the labor movement—(a) the rightward evolution of the labor leadership toward opportunism and reconciliation and (b) the settled indifference of the rank-and-file masses. However, the whole diversity of the processes taking place in industrial relations does not fit into this scheme.

p Historian Chester Morgan established two phases in the labor-employer relationships: “The two institutions—-organized labor and employer interests—typically begin their relationships in an atmosphere of hostility and open warfare.... But strangely enough, there is a second phase of institutional relationship which is reached by the majority of labor market institutions. This phase might be termed the phase of armed truce and uneasy toleration." Further on, Morgan adds: “Finally, labor market institutions may attain the phase of genuine cooperation, although to date in this nation, only a minority have done so."  [526•2  A bourgeois scientist, Morgan does not use the term “class struggle”. However, various forms of class struggle are inherent in his phases.

p Of the many books on the labor movement, we have 527 mentioned only those which are more or less typical of certain trends in contemporary American historiography. However different they may seem, these trends have a common ideological basis—denial of the existence of antagonistic class relations between labor and capital.

p The Marxist trend occupies a special place in the literature on the history and economics of the American labor movement. It is aimed against monopoly capitalism and the domination of capital.

p The proponents of this direction have had to wage a difficult ideological struggle against superior enemy forces. For Americans who criticize the bourgeois system, such things as freedom of speech, press, assembly and association became a fiction long ago. Instead, they are threatened with prosecution, prisons and police persecution.

p But even under these conditions, representatives of the Marxist direction in the American historiography of the US labor movement never balked in the face of difficulties. Valuable contributions were made by William Z. Foster, Eugene Dennis, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Gus Hall, Herbert Aptheker, Victor Perlo, Philip S. Foner, Hyman Lumer, George Morris and J. M. Budish, among others. An active part in creating the democratic literature was taken by such writers, historians, economists and publicists as Theodore Dreiser, Richard O.Boyer, Herbert M.Morais, George Marion, Albert Kahn, and Corliss Lament. All are united by a desire to establish the truth in their works, to help Americans see the capitalist essence of the social and political system of the United States, and by their fight for peace, democracy and progress. Unlike bourgeois authors, they examine social conflicts from the standpoint of the class struggle. The ideological core of their concept is struggle against monopoly domination in the economy, politics and ideology.  [527•1 

p American Marxist historians deal with a wide range of contemporary political problems. They expose Gompersism as a typical expression of bourgeois ideology in the working class, and criticize the principles of narrow trade unionism.  [528•1  They affirm man’s right to political freedom and democracy, resolutely protest against the persecution of people holding heterodox views, condemn the anti-Communist hysteria, expose the police character of the bourgeois state, and show the real essence of anti-labor legislation, the government’s interference in labor relations, and bourgeois democracy.  [528•2 

p An important merit of the Marxists is their consistent effort to reveal the role of the masses in historical developments. Meetings and demonstrations, strikes and picketing, clashes with strikebreakers and the police, arid the Communists’ speeches during court trials—-all this finds a place in their works.  [528•3  In their books, attention is focussed mainly on the role of the working class in American history. Their treatment of the labor movement is closely tied in with the general democratic struggle of the people as a whole. At the same time, the left-wing writers also discuss the weak points of the labor and communist movements.

p An important place in Marxist historiography is given to the role of the Negro people in the American working people’s movement for their rights. This subject is dealt with in its many aspects. The economic and legal status of the Negro people and their struggle for democracy and civil rights are analyzed 529 in extensive papers, major books and articles. One of the outstanding champions of the Black people’s emancipation movement was William DuBois, who denoted his life to the struggle for civil rights and genuine equality of Black Americans. The logical result of his long life and struggle was his joining the Communist Party.

p A widely known representative of the Marxist wing of the American historiography of the labor movement was William Z.Foster. His speeches, articles and books are an important contribution to the Marxist interpretation of the class struggle and the communist movement in the United States. The postwar period saw the publication of Foster’s major works devoted to the political history of America, the history of the Black people and the international labor, socialist and communist movements.  [529•1 

p It would be hard to overestimate the importance of the studies made by historians Herbert Aptheker and Philip Foner. Their scholarly works are based on a rich collection of archive materials and deal with the general history of the American people and the labor movf-im-nt. Some have been published in the Soviet Union, winning wide recognition.

p The eminent economists Victor Perlo, Hyman Lumer and J.M. Budish have given a Marxist analysis of American imperialism during and after World War II Their research is focussed on slate monopoly capitalism, its economics and politics. Perlo’s major works expose the methods by which the monopolies enrich themselves, and show their socio-economic structure and competitive struggle for dominance in the country’s economy. In contrast to bourgeois economists, the Marxist writers on the history of the labor movement reveal the real causes of the class struggle in the country. They strike at the theories found in bourgeois historiography concerning “progressive” or “people’s” capitalism, the “affluent society”, the “welfare state”, workers’ “prosperity”. the “revolution” in the distribution of the national income, and the gradual disappearance of classes. They, thereby, wage a struggle against the basic theory of conservative writers about “exceptionalism" in the development of American capitalism.

p The prominent participant in the American labor movement, George Morris worked for over 30 years for the Communist Party’s press organs, mainly the Daily Worker and The Worker. He wrote a number of books, pamphlets and many articles on various aspects of the class struggle.  [530•1  In his book, American Labor: Which Way? he gives a thorough analysis of labor’s struggle and draws a number of important conclusions on complex questions of the theory and tactics of the labor union movement. In his book, CIA and American Labor, Morris exposes the connections between the Central Intelligence Agency and the AFL-CIO leaders in the foreign policy field. On the basis of a vast body of materials, he uncovers the subversive activities of the Meany-Lovestone clique in the labor movements of Latin America and Africa.

p In books listed here earlier, the well-known progressive publicists George Marion, Corliss Lamont, C. Wright Mills and Albert Kahn expose monopoly oppression and come out against the persecution of the Communist Party, the trade unions and democratically-minded intellectuals. They bring home to the reader the truth about the class essence of bourgeois democracy, which works against Americans who demand freedom not in word but in deed and adherence to the principles of the Constitution so crudely and frequently violated by the political institutions of the bourgeois state.

p Historians Richard Boyer and Herbert Morais have brought out numerous facts from the past of the American labor movement.  [530•2  In their book, Labor’s Untold Story, they have told of the tragic fate of preceding generations of workers and showed the history of ordinary people whose labor created the nation’s wealth. No bourgeois historian has dared tell this real truth about the life of men and women of labor. Boyer and Morais describe the class battles, defeats and successes of American labor. The history of the labor movement in the 531 USA, they write, is the history of the American people, and the great motive forces that determined the historical destiny of the people were the same forces that were instrumental in the formation of the labor movement.

p Many books and pamphlets about the labor movement are published in the United States, but only a few talk about common people, their aspirations and their struggle. One of these few is a small book about the progressive union of Pacific Coast longshoremen. This pamphlet, called The ILWU Story, was written by members of the union’s executive committee, and it deserves every recognition for the iruth it tells about the life and struggle of the San Francisco dockers. As the authors remark, “this is history. This is history that’s too little noted in the schools.”   [531•1 

p There is a great abyss lying between the ideologists of the bourgeois system and those who express the interests of the proletariat. That abyss, is revealed in their principles and approach to the study of the history of the labor movement in the USA.

p Such are some of the specific features of the American historiography of the US labor movement during and after World War II. Only a general description of the bourgeois and democratic directions is presented here.

p Works by Soviet authors dealing with the American labor movement  [531•2  are part of our American studies and of Marxist historiography in general. The working-class movement in the USA has long drawn the attention of historians and economists, whose joint efforts have contributed to a Marxist understanding of the general trends and nature of the struggle going on in that country.

p Methodologically, the present work is based on the MarxistLeninist approach, which provides the key to a scientific treatment of complex socio-economic processes. Lenin’s teaching on imperialism and state-monopoly capitalism, socialist revolution and the state, classes and parties, bourgeois and 532 socialist democracy, and trade unions in many ways facilitates our understanding of contemporary problems of the US labor movement.

p The first volume of the present work contains a brief survey of works by Soviet writers relating to certain questions of the labor movement in the USA between the two world wars. The study of the American labor movement was almost completely halted during World War II. It was only in the postwar period that the economic condition and strike struggle of American workers drew the attention of some Soviet historians.

p During the first decade after World War II materials on the history and economics of the labor movement in the USA were gathered and studied. In that period, the first dissertations in this field for the degree of Candidate of Sciences were written, arid articles and the first books on the subject appeared. They dealt with certain aspects of the history of the AFL and CIO during and after World War II, the struggle of the progressive forces in the USA for civil rights and against anti-labor legislation, and the role of the Black people in the general democratic movement.

p In the late 1950s and early 1960s the range of research broadened. In particular, the history of the Communist movement in the USA and the economic condition and strike movement of the working (lass began to be studied. The international activities of the AFL and CIO were also subjected to critical analysis. During these years the first studies were published, mostly on state-monopoly capitalism and the current political history of the United States. The treatment of the fundamental problems of the labor movement became more creative. Many questions began to be resolved in a new way, with account taken of a wider range of documents, books and labor periodicals. Soviet researchers began to show more interest in studying such questions as US labor legislation, the role of the American working class in contemporary social movements, the struggle of progressive workers against the militaristic policies of the ruling circles, and so on.

p Soviet authors analyze the struggle between the two trends in the labor movement and show the democratic traditions in the working class and the processes going on in the class consciousness of the proletariat. The attention of Marxists is 533 being increasingly drawn to the bourgeois historiograph) of the American labor movement, although only the first steps have been taken in this field. A number of writers continue to study the history of the Communist movement. Books are published dealing specifically with the life and struggle of the Negro working people. The number of books about the American labor movement during arid after World War II has grown.  [533•1  In addition, but not within the scope of this chapter to examine, there have been many articles devoted to various aspects of the labor movement in the USA published in magazines, journals and books of readings.

p Recent developments in the American labor movement have also been dealt with in works on the general history of the United States. These include studies by individual authors, arid collective efforts by members of the Institute of History, the Institute of World Economy and International Relations arid the Institute of the International Labor Movement, USSR Academy of Sciences.  [533•2 

p An important step in the development of historiography was the publication of a collective work by the Department of History at Moscow University on the historiography of the modern and recent history of the countries of Europe and America.  [534•1  This is the first attempt by the chair of modern and recent history at the University to give a general picture of the historiography of the socialist countries and of certain capitalist countries, including the United States.

p Important contributions to the study of such important problems as the economic status and working conditions of American workers, wages, employment, unemployment, and the impact of technological progress on the condition of workers have been made by Soviet economists, who have published many valuable works which help to clarify a number of complex economic questions. Cooperation between historians and economists is an important requisite for a thorough study of the class struggle, especially at the present time, when the contradictions in American industry have become even sharper.  [534•2 

p The Soviet Marxist historians regard their efforts as being only the first attempts at studying the complex problems of the history of class relations in American industry.

p What has already been done along these lines by historians and economists in the Soviet Union represents only the beginning of work in one of the most complex aspects of American studies, namely, in-depth and comprehensive study of the history of the labor movement in the United States. There is a need for a more profound analysis of a number of questions that have as yet been insufficiently studied. Among these, the following deserve attention: 

p the specific features of the economic, political and ideological struggle of the American proletariat in the conditions of the scientific and technological revolution; 

p the social consequences of the scientific and technological revolution and their effect on structural changes in the composition of the industrial proletariat and other groups of wage earners; 

p the question of the proletariat’s allies in the class struggle in the light of the growing role of wage earners engaged in mental labor and the increased activity of mass anti-imperialist movements of youth, Negroes, and intellectuals; 

p the role of the working class in the general democratic movement of the masses; 

the struggle of progressive labor forces against the influence of bourgeois ideology on the labor movement.