Victories and new battles

for democracy

Two hundred twenty-five registrants came to sessions of the

AUD national conference in New York April 7-9. It was not the

largest ever; but, in one respect, it was the most impressive.

Most were unionists and supporters actively involved in union

democracy-related campaigns. Interested sympathizers were

there, but most were engaged. Those who were fighting hard

battles against the odds told of their ordeals; but this time there

were even more reports of encouraging victories.

The conference opened on Friday with seven union democ-

racy success stories, experiences which summed up the whole

three-day conference, rich in diversity, involving men, women,

whites, African-Americans, rank and filers, seasoned oldtimers

and local leaders new to the cause.

That evening, the conferees heard from Larry O’Toole, in-

ternational president of the Marine Engineers Beneficial Asso-

ciation, and from Tim Brown, international president of the

Masters, Mates and Pilots. They told similar stories of how

these licensed marine officers, after long and bitter reform

battles, freed their unions from the control of crooked offi-

cials. Then, came a range of reports from professional seafar-

ers to professional musicians.

Lucinda Lewis told how her International Conference of

Symphony and Opera Musicians (ICSOM), beginning in the

early 1960’s, won the battle for democracy inside the Ameri-

can Federation of Musicians.

Elinor Levine, young new president of the Coalition of

continued on page 5

Democracy:

burden or asset in union organizing?

In Dissent, spring issue, Katherine Sciacchitano, writing on

“Unions, Organizing, and Democracy,” searches for a way to

combine effective organizing with educating to “develop and

nurture democratic leadership among the new workforce.” Con-

vinced that the two must be linked, she cautions against those

who, in the rush to organize with least delay, “don’t give work-

ers a voice in how they are organized.” She is obviously one

who knows her subject: former labor lawyer and organizer, now

a teacher at the AFL-CIO George Meany Center for Labor

Studies; she draws upon an intimate knowledge of two organiz-

ing campaigns and perhaps participation in them: the SEIU

1996 campaign against Beverly Enterprises in Philadelphia and

a CWA campaign at US Ainvays, both of which she found in-

structive and encouraging.

“The revitalized AFL-CIO,” she notes, “has set its sight on

nothing short of movement building.” But there are serious

contradictions. “Organizing is shaped by what a small group

of insiders know and impart rather than by workers exercising

power. We end up further from, not closer to, our goal of

movement building.” in the haste to win NLRB elections,

“certain tasks are postponed: developing rank and file leader-

ship, member education, building the kind of enduring local

union organization that can give workers power and change

their lives....Where winning is impossible, the union walks

away....Workers develop a healthy fear of abandonment.”

We need more than militancy; she says “...the crucial link

between union campaigns and movement building is not just

militancy.... Movement building requires understanding how

learning and organization take place at the bottom....it means

paying attention to workers’—not just organizers’—accounts

of organizing.”

For insight in reforging the “essential link between an ac-

tive membership and movement building,” she looks to the

distant days of the thirties and the Great Depression: “the up-

surge of organizing wasn’t sudden, and it wasn’t simply the

product of the CIO. Union successes of the 30’s and 40’s were

continued on page 12

No. 130

AUD’s 30th Anniversary conference

Published by the Association for Union Democracy

Participants discuss organizing in a Saturday panel

IUOE Local 30

3

LIUNA

Postal Workers victory

12

SEIU

9

Shorts

14

Where we stand

10

Charles Delgado

15

CUNY professors

10

Challenging illegal dues

Carpenters conference

12