Labor's Giant Step: The First Twenty Years of the CIO: 1936-55

562 Pages·12.633 MB·English

by  Art Preis

Twenty years of the CIO
byArtPreis
PATHFINDER PRESS, NEW YORK
Copyright © 1964 by Pioneer Publishers
Copyright © 1972 by Pathfinder Press
All rights reserved
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 72-79771
Printed in the United States of America
First Edition, 1964
Second Edition, 1972
Second Printing, 1974
Pathfinder Press, Inc.
410 West Street
New York, N. Y. 10014
Permission to use quotations are acknowledged as follows:
From C/0-lndustrial Unionism in Action by J. Raymond Walsh; copyright 1937
by the author; published by W.W. Norton and Company, Inc. and reprinted
by their permission. From Tailor's Progress by Benjamin Stolberg; copyright
1944 by Doubleday & Company, Inc. and reprinted by their permission. From
The Automobile Industry and Organized Labor by A. J. Muste; published 1935 by
the Fellowship of Reconciliation and reprinted by their permission. From
John L. Lewis-An Unauthorized Biography by Saul Alinsky; copyright 1949 by the
author; published by G. P. Putnam's Sons and reprinted by their permission.
From Labor o" the March by Edward Levinson; copyright 1938 by the author,
copyright 1956 by Louise Levinson; published by University Books, Inc. and
reprinted by their permission. From The Roosevelt I Knew by Frances Per
kins; copyright 1946 by the author; published by Viking Press and reprinted
by their permission. From American City by Charles Rumford Walker; copy
right 1937 by the author; published by Farrar and Rinehart and reprinted by
their permission. From Sidney Hillman: Statesman of American Labor by Mat
thew Josephson; copyright 1952 by the author; published by Doubleday & Com
pany, Inc.; reprinted by permission of Harold Ober Associates Incorporated.
TO ETHEL MARY
whose love, devotion and care
made everything possible
who was my invaluable assistant
throughout the preparation and writing
of this book and who
gave it its title -
ON OUR 30th ANNIVERSARY
January 16, 1964

Contents
Introduction xi
Preface xv
. making history is what really counts.
(Speech by Art Preis at reception
in his honor, November 21, 1964) xxi
PART I
THE RISE OF THE CIO (1929-1940)
1 The "Golden Twenties" Collapse 3
2 "New Deal" -Myth and Fact 9
3 War on Labor under the NRA 14
4 Three Strikes That Paved the Way 19
5 Industrial vs. Craft Unionism 34
6 The CIO's Political Coalition with Roosevelt 44
7 Flint '37 - "Gettysburg" of the CIO 50
8 The Sit-Down Wave and Little Steel Defeat 62
9 The Roosevelt Depression and CIO Retreat 72
PART II
PRELUDE TO WAR (1940-1942)
10 Internal Conflicts and Factions 85
11 Triumphs at River Rouge and Bethlehem 95
12 Roosevelt-Open Strikebreaker 113
13 The Fight against the National Defense Mediation
Board 125
viii CONTENTS
14 The Minneapolis Labor Case 133
PART III
THE CIO IN THE WAR (1942-1945)
15 Roosevelt's War Labor Curbs 147
16 The Wartime Wage Freeze 161
17 The Break between Lewis and Murray 168
18 How the Miners Won 174
19 "The Situation Is Intolerable" 198
20 The War Labor Board and the Montgomery Ward
Strike 212
21 The Fight against the No-Strike Pledge 224
22 Labor Political Action 237
PART IV
THE POSTWAR STRIKE WAVE (1945-1946)
23 American Labor's Greatest Upsurge 257
PART V
THE NEW OF.FENSIVE AGAINST LABOR (1946-1947)
24 Truman's Anti-Labor Drive 287
25 Economic and Legislative War on Labor 301
PART VI
COLD WAR IN THE CIO (1946-1950)
26 The Cold-War Witch Hunt Begins 323
27 Conflict Over the Marshall Plan 331
28 Taft-Hartley Injunctions and Faction Strife 347
29 The Wallace Campaign and Truman's Victory 363
30 Raids and Purges 371
31 The "Fourth Round" Wage Campaign 378
32 Splits and Expulsions 39!
CONTENTS ix
PART VII
THE KOREAN WAR YEARS (1950-1953)
33 Labor's Near-Break with Truman 417
34 The Third National Steel Strike 438
35 End of an Era 452
PART VIII
AFTER THE NEW DEAL-FAIR DEAL ERA (1953-1955)
36 New Moves toward AFL-CIO Merger 471
37 "30 for 40" and "GAW" 484
38 The Witch Hunt and Labor Struggles 497
39 The World's Largest Union 512
A Note on Sources and Acknowledgments 521
Index 525

Introduction
When Art Preis put the finishing touches on this book shortly
before his death in 1964, he had completed a history of what
was, in his words, "the most significant event in modern Amer
ican history." The history of the CIO, from its turbulent begin
nings in 1935 as a split in the conservative AF L until its merger
twenty years later with that same parent organization, provides
a panorama of one of the stormiest p~riods of labor radicalism
in American history.
Since the merger of the AFL and CIO in 1955, the bureau
cratization of the unions has continued. The stifling of union
democracy; the growing remoteness and independence of the union
bureaucrats from the rank and file; their increasing subservience
to the interests of the employing class and its government; the
consequent alienation of the workers from the unions, and the
failure of the unions to act as media for the political sentiments
of the rank and file: these are still the main features of the unions
today.
Although the unions appear to have changed little in the inter
vening years, there has been significant change in American
life. The post-World War II prosperity and world economic dom
ination of American capitalism have yielded to growing economic
difficulties at home and increasingly severe competition abroad.
The years of cold-war witch-hunt, with which this book closes,