Labor Movement

THE HISTORY of the American labor movement is a murky area in the country's collective consciousness. It's not exactly a prime topic in high school classes and it is virtually ignored by most other cultural outlets.NBC's movie tonight, "Long Road Home," tries to do its part to correct that, but in the way it treads on this relatively unexplored territory, the film breaks no new ground, instead taking the safe way home. Still, it deserves some credit for its good intentions."Long Road Home," which will be on Channel 2 (WMAR)

May Day (May 1) seems a bit old-fashioned these days, as union membership is squeezed, but it recounts the bitter fight for organized labor in American and around the world. Much of that fight traces back to Baltimore in 1866, when trade union representatives created the National Labor Union, which advocated for an eight-hour workday. That issue became the centerpiece of May Day demonstrations in the United States and around the world, politicizing a day that had previously marked the coming of spring.

WASHINGTON - Labor conventions almost by definition are raucous affairs, but the AFL-CIO national gathering next month in Chicago promises to be the stormiest since 1935, when John L. Lewis of the United Mine Workers led a split in organized labor between so-called craft and industrial unions. The American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations merged in 1955 as a union powerhouse representing 35 percent of the American work force. The 50th anniversary of that historic event will come in Chicago, but a breach that has been a long time coming may well cast a pall over the celebration.

As he campaigned in the most closely watched congressional race in Maryland, state Sen. Rob Garagiola had an advantage his fellow Democratic candidates envied: the support of the politically powerful labor movement. More than a stamp of approval, endorsements from unions that represent teachers, health care workers and government employees also brought an army of volunteers to a campaign with the aim of getting voters to the polls. But despite labor's support, the Germantown attorney lost to John Delaney in Maryland's 6th Congressional District by 25 percentage points in Tuesday's primary election.

"The information economy in which all that entrepreneurship is happening plays to the importance of the individual, whereas in the industrial society, the focus was the group, the assembly line -- which contributed to the growth of unions. When people work together now, in small teams, for example, the idea is to cooperate as individuals, not to blend into a group where everyone is the same. . . . The union movement is dead. . . . Because unions don't understand the need to re-invent themselves to fit the information society, their decline and eventual demise seem certain."

With the United Parcel Service settlement seen as a major triumph and an omen of future success, union leaders, and many experts, say the labor movement is in its strongest position in nearly a generation and is poised to increase its membership after a two-decade decline.This Labor Day might be a watershed moment for unions, some experts say, because the 15-day UPS strike created a surge of sympathy for unions as many of the efforts at revitalization pushed by John Sweeney, the AFL-CIO's president, have taken root.

A review in last Sunday's Perspective section in The Sun incorrectly identified the reviewer, David Kusnet, as a staff member of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. He was on its staff from 1974 through 1984.The Sun regrets the error.For a union movement whose membership strength has dropped from 35 to 16 percent of the workforce over the past 40 years, the Teamsters' victory at UPS suggests that labor is calling a halt to its decline.With new leadership at the AFL-CIO and a commitment by major unions to devote more resources to organizing new members, it seems that labor will not go gently into the good night most media and academic pundits had forecast.

WASHINGTON - Parades and rallies across the nation tomorrow will salute the union cause. But when it comes to its national agenda, organized labor has little to celebrate. Labor unions have failed during this Congress to achieve many items on their wish list for workers - from benefit improvements to wage increases - and are having to fend off a threat to their very right to unionize. For all its legendary political influence and ability to turn out union members to tilt elections, the labor movement has been unable to translate those attributes into legislative victories.

Despite the success of last month's Teamsters strike against United Parcel Service, labor's future does not look bright. Unions fought for an eight-hour day and an end to child labor - good things. Today, unions fight for greater dependency on the state and greater government control of the economy. These are not only unpopular, they hobble economic growth and job creation.Union membership has been declining since its peak during the Eisenhower administration. "Epitaph for American Labor: How Union Leaders Lost Touch With America" by Max Green (AEI Press.

America's labor unions have made history by creating the minimum wage, job safety protections, paid vacations, and employer-provided pensions and health insurance. But now the labor movement is in danger of becoming history. It represents only 16 percent of the entire U.S. work force and less than 10 percent of workers in private industry. While the nation's labor federation, the AFL-CIO, now has activist and imaginative leaders, unions still have an uphill fight to restore their membership strength, bargaining power, political clout, and public esteem.

SILVER SPRING -- For JoAnn Johntony and Davida Russell, a college education always appeared out of reach. Finding the time and money for education, while balancing work and family, seemed impossible for the school custodian and bus driver for developmentally disabled children, respectively, from Ohio. But here they were at the National Labor College last weekend, beaming with pride and posing for pictures in their caps and gowns. With financial support from their union and the college's focus on working adults, each woman now has a bachelor's degree in labor studies.

The National Labor Relations Board issued a decision yesterday that experts say expands the definition of who can be considered a supervisor. The ruling in Washington could have far-reaching implications for trade unions and at workplaces around the country. The federal panel ruled 3-2 that permanent charge nurses at hospitals should be categorized as supervisors, meaning they would not be covered by the National Labor Relations Act and would be barred from joining a union. The long-awaited NLRB decision involved nurses at Oakwood Health Care in Michigan.

Never mind that no one suspects Wal-Mart of trying to squish one of its 200,000-square-foot superstores into the limited real estate space available in Hampden. But such is the anger that the retail behemoth engenders in some circles that it has become a kind of shorthand for all that is wrong with corporate America. Take Drew Heles, a local activist, and Benn Ray, an owner of Atomic Books. They sponsored a free screening Sunday night of Robert Greenwald's new documentary, Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, hoping to use it to highlight the dangers of chains, and help keep such shops as Starbucks or Quiznos out of the quirky, historic 36th Street corridor.

PHILADELPHIA -- Led by a former social worker from Bucks County, Pa., a group of unions estranged from the AFL-CIO pledged yesterday to rebuild the American dream for workers by growing the labor movement. "We are excited and hopeful that we can change workers' lives in this country," said Anna Burger, who was voted chairwoman of the Change to Win Coalition at its founding convention in St. Louis yesterday. The group of seven unions includes four that quit the AFL-CIO, the nation's largest labor federation.

ANDREW STERN has taken the Service Employees International Union out of the AFL-CIO, along with the Teamsters and United Food and Commercial Workers. Given federation President John Sweeney's failure to deliver on his 1995 promise to reinvigorate the labor movement and declining union membership, few can blame the rebels. But all the debate about organizing tactics and political strategy misses what really ails the labor movement. In the 1950s, unions made sense. Most American workers were employed as agricultural laborers, in routine factory jobs and in similar repetitive tasks.

Two of the nation's largest unions broke away from the AFL-CIO yesterday, creating the biggest rift organized labor has seen in decades. It is a move that some say will bring chaos to the troubled labor movement; others say it might be unions' last hope to survive the changing economy. The International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the Service Employees International Union, which was the AFL-CIO's largest and fastest-growing union, have formed a competing alliance at a time when jobs are moving overseas, financially strapped employers are using union concessions to cut costs, and union membership is rapidly declining.

Two of the nation's largest unions broke away from the AFL-CIO yesterday, creating the biggest rift organized labor has seen in decades. It is a move that some say will bring chaos to the troubled labor movement; others say it might be unions' last hope to survive the changing economy. The International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the Service Employees International Union, which was the AFL-CIO's largest and fastest-growing union, have formed a competing alliance at a time when jobs are moving overseas, financially strapped employers are using union concessions to cut costs, and union membership is rapidly declining.

Turns out the best show on MPT was off camera.The young upstart breathing life back into the labor movement is 61, the age at which his nemeses in management are pushed into retirement.BankAmerica and NationsBank decided not to merge because they are complementary and could not lay off enough workers to justify the exercise.That Commie Fidel looked around a hostile New York for friends and found the Fortune 500.

WASHINGTON - Labor conventions almost by definition are raucous affairs, but the AFL-CIO national gathering next month in Chicago promises to be the stormiest since 1935, when John L. Lewis of the United Mine Workers led a split in organized labor between so-called craft and industrial unions. The American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations merged in 1955 as a union powerhouse representing 35 percent of the American work force. The 50th anniversary of that historic event will come in Chicago, but a breach that has been a long time coming may well cast a pall over the celebration.

Frustrated with the leadership of the AFL-CIO, the presidents of five major national unions formed their own labor federation yesterday and promised a series of aggressive, coordinated organizing campaigns that will restore power to the waning labor movement. The move was widely viewed as the first step toward a historic split in the 50-year-old AFL-CIO, a federation of 57 national unions that has been losing membership and economic strength for decades. "This is a historic occasion for working people," said Bruce Raynor, president of the garment and hotel workers' union Unite Here, which is among the five.