Socialist Action /June 2000
Teamsters Notebook
No end in sight for Overnite strike
Strikes that go on for a while usually are not
"newsworthy,"at least not for the corporate press. So it wasn't
a surprise that the press didn't take note on April 24 of the six-months-long
Teamsters strike against Overnite Transportation Co.
Teamsters President James P. Hoffa launched the
strike, soon after taking office. Observers said then and still say that
Junior Hoffa (a lawyer who had never held union office, not even as a shop
steward) wanted a victory over a non-union freight company that would put
him in his fathers' league.
The real Jimmy Hoffa (the father) was the architect
of the national master freight contract that raised the unionized workforce
to industry-record levels of wages, benefits, and pensions. However, it
seems doubtful that the father would have struck Overnite (especially in
a now deregulated industry) with less than a majority of the workforce.
Former Teamsters President Ron Carey spent five
years organizing and winning bargaining elections at dozens of Overnite
terminals. But still, Carey believed that more organizing needed to be done,
in order to bring the entire 8000-strong workforce into the union at master
contract rates and conditions.
After six months of sporadic talks, a settlement
appears no closer than it did when the strike began. Overnite, (which is
a subsidiary of the wealthy and politically influential Union Pacific),
publicly says that it will not agree to sign on with the Teamsters pension
plan. The trucking firm claims that the plan is underfunded, but it may
really just want to keep the complete control it now has over the company's
existing plan.
While the union continues to picket, recently the
main action has been in the respective camps' legal and public-relations
offices. Each side has won and lost cases at the national labor board, without
changing the relationship of forces.
The company has charged the union with acts of
violence, and courts have levied fines. The union charges that the company
has conspired to violate labor laws relating to workers' right to organize.
Its evidence includes the testimony of a fired Overnite manager who says
the firm developed "hit lists"of workers who supported the union.
Should Hoffa finally sign an Overnite contract
that undercuts the Teamsters working under the master contract, he can forget
about getting re-elected next year. At the same time, should he lose the
strike against the nation's largest non-union trucking firm, his claim to
have learned everything he knows at the kitchen table may ring hollow for
thousands of Teamsters who elected him president.
Flight attendants to vote again
The 11,000 long-suffering Northwest Flight attendants
will soon be voting on another contract offer. The offer is recommended
by both Teamsters President Hoffa and a majority of the local union's leadership.
So was the previous offer that the ranks last August decisively rejected.
Now the question is whether the sweetened offer
will be ratified by the ranks. The workers have ample reason to vote yes,
if only out of frustration with both the company and the union. Northwest
has successfully denied the flight attendants a new contract for four years.
The workers, who years ago gave concessions to the international airline,
haven't had a raise since 1988.
Hoffa has ignored the workers' militancy, as expressed
in their sky-high 99 percent authorization to strike the airline (once conditions
imposed by the oppressive Railway Labor Act are fulfilled).
Hoffa recently sent a "personal representative"
to oversee the local union; perhaps, some attendants fear, as a first step
leading to a full trusteeship.
What might keep frustrated workers from voting
for a settlement they don't want is a comprehensive analysis of the relationship
of forces between the workers and the bosses. To date, no one has provided
the workers with that kind of help and leadership.
TDU leaders have yet to make a recommendation.
It may be that TDU correctly believes that the flight attendants are worn
out and not likely to respond to another call to fight on. Even so, the
workers should be told what their objective strength is, if only to prepare
the flight attendants for the next battle with the airline.
More than that, an evaluation of the relationship
of forces implicitly would help inform the workers on how to select leadership
and choose tactics, as well as evaluate proposed contract terms.
Teamsters endorse Hoekstra
Teamster President James P. Hoffa's most vocal
government ally has got to be Congressman Peter Hoekstra, a Michigan Republican.
That's true even though Hoekstra "voted against all the union's key
bills last year,"according to the Associated Press, May 28.
In the wake of the popular 1997 strike against
United Parcel Service (UPS), Ron Carey seemed unbeatable in the looming
union re-election. So, "led by ... Hoekstra of Michigan, Congress voted
to withhold funding for the [Teamsters government-run] election" (Labor
Notes, September 1998).
Hoekstra also conducted McCarthyite congressional
hearings designed to smear Carey's reputation as an honest, militant union
leader. Here too, Hoffa and Hoekstra worked hand in hand.
According to Labor Notes, one witness, speaking
out of turn, revealed that "Hoekstra's staff had urged him to get help
from attorney George Geller in preparing his testimony. Geller [a one-time
Lyndon LaRouche operative] is one of Hoffa's campaign spokespersons."
After Carey was removed from the Teamsters ballot
by federal agents regulating the union, Hoekstra, whose own election campaigns
have been financially backed by UPS, worked to get the union's delayed election
funded.
More recently, Hoekstra has worked to help Hoffa
end the 11-year Consent Decree that provides for federal oversight of the
Teamsters, under which the Feds sanctioned Carey's expulsion from the union,
in the wake of the Teamsters victory over UPS.
Bill Black of the Teamsters Joint Council 43 told
the press that Hoekstra is "the first candidate that has stood up and
said, 'It's time for the government to get out of the Teamsters' business.'
He came to speak to us and that left an impression on us." The media
also reported that the national union went along with the Michigan delegates'
endorsement of Hoekstra.
Hoekstra told the Associated Press, "The only
Teamsters that don't like me are the ones that are connected to the Ron
Carey regime."
Well, not exactly. Officers of two Michigan Teamster
locals lost no time in voicing their disapproval of the endorsement. Teamsters
Local 406 in Grand Rapids, Mich., which has many members in Hoekstra's district,
endorsed his opponent, Democrat Bob Shrauger. "We cannot endorse him
at the local level because of his voting record, and we have to reflect
what our members want," said Bob Harvey, the local's political director.
When Fred Bennett, an agent with Teamsters Local
212 in Muskegon, Mich., heard of the national union's endorsement, he laughed,
the Associated Press reported. Bennett said that his local would support
Hoekstra's opponent "no matter who it is."
"The international union is a lot different
than the regular locals," he added. "I don't think Mr. Hoekstra
has the best interest of labor at heart."
A rank and filer interviewed by the Washington
publication Roll Call said he was sickened by the union's endorsement. "When
I found this out, I just about puked," said Herman Aurich, a retired
truck driver and member of Teamsters Local 406 located in Hoekstra's district.
"The rank-and-file Teamsters are not going
to accept this decision of Jimmy Hoffa's," said Aurich, who promised
he would be working to overturn the endorsement. Aurich called it a "payback"
for Hoekstra's help to Hoffa during the congressional investigation that
focused on Carey. The journal reported that Hoekstra "helped pave the
way for Carey's rivals to win the union's presidency."
To be more than fair, let's give the last word
to Black, the Teamsters Michigan spokesperson. He told the press, "It
will not be a popular endorsement with all members of this union."
-CHARLES WALKER
Socialist Action /June 2000 |