Cold War Labor
01/05/2011 21:27
Robert W. Cherny, Ed.
American Labor and the Cold War: Grassroots Politics and Postwar Political Culture
2004
A collection of essays, looking at the period from 1945-1960. The editor says central question is, “what kinds of relationships existed among the labor unions of the AFL and CIO, the radical left and the conservative right, business and other interest groups in American communities.” (4) Really, this can be boiled down to: what was the relationship between the American communist party and labor leaders, and did McCarthyism impact the development or retardation of the labor movement?
These are interesting questions, in the sense that they suggest there was both a “genuine and principled” communism and anticommunism “in the working class communities of the nation,” and that what went on in front of TV cameras in Congress was in some way related to the grassroots conflict. (5) But even so, they are very narrow questions, and the detailed narratives and oral histories related here need to be understood as a special case. It might even be a stretch to imply that these types of things were happening in working class communities across the nation, much less that they represent some type of broad social event that mobilized large groups of regular people.
In the first article, Ellen Schrecker points out that most labor leaders who joined the communist party “felt it would help them build a strong labor movement. None of them…tried to transform their unions into revolutionary organizations.” (9) If they were indeed focused on building organizations that would be effective in promoting the agenda of actual workers, it stands to reason that they would have become disillusioned with the CPUSA after time; since it pretty much failed to deal with the reality of American society the same way it failed to deal with the reality of the Soviet Union. Schrecker criticizes the AFL and CIO for being “so thoroughly co-opted that its leaders provided cover for the CIA, and its conventions endorsed the war in Vietnam.” (19) Clearly, the leaders of these unions do seem to have “enlisted in the Cold War” to some degree; but the framing of the discussion avoids the larger issues. Who was the labor movement supposed to turn to, for guidance? The CPUSA was useless. The rank and file were, in many cases, conservative working stiffs who did support the war in Vietnam. Remember “America, Love it or Leave it”?
Gerald Zahavi’s oral histories of Schenectady GE workers are very interesting. They suggest ethnic and religious dimensions to the working-class encounter with communism that make the picture much richer and more satisfying, while at the same time suggesting that communism was not as central on the streets of company towns in upstate New York as it has become on the pages of histories. This is the type of thing I’d like to see more of, and I think the book succeeds when it focuses on actual people and lets them tell their stories. The outline of labor and church leaders interacting with government and business leaders was tedious and didn’t leave me feeling I understood what had really happened.
American Labor and the Cold War: Grassroots Politics and Postwar Political Culture
2004
A collection of essays, looking at the period from 1945-1960. The editor says central question is, “what kinds of relationships existed among the labor unions of the AFL and CIO, the radical left and the conservative right, business and other interest groups in American communities.” (4) Really, this can be boiled down to: what was the relationship between the American communist party and labor leaders, and did McCarthyism impact the development or retardation of the labor movement?
These are interesting questions, in the sense that they suggest there was both a “genuine and principled” communism and anticommunism “in the working class communities of the nation,” and that what went on in front of TV cameras in Congress was in some way related to the grassroots conflict. (5) But even so, they are very narrow questions, and the detailed narratives and oral histories related here need to be understood as a special case. It might even be a stretch to imply that these types of things were happening in working class communities across the nation, much less that they represent some type of broad social event that mobilized large groups of regular people.
In the first article, Ellen Schrecker points out that most labor leaders who joined the communist party “felt it would help them build a strong labor movement. None of them…tried to transform their unions into revolutionary organizations.” (9) If they were indeed focused on building organizations that would be effective in promoting the agenda of actual workers, it stands to reason that they would have become disillusioned with the CPUSA after time; since it pretty much failed to deal with the reality of American society the same way it failed to deal with the reality of the Soviet Union. Schrecker criticizes the AFL and CIO for being “so thoroughly co-opted that its leaders provided cover for the CIA, and its conventions endorsed the war in Vietnam.” (19) Clearly, the leaders of these unions do seem to have “enlisted in the Cold War” to some degree; but the framing of the discussion avoids the larger issues. Who was the labor movement supposed to turn to, for guidance? The CPUSA was useless. The rank and file were, in many cases, conservative working stiffs who did support the war in Vietnam. Remember “America, Love it or Leave it”?
Gerald Zahavi’s oral histories of Schenectady GE workers are very interesting. They suggest ethnic and religious dimensions to the working-class encounter with communism that make the picture much richer and more satisfying, while at the same time suggesting that communism was not as central on the streets of company towns in upstate New York as it has become on the pages of histories. This is the type of thing I’d like to see more of, and I think the book succeeds when it focuses on actual people and lets them tell their stories. The outline of labor and church leaders interacting with government and business leaders was tedious and didn’t leave me feeling I understood what had really happened.
