Paul Weber was an American labor leader. He was the founder and president of the Detroit (Michigan) chapter of the Association of Catholic Trade Unionists (ACTU) from 1939 to 1947, [1] best known for his development of an ACTU "Industrial Council Plan" (which Weber called "economic democracy" [2] [3] ) versus a CIO Industry Council Plan to foster union-management cooperation in US Labor disputes. [4] [5]
Weber also belonged to the American Newspaper Guild (now NewsGuild-CWA), [6] a CIO federation member, which made him "well-versed in union practices." [7]
He also served as editor of Wage Earner, newspaper of the Michigan ACTU. [8]
In 1946, Weber wrote to some Catholic leaders around the nation in defense of Walter Reuther, who he wrote "Walter Reuther is certainly not a Communist... he is their bete noir" even if "Walter and his brothers Victor and Roy started out to be radicals." [9]
In 1947 during a conference of the Catholic Trl-State Congress in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Weber, "Detroit newspaperman and Association of Catholic Trade Unionists leader," joined other Catholics in opposing Communist influence on labor unions. [10]
Walter Philip Reuther was an American leader of organized labor and civil rights activist who built the United Automobile Workers (UAW) into one of the most progressive labor unions in American history. He saw labor movements not as narrow special interest groups but as instruments to advance social justice and human rights in democratic societies. He leveraged the UAW's resources and influence to advocate for workers' rights, civil rights, women's rights, universal health care, public education, affordable housing, environmental stewardship and nuclear nonproliferation around the world. He believed in Swedish-style social democracy and societal change through nonviolent civil disobedience. He cofounded the AFL-CIO in 1955 with George Meany. He survived two attempted assassinations, including one at home where he was struck by a 12-gauge shotgun blast fired through his kitchen window. He was the fourth and longest serving president of the UAW, serving from 1946 until his death in 1970.
The United Auto Workers (UAW), fully named International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, is an American labor union that represents workers in the United States and southern Ontario, Canada. It was founded as part of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) in the 1930s and grew rapidly from 1936 to the 1950s. The union played a major role in the liberal wing of the Democratic Party under the leadership of Walter Reuther. It was known for gaining high wages and pensions for automotive manufacturing workers, but it was unable to unionize auto plants built by foreign-based car makers in the South after the 1970s, and it went into a steady decline in membership; reasons for this included increased automation, decreased use of labor, mismanagement, movements of manufacturing, and increased globalization.
The Communist Party (CP) and its allies played a role in the United States labor movement, particularly in the 1930s and 1940s, but largely wasn't successful either in bringing the labor movement around to its agenda or in converting their influence in any particular union into membership gains for the Party. The CP has had only negligible influence in labor since its supporters' defeat in internal union political battles in the aftermath of World War II and the Congress of Industrial Organizations's (CIO) expulsion of unions in which the party held the most influence in 1950. The expelled parties were often raided by stronger unions, and most withered away.
William George Meany was an American labor union leader for 57 years. He was the key figure in the creation of the AFL–CIO and served as the AFL–CIO's first president, from 1955 to 1979.
Philip Murray was a Scottish-born steelworker and an American labor leader. He was the first president of the Steel Workers Organizing Committee (SWOC), the first president of the United Steelworkers of America (USWA), and the longest-serving president of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO).
Douglas Andrew Fraser was a Scottish–American union leader. He was president of the United Auto Workers from 1977 to 1983 and an adjunct professor of labor relations at Wayne State University for many years.
Roland Jay Thomas, also known as R. J. Thomas, was a left-wing leader of the United Auto Workers in the 1930s and 1940s. He grew up in eastern Ohio and attended the College of Wooster for two years. The need to help support his family caused him to leave college and go to work. In 1923, he moved to Detroit, where he worked in a number of automobile plants.
The Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (CBTU) is a nonprofit organization of African American trade union members affiliated with the AFL–CIO. More than 50 different international and national trade unions are represented in CBTU and there are 50 chapters in the United States and one in Ontario, Canada.
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, formerly called the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, is an umbrella group of American civil rights interest groups.
David John McDonald was an American labor leader and president of the United Steelworkers of America from 1952 to 1965.
The Alliance for Labor Action (ALA) was an American and Canadian national trade union center which existed from July 1968 until January 1972. Its two main members were the United Auto Workers (UAW) and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, although it had some smaller affiliates.
Wyndham Mortimer was an American trade union organizer and functionary active in the United Auto Workers union (UAW). Mortimer is best remembered as a key union organizer in the 1937 Flint Sit-Down Strike. Mortimer was the First Vice President of the UAW from 1936 to 1939. A member of the Communist Party USA from about 1932, Mortimer was a critic of the efforts of the conservative American Federation of Labor to control the union and was a leader of a so-called "Unity Caucus" which led the UAW to join forces with the more aggressive Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO).
James Barron Carey was a 20th-century American labor union leader; secretary-treasurer of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) (1938–55); vice-president of AFL–CIO ; served as president of the United Electrical Workers (UE) (1936–41) but broke with it because of its alleged Communist control. He was the founder and president (1950–65) of the rival International Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers. President Truman appointed Carey to the President's Committee on Civil Rights in 1946. Carey was labor representative to the United Nations Association (1965–72). Carey helped influence the CIO’s pullout from the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU) and the formation of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) dedicated to promoting free trade and democratic unionism worldwide.
The tool and die strike of 1939, also known as the "strategy strike", was an ultimately successful attempt by the United Auto Workers Union (UAW) to be recognized as the sole representative for General Motors workers. In addition to representation rights, the UAW, working jointly with the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), sought to resolve existing grievances of skilled workers.
The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. Originally created in 1935 as a committee within the American Federation of Labor (AFL) by John L. Lewis, a leader of the United Mine Workers (UMW), and called the Committee for Industrial Organization. Its name was changed in 1938 when it broke away from the AFL. It focused on organizing unskilled workers, who had been ignored by most of the AFL unions.
The Walter P. Reuther Library, Archives of Labor and Urban Affairs, located on the campus of Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, contains millions of primary source documents related to the labor history of the United States, urban affairs, and the Wayne State University Archives. The building is named for UAW President and Congress of Industrial Organizations President Walter Reuther.
The Association of Catholic Trade Unionists (ACTU) was a labor organization associated with Catholic Worker newspaper.
Jack Barbash (1910–1994) was a labor economist best known for helping negotiate the merger of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) back into the American Federation of Labor (AFL) to form the AFL–CIO in 1955.
Nat Ganley, or Nat Kaplan, was a socialist and later communist journalist who became a union organizer in the 1930s, particularly for the United Auto Workers of America. He was tried and convicted in 1954 for violating the Smith Act, but his conviction was later overturned.