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10 of the People and Events Who Shaped the American Organized Labor Movement and Turned the Country on Its Head

Larry Holzwarth July 25, 2018 30 min

Harry Truman faced a series of strikes immediately following World War 2, infuriating him and leading him to explore nationalizing the steel industry and the railroads. The White House

The American labor movement today.

In the days after World War II concerted efforts to expand the organized labor movement into the American Deep South were blocked by a combination of factors including the Jim Crow laws of the south, national anti-union sentiment from a series of strikes in 1945, and the beginnings of the Cold War. Communism, socialism, and the organization of labor were all linked in the public mind, and exploited by those opposing unionization. This led to a weakening of the unions in general, as it became evident that factories which were struck in the north could simply be moved to the south, where there was cheaper labor and little threat of unions.

The attempted unionization of the south was a largely CIO project named Operation Dixie. Its defeat led to the merger of the CIO and the AFL in 1955, and the trend towards social unionism was replaced with the business unionism of the AFL, which reflected the beliefs in capitalism instilled by Samuel Gompers at the beginning of the century. Though the AFL and CIO did not merge until 1955, they both fought against the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947. Passed because it was perceived that the unions’ actions in striking the steel industry in 1945, and threatening a railroad strike that was called off at the last minute were dangerous to national security, Taft-Hartley placed restrictions on both unions and management in dealing with them.

Closed shops were barred by the act. Closed shops meant that all employees must be union members. The act also allowed states to establish themselves as “right-to-work” states. In a right-to-work jurisdiction, employees who are not members of a union cannot be compelled to pay union dues or other fees as a condition of employment. Twenty-eight states have right-to-work jurisdictions as of 2018. Taft-Hartley was sent to President Truman for his signature, was vetoed by the president and returned to the Congress, which overcame the president’s veto, enacting the bill into law. Despite intense lobbying by unions and other interests, it remains in effect.

With the merger of the AFL and CIO in 1955, strong efforts on the part of the unions to shed themselves of communist philosophy and members within their ranks were undertaken. As both the AFL and CIO strongly supported the anti-communist activities of the Truman Administration the extreme left-wing members of their unions protested, and they were purged from leadership activities. The CIO was in particular supported by communists in its formative years, the AFL less so because of its commitment to capitalism. By the end of the 1940s the known communist elements of the CIO and its member unions were gone from the organization.

When the AFL-CIO merger was completed in 1955 roughly 33% of the American labor force were represented by a union, and were actively paying dues for the privilege. By the year 2012 that had been reduced to about 11%. The steady decline of unionization in the private sector was fed by the relocation of jobs to right-to-work states (or their elimination by relocating them overseas), a shift of jobs from manufacturing to service industries, and the decline of the power of the unions to influence political activities. By 2010 the United Auto Workers had more members on its roster that were retired than were working, a problem facing many unions and their pension funds in the United States today.