Did labor overplay its hand with the postwar strike wave that justified Taft Hartley’s passage in 1947?

It was the government sitting the steel companies down and telling them as the war started that if it wanted contracts from the government, it was going to have to accept the union.

He was concerned that organized labor would just become a junior party in the Democratic coalition that didn’t have real power but also didn’t have the ability to extricate itself. He wasn’t wrong about this.

CIO leaders such as Sidney Hillman worked hard to seal those connections. They knew that the Roosevelt administration had created the legal conditions for unions to succeed, through the National Labor Relations Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act, not to mention the Supreme Court appointees.

So when the CIO formed, most of its leaders quickly realized that its future was going to be tied to the Democratic Party. Once huge difference between the federations was their understanding of politics. The AFL preferred to stay above politics. Their leaders were naive.

They still thought the future of labor was a contest to be decided between unions and employers in the contract, without a role for the government. The long history of government putting its thumb on the scale for the employers did not seem to break this.

“Avowed segregationist” is not hyperbole btw. Charlie Kirk was running a public smear campaign on MLK Jr. as recently as last year.

I support Palestinian liberation full stop and have for 35 years. That said anyone who thought Trump would be better or no worse for Palestinians is a fool. They should be called as much. Often.