Laura Gordon is President of the Western North Carolina Central Labor Council and delegate to the 50th AFL-CIO Convention.

End of the Sweeney Era

Ten years ago, John Sweeney was elected president of the AFL-CIO. Supporters of his New Voices slate rallied to oust the stale leadership of his predecessor, Lane Kirkland. Under Kirkland, workers had seen 20 years of declining wages, benefits and working conditions. For 20 years, attacks by the capitalists had come down, and the defenses put up by the unions failed to turn them back. In fact, most unions hadn’t fought at all.

The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) convention ended on June 4. Even in its last hours, the reform movement showed it will continue to challenge the undemocratic methods of President Andy Stern. A slate of 13 rank-and-file members stepped forward to run for International Executive Board seats. This so surprised the officers that they had to scramble to print ballots. The vote counting went well into the evening, forcing their ‘victory party’ to start before the results were announced.

In the recent past, a fight inside the SEIU (Service Employees International Union), the second largest union in the country, has broken into the open. The leader of California’s United Healthcare Workers-West (UHW) union, Sal Roselli, has resigned from SEIU’s executive board. His resignation came amid charges that SEIU’s international leadership was taking control over local negotiations with employers, leaving the workers without a voice in their contracts.

SEIU's Stern 'Trustees' California Local

The trade union bureaucrats in SEIU (Service Employees International Union) are moving to crush the California local that refused to sell out.