As the AFL-CIO prepares for a convention where leaders say the goal is unprecedented solidarity with organizations outside the labor movement, the federation is turning its back on some inside the house of labor. Leaders have ruled that locals of the West Coast Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) cannot seek “solidarity charters” and will be ousted from local and state labor councils. The ILWU international disaffiliated from the AFL-CIO last Friday.
The stance is a departure from the federation’s reactions to previous disaffiliations.
The AFL-CIO has mandated that all ILWU affiliates be expelled from state and central labor bodies effective the date of ILWU’s national disaffiliation, August 30. Central labor councils and state federations have no choice. ILWU President Bob McEllrath urged members to remain actively involved in local and state labor movements.
The issue is raiding
ILWU locals have been battling other unions, including the 400,000-member Operating Engineers and other building trades unions, over what the ILWU claims as its traditional waterfront jurisdiction. In some instances members of those unions and others have crossed ILWU picket lines.
Most notably, members of an Operating Engineers local took traditional ILWU work during a bitter struggle at a new grain terminal in Longview, Washington. Although state federations in both Oregon and Washington supported the ILWU, the national AFL-CIO insisted it could not take sides, and has resolutely refused to support longshore workers as members from the larger and more politically powerful building trades have ignored ILWU picket lines in subsequent battles with shippers and others.
Despite having only 60,000 members (about 45,000 in the U.S.), the ILWU has played a huge role in West Coast labor.
Drawing on the principle that “an injury to one is an injury to all,” ILWU longshore and marine workers have used their port power to support the struggles of myriad other unions. In Tacoma, Washington, longshore workers refused to cross picket lines by Earth First! and the IWW in support of striking Steelworkers at Kaiser Aluminum. When Teamster Port of Seattle drivers faced loss of work to non-union drivers in Tacoma, ILWU longshore and warehouse workers in both ports honored Teamster pickets, resulting in return of the work to the union drivers after only one day.
