Hormel Strike Sparks Intraunion Feud

One of the most bitter intraunion feuds in recent American labor history erupted Wednesday at the normally fraternal winter meeting of the AFL-CIO Executive Council here.

The combatants were the leaders of the long strike at the George A. Hormel & Co. pork-processing plant in Austin, Minn., and officials of their international union--the United Food and Commercial Workers--who have been severely critical of the local’s tactics.

James Guyette, president of the Austin local, accused the leaders of the international union of “undermining” the workers’ battle against concessions demanded by the company at the Austin plant.

“Their vicious anti-union attack is unprecedented in labor history,” Guyette said at a news conference. “They are out of step with the better part of the labor movement.”

Unionists Called Liars

Guyette, 38, was joined at the news conference by Ray Rogers, a consultant to the local. Rogers said international officials had frequently lied and had attempted to isolate the local from unions that might help them.

Less than an hour later, representatives of the international and other locals of the union representing Hormel workers denounced Guyette and Rogers for leading the Austin workers into a battle they could not win and said they had endangered the jobs of more than 1,000 workers who have been on strike in Austin since Aug. 17.

Lewie Anderson, director of the union’s packinghouse division, also accused Guyette and Rogers of needlessly jeopardizing the jobs of hundreds of other workers at Hormel plants in Iowa who were fired after they staged sympathy strikes earlier this year.

A ‘Suicidal’ Course

At another press conference later in the day, William H. Wynn, the union’s international president, said the local is following a “suicidal” course. “If they do not settle the strike soon, I will,” Wynn said. He would not elaborate.

Labor leaders who have attended this meeting for many years, including Sol Stetin, former president of the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers who now runs a labor history museum in New Jersey, said they had never seen a clash of this kind before.

Wynn, 54, and Guyette met Wednesday night with Lane Kirkland, president of the AFL-CIO, in an attempt to resolve their differences but after the meeting they said they had not changed their positions.

Earlier this week, Kirkland expressed support for Wynn, saying: “I am entirely confident that the international union in this case has given wise and sound advice.”

Wednesday’s confrontation was the latest chapter in a fractious dispute that has been developing for the past 17 months.

Corporate Demands

The wrangle is focused on the question of how unions should handle corporate demands that workers make concessions on wages and work rules.

But it also involves personalities, particularly Rogers, 41, a controversial tactician who played a key role in the 17-year campaign that led to unionization of workers at J.P. Stevens, a large Southern textile company, in 1980. Wynn last year dubbed Rogers the “Ayatollah of Austin.”

On Wednesday, Guyette defended Rogers and branded Wynn “the Mr. T of the labor movement,” referring to a character in a popular adventure series on television. He added that Wynn, who frequently wears expensive rings and bracelets, “wears all the gold and diamonds.”

As to the proper strategy in the Hormel dispute, the two sides remained far apart Wednesday.

The issues that precipitated the Hormel strike involve wages, benefits, seniority, grievance and arbitration procedures and health and safety issues. The battle is rooted in the broad labor turmoil that has characterized the meatpacking industry since 1980. Many plants have closed and wages, which averaged $10.69 an hour five years ago, have been sharply cut at many plants as contracts expired.

The international union has formulated a plan to re-establish a national wage rate of $8 to $9 an hour initially, with the goal of ultimately returning it to the old level. On Wednesday, Wynn said that plan is progressing.

Some Get $10 an Hour

Hormel workers in Nebraska and Iowa now earn $10 an hour. But workers at Austin, the highly profitable company’s flagship plant, have rejected proposed contracts calling for $10 an hour twice since the strike began. Their wages were unilaterally slashed from $10.69 to $8.25 an hour in October, 1984, but raised to $9.25 an hour by an arbitrator just before the start of the strike.

Wynn said the local’s position--that it would hold out for a higher wage than the rest of the Hormel workers--threatens the union’s campaign to gradually raise the pay level of all the workers. Guyette said the local decided that “we had to put an end to the concessions.”

The strike has drawn national attention, particularly since Minnesota’s Democratic Gov. Rudy Perpich called in the National Guard in late January to quell violence after Hormel resumed operations. A union rally in Austin last Saturday attracted 3,000 supporters, including union members from California to New York.

One of the strikers’ supporters, Henry Nicholas, president of the National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees, said here that he believes support for the Austin workers is “the litmus test for all of organized labor.”

However, most national union presidents here have said they support the international and none has publicly criticized Wynn.

The company said last week that it had permanently replaced all of the strikers. Guyette said Wednesday that the local, which has launched a boycott of Hormel products, can still win the strike. Wynn said that is impossible.

Both men vowed to get the strikers their jobs back. But Wynn said it would take a “lengthy litigation process” to achieve that goal.