Teamsters Narrowly Reject Presser’s Handpicked Heir

The Teamsters turned Friday to one of its “old guard” leaders, William J. McCarthy, to head the besieged union, narrowly rejecting the image-conscious heir-designate of the late Jackie Presser.

The union’s 17-member General Executive Board elected McCarthy, 69, of Boston, by a one-vote margin over Secretary-Treasurer Weldon Mathis to serve the last three years of Presser’s term as Teamsters’ president.

Presser, who died a week ago, had appointed Mathis, 62, of Atlanta, in May as acting president of the 1.6-million-member union. The appointment was to last for 120 days and was made just before Presser underwent brain surgery for cancer.

Mathis remains the union’s secretary-treasurer in the wake of the board’s decision Friday.

The turnover in the top post of the nation’s largest union--one in every 75 working Americans is a Teamster--occurs just two weeks after the Justice Department filed suit to seize control of its affairs, alleging that the union’s leadership has been controlled by organized crime for more than 30 years.

McCarthy led a a rump movement among Teamster vice presidents against a new nationwide trucking contract, signed in May, covering about 200,000 union members. McCarthy indicated Friday that he will try to reopen the pact.

“I don’t know what I can do but I plan to do everything I can to improve on it and get the wishes of our membership,” he said at a news conference after his election.

The contract was declared ratified, even though 64% of the affected members who voted opposed it. Rejection requires a two-thirds vote under the union’s constitution.

McCarthy, who has presided over the 8,000-member Teamsters Local 25 in Charlestown, Mass., for 33 years and headed the international union’s operations in New England for two decades, declined to discuss his power struggle with Mathis.

“That’s not the issue,” he said. “I got enough votes to become the president. The great strength of this board is that we will argue and fight about an issue but when the majority vote is taken, everyone stands behind the decision.”

Asked by a reporter what Presser would have thought about his election, McCarthy confirmed his reputation for a quick temper. “Who knows? Maybe he would roll over in his grave,” McCarthy replied. “I don’t know what he was thinking. Why don’t you try to locate him. That’s a goofy question, I’ll give you a goofy answer.”

The board’s exact vote was not announced, but several sources, all speaking on condition of anonymity, said McCarthy won by a 9-8 count.

Proposals Rejected

Mathis’ supporters tried several maneuvers to thwart McCarthy’s ascension, including postponing the decision until a special convention of 2,000 Teamster representatives could be assembled. But their various proposals were all rejected by the same one-vote margin.

At least two union vice presidents--the board consists of 16 vice presidents and Mathis--objected to declaring the vote for McCarthy unanimous, a Teamster tradition when the mantle is passed from one president to another, one source said.

“Two years from now, you’re going to start seeing people campaigning like crazy,” he said, referring to the union’s next international convention in the spring of 1991.

Both McCarthy and Mathis are viewed by leaders of other labor unions as being “clean”--with no major ties to organized crime figures in contrast to the ties that the government alleges that Presser and former Teamster Presidents Roy Williams and Jimmy Hoffa had. Mathis was seen, in addition, as more image-oriented. Mathis had helped Presser orchestrate several public relations campaigns in recent years and helped open the union to women and other groups in an attempt to expand the membership base in the wake of problems generated by trucking deregulation.

Named a Defendant

Like all of the Teamster vice presidents, McCarthy was named a defendant in the federal suit to take over the union. But his name surfaced only once in the 200 pages of documents the government filed to support its case.

In a transcript of an FBI-wiretapped conversation on May 9, 1984, convicted New York crime boss Anthony Salerno is quoted as recognizing McCarthy’s name as the Teamsters’ “head boss of the East Coast, this guy.”

With the government’s unprecedented attempt to take over the union, McCarthy said Friday he has a tough job ahead. “It should be condolences, not congratulations.”

But he said he is confident that the Teamsters will eventually win the case when it goes to trial before U.S. District Judge David Edelstein in New York.

“There’s a lot of insinuations and allegations made,” he said. “But . . . if the judge hears our side, I feel we will come out just as clear as we were and have been.”