LOS ANGELES TIMES INTERVIEW : Linda Chavez-Thompson : Is Revitalizing America’s Labor Movement a Sisyphean Task?

Linda Chavez Thompson’s election to the new position of AFL-CIO executive vice president ended the historic hold of white males on the top jobs in the American labor movement. She campaigned for the post by calling for major changes in the structure and tactics of the federation and, when elected last October, she told the union convention, “The face of labor is changing, and you can tell this by the mere fact that I am a woman--and a woman of color.”

But Thompson, 50, is not new to unions. She started her career as a union activist at age 23, working as a representative of a local in Texas that had many Spanish-speaking members. No one in charge could speak their language, so she was hired. She later became an organizer for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, but she and her first husband had two young children, so she took a less demanding job that allowed her to spend more time at home. As her children grew, she moved to more demanding, higher ranking jobs--as director of a local union, then regional vice president of AFSCME.

Thompson is an American success story. The granddaughter of Mexican immigrants, she was one of eight children of sharecropper parents in Lubbock, Texas. She first started working summers in the cotton fields at age 10, and dropped out of school entirely in the ninth grade to help support her family. A stocky, determined woman, she is already a grandmother.

As third-ranking leader of the AFL-CIO, Thompson says she will help cement the federation’s relations with women and minorities--who make up an increasingly large part of union membership, about 40%. Thompson is determined to raise that figure.

Though there are roughly 15 million federation members, the AFL-CIO’s percentage of the total work force has dropped dramatically over the last 30 years--and its once powerful political influence has declined proportionately. Union members are now only 15.5% of the work force, compared to more than 34% in the 1950s, and only 11% of the private work force. Thompson has long sought to unionize public employees, whom she regards as a huge source of potential new members. Indeed, she was a key figure in winning a law allowing collective bargaining by public employees in New Mexico.

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Question: Unions today represent only about 15% of the work force--less than half their strength of a few decades ago. The new top AFL-CIO leadership, that now includes you, says unions need to be revitalized. How will you do that?

Answer: First, we’ve got to spend much more money on organizing. The AFL-CIO has been spending about 5% of its budget on organizing. Most national and international unions spend about the same thing. With that, at best they just sustain their membership numbers even as the number of workers increase. The new AFL-CIO is committed to setting an example for all of its affiliates by setting aside $20 million for organizing during the first two years, and then about that much every year thereafter. Basically, it means 30% of our budget, not 5%. If each of our affiliates follow suit, you would see a major resurgence in organizing.

Q: Will the increased money for organizing really bring in many more members?

A: We can win new members in this current anti-union atmosphere created by greedy corporations and conservative politicians by using a massive campaign reminding everyone of what we did in the 1930s, when Americans faced the same kind of anti-union atmosphere and workers endured low wages and harsh work ing conditions. People then finally got tired of the financial beatings they were taking and said we’re not going to take this anymore. I think we’re getting back to those conditions again today, because corporate America doesn’t care about its employees--just about their “bottom line.” Once more, workers are saying they won’t take it anymore.

Q: If the current economic system doesn’t help the average worker, and instead is enriching the rich, as you say, then why is there not greater protest and greater support for unions to counterbalance that corporate power? Could it be that there isn’t as much imbalance as you believe?

A: There is a huge imbalance, but we’ve got to educate people about the truths about our economy so they will realize the need to change it. Workers are getting hit from all sides by corporations and right-wing politicians. The way things stand now, most working families are not able to dig themselves out of poverty and improve their standard of living. They really have to take matters into their own hands. All unions can do is show them the way.

Q: Haven’t unions tried to do that for years, with little response from workers?

A: Yes, the silence from them is deafening, maybe because there has been no voice heard from labor in many years. That’s what our election last year was all about. The new top officers of the AFL-CIO campaigned on a platform of giving American workers and their families a new voice. We have to spread the word about what unions can do. Millions don’t even know what a union is. There were some really good things going on around the country that people need to know about--such as the Service Employees Union’s Justice for Janitors campaign.

That campaign worked by forcefully reminding people of that invisible work force we have out there. As long as trash cans were emptied, factory floors cleaned, office rugs vacuumed, people don’t really notice who was doing all that hard work for low pay. That changed when janitors in Los Angeles, New York and other cities went on strike--then they noticed. Building owners felt it, as well as tenants. We publicized it. Thousands of janitors got a union, and won better wages and working conditions. We’ve got to do much more of that kind of agitating and organizing.

Q: You and others have complained about the widening gap between rich and poor, between corporate owners and the average worker. Some unionists say the capitalist system needs an overhaul. Do you agree?

A: Well, the system we have isn’t working for working families. The stock market is way up. Productivity is rising significantly. Profits are going up and up. Executive salaries are soaring. But workers’ incomes are down and people are hurting. The answer is that American workers need a raise. We don’t need to junk the capitalist system. We need to fix it. There’s plenty of money being generated. It just isn’t being distributed fairly.

Q: Other than try to get more workers into unions, what do you want to do to fix the system?

A: The AFL-CIO is going to sponsor a series of public hearings around the country to dramatize the issue of declining workers’ incomes. We’re going to hang a sign in the campaign headquarters of every political candidate we support saying something like, “It’s wages, stupid.” Worker wages must be the issue for 1996. And we’re going to make it the issue for every candidate that wants to get elected. They have to address it if they want our support. They must increase minimum wages, toughen and enforce labor laws that now mostly help employers, stop unfair trade with low-wage countries, and end corporate welfare.

Q: Is President Clinton your kind of candidate? How can you put any pressure on him to get backing for laws you want, when top AFL-CIO officers have already indicated you’re going to endorse him?

A: If we were to give President Clinton a report card he would get an “F” from us regarding NAFTA [the North American Free Trade Agreement]. But if we are talking about his position as compared to the Republican Party, as compared to other presidents in the past, he is good.

No, he might not be the kind of candidate we would have preferred four years ago, like a more liberal Ted Kennedy or Tom Harkin or someone like that. But I’ll tell you, Clinton has come through for us in in the past few weeks on the government shutdown and against GOP efforts to kill good programs for workers, senior citizens and the poor. He has said what we are saying: no deal is better than a rotten deal that will hurt working families. So yes, we may be considered as leaning very strongly toward him.

Q: You opposed NAFTA because, among other things, you feared low wages in Mexico would push down wages and reduce jobs here. Were your fears justified?

A: Yes. The administration claimed NAFTA would create 200,000 new jobs a year. True, in 1994 we did gain 150,000 jobs, but this past year we lost 140,000 and more will be lost. Unfortunately, the administration is blaming everything on the Mexican economy, and asking us to wait and see. I believe in fair trade with Mexico and other countries, but I don’t want unfair trade agreements--even with my grandparents’ home country of Mexico. We must create a more level playing field in trade to ensure that decent jobs are created in Mexico.

I’ll give you an example of the problem. I went into a nice department store for Christmas, shopping for a shirt. I went to the section with $30 shirts--they were Arrow shirts. They were all the same shirts but some were made in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Taiwan, Hong Kong. I finally found one made in the U.S.A. But all of these shirts were $30. The ones from low wage countries outside the U.S. were made far cheaper than the ones made here. Who pockets the wage differentials? It sure as hell isn’t the worker.

Q: Then how are U.S. union members going to compete with the low wages paid in Third World countries?

A: The question should be what are the people we elected to protect us and set up the standards for America going to do? Why are they saying it’s OK for American companies to take our jobs to low-wage countries with no protections for workers? The workers in those countries should not continue to be exploited. They are being denied their human rights, their union rights. Shame on us for allowing that to happen. If they do, we should not trade with them. Their horrible working conditions are forcing an increase in the illegal immigrant work force coming here. They said NAFTA would stop illegal immigration, but they’re still coming in.

Q: Should the AFL-CIO encourage even stiffer enforcement of laws barring illegal immigrants coming into this country and help restrain their entry? Many unions now welcome immigrants, legal or illegal, into their ranks as members. Should they?

A: Our job is not to screen out illegal immigrants. Our job is to help all workers. We don’t have that kind of money to hire the people to do those investigations, look for someone who suspiciously looks like an illegal immigrant. You cannot place that responsibility on people who don’t have the experience and who couldn’t possibly know if a worker is here legally.

Q: Some people see your election to one of the three highest positions in the AFL-CIO as just a token gesture toward eliminating race and gender discrimination in the top leadership ranks of unions still dominated by white males. Is that a fair criticism?

A: No, it overlooks many other leadership jobs in unions that are held by women and minorities, though I’m the only one at this level. We created the position I now hold, and the assignment I was given is something that was never done before: namely, to assist local central labor councils and state federations in their programs, to see how we can better serve them and the members. I’ve been given a critical job: to build closer coalitions with other liberal, labor and minority organizations.

We are not big and strong as we used to be. We’ve lost membership. We need to build those coalitions on issues that we can agree and work with groups like the League of Women Voters, Emily’s List, the NAACP, the Council of La Raza, the Children’s Defense League. If we can vastly increase our organizing and build those coalitions to regain the political influence we once had, I know we can revive organized labor.