UE was one of the first unions to be chartered by the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and grew to over 600,000 members in the 1940s. Franklin D. Roosevelt to stop discrimination in industry, which was disbanded after the war by President Harry Truman. In most UE locals, the decision whether to arbitrate a grievance is made by membership vote. This is the fight of our lives. UE was founded at a March 1936 meeting of existing local unions in plants of the electrical equipment and radio industries, a few months the founding of the CIO. United Electrical Radio & Machine Workers of America Erie, PA | WWW.UELOCAL506.ORG. [citation needed], To defend the union from future raids, UE reversed its refusal to sign Taft-Hartley affidavits, enabling the union to again appear on the ballot in NLRB representation elections. I have just modified 5 external links on United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America. Following the outbreak of World War II, UE joined with other unions in the CIO in urging a no-strike pledge and higher productivity for the duration of the war, which UE viewed as a struggle against world fascism and therefore worthy of labor's support. Filippelli, Ronald L., and McColloch, Mark D.. Cooley, Will, “Communism, the Cold War and a Company Town: The Rise and Fall of UE Local 709,” Labor History 55:1 (2014), 67-96. The AFL, dominated by Union leaders vowed to boycott the Taft-Hartley labor board and agreed in principle that all would refuse to sign the affidavits. Claim your profile for free. Illustration of how UE negotiates with employers can be seen in the union's detailed web reports on its 2011 national bargaining with GE.[14]. UE is very explicit in mandating that all union negotiations are a collective endeavor. Some union leaders, including Walter Reuther of the UAW, signed the Taft-Hartley affidavits and then proceeded to raid (attempt to replace) locals of UE and the Farm Equipment Workers (FE), whose leaders were still holding out and refusing to sign. Kannenberg, Lisa, "The Impact of the Cold War on Women's Trade Union Activism: The UE Experience,". The complaint charges that the North Carolina bargaining ban violates the North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation (NAALC), the labor-rights side agreement to NAFTA. It is United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America. The resulting battles were fierce: in Local 601, which represented Westinghouse workers in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and whose members had a tradition of radical politics dating back to Eugene V. Debs' candidacy for President in 1912, the two factions were led by brothers Mike and Tom Fitzgerald, who attacked each other personally as vigorously as the factions did on political issues. One feature that has distinguished UE from many other US labor unions is its strong emphasis on frugality and financial responsibility. Soon after the war ended, beginning in late 1945, the three largest unions of the CIO engaged in a national strike to regain economic ground lost by workers during the war, when wages had been frozen but industrial profits had risen significantly. Leaders of virtually all CIO and AFL unions denounced this new law, and in particular called the non-communist affidavit clause an intolerable government interference in internal union matters and an encroachment on freedom of speech and association. UE members are also rail crew drivers, co-op workers, teachers, clerical workers, graduate instructors, graduate researchers, scientists, librarians, and day care workers. In 1937 a group of local unions in the machine shop industry, led by James J. Matles, left the International Association of Machinists (IAM), objecting to that union's policies of racial discrimination, and joined the young UE. While this move was resented by UE activists elsewhere, especially in Pennsylvania and the midwest, the District 4 activists felt that the UE forces could soon have regained control of the re-united organization had the whole union followed their lead. united electrical, radio & machine workers of america et al v. general electric company doc. That year, Philco agreed to a contract with the American Federation of Radio Workers that provided for an eight-hour day, a minimum wage, premium pay for overtime, and a forty-hour workweek. In the midst of the Cold War assaults on UE, the union's newspaper reported such success stories as the promotion of a black worker at Johnson Machine to lathe operator. But few lived up to that pledge. Nonetheless oppositionists were confident that the national political atmosphere would enable them to seize power in UE at the union's 1949 convention. Assistance and publicity coincided with the Occupy movement in Chicago, members of which came to the plant. In the UE national contract with GE, UE locals retain the right to strike over grievances. In September 1936 the AFL suspended its member unions that had started the CIO – originally called the Committee on Industrial Organization and formed by existing industrial unions within the AFL as a caucus to promote organizing industrial unions in mass production industries. UE is the only national union in the US that explicitly limits the pay of officers to a pay level of members[13] As noted above, all increases in the pay of UE national officers and staff must be approved by delegates to the national convention, as amendments to the union constitution, and then ratified by membership vote at local union meetings. The UE and IUE began to cooperate in bargaining after the IUE's disastrous 1960 strike against GE. lock Unlock financial insights by subscribing to our monthly plan. Are you ready to take action to protect yourself and your co-workers? Between conventions, decisions of the national union are made by the General Executive Board, consisting of the three national officers, the three regional presidents, and 12 additional rank-and-file representatives elected by the regions.[11]. The UE and IUE were fierce rivals for many years, but in the 1960s began to cooperate in bargaining with General Electric and other employers. We can help. It is United Electrical Radio and Machine Workers of America. UE's convention delegates instead backed their national officers' demands that the CIO stop the UAW and other CIO unions from raiding UE. It discusses and approves policy resolutions submitted by locals and regions, on matters ranging from the union's bargaining and organizing strategies to domestic and foreign policy issues. From the description of UE National Office records relating to District 7 and District 7 locals, 1936-1990s. The CIO granted UE the first charter on November 16, 1938. Other unions, including the IBEW, the IAM, the UAW, the United Steel Workers of America, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the Sheet Metal Workers International Association, also wedged in during these elections. The members set the policies of the union and make all of the decisions of importance that affect their own local unions. Dante Strobino Field Organizer at United Electrical Radio and Machine Workers of America Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina Area 1 connection Tell us about what’s happening in your workplace, and we’ll reach out. Since the stoppage those workers, organized by UE Local 150, have won improvements and regular consultation of city officials with their elected union leaders. In addition to producing several publications throughout the year, the Education Department is responsible for the creation of informational films. The UE's membership dropped from 200,000 in 1953 to 58,000 in 1960. [25] In July 1950 UE leaders appointed Ernest Thompson, a black international representative and former rank-and-file factory worker, as secretary of the UE Fair Practices Committee. Democratic structure; Financial practices; Bargaining and grievances; Early history: growth and schism; UE reshapes itself; The Republic Plant Occupation of 2008 But the university administration has filed a motion seeking to strip graduate workers of their right to for a union under state law, reneging on its prior public commitment to respect graduate workers’ right to organize. Richard Peduzzi Dir., Information Systems and Special Projects at United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) Greater Pittsburgh Area In April 2009 Vice President Joe Biden visited the plant and met with company officials and union leaders, praising the reopening of the plant as "a big deal. On December 5, 2008, members of UE Local 1110 at Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago, when the plant closed with only three days notice to the employees, occupied the plant in protest of the closing and company's failure to pay employees their accrued vacation pay, and payments required under the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act. His grilling of UE members, in the guise of investigating "Communist subversion," made for sensationalist news headlines and helped the IUE eke out a narrow win. I made the following changes: [34] Since joining UE, Local 222's work has focused on bringing democracy, justice and equality to the workplace, and on organizing and mobilizing its members and local communities in fights for gender pay equity, ending all forms of discrimination, and health care for all. Employers, the federal government, the news media and other establishment forces played major roles in the efforts to eliminate UE. The fundamental unit of UE is the local union. The IUE won a close election, with the semi-skilled workers supporting the IUE while more skilled workers favored the UE. United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America We’re still waiting for a trade deal that benefits working people The proposed replacement of NAFTA, is a tool for corporate interests and provides insufficient relief to address the problems for working people embedded in … Also comprises visual images from the 1930s-1950s that represent the activities, officers, and members of the UE in Pittsburgh and vicinity. The union agreed to 90 days of employment before the plants closing. UE sees unionism as a movement and unions as independent organizations of workers. Depositor United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America is creating people-powered change, and they need your help. Among its many anti-union provisions was a clause requiring officers of all unions to sign "non-communist affidavits," swearing that they were not members of the Communist Party. The salaries of the national officers and staff are specified in the UE constitution, so giving raises to UE's paid officials requires amending the constitution at convention. As in many of the new CIO unions organized in the 1930s, the membership and leaders of UE included a variety of radicals, including socialists and communists, as well as New Deal liberals and Catholics. The UE also supported expanded use of piecework systems in industry, which it defended as both necessary to boost production and a way to improve workers' earnings under the wartime wage control systems imposed by the War Labor Board. Over the past two decades the union has built a strategic alliance with the Authentic Labor Front, an independent Mexican union, and UE is broadly active in international labor outreach and solidarity. Local 506 has remained the bargaining agent at Erie G.E. From the local to the national level, UE has a strong ethic of accountability and transparency in all its financial practices, and opposes any trace of what it calls "petty corruption" among union officials. In UE, we use the term "rank-and-file unionism" to describe how our union operates: it simply means it's the members who run our union ... in a democratic and collective manner. [9] Each region holds meetings two or three times a year, composed of delegates from local unions. Nearly 1,000 graduate workers at the University of New Mexico — a clear majority — have joined United Graduate Workers of UNM/UE, and have petitioned for recognition with the state labor board. On August 31, students at Kenyon College, a private liberal arts college in Gambier, Ohio, announced their intent to unionize with the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America … UE is an independent union (not affiliated with the AFL-CIO) proud of its democratic structure and progressive policies. And despite the union's support for the no-strike pledge, UE leaders supported militant actions by their members, such as a strike by UE members at a Babcock & Wilcox plant in New Jersey. In the heavy electrical equipment plants, on the other hand, the two factions each had substantial strength. In this petition for review, United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America (“UEW”) maintains that the Board's 1995 back pay award should have been incorporated into the employees' “base wage” for that year, so that all subsequent pay raises would be added to a … UE's organizing alliance with the FAT started in 1992 and grew from the two organizations' shared opposition to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The Center for Union Facts is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that fights for transparency and accountability in America… United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America is a union that represents workers in the manufacturing, public and private sector service jobs. LXIX No. By the mid-1960s, the former UE activists in IUE shops played a role in helping to bring about James Carey's ouster in a disputed election. UE bargaining committees regularly report back to members, both orally and through publications, during the course of bargaining. [35] Protest demonstrations at Bank of America branches took place in dozens of US cities during the sit-in. This meant that the raiding union, UAW, would appear on the NLRB ballot, but the incumbent union, UE or FE, could not. Learn about benefits. Is this your nonprofit? Community Service Fund have contributed millions of dollars over the past several decades to the United Way of Erie County. Local union members elect their local officers, negotiators, stewards, and delegates to the regional council and national convention; set policies for their local, including financial decisions; suggest bargaining demands and vote to approve the union's full list of contract proposals; vote to ratify or reject contracts and supplemental agreements with the employer; and decide whether to strike, and when to end a strike, by majority vote. UE's Mexican ally the FAT, with the support of 52 other US, Mexican, Canadian and global labor organizations, filed a complaint in October 2006 with the Mexican National Administrative Office – a body established to address complaints of labor rights violations under NAFTA. 42 in the united states district court for the western district of pennsylvania united electrical, radio & machine workers of america and local 506, united electrical, radio & machine workers of america, plaintiffs v. The city is scheduled to receive nearly $149 million from the American Rescue Plan Act, yet the raises planned in the City Manager's proposed budget do not reflect this. Every member therefore has a direct vote on whether or not the pay of their national officers and staff will be increased. Looking for abbreviations of UE? The United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America (UE) Education Department is designed to educate members and workers about the union and labor issues. In the case of UE, the CIO went a step further, chartering a rival union, the International Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers (IUE), that would attempt to destroy and replace UE. Stepan-Norris, Judith, and Zeitlin, Maurice, Kannenberg, Lisa, "The Impact of the Cold War on Women's Trade Union Activism: The UE Experience," Labor History 34 (Spring-Summer 1993), pp. since 1937 The members of U.E. In 1953 he held a hearing in Lynn, Massachusetts on the eve of an NLRB election between UE and IUE at the major GE plant there. The union frequently calls on its members to collectively demonstrate their support for the union's bargaining goals during contract talks, by wearing T-shirts, buttons or stickers with union insignia and slogans; speaking up to management on key bargaining issues; and through rallies, informational picketing and other actions. In preparation for contract bargaining, UE locals solicit ideas for contract changes from their members, and most locals then conduct a membership vote to approve the full slate of union proposals. The UE has broadened its scope in recent years, organizing public employees, service industry workers, school and college employees, and others. United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (Various Employers) Case Number: 06-CC-162236 Date Filed: 10/13/2015 : Status: Closed ... United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America: Pittsburgh, PA 15222: Charging Party Individual: … The UE has also replaced some other unions in workplaces where the existing unions has failed to adequately represent the membership. UE has a strong training program for its stewards, distributes a Steward Kit[15] that includes the exemplary "UE Steward Handbook," and publishes a monthly publication, the UE Steward, that provides tactical tips to stewards and local officers for dealing with workplace problems. GE fired John Nelson, president of UE's large Local 506[22] in Erie, Pennsylvania, on just such grounds. United Electrical Radio and Machine Workers of America listed as UERMWA. Now representing 35,000 workers in a variety of industries, UE continues actively organizing private and public sector workers, and its democratic structure and practices have attracted several small independent unions to affiliate. The 1946 strikes were successful, but the outcome stiffened the resolve of industrialists to break the power of the CIO through a strategy of divide-and-conquer. It seems a miracle that UE survived the 1950s at all, with attacks coming at it from all directions: the federal administration, Congress, Republicans and Democrats, news media, "mainstream" unions of both CIO and AFL, and even some members of the clergy. Over the past 20 years a number of existing independent unions have affiliated with UE, seeking the resources, support and solidarity of a national union and attracted by UE's democratic structure and practices. Several times a year the regions organize training workshops and other educational events through sub-regions – smaller geographic subdivisions. Investigations by the House Un-American Activities Committee and criticism from groups such as the Association of Catholic Trade Unionists, which actively organized dissenters within UE into an opposition faction, put UE leaders on the defensive. [23] The 1946 strike at GE was prolonged by the company's insistence on giving a smaller wage increase to its women employees, whom GE president Charles E. Wilson contemptuously dismissed as "bobbysoxers." The split of 1955-56 largely involved tactical disagreements over how to move the UE's progressive program and brand of unionism forward in the face of the AFL-CIO merger. Among the organizers and leaders of UE Local 107 at the Westinghouse South Philadelphia works were several former members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). Contains all of the issues of the UE News, the official newspaper of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE), from the newspaper’s founding in 1939 through 2010. Over the next few years a dramatic wave of strikes and mass organizing by industrial workers rapidly built the membership of the CIO and of newly formed industrial unions such as UE, the United Auto Workers (UAW), United Rubber Workers, and United Steelworkers (USW). On August 27, 2019, UE endorsed Bernie Sanders 2020 presidential campaign.[6][7]. While the UE and the IUE won roughly equal number of elections through the first half of the 1950s, the IUE came away with larger numbers of members, particularly in the growing field of consumer electronics. The regions elect their own officers and representatives to the General Executive Board (the national board of UE), including a full-time regional president. [38], United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, Constitution and By-Laws, amended 2011. James Carey, the founding president of UE, was appointed president of the IUE. While employers are getting trillions of dollars in bailout money to offset the impacts of the COVID-19 crisis, many workers are deemed essential and forced to continue working in unsafe conditions with little or no protection. All of the others were broken by the relentless attacks of employers, the government and other unions through the period of McCarthyism. UE was founded in March 1936 by several independent industrial unions which had been organized from the ground up in the early and mid-1930s by workers in major plants of the General Electric Company, Westinghouse Electric, RCA and other leading electrical equipment and radio manufacturers. It proved a bitter disappointment to UE activists who had managed to bring the union successfully through the hardest years of the McCarthy period and the Cold War but who were now unable to keep the union together. Dollars over the past several decades to the union and make all of others. 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