AFL-CIO chief vows to step up organizing, political campaigns

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney says politics and union organizing go hand in hand, and both will be stepped up this fall.

It's a matter of moving ahead or stagnation for the union movement, which is seeing no growth in membership.

Sweeney said 400,000 new members joined unions last year, but that was just enough to break even. About 14 percent of America's workers are unionized.

"That just kept us even," Sweeney said. "Staying even isn't enough."

Sweeney told delegates of the National Association of Letter Carriers Wednesday that 300 activists -- double the number from 1996 -- will be at work across the country this political season to communicate the organization's message.

The Letter Carriers are having a convention at the Las Vegas Convention Center.

To further its agenda, unions must increase their membership and vote into office their political allies, Sweeney said.

"So, we have decided to join organizing and politics at the hip," he said.

Some of those political coordinators will be coming to Nevada, said AFL-CIO spokesman Richard Greer. How many are coming to the Silver State has yet to be decided, but they should be here by August.

An effort to raise a $13 million "mobilization fund" approved when the AFL-CIO Executive Council met in Las Vegas last March will fund the extra coordinators, Greer said.

When the coordinators come here and to other towns, they will emphasize voter registration, seeking to enlist 4 million new union voters. They also want to sponsor 2,000 union members for elected office by the year 2000.

Both political clout and an increase in membership are needed to further the AFL-CIO's "working family agenda," Sweeney said. That agenda includes preserving Medicare and strengthening laws aimed at protecting workers who want to unionize.

Sweeney's remarks come on the heels of a union victory in California last month, when voters rejected a proposal that would have required unions to get individual members' permission before making paycheck deductions for political causes. Union officials said that was an attempt to silence the voice of unions in the political process.

In Nevada, the unions won in court to prevent a similar initiative from appearing on November's ballot. A truce was later called on the issue between supporters and opponents.

Sweeney said the AFL-CIO plans to change the way it spends its political funds and the way it communicates with its rank-and-file. More money will be spent on the organization's own media efforts rather than individual candidates.

Moreover, he said more information will be given to members on candidates and issues, "encouraging them to make up their own minds rather than relying on union endorsements."

archive