To those DU'ers who lived through the "Golden Age of Capitalism" (1940s to 1970s)-some questions...

[byeya]

11. FDR was the most powerful man in the USA. Obvious. Even he acknowledged that John L. Lewis was

the second most powerful man. Lewis was head of the UMW and perhaps the head of the CIO too. It shows the sort of power unions commanded from the late 1930s to the red-baiting days of Eisenhower and McCarthy. This was power the working class won by putting their lives on the line(See Wiki for Blair Mountain, WV, information) and the political class was forced to recognize it.

The Cold War, which had it's planning during the late stages of WW2, was aimed at curbing union power and a lot of the attacks on unions and union members came from unionists themselves, primarily AFL trade union leaders. Red unions and red unionists were thrown out of organized labor with a lot of money to do so coming from various government agencies that still exist and are still anti-worker today - especially anti-class-conscious workers.

That said, there was prosperity even down to the wage earner. In my family there were longshoremen; IBEW electricians; National Maritime Union(later Seafarers); and Fraternal Order of Police. A worker could provide for his family and send kids to college if they wanted and were qualified.

Tuitions were low, so that had to be changed; unions ran shop floors, so that had to be changed; all workers under a collective bargaining agreement were union members, so that had to be changed with right-to-work.

In the 1960s, most union leaders supported our war against the people of South View Nam; most young people did not. Unions also accepted State Dept money to help workers organize under the auspices of the USA approved model. Union leaders liked being considered insiders although they really weren't - they were useful tools of statecraft.


"In the bleakness of the Eisenhower 50s, you'd hitchhike 1000 miles to see a friend"...Gary Snyder.