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Al Hayes--A Man For the Times
In many ways the 1950's were like the 1920's. Americans
generally were weary of the idealism and sacrifices required by war.
Most wanted little more than to forget the troubles of the world and
get on with their own lives.
The fat '50's were a time of fads, of Davy Crockett hats and
hula hoops, bobby sox and flapping shirttails for girls, crew cuts
or duck tails for boys, gold toothpicks and whiskey-flavored
toothpaste ("for the man who has everything"), Howdy Dowdy
and the "$64,000 Question".
This was the decade in which millions of families left
traditional working class neighborhoods to practice
"Togetherness" in burgeoning suburban Levittown's. It was
also the decade in which the nation's young people turned inward,
onto themselves, in retreat from "Cold War" tensions. In
the face of McCarthy's anti-Communist hysteria the youth of the
'50's became known as the "Silent generation".
Eisenhower was the perfect President for the times. To a
nation seeking to forget depressions and wars he offered a sense of
serene confidence. Although far removed from the roots of his small
town Kansas boyhood and most comfortable in the company of the rich
and powerful, he was seen as a decent human being. Most importantly,
he rocked no boats and issued no clarion calls. He could
say, in all sincerity, that "only a fool would try to deprive
working men and working women of the right to join the union of
their choice." And yet while the nation's steel workers were on
strike, he would not hesitate to go on a golfing vacation with the
magnates who ran the steel industry. Seen as a father figure
Eisenhower became the first Republican President in the century to
serve two full terms. Just as Eisenhower was the right man
for the time for America, Albert John Hayes was the right man for
the time for the IAM. Like Eisenhower, Hayes radiated a sense of
calm confidence. Unlike Harvey Brown, who charged head-on into every
real or suspected challenge Hayes preferred conciliation to
controversy. Al Hayes was 49 years old when he succeeded
Harvey Brown. Except for the UAW's Walter Reuther he was the
youngest chief of any major union in America. Two pictures on his
office wall symbolized the convictions that guided him to the IAM's
highest office. The first was Bob LaFollette the elder, the great
Progressive from Hayes' home state of Wisconsin. The other was
Franklin D. Roosevelt whose New Deal rescued America's working
people from the worst depression in history. Born on
Valentine's Day, 1900, to immigrant German parents in Milwaukee,
Hayes was the seventh in a family of ten children.* Like so many
first generation children in those days, Al Hayes grew up speaking
two languages. He was an exceptionally bright student and a highly
competitive third baseman who remained a fierce competitor
throughout his life. Hayes apparently hoped to be the first of his
family to graduate from college. But this hope ended abruptly when
his father was permanently and totally crippled by a freak accident
in the coal yard where he worked as foreman. In his early teens
Hayes had enrolled in extension courses in economics and history at
the University of Wisconsin. But with his help desperately needed at
home he was forced to go to work. Settling on a machinist
apprenticeship as his best choice for a lifetime career he got a job
with the West Milwaukee shops of the Milwaukee Railroad. Though only
17 years old Hayes leadership qualities soon emerged. He became the
chosen spokesman for the other apprentice boys. When they formed a
committee to protest failure by foremen to provide proper journeyman
training they elected Hayes to go and present their grievances to
higher management. |
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Hayes joined Lodge 234 as soon as his journeyman papers made him
eligible for IAM membership. According to the custom of the time he
boomed around to get wider shop experience in various skills of the
trade. In 1921 he returned to Milwaukee where he went to work for
the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad. Transferring his membership
to Lodge 1052 Hayes was settling into the life of a newlywed when
300,000 railroad shopmen, including 79,000 IAM members, hit the
bricks in the Great Railroad Strike which began on July 1, 1922. For
the next three months, he walked the picket line by day. With his
young bride, Lil, expecting, he also hustled from door to door
selling brushes by night. When the strike was called off in the
middle of October he returned to the Chicago and Northwestern. After
gaining experience as shop chairman in several shops he was elected
president of District Lodge 7 two years later. When the National
Recover Act (NRA) opened the way for a resurgence of union
organizing in 1934, Arthur Wharton tapped him for the Grand Lodge
staff. During the next decade Hayes organized and negotiated
throughout an area stretching from Port Huron in the east to Rapid
City in the west, from Minot in the north to St. Joe in the south.
Throughout those fast moving years, he negotiated many of the IAM's
first contracts with such large midwestern companies as American
Brass, Nash-Kelvinator and the Simmons Company. In 1944 he moved up
to the Executive Council and a year later Harvey Brown brought him
to Grand Lodge as resident GVP.
Though of average height Hayes was so powerfully built in the
torso and shoulders, he seemed, at first glance, to be larger than
he actually was. Conscious of his image as the IAM's IP he dressed
carefully and conservatively and carried himself with dignity. Calm
and unruffled by disposition he could, when challenged, be as hard
as nails. If angered Hayes could freeze and adversary with an icy
glare. On the whole, however, he was completely comfortable with
himself and communicated a sense of serenity to others. As a speaker
he was poised and polished, preferring to make his points through
reason rather than emotion. As a parliamentarian he was peerless.
The four Grand Lodge Conventions he chaired were long remembered as
models of democratic trade unionism in action. While smoothly
steering proceedings past pitfalls set up by union hall
"lawyers" he would leave even those who opposed him
feeling he had been completely fair.
Called to serve ever more frequently on various governmental
boards and advisory commissions he developed many friendships among
the nation's business and political leaders. Though he moved easily
among the rich and powerful, Hayes never lost touch with the
rank-and-file in his own union. Representatives of other unions were
sometimes surprised by the ease with which he was approached and the
informality with which he was treated by IAM staffers. On the whole
the IAM members considered Al Hayes a very classy guy. And they were
proud to have him at the head of their union.
Politically progressive and steeped in the tradition of
old-fashioned Milwaukee socialism, Hayes nevertheless believed labor
and management in America have more in common than contention, more
on which to agree than disagree. His economic philosophy could be
summed up simply and briefly: A nation's prosperity begins with its
work force. Throughout his long career Al Hayes tried to persuade
government and business that higher wages, being the essential spur
to higher consumption and productivity, lead to greater prosperity
for everyone. Having personally suffered the hardships of the
disastrous shopmen's strike of 1922 he was convinced that unions
should try to win higher wages and better working conditions through
negotiations, not strikes. As a long-time member of the inner
councils of the labor movement, first in the AFL and later the
AFL-CIO, Hayes was dedicated both to greater unity within the labor
movement and grater understanding between labor and management.
Return to the House of Labor Throughout the
period of the IAM's disaffiliation from the AFL, Machinist
organizers more than held their own in recruiting new members and
winning representation elections. An especially gratifying victory
was scored in the Fall of '49 in an organizing drive directed by GVP
Earl Melton, when several thousand machinists on the Pennsylvania
Railroad voted for the IAM two to one over a contending CIO union.
This recaptured the last of the units that were destroyed on the
railroads in 1922. Equally encouraging was a hard-fought win at
Republic Aviation on Long Island the following year. Republic was
one of the last major holdouts against unionization in the air frame
industry. A number of previous organizing attempts by the IAM as
well as other unions had all failed. Altogether the IAM won 397 NLRB
elections--an average of more than one a day--in Hayes' firs year as
International President. Undoubtedly the sweetest victory was the
stunning upset over the combined opposition of the company and the
Teamsters at Boeing. Despite this success in going it alone
Hayes intended, from the minute he took office, to take the IAM back
to its traditional home in the AFL. Like most craft trade unionists
of his generation Hayes was emotionally attached to the memory of
the incomparable Gompers. He had not only grown up in the House of
Labor but, man and boy, had fought side by side with other AFL union
against enemies ranging from the NAM and the NMTA to the IWW and the
CIO. With Harvey Brown gone and the Old Guard at the AFL
passing from the scene the time was ripe for re-affiliation. Hayes
was too cunning, however, to return without getting solid guarantees
for the future. For months he played it cool in parleys and
correspondence with Green. At one point he bluntly made it
clear that Green's radio speech in support for Teamster's scabbing
in the Boeing strike had soured many IAM members. The
anti-affiliation mood was especially strong in the Pacific
Northwest. Hayes warned Green "Unless a way can be found to
compose our differences within a reasonable time the passing years
will make it more difficult to find a solution." He also
assured Green that the IAM was not suing for peace because of any
internal financial or membership problems but solely because of
"a sincere desire to contribute to a united labor
movement." The IAM's bargaining position during these
months of negotiation was strengthened by a series of favorable NLRB
calls in cases involving jurisdictional disputes with the
Carpenters. In Redondo Beach, California, for example, the
Carpenters struck Westinghouse Electric to force replacement of IAM
erection Machinists with Carpenter millwrights. In a
precedent-setting decision the Board officially denied the Carpenter
claim. This decision was soon followed by similar rulings--and back
pay awards to IAM members--in cases ranging from Buffalo and
Syracuse to Decatur, Portland and Fort Worth. The IAM's
success in enforcing its jurisdiction pushed the AFL toward
significant concessions. In March 1950, Green agreed to withdraw a
letter giving the Operating Engineers jurisdiction over certain work
on ships which traditionally belonged to the IAM. He also agreed to
notify the Building Trades Department, in writing, that it had no
authority to render decisions in jurisdictional disputes affecting
unions not affiliated with it. The Federation further agreed that
the IAM could return without payment of back per capita. With
these and other favorable terms in hand, Hayes called the IAM's
field staff of 484 GLR's, business reps and general chairmen to
Chicago. He told them he would recommend that the members approve
re-affiliation in a union-wide referendum. In December 1950, after
five years as an independent, the members voted by a four to one
margin to return to the AFL. |
