Report on Labor Party Convention and Proposals by Paul Zarembka June 11, 1996 LABOR PARTY FOUNDING CONVENTION--A REPORT AND PROPOSALS Cleveland, Ohio, June 6-9, 1996 by Paul Zarembka, Delegate, United University Professions-Buffalo Chapter/ American Federation of Teachers 2190, and Chair, Labor Party Chapter, Buffalo, New York, for identification purposes only. Prepared for the use of these two union entities and distributed to others for their interest. (716-875-1698 and internet: zarembka@acsu.buffalo.edu). To cut to the chase (as I see it), the Founding Convention of Labor Party adopted a constitution and progressive platform (with two exceptions), determined basically by two union Internationals--Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers (OCAW) and United Electrical (UE). They also controlled voting procedures. If one places structure as more important than platform, the result is an undemocratically achieved, but progressive platform. Is this good enough? The answer is no. WHAT WERE THE UNDEMOCRATIC ASPECTS OF THE FOUNDING CONVENTION? 1. The 1367 Delegates to the convention received no agenda, draft constitution or draft platform in the mail with their credentials, nor before or afterward (drafts had been prepared quite some time earlier and some Delegates received these by indirect sources). Neither was the general membership solicited for their input. 2. Voting strength was not based on persons, but rather by a formula which was neither defended nor presented for any kind of vote by the Convention. Endorsing International Unions received 100 votes each, apart from any voting strength achieved by their individual locals. When queried from the floor, the chair for the Friday morning session ruled that voting procedures had been decided when rules were adopted the prior evening, yet voting procedures had never been introduced into the rules discussion. On the other hand, handling of motions and discussion on the Convention floor was by and large handled democratically (however, see below). 3. a. The constitution proposed at the Convention initially had no "transition period" and would certainly have led to a very small National Council in the next few years, easily able to be dominated by the leadership of a few endorsing Internationals. b. After query from the floor, an Implementation Agreement was produced which mandated that the following union entities would have votes on the National Council: OCAW, UE, Maintenance of Way Employees, Longshoremen and Warehousemen, California State Nurses, American Federation of Government Employees, United Mine Workers, California State Carpenters, Farm Labor Organizing Committee, and "others" to be determined by the Interim National Council (one vote each, as stated in response to query but not explicit in the Implementation Agreement) and one vote for ALL "chapters" divided between five representatives, one-fifth vote each. In other words, the chapters where most of the smaller unions and the unorganized are will be completely overwhelmed. This cannot be encouraging to the mass of humans attaching themselves to the Labor Party through chapters. 4. The National Council will set up voting rules for the next Convention. In other words, voting rules have never been decided by a Convention body. 5. The procedure practiced was for the Constitution or Platform Committee to decide if an amendment was "friendly". If not, it went down to defeat. In fact, only two amendments of any consequence were adopted from the floor (unless I have forgotten something). The first was an addition of an international solidarity clause into the preamble of the Constitution. The second is a classic case of proving the rule: when an amendment on international solidarity was proposed for the platform, the chair first took a voice vote and the amendment was declared defeated (although the voices in favor sounded louder); after a call for division of the house, it was clear that many more voices were in favor but the voting strength of a few endorsing Internationals had swamped the voices; after noise in the hall, the chair declared the amendment passed "to make things easy" (i.e., he arbitrarily nullified the voting strength of the Internationals and so violated procedures he had defended). That chair was Robert Wages, President of the OCAW. WHAT KIND OF PLATFORM? The platform that the leadership decided should be adopted by the Convention is quite progressive, including a guaranteed job and a $10 minimum wage indexed to today's price level; two-months severance pay for every year of service for layoff; repeal Taft-Hartley and greatly strengthed rights to organize, bargain, and strike; end bigotry; universal health care; 32-hour workweek and twenty days mandatory yearly vacation; real protection of families including a guaranteed annual income; free public education at all levels including university and 15 to 1 student-teacher ratios; free trade but only when workers' rights here and abroad are strongly protected (opposition to NAFTA and GATT); end of "corporate welfare"; much increased taxation of the wealthy; revitalized public sector; end to corporate domination of elections; protection of the environment; worker inspectors to enforce safety and health of the workplace; and publicly-funded Technology Democratization Commission (to reclaim the workplace). WHAT WERE TWO MAJOR EXCEPTIONS TO THE PROGRESSIVE CHARACTER OF THE PLATFORM? First, the military budget is left basically untouched with the following wording, "insure adequate national defense". An amendment to reduce the military budget by 50% was defeated. Second, the health care section includes the wording "informed choice and unimpended access to a full range of family planning and reproductive services for men and women". A friendly amendment to change "a" to "the" was not accepted. More significantly, the following amendment was proposed for adoption: "The Labor Party supports safe, legal abortion and believes it is a woman's private decision, and we call for an end to forced sterilization" (the latter portion being added as an amendment to proposed amendment). The main argument in favor was that the existing language on abortion was ambiguous and the Labor Party had to take a clear stand (and that indeed the Democratic Party's stand was clearer), while the main argument against was that the existing language was clear enough without hitting people in the face with a pro-choice statement. The amendment was defeated 629 in favor to 1723 against (there were 1367 Delegates, with 2979 total votes being cast, including fractional votes of many delegates). At this point, Leslie Rockenbach of the Graduate Student Employees Union/Communications Workers of America stated at the microphone that she would have withdraw from the Labor Party until such a time as it would openly support right to abortion. Personally, I think the adopted language is sufficiently ambiguous as to allow the Labor Party leaders to talk out of two sides of their mouths. WHAT ABOUT "ELECTORAL POLITICS"? Many delegates came to the Convention wanting the Labor Party to become involved at least in local elections. The argument in favor was basically that change cannot take place without it and we cannot wait for change. The argument against asserted that the Labor Party needed time to get its act together and that local mistakes could have damaging implications for the party nationally. The argument against was sufficiently important that the leading founder of the Labor Party Advocates Tony Mazzocchi went to the microphone to argue against participation at this stage in electoral politics and even went so far as to say that many of the Internationals which had funded and materially supported LPA and the Founding Convention could not and would not put their resources behind a party which, at this stage, engaged in electoral politics. As almost everyone expected, this argument prevailed for the same structural reasons as I have outlined above regarding how the Convention was organized. I changed my own position during the process of this discussion. I had come to the Convention agreeing not to engage in electoral politics at this stage, but concluded at the Convention that if others felt they were ready locally I did not want a mandate to stop them (the New Party has stated that it is won 94 elections out of 140 it has openly engaged locally). The Longshoresmen's (ILWU) union offered the principal resolution on the electoral issue. I have heard that it only got to the floor when the ILWU threatened to pull out if they were not given the opportunity--I cannot verify this, but I can report that a Longshoresmen's Delegate told me that the OCAW and the UE initially refused to even meet with the ILWU on the issue. In any case, its intervention, although defeated, helped Delegates realize that not all of the Internationals agreed with the OCAW and UE. And one of Longshoresmen's Delegates participated after the Convention was over in helping to organize chapters for the immediate future. ALTERNATIVE PROPOSALS There are three alternative reactions given the deep importance of the structure of a political party. First, a Reform Caucus within the Labor Party could be formed. The OCAW and UE leaderships already have overwhelming control and a coherent alternative has a chance of democratizing the Labor Party. Second, recognizing that the Labor Party itself was founded much later than earlier LPA expectations, a one-step backwards is possible. A lack of enthusiasm at the grass roots level may send the appropriate signal to the OCAW, UE and other leaderships that democratization is not just the right thing to do, but also a necessity for survival and growth. Third, we can sort of ignore the undemocratic aspects, organize and get membership on the National Council. The limitation is that it is easier for top-down Internationals to endorse the Labor Party. FINAL COMMENT: I heard much fear of sectarian interventions. This fear was used to justify the necessity for "control". Personally, however, I found the fear unjustified by what I actually saw (i.e., almost all proposed amendments were not from "flakes" or "crazies" or whatever label you might hear, but from progressives with their own ideas).