In my early 20's I participated in an attempt to organize the drapery factory where I worked. I actually believed that the National Labor Relations(NLR) was an agency that protected the rights of Labor. I know, I know, but I was young and niaive back then.
Even worse than that, we went to the local Teamster's Union and solicited their help. When I arrived at the union hall I noticed a group of women marching with picket signs. It turned out to be the Teamster's secretaries demanding better pay and the right to organize. Sheesh!
The story gets even worse. Thinking we had about 120 employees eligible to form a union, the Teamsters were right there urging us on and advising us. But after the NLR ruled that a large portion of our members were not eligible to belong to our union, we had exactly five of us still able to organize. Suddenly the Teamsters lost interest.
I remember the Teamster agent, a Mister Lamb, calling me and saying, "You go in there and vote for the union. If you lose, we'll take care of you."
"Like you've taken care of us so far?" I asked. After polling our five eligible employees the vote looked to be 3 to 2 in favor of the company.
I went to the other fellow willing to stand his ground and said, "You and I can vote the right way and then we'll be out of work and we will be the only losers. Or we can vote for the company and still have our jobs and the luxury of time to find better work".
The paper ran a small article the next day declaring that the employees of Bartmann and Bixer of the Northwest, Inc. had voted unaminously in favor of not organizing.
Was it a sellout? Or had the Teamsters sold us out and forced us to vote the way we did? Who will ever know. But the boss called me in after the dust had settled and gave me a 75 cent an hour pay raise. That was a princely amount considering I was earning $1.85 cents and the new pay raised me to $2.60 per hour.
Curious Carl
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