Some Unwanted Attention

Today the Washington Post reported an odd story regarding John Hinckley Jr., who is still incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital for having attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagan (and seriously wounding others including James Brady) outside the Washington Hilton on March 30, 1981. 
    A court hearing was held today on whether Hinckley ought to remain incarcerated.  At the hearing, Secret Service agent Jason Clickner testified about what transpired when he followed Hinckley on October 16, on one of the periodic excursions Hinckley is granted from the hospital.  The agent reported that on this outing Hinckley entered a Barnes & Noble bookstore, went directly to the History section, and became fixated on a certain book he saw on the shelf there, the blue front cover of which featured a photo of President Reagan in its upper right corner.  Hinckley's fixation on the book gave the agent "goosebumps."  Read this bizarre story in full at this link.  And for CNN's report on the affair click here.

50th Anniversary of Federal Sector Bargaining

Fifty years ago today, on January 17, 1962, President John F. Kennedy signed Executive Order 10988.  That act helped change the course of American labor history by offering most federal workers the opportunity to form unions and bargain collectively for the first time.   At that point, few workers at any level of government had yet gotten their employers to accept collective bargaining.  Wisconsin, the first state to enact a state level law that gave goverment workers the right to bargain, had not done so until 1959.  Kennedy's action built on the Wisconsin precedent, and similar precedents set at the municipal level in New York City and Philadelphia.  Most states and localities had been reluctant to follow the example of these jurisdictions -- that is, until the federal government acted.  Although it applied only to federal workers, Kennedy's order helped break a log jam in states and localities around the country.  Soon more than half of the states followed Wisconsin's example, and city after city emulated New York and Philadelphia.  The largest wave of unionization in the postwar years--the organization of public sector workers--was suddenly underway.
    The Kennedy order has often been portrayed as a reward to organized labor, a quid pro quo offered by the president in return for labor's support in his narrow election victory over Richard M. Nixon in 1960.  As I show in Collision Course, this portrayal of the Kennedy order is filled with distortions.  In many ways the order fell far short of what the labor movement wanted (it did not give unions the right to bargain over wages and benefits, as some legislation being considered by the Congress would have done).  Indeed, labor's key negotiators felt sold out by the wording of the Kennedy order, which did not even mention "collective bargaining."  The defects of the order would create severe problems for one group of federal workers who tried to organize in the early 1960s, air traffic controllers.  The lack of strong protections in the order forced the controllers to become increasingly militant and to form their own independent union, PATCO, in an effort to surmount the problems they faced trying to get the government to listen to them.
     Its glaring defects notwithstanding, the Kennedy order still represented a huge advance over what preceded it.  And it is worth remembering on this anniversary.  Today in the Los Angeles Times I have an editorial considering the significance of this landmark event in U.S. labor history.  You can read my editorial in full here.

PATCO Writers Respond

One of the most interesting parts of my research for this book was discovering the number of fired air traffic controllers who turned to writing to make sense of their experience.  I have learned a lot from these PATCO veterans.  Some wrote novels.  Others wrote memoirs.   Some penned screen plays.  Most of them were never published.  Indeed, most were never finished.  But for many PATCO families, strike veterans, and people curious about what happened in 1981, the memories preserved by these writings can be quite revealing.
     Recently, I heard from two PATCO veterans whose work I read as part of my research.  One of them was Terry Paddack whose novel, Crossing Runways, is pictured above and can be found on Amazon at this link. Terry wrote to say that he had enjoyed Collision Course.  And he shared the review he wrote of the book on Amazon.  "As a fired air traffic controller and PATCO striker, I found myself reliving the emotional and sometimes painful of memories and loss of the people who are no longer with us," he wrote.  I was happy to see Collision Course favorably reviewed in the New York Times, of course.  But the author of that review, Bryan Burrough, had no deep knowledge of air traffic controllers or labor, and certainly had not experienced this story the way Terry did.  So in many ways it is even more gratifying to receive a favorable review from Terry, who, as he said, "lived this story."  You can read his full review here.    
     Most of the PATCO veterans who did write about their experiences either never finished their projects or never brought them to publication.  Still, some of these unpublished works are enormously informative.  One of the best unpublished PATCO memoirs I read was a 428 page manuscript called "One Strike and You're Out," by Robert E. Lambrecht, who worked at Chicago Center.  Robert was the other PATCO writer I've heard from recently.  His own unpublished manuscript was detailed and revealing.  Among other things, it gave me one of the best accounts I found regarding how he and his generation of controllers learned to do the work.  Recently Robert wrote to say he enjoyed my book:  "If there was ever a book written which needs to be considered the 'Bible for Labor' and to be seriously read and understood by Non-management workers in America, it would be Collision Course in my humble opinion," he said.  I'm grateful for his endorsement (and for his encouragement over the years I worked on the book).  He sent a very thoughtful three-page statement on his own experience and reflection 30 years later.  It can be read in full at this link.
   I'm thankful that Terry and Robert took the time to write and I'm very pleased to recommend them and their writing to anyone who wants to learn more about what it was like to live the history I wrote about.  

Remembering in the House of Labor

I was honored to have an opportunity to speak about Collision Course on December 14 in the Samuel Gompers room at the headquarters of the AFL-CIO in an event hosted by the labor federation's president, Richard Trumka.  With me were two former PATCO strikers who lost their jobs in 1981, Elliott Simons, who worked then at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, and Jim Morin, who worked at LaGuardia Airport in New York, as well as Ken Moffett, who headed the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service in 1981, and who hosted the failed negotiations that preceded the controllers' walkout.  It was an emotional event for some of those who had been around in 1981.  Some PATCO strikers felt cut off from the rest of the labor movement thirty years ago, and for them it

The Offer PATCO Rejected: Answering a Query

Recently, I had a very good set of questions directed to me by a PATCO brother, whose knowledge and views I respect, asking about the way I characterized the offer that the Reagan administration made to the union in June 1981 (the offer the union ultimately voted down before deciding to strike).  This brother was skeptical about my account characterizing the offer as precedent-setting.  He remembered the offer as adding nothing at all to what controllers had prior to the strike.  My dialogue with him reminded me that the disjuncture between the way controllers saw the June offer (as giving them very little indeed) and the way neutral observers like the federal mediators Ken Moffett and Brian Flores saw it (they saw it as path-breaking) is one of the enduring puzzles of the PATCO story for those who want to understand the strike.  Which was it?  Path-breaking or completely inadequate?  In fact, as I discovered and explain in my book, the June offer was both.  Explaining this paradox helps put to rest two bogus myths about the strike: 1) that it was the result of controller greed and union overreach on the one hand; or 2) that it was the fruit of a prearranged plan by the Reagan people to trap and destroy PATCO as a way to undermine organized labor altogether.  In fact, neither of these myths is true.   The reality was more complicated, and more tragic.  To explain it, let me begin with the memo pictured above, which was written from Secretary of Transportation Drew Lewis to White House counselor, Ed Meese, on June 11, 1981. (To follow this, read below the jump.) 

One of the "Oklahoma City Five" Remembers

Among the most difficult things that striking air traffic controllers faced in 1981 was the prospect of prosecution for violating the law and leading a work stoppage against the United States government.   In the book, I wrote this about the emotions that one controller's family felt in confronting this prospect:  "As the clocked ticked down toward the strike vote, many tearful conversations took place in controllers' families.  'Daddy may even have to go to jail,' the wife of one Vermont controller told her children.  If he did, they should not 'be ashamed,' she said.  Instead, they should 'be very proud of him,' because if that happened it would be 'for a great cause.'"  

    In reality, of course, the prospect of defying the federal government was frightening, no matter how deeply one believed in the cause.   Recently, I received two e-mails from a controller who did defy the government on August 3, 1981, and suffered for it.  His name is Tim Berlekamp; he is currently President and CEO of Altec Limited, a consulting company that provides sustainable business solutions.  In 1981 he was one of the "Oklahoma City Five," a group of five strikers who were singled out and prosecuted for their actions (such prosecutions happened in a number of cities).  His reflections appear below the jump:

An Actor/Musician Reflects on PATCO, Unions, and Strikes

This week I received an inspiring note from a former student of mine from back when I taught at SUNY-Geneseo.  His name is Lucas Papaelias, and he now makes his living as an actor and musician in New York City.   Lucas was moved by my account of the PATCO strike to talk about his own recent experiences during the 2007 strike by Broadway stagehands, members of Local 1 of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees.  He explains why he supported that strike, even though it might have potentially cost him a chance to appear in a high-profile production with stars Kevin Kline and Jennifer Garner.  He tells that story, goes on to explain how his other union, Local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians, came to his rescue in another dispute, and reflects on the importance of unions for all workers.  Here is what he wrote: 

i was unaware of the scope of the '81 PATCO strike.... i think it is an incredible subject matter and a true American story. it is inspiring, and got me to think of my own experiences.
in fall 2007, at the same time the Screen Actors Guild Writers strike was in full-swing, there was also an unprecedented strike conducted by the Local 1 stagehands union, which shut down most of Broadway for several weeks during november. the Actors Equity Association (my union since '00) was in full support of the strike, which affected me directly; i was making my Broadway debut at the time in a production of Cyrano de