Saul Rosen - ILGWU Heritage Project
- Interviewer: Saul Rosen
- Date: June 12, 2009
- Recordings: 1 part; 1:43:09
Biographical Information
Born June 8, 1932, Buenos Aires, Argentina, to East European Jewish immigrant parents. The family they moved to join relatives in Boston when Saul was six. His mother was a homemaker who did some alterations, his father a factory worker. He describes himself as apolitical throughout his school years; he was drafted into the Korean War, and went to Boston University on returning ('54 or '55). Worked with both Adlai Stevenson campaigns ('52 and '56) and then joined the labor movement as a means of remaining/becoming socially active. Following a cousin, he joined ILGWU Training Institute in 1958, where he trained under Gus Tyler, David Wells, Evelyn Dubrow, and Philip Taft, followed by six months' organizing work in St. Louis. He worked under Leon Stein on the ILGWU organ, Justice, from 1959-64. He served ILGUW as, successively, Eastern District education director, 1964-1970, Westchester-Rockland district manager, 1970-1976, and associate director of the Education and Political Department for the International, 1976-1989. In 1989, he left the ILGWU to become the associate executive director of the Consortium for Workers' Education, which he had helped found while still on the union staff. He retired in 2004. He served for three years as national chairman of the American Veterans' Committee. He is married to a fashion designer.
Abstract
Rosen discusses his family and educational background in Boston, and his growing interest in political and social issues. He describes the ILGWU training program and organizing for the union in St. Louis. Rosen talks about the nature of the union's publication, Justice, and its relationship to the members and to the union's foreign-language organs. Rosen was not involved in FOUR, but discusses some of its leaders. He discusses accusations of discrimination against minorities made against ILGWU in the 60s, and the policies and realities within the union at the time, as well as division of labor and paths of promotion within the union, both for craft workers and staff officers. He was involved with leadership training and the organization thereof at the local and central levels. Learning Spanish in his training courses led to his conviction of the importance of Spanish-language literature in reaching out to the increasing numbers of Latino/a workers. He discusses the impact of imports at the local level. As district manager, he attempted to spread the word about politicizing at the local level in order to combat the threat which imports posed to the industry. He was involved in mounting a major campaign for the awareness and combating of imports, including national mobilization and anti-import rallies in Washington D.C. and elsewhere. Cooperation with the Amalgamated was involved. He was also engaged in the congressional campaigns of Richard Ottinger and Ogden Reid. He discusses the transfer between the presidencies of Dubinsky and Stulberg, and the different tenor of each; also discusses the personality and leadership style of Tyler. Cofounded the Consortium for Workers' Education, where delegates from ILGWU, Amalgamated, and the Teamsters' Union, among others, got funding and facilities to provide classes for dislocated workers (both union and non-union). He mentions Dubinsky's engagement in the Liberal Party and his advocacy for both John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, as well as Stulberg's subsequent easing the International away from the political arena at that level. The Consortium for Worker Education's involvement in assisting small-business recovery in the aftermath of 9/11 is also discussed, as are Rosen's activities as national chairman of the American Veterans' Committee, which he joined after his return from the Korean War. He also briefly discusses the situation of the labor movement in the United States relative to that in other industrialized nations, and his own experience of anti-union campaigns.
Mentioned: Burton Berinsky, Ray Bramucci, Gus Tyler, Eddie Kramer, Herbert Hill, Local 22, Peter Detlefsen, George Girendal [?], Sal Giardina, Sol Chaikin, Jay Mazur, Jay Lovestone, Jack Sheinkman
Project Description
The ILGWU Heritage Project documents the history of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union by collecting oral histories from retired union officers and staff. It is funded by a grant from the 21st Century ILGWU Heritage Fund (Jay Mazur, president; Muzaffar Chishti, director) to Fordham University.
Part 1, 1:43:09
Transcript
[0:00:00]
Soyer:
OK, we're good. So, this is Daniel Soyer interviewing Saul Rosen, on June 12, 2009. So, where I've been beginning with everyone, is to ask them to tell me a little bit about your background, where were you born, where'd you grow up, tell me something about your family.
Rosen:
I was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, grew up in Boston, where I went to school. My family were Eastern European, sometimes Russia, sometimes Poland, I guess depending on where the Cossacks were at the time. They traveled from there -- my father was trying to avoid military duty with the Russian army at the time, went to Buenos Aires, and as the story is related to me, simply because that's where the next ship was going. And, we're down there for, about 10 or 12 years, I guess, that's where I was born. But my father had two brothers, two older brothers, who were living in Boston at the time, and they arranged for the family to come up to Boston, went there when I was six years old.
Soyer:
When were you born?
Rosen:
1932. And --
Soyer:
What's your birth date?
Rosen:
Oh, June 8, 1932. Yeah. Just had a birthday a few days ago. Yeah, yeah.
Soyer:
So, go ahead.
Rosen:
Came to Boston, actually a section of Boston known as Dorchester. At the time, it was ethnically divided between the Irish and the Jews, and politically, a very active community. John Kennedy campaigned there, Speaker McCormack came from Ward 14, which included Dorchester at the time, and that's where I went to school.
Soyer:
Were you -- did your family have any labor movement background, or political --
Rosen:
No.
Soyer:
-- affiliation?
Rosen:
In fact, no, but we were always a family of the left. I'm a man of the left, I had been all my life, and unlike the traditional which is a slow movement to the right, as most lefties do, I've gone maybe even further to the left.
Soyer:
Oh, OK.
Rosen:
I've bucked the trend, yeah.
Soyer:
Did your parents have any affiliations --
Rosen:
No.
Soyer:
-- with the --
Rosen:
They were apolitical, they were both apolitical, except that, FDR was the savior. That's the extent of their politics, and they voted, of course, in every election, they voted Democratic.
Soyer:
What did they do for a living?
Rosen:
My mother was a homemaker, she stayed at home, although she did take in some clothing repairs, women's clothing. She did alterations. My father was a factory worker.
Soyer:
Was he a union man?
Rosen:
No, there was no union at the time.
Soyer:
What kind of factory?
Rosen:
Made luggage.
Soyer:
And you went to, I guess, a public high school?
Rosen:
Yes.
Soyer:
Were you active in politics then?
Rosen:
No, I did not become active in politics until after school. Actually, I was drafted, and when I came back from the army, that's when I became aggressive in politics.
Soyer:
And you were drafted during Korea?
Rosen:
Korean War, yeah.
Soyer:
And did you go to college, or university?
Rosen:
Yeah.
Soyer:
Where did you go?
Rosen:
Boston University, B.U.
Soyer:
And you were active there?
Rosen:
No, I was not.
Soyer:
Not at all?
Rosen:
At that time, there were no dorms at B.U. it was a 100% commuter school.
Soyer:
How did you -- how did you start to get involved in -- which came first, the labor movement, or the politics?
Rosen:
I think the politics came first, I got active in the Stevenson 1952 campaign, and carried right over into 1956, and of course, the two losing campaigns, and then saw, wanting to become socially active, saw the labor movement as a good pathway for me, for myself. I had an older cousin who had gone to the ILGW training institute. He told me about it, I applied, went to the trading institute, and that's how I came along with the ILG and the labor movement.
Soyer:
Did you -- what was your career path up to that time?
Rosen:
I got out of the army in -- I'm trying to think -- it was around 1954, 1955, and went to the ILG training institute in 1958, and in the interim,
[05:00]
I just did odd jobs here and there. There was no -- it was not a career path, nothing that could be identified as such.
Soyer:
And you had already graduated from college?
Rosen:
Yes.
Soyer:
What did you study in college?
Rosen:
History and English.
Soyer:
So, that didn't prepare you for --
Rosen:
Certainly didn't, no, except for some studies of socialist movements around the world.
Soyer:
So, you just heard about the training institute --
Rosen:
Right, from my cousin.
Soyer:
From your cousin.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
Who was your cousin?
Rosen:
His name was Burton Berinsky.
Soyer:
OK, did he work for the union after --
Rosen:
He did. Yep. He became the photographer for the union -- became the photographer for the union publication, for Justice, but before that, he was a business representative, a business agent, in New Jersey.
Soyer:
So, you were accepted into the Institute. What kind of things --
Rosen:
Not easily, but I was accepted.
Soyer:
Why wasn't it easy?
Rosen:
Because, during some interviews, my application, during some interviews, I was actually rejected, and they never give a reason why, at least they didn't give me a reason why. It's like being rejected for a judgeship, or something like that. I think the reason was that they were looking for some street people, some organizers, somebody who could handle themselves at a factory, and they didn't see me as that sort of an individual, so they turned me down. A story, that a friend of mine Ray Bramucci likes to tell, he was a classmate of mine. I don't know if the name means anything --
Soyer:
I've heard, yeah, several people have mentioned him.
Rosen:
Yeah, he was Assistant Secretary of Labor, with the Clinton administration. But, Ray was in the class with me. He likes to tell the story that I was rejected for the Institute, and the first day at the Institute, they were taking attendance, and they went around the room, and nobody called out my name because I was not supposed to be there, and somebody finally asked me what I was doing there. I told them, I gave them my name, and they said, "But, you were rejected from the Institute." And my response is, "I know, you made a mistake." And they just let me stay there.
Soyer:
So, you just showed up.
Rosen:
Just showed up.
Soyer:
That probably showed them that you were actually the right kind of material.
Rosen:
Maybe so, I don't know.
Soyer:
So, what kind of things did you learn at the Institute?
Rosen:
Any number of things -- of course contracts, history of the labor movement, contracts and contract enforcement, and the roles of different people, the hierarchy in the union, a lot of Spanish language classes. At that time, the Spanish population in the industry was growing by leaps and bounds, and the Institute organizers, Gus Tyler ran the institute at the time, decided that Spanish was a necessary, a need, for anybody who was going to be active in the union. So, it's Spanish. The Institute was a one-year institute, evenly divided between six months of classroom work, and six months of field work, and all the students -- I would guess around 18, 20 people in the class -- and all the students were assigned to a different area of the union, anywhere in the country, West Coast, anywhere else in the country, were assigned to work there, with the staff there, for a six month period.
Soyer:
Who were the other students? Were there any Spanish-speaking students?
Rosen:
Sure, there was some. Yeah, yeah
Soyer:
Who were the other students? Were they mostly college --
Rosen:
No, no --
Soyer:
-- graduates, or from the shops --
Rosen:
-- as a matter of fact, people came from the shops, yeah. I remember, a couple of classmates of mine were former cutters, who came to the Institute. There were some from college. There were a couple of sewing machine operators, I remember a couple of women from Pennsylvania as I recall, who were in my class at the Institute.
Soyer:
And who were the instructors?
Rosen:
Gus was an instructor, David Wells was an instructor, Evelyn -- these names will mean something to you, of course. Evelyn Dubrow was an instructor, and there were some people from the University, I'm trying to think of -- Philip -- historian, whose name eludes me now. I'll probably think of it before the afternoon is out.
Soyer:
So, you got six months of classroom instruction. Where were you sent --
Rosen:
I was sent to St. Louis. I worked in St. Louis
[10:00]
with some organizers there.
Soyer:
What went on there? What were your goals, what were you trying to do there?
Rosen:
Well, they immediately assigned me to the organization director there, and I worked with him, and we did typical organizing work. In front of the factory, early in the morning, handing out leaflets, house-visiting in the evenings, from working in the factory, and it was always, would you like to join our lovely union?
Soyer:
What kind of -- what element were the workers?
Rosen:
Mid-western.
Soyer:
Native born?
Rosen:
Yeah, native born, very few immigrants. I don't recall many immigrants, at all.
Soyer:
Did you find it easy to connect with them?
Rosen:
They were hospitable. There was no hostility there, no door slammed in the face. It wasn't easy doing, but no real threats to somebody that was trying to organize a union.
Soyer:
How about the employers? What were the employers like?
Rosen:
The employers were typically Midwestern, but many of them had migrated to the Midwest, and they were Eastern employers, who had migrated there, or contractors primarily. There were very few manufacturers, in situ within the Midwest.
Soyer:
So, how long were you in St. Louis?
Rosen:
Six month period.
Soyer:
And then --
Rosen:
Back to the training institute, to complete the classroom work, and Philip Taft was the name of the person I was trying to name.
Soyer:
You know, it sounded familiar.
Rosen:
Yeah, yeah, Philip Taft --
Soyer:
(overlapping dialogue; inaudible) labor historian.
Rosen:
Yeah, yeah. And to complete the classroom work, finished it, and got an assignment.
Soyer:
Now, in your -- you sent me your CV --
Rosen:
Yeah.
Soyer:
And the first job that was as editor of a union publication.
Rosen:
Yeah, editor might be misleading. The publication had an editor, Leon Stein, was the editor of Justice, and he had -- there were about three or four of us who worked under Leon there, but we all had the title of editor, that's what we were called.
Soyer:
So, is that your first job?
Rosen:
That was the first job, yeah.
Soyer:
Did you have any journalistic experience?
Rosen:
No, but because of my background, being facile with language, with English, I just assumed it was something I could do. At that time, there was a trend. It was supported by Gus Tyler, primarily. It was a trend to get the institute of graduates in different areas of the union, not just to limit them to field work, as organizers, or business agents, but get them to work, the political department, with Justice, and so on, and my assignment was with Justice.
Soyer:
So, what were your duties with Justice, what was the (overlapping dialogue; inaudible)?
Rosen:
Mostly rewrite and editing. We would get material from around the country, from the different affiliates, who were either in an organizing campaign, or were doing something special politically, or made some political endorsements, and so on, and we're sending this material they would want, in the international publication. And we had an editing standard, like the style book of The Times, and we had an editing standard, and I would just do a rewrite of the material that came in -- sometimes it was not as literate as we would want it to be.
Soyer:
Did you ever go out and report on events?
Rosen:
Not frequently at all. It was a rare occasion. Occasionally, there would be something special, like a major meeting of a joint board of a large affiliate, and we would cover it in the field, but mostly it was a rewrite of material that was sent into us.
Soyer:
What was it like to work for Leon Stein?
Rosen:
Leon was a very congenial person, very easy to get along with, very easy to work with.
Soyer:
What kind of readers -- readers obviously were the members of the union, but did you have any goals in terms of how they should be reached, or what you were trying to say to them, or to teach them --
Rosen:
Well, it was a --
Soyer:
-- convince them?
Rosen:
-- clearly a free publication, and it was distributed nationwide to all the members, and we just gave it to affiliates, and told them, give it out in the shops, keep them in the office, let people pick up a copy when they come by.
Soyer:
Was it strictly news about the union, or did you have features?
Rosen:
No, we had features. There was occasional political news, particularly in season, election season, there was always some political news, and there were features about -- what would a feature be? A particular affiliate who was doing something special with a training course, or something like that.
[15:00]
Soyer:
What kind of mix was there, of industry news, of union news, political news -- what role did politics play?
Rosen:
Not a major role, except in election season, but it was mostly industry news, was mostly industry news, about contract negotiations, because they were going on around the clock, throughout the country.
Soyer:
Did you ever have contact with Dubinsky or the top leadership?
Rosen:
Rarely. Leon did, he went to see Dubinsky practically everyday, when Dubinsky was around, but not for me. I did encounter Dubi -- one story that I recall, I encountered Dubinsky once in the elevator, going up to work in the morning, and he was carrying a copy of the Daily News, and I asked him, "How come you're reading the Daily News?" He just looked at me, and said, "I read what the workers read," which is classic Dubinsky.
Soyer:
In those days, there were a lot of newspapers.
Rosen:
Oh, yeah, at least half a dozen in New York City.
Soyer:
Right.
Rosen:
Yeah, we had the Times, and the News, and the Journal-American, and Herald-Tribune, the Post of course. At that time, the Post was not a fiction instrument.
Soyer:
Right. At that time, the Post was very liberal -- was a liberal --
Rosen:
Exactly, sure.
Soyer:
-- afternoon paper.
Rosen:
Yeah, Dolly Schiff.
Soyer:
Did you have any contact with the foreign language organs of the --
Rosen:
I knew them, they were in the building, and I knew them. Giustizzia, we had an Italian language Justice, and a Spanish language Justice, and I knew the editors of both of them. They were just one or two personnel operations, because they had limited distribution.
Soyer:
But, Gerekhtikayt, the Yiddish --
Rosen:
Was gone.
Soyer:
-- was closed.
Rosen:
Yeah, right.
Soyer:
Probably, like right around the time you came, or just before.
Rosen:
Just before I got there, as I remember it, yeah.
Soyer:
Did they - did Giustizzia, and Justicia, print pretty much the same kind of material?
Rosen:
They tried to print stuff that was a little more slanted towards the ethnic background, but pretty much the same stuff. The contract negotiation covers everybody, not just one ethnic group, so pretty much the same stuff.
Soyer:
Did you have editorial meetings, or did you just get assignments from Leon Stein?
Rosen:
No, there were occasionally editorial meetings, yeah, about what would be the feature, what would be the highlight for the next issue.
Soyer:
Was there any story, or anything, that you remember, that was kind of a highlight in your journalistic career?
Rosen:
No, nothing really stands out. It all got to be pretty routine.
Soyer:
So, how long were you with the newspaper?
Rosen:
As I recall it, it was about three years. Yeah, no more than that, about three years.
Soyer:
From '50 --
Rosen:
'50... Well, let's say '59 to '62, or something like that. Roughly.
Soyer:
That was around the time that there was controversy with FOUR.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
Were you involved in FOUR at all?
Rosen:
No, the FOUR organizers, the people who were most active in FOUR, Gus Sedares, Marty -- last name eludes me, guy from Pennsylvania -- but they thought that administration people were not what FOUR was after, they were not primary subjects for a FOUR campaign. I suppose, because we were not field people, and that's what they were looking to do, was organize the people in the field, organizers, business agents, and the like, and they may have thought that given the nature of our work, we were more administration-oriented, and we would be the field operatives.
Soyer:
Were you part -- there was an office union.
Rosen:
Yes.
Soyer:
Were you part of the office union?
Rosen:
No, that was just strictly for office workers. I'm trying to think, it was local 153 was it?
Soyer:
That's the Office and Professional Union.
Rosen:
Yeah, right. No, we're not members of that either. I was a member of the ILGW.
Soyer:
Did you have to become a member of the ILGW?
Rosen:
Did not, as I recall it, I just remember that, according to the Constitution, officers were supposed to become members of the union. And I did, automatically, never gave it a thought.
Soyer:
But did you cover FOUR for Justice? Did Justice ever run anything about FOUR, or did it not talk about internal controversies?
[20:00]
Rosen:
I seem to recall that they did. I'm not quite certain, but I think, what they did, was set forth the administration position, that unions were for workers, and officers of the union were not considered workers, missionaries was their role.
Soyer:
Was there -- is there a difference between an officer and a staff member? This is something that's come up -- I haven't actually asked anyone point black, this, but it seems to me there've been people who were kind of on a staff track, and there are people on an officer track, but there are some people who switch back and forth a little bit. In other words, they, they would have, let's say, they'd be in the journalistic department, legal department, clinical department, and they weren't really officers, they were -- they considered themselves staff members, and they continued along that path. Others, maybe were moving from business agent to manager, eventually move up to kind of vice president, or things like this, on an officer track. Does that make sense at all?
Rosen:
Yeah, I think that describes it accurately, sure. The office of personnel were the ones who were in the field, and they may have been organizers, or business agents, or education directors in the field, who if they moved up, if they were promoted, however that would've happened, might have been assistant manager, might have been manager, and some managers are local, some manager's affiliates, eventually were elected to the general executive board.
Soyer:
But then some people moved over. It seems to me, like for example, you were working for the newspaper, that sounds to me like a professional role --
Rosen:
Right, that was a staff position.
Soyer:
-- journalistic, kind of staff position, but then you did become, I guess, education director.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
And you were a manager, a district manager --
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
-- so, that kind of moves over, I think, into the, as you call it, the field role.
Rosen:
Right. And then I moved back again, when I went back to work for the International Political Education Department. So, I did make that kind of a switch. I worked for Justice, I worked there for a couple of years, it was routine work, it was satisfying, but it was what it was. There was no moving from there. I knew -- from my position, from my work, I knew a number of field officers, I knew a number of general executive board members, one of them being the general executive board member from the Eastern region, name was Edward Kramer, Eddie Kramer, and Eddie needed an education director. His office was in our same building, 1710 Broadway, and he approached me, the job, and it was enticing, it was an attractive offer. It would get me more into the kind of union work that I was interested in, and so I accepted, and became education director for the Eastern region.
Soyer:
You were never education director for any particular local?
Rosen:
No.
Soyer:
Did each local have their own education director?
Rosen:
Virtually every local had an education director, yeah.
Soyer:
Did you encounter any resentment or anything, that you had bypassed that, and gone directly from your other staff position, to regional director?
Rosen:
None whatsoever, nobody ever mentioned it to me. No, I always accepted. One of my roles in the Eastern region, was to be active at the different locals in Connecticut, in New Jersey, and in upstate New York, and I was welcomed by all the managers, in all the staff, in all those areas. Never any resentment, whatsoever, not an iota.
Soyer:
What were your duties as education director?
Rosen:
See to it that the local education director, if there was one, and not every local had an education director, but see that the locals themselves, undertook certain kind of training programs, training programs for the membership, the duties, of shop chairperson, for example, they were all called chairladies at the time. But, the duties of a shop chairperson, the duties of a local executive board, what a local executive board would undertake at their regular meetings. The executive boards usually met at least once a month, sometimes more than that. They, they, and of course, I was not an instrument to introduce this kind of thing to the locals, because they already existed, they were already there.
Soyer:
Did you have direct contact with the members?
Rosen:
Sure sometimes, certainly with the executive boards, and in case, I would go into the shops.
Soyer:
And the shops, to give classes, or --
[25:00]
Rosen:
No, I would not personally give the class. The local staff would give the class.
Soyer:
So, why would you go into the shops?
Rosen:
Because, I was welcomed by some of the staff. I'm going to this factory, come along with me.
Soyer:
So, is the educational program mostly about training for leadership, or did you have also kind of enrichment courses that you say were broader, kind of political, or cultural courses?
Rosen:
Well, I don't know if they were cultural. Certainly, history of the union, background of the union, some of the history of the industry itself, beginning with the invention of the sewing machine, I guess, and going from there, and then, of course, there would be some classes in why the union is active in politics, why it was a necessity, so people would understand.
Soyer:
Did the Liberal Party figure into those kinds of classes?
Rosen:
Did not, no, but the Liberal Party, as you are aware, was certainly a different instrument in those days, than what it became, and what it is today, as it still is.
Soyer:
I'd like to come back to that, but who were the workers at this time, in the region?
Rosen:
Well, initially as you know, the workers were either Jewish or Italian, primarily. And they were either Mediterranean or Eastern European. By this time, by the late '50s, by the early '60s, the Jewish population started dwindling, and so did some of the Italian population, and some African-American and Latino and Latina members started coming into the industry, and that was pretty much the ethnic breakdown. I would say the majority still was Italian, Jewish -- talking about the Eastern region of course, because that's the membership that I dealt with.
Soyer:
Did you have English classes for the members, just as the Institute had Spanish classes? Did you ever have English classes for people?
Rosen:
No, but there's a very funny story that you may not have heard, that goes back long ago. But, when the union was first organized, when the union was first formed, we had Italian locals, and we had Jewish locals, and they conducted meetings in Italian, and Jewish, they had their own publications, and of course, so on. And the biggest Jewish local, was local 22, the dressmakers local in New York City, and about this time, there was the Northern migration of African-Americans from the South, into the bigger cities, and some of them began to come into the factories in New York City. And this posed a dilemma for the leadership of local 22, because the object was of course to get these new members active in the activities of the union, get them involved, but the classes would -- the members meetings were conducted in Yiddish, so who is that going to help? And some of the officers in local 22 had a brainstorm. Why don't we teach the African-Americans Yiddish, so they could be part of it. Have you heard this story before?
Soyer:
No, no.
Rosen:
Yeah. It didn't happen, of course, but it was a pretty wild idea.
Soyer:
By the early '60s, as you said, there were a lot of Latino workers --
Rosen:
Sure.
Soyer:
-- more and more, and at least for awhile, there were some African-American workers, and the union was accused, in the early '60s, by Herbert Hill and by Powell, some others, of discriminating, or --
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
-- discriminating, or at least condoning, or tolerating discrimination. I was wondering if you had any context -- with that issue at the time.
Rosen:
I was aware of it, certainly, yeah. Herbert Hill, who was labor secretary for the NAACP, and who I think had an anti-union bias --
Soyer:
Anti-union in general, or anti-ILG?
Rosen:
Well, specifically ILGWU, but I think anti-union in general, he just did not see the labor movement in the United States as being hospitable to minority groups in the United States. There was something to that, of course, but it was not as widespread as he made it out to be, and certainly not specifically the ILGWU. Did we have a fast track for integrating minorities, and putting them on a leadership position? Not as much as it should've been, we'll put it that way, but certainly there were no
[30:00]
racists in the ILGWU who specifically said, we don't want that "element," as Herbert Hill would call it, in the union.
Soyer:
I think there were two kinds of accusations, one was in terms of the union organization itself, that they weren't bringing in blacks, and Hispanics, into the leadership, and there was also the problem of enabling workers to advance within the industry, to move, let's say, from less-skilled jobs, into cutting, or whatever the locals were keeping them out.
Rosen:
The major craft in the industry was sewing machine operator, obviously. Sewing machine operator, there were very few opportunities for sewing machine operators, say, I'd like to be a cutter, or I'd like to be a presser, something like that. In some cases, it actually did take place. Certainly, outside of New York City, it was widespread. I can recall in Pennsylvania, the pressers were virtually all women, rather than men, but that was not the case in New York City. A track to become a cutter, that would take place within the cutter's local. People would be recruited for them to the cutter's local, and give them classes on how to become a cutter, that did take place.
Soyer:
So, it was more like a craft union, working like the building trades unions, where you through the local, you apprentice, and become a member of the craft.
Rosen:
Right, you were recruited, and became part of that craft, right. Of course, the actual training took place in the shops. That's where you learned how to do, what you wanted to do.
Soyer:
Could the union have done more to integrate --
Rosen:
I think it's safe to say, you could always have done more.
Soyer:
So, who taught the actual classes when you were educational director, and where did the materials come from?
Rosen:
The materials were generated by the political education department, came out of Gus Tyler's, and David Wells', and Evelyn Dubrow's office, the classes were taught by staff at the local level, materials were provided by the international, but then the locals generated their own materials, they knew exactly what they wanted to do, what they wanted to accomplish, and it was left to them.
Soyer:
Did people leading classes have any pedagogical training, did they get any pedagogical training, were there any tips even just how to teach a class, or did they --
Rosen:
There was actually material of that kind too, and there were lesson plans that were provided. I have a huge folder still at home. Yeah, the lesson plans, on topics like, how to communicate, what is communication, why do we communicate, how do you communicate, things like that. How do you generate a consensus? How do you build a consensus? All sort of topics that were necessary for staff.
Soyer:
I'm wondering, so, were people then recruited out of the classes to become business agents?
Rosen:
Absolutely.
Soyer:
How were they identified? How was the --
Rosen:
I think they were identified by the local staff, because of the aggression, and willingness, that they demonstrated in the shop, or in the factory. They -- did they keep an eye on the employer? Did they make sure the employer lived up to the contract? If not, were they whistleblowers in the factory? They were the kind of people that the union said, you can be very useful to us in enforcing the contract and building the union.
Soyer:
Were they -- how did it work? Were those kinds of people identified, and then they took the class, or did people just sign up for the class, and then people picked out of class?
Rosen:
I think they were identified first, although there -- I'm not sure of this, but there might have been volunteers for the classes, people who came forward and said, I would like to do this.
Soyer:
How about training for advancement, again, within the industry, with the skills? It strikes me that the union maybe could have said, well, we'll train people to be cutters, and then people will be hired. Did anything like that go on, in terms of --
Rosen:
I think that local autonomy took precedence there, and if the local had a need, then they would try to fulfill that need. But, certainly the international would not say to the local, this is what you would have to do.
Soyer:
OK.
[35:00]
Did you think anyone used this training to leave the industry? To be upwardly mobile, socially, to use the skills they learned, to go into business, or to go into other kinds of things.
Rosen:
(overlapping conversation, inaudible) I'm sure some people did yeah, I'm sure some people did, yeah.
Soyer:
So, how long were you education director for the Eastern region?
Rosen:
About five or six years, something like that.
Soyer:
'62 to...
Rosen:
About '67, '68.
Soyer:
And, how did you move out of that?
Rosen:
The manager of the Westchester-Rockland council's a guy name Louie Reiff, Louis Reiff, was in bad health, he was in ill health, and he was getting ready to retire anyway, and Eddie Kramer, the Eastern region general manager, was looking for someone to replace him. Immodestly, I'll say I was someone he thought he could rely on, and he asked me to take the job.
Soyer:
Could you tell me something about Eddie Kramer, because his name comes up a lot, what kind of guy was he?
Rosen:
He was a lawyer. He was general manager of the Eastern region, member of the general executive board. I believe briefly he entertained hopes of actually becoming president of the union. But, that was not going to happen, I don't think that was in the cards, but intelligent, aggressive, politically astute, was a good organizer, and sought out staff people who were also good organizers. He picked out a Swedish organizer, named Peter Detlefsen, strange for a Swede in the industry, and gave him the resources and potential, to organize the knit wear industry in New Jersey. It was a major industry, thousands of workers, and completely non-union, and over a course of a couple of years, Detlefsen actually organized the industry
Soyer:
So, he identified you as someone who could --
Rosen:
Yep.
Soyer:
-- place. And this is a very different role, I think, than you had up to this time --
Rosen:
It was.
Soyer:
Much more direct contact with the shops.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
So, how did you adjust to that?
Rosen:
Well, I was fortunate with the staff that was up there. They were both very knowledgeable, they knew the industry. At that time, I did not know a full-fashioned sleeve, from a set-in sleeve. I knew nothing about the garment itself, except what we learned in the training institute, and that was another one of the prominent classes that we had in the Institute, we would learn about apparel construction, and so on, and how piece rates were set. But, what I learned in the training institute was limited to that. I had a couple of staff members up in Westchester County who knew the industry, knew the shop work, knew all the contractors, and they, so to speak, broke me in.
Soyer:
So, you said they both. So, you had two --
Rosen:
I had two, yeah.
Soyer:
-- staff members? What were their titles? They were assistant --
Rosen:
Well, they were both business agents. Let's see, George [Girendal?] and Sal Giardina were their names. And, I got along well with both of them, I believe we never discussed it, but I believe George thought that we had an understudy to Louie Reiff, and when Reiff retired, he would become the manager. It's my opinion that he would've been a good manager. But that was not in the cards, so George became assistant manager, I made him assistant manager, up there. George and Sal worked with me, and the three of us were up there working.
Soyer:
How big was the industry there, what were the shops like?
Rosen:
When I got there, in Westchester and Rockland County, it was a good size, there were 5,000 members, which is a lot for that kind of an area.
Soyer:
But they were divided into several locals?
Rosen:
There were several locals, but actually, as I recall, three different locals, but the three locals were
[40:00]
serviced out of the Mount Vernon office. And, the shops were spread out, very widespread over Rockland County, a matter of a lot of mileage from town to town, to cover all the shops.
Soyer:
Mostly contractor shops?
Rosen:
All contractor -- well not all, there were a couple of manufacturers, but no more than two.
Soyer:
Were there non-union shops in the area as well?
Rosen:
There were.
Soyer:
Did you make an effort to organize them?
Rosen:
Sure we did. More than an effort, we organized some of them.
Soyer:
How did you go about identifying non-union shops? How did you find them?
Rosen:
There are a lot of ways. One, traditional way, is to follow the trucks, and the trucks would lead you to the factory.
Soyer:
Where would you find the trucks?
Rosen:
They'd come out of New York City, and they'd come up to Westchester, and to Rockland County, and you knew which trucking companies serviced those areas. There were jurisdictions, and certain trucking companies had Westchester and Rockland counties, so you knew which they were. Follow the trucks, and you'd find the factory.
Soyer:
So, you would start in the garment district here, let's say, and get behind a truck, and --
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
Could you tell me of any specific examples of organizing a company that way?
Rosen:
Well, I don't know about organizing company that way, but, there were for example, one of the manufacturers was a knitwear manufacturer in New City. It was non-union, it was a pretty large factory, about 150 workers, which is gigantic given what our industry is with contracting shops of 20 and 25 workers. It was a large industry. We conducted an organizing campaign, it was a traditional organizing campaign, at the factory gates in the morning, giving out leaflets, and doing the house visiting of the workers at night. At this time, New City had a Latino immigration population, a pretty sizeable one, and this factory had a lot of Spanish-speaking workers, but we conducted a campaign, took us course of a couple of months as I recall it, finally had a majority in the shop, approached the employer, I remember now the employer had a plant manager who was militantly anti-union, and the employer himself was a liberal. He was not anti-union. And, was willing to sit down and talk, and did.
Soyer:
Was there an election, or you didn't even have to go to an election?
Rosen:
I don't think we went to an election, I don't recall.
Soyer:
How did the -- how did the dynamics play out between the manager and the employer? Did you witness any discussions between them?
Rosen:
No, no. There was no -- but very clearly, from the way the plant manager approached us, and approached the workers, he did not think that the employer should have settled with the union, the employer did.
Soyer:
Did you ever have any contact with other unions, any jurisdictional disputes?
Rosen:
No, not one I could think of. No. No, there was absolutely no men's apparel industry up there that I know of.
Soyer:
Did you have Spanish literature for the Spanish-speaking workers there?
Rosen:
We developed it after awhile, yeah, absolutely.
Soyer:
Did you have any Spanish-speaking organizers?
Rosen:
No, but we asked some of the staff from the international to develop some material for us.
Soyer:
What would you say were your biggest successes as manager?
Rosen:
Well, a couple of organizing campaigns went pretty successful. I remember a large one in this New City campaign, there was another one in Port Chester, I'm trying to recall what it was, but it was a successful organization campaign. There were a couple, there was one in Yonkers, there were a handful of successful organizing campaigns, shops that had been up there for a long, long time, remained non-union for a long, long time.
Soyer:
Did you increase the membership in this time?
Rosen:
The membership remained stable, but it did not increase because just at about this time, the industry was going into a slump,
[45:00]
imports were making a major impact, in the late '60s, and early '70s, imports a major impact, and there was less and less work around.
Soyer:
I want to get back to that in a second, but how about any failures? Did you have any failed campaigns?
Rosen:
Off the top of my head, I want to say there must have been. I can't think of any off hand, maybe I will before, after it's over, but there must have, yeah. We must have had to walk away from some situation.
Soyer:
Do you remember any -- is there anything you would've done differently, let's say, as manager?
Rosen:
In hindsight, I probably could sit down, and draw up a chart of things I should've done, that I did not do, things that I did, that maybe I should not have done. Off hand, I can't think of any.
Soyer:
So, you start to talk about imports --
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
-- and I'm interested to know, on that local level, when you started noticing the impact of imports, and how you started noticing the impact of imports? I talked to, for example, Walter Mankoff --
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
-- who of course was in the research department --
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
-- getting all kinds of aggregate figures, you know, but I'm also interested to know how this showed up in and around the shops?
Rosen:
Well, the basic product of the shop is the bundle, it's called the bundle, and the bundle is a collection of units, of units, of a product, dresses, blouses, skirts, pants, whatever it might be. The number one complaint, in the shop, at all times, was that the bundle is shrinking, the bundle is getting smaller. As you know, it's a piece work industry. If the bundle is a good size, sewing machine operators can get their hands into the work, they pick up their speed as they go along, they get accustomed, more familiar with the product itself, as they go along, your speed increases, and they can make more money on piece work. If the bundle is smaller, by the time they get their hand into it, it's gone. So, we started noticing the bundle shrinking, and of course, we were not isolated, we knew about imports, we knew about the manufacturers in New York City, and in fact around the country who were doing more and more importing. We felt it.
Soyer:
Was there anything that you could do at the local level, or the regional level, to counteract that?
Rosen:
Only to get the membership aware of the impact that imports were having in the industry, and get them involved in our campaign until we slow up the measure of imports. The message very clearly is we have to go to membership and say, look, there are some problems that cannot be solved in the factory, which we could go to your shop, and adjust the piece fragment, or we can go to your shop, and keep somebody from getting fired. There are certain things that are done in the factory. We can't stop imports in the factory. That has to be done politically, and it needs the help of all of our members, should become politically aggressive, and not to campaign to slow up the impact of imports.
Q:Was there ever any temptation to lower the standards to lower rate for the work, in an effort to --
Rosen:
To match the --
Soyer:
-- to match the, you couldn't really match the imports, but at least make the discrepancy smaller?
Rosen:
I know what you're saying. To narrow the margin, the differential. In fact, we never did that. It'd be very difficult, once the piece rate is set, for example, and that's the unit, the piece rate, and the persons get paid by the garments they press. But once the rate is set, it's very difficult to go in and say, we're adjusting this rate downward.
Soyer:
Did you set the rates?
Rosen:
No, the rates are set in New York City. There is a unit, a major unit, called the Dressmakers Joint Council, the dress joint board, you've heard of that of course, and they had a piece settlement department, and they would set the piece rates for the manufacturers, and those piece rates were translated into the factory rates.
Soyer:
Did you have to --
[50:00]
did you have to look at the garments to make sure that the rates were being paid, matched what they were supposed to be? I forget the term, there's a term, I think Manny Leventhal was using it, he's very good at --
Rosen:
The piece rate?
Soyer:
Well, setting, looking at a garment, and saying, well, you've got a zipper here, you've got two pockets, you've got this, you've got that, so this garment should have, should cost this much.
Rosen:
Yeah, and that's what the price-settlement department did, and in fact, sometimes when there's a rate set in the factory, and it's not a rate that reflects the amount of work that goes into the job, we would make an adjustment to the factory. I would not, but George [Girendal?] or Sal Giardina would.
Soyer:
Right on the spot?
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
When the bundles are getting smaller, you talked about the problem that they can't work as quickly, so they're not making as much.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
But, did it ever get to the point where they were simply running out of work? That they didn't have enough to keep them busy for a week?
Rosen:
Absolutely, sure. And as you know, unemployment insurance in this industry, considered part of the industry. It's a seasonal industry, there's not work 52 weeks of the year, there are seasons, and one of the seasons is unemployment.
Soyer:
So, the work season's getting shorter?
Rosen:
I shouldn't nod my head, I should say yes, (laughter).
Soyer:
This is an audio tape. Do you think there's anything -- ultimately of course, the union was not successful in keeping up with imports.
Do you think there's anything that it could have done more effectively?
Rosen:
I don't think so. We mounted a major campaign, politically quite aggressive. We got the membership coast-to-coast to work, we did an awful lot of lobbying in Washington, from the rank-and-file -- I don't like that term -- from the membership, right up to the president of the union, did an awful lot -- it didn't have any effect, it was the globalization of our industry, as well as other industries, and we've seen it all coming. Of course, it's much easier in apparel, than it is in other industries, because every country in the world has sewing machines.
Soyer:
It's always been a low-capital industry --
Rosen:
Yep.
Soyer:
-- it's not that hard to set up a contract shop.
Rosen:
Nope, not difficult at all. If you have a garage with six sewing machines, you're a contractor.
Soyer:
How did you get that even in your district? I assume that every season you had to go out looking for the shops, or did you get lists from the manufacturers, or from the joint board? How did you identify new contractors coming into business, each season?
Rosen:
Well, there were not that many new contractors coming into business. There were some, but of course, the direct correlation of work to the factories between the contractor and the manufacturer. That was the relationship, and the contractors would deal directly with the manufacturers, to get work into their shops, into their factories.
Soyer:
So, then you moved from the manager ship, to the education political department.
Rosen:
Correct, yeah.
Soyer:
How did that take place?
Rosen:
I was recruited by Gus Tyler. He knew that I was politically very active, not just with the membership, but with the AFL-CIO Council in Westchester and Rockland counties. I was very active with some members of Congress up there, in Westchester County. Our two members of Congress, I recall, were Dick Ottinger who was a Democrat and friend, and Ogden Reid, Brownie Reid, who was a Republican, and maybe one of the last of the liberal Republicans, and I was very active in both of their campaigns, and I got membership active in both of their campaigns, and Gus knew that I was active politically in the region. He was looking for somebody to come down to the international to work with him in politics, and he recruited me.
Soyer:
Were you active through the Liberal Party?
Rosen:
I was not active through the Liberal Party, the Liberal Party was a separate entity, but of course the ILG was very active in the Liberal Party.
Soyer:
But when you were active in politics, were you personally involved in
[55:00]
the Liberal Party?
Rosen:
Just in the sense that, whatever the ILG did on behalf of the Liberal Party, and of course we were very active with the Liberals. We conducted a lot of rallies, primarily in New York City.
Soyer:
How about in Westchester, and Rockland?
Rosen:
No, not so much. In fact, probably safe to say, not at all. There was no entity, no Liberal Party up there. Can I get a little bit of water now, can we just.
Soyer:
Yeah, let me pause it. OK, so I think we were talking about political activities? So, what kind of political activities went on with the union, in Westchester let's say, with Ottinger with Reid?
Rosen:
Clearly, they were both friendly towards unions, and when we had certain issues we wanted to talk about, imports for example, they gave us a good audience, and did what they could to help us. The traditional trade union issues, minimum wage, health care, imports, the things of interest to our members, that was the political activity up there. Of course, with the international it was different. International, it was with the Liberal Party, and more on a national basis, more through Gus Tyler, Evelyn Dubrow, and David Dubinsky who himself was highly political, and very active in the political life of the union. The Liberal Party, as you know, was quite a different institution in those days, as it is today, as is the labor movement, in fact. When I came to the labor movement, there were people like George Meany, and Walter Reuther, and Victor Reuther, and John L. Lewis, James Carey, and David Dubinsky, and these were people formidable, not just in their own industries and unions, but in the social life of the country. But, at that time, I guess, 35% of workers in the country were members of unions, and today, in the private sector, it's below 10%.
Soyer:
Tell me a little bit about your work -- well since you mentioned the leadership, tell me a little bit more about Dubinsky, how did he compare, let's say, to Stulberg, because I think we're talking now about the late '60s, so this is about the transition to Stulberg.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
What was the difference in the union between the Dubinsky era, and the Stulberg era?
Rosen:
Well, by the time of the Stulberg era, the union was already, the industry was already in decline, and concurrent with that, obviously, was the union in decline, and losing membership. What we tried to do to stem the losses was not successful, it did not work. Dubinsky was president of the union at its peak. I remember, when I came into the industry, the union, we had almost 500,000 members, almost half a million members. And today, I don't think Bruce Raynor would dare to tell you how many members he has left.
Soyer:
In garments.
Rosen:
Absolutely not. He has some good financial institutions, but he doesn't have the members.
Soyer:
Maybe, maybe.
Rosen:
Yeah, if he can hold them, if he can keep them, yeah.
Soyer:
How about personality-wise, Dubinsky, Stulberg, also Chaikin, Mazur?
Rosen:
Dubinsky was gregarious, very lively, very emotional, and very upfront with all his activities. Stulberg was more phlegmatic. He was a little reserved, a little subdued, knew the industry, but really did not have the dynamics of the Dubinsky or of his successor [Chaiken?] who was dynamic, and had tremendous charisma, a lot of friends, and some enemies, but a completely different personality than Stulberg. And, of course, Chaikin was succeeded by Jay Mazur, who was by the way
[01:00:00]
himself, an education director, at local 23, and came into 1710 - Chaikin brought him in, and looking around for somebody to succeed him, possibly, and he saw Jay as that individual. And Jay, again, what was, I wouldn't say charismatic, but he was certainly lively, he was energetic, in fact he had energy to burn. And, was a completely different personality. There were four different people, there were really four different people.
Soyer:
How do you think that impacted on the working for the union, or the functioning of the union?
Rosen:
The fact that they were different personalities? I don't think it had that much of an impact. I think Chaikin was much more aggressive in dealing with the outside world, became a member of the Trilateral Commission, for example, was very active in the ICFTU, International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, which Dubinsky was instrumental in forming, Dubinsky and Jay Lovestone, and Irving Brown, but that was meat and potatoes, he really enjoyed that stuff, Jay not so much so, but Jay was still very energetic.
Soyer:
What did you do as associate director of education and politics?
Rosen:
Well, I did what Evelyn Dubrow and Gus wanted to do, but we turned out material, we were major players in formulating the anti-import campaign. I think it's correct to call it an anti-import campaign. I remember our slogan was, there should "be a fair share for America," and we knew we'd not be able to cut off imports completely, but we wanted to save some of the industry for domestic workers. And we turned out material for that, we organized lobbying campaigns, we organized a major rally in Washington, more than one in fact, in Washington.
Soyer:
Tell me about organizing the rallies.
Rosen:
Well, it meant major -- it was done coast-to-coast, of course, so it meant major transportation organization -- buses, trains, planes, wherever people were coming from. It meant that, in Washington, we had to arrange for parking at RFK Stadium, for example, or on-the-street parking, or on the mall parking, for our buses, because most of them just came in by bus. Certainly from New England, from the East Coast, they came in by bus, some came by train, a few came by plane, not that many.
Soyer:
Was it all people from the ILG, or did you involve other unions as well?
Rosen:
Other unions got involved from time to time, certainly the Amalgamated got involved.
Soyer:
Did you work closely with people in the Amalgamated?
Rosen:
Yeah, we worked closely with Jack Sheinkman who was president of the Amalgamated. By this time, Jack Potofsky was gone from the scene, he left.
Soyer:
How was it to work with them? I get the impression that there were very different internal cultures between the ILG and the Amalgamated.
Rosen:
Different internal cultures is correct, yeah. The ILG was more of a president's union, more centrally-administered, the Amalgamated locals had more autonomy. In fact, many of them just went their own way, and completely ignored the international. The individuals were not that difficult. Jack Sheinkman was very easy to get along with.
Soyer:
How about the politics of the two unions? Did they mesh well?
Rosen:
The answer has to be yes, sure, we had the same objectives. Yeah.
Soyer:
Did you also get involved in issues which were not particular to the industry itself, such as Vietnam, or let's say Vietnam in the late '60s. I know that was, within the Liberal Party for example, that was one of the big issues that detached the ILG from the Liberal Party.
Rosen:
Right, yeah. Chick, I think,
[01:05:00]
was a believer in the domino theory, and the ILG, you know the ILG history about anti-communism, it lived and breathed anti-communism, and I think that extended right to the present day.
Soyer:
Was there any dissent within the union?
Rosen:
Probably individual dissent, but there was no organized dissent.
Soyer:
Any dissent voiced even by individuals?
Rosen:
I'm sure, yes. We had people who were against the war, people who were for the war.
Soyer:
How is it to work with Tyler? Tell me something about Tyler.
Rosen:
Very charismatic individual. Very highly intelligent, creative, also easy to get along with, no dictatorial methods of running the departments in Gus. And, very prescient in a lot of things. Gus would write an article, for example, something that we're facing right now, wrote an article about one of the problems this country's going to face in the future, is the problem of glut. Too many stores, too many cars, too many outlets, too many dealerships, too much of everything, for what one economy can sustain, and one of the reasons there, of course is, the purchasing power is limited -- and that was always one of his points, that the economy would work well, as long as there was sustainable purchasing power, and discretionary spending money available. And of course, the other side of that coin is, that it was an economy based in the United States, but in fact, the markets in the rest of the world were there, and they just could not, were too poor to help our economy.
Soyer:
So, is that an argument to increase, spur development in other parts of the world?
Rosen:
Always, yeah.
Soyer:
But there's some tension between that and the idea of keeping jobs here? How would development take place in other countries, without garment factories being here?
Rosen:
That argument was not limited to garment and apparel factories. That's an argument made about the general economy of the world, and concurrent with that argument, by the way, is the argument that the standards in the rest of the world have to be raised, and have to be brought up, so that there's not that big a differential between living standards in the United States, and those in Africa, Asia, Southeast Asia, wherever.
Soyer:
How about the issue of homework? I know that started to come up maybe the '80s?
Rosen:
I think that's always an issue, I think it was always a problem. And, I don't know whether there was a growth in the '80s, I don't know whether there was more home work in the '80s, than there were in the '70s and '60s, so example, but always a problem. There were some people with sewing machines at home, who said, I've got nothing to do, I could work for an hour or two and make some money, and they did.
Soyer:
How did the differences in the different administrations affect the industry, or the union? You were in the political department, so I'm wondering about, let's say, how you were able to function, let's say, under the Johnson Administration, versus the Nixon Administration, Carter...
Rosen:
The Johnson Administration, Dubinsky was still here, and he was still the president, and they were friends, and of course, the Johnson Administration, you know, Lyndon Johnson actually said to a joint session of Congress, "We shall overcome." We had no problems with Lyndon Johnson whatsoever, and you know, the voting rights act, and the civil rights act, and minimum wage, and so on. Nixon of course was a right-winger, he was not as friendly. Did some peculiar things, imposed wage-and-price controls, the Nixon Administration, did some strange things, but he was not a friend to unions, obviously. Kennedy was a friend, but was not around long enough to do anything much more than the Bay of Pigs. Not very helpful to us.
[01:10:00]
Soyer:
And Dubinsky was very pro-Kennedy. He was one of the early --
Rosen:
Oh, absolutely.
Soyer:
-- supporters.
Rosen:
Sure, yeah. As a matter of fact, and this was a Liberal Party function, but the Liberal Party was having a problem swallowing Lyndon Johnson as the Vice Presidential candidate, with Jack Kennedy, and Dubinsky arranged a meeting with the Liberal Party in New York City, I remember, it was at the Astor Hotel, I remember that, and he brought Lyndon Johnson up, to introduce him to the Liberal Party, to say that this is a Texan who knows workers, understands workers, is pro-worker, and so on, and he sold the Liberal Party the endorsement.
Soyer:
You think the misgivings were largely cultural, and people didn't trust a Texan like Johnson?
Rosen:
I think so, yeah.
Soyer:
Was there ever any effort to get the membership involved in the Liberal Party, in your experience?
Rosen:
Yes, I think a lot of the membership were involved in the Liberal Party activities.
Soyer:
So, the older members?
Rosen:
Mostly in New York City -- yeah, the older members, sure.
Soyer:
How about the younger membership?
Rosen:
Some because, at that time, some people in the Liberal Party, were members of the -- the new immigrants to the country, and were becoming active in political activities of their own. They were interested in actually getting Liberal Party endorsement for their runs for City Council, or whatever it might be.
Soyer:
Between '66 and '69 -- well, Dubinsky retired in '66, Stulberg took over, and he began to detach the union from the Liberal Party, partly it was over things like Vietnam, partly he just probably wanted to do his own thing, make his own mark.
Rosen:
Of course, both those things yeah.
Soyer:
Do you remember any internal struggles over affiliation, or any kind of a turmoil about leaving the Liberal Party?
Rosen:
No, I think by that time, the Liberal Party was no longer what it had been, it was starting to evolve, and there were no longer La Guardias, or Eleanor Roosevelts, or other, some of the other prominent names in New York State, of the Liberal Party -- Wagner -- and I think the parting was accomplished quietly and peacefully.
Soyer:
There was some conflict over the Lindsay Administration. Do you remember discussing the Lindsay Administration, and how the Lindsay Administration dealt with the industry, or with the union?
Rosen:
I have to say, no. It's not vivid in my mind, I don't recall it.
Soyer:
So, you were active, associate director of the educational -- what was it, the educational and political department?
Rosen:
Yeah, they were combined.
Soyer:
It was a merged --
Rosen:
Yeah.
Soyer:
Were the functions completely merged, or were there some people really functioning as a political department, some people functioning as an education?
Rosen:
The functions were merged under Gus, because Gus is director of both departments, but certain people worked in certain areas. David Wells was mostly political, practically all political, I was mostly educational, it broke down that way.
Soyer:
So, what kind of things did the international do that, let's say, the regions and the locals didn't, in the educational area?
Rosen:
Generated a lot of material that was nationwide, that was not affiliate-specific, whether it was, why hire minimum wage, why imports, why national health insurance -- those sort of things, the local affiliates did not do.
Soyer:
Did you work closely with Evelyn Dubrow as well?
Rosen:
Yeah.
Soyer:
She was in Washington, by this time?
Rosen:
She was in Washington, sure.
Soyer:
How did that relationship work, did she request information when she was lobbying?
Rosen:
Sometimes, yeah. Mostly, she would get that from David, though, political, and from the research department, (inaudible).
Soyer:
So, you left the union in 1989.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
And you became
[01:15:00]
well, you joined the Consortium for Worker's Education, but it sounded, from your resume, that the Consortium had been founded a little bit earlier, and you had had a hand in it?
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
Even when you were with the union.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
Tell me about the origins of the Consortium for Worker's Education.
Rosen:
Well, the state education department, the federal government, and even some of the agencies in New York City government, had funding available for education programs. By then, by the late -- well, by the mid '80s, I would guess, the two principal needs for education, for workers in New York, primarily dislocated workers, people who lost their jobs, were for language skills, and for computer skills. There were other things, of course, medical skills, things that 1199 would be interested in, but primarily language and computer.
Soyer:
When you say language, you mean English --
Rosen:
Yes, English. Yeah, and that would be a mantra that most unions in this city would repeat over and over again. The single best thing you can do for yourself to get a job, is to learn English, because that's virtually a a sine qua non requirement. And, some of the people in other unions, Joe McDermott, of the Teamsters, and a couple of others -- let's see, Nick Unger of the Amalgamated, said, "We ought to be doing this, we ought to be training this workers -- many of them are our members, who have lost their jobs. They don't have the skills, in demand, in the marketplace right now. We ought to be giving them those skills, we ought to be looking to get some of this funding to set up our own classes." And that's exactly how it evolved, that's how the Consortium came about, about half a dozen unions got together, staff from the unions got together, and said, let's submit a proposal, a proposal from a grant, to set up these classes, which is what we did. We started getting funding, we started setting up these classes. At the time, I was still with the ILGWU, and I was the ILG liaison to the Consortium for the classes, and I helped run the ILG classes, that were being funded in part by the Consortium. There was a transition here, and I'm not clear exactly the year it took place, where I was still on the ILGWU payroll, but since I was doing so much for the Consortium, the Consortium was reimbursing the ILG for my salary, and expenses, and that took place for a few years, until 1989. And finally, in 1989, the Consortium grew large enough that we had to start looking for our own office space, and our own classroom space, and Joe McDermott, and Bob Norris, who was then an officer of the Consortium, approached me and said, "Look, we're going to set up a career center on 54th Street. And that would be our first career center, and we want to do dislocated worker training in that career center, but we want you to come over and run it." I spoke at that time Jay Mazur, Jay was then president of the union. He, to put it mildly, did not resist, he encouraged it. At the time, I was having some minor political problems with Jay's assistant, Susan Cowell, who was doing an awful lot of work for Jay. She was very energetic, and very smart, and Jay would've had a tough time doing without her, and she would've been very happy doing without me. It was a political squeeze, so, when I said I was going to go to the Consortium to work there full-time, with their blessings, and I did, and that's how I went over to 54th Street, our first Consortium office, on 54th Street, at the state Department of Labor building.
Soyer:
So, at first, at first, the classes were actually taught within the unions?
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
But the funding came from the government, through the Consortium.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
So, is this -- was the original idea just as a funding mechanism
[01:20:00]
or was there some sort of other goal that the unions couldn't have done on their own?
Rosen:
The unions would not have done that. The unions represented members. They did not represent unemployed workers, and unemployed workers were not necessarily union members, and there was a need for the training, for these dislocated workers, whether they had come from unions, or not from unions. The need was still there, and the Consortium can fill that need. And so, that's how we were organized, and we recruited dislocated workers, to come from the unemployment office, but not necessarily from there, from the unions themselves, and said, c'mon, this is government funding, so we can't limit it to union members. Come one, come all, and we set up these kind of training programs.
Soyer:
Did you work with employers as well?
Rosen:
Some -- in a peripheral sense. For example, we set up training programs with the building and construction trades, and with their employer association. They encouraged us.
Soyer:
Did you consult with employers in terms of the skills that they needed?
Rosen:
I think we pretty much knew what was needed. An employer would say, sure, I got a warehouse, but the inventory of the warehouse is tracked by computers. So, you could give me a warehouse worker, but if that warehouse worker does not have computer skills, I can't use him or her.
Soyer:
And did you have a placement service as well?
Rosen:
Sure, yeah.
Soyer:
How did you --
Rosen:
That was a very important part of what the Consortium did, yeah.
Soyer:
So, how did you learn about jobs?
Rosen:
We encouraged employers to come to us, and say, look, I'm looking for this, I'm looking to that, in every industry. They sent people out to work.
Soyer:
Do you think that over time, did the goals remain the same, for the Consortium, or do you think that there was a change in how it worked, or what its goals were?
Rosen:
Well, of course, I haven't been there for four, five years now, I'm retired, but I still have friends there, I have lunch with a couple colleagues down there, all the time, on a regular basis, and I don't think it's changed very much. I think what has changed, is there has become more competition for the funding, and the Consortium I think has shrunk in that sense. At one time, when I was there, and I was in charge of career programs at the Consortium, we had six worker career centers in New York City, in the five boroughs. I think the Consortium is reduced to one now. It does not mean that there are not worker career centers around the city, it just means that other institutions have won the grants, and submitted proposals, and won the grants to run those career centers.
Soyer:
You think that the ties with the labor movement made the Consortium a little different from other such training programs?
Rosen:
(inaudible) Well, because, we had a board of directors, the Consortium had a board of directors, and it was comprised of members -- of leading officers, if not the actual presidents, of some of the major unions in New York City.
Soyer:
How did that translate into differences in the work? How did that translate into differences in the way the Consortium worked, or services it offered?
SAUL ROSEN:Different from the other career centers you mean? Well, I think we had more outreach to workers, than the other career centers. They had to open their doors, and hope that people would come in, and we had the outreach to the various industries, and dislocated workers.
Soyer:
Did you ever get involved again in training people for advancement within an industry they already had jobs, or were you always more concerned with unemployed workers?
Rosen:
Both. I can cite some examples. For example, in 1199, in Dennis Rivera's union, for example, there increasingly became a need for registered practical nurses, for registered nurses, for operating room technicians. They had that need for upgrading their members, and we started
[01:25:00]
running classes, for their members, specifically to upgrade them within their industries.
Soyer:
How about in the city itself, of course, the economy was changing, there were some industries were shrinking, the garment industry the main one, probably, and others were expanding -- the health care industry. How did you keep track of that, and how did you try to adjust to those kinds of changes?
Rosen:
It was daily news, so it wasn't very difficult to track it. We knew that publishing, for example, was shrinking in the city, books, newspapers, magazines, whatever it might be -- so that became a void. There were other industries that were declining also. Health care, on the other hand, was expanding, and became a greater need. Yeah, transportation, pretty stable. Public transportation was pretty stable.
Soyer:
I know the Consortium for Worker Education got involved in the aftermath of September 11th. What industries and communities were most affected by that, and how did the Consortium get involved specifically in issues that arose from that?
Rosen:
Well, for example, a major participant in the Consortium was the ILGWU, and Chinatown was devastated by 9/11, and a large part of the industry at that time was in Chinatown, so, we did a major piece of recruiting down there from those industries and contracting shops. All the small, mom and pop so to speak, shops, in that area, in the financial district, whether it's a newsstand, or a candy store, or a small restaurant, they were also impacted by 9/11, and we did major recruiting in those industries too. We set up a special organization, 9/11 organization, and sought funding to do that, and we set up some offices for people who were impacted by 9/11.
Soyer:
So, what were you trying to train them to do, then?
Rosen:
Again, computer training, and English language training, were primary, health care industry. What else was providing jobs at the time? Some building and construction trades.
Soyer:
Where do you think a lot of the women who were garment workers in Chinatown ended up?
Rosen:
I think they just waited to come back into the industry. Some of them might have gone out to where the industry is located, on 38th and 39th Street, some of them might have gone out to Flushing, some of them might have gone out to Sunrise, places where there are pockets of apparel factories.
Soyer:
So, you think most of those workers eventually found their way back into the garment industry?
Rosen:
I would think so, because I don't know what else they could've done.
Soyer:
Because of their lack of English skills?
Rosen:
Lack, of among others, lack of other skills, technical skills.
Soyer:
Did you work closely with other agencies, after September 11?
Rosen:
Well, we always worked closely with the state Department of Labor, and the city Department of Education, until it became the City Business Services, Department of Business Services, which took over, but we always worked very closely with all the city agencies. They were some of our major funders. When we submitted proposals to operate the worker career centers, those proposals were submitted to the city, the Department of Employment at that time.
Soyer:
How about other private agencies? You mentioned there was competition for funding --
Rosen:
Yeah.
Soyer:
-- for similar kinds of services.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
How was there ever any --
Rosen:
Places like Goodwill Industries, Wildcat, some of the other schools for example, you know, La Guardia Community College, Hostos, and some of those places, would be submitting proposals. It eludes me now, but there are a whole bunch of organizations around the city that are not-for-profits, but did the same sort of work.
Soyer:
Was there ever any kind of an attempt to coordinate work, so as not to duplicate services?
Rosen:
Well, we tried to, and the Consortium that tried to do that.
[01:30:00]
We called meetings with a lot of these institutions, and said, let's not fight. If the Consortium had funding, and we actually did this, if the Consortium has funding, we will submit some funding to you, so you could contract out to wherever you operate, with your own constituency, and your own training programs. We have no use for the money, except to put into programs like this, and we did that. We had an awful lot of money, into different organizations around the city, that were running these training programs.
Soyer:
I know you were involved in other activities outside the union, outside labor education, the American Veteran's Committee.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
Tell me something about your involvement --
Rosen:
Well, I was national chairman for three sessions. I don't know if you're familiar with the American Veteran's Committee --
Soyer:
Well, (inaudible)
Rosen:
(overlapping conversation, inaudible) It's a liberal --
Soyer:
It came out of World War II --
Rosen:
Came out of World War II.
Soyer:
Like, FDR Jr. was involved in it, I think, in the '40s.
Rosen:
Yeah, and Michael Straight, and Gus Tyler was a founder of it -- and I'm trying to think of some of the others. Was it Chester Bowles I think? Anyway, it was formed as sort of an offset -- a liberal, veteran's organization, as an offset to the American Legion, and Disabled American Veterans, and some veteran organizations that might be more conservative, and in fact our slogan was "Citizens First, Veterans Second," and we were interested in an awful lot of things, besides just providing for veterans, although obviously, that was our mandate. I became, when I got out of Korea, and became active in the ILGWU, through Gus and some of the other people, I became active in the -- I joined the American Veteran's Committee, I joined a large chapter that local 22 had in New York City, ILGWU Local 22 had, and became active in a number of meetings, and number of roles, and then became a candidate for national chairman in -- I'm trying to think of the year. I'll have to go back and look at my gavel, to see what year it was, but I became active, became national chairman one year, and then was reelected for two other terms. I was national chairman for three straight years, and I was succeeded by Gus Tyler. He became national chairman after me. He was national chairman before me, and national chairman after me.
Soyer:
Sounds like the American Veteran's Committee was very closely tied to the labor movement.
Rosen:
Yeah, yeah. But, you know, there were an awful lot of very prominent people in the American Veteran's Committee, from around the country, who had absolutely nothing to do with the labor movement, except they supported it, just by nature of being to the left of center.
Soyer:
Was it unusual for Korean veterans to be in the committee? Was it more of a World War II organization?
Rosen:
It was a World War II organization, but by the time we got into Vietnam, Vietnam Veterans of America had their own organization, which we tried to have them become members and party to the American Veteran's Committee, but they had their own issues, they were probably correct about that, they probably had their own things to be concerned about, so by then, the American Veterans Committee was aging. It was World War II and Korean veterans primarily, but World War II mainly, and just disbanded when the then-executive director, June Willens was her name. She was based in Washington, and she retired, from the American Veterans Committee.
Soyer:
It lasted through the Vietnam era?
Rosen:
Yeah.
Soyer:
What was its position on Vietnam?
Rosen:
Split.
Soyer:
Were there fights about it?
Rosen:
Yeah, and I think, I think maybe it's not fair to say split, I think mostly it was against the war, more against the war than for. A handful were for the war.
Soyer:
Did it ever come out officially against the war?
Rosen:
No.
Soyer:
What other -- you mentioned the slogan of "Citizens First, Veterans Second," what kind of issues did the committee work on?
Rosen:
Civil rights, civil liberties, health care -- issues of the
[01:35:00]
economy, national economy.
Soyer:
Did you have relations with the American Legion, or with the VFW organizations like that?
Rosen:
We did, yeah. It was not a hostile relationship. We worked very closely with the Disabled American Veterans. There is an international veteran's association, primarily veteran's organizations in countries around the world, primarily World War II, and every two years, they would have an international convention. And delegations from the various countries would go there. Interesting to see German World War II veterans, meeting with American World War II veterans.
Soyer:
How about lobbying the VA and things like that. Did you also do a lot of that, or did you leave that to the big organizations?
Rosen:
Yeah, no, we did not do a lot of that, we did some of it, but not a lot. And, when that was done, it was primarily done through June Willens who was a full time executive director, and lived in Washington.
Soyer:
Is she related to Pearl Willens?
Rosen:
I don't know a Pearl Willens.
Soyer:
She was very active in liberal circles in the '40s, the '30s and '40s, her name was always coming up. I don't know what became of her afterward.
Rosen:
I'll Google it and see.
Soyer:
I think she had a husband too, also who was very active. How about -- I've been asking people also to talk about how their union activities affected their personal lives, and their families, and I know that you're a little bit unique in that you're married to someone who's in the industry.
Rosen:
Right.
Soyer:
Does this present any special problems or opportunities --
Rosen:
None whatsoever. None whatsoever. My wife's a designer. And, she's exclusively at the creative end of fashion, and has absolutely nothing to do with the industry, or factory, or any of that stuff.
Soyer:
She doesn't have her own label.
Rosen:
Yeah.
Soyer:
And how does it get manufactured?
Rosen:
Oh, it goes through -- she has a production manager, somebody who is familiar with factories, and do stuff, and her stuff is manufactured in this country.
Soyer:
Is this something that she would've thought of if she hadn't been with you, do you think?
Rosen:
No.
Soyer:
Or do you think you had influence on how she went about producing that?
Rosen:
We really kept that separate from our married life, although she was aware of what I did, and when we went to meetings, and dinners, or receptions, and things like that, she would accompany me of course. But, everybody knew who she was.
Soyer:
Did you meet through the industry --
Rosen:
No.
Soyer:
-- or was it completely coincidental?
Rosen:
No, completely coincidental. We met at a beach.
Soyer:
How about if you have any children?
Rosen:
No, we do not.
Soyer:
Is there anything else you'd like to mention? Anything else we left out, in terms of how you worked with the union, or your career in general?
Rosen:
I think we pretty much covered it, I can't think of anything else. No.
Soyer:
Is there -- is this a career you would recommend to other people coming up?
Rosen:
Well, given the nature of this -- you know, the United States is the only really industrialized country, where even the workers are anti-union. It's very unusual. There's just not that union tradition. Now, is it because of media control, is it because of the stranglehold that corporations have on information in this country, or in politics for that matter in this country? It's for all of those reasons, I think. But, it's so common, that employers will simply say we don't need a third party. The union is a third party coming between us. We can settle our own problems, we can take care of ourselves, and the workers buy it. It's astonishing.
Soyer:
Did you run into that attitude --
Rosen:
Oh sure.
Soyer:
-- when you were organizing?
Rosen:
Absolutely. Run into the attitude? We had counter leaflets that said as much. You know, the union busting industry in this country is a pretty profitable and large industry.
[01:40:00]
Soyer:
Who makes money from the union-busting industry?
Rosen:
There are legal entities that sell themselves to corporations as "union prevention" institutions.
Soyer:
Did you encounter those --
Rosen:
Sure.
Soyer:
-- in Westchester, and Rockland? Even for the little contractors?
Rosen:
Even for the little contractors.
Soyer:
How would they operate, how would they intervene in that situation?
Rosen:
There would be a local lawyer who sold himself as this kind of an industry.
Soyer:
And what did they do? Did they try to intimidate workers, or did they just try to raise legal objections to contracts, or --
Rosen:
Not legal objections to contracts, but they would conduct this anti-union campaign in the nature of what I just described. Don't let the union come between us. We can take care of our own problems, all they want is your dues. Look how they live off the fat of the land. They don't work and you work. Those sort of things. Very effective. And you combine that with one-on-one meetings of supervisors with workers, and supervisors with union activists, within a factory -- I tell you, if I had a factory, if I were an employer, no union would ever get into my factory. I just know exactly to what to do, to keep them out.
Soyer:
What is that?
Rosen:
Just what I've been describing.
Soyer:
How do you make yourself, as an employer, more convincing than the unions, who are trying to counter that?
Rosen:
To begin with, the major issue always, in most of these campaigns, is dues, and the "union bosses," and the workers don't have to be told about union bosses, because they read about them in the newspapers everyday, and it doesn't have to be the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal. They can read it in The New York Times, also.
Soyer:
So, how did you convince people that their dues would've been well spent?
Rosen:
We took a lot of convincing. But, part of it was of course, this is what would be the result of a union contract, this would be your advantage in a union contract. I can't guarantee it, but this is what we usually go after, we come close to it, and it more than offsets any dues you pay.
Soyer:
So, getting back to the original question. Is this a career you would advise people to go in to? Was it a satisfying career?
Rosen:
Oh yeah, in fact, that's the payoff, the satisfaction. There is no other payoff. You're trying to help people, and you're doing some good. And, there are still a lot of people out there who want to do that.
Soyer:
Anything else?
Rosen:
Not that I can think of, I think that covers it. I think you prepared very well with your notes there.
[1:43:09]
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