The Unspoken Cause of “California Disease”
Theories of demographic change driving political change are overstated. California is often pointed to as an example, but California was a progressive state, not a red state. Using these theories…
Ronald Reagan
Big Labor’s Decline and Left Turn: A New Power Rises
As President John F. Kennedy took office in January 1961, organized labor looked ahead toward a future of ever-increasing power and influence. States had begun to advance laws requiring themselves…
Big Labor’s Decline and Left Turn: Labor’s Private-Sector Left
In the 1960s, government worker unionism subordinating the wider labor movement was still decades away. The Left of organized labor (laying aside some straggling outright communists and fellow-travelers like International…
Big Labor’s Decline and Left Turn: Causes of the Long Decline
By 1979, when Lane Kirkland succeeded George Meany as head of the AFL-CIO, fundamental changes to the economy had led to a decline in the unionized share of the private…
Big Labor’s Decline and Left Turn: A Trade Unionist in the White House
Precisely one former national labor union president has been elected to the presidency of the United States: Ronald Reagan. Before his political career, he was already a notable figure, perhaps…
Big Labor’s Decline and Left Turn: Membership Decline
Lane Kirkland, leadership of the AFL-CIO from 1979 through 1995, was defined by the Long Decline in union membership and union density, the proportion of the workforce consisting of organized…
The Price of Bent Unions Is Red Unions
Corruption within organized labor is pervasive, but what happens to a union after the thieves, Mafiosi, or corrupt political fixers have been driven out by the long arm of the…
Martin Luther King Jr. Day, 2024
In 1983, Congress passed the bill creating a federal holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr. on the third Monday of January. The federal holiday was first observed on January 20,…
Big Labor’s Golden State: A Tale of Two Cities
Summary: With over 10 percent of the nation’s population and an economy larger than that of France, California has loomed large in the nation’s politics and economy since the mid-20th…
Big Labor’s Golden State: Rise of Industrial California
Labor relations nationwide were transformed by the New Deal, especially the passage of the National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act) in 1935. The law abolished the strong form of the…