Postal Workers' Strike

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Postal Workers' Strike

United States 1970

Synopsis

In March 1970 the first nationwide strike of federal employees occurred in New York City. Plagued by persistent problems, the most important being low wages, the postal carriers of New York's local number 36 walked out on 17 March 1970. Within two days the New York strikers were joined by mail carriers throughout the Northeast. The postmaster general obtained an injunction ordering postal carriers back to work, but the federal government was unwilling to enforce the injunction so early in the strike. Because the majority of the country's financial correspondence traveled through New York, the postal strike was of national concern. After failed attempts to fashion an agreement, President Richard Nixon finally stepped in and ordered the use of troops, enforced injunctions, and stated that no negotiations would be held until the postal workers went back to work. This pressure worked, and postal carriers returned to work. The two sides eventually agreed on a two-part settlement that raised salaries and addressed the concerns of postal reorganization. President Nixon signed the resulting Postal Reorganization Act on 12 August 1970.

Timeline

1950: North Korean troops pour into South Korea, starting the Korean War.
1955: Signing of the Warsaw Pact by the Soviet Union and its satellites in eastern Europe.
1959: Alaska and Hawaii become the last states added to the Union.
1965: Arrest of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., and more than 2,600 others in Selma, Alabama. Three weeks later, in New York City, Malcolm X is assassinated.
1967: Arabs attack Israel, launching the Six-Day War, which results in an Israeli victory.
1970: After 32 months of civil war in Nigeria, Biafran secessionists surrender in January.
1970: Nixon sends U.S. troops into Cambodia on 30 April. Four days later, National Guardsmen open fire on antiwar protesters at Kent State University in Ohio. By 24 June antiwar sentiment is so strong that the Senate repeals the Gulf of Tonkin resolution. On 29 June, Nixon orders troops back out of Cambodia.
1970: Gamal Abdel Nasser, father of Arab nationalism and mentor of younger leaders such as Libya's Muammar al-Qaddafi, dies. His funeral in Cairo is the largest in history.
1973: Signing of peace accords in Paris in January ends the Vietnam War.
1975: Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge launch a campaign of genocide in Cambodia unparalleled in human history.
1980: In protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, President Carter keeps U.S. athletes out of the Moscow Olympics.
1985: A new era begins in the USSR as Konstantin Chernenko dies, and is replaced by Mikhail Gorbachev, who at 54 years old is the youngest Soviet leader in decades.

Event and Its Context

During the 1960s a number of problems in the postal service created an environment of militancy and discontent among postal workers and led to the first nationwide strike of federal employees. The problems plaguing the postal services were varied and complex. Among these problems was the issue of facility and location obsolescence. Many of the post office's facilities were outdated and too small to handle the increasing mail volume. The management structure of the post office was largely ineffective and cumbersome. Further, the post office's union adopted the organizational structure of the post office, which created the same difficulties within the union that existed in the post office itself.

The most immediate problem, however, was the pay scale. In New York, where the strike started, postal carriers were unable to support their families without supplementing their pay with either a second job or welfare. Also in New York, the top pay for a postal carrier with 21 years of service was several thousand dollars below what the government determined as the salary needed to maintain a moderate standard of living in New York.

As early as 1968, postal carriers at the United Federation of Postal Clerks convention and the National Postal Union convention voted to remove no-strike clauses from their organizations. In New York the letter carriers tried unsuccessfully to pass a "right-to-strike" resolution. When the letter carriers received word in 1970 that their July pay increases might be postponed, they demanded a strike. National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC) president James Rademacher complied by stating if the pay matter was still unresolved by 15 April, he would call for a nationwide strike.

On 12 March the House Post Office and Civil Service Committee passed a reform pay package that Rademacher favored, but the union membership remained displeased. Also on 12 March, New York's Local number 36, composed of almost 7,000 members from the Bronx and Manhattan, held its scheduled monthly meeting. When the president of the local, Gustave Johnson, reported on the reform pay package, the members insisted on setting a date for a strike. Over Johnson's objection, the members set the strike date for 17 March. Picket lines were in place that morning, even though most union leaders, including Rademacher, were not in favor of a strike. The movement spread very quickly as support for Local 36 grew. By 19 March the strike had spread to such cities as Akron, Ohio; Boston, Massachusetts; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Houston, Texas; and Detroit, Michigan. The wildcat strike was hugely effective.

The response from the federal government was a court injunction ordering the carriers back to work, but the rank and file ignored the injunction as well as requests from union leaders to return to work. The postmaster general, Winton M. Blount, placed strikers on nonpay status, issued mail embargo orders, and suspended the postal monopoly for New York City. Everyone realized the importance of the financial papers, such as paychecks, bills, bonds, and stocks, that moved through New York City. A prolonged strike would devastate the national economy.

The union leaders were also afraid that the strike was moving beyond their control. The letter carriers struck without the approval of the national unions, and the longer the strike continued, the harder it was to keep others from joining. Union leaders asked Secretary of Labor George Shultz for help. Shultz found Blount and others very resistant to a meeting while an illegal strike was in progress, so he initially refused to intervene. However, Assistant Secretary of Labor William J. Usery convinced Shultz to help, and together they convinced Blount to meet with union leaders. This meeting was scheduled for 20 March, the same day that the emergency conference of letter carriers was meeting to vote on a national strike.

The Shultz meeting reached several agreements. First, union leaders agreed to request that everyone return to work. Once service was restored, the appropriate officials would meet and discuss all the issues raised. When the issues had been addressed and agreed upon, the unions and the postal administration would then send a united proposal to Congress. The union leaders pitched the agreement to their members, but it was rejected. The rank-and-file postal carriers viewed the agreement as a sellout that was too similar to past broken promises.

Instead of making things better, the negotiations worsened the situation. Union officials realized that to remain in power they had to take control of the strike and lead it instead of trying to settle it. Rademacher also lost his standing and authority in his attempts to settle the strike. He was hung in effigy at several union meetings. With union leaders poised to lead the strike, Rademacher losing influence, and the threat of more walk-outs, President Nixon finally stepped into the fray.

Nixon declared that if the mail service was not restored by 23 March, he would meet his "Constitutional obligation to see that the mails go through." Nixon also made it clear that no negotiations would occur until the postal workers initiated a back-to-work movement. If there was no such movement, then the president would authorize the use of troops to enforce the court injunctions.

When the deadline passed without action, Nixon authorized the use of military troops. The Defense Department plan allowed for the deployment 115,000 troops in 36 cities. On 24 March, Nixon decided to send 2,500 federal troops and 16,000 National Guardsmen into New York to fill the void left by 57,000 postal workers. The soldiers were charged with moving the mail. They entered New York wearing fatigues, not battle gear, and were unarmed. The troops were not to confront or arrest any protestors, and they did not attempt any home delivery of mail. The soldiers mainly sorted mail, loaded and unloaded trucks, and sold stamps. The use of troops was more of a symbolic act asserting the power and authority of the federal government than a determined effort to resume normal postal services.

Federal marshals also served Gustave Johnson and several other New York union leaders with papers ordering them to appear in federal court to demonstrate why they should not be charged with contempt. Similar injunctions were also issued in other cities. The combination of the troops and the enforcement of the injunctions spurred a back-to-work movement that began on 25 March.

After the postal employees went back to work, negotiations began. Union officials had drawn up an agreement that provided for a 12 percent pay raise retroactive to October 1969 and that paid health benefits. The agreement reduced the length of service required for top pay from 20 to eight years, based wages on cost-of-living indices, gave amnesty to the strikers, and allowed for collective bargaining and arbitration. This package went to the negotiations to be held in Washington, D.C.

As a result of these negotiations, on 30 March the union and post office officials finished a proposal for a two-part agreement. The revised agreement included an immediate six percent raise retroactive to January 1970 for all government and military employees and joint sponsorship of postal reorganization. This would mean another six percent raise for postal carriers on the congressional enactment date, top pay for eight years of service, collective bargaining on future issues, and no disciplinary action for strikers until the conclusion of amnesty talks. The first part of the settlement was announced on 2 April. It quickly passed both houses of Congress, and President Nixon signed the bill, with an eight percent raise, on 15 April 1970.

At the same time, union and postal officials continued to work on postal reorganization. In the final version of part two of the agreement, the unions adopted a collective bargaining structure in place of their traditional structure. The parties reached agreement on this second part of negotiations on 16 April. Congress acted much more slowly on this agreement than on the first, but after a threatened filibuster and talk of another strike, the agreement passed with amendments to address new concerns.

The majority of postal workers accepted the settlement, but enough workers were dissatisfied that Local 36 threatened another walkout. There were basically two problems. The first was that New York workers believed they would receive area wage differentials, prepaid health insurance, and a longer period of retroactivity. The second was that neither the National Postal Union nor the National Alliance of Postal and Federal Employees were allowed to participate in the negotiations. The amendments that were added protected minority unions and prevented a union shop. The Postal Reorganization Act passed Congress on 6 August, and Nixon signed the act into law on 12 August 1970.

Key Players

Blount, Winton M. (1921-): Blount, a native of Alabama, graduated from the University of Alabama and during World War II flew B-29 bombers. After the war he and his brother created a successful general contracting business. Active in civil affairs, Blount eventually rose through the ranks and served as postmaster general from 1969 to 1971.

Rademacher, James: President of the National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC) from 1969 to 1976. Rademacher successfully negotiated three collective bargaining agreements.

Shultz, George Pratt (1920-): Shultz served in a number of political positions including secretary of labor (1968), head of the Office of Management and Budget (1970), secretary of the treasury (1973), and as President Ronald Reagan's secretary of state (1982-1989).

Bibliography

Books

Filippelli, Ronald L. "Postal Strike of 1970." In Labor Conflict in the United States: An Encyclopedia, edited by Ronald L. Filippelli. New York: Garland, 1990.