Despite the tough times the IAM faces, President Tom Buffenbarger predicted that “we will forge a brighter future for our families, our great union, our communities, and our respective countries.”

Buffenbarger Optimistic About the IAM’s Future

International President Tom Buffenbarger closed the 36th Grand Lodge Convention on a positive note as he thanked the delegates for “laying a good, solid foundation” and vowed that the IAM will “grow and prosper like never before in our 116-year history.”

Casting back to his Ohio roots, Buffenbarger shared the history he has lived through, and which helped form his core beliefs.

“We were taught, and we believed, that one man or woman could make a difference. We had irrefutable proof in the lives of John and Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Rosa Parks.”

“As an Ohioan, as an American, as a North American, I was raised an optimist. I truly believe that with effort we can make tomorrow better than today.”

Despite the tough times the IAM faces, Buffenbarger predicted that “we will forge a brighter future for our families, our great union, our communities, and our respective countries.”

Buffenbarger summed up the week and the theme of the convention by reminding the delegates about how much power the IAM and its members do possess.

“As individual trade unionists, as members of local lodges, as part of an international union, each of us has come to realize how much this massive continent depends on us. We art not bit players on a global stage. We are the indispensables.”

We are North America’s Might.

Delegates Approve Resolution #23

In a near-unanimous vote, delegates approved Resolution # 23, authorizing the IAM Executive Council to withdraw IAM affiliation from the AFL-CIO if so-called reform movements within that organization threaten our integrity, autonomy or independence.

“We need to send a strong message to the AFL-CIO – we should not allow our own dues dollars to be used against us,” said Tom Buffenbarger, who detailed a series of recent actions and decisions by the AFL-CIO that revealed an agenda favoring one group of unions at the expense of another. Under changes currently being promoted at the AFL-CIO, some member unions would be merged, by fiat, into organizations determined by the AFL-CIO, without a method whereby consent or dissent for such actions could be expressed. “I don’t believe the AFL-CIO has that kind of authority over the lives of unions,” said Buffenbarger. “I believe that rests in your hands.”

 

Full text:

 

RESOLUTION 23

Subj: AFL-CI0

Submitted by the Executive Council

WHEREAS, the AFL-CIO Executive Council, by mail prop action, issued an unprecedented ruling granting the Teamsters Union an open period of time during which they could raid IAM membership at all Auto Truck Transport locations across the United States, with the sole exception of one location, and

WHEREAS, this ruling, based upon political considerations, caused the IAM to divert resources otherwise reserved for organizing new members, thus impacting our successful organizing agenda, and

WHEREAS, the AFL-CIO ruling was only mitigated by the abject failure of the Teamsters to find sufficient interest among our Auto Truck Transport membership to carry the raid forward to an NLRB election, thereby allowing the IAM to prevail despite the heinous action of the AFL-CIO, and

WHEREAS, the AFL-CIO, at the initiation of the Service Employees union, took action to block a merger of the United Service Workers/IUJHAT with the IAM, thereby blocking the affiliation of approximately 50,000 new members with the IAM, and

WHEREAS, the AFL-CIO continues to allow the Carpenters Union access to AFL-CIO programs and benefits despite the fact that the Carpenters have long since disaffiliated with the AFL-CIO, having repeatedly failed and refused to pay the required per capita taxes in defiance of the AFL-CIO Constitution, and

WHEREAS, this blatant refusal, by the AFL-CIO, to enforce their own Constitution has led to the IAM losing jurisdictional disputes to the Carpenters and thereby suffering further raids upon our membership, and

WHEREAS, the leadership of the AFL-CIO has not responded to the foregoing disputes and blatant inequities as prescribed by the AFL-CIO Constitution, thereby placing the best interests of our membership in a precarious position, therefore, be it

RESOLVED, that this 36 th Convention of the Grand Lodge of the IAM&AW goes on record as urging the AFL-CIO and its leadership to exercise more prudent judgment and to take action to reclaim a leadership position with respect to the goals of a unified labor movement and to denounce the intent of some affiliates to usurp the role of the AFL-CIO, and be it further

RESOLVED, that this 36 th Grand Lodge Convention, with great reluctance, goes on record as stating that a failure to respond to the growing threats upon the institution of the AFL-CIO shall be sufficient to authorize the Executive Council of the IAM&AW to withdraw from the AFL-CIO, if, in their best judgment, such action would be necessary to preserve the integrity, independence and autonomy of this great union.