International Union of Electronic, Electrical, Salaried, Machine & Furniture Workers

Chartered as an affiliate of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) on 2 November 1949, after a tumultuous split with its parent organization--the communist-dominated United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE)--the International Union of Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers (IUE) evolved into one of the most influential trade unions in North America. Its membership reached a high of 400,000 during the mid-1950s and comprised a significant proportion of the unionized labor force employed in electrical durable goods manufacturing and related industries (radio, TV, household appliances, lamps, optics, batteries, business and calculating machinery); heavy electrical generating equipment and machinery; atomic energy; and electronics and defense-related industries (data processing, aviation, space technology). From its inception the union expanded its jurisdiction to include technical and salaried workers in several fields. In 1987 the IUE absorbed the United Furniture Workers Union.

The IUE's internecine struggle with the UE for dominance within theelectrical/electronics industry mirrored the frenzied anti-communist environment which engulfed American society during the McCarthy era of the early 1950s. Both unions vied for representation rights within the major chain corporations--General Electric (GE), Westinghouse Electric, General Motors (GM), Radio Corporation of America (RCA), and Sylvania. A disaffiliation movement within the UE resulted in the IUE's absorption of several key UE districts and locals as well as the defection of many key UE leaders. By 1956 the IUE became the dominant union within the electrical industry.

During the period 1955-1960, the union consolidated organizational and membership gains and advanced its collective bargaining agenda. IUE Conference Boards--representing affiliated locals within a respective corporate chain--enabled the union to increase its bargaining leverage and served as a vehicle to establish industry-wide standards with respect to wages, benefits, and working conditions. The IUE grappled with many of the outstanding economic and employment security issues of the era--including equitable administration of the Korean War defense production programs, automation and technological displacement, imports, and corporate decentralization resulting in runaway shops. When collective bargaining failed to resolve labor-management differences, the union resorted to various job actions and national strikes (Westinghouse, 1955-1956, and GE, 1960) to achieve its objectives.

The IUE and its leadership (particularly IUE President James B. Carey) played a significant role in facilitating the AFL-CIO merger agreement in 1955, and in the affairs of the labor federation during the period 1955-1965. Working through the AFL-CIO Industrial Union Department (IUD), the IUE defended its jurisdictional prerogatives against encroachment by the Building and Construction trades; pushed for the adoption of non-discrimination clauses with in union constitutions and contracts; the elimination of regional wage differentials and pay inequities due to gender; and the expulsion of corrupt labor unions from the federation. The IUE promoted democratic trade unionism abroad by funding and participating in conferences, meetings, and programs of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, the International Labour Organisation, and the International Metalworkers Federation.

On the political and legislative front the IUE established itself in the progressive vanguard on a number of important public policy and social welfare issues which dominated the domestic political milieu of the 1950s and 1960s. The union forged alliances with many prominent liberal organizations and leaders to advance key labor and economic legislation, civil rights and gender equity issues, and the anti-poverty measures associated with President Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society program. Through its various political action programs--CIO Political Action Committee (CIO-PAC) and AFL-CIO Committee on Political Education (COPE)--the union rallied its members' collective political strength behind Democratic Party candidates and party platforms in support of its political objectives.