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From the May-June 2008 issue of Union Democracy Review #173
Maine shipbuilders protest vs. IAM trusteeship
Thomas Buffenbarger, Machinists international president, dispatched his deputy to Bath, Maine on March 17 to change the locks on the hall of Local S6, then put the local under trusteeship, ousted the local officers, and took over negotiating a new contract. It was the culminating act in a long campaign to try to get this independent local under control. Routine. At worst, Buffenbarger might have anticipated the usual ineffective protest; but he could not have expected what followed: continued mass protest picket lines, an unfavorable local press, and powerful resistance in federal court.
This 3,400-member local represents workers at the Bath Iron Works which builds and repairs boats for the military and is owned by General Dynamics. The local is not easily quelled; its members know their popular president, Mike Keenan, --- just removed by Buffenbarger's trustee --- as independent-minded, outspoken, and an occasional critic of the IAM district officialdom. He was elected in 2001 and has been reelected every three years since.
At one point, he complained that one district official was getting improper double pension payments and that another was using union funds to promote a personal affair. He aroused intense hostility from the district officials when he refused to pay out money from the local treasury into the international's Machinists Non Partisan League Educational Fund, which covers administrative costs of the union's political action committee. He explained that the membership had voted against making the payment.
The international's obvious drive to get rid of Keenan began when it supported an opposing slate against him in the October 2007 local elections. That first attempt failed when Keenan was reelected, along with Troy Osgood for vice president, and Michael Cyr for chief steward. But investigators assigned by the international ruled that various technical violations had occurred --- Keenan's supporters noted that this election had proceeded under precisely the same rules that had been unchallenged under previous elections. Nevertheless, the international simply voided the 2007 election and ordered a rerun for February 12, 2008. This time, the rerun election was under total control of the international itself. Nevertheless, its second attempt to dump Keenan fizzled badly when his slate did even better than before. He, Troy, and Cyr were reelected. But, Cathy London, their candidate for trustee, who had been defeated in the first round, was elected along with them. Nothing else worked against Keenan. The trusteeship followed on March 17.
To justify the trusteeship, the international obviously fished through the local's books and records over the years to assemble a mishmash of alleged misdeeds: accounting errors, questionable payments to staff, late payments to suppliers, a presumed backlog of grievances, a dispute over payments for pizza. The local was charged with running a voided election in 2007, which could hardly justify a trusteeship: any defect was corrected by the new election. One charge, oozing with lurid juice, was based on an alleged finding of child pornography on some local computers. What it was, no one would say but, in any event, it later came out that whatever it was, it was on some computer in Alabama.
The IAM makes it impossible for members to get fair legal representation in internal union procedures. When the international conducted hearings on post 2008 election disputes, the local's own lawyer was not permitted to represent Keenan or other local executive board members. The IAM allows members to be represented only by other IAM members and the local's attorney was presumably not a member. But the international easily escapes that limitation; it simply gives union "membership" to its own international lawyers.
When trusteeing a local, the international goes further; it makes it impossible for the removed local officers to defend their own rights in court or to defend the rights of the local membership during the period of trusteeship, because the international trustee takes control of all the local assets; and the local loses access to its own money. If the removed local officers, or any individual members, want to sue in defense of their legal rights, they must hire their own attorney, which is almost always prohibitively expensive for any normal human being.
But this case turned out to be different because with the assistance of the Association for Union Democracy, the local officers are represented by attorney Leon Rosenblatt, who is an expert on union democracy law, an AUD advisor, and serves on a contingency fee basis. With his help, they have been able to prepare an effective defense at internal union hearings and in federal court. (This account is based upon their formal statements, verified by newspaper accounts.)
Now in federal court, Keenan, Osgood, Cyr, and London charge that the IAM has violated their free speech rights protected by LMRDA Title I, that it has illegally imposed a trusteeship over the local in violation of Title III, and that it has defamed and harmed them in violation of state law.
For other articles on the IAM, try our search tool.
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