UFT Opposition Update: Not All Peace and Harmony as 2019 Elections Approach

Representatives of MORE and New Action met recently to discuss running in the UFT election and from what we hear the coalition would not include Solidarity Caucus.

With the disagreements between some people in ICEUFT and MORE many ICEers do not want to work with MORE/NA in the election.

And there is a faction of New Action that will ONLY be involved in the election if Solidarity is included. A crucial vote in New Action will take place at the beginning of November. Some members of New Action are threatening to leave the caucus if the anti-Solidarity faction prevails.

MORE doesn't meet until October 27 and there are people in MORE supposedly who do not want to run in the election. And further, Unity has been doing some recruiting among the people they see as disaffected from all the caucuses.

Are you confused? It is time for me to do a series of blog posts (or maybe a book) about the history of the opposition and the current state of opposition politics in the UFT and why I and others have basically given up on the idea that we can affect much of a change in a UFT dominated by the too big to fail Unity Caucus. 

Is it worth the enormous amount of time and energy it takes to even run in a UFT election just to possibly win 7 high school seats on a 100 member Executive Board? Is it worth the time and energy to print up leaflets and go to a Delegate Assembly just to make a point in a sea of Unity? If I saw something bubbling up in the schools, maybe it would be worth it.

I had hopes for MORE -- until a year ago. I'll get into why I no longer have faith that MORE can ever challenge Unity in follow-up blogs over the next few months as I report on UFT internal politics.

I had envisioned MORE as a big tent caucus that everyone in an interest in beating Unity could coalesce in. That is no longer true as MORE has morphed into a group that knows it cannot win but instead wants to use its organizational initiatives to push certain ideological positions on the UFT leadership --- a lobby/pressure group of sorts.

After 6 years of life what I see are still very few schools with real activity based on MORE initiatives. In fact, I think MORE has less schools now than it did 6 years ago. And yes Virginia, size does matter in terms of ability to influence the direction of the union.

James Eterno has an optimistic report on last Friday's ICEUFT meeting attended by people connected to the various grouplings within the UFT that would be termed "the opposition."

ICEUFT Blog ICEUFT MEETING BRINGS TOGETHER MEMBERS OF ALL UFT OPPOSITION GROUPS

James says:

.... the groups seem to have much more in common in wanting a powerful union than what divides us. The leaders of the various opposition groups might not always agree on the general direction for the movement but I learned at the ICEUFT meeting that there is plenty of common ground.

James is hoping there will be opportunities to work together in the upcoming contract ratification vote and in the UFT elections in 2019.

After almost 50 years of being part of opposition politics in the UFT, I'm not as hopeful. Being optimistic is not a bad thing - as long as we have a dose of reality tossed in.

James pointed out that

ICEUFT was joined by members from New Action UFT and Solidarity caucuses. Since some of the people in ICEUFT are still part of MORE (the Movement of Rank and File Educators, all of the opposition groups to Michael Mulgrew and Randi Weingarten's Unity Caucus within the UFT were represented at the ICEUFT meeting..... http://iceuftblog.blogspot.com/2018/10/iceuft-meeting-brings-together-members.html

Why are there so many grouplings and factions in the UFT?
In fact there was only a faction of New Action since there are some splits brewing over the UFT elections and who to run with. And there was only a faction of MORE present. I don't know enough about Solidarity.

When asked why the different caucuses and the non-aligned who oppose Unity Caucus in the UFT don't join together I answer with a question of my own:

Why is there a MORE, New Action, Solidarity, ICEUFT?
Given the relative small size of the number of activists, why is there more than one caucus? And not only that, why are there factions within caucuses? I guess the answer to the 2nd question explains the first. Unless a caucus - or any political group - understands that factions will exist and makes provisions for that, there will inevitably be splits and the formation of other caucuses. And when they are so weak they combine (see below for the 1995 NAC creation and the 2012 MORE creation as a result of mergers of sorts.)

And in the UFT where there is a dominant one party system of control under Unity, not having one opposition caucus under one tent spells ultimate doom for the opposition. That has proven true over the 50 years of opposition politics.

TAC
Since the first opposition caucus formed - Teachers Action Caucus (TAC) after the 1968 strike --- they were people who opposed the strike ---- there has never really been a time where there was just one big tent caucus in opposition to Unity. There were coalitions of caucuses that came together for UFT elections, but went their own way otherwise. In effect they were competing for the same few potential activists at the expense of the other caucuses.

New Directions merges with TAC
ND was a group that split off from the group I was in in the 70s -- Coalition of School Workers (CSW) which basically stopped functioning around 1981 but came back to life as ICE in 2003.

New Action came the closest to being the one opposition caucus in town when TAC merged with New Directions in 1995 after having had electoral success as a coalition of caucuses and independents in the 1991 election when they won 13 Ex Bd seats.

What is funny is that the current issues in NA run along the TAC people vs the ND people -- and ideology plays a role.  That's 23 years later and there are still latent issues.

NAC made their deal with Unity in 2003 in prep for the 2004 UFT election where they did not run a candidate for president against Randi Weingarten after she "guaranteed" them the 6 high school Ex Bd seats.


TJC and ICE
That led to the formation of two caucuses to fight against that deal --- Teachers for a Just Contract (TJC) and Independent Community of Educators (ICE-UFT). TJC had already been around for a decade but not as a caucus. The 2004 election was their first foray. We formed ICE in late 2003 because many independents did not find TJC conducive to being a truly democratic caucus but under the control of a few sectarians with a definitive ideological position that left little room for dissenting opinions.

There was immediate friction between ICE and TJC that never went away even though we won the high school seats in 2004 and ran together in 2007 and 2010.

MORE and GEM
Both caucuses were withering away with no growth - actually they shrank. Some of us in ICE saw that and organized a non-caucus -- GEM in 2009 that was non-sectarian and looked beyond internal UFT politics. GEM attracted enough people who began to think that a non-sectarian open caucus was possible.

Thus was born MORE in 2011-12 where the members of TJC and ICE came together with others. But the political tensions that had existed between ICE and TJC since 2003 never went away. And the recent splits in MORE represent those tensions where the TJC faction over the past 6 months to a year gained ascendancy and has tried to push the ICE people out. Many have abandoned MORE over the ideological differences.

So when James points to MORE people being at the ICE meeting, it is actually the ICE people still involved in MORE but at as an inconsequential level of influence.

Factions in caucuses

Unity Caucus does not seem to have factions. It runs by democratic centralism -- where even if you disagree, you must support the will of the majority or be forced out. Now some people in Unity have been talking behind the scenes that there is a faction in Unity that wants changes as a way to recruit people aligned with the divided opposition. I heard that line from Randi and crew back in the late 90s. It is just blowing smoke.

I believe that recognizing factions and holding debates on where people are divided so as to forge some common agreements is a healthy thing for a caucus and a union.

At the organizing meetings for MORE In 2011, all factions were there and sent 2 reps to each meeting. I brought up numerous times that we should explore what divided ICE and TJC as a way to resolve future issues. I was told we should only focus on what unites us not divides us. I saw this as a way to fluff over and stifle opinions.

At the very first large MORE organizing meeting in February 2012 I warned about the factions among the founders of MORE and said they must be taken into account --- ie.  make sure there is diversity of opinions and have the factions represented. But whenever you have sectarians in an organization, they will move to control the group and shut out or purge dissident voices.

Sadly, MORE has moved in that direction. The direction Unity follows, where those who disagree with policies set by the dominant faction are invited to leave the caucus - there is no longer a steering committee or any clear lines as to who are making decisions in MORE -- top down leadership so eschewed by social justice caucuses ----

As one former MORE member who left in disgust said: If MORE is going to have Unity Caucus like loyalty oaths why not just go to Unity which at least has all the toys?

Is there a way forward for the opposition and more historical context coming in future posts.

ICE Throws it Down for the 2010 UFT Elections

ICE/TJC presidential candidate James Eterno throws it down in his post at the ICE Blog.

An excerpt from Eterno's post:

We are posting this so we can start to emphasize to the readers of this blog how difficult it will be to unseat Mulgrew and Unity Caucus.

The NY Teacher is a house organ and as such it is a very efficient propaganda newspaper, spinning a positive message about the state of our union and its leaders. In addition, Unity has money as people who accept their invitation to join have to pay a fee.

Since being in Unity has guaranteed victory in UFT elections, Unity has a very deep treasury; they will use it to smear us in the general election in 2010. They are extremely adept in one area: keeping themselves in power. They count on member apathy. Sadly, the vast majority of teachers do not vote.

Unity even has a loyal subsidiary group called New Action. The traditional opposition party has not run a candidate for UFT President since 2001 and yet they remain on the ballot in UFT elections. Their purpose appears to be to confuse people who want to vote for something different. Their reward has been union jobs.

If we want to see real change in the UFT, ICE-TJC can lead the movement. We have union passion. Many in our group are experienced chapter leaders, delegates and activists. Some of us have even sat on theUFT Executive Board. We have served on the inside so we can clearly see how to repair the Union.

If elected, we will protect every member and Chapter as fully as possible. No UFT member should ever feel that the UFT doesn’t completely have their back.

More from James Eterno at 2010 Campaign Kickoff: We need YOU to Help Us Form a Real Union

Ed Notes Commentary

I learned a term in Los Angeles a few weeks ago: an organizing union vs. a service (or lack thereof) - the UFT/Unity top down model. In practical terms, this means that instead of sitting back and telling people to call the union when you have a grievance (and most of the time they tell you it is a waste of time) - the quasi service model – an organizing union is proactive and out there organizing the members into an active force that functions effectively at the school level.

The UFT/Unity model can't and won't implement an organizing model because that requires an open democratic, bottom up system. They fear their own members' activism because an active membership would be aware of the kinds of scams the leadership is pulling and threaten their control.

The Independent Community of Educators, ICE, in its almost 6 years of existence, has struggled to build itself in a way that doesn't emulate Unity.

ICE bends over backwards to implement democracy internally and must do so if it expects to implement an organizing union. But as you can imagine, democracy can get messy and we always don't get done what we feel we should get done. But it's worth the mess.

ICE believes that the key to a well functioning union that can serve and protect the members is through the most democracy, not the least. If ICE were to function in a top down, undemocratic manner, I would be the first to criticize.

I'll be writing a lot about Ed Notes views concerning organizing and elections in the UFT. What I say should not be construed as ICE/UFT positions as I don't always agree 100% with where ICE stands but I support the organization 100%.

UFT Exec Bd Nominates Mulgrew As Lone Candidate for Pres as ICE Attempt to Nominate Eterno is Rejected

Putin, Ahmadinejad, Kim Il Jong Jealous of Model of Undemocratic Precedure

Continuing a 25 year tradition, the UFT executive board again rubber stamped a hand-picked successor as the lone nominee to fill out a term of office. Given that Unity Caucus controls all the seats on the Board, Mulgrew is expected to win with 100% of the vote. Saddam Hussein is rolling over in his grave with consternation over how he could never figure out a way to get more than 98% of the vote. Even Ahmadinejad got only 2/3 of the vote. (The Mullahs are having the UFT Constitution translated into Farsi.)

A large group of ICEers, who have no seats on the Board, attended in the hope they would get an opportunity to speak and nominate James Eterno from the floor (read Anna Philips profile of James at Gotham). The vote on July 29 will still result in 100% for Mulgrew and having a 2nd candidate would only be symbolic, but ICE figured, why not try? Worse case scenario, get a few cookies and some fruit (that giant chocolate chip was fab).

James Eterno, a member of ICE, is running for president of the UFT. (Photo via GothamSchools' Flickr)

Figuring to use the EB rule giving any union member speaking time before the meeting as an opportunity to point out the lack of democratic procedure, I called ahead and asked for speaking time and was not told this was not allowed. I was recovering from my Bikram Yoga class, but I dropped my cigar and left the beach in Rockaway and schlepped over, but I was told by Michael Mendel that I would not be allowed to speak, as the speaking rule was suspended for these types of meetings. Former EB member (when she was with New Action) Ellen Fox of ICE also attempted to speak, but was turned away.

We were armed with the UFT Constitution, which has some of the more ambiguous language than credit default swap explanations. ICE's interpretation was that the Mulgew nomination was illegal, as the Constitution says an officer cannot run for another office unless he/she resigned as of July 1. It also says anyone can make a nomination without specifying that only applies to EB members. But if you read the Constitution backwardsor standing on your head, it is all legal.

I had the most fun watching the New Action EB crew, all elected with Unity support, sit there and blandly accept the situation without attempting to nominate anyone. Their fearless leader, Michael Shulman, even got up to ask why there was a need to hold the pro forma election on July 29 if there was one candidate and why not just put on the crown immediately? Mendel said the Constitution calls for two separate meetings. Hey Mike, nice to see the Constitution being followed at times. (Actually, Unity has made the Constitution ironclad undemocratic with few if any loopholes.)

New Action is praying Mulgrew will give them a quarter of the attention Weingarten gave them. ICE expects New Action to run another bogus slate in 2010, with a small group of candidates endorsed by Unity in an attempt to claim there is bipartisanship and to keep any ICE/TJC people off the board.

For the record, in the last election (2007) ICE/TJC received 5500 votes while New Action got 3500, yet NA got 8 seats and ICE/TJC got none. Ahhhh, that fresh air of democracy.

George Schmidt, editor of the widely read Chicago-based resistance newspaper and web site, Substance, joined ICE at the meeting as an observer. "At least you can attend EB meetings even though you are gagged," Schmidt said. "The Chicago TU EB meetings are closed." Ah, more fresh air of UFT democracy, with the reigning theme being, "You can attend, as long as you eat your cookies and fruit and shut up."

Related:
Eterno Comments on Mulgrew Nomination at the ICE blog
MULGREW CORONATION: MEET THE NEW BOSS SAME AS THE OLD BOSS

Labor and the UFT

Friday night I was at a NYCoRE reception for their spring ITaGs (Inquiry to Action Groups.) There must have been at least 40 people present. I was too busy drooling over the guacamole to count.

I joined the Teachers as Organizers group and for the next 6 weeks we will explore issues related to labor with a focus on the UFT. (I wrote about it a few weeks ago Teachers as Organizers @ NYCORE.) I think there are about 7 of us in the group with quite a range of age and experience, so it should be illuminating.

Group leaders Seth Rader and Rosie Frascella, both NYC teachers, led an introductory discussion on where we should put our focus. We will cover issues related to working with teachers and working with children. Our first "assignment" is Why Teach Labor History? from the winter 2008/9 edition of American Educator.

Here is a tentative list of topics:

• History/structure of the UFT
• Identifying potential issues to organize around in individual chapter settings (bringing it back to schools)
• Connections to the wider labor movement
• Looking at teachers unions globally
• Teaching about labor

Since the first scheduled session is tomorrow, Jan.22, there was a conflict with the conference
WHAT STRATEGIES FOR STRUGGLE IN THE UFT: A Discussion/Debate being held at CUNY tomorrow from 4:30-7:30.

So, we're going on a field trip (I have to have my soon to be 91 year old dad - on Tuesday - sign my consent slip) to CUNY tomorrow.

With chapter leader elections this spring and with UFT general elections a year from now, it will be interesting to see how the different groups view the organizing situation. There is no official ICE speaker. ICE is in the process of working out where it will stand on a range of issues. Two speakers are affiliated with ICE and will be speaking from their own point of view. I'll have a report on the event Friday.

Here is the announcement from John Powers.

With public education the focal point, it is time to raise and debate the strategies and struggles facing the UFT and all educators. Join in an evening of lively discussion of various viewpoints.

Speakers: Sean Ahern (Ad Hoc Committee to Reverse the Disappearing of Black and Latino/a Educators), Angel Gonzalez, Sally Lee (Teachers Unite), Marjorie Stamberg (Class Struggle Education Workers) and Kit Wainer (Teachers for a Just Contract). Moderator: John Powers (CSEW)

Thursday, January 22, 2009, 4:30-7 p.m.
CUNY Graduate Center, Room 5414
365 Fifth Avenue (at 34th St.)
B, D, F, Q, R, N, W to 34th (Sixth Ave.), or 6 train to 33rd

Lessons for Anti-Unity Caucus Oranizers in the UFT?

The organizing methods of the Obama campaign may have some lessons for anti-Unity organizers within the UFT. See related link from Under Assault.

The struggle to create a movement for change within the UFT has been a difficult one. Perhaps the caucus system is not as effective a tool. Maybe too top down. Though associated with ICE, my instinct has been to encourage people to form into decentralized groups rather than try to bring everyone into one big tent.

Let each group organize whatever constituency they serve and then try to get the groups to affiliate with each other. That is the bottom up aspect talked about in this article. The difficulty is in the coordination at the higher level. Right now there are lots of forces (ICE, TJC, NYCORE, Teachers Unite, various ad hoc groups - ATRs, rubber room, other special interest lobby groups within the UFT) floating around. They may come together at a point there is a feeling of need to take some action. People are going to watch how the UFT handles the ATR demonstration that was forced down their throats at the Delegate Assembly last week. The UFT business as usual approach of holding a narrow demo without a major attempt to organize may not work for the UFT - with over 100 schools signing petitions for the ATRs - and it's still growing. I ran into a guy I know who lives and teaches in Rockway. HE is anti-Unity. Getting him to come to anything the UFT does is impossible. "I'll come to an ATR demo," he told me. ATRs are a hot issue with many teachers who are in schools threatened with being closed - probably in the long run, the overwhelming majority.

The Obama organization from the Huffington Post

Inside the Obama campaign, almost without anyone noticing, an insurgent generation of organizers has built the Progressive movement a brand new and potentially durable people's organization, in a dozen states, rooted at the neighborhood level.

The "New Organizers" have succeeded in building what many netroots-oriented campaigners have been dreaming about for a decade. Other recent attempts have failed because they were either so "top-down" and/or poorly-managed that they choked volunteer leadership and enthusiasm; or because they were so dogmatically fixated on pure peer-to-peer or "bottom-up" organizing that they rejected basic management, accountability and planning. The architects and builders of the Obama field campaign, on the other hand, have undogmatically mixed timeless traditions and discipline of good organizing with new technologies of decentralization and self-organization.

Win or lose, "The New Organizers" have already transformed thousands of communities—and revolutionized the way organizing itself will be understood and practiced for at least the next generation.

More

The Delicious Irony of the UFT Suit on Political Freedom

In the entire world of UFTdom, this lawsuit has to be one of the funniest things to come out of 52 Broadway in a long time.

With only weeks to go before the November 4 elections, the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) today [Oct. 10] filed a federal court lawsuit claiming that a New York City Department of Education policy banning educators from wearing campaign pins in schools violates their constitutional rights to free speech and political expression.
- UFT press release, Oct. 10, 2008. [Full release at Norms Notes.]

Ahhh, the hypocrisy of this defense of free speech by the UFT/Unity Caucus, the very organization that has its people pull opposition literature from mail boxes and has taken the astounding stand that groups critical of the leadership only have the right to go into schools to communicate their views once every three years during the 6 week UFT election period.

“The ban on members wearing lapel pins is bad enough,” Weingarten told reporters. “Now the Department of Education wants to restrict the communications between the UFT and its members through the regular channels utilized for such communications such as union bulletin boards and employee mailboxes, both of which are out of students’ view.

Unity Caucus chapter leaders have refused to allow anyone but them to post material on the UFT bulletin boards. UFT district reps have gone into schools and removed ICE and Ed Notes from mailboxes.

Have you been to a UFT Delegate Assembly and seen Unity delegates hoot and boo members of the opposition? You'd think you were at a Sarah Palin rally. Just short of, "Kill Jeff Kaufman. He's a terrorist."

The UFT's filing of a law suit against the DOE for banning teachers from wearing political buttons as an attack on free speech is akin to John McCain's attempt to distract people from the economy by raising straw men. And talk about character assassination.

"Are these the kind of leaders we want running our union" is a question asked by the card mailed directly to thousands of teachers' home? Distorting the ICE/TJC platform and going after Randi Weingarten's opponent in the 2007 election Kit Wainer's personal political views.

Remind you of the scare tactic character assassination of Barack Obama by the McCain campaign? It is a perfect example of the kinds of attacks the UFT/Unity Caucus machine engages in to slime the opposition.

Unity Caucus' Jeff Zahler, now Director of Staff at the American Federation of Teachers, told a Delegate Assembly he was proud of the Unity Caucus campaign literature that attacked Wainer for his socialist views. The only thing they didn't include was connecting Kit to Bill Ayres.

Here is a link to some ed notes commentary on the Unity slime literature.
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2007/03/unity-propaganda-machine-treads-in.html

Shuffling the Deck on the UFT Titanic

"He won't last 6 months." Thus spoke an observer upon hearing Jeff Zahler was replacing the affable and capable Michael Mendel as the UFT's Staff Director at the end of the last school year. "He doesn't have the temperament for the job," she said.

And so it has come to pass, as Zahler, noted for his red-baiting attack on Kit Wainer during the 2007 election campaign amongst other lovable things about him, will be leaving the post next week, but will remain as the head of Unity Caucus. Oh, those deck chairs.

His replacement will be Manhattan District High School rep for small schools, Leroy Barr. Barr will be the 4th staff director since strongman Tom Pappas left the post a few years ago. Under Weingarten, the staff director position has lost some of its dominance as she is a hands on micromanager (or meddler to some) and there is not a clear chain of command with so many political appointments who can go right to Weingarten over the head of the staff director.

With her expected move to the AFT Presidency next July, Weingarten must firm up the home front just in case a serious opposition should emerge. The brilliant move of buying off the long-time opposition, New Action, can only last so long as their support in the schools dwindles to microscopic levels. (Is New Action Really a Caucus?)

The staff director has often been viewed as the 2nd in command – Sandra Feldman held that position before being elevated to UFT Presidency when Albert Shanker finally gave up the position after holding both AFT and UFT positions for 11 years. She appointed Pappas, who was considered by some a possible replacement for Feldman at one point. But Feldman and Shanker had their eye on Randi Weingarten as a better choice than the rough and tough Pappas, who has run the all-important Retirement Chapter since he gave up his post as staff director. At that time Weingarten handed the position to Queens Borough Rep Elizabeth Langiulli, which quickly turned into a disaster. Then came Mendel who seemed to be doing fairly well (he always seemed to be available) before he was kicked upstairs. Maybe he was too popular.

So, has Leroy Barr suddenly jumped into the race as a possible successor to Weingarten when she moves to take over the AFT this July? We think not, certainly at this time. The leading contenders to take over for Weingarten one day have been Elementary School VP Michelle Bodden (who is rumored for reassignment), the up and coming Vocational HS VP Michael Mulgrew and Mendel. None of these choices really work for Weingarten's purposes, though Bodden is considered the most "presidential."

Ed Notes' position has long been that Weingarten will hold on to the UFT Presidency as long as feasible, but to do so she needs to strengthen the home front to cover for her while she is traipsing around the country. The next election in 2010 will be the telling factor. If she planned on not running at that time one would think there would be a clear successor who could use the next 2 years to make himself/herself known to the members. Barr's appointment only further muddies the waters.

I remember Shanker running through a few successors - Herb Magidson was one around 1975 before he was kicked upstairs to NYSUT – before settling on Feldman, who some people thought would have a tough time filling Shanker's shoes, but in retrospect, managed fairly well. I find it interesting the number of people who tell me they miss her after dealing with Weingarten, which is surprising considering she was not Miss Warmth. But there was a certain "what you see is what you get" with the late Feldman that would be refreshing today. It is hard to imagine she would buy off New Action, especially with Shulman, whom she had no respect for as the leader. And with his old left background, Feldman's right wing Social Democrats USA (SDUSA) party ideals would curdle in her stomach.

Feldman also had a "teacher" mentality even though she did little teaching. But she trained as a teacher and was a socialist with a trade union background. (I was at the AFT convention in Washington in 2004 when she made her farewell speech and was very impressed as she focused on her activities in the civil rights struggles of the 50's and 60's.) Actually, despite the condescending arrogance that at times came from her and her inner circle, I sort of miss her too.

It was well known before Weingarten ever set foot in a school that she was the chosen one. She never taught and rose through the ranks but was a lawyer who was given a part-time teaching position while also working at the UFT so she could claim legitimacy as a teacher as Feldman's successor. Give both Shanker and Feldman credit in that they defined clear successors. Weingarten is too insecure to have her own Weingarten-like successor and this lack of talent near the top will have a long-time impact.

The UFT, the largest local in the world with almost 200,000 members, controls the NY State United Teachers which recently merged with the NEA in NY state (the idea of a national merger is on hold) and thus controls the AFT. That is why Weingarten is assured of being elected AFT Pres.

But there are serious dangers for Weingarten's power base if she turns the reins over to a powerful and ambitious successor as she was. Stories abound of friction between her and Feldman when the latter tried to tell her what to do. Weingarten quickly moved to replace Feldman/Shanker loyalists with her own people. What would stop a successor from doing the same no matter how much she felt she trusted that person? The reins of power are the reigns of power and we know how power can make people so light-headed they become blind.

Maybe Weingarten is trying to trisect – a troika, or quadrisect – a "quadrumvirate"- the leadership so no one person gets too much power or gets too popular with the rank and file.

Both Bodden and Barr are African-American. Weingarten has diversified the UFT Executive Board ethnically and racially, though certainly not politically, as all members, including the 8 New Action members who received the "gift" from Weingarten, adhere rigidly to the Unity line. Ed Notes has long maintained that a politically diversified EB not dominated by people on the UFT dole and that reflected the realities in the schools, would have a positive impact on the union.

Watch to see who emerges as a major spokesperson when Weingarten is not around. It will be very interesting if it does turn out to be Barr, who from my own limited contact seems a decent guy. In his performance as District Rep I've heard generally good things with a few minor complaints. Everyone in the union benefits with a responsive staff director. We wish him well in his new position.

Maybe It Wasn't Shanker After All - Updated

Read the additional update below from the AFT blog with an addendum from me and brief history of the opposition in the UFT from Shanker times on.

Posted by Alexander Russo on September 20, 2007 on his edweek blog.

"One of the most interesting of the 20-something mostly irate comments on my Huffington Post article claims that Shanker doesn't deserve credit for unionizing the teachers because David Selden was the true visionary and was replaced by Shanker in a power struggle along the lines of Stalin and Trotsky. Hmm. Guess I skipped that chapter in Kahlenberg's book."


Ahh! Now we're getting to the source of Jeff Zahler's red-baiting attack on Kit Wainer who ran against Randi Weingarten in last spring's UFT election. I am into just the 2nd chapter of Kahlenberg's book ("Tough Liberal") and there are many themes and contradictions emerging. Like Shanker's "commitment" to democracy and vehement opposition to totalitarianism, while at the same time setting up the Unity Caucus system of governing the UFT that would make your average run of the mill dictator envious. Kahlenberg's index doesn't even mention Unity Caucus. Maybe it's a figment of all our imaginations.

I won't even go into the issues of his support for all the very things that have led to the undermining of the very union structure he helped build. Reading an account of Shanker's humiliating experience as a teacher in the 50's sounds so much like today. But then the UFT leadership would say he didn't have big, bad BloomKlein to deal with in those early years of organizing (Maybe it really was Selden). Poor babies, they have it so hard.

Not that I am new to this stuff since I was part of the opposition to Shanker in the 70's and even attended Shanker's coronation as AFT President at the AFT convention in Toronto in 1974 where Shanker stabbed Dave Seldin in the back and turned the AFT into an agent of his foreign policy.

We'll be doing a lot more on Shanker as I am working with Bruce Markens on a review of the Kahlenberg book for New Politics. Bruce was in this thing from the early 60's and ended up being the only elected UFT District rep that kept beating the Shanker machine (even though it was run by Feldman at the time.)

I hear old timers say that Shanker must be turning over in his grave over saw what is happening to teachers in schools today. I don't agree. He would be perfectly comfortable as it is a system inherited from him.

And in many ways, Randi Weingarten is more adept at selling this kind of stuff to the members. She's much more socially adept than Shanker (or Feldman) and much more of a politician - in the Clinton "We feel your pain" sense.

When Feldman/Shanker chose their successor, they knew exactly what they were doing. And it is in this sphere where Weingarten is far behind them - never secure enough to cultivate someone strong enough to run the UFT effectively in her absence. That may prove to be her bete noire.

Posts on Unity Caucus red-baiting can be found here, here, and here

Also check out the Century Foundation slightly biased roundtable discussion on Shanker's legacy. There are some powerful political forces behind the Shanker resurrection. And none of them bear well for teachers.


UPDATE from AFT blog:

Shanker in Our Times
September 21, 2007 12:28 PM

I am currently reading the new Shanker biography the Washington Way--I am looking up names in the index and then seeing what people said, or what is said about them, in the text. (C'mon, I work here, it's all part of the intrigue.) So, who did I start with? Bella Rosenberg. And, in the short section on NCLB, Bella says:

"Al believed in eradicating achievement gaps, group distinctions . . . But Al also knew that since the beginning of time, there had been individual variability," so a performance standard which requires 100 percent proficiency by a certain date "is just a human impossibility."

In reading over that section, I thought, gee that sounds familiar. Who was it, who was it, oh yeah, it was Amy Wilkins at Ed Trust who recently said in press release a on the Miller-McKeon bill:

"The 2013-14 deadline for proficiency is a powerful disincentive to raising standards. If we are going to ask states – and students – to climb a higher mountain, we need to give them more time to get there . . ."

So, it only took Wilkins five years and half years of NCL to realize what Shanker knew intuitively over ten years ago. He was a man ahead of his times. To read some of the reviews of his biography, click here.

Oh, and if you really want to understand what makes the AFT tick, read the sections on the Social Democrats with care. I, myself, never realized that Yetta Barsh, Shanker's assistant, was married to Max Shachtman.

Ed Notes comment:
Back in the 70's we used to talk about certain ironies in the fact that Yetta Barsh held the gateway to Shanker.

It is worth reading the Wiki about former Trotskyite Shachtman to get a picture of the underlying roots of the UFT/AFT.

Here's a piece:
Social Democracy. After Shachtman's death in 1972, many social democratic Shachtmanites rose to prominent positions in government and organized labor. Supporters of Social Democrats USA (SDUSA) in the labor movement included Albert Shanker (president of the American Federation of Teachers), as well as AFL/CIO presidents George Meany and Lane Kirkland.


The Opposition in the UFT: A brief, down and dirty history

With the main opposition to Shanker coming from Teachers Action Caucus, a Communist Party dominated group, the Stalin/Trotsky wars were being fought out in the UFT beneath the surface. With the rise of the New Left in the 60's and 70's, new groups of Trotsky derivatives began to surface in the UFT. As oppositionists, they could not work with TAC and therefore became part of the opposition independent of TAC.

TAC was opposed to the '68 strike and for years were branded as strike breakers, an unfair label, as that strike had so many connotations beyond labor issues.

The group I was with (Coalition of NYC School Workers), independent left-wing but anti-left political party - by this I mean, we viewed people who joined left political parties came into a group with a priority of organizing for their party and not for the group – occupied a middle position within this milieu and anti-CP (Communist Party) leftists gravitated to us.

Ultimately (1975-6), some of the Trot party people saw they weren't going to get anywhere and split off into New Directions along with others who felt the CSW were too cerebral and not action oriented. The dichotomy in New Directions led to a split there with the Trot party people left out in the cold and they ultimately formed a group called Chalk Dust while ND was left with the more middle of the road right wing elements. Eventually, ND and TAC merged (around 1990) into what is currently New Action and some of the Chalk Dust people evolved into Teachers for a Just Contract. New Action still has the old TAC/New Direction dichotomy with the NA core people still coming from the old TAC.

Thus, the roots of why New Action and TJC would find it impossible to work together go a long way back.

ICE (Independent Community of Educators) was formed 4 years ago from the original people involved in the old CSW from the 70's and people who worked with Education Notes, which began publishing around 1996 as an alternative point of view to New Action and TJC. The word "Independent" in the name of the organization was very important, reflecting those same feelings from the 70's when the CSW was in the middle of the ideological battles between the Social Democrats, CP and Trots.

That battle still goes on, as does the red-baiting on the part of Unity Caucus.