Labor Will Rule: Sidney Hillman and the Rise of American Labor

Reprint of the Free Press book originally published in 1991 (and warmly received by PW-4/12/91, LJ-4/12/91, and Kirkus 4/15/91). Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.

The lives of few American labor leaders have been given as thorough and caring an examination as that of Sidney Hillman in this massive biography by Fraser, the executive editor of Basic Books. Fraser shows how Hillman's early experience as an agitator in revolutionary Russia and as an immigrant toiling in America's textile industry shaped his outlook on the ``labor question'' for the rest of his life. Indeed, Fraser depicts how Hillman's passionate belief in the dignity of working people translated into his advocacy of a national labor policy that would shield American workers from the vicissitudes of the market system and provide them with economic security and equal rights in the work place. The author also painstakingly details how this led Hillman to seek an alliance with progressive industrialists and leaders of the Democratic Party to achieve his goals. Hillman's successes, from the Protocols of Peace to the organizing of the CIO, and his access to Franklin Roosevelt (memorialized in FDR's quip, ``Clear it with Sidney''), contained, Fraser argues, the seeds of organized labor's fall in the decades after WW II--a crucial paradox to Fraser, for as Hillman and organized labor succeeded in improving the living standards of American workers, they did so by forsaking their demand to include labor's voice in managing the American economy. An impressive work that both vividly documents the life of one of America's foremost labor leaders and manages to address a number of questions about the rise and fall of American labor and the Democratic Party over the course of the 20th century. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Onetime radical revolutionary from a Lithuanian village, Sidney Hillman (1887-1946) eked out a living as a cutter in Chicago's garment trade, then rose to become an influential labor leader and a member of FDR's inner circle. Due to his efforts, the Democratic Party of the mid-1930s came close to becoming the recognized party of organized labor. The nation's first political action committee, the CIO-PAC, which Hillman created, pioneered demands in 1944 for racial equality, women's right to work, equal pay and federally subsidized child care. Yet, in his close association with New Deal politicians, Hillman saw his moral authority erode among comrades as the labor bureaucracy he helped erect became increasingly ossified. Foster, executive editor of Basic Books, explores these contradictions in a superb, vibrant biography that mirrors American labor's "sea change" from insurgent proletariat to a force integrated into capitalist mass culture.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Fraser has written the definitive study of the public career of Sidney Hillman (1887-1946), which supersedes Matthew Josephson's Sidney Hillman: Statesman of American Labor ( LJ 11/15/52) and all other earlier biographies. Hillman, a founder in 1914 and lifetime President of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, went on to become a major force in the American labor movement, a founder of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), and a recognized spokesman for working people in the corridors of power in Washington. He also was a confidant of President Franklin D. Roosevelt; a major player in mobilizing labor for the industrial and military build-up before Pearl Harbor and during World War II; an originator of labor's political action committees (PAC); and a power broker in the Democratic party in the 1944 presidential election. Fraser tells Hillman's story skillfully and perceptively in a book that is highly recommended for current American history and labor collections.
- Harry Frumerman, formerly with Hunter Coll., New York
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.