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Mexican State Development Policy and Labor Internationalism, 1945–1958

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 February 2009

Norman Caulfield
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Summary

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The Mexican state's drive toward industrialization during World War II and the post-war years required the cooperation of organized labor. Central to this policy was the role played by American trade unions, which cooperated with US government agencies in providing financial and logistical support for Mexican trade unionists who complied with state development policy. The interests of American labor leaders, US policymakers and Mexican modernizing elites converged in an attempt to eradicate radical unionism and promote US hegemony in the western hemisphere. This study builds upon works that treat the earlier activities of US labor in Mexico.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review of Social History , Volume 42 , Issue 1 , April 1997 , pp. 45 - 66
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1997

References

1 This interpretation is powerfully advanced in Andrews, Gregg, Shoulder to Shoulder? The American Federation of Labor, the Mexican Revolution, and the United States, 1910–1924 (Berkeley [etc.], 1991)Google Scholar. For a contrasting interpretation of the AFL's role in the Mexican Revolution see Taft, Philip, The A.F. of L. in the Time of Gompers (New York, 1957), pp. 320–333Google Scholar. Taft views the growing interest of AFL leaders in Mexico as an expression of genuine labor internationalism. Snow's, SinclairThe Pan-American Federation of Labor (Durham, NC, 1964)Google Scholar views Gompers' efforts as an attempt to counteract US business in the western hemisphere. Scott, Jack, Yankee Unions, Go Home! How the AFL Helped the U.S. Build an Empire in Latin America (Vancouver, 1978)Google Scholar, and Radosh, Ronald, American Labor and United States Foreign Policy (New York, 1969)Google Scholar both stress US organized labor's integration into the foreign policy apparatus of the United States. Levenstein, Harvey, Labor Organizations in the United States and Mexico (Westport, CN, 1971)Google Scholar discusses the limits of Gompers' internationalism, but fails to connect the AFL to US foreign policy objectives. For discussion and analysis of the American labor movement's radical wing's influence on Mexican workers and their organizations, see Christopulos, Diana K., “American Radicals and the Mexican Revolution, 1900–1925” (Ph.D., State University of New York at Bing-hampton, 1980)Google Scholar; Hart, John M., Anarchism and the Mexican Working Class, 1860–1930 (Austin, 1978)Google Scholar; Hodges, Donald, Mexican Anarchism After the Revolution (Austin, 1995)Google Scholar; and Caulfield, Norman, “Wobblies and Mexican Workers in Mining and Petroleum, 1905–1924”, International Review of Social History, 40 (1995), pp. 51–76CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2 For a discussion of the increased managerial role of the US government in the Mexican economy, see Niblo, Stephen R., War, Diplomacy, and Development: The United States and Mexico, 1938–1954 (Wilmington, DE, 1995), pp. 105–119Google Scholar.

3 Middlebrook, Kevin J., The Paradox of Revolution (Baltimore, 1995), p. 160Google Scholar. Also see Brachet-Marquez, Viviane, The Dynamics of Domination (Pittsburgh and London, 1994), pp. 83–111Google Scholar, for an overview of the state's conservative shift in labor policy.

4 Gompers' labor internationalism and its ties to US economic hegemony in Latin America are explained in Andrews, Shoulder to Shoulder?

5 Early studies of this dynamic are: Radosh, American Labor and U.S. Foreign Policy: Snow, The Pan-American Federation of Labor, Levenstein, Labor Organizations; Scott, Yankee Unions; and Berger, Henry W., “Union Diplomacy: American Labor's Foreign Policy in Latin America, 1932–1955” (Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, 1966)Google Scholar. More recent studies are: Andrews, Shoulder to Shoulder?; Weiler, Peter, “The U.S., International Labor, and the Cold War: the Break-Up of the World Federation of Trade Unions”, Diplomatic History, 5 (1981), pp. 1–22CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Spalding, Hobart A. Jr, “The Two Latin American Foreign Policies of the US Labor Movement: The AFL-CIO Top Brass vs. Rank-and-File”, Science and Society, 56 (1993), pp. 421–439Google Scholar; and Welch, Cliff, “Labor Internationalism: U.S. Involvement in Brazilian Unions, 1945–1965”, Latin American Research Review, 30 (1995), pp. 61–89Google Scholar. In addition to these works, Roxborough's, Ian essay “Labor Control and the Postwar Growth Model in Latin America”, in Rock, David (ed.), Latin America in the 1940s: War and Post-War Transitions (Berkeley [etc.], 1994)Google Scholar, contextualizes the efforts of Latin America's modernizing elites to harness labor militancy within economic development strategies that increasingly relied on foreign capital. This theme is expanded upon in Kofas, Jon V., The Struggle for Legitimacy: Latin American Labor and the United States, 1930–1960 (Tempe, AZ, 1992)Google Scholar. More specifically, Kofas focuses on the labor dimension of the Cold War, and relies heavily upon US State Department records to document the formation of ORIT and the AFL-State Department's anti-CTAL campaign.

6 Although Brachet-Marquez, The Dynamics of Domination and Middlebrook, The Paradox of Revolution offer keen insight and detail of Mexican trade union politics during the early years of the Cold War, they both fail to address the issue of labor internationalism, which included the interventionist role of ORIT, the AFL, the CIO and the impact these forces had upon the Mexican working-class movement historically as well as within a contemporary context. Mexican scholars of the labor movement generally fall into the same category. While the essays in Ponte, Victor Manuel Durand (ed.), Las derrotas obreras, 1946–1952 (Mexico City, 1984)Google Scholar, analyze leftist setbacks and defeats in the petroleum, railroad and mining unions during the Alemán sexenio, they fail to link this dynamic to Quintanilla's, Lourdes study, Lomabardismo y sindicatos en américa latina (Mexico City, 1982)Google Scholar.

7 Middlebrook, The Paradox of Revolution, p. 160.

8 Niblo, War, Diplomacy, and Development, p. 159.

9 Kofas, Struggle for Legitimacy, pp. 38–39.

10 Millon, Robert Paul, Mexican Marxist: Vicente Lombardo Toledano (Chapel Hill, 1966), pp. 138–139Google Scholar.

11 See Chassen, Francie de López, Lombardo Toledano y el movimiento obrero mexicano, 1917–1940 (Mexico, DF, 1977)Google Scholar, and Millon, Mexican Marxist, for an examination of Lombardo's politics, philosophy and career as a trade union leader.

12 Niblo, War, Diplomacy, and Development, p. 11.

13 Cited in Cockroft, James D., Mexico: Class Formation, Capital Accumulation, and the State (New York, 1983), p. 154Google Scholar. For detailed study and analysis of wage developments, especially in Mexico City, see Bortz, Jeffrey, Los salarios industriales en la ciudad de México, 1939–1975 (Mexico City, 1988)Google Scholar. Both Cockroft and Bortz document that from 1939 to 1946 the manufacturing workers' real wage dropped 50 per cent because prices for basic necessities increased by 300 per cent. Economic data generated by the Mexican government is also found in National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, DC, State Department Records, Record Group 59 (hereafter NARAW, SD Records, RG 59) 812.5045/1037; US Embassy to the Secretary of State, 5 April 1944. The report indicated that, between 1941 and 1943, prices in the Federal District rose 60 per cent while wages increased only 20 per cent.

14 Excélsior, 14 June 1944.

15 El Popular, 17 June 1944.

16 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.5041/1–1845; Henry F. Holland to the Secretary of State, 16 January 1945.

17 Ibid., 812.504/2–1545; Ailshie's “Interpretive Comment on Mexican Labor”, to the Secretary of State, 15 February 1945.

18 El Popular, 24 March 1945.

19 Excélsior, 21 September 1945.

20 Ibid., 6 December 1945.

21 Caulfield, “Wobblies and Mexican Workers”, p. 52.

22 On the differences between the AFL and the CIO with regard to Mexico in the 1930s, see Levenstein, Labor Organizations, ch. 10.

23 CIO News, 12 March 1945.

24 Ibid.

25 Scott, Yankee Unions, p. 202.

26 As cited in ibid., p. 195.

27 Ibid., p. 210.

28 Niblo, War, Diplomacy, and Development, pp. 10–11.

29 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.00/9–2144; “Conversation with Lic. Alejandro Carrillo, Editor of El Popular and Prominent Mexican Labor Leader”, Ailshie to Secretary of State, 21 September 1944.

30 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.504/2273; Ailshie, “Memorandum of Conversation with Mr. Lombardo Toledano by a member of the Staff of the Embassy”, 17 April 1944.

31 NARAW, SD Records, Central Files, 800/850.4; Information on Lombardo's proposed ouster by Avila Camacho supporters was given to American Consul, George P. Shaw by FBI agent Gus Jones on 11 January 1940. Jones received his information from an informant, Francisco de la Garza, of San Antonio, Texas, a close friend and confidant of President Avila Camacho.

32 Meany, George, “Pan-American Day Address”, cited in Romauldi, Serafino, Presidents and Peons: Recollections of a Labor Ambassador (New York, 1967), p. 47Google Scholar.

33 For an account of Robert Haberman's activities in Mexico during the 1920s, see Andrews, Gregg, “Robert Haberman, Socialist Ideology, and the Politics of National Reconstruction in Mexico, 1920–25”, Mexican Studies/Estudios Mexicanos, 6 (Summer 1990), pp. 189–211CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

34 NARAW, SD Records, Central Files, 812.6363/3523; 812.6363/3524.

35 Ibid.

36 El Popular, 31 July 1945; also see CTAL News (Mexico City), August 1945.

37 Excélsior, 12 February 1946.

38 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.504/6–2146; Ailshie to the Secretary of State, 21 June 1946.

39 CTAL News, 24 June 1946.

40 El Popular, 1 August 1946.

41 Ibid., 22 August 1946.

42 For an excellent analysis of the collaborationist policies of the CTM during this period see Jorge Basurto, Del avilacamachismo al alemanismo (1940–1952), vol. 11 of La clase obrera en la historia de México (Mexico, 1984), pp. 72–76; and López, Virginia Villegas Manjarrez, La CTM vs. otras organizaciones obreras (Mexico, 1983)Google Scholar.

43 NARAW, SD Records, 812.5043/8–1547; letter from S. Walter Washington to the Secretary of State, 27 March 1947.

44 El National, 10 January 1948.

45 Ibid.

46 Alonso, Antonio, El movimiento ferrocarrilero en México: 1958–1959 (Mexico, 1979, 3rd ed.), p. 75Google Scholar. Also see Gill, Mario, Los ferrocarrileros (Mexico, DF, 1971), pp. 146–151Google Scholar.

47 NARAW, SD Records, Record Group 84, Dept. of State Inter-American Affairs, Regional Circular no. 4, post files 560, 5 May 1951.

48 Ibid.

49 Ibid.

50 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59,812.06/9–1153; Stephansky to the Secretary of State, 17 March 1954. For a discussion of the importance of state subsidies to Mexican labor unions see Middlebrook, The Paradox of Revolution, pp. 72–106, and 109.

51 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.067/9–1153; Stephansky to Secretary of State, 17 March 1954.

52 Basurto, Del avilacamachismo, p. 246.

53 Besserer, Federico, Novelo, Victoria and Sariego, Juan Luis, El sindicalismo minero en México: 1900–1952 (Mexico, 1983), pp. 51–53Google Scholar.

54 Suárez, Armando Rodríguez, “Nueva Rosita! Drama y Ejemplo de Hombres Dignos”, in Gill, Marió (ed.), La huelga de Nueva Rosita (Mexico, 1959), pp. 67, 113Google Scholar.

55 ibid., p. 22.

56 Ibid.

57 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.062/8–453; Stephansky to Secretary of State, 4 August 1953.

58 Ibid.

59 Ibid.

60 Ibid.

61 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.06/10–1454; Stephansky's Semi-Annual Labor Report to the Secretary of State, 14 October 1954.

62 Ibid.

63 Ibid., 812.06/3–1754; Stephansky to the Secretary of State, 17 March 1954.

64 Ibid.

65 Ibid., 812.06/11–2652; Report from Windsor Stroup, American Labor Officer in the US Embassy in Mexico to the Secretary of State, 26 November 1957.

66 NARAW, SD Records, RG 84, post files 560, “Policy Guidance regarding Labor and Manpower Aspects of Technical Cooperation Program”, a confidential policy statement from the Acting Administrator to Technical Cooperation Country Director, All Missions, 5 March 1952.

67 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.06/10–1454; Stephansky's Semi-Annual Labor Report to the Secretary of State, 14 October 1954.

68 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.06/11–2657; Stroup to the Secretary of State, 26 November 1957.

69 Ibid., Salazar had opposed Gompers and the AFL's activities during the early 1920s when he was an important intellectual leader of the anarchosyndicalist Confederación General de Trabajadores (CGT). As early as 1926, however, he began working with the reformist CROM.

70 Ibid., 812.06/6–657; Stephansky to the Secretary of State, 6 June 1957.

71 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59, 812.06/3–2057; Stephansky's 1956 Annual Labor Report, 20 March 1957.

72 NARAW, SD Records, RG 59,812.0621/3–1258; A. Kramer, labor attaché of the American Embassy, to the Secretary of State, 12 March 1958.

73 Ibid. Kramer reported that Mexican government officials were concerned that forceful intervention in the strike might produce martyrs for the strikers, something the ruling party did not want during an election year.

74 Ibid.

75 Brambila, Aurora Loyo, El movimiento magisterial de 1958 en México (Mexico, 1980, 2nd ed.), p. 29Google Scholar.

76 NARAW, SD Records, Central Files, 712/8–2985; 712.00/8–2958; telegram from the US Embassy in Mexico City to the Department of State, 29 August 1958.

77 Loyo Brambila, El movimiento, pp. 46–49.