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BOOK REVIEW
| James B. Jacobs, Mobsters, Unions, and Feds: The Mafia and the American Labor Movement, New York University Press, New York, 2006. pp. xxxii + 320. US $32.95 cloth.
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| Every now and then a book comes along which makes us rethink a major issue or question. The issue here is the long run subservience, or inability, of unions to establish a secure footing in America. Why is it that American unions, with the exception of the era associated with the passage of the Wagner Act 1935, have found it so difficult to find a place in the American sun? Mobsters, Unions, and Feds: The Mafia and the American Labor Movement by James B. Jacobs has a relatively narrow focus. Its concern is the mafia's involvement with American unions, and attempts by the state, particularly in the last quarter of a century, to free them from such domination. |
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Mobsters, Unions, and Feds: The Mafia and the American Labor Movement is a path breaking work. In the preface, which provides a comprehensive literature survey, Jacobs points out that corruption of unions by the mafia 'has not attracted much interest from university-based scholars. Students of crime, law and society, American history, and even American labour history have largely ignored this disturbing story' (p. xii). |
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Traditionally, law enforcement agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Department of Justice (DOJ), as well as the Department of Labor, were not concerned with the penetration of unions by the mob. For most of the twentieth century, they interpreted their major mission as keeping 'reds' and radicals out of unions; a mission which became increasingly intense during the Cold War. Following the death of J. Edgar Hoover in 1972, and the disappearance, or more correctly, assassination of Teamster union boss Jimmy Hoffa in 1975, both the FBI and DOJ decided that they would mount a serious campaign in ridding unions of mafia elements. |
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Since the mid 1980s Jacobs has been involved with various crime task forces in such campaigns. He has also been a member of the Centre for Research in Crime and Justice at New York University's School of Law. His career has been devoted to researching and combating organised crime in American unions. He writes as an insider, with a breadth of knowledge concerning various dimensions of this problem, particularly, the legislative framework which governs this area, and the extensive case law that it has spawned. He is to be commended for the clear and concise way that he takes readers through the intricacies of this 'new province for law and order'. At a minimum, Jacobs has added a new and valuable dimension to industrial relations scholarship with the incorporation of knowledge from criminal law. |
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The structure of The Mafia and the American Labor Movement is straight forward. Following the preface, Jacobs outlines the major actors involved in fighting corruption in unions, with particular attention on the mafia and various arms of the state. He provides historical information on how the mafia infiltrated and took over unions, how they operate, the response of organised labour – essentially the AFL-CIO – and state agencies to such infiltration, Congressional inquiries, Presidential Commissions, and the various activities of law enforcement agencies, such as the FBI and the DOJ. |
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In the 1980s such agencies decided to use the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act 1970 (RICO) to combat union racketeering. The most significant aspect of RICO is that a Federal Court can order that a union be placed under trusteeship to remove mafia personnel and influence from the operation of that union and to help reform it to become a democratic organisation. Up to 2005, when research for this volume concluded, there have been 20 such RICO trusteeships. Jacobs provides information on how a RICO action unfolds and examines the success, or otherwise, of such trusteeships. |
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Borrowing from the principles of insolvency or administration associated with corporations that experience financial difficulties, payments for RICO appointed trustees come from union funds. Jacobs points out that the persons who have been appointed as trustees 'are almost all former prosecutors with experience investigating and prosecuting organized crime' (p. 146). The problem here is that they charge 'normal' legal rates. Jacobs observes that union members find rates of $300-$500 an hour 'staggering ... Ironically, such compensation exceeds the remuneration of mob-connected union officials whose salaries and emoluments prosecutors condemned as bloated, unjustified and exploitive' (p. 153). Rank and file unionists, caught up in this experiment of 'democratization from above' (p. 261) have found it difficult to distinguish between the two competing teams that raid union accounts – the flashy dressed who operate in cash and those in pinstriped suits who use invoices and credit cards. The logical policy option would appear to be that trustees should be paid from the public purse, particularly if the object of RICO actions is to protect the broader community from the mafia. This is not an option canvassed by Jacobs. |
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The most disturbing part of Mobsters, Unions, and Feds: The Mafia and the American Labor Movement is Jacob's conclusion concerning the success of RICO actions. He says
RICO ... has fallen seriously short of its full potential. The majority of trusteeships have not produced regime change. Many have not produced a single fair, much less competitive, election. The majority have probably not completely purged organized crime's influence from the union (p. 259).
Moreover, he fears that in the post 9/11 environment, the FBI and DOJ will turn away from fighting organised crime to an unremitting search for terrorists. His work concludes with a lament about the lack of broader public, governmental and academic concern with the scourge of union racketeering. |
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This brings us back to the broader question: what does this volume tell us about the broader ebbs and flows of American unionism? Jacobs correctly points out the mafia and their takeover of various unions has harmed the cause of labour, and the mafia have used unions as a base to entrench themselves and to corrupt political and legal processes in imposing costs on the rest of society. Is the mafia a cause or effect of the strange dance between America and its union movement? |
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America is the land of rugged individualism, the land where corporations are god, queen and country; it is the bastion of capitalism. With the exception of the period associated with the Wagner Act 1935, America has not welcomed unions and their quest to defend the rights and interests of workers. The history of American industrial relations is replete with examples of employer and state violence directed against unions, their leaders and rank and file members. Moreover, courts have found ways to interpret statutes which have further inhibited their ability and freedom to campaign, organise workers, and take on employers in collective bargaining. In addition, various local communities, state agencies, including, if not especially the FBI during the reign of J. Edgar Hoover have tarred progressive elements within the union movement as nothing more than communist inspired agitators determined to destroy the American way of life. |
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Unionism in America has been and is a sick patient. It has been attacked by various diseases. Jacobs has documented its inability to resist and cope with the cancer of mafia infiltration. The cure that America has developed is one of attacking the disease rather than dealing with the health of the patient. This is the ultimate reason why RICO actions have so far proved unsuccessful in reviving the health of the patient. Its health will only be improved when fundamental change occurs to the environment in which American unions operate. Don't hold your breath! |
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Mobsters, Unions, and Feds: The Mafia and the American Labor Movement is an important work and is highly recommended for all students interested in unions and industrial relations. It makes a new and unique contribution in examining the orbit of union racketeering, and, in so doing, raises larger issues concerned with the place of unions within America. |
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| University of Melbourne |
BRAHAM DABSCHECK | |
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