Medical Program of Welfare and Retirement Fund of the United Mine Workers of America

1960 ◽  
Vol 2 (8) ◽  
pp. 418
Author(s):  
W F Draper
Keyword(s):  
Medical Program ◽  
Retirement Fund ◽  
United Mine Workers ◽  
United Mine ◽  
Mine Workers

A Social Contract for the Coal Fields: The Rise and Fall of the United Mine Workers of America Welfare and Retirement Fund. By Richard P. Mulcahy. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2000. Pp xiii, 274. $34.00.

2001 ◽  
Vol 61 (4) ◽  
pp. 1153-1154
Author(s):  
Lawrence W. Boyd
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
New York ◽  
Story Line ◽  
University Of Tennessee ◽  
Narrative History ◽  
Retirement Fund ◽  
United Mine Workers ◽  
Pension Benefits ◽  
United Mine ◽  
Mine Workers

This is a book that deserves a wider readership than its title might suggest. More than a narrow history concerning health and pension benefits received by one union, it touches on nearly every issue that has been raised concerning health care and social-security reform. Richard Mulcahy accomplishes this feat through a clearly written narrative history that seldom strays from its basic story line. The story involves the founding, development and demise of medical coverage provided by the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) Welfare and Retirement Fund. Furthermore Mulcahy provides what might be called a revisionist historical assessment of John L. Lewis, president of the UMWA; specifically that his regime might not have been the “Corrupt Kingdom” described by William Finley (The Corrupt Kingdom. The Rise and Fall of the United Mine Workers. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1972).

“Judases”

2020 ◽  
pp. 67-92
Keyword(s):  
Gilded Age ◽  
Local Union ◽  
Union Leadership ◽  
Union Leaders ◽  
Union Decline ◽  
United Mine Workers ◽  
United Mine ◽  
Mine Workers

Chapter 3 examines the reasons that caused workers to leave or reject unions. Scholars normally associate union decline with workers disillusion with unionism. This chapter, however, argues that workers’ faith in unionism did not waver as much as their faith in union leaders did. As Gilded Age unions like the United Mine Workers implemented a more centralized hierarchy, local union autonomy waned. As a result, workers doubted whether union leaders made decisions with the workers’ interests in mind, and they left the union when it seemed their leaders went astray. Rather than abandoning unionism altogether, however, many of these individuals formed local unions that rivaled the national unions, indicating that workers had more problems with union leadership than they did with unionism itself.

Outsiders

2020 ◽  
pp. 93-118
Keyword(s):  
White Women ◽  
People Of Color ◽  
Immigrant Workers ◽  
Union Leadership ◽  
Union Leaders ◽  
Highly Skilled ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
United Mine Workers ◽  
United Mine ◽  
Mine Workers

This chapter discusses the problems within unions that caused union leadership to treat members differently from one another. It argues that although union leaders often claimed the unions were open to all races and ethnicities, the efforts they pursued favored white laborers over people of color. Stereotypes that associated black miners with strikebreaking and construed non-English-speaking immigrant miners as unintelligent and unskilled cast a shadow over union procedures and the laws unions fought to secure. Even though farmers and white women had less experience in the mines, these individuals were welcomed far more readily than black and immigrant workers who were often highly skilled in the mining trades. In the end, the exclusivity practiced by organizations like the United Mine Workers alienated nonwhite and non-English-speaking workers, giving these groups little reason to join union ranks

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document