100th Anniversary of the Birth of Walter Reuther
by Region 8 Webmaster John Davis
photos courtesy Reuther Library Wayne State University

100 years; an entire century; a measure of time. On September 01, 2007 the 100 years anniversary of the birth of Walter Reuther will occur. Even though he died in a plane crash in May of 1970, his mark on this union, working Americans and this country is still felt today.

In his time, Walter Reuther pioneered a number of benefits that every day working Americans take for granted. Here are just a few of Walter Reuther’s accomplishments:

- employer provided health care
- pension plans
- cost of living increases
- guaranteed job assurance
- the Peace Core
- the idea of national health care

From humble beginnings in Wheeling West, Virginia, Walter Reuther went on to become a confidant to a number of presidents, world leaders and one of the best friends a working person ever had. His unwavering efforts for truth, justice and the rights of America’s workers earned him a spot on Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people of the 20th Century.

Born the second of five children, Walter Reuther was the son of Valentine Reuther, and immigrant and member of the Brewery Worker’s Union. Walter Reuther recalled, “At my father’s knee we learned the philosophy of trade unionism. We got the struggles, the hopes and the aspirations of working people every day.” The young Reuthers developed a commitment to addressing social problems through union and political action.

Valentine Reuther would debate the social issues of the day with his sons after dinner after having sent them to the library to research the topics. Walter Reuther would say “that while his friends played baseball, fished or had fun, he spent his days reading up on the issues of the times.”

The Reuther Brothers would move to Detroit seeking jobs in the booming automobile industry. Following this brief stint the Reuther Brothers would go to Europe to visit relatives in German and take jobs training Ford workers in Russia. While visiting German relatives the brothers would end up having to hide from the Nazis before making their way back to America.

By the end of 1935, the Russian workers were trained and the Reuther brothers returned to Detroit just in time to participate in the great union-organizing struggles in the automobile industry. To more effectively “organize the unorganized,” Walter Reuther worked to combine several small Detroit local unions into the Westside Local 174. He became president of the large local, and at the UAW’s 1936 convention, he was elected to the union’s executive board.

Reuther’s rise would be boosted by the famous “battle of the overpass” as he and several other UAW organizers were beaten by thugs hired by Ford as they passed out union literature at the overpass that carried workers from the parking lot across the street to the Ford Rouge factory complex in Dearborn, Michigan. It would take four years but workers at Ford would finally win union membership.

In 1939 Reuther was appointed the head of the General Motors department by UAW President R. J. Thomas. When General Motors stalled negotiations for a new union contract, Reuther called for a June strike, but only by tool-and-die workers. This tactic halted the all-important retooling for the 1940 model year. Faced with a production shutdown, General Motors agreed to a new contract.

In 1939 Walter Reuther went to his friend Franklin Roosevelt with a proposal to develop a contingency plan to covert automotive factories to war time production. In Europe World War II was raging and Reuther felt that it was just a matter of time before the United States was drawn into the war. His “500 Planes a Day” plan was adopted by President Roosevelt and when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 07, 1941 the country had a plan for supporting the war time effort. Roosevelt was so impressed with Reuther he offered him a position in his administration, but Reuther turned him down because his heart was with the labor movement.

Walter Reuther was recognized as a labor leader of national stature when he led a strike against General Motors at the end of 1945. Autoworkers had seen their buying power erode during the war and Reuther demanded a 30 percent pay increase. He claimed GM could grant the pay hike without increasing car prices and challenged the corporation to open its books to prove it. The UAW and GM reached a compromise without opening the corporation’s books, but Reuther often returned to the theme that automakers had obligations beyond making money for their stockholders. They also had a duty to their employees and, ultimately, the American public.

After Reuther was elected president of the UAW in 1946, he began to guide the union down a new path and pledged to work for “a labor movement whose philosophy demands that it fight for the welfare of the public at large.” Under his leadership, UAW members won unprecedented benefits, including enhanced job security, cost-of-living adjustments, vacations and health-care insurance. Supplemental unemployment benefits (SUB), introduced in 1955, helped to ease the economic pain caused by the cyclical nature of auto work. With SUB, workers on layoff continued to receive a paycheck, which equaled 95 percent of their regular take-home pay. Reuther hailed SUB as “the first time in the history of collective bargaining [that] great corporations agreed to begin to accept responsibility” for their workers during layoff.

Walter Reuther was admired and loved by working class people everywhere, but not so by the rich and powerful. In 1938 a group attempted to kidnap and murder Reuther but he escaped. After returning home after a late meeting in 1948, Reuther sat at his dining room table eating his warmed over dinner when an assassin fired a shotgun through a window in his home. With his wife May and children sitting along side him, the blast almost blew his right arm off. He would eventually regain limited use of his arm, but it would pain him the remainder of his life. The police placed little effort in finding the criminals, because of the influence of the rich and powerful in Detroit. Reuther’s drive to change the nature of work in the auto industry resulted in strong and steady opposition. Future Michigan Governor George Romney, then with the Automobile Manufacturers’ Association, called Reuther “the most dangerous man in Detroit” for the labor leader’s skill in “bringing about…revolution without seeming to disturb the existing…society.”

Walter Reuther was a visionary whose efforts would benefit the entire segment of working class Americans. In 1959 he met a young minister named Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and formed a friendship that would last the remainder of their lives. He marched with Dr. King in Selma, Alabama and gave him an office at Solidarity House, the UAW Headquarters in Detroit, to organize the Freedom March in Detroit and the March on Washington in 1963. At the historic March on Washington, where Dr. King delivered his famous “I Have a Dream Speech”, Walter Reuther would be the only white man to deliver speech from the podium.

The 1960s found Walter Reuther spending much of time working on social issues and had just begun the push for National Health Care when his life was cut short. For years he had envisioned an education center for UAW members to discuss and learn about the issues that working class people face. His dream became the Walter and May Reuther Family Education Center at Black Lake, Michigan. On May 09, 1970 Walter and May flew to Black Lake for a final walk through before the center opened. They were killed in a plane crash at Traverse City, Michigan as the plane landed. Test would indicate the plane had been tampered with but no one was ever arrested in connection with the crash.
Labor’s great voice and advocate had been silenced just as his friends Dr. King and John and Bobby Kennedy. Yet, his legacy remains for us today.

On this 100 anniversary of the death of Walter Reuther many of his dreams remain unfulfilled. Health Care for everyone was an idea that he was just beginning to push at his untimely death. Today, this idea remains undone. Reuther felt that health care should be a right and not a privilege. He was against oppression of the people of underdeveloped countries at the benefit of the major corporations. He felt that government existed to serve and protect all citizens – not just the wealthy and powerful.

On this centennial anniversary of this great man, there is no better honor that we could bestow than to continue his work. Walter Reuther believed in social unionism and we should follow his example. “Social Unionism” refers to the idea that organized labor exists to serve the needs of the working class as oppose to concerning itself with its members alone. This means that we are concerned about issues that impact all working class families. If we do this, then issues such as minimum wage and national health care are important to us. Our members make more than minimum wage and most have health care, but our efforts should lean toward making certain that all working class families have these rights and it is our voice that speaks for these families. When working class families see us working for them in their communities, in their local and state politics and on the national scene, then we won’t be knocking on our working class friends and families door asking them to join us. When they see us exhibiting social unionism, then they will come knocking on our door asking how they can join.

On this important birthday for Walter Reuther, let us dedicate ourselves toward carrying the torch for the working class that he so proudly displayed. The terms on which he lived his life can best be summed in a quote by the man himself which goes “There is no greater calling than to serve your fellow men. There is no greater contribution than to help the weak. There is no greater satisfaction than to do it well.” Walter Reuther is surely enjoying his eternal rest in the satisfaction of knowing he did it well.