Peter Kellman

Peter Kellman (born 1945) is an anti-war activist, author, and American labor union leader and activist.

He is president of the Southern Maine Central Labor Council, and a member of the executive board of the Maine AFL-CIO.

Among a number of other positions he holds, Kellman is also a researcher with the Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy (POCLAD). POCLAD is a project of the Council on International and Public Affairs (CIPA).

Early life

Kellman was born in New York City in 1945. His parents and their friends communists, and friends of the family were similar "fellow travelers": communists, socialists and trade union activists. The Kellman family moved to Maine, where Peter Kellman grew up and attended school.

In 1965, two years after graduating from high school, he became active in the civil rights movement and joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). SNCC sent Kellman to Alabama, where he helped coordinate the Selma to Montgomery marches in support of black voting rights. Afterward, he helped build the Selma Free Library. When SNCC decided to form local political parties in Alabama independent of the Democratic Party, Kellman was one of the volunteers sent to build the nascent organizations (working in Sumter County, Alabama).

Returning north after his work for SNCC, Kellman became involved in the American peace movement, where he helped organize the first anti-draft rallies in 1967 against the Vietnam War.

Returning to New England, in the late 1960s and 1970s Kellman worked as a construction worker, air conditioning repairman, painter and shop floor workers in a rubber mill.

Labor movement activism

In 1976, Kellman was working at a Converse shoe factory in North Berwick, Maine making sneakers. Kellman, who worked in the rubber mill portion of the factory, tried to form a union along with his 500 co-workers. The organizing effort was unsuccessful. But the effect the company's anti-union effort had was a radicalizing one, and Kellman became more and more interested in the labor movement.

Kellman later became a painter, and was elected steward in the local painter's union.

Kellman also became involved in the anti-nuclear movement. In 1977, he worked with the Clamshell Alliance to build public support to oppose construction of the Seabrook Nuclear Power Station in New Hampshire and oppose all nuclear power in New England.

In 1979, Kellman took another job in a shoe factory. He was elected president of Local 82, Shoe Division, of the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union, AFL-CIO in Sanford, Maine.

Moving to New Hampshire, Kellman worked as an organizer for the AFL-CIO. This brought him his first experience with a strike. Kellman's instinct for building solidarity and his organizational skills "turned a routine strike into a crusade marked by rallies, marches, and emotional meetings." [Getman, "The Betrayal of Local 14," p. 52.] After the strike, Kellman became director of the newly-formed New Hampshire Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health.

Kellman returned to Maine, where he joined the staff of the Maine AFL-CIO as an organizer.

International Paper strike

When paper workers in Jay, Maine began tough collective bargaining talks with the International Paper (IP) in 1987, the Maine AFL-CIO assigned Kellman to work with the local.

Local 14 of the United Paperworkers' International Union (UPIU, now part of the United Steelworkers), based in Androscoggin, Maine, faced demands which, on the face of it, seemed unbelievable. Among IP's demands were the elimination of overtime pay on Sunday and no more Christmas Day holiday.

The local union, however, had no history of member activism and little organizational infrastructure. The local community provided little support for the paperworkers' union so long as IP provided well-paying jobs. [Steve Early, "Solidarity Sometimes," "The American Prospect," Sept. 11, 2000.] But within a month of the start of the strike in June 1987, Kellman had radicalized and energized the factory workers and was building a successful "class-based social movement." [Ellen J. Dannin, "Divided We Fall: The Story of the Paperworkers' Union and the Future of Labor (review)," "Labor Studies Journal", 31:1 (Spring 2006), pp. 96-97.] The strike by IP's 1,200 workers in Jay generated international attention and even provoked the introduction of a bill to ban striker replacement in Congress.

International Paper immediately fired every single union worker who had struck, and hired permanent replacements.

Although the strike lingered until October 1988, Kellman and the union were fighting a losing battle. Kellman convinced the local union leadership to seek assistance from their parent union and the AFL-CIO. Initially, UPIU leaders agreed to begin a comprehensive campaign against International Paper. But UPIU was unprepared to engage in such a battle. Neither the local nor the international union had had enough lead-time to conduct research, the unions did not have economic or shareholder leverage against IP, and state and local community leaders were ambivalent about supporting the union. [Getman, "The Betrayal of Local 14," supra.] The strikers had little bargaining power once they had been replaced. [Timothy J. Minchin, " ‘Labor's Empty Gun’: Permanent Replacements and the International Paper Company Strike of 1987–88," "Labor History", Feb. 2006, p. 1.]

Many in the labor movement, including Kellman, argued that UPIU and the AFL-CIO had "sold out" Local 14. In time, Kellman came to moderate his position, arguing that a corporate campaign strategy would have worked but that all organizations involved lacked the organizational expertise and infrastructure and lacked the political will to successfully implement the tactic.

Current positions

In addition to his work for the Southern Maine Central Labor Council and Maine AFL-CIO, Kellman works as a researcher for the Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy (POCLAD). He researches the history of the labor movement and the legal, social and moral development of corporate power.

POCLAD was formed by 11 labor, community, political and environmental activists to strategize about the future of progressive and radical social movements in the U.S. ["Interview with POCLAD's Peter Kellman," "Corporate Crime Reporter", 15:19 (May 7, 2001) [http://www.poclad.org/articles/kellman-interview.html http://www.poclad.org/articles/kellman-interview.html] ] POCLAD is a project of the Council on International and Public Affairs (CIPA), a non-profit research and education group.

Kellman is also coordinator of the Jay-Livermore Falls Working Class History Project, and a visiting artist at the Heartwood College of Art in Kennebunk, Maine.

As part of his work with POCLAD, the AFL-CIO and the Jay-Livermore Falls Working Class History Project, Kellman conducted research into the paperworkers' strike against IP. He turned his research into a book, "Divided We Fall: The Story of the Paperworkers' Union and the Future of Labor," which was well-reviewed when published in 2004.

Kellman is also very active in Labor Party politics.

Memberships and awards

Peter Kellman is a member of the National Writers Union, Local 1981, United Auto Workers, AFL-CIO, and a member of the American Federation of Teachers.

In 2002, Kellman was named a co-recipient of the 2002 Stringfellow Awards for Justice and Peace, given by the Chaplain's Office at Bates College in honor of peace activist, theologian and lawyer William Stringfellow.

Published works

*Kellman, Peter. "Building Unions." Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y.: Apex Press, 2001). ISBN 1-891843-09-5.
*Kellman, Peter. "Divided We Fall: The Story of the Paperworkers' Union and the Future of Labor." Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y.: Apex Press, 2004. ISBN 1-8918-4323-0
*Kellman, Peter, ed. "Pain On Their Faces: Testimonies on the Paper Mill Strike, Jay, Maine, 1987-1988." Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y.: Apex Press, 1998. ISBN 0-9452-5796-1
*Kellman, Peter and Bruno, Ed. "Toward a New Labor Rights Movement." "WorkingUSA." Spring 2001.

External links

* [http://www.maineaflcio.org/ Maine AFL-CIO]
* [http://www.poclad.org/ Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy (POCLAD)]
* [http://www.cipa-apex.org/ Council on International and Public Affairs (CIPA)]

Notes

References

*"1,200 Maine Workers Strike International Paper Co. Plant." "New York Times." June 17, 1987.
*Getman, Julius. "The Betrayal of Local 14." Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1999. ISBN 0-8014-8628-9
*Minchin, Timothy J. " 'Labor's Empty Gun': Permanent Replacements and the International Paper Company Strike of 1987–88." "Labor History." 47:1 (February 2006).
*Kellman, Peter. "Divided We Fall: The Story of the Paperworkers' Union and the Future of Labor." Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y.: Apex Press, 2004. ISBN 1-8918-4323-0