II. STAFF MEMORANDA, 1949-1965

Grouped alphabetically by staff member's name and thereunder arranged chronologically by date of issue.

Includes memoranda, correspondence, research data, telegrams, and notes generated and received by IUE staff members, administrative assistants, and department heads who served under IUE President James B. Carey. The series provides important historical and evidential information pertaining to the responsibilities delegated to IUE staff members and Carey's reliance upon their functional expertise for effective administration of IUE affairs. Major subject areas include: organizing campaigns; publicity; strikes and relief efforts; collective bargaining and negotiations; pension and health programs; legislative affairs and political education; civil rights programs; litigation and legal affairs; labor education programs; staff appointments and assignment of field representatives; financial affairs and collection of per capita dues from IUE locals.

Representative staff members and department heads include: Carey's administrative assistants Walter Comer, Les Finnegan, David Lasser, Barton Post, and George Weaver; Albin Hartnett, Secretary-Treasurer; Benjamin C. Sigal, General Counsel; Benjamin Segal, Education; Edward Rovner, Committee on Political Education (COPE); John (Jack) Flynn and Kenneth Peterson, Legislative Department; Arthur Riordan and Ray Hansen, Publicity Department; Rodger Coyne, Assistant to Hartnett and Director of Organizing Campaigns; Richard E. Bauer, Comptroller and Accounting; and Joseph Swire, Pension and Health Programs. The collective memoranda files supplement and overlap, to a large degree, the records and series of the respective departments under which they functioned.

Each of Carey's executive assistants assumed responsibility for an area of expertise in addition to handling routine administrative matters. David Lasser's memo files document his work as the union's de facto research director. His files contain rich source material outlining the IUE's collective bargaining history with General Electric (GE) and Westinghouse, and IUE proposals for the implementation of a guaranteed annual wage (GAW) and supplemental unemployment benefits (SUB) plan. The union's struggle to counterbalance "Boulwarism" and adverse publicity generated by GE corporate publicists receives significant attention. Moreover, Lasser's compilation and analyses of comparative wage and contract data provide a framework for understanding the IUE's negotiating strategy. Les Finnegan, Carey's principal speech writer, collated research material on communism and the UE and monitored that union's relative strength within locals and segments of the electrical and electronics industries. He spearheaded the IUE's anticommunist campaign, marshalling and coordinating IUE resources to defeat the UE in National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) elections. Carey retained George Weaver to direct the IUE's COPE program and consult on matters relating to civil rights. In his capacity as an influential advisor to Carey, Weaver generated memoranda and correspondence pertaining to the outstanding political, economic, and social issues of the 1950s.

Albin Hartnett's files, and the extensive body of memoranda and correspondence generated by his staff assistants, contain valuable information relating to the IUE's financial affairs (i.e., per capita dues, delinquent locals, strike relief funds and disbursement, COPE contributions, and organizing campaign expenses) and the geographic distribution of its membership. Monthly per capita dues reports and tabulated membership figures (covering U.S. and Canadian affiliates), filed by Comptroller Richard Bauer, comprise a significant portion of this series. Rodger Coyne's files are noteworthy for their incisive assessment of key organizing campaigns and strikes, and the obstacles encountered by field representatives and organizers in enlisting new rank and file members. Related memoranda documenting publicity efforts in conjunction with organizing campaigns is contained within the files of IUE Publicity Directors Arthur Riordan and Ray Hansen. Both assisted IUE and CIO organizers at the local level. Riordan's role in orchestrating IUE union publicity activities during the GE Schenectady, New York (Local 301) campaign of 1954 is particularly illuminating.

Memoranda pertaining to the union's legal, legislative and political activities (Sigal, Flynn, Peterson, Rovner et al.) primarily duplicate and supplement the more voluminous and significant departmental records contained within other subgroups of the IUE records.