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International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 309 and the Fate of American

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International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers
Local 309 and the Fate of American
Construction Trade Unions, 1965-2002.[1]

Louis Baczewski


Louis Baczewski, a senior history major at Eastern Illinois University, wrote this paper for
Dr. Edmund Werhle Fall of 2001. It was part of an independent study project and received
the Alexander Hamilton Paper Award.


The word around the IBEW (International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers) was that if
you could not find work in the United States or Canada you could go to East St Louis.[2]
IBEW Local 309 in East St Louis had a reputation throughout the country as a strong local.
It controlled the work and provided above average working conditions in its jurisdiction. 309
cooperated with its state and local legislators and could count on a vast array of jobs due to
the regions industrial prospects. In the mid to late 1960s the work picture could not have
been better for all trades in this region, and across the country. Unemployment was at an
all time low; in 1968 and 1969 rates fell as low as 1.6 percent for electricians while the
other trades had similar rates.[3] Low unemployment coupled with the building trades
relative monopoly on the supply of skilled labor amounted to a contractors worst nightmare.
In this period, organized labor had the upper hand in this struggle and hence the ability to
make significant wage and benefit demands. Yet these exceptional times would prove to be
a double-edged sword.

Local 309, like trade unions across the country, lacked the manpower in the 1960s to meet
the demand generated by government-funded projects. In effect, the entire country was in
a construction boom and skilled journeymen were in great demand. Contractors were
dependent upon unions to provide enough skilled labor for the many projects developing
around the country. Construction unions looked outside of their own membership to fill this
labor void, taking on permit workers or white tickets[4] who were not fully accepted into
the union, but worked on union projects. Local 309 used white tickets when there was too
much work for the local men to handle. Yet, when worked slowed in the 1970s, these ticket
workers lost their jobs.

What seemed as a period of opportunity, was in truth a time when trade unions created
their own worst enemy: non-union competition. This problem began when the prosperity of
the 1960s era ended, and the white ticket workers were put back on the street. Due to the
bargaining power that construction unions gained during the 1960s, contractors and
corporations alike became increasingly resentful of union power. The prosperity and
negotiating strength that unions took for granted during the late 1960s would soon be
compromised. When the unions failed to organize the white tickets after the prosperity of
the 1960s subsided, corporations saw the opportunity to capitalize on the available

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workforce. These white tickets received on the job training, but were excluded from union
membership. Unions would not accept these ticket people, so non-union firms did so.

The repercussions caused by these exclusionary practices, which were made in unions
across the country, were not as harmful in local 309s region. As IBEW locals and other
trade locals throughout the United States began to fall apart, 309 stayed strong. Yet, local
309 was still plagued by a mentality of exclusion, which characterized most trade locals.
Only their tough reputation, infrastructure, and political clout enabled them to survive.
Former 309 business agent[5] Mike Faust suggested that, the local did not want too many
members, for they wanted to keep the work in a confined group, selfishness on our part
perhaps. No, not perhaps, surely it was selfishness.[6]

This mentality would destroy many unions across the country once the difficult economic
times of the 1970s and 1980s coincided with a corporate and conservative governmental
collaboration to undermine unions. Union market share dwindled since the 1970s and as
construction jobs increased, union memberships stayed relatively static. Anti-labor
legislation and corporate attacks combined with construction unions self-inflicted wounds
resulted in a battle for the very survival of organized labor. Trade unions had become
increasingly anachronistic in their methods; old school ideologies hindered change or even
the recognition of an existing threat. By the 1980s, the non-union threat could no longer be
ignored or dealt with through intimidation or violence. All of these aforementioned threats
combined with the drastic economic changes of the past 40 years have led unionists to the
realization that they must either change or perish.

Using local 309 as an example, this paper investigates the economic crossroads of
the 1960s and the effects of this turning point on the present day. The country club
mentality, which was characteristic of most trade unions, was no different in local 309. Yet
local 309, unlike many trade locals across the country, survived: the question is why? The
reason seems to be 309s strong cooperation with local and state legislators as well as a
relatively diversified and abundant work picture in their region. However, local 309 was still
hindered by the memberships exclusiveness and unwillingness to change, organize, or do
smaller commercial and residential work. Despite the amount of work and cooperation with
legislators, 309 now realizes that change must come if it wants to survive. Eventually, the
determined and skillful leadership of the local was able to make great strides, but even
those officials seem to wonder if it is too little too late.

--The Sixties--

During the mid 1960s, the construction boom reached national consciousness. As
President Lyndon Johnson said in May 1964, Construction wages are rising too fast, to the
dismay: of home-buyers and home makers, who have to pay through the nose for plumbers
carpenters, electricians, etc; of other workers who feel these decentralized unions are
getting away with murder.[7] Although unions saw it differently, St. Louis also fad a
construction boom.


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In November of 1966, the Local 309 submission to the Electrical Workers Journal headlined
as, Many Traveling Brothers Helping Local 309. The local was overrun with work and
could not handle the influx. The article boasted that at least 200 men were working on
Granite City Steel foundry alone. By 1967 with the construction of a basic oxygen furnace
and hot strip projects, the Granite job would carry an estimated 700 electricians.[8] All the
while, the local industrial complexes of Monsanto, and Ethyl in East St Louis, had an
estimated 100 to 200 men each. Around the same time, major commercial jobs were also
underway. The entire Southern Illinois University Campus at Edwardsville had been under
construction since mid 1965 and would be until the early 1970s. By 1967 the Federal
government announced a ten million-dollar project on near by Scott Air-Force Base, a
five-year powerhouse job was begun in Baldwin[9], and Granite City announced another
seven million-dollar project.[10]

Consequently, most of the 300 Local 309 wiremen were forced to serve as foreman or crew
leaders, and the rest of the workers had to be found elsewhere. The first option to fill this
void was to use traveling brothers, journeymen IBEW members who travel to find work in
other locals typically during boom times when overtime is involved or to find a local with a
better pay scale. [11] But travelers, for the most part, sought overtime work and a sizable
amount of these jobs were only 40 hours-a-week. Since this economic boom was raging all
across the country at this time, many travelers went somewhere else. A fella [traveler] may
have worked for you for a day, six hours, whatever, when he found out there was no
overtime, he quit the job, explained one 309 foreman.[12]

With few options, local 309 allowed contractors to hire off the street, under the condition
that they would pay them the prevailing wage. These men hired off the street were called
ticket help or white tickets. The region was so desperate that for electricians that one
contractor in Granite City began to advertise on St Louis KMOX radio in order to find
workers. Men were hired in Granite City, promptly put on a company truck, and then taken
to the hardware store to buy their hand tools. The tool cost was deducted from their first
paychecks and they were put to work.[13] At this point, there was so much work, that
experience was helpful, but hardly necessary for being hired. Former BA Mike Faust who
was second in command on the Granite City Steel BOF project, remembered that his crew,
was comprised of only one journeyman the rest were ticket workers.[14]

From 1966 to late 1969, this boom continued. Work eventually tapered off in 1971, to the
point where only a handful of travelers or white tickets were employed in the 309 area.[15]
The boom died, but in those few years, drastic changes had occurred that which changed
American union strength forever. The hiring of white tickets to fill the work