Frank Fitzsimmons
Encyclopedia
Frank Edward Fitzsimmons (August 7, 1908 – May 6, 1981), was an American labor
leader. He was acting president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters from 1967 to 1971, and president from 1971 to 1981.
, to Frank and Ida May Fitzsimmons. His father was a brewer who moved the family to Detroit, Michigan
, in 1924 when Frank was 16. His father died of a heart attack when Fitzsimmons was 17 years old, and Frank dropped out of high school to support his family by working in an automobile hardware store. In 1932, he got a job as a bus driver in Detroit, Michigan
, and New York City before becoming a truck driver in Detroit in 1935. He joined Teamsters Local 299, and became friendly with the local union's president, Jimmy Hoffa
.
Fitzsimmons was elected Local 299 business manager in 1936, Local 299 vice president in 1940, and (at Hoffa's insistence) an international union vice president of the Teamsters in 1961. He was appointed secretary-treasurer of the 80,000-member Michigan Conference of Teamsters in 1949, and vice president of Teamsters Joint Council 43 in Detroit in 1959. During this time, Fitzsimmons became known as "a figure of ridicule" in the Teamsters. Inarticulate, chubby, passive and easily embarrassed, Hoffa and others frequently had him make coffee or hold chairs and rarely gave him any authority or duties. Nonetheless, Fitzsimmons was considered an adept manager and a very skilled contract negotiator. Despite Hoffa's many legal problems and the routine emasculation, Fitzsimmons remained the Teamsters president's staunchest supporter.
resigned as Hoffa's executive assistant in December 1963 after a failed coup against the indicted Teamsters president, Hoffa appointed Fitzsimmons to the office. Hoffa was sentenced to eight years in a federal prison for jury tampering
, conspiracy
, and fraud
, but was free while he appealed the decision. Fitzsimmons was initially not considered to be politically popular enough to succeed Hoffa. But Fitzsimmons was elected General Vice President of the Teamsters in July 1966, which to many Teamsters leaders signalled Hoffa's intention to make Fitzsimmons his heir-apparent in the event Hoffa was imprisoned. On February 28, 1967, the Teamsters executive board passed a resolution appointing Fitzsimmons "acting president" in the event Hoffa was no longer able to carry out his duties.
Hoffa entered prison in March 1967, and attempted to run the union from jail through Fitzsimmons. Fitzsimmons, however, was to be nothing more than a glorified gofer
:
Fitzsimmons and others even denied that they were doing work on Hoffa's orders. National trucking industry talks, interrupted when Hoffa went to jail, resumed with Fitzsimmons at the table. Although the pact expired and the union struck for three days, Fitzsimmons was able to negotiate a new agreement (with a federal mediator's help) which some believed was richer than any Hoffa could have obtained. He negotiated a second contract three years later which provided a 27 percent wage increase over three years.
Fitzsimmons rapidly solidified his own hold on the Teamsters presidency throughout 1967. He had permitted the International vice presidents greater latitude in their own affairs and delegated significant authority to them, winning their allegiance. He defeated an executive board attempt to oust him in July, and followed it up by demoting a number of Hoffa aides and promoting his own supporters (including Weldon Mathis
) to high positions in the union. By August, he had openly declared he would run for the presidency of the union. He further enhanced his popularity by negotiating in October 1967 a national master contract
in the trucking industry which brought 40,000 Northeastern
truckers into the contract for the first time, and by negotiating a new contract with ended a five-month steel haulers' strike.
Fitzsimmons also began taking the union in new directions. In July 1968 he and Walter Reuther
, president of the United Auto Workers
formed a new national trade union center
, the Alliance for Labor Action
, to organize unorganized workers and pursue leftist
political and social projects. Fitzsimmons and Reuther offered the AFL-CIO
a no-raid pact as a first step toward building a working relationship between the competing trade union centers, but the offered was rejected. The Alliance's initial program was ambitious, but Reuther's death in a plane crash on May 9, 1970, near Black Lake, Michigan
, dealt a serious blow to the Alliance. The group collapsed in January 1972 after the Auto Workers were unable to continue to fund its operations.
Fitzsimmons engaged in a notorious jurisdictional and organizing dispute with the United Farm Workers
(UFW) from 1972 to 1977, raiding the smaller union and establishing a new national farm workers' union to compete with it. The series of raids and counter-raids, repudiated contracts, and public relations attacks began in December 1972 when Fitzsimmons ordered a 1967 no-raid and organizing non-compete agreement with the UFW dissolved and Teamsters contract negotiators to re-open contracts. The UFW sued, the AFL-CIO condemned the action, and many employers negotiated contracts with the Teamsters rather than with the UFW. Although an agreement giving UFW jurisidction over field workers and the Teamsters jurisdiction over packing and warehouse workers was reached on September 27, 1973, Fitzsimmons reneged on the agreement within a month and moved ahead with forming a farm workers regional union in California. The organizing battles even became violent at times. By 1975, the UFW had won 24 elections and the Teamsters 14; UFW membership had plummeted to just 6,000 from nearly 70,000 while the Teamsters farmworker division counted 55,000 workers. The Teamsters subsequently signed sweetheart deal
s with more than 375 California growers. Financially exhausted, the UFW signed an agreement with Fitzsimmons in March 1977 in which the UFW agreed to seek to organize only those workers covered by the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act
, while the Teamsters had jurisdiction over all other agricultural workers.
In October 1973, Fitzsimmons ended a long-running jurisdictional dispute with the United Brewery Workers
, and the Brewery Workers merged with the Teamsters.
By 1975, Jimmy Hoffa was planning to seize the presidency of the Teamsters again. Hoffa had been released from prison on December 23, 1971, when President Richard Nixon
commuted his sentence to time served. According to the United States Department of Justice
and White House officials, Hoffa's release was granted on the condition that he not participate directly or indirectly in union activities until 1980. But Hoffa contended that he had never agreed to any such condition, and unsuccessfully sued to have the restriction overturned. But Fitzsimmons supported the government's position, and Charles Colson
, special counsel
to President Nixon who helped negotiate Hoffa's release, backed Fitzsimmon's interpretation of the release agreement.
Hoffa intended to publish a book accusing Fitzsimmons of "selling out to mobsters" and giving large low- and no-interest loans from Teamsters pension funds to mob-related businesses. But Jimmy Hoffa disappeared on July 30, 1975, removing the last significant opposition to Fitzsimmons' re-election. Fitzsimmons was, for a time, a suspect in the disappearance. Fitzsimmons continued to solidify his hold on the Teamsters throughout 1975 and 1976.
Fitzsimmons oversaw national trucking negotiations again in 1976, which led to major wage gains. Once again, the contract expired and the Teamsters engaged in a national trucking strike. But the strike ended after just three days, and union members ratified a contract which included a cost of living adjustment as well as a 30 percent rise in wages over three years.
, issued a massive report accusing Fitzsimmons and other Teamsters of corruption and suppressing democracy in the union and picketed the June Teamsters convention. Fitzsimmons attacked the dissidents for trying to "destroy the union". He famously raged from the podium:
Delegates to the convention were not persuaded by the attacks on the union leadership: They voted Fitzsimmons a 17 percent pay raise (bringing his salary to $516,250 a year) and re-elected him to a second full term.
In the late fall of 1976, Fitzsimmons oversaw a 10-week strike at United Parcel Service
. The strike, which affected 15 Eastern states
and included 18,000 warehouse workers and drivers, ended after the union reached an agreement to give workers a 33 percent wage increase over three years and restrict the employer's ability to replace full-time workers with part-time employees.
Fitzsimmons was investigated in 1976 for failing to perform his fiduciary duties as a trustee on the Teamsters' Central States Pension Fund, and forced to resign from the board of trustees in 1977. The U.S. Departments of Labor
and Justice
first began investigating the fund in January 1976. He was subpoena
ed by both the U.S. Senate's
Committee on Labor and Public Welfare
and by the Labor Department, and testified in public and private regarding loans the pension fund made to certain mob
-related businesses and the fund's operations. Although the Internal Revenue Service
revoked the fund's non-profit status, the penalty was suspended after Fitzsimmons agreed to remove several trustees (which he did in September 1976). Fitzsimmons and Roy Lee Williams
, director of the Central Conference of Teamsters, attempted to remain on the board, but were forced out in March 1977.
Much of his final term as president was spent fighting deregulation
of the trucking industry. Deregulation had first been proposed by President Gerald Ford
in 1975, and President Jimmy Carter
followed through by seeking and winning passage of the Motor Carrier Act of 1980
.
One of the last national negotiations Fitzsimmons oversaw was another national trucking contract. With deregulation moving forward, the negotiations (which began in early 1979) were particularly difficult. Fitzsimmons gambled and decided to engage in a series of whipsaw strike
s in order to pressure the employers to agree to terms, but the trucking companies responded with a lockout
on April 2. The Carter administration had imposed wage and price controls
which sought to hold collective bargaining
wage and benefit increases to 7.5 percent a year, but Fitzsimmons sought 10 percent a year. Four days into the labor dispute, layoffs in the automobile manufacturing industry reached 100,000, putting significant pressure on Fitzsimmons to lower his contract demands. The strike and lockout were a short one due to these pressures, and Fitzsimmons reached an agreement on April 11, 1979, which met the President's wage control guideline.
published a story claiming that Fitzsimmons was suffering from abdominal cancer, setting off widespread rumors that Fitzsimmons was dying and that a power struggle over his successor was raging in the Teamsters. Fitzsimmons denied that he had cancer. Nonetheless, by July Fitzsimmons admitted he had lung cancer
and had undergone chemotherapy
for the past seven months. However, he also declared himself cancer-free and fit to run for re-election in 1981.
Fitzsimmons' cancer returned in January 1981, leading to repeated hospitalizations, tests, weight loss, hair loss, and bouts of depression. Although he returned to work in mid-March, he was so ill by early April that many felt he might not attend the union's executive board meeting later that month. Although the deadline for announcing his re-election bid was June 1, anonymous union officials believed him to be so ill that he would announce his retirement before the board meeting. Planning began to name Ray Schoessling, the union's 75-year-old secretary-treasurer, interim president. As news of Fitzsimmons' deteriorating health spread, a number of union leaders began to fight to take over the union.
Fitzsimmons's illness led to a significant deterioration in labor relations in the trucking industry. Deregulation had led to fierce competition and significantly lower rates in the industry, and a number of trucking companies let it be known that they would not pay the wage and benefit increases Fitzsimmons had negotiated two years before. Before entering the hospital again in late March, Fitzsimmons wrote a letter to the employers demanding that they adhere to the contract.
On May 1, 1981, Roy Lee Williams announced his candidacy for the presidency of the Teamsters. Williams made it clear, however, that if Fitzsimmons' health improved he would back the ailing general president. Williams made his announcement after rumors spread that union officials had visited Fitzsimmons in the hospital in La Jolla, California, and Fitzsimmons had agreed to retire.
Fitzsimmons died of lung cancer in San Diego, California
, on May 6, 1981. He was survived by his second wife, Mary, and his four children. Only four mourners attended his funeral mass at Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church in Palm Desert, California
.
portrayed Fitzsimmons in the 1992 movie Hoffa
.
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
leader. He was acting president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters from 1967 to 1971, and president from 1971 to 1981.
Early life
Frank Fitzsimmons was born in April 1908, in Jeannette, PennsylvaniaJeannette, Pennsylvania
Jeannette is a city in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 10,788 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Jeannette is located at ....
, to Frank and Ida May Fitzsimmons. His father was a brewer who moved the family to Detroit, Michigan
Detroit, Michigan
Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...
, in 1924 when Frank was 16. His father died of a heart attack when Fitzsimmons was 17 years old, and Frank dropped out of high school to support his family by working in an automobile hardware store. In 1932, he got a job as a bus driver in Detroit, Michigan
Detroit, Michigan
Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...
, and New York City before becoming a truck driver in Detroit in 1935. He joined Teamsters Local 299, and became friendly with the local union's president, Jimmy Hoffa
Jimmy Hoffa
James Riddle "Jimmy" Hoffa was an American labor union leader....
.
Fitzsimmons was elected Local 299 business manager in 1936, Local 299 vice president in 1940, and (at Hoffa's insistence) an international union vice president of the Teamsters in 1961. He was appointed secretary-treasurer of the 80,000-member Michigan Conference of Teamsters in 1949, and vice president of Teamsters Joint Council 43 in Detroit in 1959. During this time, Fitzsimmons became known as "a figure of ridicule" in the Teamsters. Inarticulate, chubby, passive and easily embarrassed, Hoffa and others frequently had him make coffee or hold chairs and rarely gave him any authority or duties. Nonetheless, Fitzsimmons was considered an adept manager and a very skilled contract negotiator. Despite Hoffa's many legal problems and the routine emasculation, Fitzsimmons remained the Teamsters president's staunchest supporter.
Acting president
When Harold J. GibbonsHarold J. Gibbons
Harold Joseph Patrick Gibbons was an American trade unionist and labor leader.Born the youngest of 23 children in Archibald Patch, Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, he nonetheless matriculated at the University of Chicago. He became a St. Louis union leader of Warehousemen, when St...
resigned as Hoffa's executive assistant in December 1963 after a failed coup against the indicted Teamsters president, Hoffa appointed Fitzsimmons to the office. Hoffa was sentenced to eight years in a federal prison for jury tampering
Jury tampering
Jury tampering is the crime of unduly attempting to influence the composition and/or decisions of a jury during the course of a trial.The means by which this crime could be perpetrated can include attempting to discredit potential jurors to ensure they will not be selected for duty. Once selected,...
, conspiracy
Conspiracy (crime)
In the criminal law, a conspiracy is an agreement between two or more persons to break the law at some time in the future, and, in some cases, with at least one overt act in furtherance of that agreement...
, and fraud
Fraud
In criminal law, a fraud is an intentional deception made for personal gain or to damage another individual; the related adjective is fraudulent. The specific legal definition varies by legal jurisdiction. Fraud is a crime, and also a civil law violation...
, but was free while he appealed the decision. Fitzsimmons was initially not considered to be politically popular enough to succeed Hoffa. But Fitzsimmons was elected General Vice President of the Teamsters in July 1966, which to many Teamsters leaders signalled Hoffa's intention to make Fitzsimmons his heir-apparent in the event Hoffa was imprisoned. On February 28, 1967, the Teamsters executive board passed a resolution appointing Fitzsimmons "acting president" in the event Hoffa was no longer able to carry out his duties.
Hoffa entered prison in March 1967, and attempted to run the union from jail through Fitzsimmons. Fitzsimmons, however, was to be nothing more than a glorified gofer
Gofer
A gofer or go-fer is an employee who is often sent on errands. "Gofer" reflects the likelihood of instructions to go for coffee, dry cleaning, or stamps, or to make other straightforward or familiar procurements. The term gofer originated in North America...
:
But there is no certainty that Hoffa intends to let Fitzsimmons run anything. Indeed, few other Teamster big wigs even pretend that the chunky, amiable Hoffa right bower has the capacity to hold the union together for long. "He's just a peanut butter sandwich; he'll melt in no time," is the unflattering comment of one union insider.
Fitzsimmons and others even denied that they were doing work on Hoffa's orders. National trucking industry talks, interrupted when Hoffa went to jail, resumed with Fitzsimmons at the table. Although the pact expired and the union struck for three days, Fitzsimmons was able to negotiate a new agreement (with a federal mediator's help) which some believed was richer than any Hoffa could have obtained. He negotiated a second contract three years later which provided a 27 percent wage increase over three years.
Fitzsimmons rapidly solidified his own hold on the Teamsters presidency throughout 1967. He had permitted the International vice presidents greater latitude in their own affairs and delegated significant authority to them, winning their allegiance. He defeated an executive board attempt to oust him in July, and followed it up by demoting a number of Hoffa aides and promoting his own supporters (including Weldon Mathis
Weldon Mathis
Weldon Lamar Mathis was an American labor leader. He was secretary-treasurer of the Teamsters from 1985 to 1991. After Teamsters president Jackie Presser took a leave of absence for health reasons, Mathis was interim president from May 5, 1988 - July 18, 1988...
) to high positions in the union. By August, he had openly declared he would run for the presidency of the union. He further enhanced his popularity by negotiating in October 1967 a national master contract
Master contract
A master contract is a contract reached between parties, in which the parties agree to most of the terms that will govern future transactions or future agreements...
in the trucking industry which brought 40,000 Northeastern
Northeastern United States
The Northeastern United States is a region of the United States as defined by the United States Census Bureau.-Composition:The region comprises nine states: the New England states of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont; and the Mid-Atlantic states of New...
truckers into the contract for the first time, and by negotiating a new contract with ended a five-month steel haulers' strike.
Fitzsimmons also began taking the union in new directions. In July 1968 he and Walter Reuther
Walter Reuther
Walter Philip Reuther was an American labor union leader, who made the United Automobile Workers a major force not only in the auto industry but also in the Democratic Party in the mid 20th century...
, president of the United Auto Workers
United Auto Workers
The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, better known as the United Auto Workers , is a labor union which represents workers in the United States and Puerto Rico, and formerly in Canada. Founded as part of the Congress of Industrial...
formed a new national trade union center
National trade union center
A national trade union center is a federation or confederation of trade unions in a single country. Nearly every country in the world has a national trade union center, and many have more than one. When there is more than one national center, it is often because of ideological differences—in some...
, the Alliance for Labor Action
Alliance for Labor Action
The Alliance for Labor Action was an American and Canadian national trade union center which existed from July 1968 until January 1972. Its two main members were the United Auto Workers and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, although it had some smaller affiliates.-Formation and...
, to organize unorganized workers and pursue leftist
Left-wing politics
In politics, Left, left-wing and leftist generally refer to support for social change to create a more egalitarian society...
political and social projects. Fitzsimmons and Reuther offered the AFL-CIO
AFL-CIO
The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, commonly AFL–CIO, is a national trade union center, the largest federation of unions in the United States, made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 11 million workers...
a no-raid pact as a first step toward building a working relationship between the competing trade union centers, but the offered was rejected. The Alliance's initial program was ambitious, but Reuther's death in a plane crash on May 9, 1970, near Black Lake, Michigan
Black Lake (Michigan)
Black Lake is located in Cheboygan and Presque Isle counties in Northern Michigan. With a surface area of 10,130 acres , it is the seventh largest inland lake in Michigan. The largest body of water in the Black River watershed, it drains through the Lower Black and Cheboygan Rivers into Lake Huron...
, dealt a serious blow to the Alliance. The group collapsed in January 1972 after the Auto Workers were unable to continue to fund its operations.
First presidency
In 1971, Hoffa resigned as Teamsters president and Fitzsimmons was elected international president in his own right. By year's end, Fitzsimmons had purged a number of Hoffa supporters from the union's top offices. In 1973, he resigned his position as vice president of Local 299 and his son, Richard, was appointed his successor.Fitzsimmons engaged in a notorious jurisdictional and organizing dispute with the United Farm Workers
United Farm Workers
The United Farm Workers of America is a labor union created from the merging of two groups, the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee led by Filipino organizer Larry Itliong, and the National Farm Workers Association led by César Chávez...
(UFW) from 1972 to 1977, raiding the smaller union and establishing a new national farm workers' union to compete with it. The series of raids and counter-raids, repudiated contracts, and public relations attacks began in December 1972 when Fitzsimmons ordered a 1967 no-raid and organizing non-compete agreement with the UFW dissolved and Teamsters contract negotiators to re-open contracts. The UFW sued, the AFL-CIO condemned the action, and many employers negotiated contracts with the Teamsters rather than with the UFW. Although an agreement giving UFW jurisidction over field workers and the Teamsters jurisdiction over packing and warehouse workers was reached on September 27, 1973, Fitzsimmons reneged on the agreement within a month and moved ahead with forming a farm workers regional union in California. The organizing battles even became violent at times. By 1975, the UFW had won 24 elections and the Teamsters 14; UFW membership had plummeted to just 6,000 from nearly 70,000 while the Teamsters farmworker division counted 55,000 workers. The Teamsters subsequently signed sweetheart deal
Sweetheart deal
The term sweetheart deal or sweetheart contract is used to describe an abnormally favorable contractual arrangement. A golden parachute is an example of a type of sweetheart deal...
s with more than 375 California growers. Financially exhausted, the UFW signed an agreement with Fitzsimmons in March 1977 in which the UFW agreed to seek to organize only those workers covered by the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act
California Agricultural Labor Relations Act
The California Agricultural Labor Relations Act is a landmark statute enacted by the state of California which became law on June 5, 1975, and which establishes collective bargaining for farmworkers in that state....
, while the Teamsters had jurisdiction over all other agricultural workers.
In October 1973, Fitzsimmons ended a long-running jurisdictional dispute with the United Brewery Workers
International Union of United Brewery, Flour, Cereal, Soft Drink and Distillery Workers
The International Union of United Brewery, Flour, Cereal, Soft Drink and Distillery Workers was an labor union in the United States. The union merged with the Teamsters in 1973.-Early history:...
, and the Brewery Workers merged with the Teamsters.
By 1975, Jimmy Hoffa was planning to seize the presidency of the Teamsters again. Hoffa had been released from prison on December 23, 1971, when President Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
commuted his sentence to time served. According to the United States Department of Justice
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
and White House officials, Hoffa's release was granted on the condition that he not participate directly or indirectly in union activities until 1980. But Hoffa contended that he had never agreed to any such condition, and unsuccessfully sued to have the restriction overturned. But Fitzsimmons supported the government's position, and Charles Colson
Charles Colson
Charles Wendell "Chuck" Colson is a Christian leader, cultural commentator, and former Special Counsel for President Richard Nixon from 1969 to 1973....
, special counsel
White House Counsel
The White House Counsel is a staff appointee of the President of the United States.-Role:The Counsel's role is to advise the President on all legal issues concerning the President and the White House...
to President Nixon who helped negotiate Hoffa's release, backed Fitzsimmon's interpretation of the release agreement.
Hoffa intended to publish a book accusing Fitzsimmons of "selling out to mobsters" and giving large low- and no-interest loans from Teamsters pension funds to mob-related businesses. But Jimmy Hoffa disappeared on July 30, 1975, removing the last significant opposition to Fitzsimmons' re-election. Fitzsimmons was, for a time, a suspect in the disappearance. Fitzsimmons continued to solidify his hold on the Teamsters throughout 1975 and 1976.
Fitzsimmons oversaw national trucking negotiations again in 1976, which led to major wage gains. Once again, the contract expired and the Teamsters engaged in a national trucking strike. But the strike ended after just three days, and union members ratified a contract which included a cost of living adjustment as well as a 30 percent rise in wages over three years.
Second presidency
Fitzsimmons was re-elected General President of the Teamsters in Las Vegas, Nevada, on June 16, 1976. An insurgent reform group, which later adopted the name Teamsters for a Democratic UnionTeamsters for a Democratic Union
Teamsters for a Democratic Union is a rank-and-file union democracy movement organizing to reform the International Brotherhood of Teamsters , or Teamsters. TDU was created out of the merger of the Professional Drivers Council and TDU in 1979...
, issued a massive report accusing Fitzsimmons and other Teamsters of corruption and suppressing democracy in the union and picketed the June Teamsters convention. Fitzsimmons attacked the dissidents for trying to "destroy the union". He famously raged from the podium:
To those who say it's time to reform this organization, that it's time that the officers quit selling out the membership, I say to them, go to hell.
Delegates to the convention were not persuaded by the attacks on the union leadership: They voted Fitzsimmons a 17 percent pay raise (bringing his salary to $516,250 a year) and re-elected him to a second full term.
In the late fall of 1976, Fitzsimmons oversaw a 10-week strike at United Parcel Service
United Parcel Service
United Parcel Service, Inc. , typically referred to by the acronym UPS, is a package delivery company. Headquartered in Sandy Springs, Georgia, United States, UPS delivers more than 15 million packages a day to 6.1 million customers in more than 220 countries and territories around the...
. The strike, which affected 15 Eastern states
Eastern United States
The Eastern United States, the American East, or simply the East is traditionally defined as the states east of the Mississippi River. The first two tiers of states west of the Mississippi have traditionally been considered part of the West, but can be included in the East today; usually in...
and included 18,000 warehouse workers and drivers, ended after the union reached an agreement to give workers a 33 percent wage increase over three years and restrict the employer's ability to replace full-time workers with part-time employees.
Fitzsimmons was investigated in 1976 for failing to perform his fiduciary duties as a trustee on the Teamsters' Central States Pension Fund, and forced to resign from the board of trustees in 1977. The U.S. Departments of Labor
United States Department of Labor
The United States Department of Labor is a Cabinet department of the United States government responsible for occupational safety, wage and hour standards, unemployment insurance benefits, re-employment services, and some economic statistics. Many U.S. states also have such departments. The...
and Justice
United States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
first began investigating the fund in January 1976. He was subpoena
Subpoena
A subpoena is a writ by a government agency, most often a court, that has authority to compel testimony by a witness or production of evidence under a penalty for failure. There are two common types of subpoena:...
ed by both the U.S. Senate's
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
Committee on Labor and Public Welfare
United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
The United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions generally considers matters relating to health, education, labor, and pensions...
and by the Labor Department, and testified in public and private regarding loans the pension fund made to certain mob
Organized crime
Organized crime or criminal organizations are transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals for the purpose of engaging in illegal activity, most commonly for monetary profit. Some criminal organizations, such as terrorist organizations, are...
-related businesses and the fund's operations. Although the Internal Revenue Service
Internal Revenue Service
The Internal Revenue Service is the revenue service of the United States federal government. The agency is a bureau of the Department of the Treasury, and is under the immediate direction of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue...
revoked the fund's non-profit status, the penalty was suspended after Fitzsimmons agreed to remove several trustees (which he did in September 1976). Fitzsimmons and Roy Lee Williams
Roy Lee Williams
Roy Lee Williams was an American labor leader who was president of the Teamsters from May 15, 1981, to April 14, 1983.-Early life and career:...
, director of the Central Conference of Teamsters, attempted to remain on the board, but were forced out in March 1977.
Much of his final term as president was spent fighting deregulation
Deregulation
Deregulation is the removal or simplification of government rules and regulations that constrain the operation of market forces.Deregulation is the removal or simplification of government rules and regulations that constrain the operation of market forces.Deregulation is the removal or...
of the trucking industry. Deregulation had first been proposed by President Gerald Ford
Gerald Ford
Gerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...
in 1975, and President Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter
James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...
followed through by seeking and winning passage of the Motor Carrier Act of 1980
Motor Carrier Act of 1980
The Motor Carrier Regulatory Reform and Modernization Act, more commonly known as the Motor Carrier Act of 1980 is a United States federal law which deregulated the trucking industry.-Background:...
.
One of the last national negotiations Fitzsimmons oversaw was another national trucking contract. With deregulation moving forward, the negotiations (which began in early 1979) were particularly difficult. Fitzsimmons gambled and decided to engage in a series of whipsaw strike
Whipsaw strike
A whipsaw strike is a strike by a trade union against only one or a few employers in an industry or a multi-employer association at a time...
s in order to pressure the employers to agree to terms, but the trucking companies responded with a lockout
Lockout (industry)
A lockout is a work stoppage in which an employer prevents employees from working. This is different from a strike, in which employees refuse to work.- Causes :...
on April 2. The Carter administration had imposed wage and price controls
Incomes policy
Incomes policies in economics are economy-wide wage and price controls, most commonly instituted as a response to inflation, and usually below market level.Incomes policies have often been resorted to during wartime...
which sought to hold collective bargaining
Collective bargaining
Collective bargaining is a process of negotiations between employers and the representatives of a unit of employees aimed at reaching agreements that regulate working conditions...
wage and benefit increases to 7.5 percent a year, but Fitzsimmons sought 10 percent a year. Four days into the labor dispute, layoffs in the automobile manufacturing industry reached 100,000, putting significant pressure on Fitzsimmons to lower his contract demands. The strike and lockout were a short one due to these pressures, and Fitzsimmons reached an agreement on April 11, 1979, which met the President's wage control guideline.
Death
After suffering shortness of breath at a Teamsters executive board meeting, Fitzsimmons underwent surgery in late December 1979 which removed a non-malignant tumor in his bronchial passage. In early January 1980, the Los Angeles Herald-ExaminerLos Angeles Herald-Examiner
The Los Angeles Herald Examiner was a major Los Angeles daily newspaper, published Monday through Friday in the afternoon, and in the morning on Saturdays and Sundays. It was part of the Hearst syndicate. The afternoon Herald-Express and the morning Examiner, both of which had been publishing in...
published a story claiming that Fitzsimmons was suffering from abdominal cancer, setting off widespread rumors that Fitzsimmons was dying and that a power struggle over his successor was raging in the Teamsters. Fitzsimmons denied that he had cancer. Nonetheless, by July Fitzsimmons admitted he had lung cancer
Lung cancer
Lung cancer is a disease characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissues of the lung. If left untreated, this growth can spread beyond the lung in a process called metastasis into nearby tissue and, eventually, into other parts of the body. Most cancers that start in lung, known as primary...
and had undergone chemotherapy
Chemotherapy
Chemotherapy is the treatment of cancer with an antineoplastic drug or with a combination of such drugs into a standardized treatment regimen....
for the past seven months. However, he also declared himself cancer-free and fit to run for re-election in 1981.
Fitzsimmons' cancer returned in January 1981, leading to repeated hospitalizations, tests, weight loss, hair loss, and bouts of depression. Although he returned to work in mid-March, he was so ill by early April that many felt he might not attend the union's executive board meeting later that month. Although the deadline for announcing his re-election bid was June 1, anonymous union officials believed him to be so ill that he would announce his retirement before the board meeting. Planning began to name Ray Schoessling, the union's 75-year-old secretary-treasurer, interim president. As news of Fitzsimmons' deteriorating health spread, a number of union leaders began to fight to take over the union.
Fitzsimmons's illness led to a significant deterioration in labor relations in the trucking industry. Deregulation had led to fierce competition and significantly lower rates in the industry, and a number of trucking companies let it be known that they would not pay the wage and benefit increases Fitzsimmons had negotiated two years before. Before entering the hospital again in late March, Fitzsimmons wrote a letter to the employers demanding that they adhere to the contract.
On May 1, 1981, Roy Lee Williams announced his candidacy for the presidency of the Teamsters. Williams made it clear, however, that if Fitzsimmons' health improved he would back the ailing general president. Williams made his announcement after rumors spread that union officials had visited Fitzsimmons in the hospital in La Jolla, California, and Fitzsimmons had agreed to retire.
Fitzsimmons died of lung cancer in San Diego, California
San Diego, California
San Diego is the eighth-largest city in the United States and second-largest city in California. The city is located on the coast of the Pacific Ocean in Southern California, immediately adjacent to the Mexican border. The birthplace of California, San Diego is known for its mild year-round...
, on May 6, 1981. He was survived by his second wife, Mary, and his four children. Only four mourners attended his funeral mass at Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church in Palm Desert, California
Palm Desert, California
Palm Desert is a city in Riverside County, California, United States, in the Coachella Valley, approximately east of Palm Springs. The population was 48,445 at the 2010 census, up from 41,155 at the 2000 census...
.
Popular culture
Character actor J. T. WalshJ. T. Walsh
James Thomas Patrick "J. T." Walsh was an American character actor. He appeared in many well-known films, including Nixon, Hoffa, A Few Good Men, Backdraft, Miracle on 34th Street, Breakdown, and Good Morning, Vietnam.Walsh was known for his roles as "quietly sinister white-collar sleazeballs"...
portrayed Fitzsimmons in the 1992 movie Hoffa
Hoffa
Hoffa is a 1992 biographical film directed by Danny DeVito and written by David Mamet, based on the life of Teamsters Union leader Jimmy Hoffa. Jack Nicholson plays Hoffa, and Danny DeVito plays Hoffa's fictional longtime friend Robert "Bobby" Ciaro, an amalgamation of several Hoffa associates over...
.