Tony Mazzocchi
Encyclopedia
Anthony Mazzocchi was an American
labor leader
. He was a high elected official of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union (OCAW), serving as vice president from 1977 to 1988, and as secretary-treasurer from 1988 to 1991. He was a mentor to Karen Silkwood
, a co-founder of the Labor Party, and credited by President
Richard Nixon
as being the primary force behind enactment of the Occupational Safety and Health Act
of 1970. For his efforts, he was called the "Rachel Carson
of the American workplace."
, New York
, on June 13, 1926, to Joseph and Angelina (Lamardo) Mazzocchi. His father was a garment worker and union member. The family was very poor, and Mazzocchi slept in the same bed with two of his siblings. His mother died of cancer when Mazzocchi was six years old, and the family lost their home because of the cost of medical care.
His future politics were shaped at an early age. His two sisters and a closeted
gay
uncle were all communists
. In 1949, he supported Vito Marcantonio
in his bid to become Mayor of New York City
. Both factors played a major role in influencing Mazzocchi's radically progressive political views.
Mazzocchi dropped out of high school in the ninth grade when he was 16 years old. Lying about his age, he enlisted in the United States Army
, and fought in Europe during World War II
as an anti-aircraft gunner. He saw combat in three major campaigns, most notably the Battle of the Bulge
, and helped liberate Buchenwald concentration camp
.
After his discharge in 1946, Mazzocchi got a job as an autoworker for Ford Motor Company
in Edgewater, New Jersey
. Having read extensively while in the Army, he went back to school and graduated from vocational-technical school
while working as a construction worker and steelworker in Brooklyn. In 1950, he took a job at a Helena Rubenstein cosmetics factory in Roslyn, New York
.
. Within a few years, he had not only won equal pay for equal work
for women but also negotiated a health insurance plan—one which included the first dental insurance coverage in the private sector in the U.S. During his tenure as president of Local 149, Mazzocchi also led numerous successful organizing drives. He merged several smaller locals into his own and conducted a number of organizing drives, until Local 149 represented workers in 25 companies. He was elected Vice-President of the Nassau-Suffolk CIO
Council from 1952 to 1955, and (after the merger of the AFL
and CIO in 1955) the Long Island Federation of Labor from 1955 to 1973.
Mazzocchi became increasingly influential within UGCCWU. He helped engineer the 1955 merger of UGCCWU with the Oil Workers International Union to form the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union. In 1957, he was elected to the International Executive Board of OCAW from District 8. He served until 1965, when he was appointed OCAW's Citizenship-Legislative Director.
, and effort which paid off in the passage of major federal worker legislation. In 1962, he read Rachel Carson's
book, Silent Spring
. Mazzocchi reasoned that if small doses of the chemicals discussed in Silent Spring caused harm, the workers who received large doses in manufacturing plants must be in medical danger. Mazzocchi used this insight to begin building support in the environmental movement for worker health and safety, and began pushing the labor movement to support environmentalists.
Mazzocchi became a national staffer in 1965. That year, long-time OCAW president O.A. Knight retired. Secretary-Treasurer Alvin F. Grospiron
ran for president, and Mazzocchi strongly backed his candidacy. The election was a bitter one. Knight had allowed the Central Intelligence Agency
to use the union as a cover for covert operations, and had accepted large sums of money from the agency. Because of his support for Gospiron, Mazzocchi was appointed OCAW's Citizenship-Legislative Director in 1965. He used his position to push heavily for health and safety language in union contracts as well as for state and federal legislation on the issue. In 1969 and 1970, he organized a series of public meetings in which OCAW and other union members testified about the chemicals they were handling and the health problems they were experiencing. Scientists also testified at these public hearings about the danger of these chemicals. The public meetings gained widespread press attention. Mazzocchi also used the hearings to help educate workers on the legislative process, and trained them to act as lobbyists for federal health and safety legislation. The media attention and pressure from union members provided critical support for congressional attempted to pass comprehensive occupational health and safety legislation. In December 1970, Congress enacted and President Richard Nixon signed the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA). Nixon specifically cited Mazzocchi's leadership and grassroots organizing efforts as key in winning passage of the Act.
Because of his strong ties to the environmental movement, Mazzocchi was named chair of the first Earth Day
rally in New York City
on April 22, 1970.
Mazzocchi was also influential in Democratic
politics. He campaigned on behalf of Adlai Stevenson in 1956
, and became one of Long Island
's most politically influential labor leaders. In 1964, Mazzocchi considered running for Congress
. However, he never undertook a campaign after being advised by party leaders that he was too radical for the electorate and would endanger the candidacies of other Democrats.
Mazzocchi also undertook a major campaign against asbestos in the mid-1960s. Numerous studies had documented the health hazards of long-term exposure to asbestos beginning in the 1930s. After becoming legislative director for OCAW, Mazzocchi began a worker education campaign on the dangers of asbestos in the workplace. Workers with asbestosis
, lung cancer
, and peritoneal mesothelioma
played a prominent role in the occupational health and safety conferences he organized as part of his OSHA
campaign. In 1971, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration promulgated the first national standards for workplace exposure to asbestos. But Mazzocchi believed the OSHA standard was too lenient, and began a campaign to have the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
conduct additional research into the toxicity of asbestos. In 1976, NIOSH issued a revision of its toxicity assessment for asbestos. But under significant pressure from asbestos manufacturers, OSHA refused to issue a revised standard. Mazzocchi continued to fight for a new asbestos standard, and in 1986 OSHA issued a temporary revised standard. Mazzocchi's efforts for a stricter standard continued, and in 1992 OSHA issued a final revised standard which cut in half the levels of asbestos exposure permitted under its 1986 rule.
Mazzocchi believed his most profound contribution was linking the scientific and public health communities with workers and unions to create the modern occupational safety and health movement. In speaking about the exposure of hundreds of workers to asbestos in Tyler, Texas
, during the 1960s, he said:
. Silkwood was a technician at a Kerr-McGee
nuclear fuel
milling, conversion, enrichment, and fuel rod fabrication plant in Crescent, Oklahoma
, about 30 miles north of Oklahoma City
. Silkwood, a newly-elected union representative, was concerned that Kerr-McGee officials were falsifying records about the integrity of the plant's plutonium
nuclear fuel rods. Silkwood and two other workers met with Mazzocchi in Washington, D.C.
, the week of September 26, 1974. Although Mazzocchi was preoccupied with his asbestos fight, he spent a day talking to the three workers. They knew almost nothing about the dangers of the materials they were working with, and Mazzocchi helped educate them about these hazards. At this meeting, Silkwood revealed that she was aware Kerr-McGee may have falsified its quality-control records. Mazzocchi arranged for the three to testify before the Atomic Energy Commission
(AEC) regarding safety failures at the Crescent plant. Mazzocchi also outlined a two-point plan for the workers to follow. First, they would pursue the safety lapses with the AEC. Second, and more importantly, Mazzocchi asked Silkwood to collect more information on the quality lapses. She was not to take any documents, but was to take notes on documents, record what she observed, and begin building a case. Mazzocchi believed that by leaking documents to the press and then following up with public testimony, he could create the same public cry for change which had proven so successful in the OSHA campaign. When it turned out that Silkwood had been contaminated with plutonium in the weeks before her death, Mazzocchi feared that Kerr-McGee might pinpoint Silkwood as the source of the documents OCAW intended to leak to the New York Times.
Karen Silkwood died in a car accident on November 13, 1974, while on her way to talk with a Times reporter about the safety violations at the Crescent plant. Alerted to suspicious aspects of the accident, Mazzocchi permitted the use of OCAW funds to hire a former police officer-turned-private investigator to examine the accident scene and Silkwood's car. After the investigator found evidence that Silkwood's car may have been forced off the road and that Silkwood was awake when the crash occurred (rather than asleep at the wheel as Oklahoma state police had concluded), Mazzocchi asked Attorney General
William B. Saxbe
on November 19, 1974, to investigate Silkwood's death. Mazzocchi also released a statement to the press, prematurely as it turned out: The private investigator's report had not yet been written, and the press release exposed the investigator to harassment and press mis-reporting which severely muddled OCAW's case that Silkwood may have been murdered. When the AEC concluded that Silkwood had not been contaminated accidentally, Mazzocchi was pleased with the result. He was not pleased when the AEC refused any attempt to try to discover how she had been poisoned. The Attorney General closed the investigation into Silkwood's death on April 30, 1975, saying there was no evidence of foul play.
Mazzocchi also assisted other workers who had been retaliated against for speaking out against safety and health violations at the Kerr-McGee plant. When two OCAW members who had helped Silkwood were fired on what Mazzocchi felt were trumped-up charges of drug abuse, he filed charges with the AEC and the National Labor Relations Board
(NLRB) accusing Kerr-McGee of violating federal law. An arbitrator reinstated one worker with back pay. The AEC sent its complaint to the Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI), as retaliation against a whistleblower
is a criminal violation of federal law. The FBI referred the matter to the Attorney General, and the complaint was never acted on. The NLRB issued a complaint against Kerr-McGee for violating the National Labor Relations Act
, but never sought court enforcement of its order. The NLRB also referred its charges to the Attorney General for prosecution, but no action was taken.
Although Mazzocchi continued to fight for worker health and safety issues at Kerr-McGee, he was forced to cease any further investigations into Silkwood's death in 1975. Union members began to fear the AEC or the company might close the plant, and Mazzocchi was forced to weigh the livelihoods of hundreds of members against any additional investigation.
retired. He lost to Robert Goss by 1 percent of the vote. He challenged Goss for the presidency again in 1981. But the disaffiliation of most of OCAW's Canadian
membership and the breakup of the environmental-union coalition over the issue of job protections led to a second defeat (again by less than 1 percent of the vote). Some accused Goss, who had strong ties to the Central Intelligence Agency, of dirty tricks during the election. Others pointed out that many OCAW members were unhappy with Mazzocchi's views on nuclear disarmament and the environment.
Estranged from the OCAW leadership, Mazzocchi spent much of the early 1980s agitating for more aggressive organizing and even stronger stands on occupational health and safety. He was an important figure in the "right to know
" movement, which advocated for rules, regulations and legislation to give individuals the right to know which chemicals they may be exposed to while on the job. He drew national attention to industry efforts to force women who worked with toxic chemical to undergo sterilization
. Ms. magazine named him one of the "40 Male Heroes of the Decade" in 1982 for his work against company-sponsored sterilization.
Goss retired in 1988, and was succeeded by Robert Wages. Mazzocchi had reconciled with Wages in the mid-1980s, and Wages asked him to be his running mate. Mazzocchi was elected OCAW's Secretary-Treasurer in 1988 and served until his retirement in 1991. From 1991 to 1999, Mazzocchi served as "special assistant to the president” on legislative, civil rights, health and safety matters.
In 1991, Mazzocchi established Alice Hamilton College, an alternative school
for union members. It is named for Dr. Alice Hamilton
, a pioneer in occupational health. In 2001, he founded the Labor Film Festival at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
.
Mazzocchi founded the Labor Party in Cleveland, Ohio
, in 1996. He had won the support of nine international unions and hundreds of local unions and central labor councils. Their membership totaled more than a million workers.
. He concluded that poor workplace health and safety was, in essence, violence against workers. This led him to become active in the broader peace movement as a way of combating other forms of violence against workers. In 1957, Mazzocchi helped launched the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy
(SANE). His activities in SANE won him a meeting in 1964 with President Lyndon B. Johnson
to discuss converting military production facilities to civilian use. In 1972, when most American labor leaders strongly supported the Vietnam War
, Mazzocchi founded Labor for Peace, a group of 22 labor leaders from 13 unions dedicated to ending the war.
in the spring of 2002. He died of the disease at his home in Washington, D.C.
, on October 5, 2002. Mazzocchi was married twice. His marriages to Rose Alfonso and Susan Lynn Kleinwaks ended in divorce. He had one son and five daughters. In his later years, Mazzocchi cohabited with Katherine Isaac at his home in Washington, D.C.
After several mergers, OCAW became part of the United Steelworkers of America. The Steelworkers' Tony Mazzocchi Center for Health, Safety and Environmental Education in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
, was dedicated to Mazzocchi.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
labor leader
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...
. He was a high elected official of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union (OCAW), serving as vice president from 1977 to 1988, and as secretary-treasurer from 1988 to 1991. He was a mentor to Karen Silkwood
Karen Silkwood
Karen Gay Silkwood was an American labor union activist and chemical technician at the Kerr-McGee plant near Crescent, Oklahoma, United States. Silkwood's job was making plutonium pellets for nuclear reactor fuel rods...
, a co-founder of the Labor Party, and credited by President
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
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...
as being the primary force behind enactment of the Occupational Safety and Health Act
Occupational Safety and Health Act
The Occupational Safety and Health Act is the primary federal law which governs occupational health and safety in the private sector and federal government in the United States. It was enacted by Congress in 1970 and was signed by President Richard Nixon on December 29, 1970...
of 1970. For his efforts, he was called the "Rachel Carson
Rachel Carson
Rachel Louise Carson was an American marine biologist and conservationist whose writings are credited with advancing the global environmental movement....
of the American workplace."
Early life
Anthony Mazzocchi was born in Bensonhurst, BrooklynBensonhurst, Brooklyn
Bensonhurst is a neighborhood located in the southwestern part of the New York City borough of Brooklyn.-Geography:Sometimes erroneously thought to include all or parts of such neighborhoods as Bath Beach, Dyker Heights, and Borough Park, or to be defined by the streets where the concentration of...
, New York
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, on June 13, 1926, to Joseph and Angelina (Lamardo) Mazzocchi. His father was a garment worker and union member. The family was very poor, and Mazzocchi slept in the same bed with two of his siblings. His mother died of cancer when Mazzocchi was six years old, and the family lost their home because of the cost of medical care.
His future politics were shaped at an early age. His two sisters and a closeted
Closeted
Closeted and in the closet are metaphors used to describe lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer/questioning and intersex people who have not disclosed their sexual orientation or gender identity and aspects thereof, including sexual identity and sexual behavior.-Background:In late 20th...
gay
Gay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....
uncle were all communists
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
. In 1949, he supported Vito Marcantonio
Vito Marcantonio
Vito Anthony Marcantonio was an American lawyer and democratic socialist politician. Originally a member of the Republican Party and a supporter of Fiorello LaGuardia, he switched to the American Labor Party.-Early life:...
in his bid to become Mayor of New York City
Mayor of New York City
The Mayor of the City of New York is head of the executive branch of New York City's government. The mayor's office administers all city services, public property, police and fire protection, most public agencies, and enforces all city and state laws within New York City.The budget overseen by the...
. Both factors played a major role in influencing Mazzocchi's radically progressive political views.
Mazzocchi dropped out of high school in the ninth grade when he was 16 years old. Lying about his age, he enlisted in the United States Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
, and fought in Europe during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
as an anti-aircraft gunner. He saw combat in three major campaigns, most notably the Battle of the Bulge
Battle of the Bulge
The Battle of the Bulge was a major German offensive , launched toward the end of World War II through the densely forested Ardennes mountain region of Wallonia in Belgium, hence its French name , and France and...
, and helped liberate Buchenwald concentration camp
Buchenwald concentration camp
Buchenwald concentration camp was a German Nazi concentration camp established on the Ettersberg near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937, one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps on German soil.Camp prisoners from all over Europe and Russia—Jews, non-Jewish Poles and Slovenes,...
.
After his discharge in 1946, Mazzocchi got a job as an autoworker for Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company is an American multinational automaker based in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. The automaker was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. In addition to the Ford and Lincoln brands, Ford also owns a small stake in Mazda in Japan and Aston Martin in the UK...
in Edgewater, New Jersey
Edgewater, New Jersey
Edgewater is a borough located along the Hudson River in Bergen County, New Jersey. As of the 2010 census, the borough had a population of 11,513...
. Having read extensively while in the Army, he went back to school and graduated from vocational-technical school
Vocational-technical school
A vocational-technical school, often called a vo-tech school, is a high school in the United States and Canada designed to bring vocational and technical training to its students. Such skills become highly valuable to students entering into a vocational or technical field without first obtaining...
while working as a construction worker and steelworker in Brooklyn. In 1950, he took a job at a Helena Rubenstein cosmetics factory in Roslyn, New York
Roslyn, New York
Roslyn is a village in Nassau County, New York, on the North Shore of Long Island. As of the United States 2010 Census, the village population was 2,770...
.
Union career
In 1953, at the age of 26, Mazzocchi was elected president of United Gas, Coke, and Chemical Workers' Union (UGCCWU) Local 149, having run on a pledge of equal pay for womenEqual pay for women
Equal pay for women is an issue regarding pay inequality between men and women. It is often introduced into domestic politics in many first world countries as an economic problem that needs governmental intervention via regulation...
. Within a few years, he had not only won equal pay for equal work
Equal pay for equal work
Equal pay for equal work is the concept that individuals doing the same work should receive the same remuneration. In America, for example, the law states that "employers may not pay unequal wages to men and women who perform jobs that require substantially equal skill, effort and responsibility,...
for women but also negotiated a health insurance plan—one which included the first dental insurance coverage in the private sector in the U.S. During his tenure as president of Local 149, Mazzocchi also led numerous successful organizing drives. He merged several smaller locals into his own and conducted a number of organizing drives, until Local 149 represented workers in 25 companies. He was elected Vice-President of the Nassau-Suffolk CIO
Congress of Industrial Organizations
The Congress of Industrial Organizations, or CIO, proposed by John L. Lewis in 1932, was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 required union leaders to swear that they were not...
Council from 1952 to 1955, and (after the merger of the AFL
American Federation of Labor
The American Federation of Labor was one of the first federations of labor unions in the United States. It was founded in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions disaffected from the Knights of Labor, a national labor association. Samuel Gompers was elected president of the Federation at its...
and CIO in 1955) the Long Island Federation of Labor from 1955 to 1973.
Mazzocchi became increasingly influential within UGCCWU. He helped engineer the 1955 merger of UGCCWU with the Oil Workers International Union to form the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union. In 1957, he was elected to the International Executive Board of OCAW from District 8. He served until 1965, when he was appointed OCAW's Citizenship-Legislative Director.
Passage of OSHA and other political work
In the 1960s, Mazzocchi was one of the first labor leaders to begin building strong ties with the environmental movementEnvironmental movement
The environmental movement, a term that includes the conservation and green politics, is a diverse scientific, social, and political movement for addressing environmental issues....
, and effort which paid off in the passage of major federal worker legislation. In 1962, he read Rachel Carson's
Rachel Carson
Rachel Louise Carson was an American marine biologist and conservationist whose writings are credited with advancing the global environmental movement....
book, Silent Spring
Silent Spring
Silent Spring is a book written by Rachel Carson and published by Houghton Mifflin on 27 September 1962. The book is widely credited with helping launch the environmental movement....
. Mazzocchi reasoned that if small doses of the chemicals discussed in Silent Spring caused harm, the workers who received large doses in manufacturing plants must be in medical danger. Mazzocchi used this insight to begin building support in the environmental movement for worker health and safety, and began pushing the labor movement to support environmentalists.
Mazzocchi became a national staffer in 1965. That year, long-time OCAW president O.A. Knight retired. Secretary-Treasurer Alvin F. Grospiron
Alvin F. Grospiron
Alvin F. Grospiron was president of Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union from 1965 to 1979. He had been Secretary-Treasurer of the international union under the O. A. Knight, who had led the union since its founding merger in 1955...
ran for president, and Mazzocchi strongly backed his candidacy. The election was a bitter one. Knight had allowed the Central Intelligence Agency
Central Intelligence Agency
The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian intelligence agency of the United States government. It is an executive agency and reports directly to the Director of National Intelligence, responsible for providing national security intelligence assessment to senior United States policymakers...
to use the union as a cover for covert operations, and had accepted large sums of money from the agency. Because of his support for Gospiron, Mazzocchi was appointed OCAW's Citizenship-Legislative Director in 1965. He used his position to push heavily for health and safety language in union contracts as well as for state and federal legislation on the issue. In 1969 and 1970, he organized a series of public meetings in which OCAW and other union members testified about the chemicals they were handling and the health problems they were experiencing. Scientists also testified at these public hearings about the danger of these chemicals. The public meetings gained widespread press attention. Mazzocchi also used the hearings to help educate workers on the legislative process, and trained them to act as lobbyists for federal health and safety legislation. The media attention and pressure from union members provided critical support for congressional attempted to pass comprehensive occupational health and safety legislation. In December 1970, Congress enacted and President Richard Nixon signed the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA). Nixon specifically cited Mazzocchi's leadership and grassroots organizing efforts as key in winning passage of the Act.
Because of his strong ties to the environmental movement, Mazzocchi was named chair of the first Earth Day
Earth Day
Earth Day is a day that is intended to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth's natural environment. The name and concept of Earth Day was allegedly pioneered by John McConnell in 1969 at a UNESCO Conference in San Francisco. The first Proclamation of Earth Day was by San Francisco, the...
rally in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
on April 22, 1970.
Mazzocchi was also influential in Democratic
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
politics. He campaigned on behalf of Adlai Stevenson in 1956
United States presidential election, 1956
The United States presidential election of 1956 saw a popular Dwight D. Eisenhower successfully run for re-election. The 1956 election was a rematch of 1952, as Eisenhower's opponent in 1956 was Democrat Adlai Stevenson, whom Eisenhower had defeated four years earlier.Incumbent President Eisenhower...
, and became one of Long Island
Long Island
Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...
's most politically influential labor leaders. In 1964, Mazzocchi considered running for Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
. However, he never undertook a campaign after being advised by party leaders that he was too radical for the electorate and would endanger the candidacies of other Democrats.
Mazzocchi also undertook a major campaign against asbestos in the mid-1960s. Numerous studies had documented the health hazards of long-term exposure to asbestos beginning in the 1930s. After becoming legislative director for OCAW, Mazzocchi began a worker education campaign on the dangers of asbestos in the workplace. Workers with asbestosis
Asbestosis
Asbestosis is a chronic inflammatory and fibrotic medical condition affecting the parenchymal tissue of the lungs caused by the inhalation and retention of asbestos fibers...
, 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 peritoneal mesothelioma
Peritoneal mesothelioma
Peritoneal mesothelioma is the name given to the cancer that attacks the lining of the abdomen. This type of cancer affects the lining that protects the contents of the abdomen and which also provides a lubricating fluid to enable the organs to move and work properly.The peritoneum is made of two...
played a prominent role in the occupational health and safety conferences he organized as part of his OSHA
Occupational Safety and Health Administration
The United States Occupational Safety and Health Administration is an agency of the United States Department of Labor. It was created by Congress of the United States under the Occupational Safety and Health Act, signed by President Richard M. Nixon, on December 29, 1970...
campaign. In 1971, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration promulgated the first national standards for workplace exposure to asbestos. But Mazzocchi believed the OSHA standard was too lenient, and began a campaign to have the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health is the United States’ federal agency responsible for conducting research and making recommendations for the prevention of work-related injury and illness. NIOSH is part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention within the U.S...
conduct additional research into the toxicity of asbestos. In 1976, NIOSH issued a revision of its toxicity assessment for asbestos. But under significant pressure from asbestos manufacturers, OSHA refused to issue a revised standard. Mazzocchi continued to fight for a new asbestos standard, and in 1986 OSHA issued a temporary revised standard. Mazzocchi's efforts for a stricter standard continued, and in 1992 OSHA issued a final revised standard which cut in half the levels of asbestos exposure permitted under its 1986 rule.
Mazzocchi believed his most profound contribution was linking the scientific and public health communities with workers and unions to create the modern occupational safety and health movement. In speaking about the exposure of hundreds of workers to asbestos in Tyler, Texas
Tyler, Texas
Tyler is a city in and the county seat of Smith County, Texas, in the United States. It takes its name from President John Tyler . The city had a population of 109,000 in 2010, according to the United States Census Bureau...
, during the 1960s, he said:
- I wanted the whole country to know in detail what had happened at that factory, and to understand what had gone on there—the fruitless...lack of enforcement by the Department of Labor, the whole long lousy history of neglect, deceit and stupidity—was happening in dozens of other ways, in hundreds of other factories, to thousands of other men across the land. I wanted people to know that thousands upon thousands of their fellow citizens were being assaulted daily, and that the police—in this case, the federal government—had done nothing to remedy the situation. In short I wanted them to know that murder was being committed in the workplace, and that no one was bothering about it.
The Silkwood case
Mazzocchi was a friend and confidante of Karen SilkwoodKaren Silkwood
Karen Gay Silkwood was an American labor union activist and chemical technician at the Kerr-McGee plant near Crescent, Oklahoma, United States. Silkwood's job was making plutonium pellets for nuclear reactor fuel rods...
. Silkwood was a technician at a Kerr-McGee
Kerr-McGee
The Kerr-McGee Corporation, founded in 1929, was an energy company involved in the exploration and production of oil and gas. On June 23, 2006, Houston-based Anadarko Petroleum Corporation agreed to acquire Kerr-McGee in an all-cash transaction totaling $16.5 billion plus the assumption of $2.6...
nuclear fuel
Nuclear fuel
Nuclear fuel is a material that can be 'consumed' by fission or fusion to derive nuclear energy. Nuclear fuels are the most dense sources of energy available...
milling, conversion, enrichment, and fuel rod fabrication plant in Crescent, Oklahoma
Crescent, Oklahoma
Crescent is a city in Logan County, Oklahoma, United States. The population inside the city limits was 1,281 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Oklahoma City Metropolitan Statistical Area...
, about 30 miles north of Oklahoma City
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City is the capital and the largest city in the state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, the city ranks 31st among United States cities in population. The city's population, from the 2010 census, was 579,999, with a metro-area population of 1,252,987 . In 2010, the Oklahoma...
. Silkwood, a newly-elected union representative, was concerned that Kerr-McGee officials were falsifying records about the integrity of the plant's plutonium
Plutonium
Plutonium is a transuranic radioactive chemical element with the chemical symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is an actinide metal of silvery-gray appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air, forming a dull coating when oxidized. The element normally exhibits six allotropes and four oxidation...
nuclear fuel rods. Silkwood and two other workers met with Mazzocchi in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, the week of September 26, 1974. Although Mazzocchi was preoccupied with his asbestos fight, he spent a day talking to the three workers. They knew almost nothing about the dangers of the materials they were working with, and Mazzocchi helped educate them about these hazards. At this meeting, Silkwood revealed that she was aware Kerr-McGee may have falsified its quality-control records. Mazzocchi arranged for the three to testify before the Atomic Energy Commission
United States Atomic Energy Commission
The United States Atomic Energy Commission was an agency of the United States government established after World War II by Congress to foster and control the peace time development of atomic science and technology. President Harry S...
(AEC) regarding safety failures at the Crescent plant. Mazzocchi also outlined a two-point plan for the workers to follow. First, they would pursue the safety lapses with the AEC. Second, and more importantly, Mazzocchi asked Silkwood to collect more information on the quality lapses. She was not to take any documents, but was to take notes on documents, record what she observed, and begin building a case. Mazzocchi believed that by leaking documents to the press and then following up with public testimony, he could create the same public cry for change which had proven so successful in the OSHA campaign. When it turned out that Silkwood had been contaminated with plutonium in the weeks before her death, Mazzocchi feared that Kerr-McGee might pinpoint Silkwood as the source of the documents OCAW intended to leak to the New York Times.
Karen Silkwood died in a car accident on November 13, 1974, while on her way to talk with a Times reporter about the safety violations at the Crescent plant. Alerted to suspicious aspects of the accident, Mazzocchi permitted the use of OCAW funds to hire a former police officer-turned-private investigator to examine the accident scene and Silkwood's car. After the investigator found evidence that Silkwood's car may have been forced off the road and that Silkwood was awake when the crash occurred (rather than asleep at the wheel as Oklahoma state police had concluded), Mazzocchi asked Attorney General
United States Attorney General
The United States Attorney General is the head of the United States Department of Justice concerned with legal affairs and is the chief law enforcement officer of the United States government. The attorney general is considered to be the chief lawyer of the U.S. government...
William B. Saxbe
William B. Saxbe
William Bart "Bill" Saxbe was an American politician affiliated with the Republican Party, who served as a U.S. Senator from Ohio, as U.S. Attorney General under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald R. Ford, and as United States Ambassador to India.At the time of his death, Saxbe was the...
on November 19, 1974, to investigate Silkwood's death. Mazzocchi also released a statement to the press, prematurely as it turned out: The private investigator's report had not yet been written, and the press release exposed the investigator to harassment and press mis-reporting which severely muddled OCAW's case that Silkwood may have been murdered. When the AEC concluded that Silkwood had not been contaminated accidentally, Mazzocchi was pleased with the result. He was not pleased when the AEC refused any attempt to try to discover how she had been poisoned. The Attorney General closed the investigation into Silkwood's death on April 30, 1975, saying there was no evidence of foul play.
Mazzocchi also assisted other workers who had been retaliated against for speaking out against safety and health violations at the Kerr-McGee plant. When two OCAW members who had helped Silkwood were fired on what Mazzocchi felt were trumped-up charges of drug abuse, he filed charges with the AEC and the National Labor Relations Board
National Labor Relations Board
The National Labor Relations Board is an independent agency of the United States government charged with conducting elections for labor union representation and with investigating and remedying unfair labor practices. Unfair labor practices may involve union-related situations or instances of...
(NLRB) accusing Kerr-McGee of violating federal law. An arbitrator reinstated one worker with back pay. The AEC sent its complaint to the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
(FBI), as retaliation against a whistleblower
Whistleblower
A whistleblower is a person who tells the public or someone in authority about alleged dishonest or illegal activities occurring in a government department, a public or private organization, or a company...
is a criminal violation of federal law. The FBI referred the matter to the Attorney General, and the complaint was never acted on. The NLRB issued a complaint against Kerr-McGee for violating the National Labor Relations Act
National Labor Relations Act
The National Labor Relations Act or Wagner Act , is a 1935 United States federal law that limits the means with which employers may react to workers in the private sector who create labor unions , engage in collective bargaining, and take part in strikes and other forms of concerted activity in...
, but never sought court enforcement of its order. The NLRB also referred its charges to the Attorney General for prosecution, but no action was taken.
Although Mazzocchi continued to fight for worker health and safety issues at Kerr-McGee, he was forced to cease any further investigations into Silkwood's death in 1975. Union members began to fear the AEC or the company might close the plant, and Mazzocchi was forced to weigh the livelihoods of hundreds of members against any additional investigation.
Later career
Mazzocchi's efforts on health and safety boosted his political popularity within the union. In 1977, he defeated incumbent Elwood Swisher to become vice president of OCAW. Encouraged by supporters, he ran for president of the union in 1979 when Alvin F. GrospironAlvin F. Grospiron
Alvin F. Grospiron was president of Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union from 1965 to 1979. He had been Secretary-Treasurer of the international union under the O. A. Knight, who had led the union since its founding merger in 1955...
retired. He lost to Robert Goss by 1 percent of the vote. He challenged Goss for the presidency again in 1981. But the disaffiliation of most of OCAW's Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
membership and the breakup of the environmental-union coalition over the issue of job protections led to a second defeat (again by less than 1 percent of the vote). Some accused Goss, who had strong ties to the Central Intelligence Agency, of dirty tricks during the election. Others pointed out that many OCAW members were unhappy with Mazzocchi's views on nuclear disarmament and the environment.
Estranged from the OCAW leadership, Mazzocchi spent much of the early 1980s agitating for more aggressive organizing and even stronger stands on occupational health and safety. He was an important figure in the "right to know
Right to know
"Right to know", in the context of United States workplace and community environmental law, is the legal principle that the individual has the right to know the chemicals to which they may be exposed in their daily living. It is embodied in federal law in the United States as well as in local laws...
" movement, which advocated for rules, regulations and legislation to give individuals the right to know which chemicals they may be exposed to while on the job. He drew national attention to industry efforts to force women who worked with toxic chemical to undergo sterilization
Compulsory sterilization
Compulsory sterilization also known as forced sterilization programs are government policies which attempt to force people to undergo surgical sterilization...
. Ms. magazine named him one of the "40 Male Heroes of the Decade" in 1982 for his work against company-sponsored sterilization.
Goss retired in 1988, and was succeeded by Robert Wages. Mazzocchi had reconciled with Wages in the mid-1980s, and Wages asked him to be his running mate. Mazzocchi was elected OCAW's Secretary-Treasurer in 1988 and served until his retirement in 1991. From 1991 to 1999, Mazzocchi served as "special assistant to the president” on legislative, civil rights, health and safety matters.
In 1991, Mazzocchi established Alice Hamilton College, an alternative school
Alternative school
Alternative school is the name used in some parts of the world to describe an institution which provides part of alternative education. It is an educational establishment with a curriculum and methods that are nontraditional...
for union members. It is named for Dr. Alice Hamilton
Alice Hamilton
Alice Hamilton was the first woman appointed to the faculty of Harvard University and was a leading expert in the field of occupational health...
, a pioneer in occupational health. In 2001, he founded the Labor Film Festival at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is a performing arts center located on the Potomac River, adjacent to the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C...
.
Founding the Labor Party
Mazzocchi founded the Labor Party in 1996. For several decades, Mazzocchi had been convinced that corporations and entrenched political interests were not serving the best interests of working people. Throughout the 1980s, Mazzocchi ran an organization known as the Labor Party Advocates, a group of individuals committed to the goal of organizing a political party to support national health care, Social Security, labor rights and other workers' issues.Mazzocchi founded the Labor Party in Cleveland, Ohio
Cleveland, Ohio
Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...
, in 1996. He had won the support of nine international unions and hundreds of local unions and central labor councils. Their membership totaled more than a million workers.
Role in peace movement
Mazzocchi had a strong interest in the peace movementPeace movement
A peace movement is a social movement that seeks to achieve ideals such as the ending of a particular war , minimize inter-human violence in a particular place or type of situation, often linked to the goal of achieving world peace...
. He concluded that poor workplace health and safety was, in essence, violence against workers. This led him to become active in the broader peace movement as a way of combating other forms of violence against workers. In 1957, Mazzocchi helped launched the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy
Peace Action
Peace Action is a peace organization formed through the merger of The Committee for a SANE Nuclear Policy and the Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign...
(SANE). His activities in SANE won him a meeting in 1964 with President Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...
to discuss converting military production facilities to civilian use. In 1972, when most American labor leaders strongly supported the Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
, Mazzocchi founded Labor for Peace, a group of 22 labor leaders from 13 unions dedicated to ending the war.
Death
Mazzocchi was diagnosed with pancreatic cancerPancreatic cancer
Pancreatic cancer refers to a malignant neoplasm of the pancreas. The most common type of pancreatic cancer, accounting for 95% of these tumors is adenocarcinoma, which arises within the exocrine component of the pancreas. A minority arises from the islet cells and is classified as a...
in the spring of 2002. He died of the disease at his home in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, on October 5, 2002. Mazzocchi was married twice. His marriages to Rose Alfonso and Susan Lynn Kleinwaks ended in divorce. He had one son and five daughters. In his later years, Mazzocchi cohabited with Katherine Isaac at his home in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
After several mergers, OCAW became part of the United Steelworkers of America. The Steelworkers' Tony Mazzocchi Center for Health, Safety and Environmental Education in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...
, was dedicated to Mazzocchi.
Quotations
- There is a dawn approaching that is indicating and shouting to us that it's our moment. But we've got to seize that moment and use what we know so well—how to organize and, fundamentally, how to fight!
- When you build a big movement from down below, regardless of who's in the White House, you can bring about change.
- Movements grow in desperate times. We are being born.
- We're the only industrial nation in the world where if you strike the employer can replace you with scabs—permanently. That's not a right to strike. That's a right to commit suicide.