STEWARD HANDBOOK

AFSCME Retirees
Nearly 250,000 women and men belong to AFSCME Retirees, a nationwide
program that enables them to fight effectively for common goals such as preserving
Social Security and improved retirement benefits.
Child Care Providers Together
Child Care Providers Together (CCPT) was founded and is run by homebased
child care providers, who believe every child deserves the best early
care and education. By joining together in CCPT, providers gain more control
over their work, access to benefits and greater respect as professionals.
AFSCME: Decades of Fighting for Worker Rights
In 1932, as the country suffered through a severe economic depression, a
small group of white-collar professional state employees met in Madison,
Wis., and formed what would later become Wisconsin State Employees
Union Council 24. The reason for the group’s creation was simple: basic
survival. State employees feared that politicians would implement a political
patronage system and thousands of workers would lose their jobs. Meetings
were held, marches and demonstrations were organized, and this first movement
of public-sector workers saved their jobs and gave birth to a union.
By 1935, similar state employee associations emerged in 19 states,
fighting for job security, decent pensions and health insurance for public
workers. In 1936 the group – which changed its name to the American
Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees – was granted a
charter by the American Federation of Labor (AFL). The union of 10,000
members chose Arnold Zander as its first national president.
Two years later, in 1938, 2,000 garbage collectors in Philadelphia went
on strike to protest layoffs and pay cuts, and four days later they won the
union’s first bargaining agreement with a major city. Workers in other
urban areas began organizing, increasing AFSCME’s membership among
blue-collar workers with strong trade union roots and traditions. Twenty
years after the creation of AFSCME, the union had 200,000 members and
a battle on its hands with the entrenched power structure of America’s
major cities.
The movement to build power for public employees got a major boost in
1958 when President Jerry Wurf of District Council 37 led a series of strikes
and demonstrations that forced the mayor of New York City to negotiate
with the unions representing city employees. A turning point was reached.
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