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Dissertation Information for Charles Waite Romney

NAME:
- Charles Waite Romney

DEGREE:
- Ph.D.

DISCIPLINE:
- History

SCHOOL:
- University of California, Los Angeles (USA) (1996)

ADVISORS:
- Eric H. Monkkonen
- Stanford Jacoby

COMMITTEE MEMBERS:
- Cecile Whiting

MPACT Status: Fully Complete

Title: The business of unionism: Race, politics, capitalism, and the West Coast Teamsters, 1940-1952

Abstract: This dissertation investigates American political development in twentieth-century America. Many historians assume that labor unions supported liberal reforms in the postwar era, and that political conservatives first gained strength in the 1960s. My study of the West Coast Teamsters revises these views on three counts. First, the Teamsters under leader Dave Beck show that the labor movement was divided between its radical and conservative wings in the 1940s. Teamster leaders sought to return the country to capitalism by limiting government involvement in the economy and halting any expansion of the welfare state. Second, the Teamsters' location on the west coast and their anti-government ideology suggest that western conservatism thrived in the 1940s, well before its more celebrated success in the 1960s. Finally, Beck's West Coast Teamsters reveal the strength of capitalist theory and practice in the immediate postwar period. Under Beck's leadership the Teamsters went beyond a rhetorical defense of private enterprise. Teamster officials saw the union as a business, seeking to sign up more members in order to increase union dues. Teamster officials also treated members as customers by selling them union products like health insurance. To Beck and his associates the union was a business like any other, one that would better thrive in a country where the state did not enter into the economy. The primacy of business principles can be seen in the Teamster union's treatment of race and gender in the 1940s. During World War II the union leadership supported the internment of the Japanese and tried to keep women out of the labor force. After the war, however, when the Teamsters sought to expand into new industries, they offered union membership to Japanese-Americans and other people of color as well as to women. The union's business principles were more important in the postwar period than their desire to keep the union white and male.

MPACT Scores for Charles Waite Romney

A = 0
C = 0
A+C = 0
T = 0
G = 0
W = 0
TD = 0
TA = 0
calculated 2009-02-03 10:56:02

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Students under Charles Waite Romney

ADVISEES:
- None

COMMITTEESHIPS:
- None