Which Side Are You On?: Trying to Be for Labor When It's Flat on Its Back (Plume) [Paperback]

Thomas Geohegan (Author)

Book Description

Series: Plume | Publication Date: August 1, 1992

A lawyer working for the unions brings to life the teamsters, steelworkers, nurses, carpenters, and others who are clinging to their right to organize and fighting to preserve a way of life. Reprint. NYT.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Based on his experiences as a Chicago labor lawyer, Geoghegan contends persuasively that post-industrial Reaganomics have caused a widening rift between the working and professional middle classes. In related episodes, he demonstrates how the combined effects of steel mill closings, leveraged buyouts and Third World competitive labor have contributed to the decline of American organized labor. Even more tragic for the workers is their betrayal by international unions which, he asserts, are run by high-powered lawyers engaged in incessant arbitration; in cahoots with the Labor Department and, in some cases, with the mob--e.g., the Teamsters--labor lawyers are accused here of conspiracy to deprive the rank and file of the rights to organize, vote and air grievances freely. Moreover, Geoghegan declares, government regulations (the Taft-Hartley act, etc.) and a dilatory National Labor Relations Board have further weakened unionism, reducing it to the status of an ineffectual counterculture.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Geoghegan, a labor lawyer employed by Chicago area union locals, provides an interesting and at times incisive "insider's" view of organized labor. While his book is not the comprehensive analysis of the contemporary organized labor malaise that is so desperately needed, it will stimulate considerable reader interest. After all, the plight of American workers thrown on the trash heap of post-industrial capitalism is one of the truly tragic stories of the modern age, and even Geoghegan's periodic straining for effect and descents into maudlinism do not seriously thwart the impact of his narrative. Stressing the theme of the worker as victim, he recounts the way the courts, the politicians, the corporate interests, and all too often the union hierarchies have combined to undermine the health and well-being of the "working stiff." What he is really describing is the end of the period when American workers had at least a chance at getting a fair shake in the Ameri can economic contest.
- Norman Lederer, Thaddeus Stevens State Sch. of Technology, Lancaster, Pa.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 287 pages
• Publisher: Plume (August 1, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0452268915
• ISBN-13: 978-0452268913
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,318,686 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Thomas Geoghegan is a practicing attorney and the author of several books, including the National Book Critics Circle Award finalist Which Side Are You On?, In America's Court, and See You in Court (all available from The New Press). He has written for The Nation, the New York Times, and Harper's and lives in Chicago.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The decline of unions was not inevitable, and it can be reversed, July 2, 2008

By 

Stephen R. Laniel (Cambridge, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Which Side Are You On?: Trying to Be for Labor When It's Flat on Its Back, Revised Edition (Paperback)

You know how some people say, "I don't believe in religion, but I believe in God"? Thomas Geoghegan doesn't necessarily believe in labor unions, but he believes in labor. Or maybe: he doesn't believe ultimate salvation is to be found in unions, but that there's no alternative to them for now, and that without them we're ... well, we're in the state we're in today, where workers are powerless and can be left unemployed and uninsured at any moment. A world without unions is a world where we're scared.

This is just not the world we ought to be living in. There is a better way and a better world, of course. We know that we can't get to this world on our own. On our own, we are isolated from the rest of those who are suffering. We are powerless so long as we are isolated.

It's virtually an axiom, then, that some form of collective resistance to limitlessly powerful corporations is necessary. We simply cannot do it on our own. It does not follow, however, that labor unions are the ideal form of that resistance. It also doesn't follow that government is the ideal form. But in their highly imperfect way, says Thomas Geoghegan, labor unions are far better than a world without them. He backs this up with story upon story about corporations absolutely crushing workers in the absence of any labor-union resistance.

Geoghegan himself is a labor lawyer who's been fighting the fight alongside labor unions for a quarter century or more. He's also often worked against them: he's sued the Teamsters repeatedly, in essence fighting for more union democracy. He's trying to get the unions that the employees deserve.

He's not had much luck fighting against them. For a short time, Geoghegan's heart leapt for joy when Ron Carey was at the Teamsters' helm, but the Carey era ended quickly enough and James P. Hoffa (son of Jimmy Hoffa) took over.

As for fighting alongside them, that hasn't worked very well either. Unions are down to 10% or so of the working population. Not coincidentally (as any reader of Paul Krugman knows well), the Democratic party is in a shambles and has been for at least thirty years. The Democrats need the unions.

What makes this book so agonizing is Geoghegan's insistence that a few little changes would bring democracy to the unions, unions to the workers, and the Democratic party to power. One such change is a card-check system like the one Canada uses. Consequently, Canadian union membership has been consistently in the 30% range for at least a decade. When we dream of the better world that Canadians seem to inhabit, it's well to consider how they got there.

The fact that just over the border is a country not much different than ours, but whose policies could hardly be more different, gives the lie to the notion that unions have disappeared in the U.S. because of changing workplaces. Yes, we're now a service economy rather than an industrial economy. But so is Canada. Geoghegan dispenses with any number of commonplaces like this one.

In general, he spends the most time dismantling the idea that unions' disappearance is in some sense "natural." It's not. It has a lot to do with Republicans and with conservative courts. It has to do with Taft-Hartley. It has to do with one law after another that smashed unions into the ground. There was nothing natural about it.

This book doesn't give much in the way of solutions, but I'm not even sure that's its point. Merely getting people -- especially Democrats -- to recognize a problem is plenty. Getting them to recognize a human-created problem is better still. Along the way, Geoghegan is impossibly funny, chatty, and self-deprecating. While I can't quite call this book a "joy" -- it's too maddening for that -- I do submit that it's indispensible and should be on every American's bookshelf.

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars both devastating and inspiring, March 14, 2000

By 

Sheena McGrath (United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Which Side Are You On?: Trying to Be for Labor When It's Flat on Its Back (Plume) (Paperback)

I first read this book about 10 years ago, and I was struck by both the author's despair, and the amount of work that needs to be done. He does a great job of convincing the reader that unions are relevant. He also made me see that they should be saved, from themselves, and from the incredibly restrictive U.S. labour laws.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dynamite book, June 7, 2000

By 

Josh Wilson (Pittsburgh) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Which Side Are You On?: Trying to Be for Labor When It's Flat on Its Back (Plume) (Paperback)

I recently picked this up again. Both a great sketch of labor history and especially labor in the 80's, and also a kind of coming of age story of a man struggling with his idealism. For all that, it's absolutely fun to read - the tone is sharp and fast, and the author never takes himself too seriously. Reminds me of another favorite on a different topic, Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner.