I do not know who Peter Cole is, but he wrote this essay on
Eric Hoffer. Yes, Hoffer was and is the Right’s working class philosopher, but
he is also a promoter of workers and average people in the middle or on the
Left: Hoffer was an individualist and egoist, but he was an uncommon common man
too, and today many trade unionists are conservatives, capitalists and
individualists—I am one of them, as was Hoffer—but we are not traitors to the
working cause, and nor are we Marxist. I would argue that the individuating
blue-collar worker will make workers’ rights powerful and respected, be he in a
trade union or not.
I copied this entire article below and will comment on it.
Here is the article:
Cole (C after this):
“
Eric Hoffer: The Right's
Working-Class Philosopher
Historical Essay
by Peter Cole, originally published in Jacobin, September 2014
Hoffer
Eric Hoffer was a conservative who only
had the time to write because he was represented by a powerful leftist union.
Nicknamed the “longshoreman philosopher,” Eric Hoffer was the best-known
working-class author and intellectual in postwar America.
From the 1950s to the 70s, the cold
warrior’s essays regularly appeared in newspapers and magazines. President
Eisenhower called Hoffer his favorite author. During the Free Speech Movement,
the University of California, Berkeley appointed him an adjunct professor.
He was a frequent guest on network
television, often praising conservative politicians like then-California
Governor Ronald Reagan. In his first and most influential book, The True
Believer, Hoffer criticized mass movements of all stripes, especially communism,
and lauded the government’s containment policy.
Yet Hoffer was a walking contradiction.
Despite his rightist politics, Hoffer belonged not just to the country’s most
powerful leftist union, the International Longshoremen’s & Warehousemen’s
Union (ILWU), but its most militant local, the San Francisco Bay Area’s Local
10.
The central paradox of Hoffer’s life is
even more striking because it was precisely the left-wing militancy of the ILWU
that provided him the good fortune (yes, fortune) and time to write nearly a
dozen books and hundreds of articles condemning radicalism, civil rights, and
the social advances of the 1960s.”
My response: I think Cole does not
fully understand Hoffer: Hoffer worked enough to eke out a subsistence
existence, and, if he was never a trade unionist, and before he was a trade
unionist, he still wrote when he had acquired some cash, finding a room between
the library and the brothel.
Hoffer the thinker, reader, and writer,
lived simply, and likely never would have worked full time, whether he had a
union job or a non-union job, willing to live on less to gain precious time to
do and write his philosophy. Hoffer made time for his philosophizing,
researching, and writing. The Union did not make that existence on part-time
pay possible, but it did make it easier and a bit more affluent for Hoffer to
so live.
Cole seems to be a Leftist and Marxist, and he
seems to hold a grudge against Hoffer for being a conservative for capitalism. Hoffer
is an ethical and ontological moderate, which means he thinks the world is a
complex place, and that the best union member would be an individualist, the
avatar of individuating, individualism, and hard-working and these can be trade
unionist member assets of the highest caliber. These were Hoffer’s personal as
well as philosophical values. Leftist, trade union ideologues need to have a
big tent tolerance of conservatives and independent-thinkers within the trade
movement (especially in capitalist and individualist America where rugged
individualism and freedom are loved by trade unionists). As long as they do not
cross the picket line in a strike, do not vote to decertify the Union, snitch
on fellow union members to Management or betray their brothers and sisters to
gain a promotion or whatever, the ideologues and groupists in the Union have no
legitimate beef or complaint against conservatives, individualists and
pro-capitalists in their Union. Purity and loyalty tests for being
true-believing Comrades is just too un-American.
Hoffer knew that ideology and
ideologists, be they Communist or Fascist, were pushed by evil people and these
fanatical groupists would sow discord and violence, and they would fill their
unions with true believers, and that would not be good for the workers, the
employer, or the country, so Hoffer had solid, legitimate reasons for rejecting
the message of Communists in the trade unionist movement and in his union.
Cole seems to engage in a false
dichotomy here, a lens through which he views Eric Hoffer. Either one is a
Marxist or strong, militant Leftist in promoting union rights and left-wing
causes, or at best this conservative trade unionist is a willing, foolish dupe
for the Right, or at worst, he is a cynical, willfully blind conservative trade
unionist out to curry favor with bosses and capitalists for accolades or
financial rewards. This attribution to Hoffer does not fit him at all. Hoffer
loved his union, and was proud of his union, and felt affection towards his
brothers in the union, though he did not romanticize at all about the noble
working man. Hoffer admired and was completely loyal to his Union and brothers
in the Union.
In America, workers and trade unionists
never have had a single world view, and only a fanatic would demand that Hoffer
should have thought like a Marxist, or implied that he was a hypocrite and
traitor, taking advantage of what the Longshoreman’s Union provided for him,
without him being loyal or grateful. I think Hoffer was loyal and grateful, but
he was not one-dimensional, and to smear this good man as a traitor seems
unfair to me, if that is where this article is headed.
If it is Cole’s view of the ideal trade
union member being an unthinking, conformist joiner, an ultraist, that despises
capitalism, loves Marxism, and regards Labor as always Democrat, and preferably
Socialist, even culturally, then Hoffer and I, trade unionist both, firmly part
ways with Cole, and would publicly, consistently voice our opposition to his
extremism.
My ideal trade unionist is an
individuating supercitizen: he might be pro-capitalist and pro-America, but he
is also a populist, and will cooperate and unite with his sisters and brothers
in the Union where and when necessary, and he will never suck up to Management
and sell the collective membership out; though he is no true believer, he is
feisty and sucks up neither to Management or Labor bosses, but works hard, is
honest and just, so he will be good for the Company and good for his Union at
the same time.
C: “Hoffer worked as a longshoreman in
San Francisco before and after becoming a successful author and public figure.
During World War II, he had drifted up to the Bay Area from southern
California, quickly finding work on the waterfront because the war effort had
created a huge labor shortage.
Similar to the autoworkers,
steelworkers, and packinghouse workers who formed militant, anti-racist,
progressive unions in the 1930s, the ILWU was born out of the working-class
anger, leftward turn, and rebelliousness that erupted during the Great Depression.
Instrumental in securing the ILWU’s impressive gains were the cadre of
communists and other leftists (including Wobblies and Trotskyists) who founded
the union.
For longshore workers, the seminal
event was The
Big Strike, a 1934 work
stoppage across the West Coast that exploded into a San Francisco-wide general
strike after police repression left two dead on “Bloody Thursday” (henceforth, a legal holiday under the
union’s contract). Ultimately, employers — under pressure from the Roosevelt
administration — recognized the workers’ right to unionize, and the ILWU was
born soon thereafter.
The ILWU wielded its power via repeated
and countless “quickie” strikes during the late 1930s and 1940s. These actions
forced employers to accept additional concessions related to work performance,
including maximum weight on each sling of cargo. By the time Hoffer found his
way to the Embarcadero, the ILWU had revolutionized labor relations in San
Francisco, and members proudly embraced the nickname “the lords of the docks.”
West Coast longshoremen were “lords”
because they earned high wages by blue-collar standards, were paid overtime
starting with the seventh hour of a shift, and had protections against laboring
under dangerous conditions. They even had the right to stop working at any time
if “health and safety” were imperiled. Essentially, to the great consternation
of employers, the union controlled much of the workplace.
The hiring hall was the day-to-day locus of union
power. Controlled by each local’s elected leadership, the hall decided who
would and wouldn’t work. Crucially, under the radically egalitarian policy of
“low man out,” the first workers to be dispatched were those who had worked the
least in that quarter of the year.
In the words of Herb Mills, a retired
Local 10 member:
The hiring hall was indeed “the union.”
It was the institution whereby the reality of community could be fashioned and
maintained by men who had agreed to structure and divide their work on a fair
and equal basis and who, through great strife and conflict, had won the right
to do so.
In a real sense, sailors and dockers
were the world’s first
proletarians, toiling under
corporate-controlled shipping lines in the first global industry. And like some
of the pirates of yesteryear, the ILWU had created a system that spread the
wealth among all its members.
In addition to this largesse, Hoffer
also benefited from the tremendous flexibility ILWU members had won. In
essence, rank and filers could decide when — and if — they wanted to work on a
particular day. He also had the advantage of location: While there were no
guarantees of a ship to work, San Francisco had long been the largest and
busiest port on the coast.”
My response: Cole is correct that his
Union won great pay and benefits and leisure time (Hoffer was so frugal and
ascetic—he only needed to work three days per week, but this should not be used
to discredit Hoffer or detract from his goodness, his genius, his originality.).
C: “All Hoffer had to do to maintain
his union membership was report to the hall a certain number of days each
quarter, attend monthly meetings, and pay his union dues. Thus, the “longshore
philosopher” could work three days a week, write the other days, and know that
he would get dispatched when he showed up at the hall. Or, he could work six
straight days and take a week off to think and write, as he often did. And if
that didn’t provide him enough latitude, union members like Hoffer could decide
that they wanted to work in another ILWU-controlled port.
It as into this union that Hoffer
stumbled, making (for a writer) an incredibly soft landing. He then proceeded
to lambast the politics of the Left that had made his life so rich in money,
safety, and workplace power.
Hoffer deeply appreciated the working
conditions created by his powerful union, calling them “millennial” on numerous
occasions. Yet he refused to praise the union and its leftist leadership,
including President Harry
Bridges. Bridges and
the ILWU membership were highly critical of US foreign policy, especially its
military interventions in Asia.”
My response: Hoffer would never deny
the good that Harry Bridges and the radicals in the LWU did for them and all
workers, but Hoffer the realist knew that fanaticism as a mass movement among
laborers, or any social group, if it goes on too long, ultimately turns evil,
violent, revolutionary, and totalitarian, conditions not conducive to the
well-being of America, let alone the Union members.
I know Cole not, but he might even be a
Communist. Hoffer was a staunch individualist, a capitalist, a democrat, and a
proponent of egoist morality. He knew that people were not basically good, and
he loathed collectivist morality, collectivist/totalitarian economic and
political arrangements that were pure evil. For these legitimate objections, he
could not support Bridges’ radicalism.
Hoffer was also a loner and did not
speak up at meetings or seek to at union meetings, likely because it was not
easy for him to for him to speak up among the assembled collective, with open relationships
and communications shared, conveyed, and experienced with other workers at a
public meeting. Also, he was a most private person, leading his life alone as a
scholar and writer. This more than being anti-union while taking advantage of
union benefits is likely why he was not strongly pro-Harry Bridges, in the
public arena or in his writings.
C: “As a result of their politics,
hundreds — perhaps thousands — of ILWU members were investigated for “communist
sympathies.” Bridges himself was likely the single most persecuted labor leader
during the McCarthy era — both by the government and a rightward-shifting CIO,
which expelled the ILWU in 1950. However, he survived due to the tremendous
loyalty of ILWU members, most of whom were not communists but almost all of
whom loved what Harry and the other “’34 men” had done to create such a great
job for working people.
Even in his private journals, some of
which later were published, Hoffer rarely credited the union, and never
Bridges. Though the man wrote constantly and voluminously, he rarely wrote
about the union that made the selfsame writing possible.
He occasionally commented in his
journals on the work he did — unloading transistor radios for eight hours at
Pier 34 or working with a Portuguese partner while talking about his family.
But the “longshoremen philosopher” never seemed to reflect deeply on the ILWU
nor his role in it. For a while he became interested in automation and its
impacts on workers, but largely was sanguine, hopeful, and arguably naïve about
the benefits of capitalism for ordinary people.
The man lived a rich life of the mind —
reading on the job during breaks, taking half-day walks to ponder particular
intellectual conundrums, journaling fastidiously, and writing for publications.
However, he never changed his views that politicians like Nixon and,
especially, Reagan (first as governor, later as president) were noble and his
union leaders dupes, “true believers” of false idols who demonstrated their own
lack of self-confidence by joining a mass movement. Based on the limited
record, Hoffer never spoke at meetings, never ran for any union office, and
never volunteered in the union to help his fellow workers.
Ironically, the best-known
working-class American of the Cold War era was a conservative who was lucky
enough to find a job represented by the most powerful leftist union in postwar
America. As such, his life represents the cognitive dissonance of many working
Americans today: profiting from — albeit less so than in the past — the great
gains of the labor movement yet unwilling to become union advocates.”
My response: Cole needs to understand
that Hoffer was a great soul, and there are plentiful, wholesome contrary and contradictory
aspects operating in his soul. These paradoxes at work are easily observable,
thus he could be a proud and loyal trade unionist, while being a conservative,
and a retiring philosopher, not an activist union advocate, while quietly being
pro-Union. His was a complex nature and worldview but he was loyal to the other
members of the union and never worked to undermine them.
Cole seems to dismiss such complex,
contradictory reacting to Union militancy and hardcore Leninism as being a
turncoat blue-collar worker, thinker, and union-member. Cole seems to suggest that conservative trade
unionists are either guilty, at best, of muddled thinking, poorly thought out,
confused thinking or, more sinisterly, can be showing to work to undercut the Union
like the ungrateful, hypocritical, scheming traitors of the Union that they
are. He seems angry at Hoffer for rejecting Union radicalism, the Union which
gave Hoffer so much, and it did.
The ultraist demands total allegiance,
praise, support, and conformity from Union followers, or they are dismissed,
and likely to be forced out of the Union for being traitors to the cause.
Hoffer’s relationship to his trade
unions was complicated and not be condemned. He was not, but never should have
been dismissed from Union, driven out by hard-core Marxists in the trade union
movement, forced out as a sold out, disloyal traitor.
C: “As for Hoffer’s legacy, history can
be cruel even to those who appreciate its fickleness. Today, few people know of
Hoffer and fewer read him (though the term “true believer” still carries some
rhetorical weight). The “longshoremen philosopher” was a powerful thinker, and
the fact that he was a literary celebrity during the Cold War and consistently
identified as “working class” is noteworthy.
While historians commonly associate the
conservative ascendancy with Nixon and Reagan, they rarely note that the
influential writings of the slightly older Hoffer predicted and praised the
rise of the New Right. Scholars of Hoffer (generally conservatives themselves)
inevitably note his working-class bonafides, but they don’t mention or analyze
the irony of his membership in the leftist ILWU. In that way, they’re similar
to all those, Hoffer included, who forgot that the labor movement brought us
the weekend and much more.”
My response: I do not like Cole’s lambasting
Hoffer. Hoffer loved the common people and sided with them all the time. He was
proud of being a trade unionist and love his union. He was quiet at meetings
because he was a scholar and writer, and that was his passion, not being a
trade union activist. I do not think Cole portrays Hoffer in a fair way or
paints an accurate depiction of Hoffer as a longshoreman or trade unionist.
