In case anyone thought racial problems in the Teamsters is new under O’Brien.

O’Brien praised Tobin when running for his position, the racist, picket-line crossing, pro-business former Teamster’s leader.

Tobin was a very conservative and prejudiced man uninterested in organizing minorities or industrial workers, who he referred to as “riff-raff.”1 Organizationally, his IBT focused attention on only recruiting skilled workers. Nevertheless, under Tobin, the union steadily grew in membership during the first quarter of the century. However, Tobin actively discouraged strikes while encouraging a “go-along to get-along” agenda with employers. Anyone who dared to challenge his official policies could expect to be disciplined from the top. In 1915 he wrote, “Our international union is a business institution and it must be run on business lines or it cannot continue to exist.”2

The Teamsters were famous for pushing “skilled” vs “unskilled” worker distinctions. Only skilled workers needed union protections. You could usually tell if a worker was considered skilled by their skin color.

The Teamsters have always been the union that your boss wants you to choose if they have to let you pick a union. They have everything a boss wants: no strikes, keep people divided via racism, crush any talk of socialism, no qualms about crossing picket lines and being scabs to “raid” a more principled union as a method of hostile, boss-assisted growth.