Working the Navajo Way by Colleen O'Neill

Author:Colleen O'Neill [O'Neill, Colleen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Indigenous Peoples of the Americas, Social Science, Ethnic Studies, American, Native American Studies
ISBN: 9780700613953
Google: 1N91AAAAMAAJ
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Published: 2005-01-15T00:19:32+00:00

Navajo Construction Workers Association

In the mid-1960s the relationship among the BIA, the Navajo Tribal Council, and organized labor improved significantly. Robert Bennett, the new commissioner of Indian affairs and the first American Indian to hold that position since the mid-nineteenth century, published an article in the AFL-CIO Federationist that seemed to indicate a new cooperative atmosphere. Using the AFL-CIO Federationist as a mouthpiece, Bennett announced a “a new era for American Indians.” The article described the terrible poverty native peoples suffered throughout the United States and offered industrial development, an end to federal paternalism, and increasing self-sufficiency as solutions.81 But Bennett failed to mention what role organized labor would have in that process. Although writing for an official publication of the American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) hinted at better relations between unions and the BIA, Bennett did not endorse trade union organizing on reservations.

The election of Raymond Nakai in 1963 to the chair of the Navajo Tribal Council signified a change in Navajo labor relations. Nakai, unlike his predecessors Paul Jones and Scott Preston, assumed a rather pragmatic position on organized labor and did not use his position to discourage union membership among the Navajo people.82 The tribal council’s position remained consistent into the mid-1970s, even with the election of Peter MacDonald, who was notoriously anti-union.83 Even though MacDonald was a firm supporter of the tribal “right-to-work” law, he eventually entered into a formal agreement with the AFL-CIO to ensure that Navajos would be hired at the Four Corners coal gasification plants near Shiprock.84 Instead of viewing unions as a threat from “outsiders,”BIA and Navajo tribal officials were beginning to see trade unions as vehicles for Navajo workers to use to gain access to skilled jobs.

At a hearing before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights in Window Rock, Thomas Brose, director of the Office of Navajo Labor Relations, explained the tribal council’s new, pragmatic labor policy. He told the commission that the tribal council did not enforce its “right to work policy.”85 Instead, the Office of Navajo Labor Relations worked with the unions to ensure that they included a Navajo preference clause in their collective bargaining agreements. These clauses were similar to those included in leasing agreements that were supposed to give Navajos priority access to jobs on the reservation. But, in the past, that protocol had not been enforced. In 1972 only 8 percent of the workers constructing the Four Corners project were Navajos. The situation was better at the Navajo Generating Plant, where Navajos made up 22 percent of the workforce.86 Ideally, Brose explained, when jobs on the reservation were available, unions would first draw from a separate list of Navajo workers before they referred any non-Navajos to the employer.87 Perhaps encouraging unions to adopt preference clauses was one way Navajo leaders could gain compliance from industries leasing reservation land.

Unlike their counterparts in Mexican Hat in 1961, Navajo workers in the new reservation industries did not completely reject unions. Prior to 1960 trade unions were largely superfluous to the experience of most Navajo workers, but by the 1970s that had changed.

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