Rise in Union Leadership
In 1920, Meany was elected to the executive board of Local 463. In 1922, he became a full time business agent of the local, which had 3,600 members at that time. In 1923, he was elected secretary of the New York City Building Trades Council. He won a court injunction against a lockout in 1927, which was then considered an innovative tactic for a union. In 1934, he became president of the New York State Federation of Labor. He developed a reputation for honesty, diligence and the ability to testify effectively before legislative hearings and speak clearly to the press. In 1936, he co-founded the American Labor Party along with David Dubinsky and Sidney Hillman, as a vehicle to organize support for the re-election that year of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and mayor Fiorello La Guardia among Socialists in the union movement.
Three years later, he moved to Washington, DC to become national secretary-treasurer of the American Federation of Labor. where he served under AFL president William Green. During World War II, he was one of the permanent representatives of the AFL to the National War Labor Board. During the war, he established close ties to prominent anti-communists in the U.S. labor movement, including David Dubinsky, Jay Lovestone and Matthew Woll. In 1945, he led the AFL boycott of the World Federation of Trade Unions, which welcomed participation by communist labor groups from the Soviet Union.
When William Green's health declined in 1951, Meany gradually took over day-to-day operations of the AFL. He became president of the American Federation of Labor in 1952 upon the Green's death., which occurred just 12 days after the death of Congress of Industrial Organizations president Philip Murray. Meany immediately advocated the merger of the two rival U.S. labor federations. Walter Reuther of the United Auto Workers became president of the CIO, and he too supported a merger.
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