In 2008, What Does Labor Support Mean?

In 2004, Dick Gephardt brought 23 unions to the Iowa caucuses; all told, he had the paper support of more than 96,000 members in that state alone.

He finished fourth and dropped out.

So is it even worth writing about the potential boon of labor support in 2008?

Most of Gephardt's union endorsements were presented to the rank and file from their executive boards. Few of the unions back then had a true grassroots process to determine who the endorsee would be.

Grassroots legitimacy was never developed, and union members in Iowa wound up voting for their favorite candidates... just not the candidate who happened to be the favorite of union leaders in Washington.

This year, the candidates are fighting union-by-union, even local-by-local in some cases for endorsements.

When John Edwards failed to secure enough support on the SEIU's board for an international endorsement, the union threw the process back to its state councils. And that forced Edwards to work the process -- to do direct member to member engagement, to earn it on the ground. It also allowed Barack Obama to play a spoiler's role.

The SEIU's decision made every state council endorsement process as complicated and detail focused as an international union endorsement and maybe even more valuable.

In New Hampshire, Edwards won the member straw poll, the political education committee vote and, finally, after some tense weeks, the executive board. But the combat was so fierce and the members so split that the controversy over his endorsement may, in that state, reduce its effect.

Or it could strengthen it. Indeed, in 12 states Edwards has fought for the SEIU endorsement against Obama, primarily, and against the word of Bill Clinton, who tends to telephone members of state SEIU boards to lobby on behalf of his wife.

Since Edwards's partisans in these union affiliates have fought to win the endorsement, they're more heavily invested in the outcome of Edwards's campaign. They might be prompted to work harder and longer on his behalf.

There aren't too many SEIU members in Iowa, but they have a real strong connection to Edwards: after all, it was they -- not their executive board from on high -- who decide to endorse him. Same goes for New Hampshire and California.

It's true that SEIU members are limited to member-to-member contact -- phone banking, door knocking, letter-writing, and the ROI may be along the high end of marginal.

The 90,000 SEIU members in Massachusetts, for example, can cross the border and lobby their NH brothers and sisters. Importantly -- again -- the Massachusetts SEIU chose to endorse Edwards on their own.

Iowa's AFSCME 61 is one of the biggest locals in Iowa and its support will certainly help Hillary Clinton in vote-dense parts of the state. (She needs more help in rural parts of the state -- parts owned, at the moment, by Edwards, who has visited all 99 Iowa counties..twice).

Comments

"In 2004, Dick Gephardt brought 23 unions to the Iowa caucuses; all told, he had the paper support of more than 96,000 members in that state alone. He finished fourth and dropped out."

Marc's point about the increased member level intensity on behalf of Edwards is this time around is a good one.

But it's also worth noting that while Geppy had basically no support outside of unions in '04, Edwards' union support in '08 is part of a larger coalition of support.

One way of thinking about it is that Edwards' universe of support in '08 can be thought of as being the sum of several '04 candidacies. In short:

Gephardt '04 + Dean '04 + Edwards '04 = Edwards '08

It's the kind of broad coalition of the left-center that can overtake a pseudo-incumbent like Senator Clinton.

Posted by Petey | November 1, 2007 11:28 AM

Marc, you've gone amazing reporting about the NH SEIU endorsement but not much on NV to this point.

NV's membership has reportedly been favorable to Edwards from the beginning and his reps got a standing ovation from the membership at a meeting in October. Though the results of the straw poll taken that day were never announced, its been widely rumored that Edwards won with Obama second and Clinton a close third. They've told Richardson that he is out of the running.

Right now it appears the poli-ed committee is waiting for another presentation from Obama, probably just before the next debate -- and will be presumably meeting with former President Clinton when he shows up in Las Vegas sometime next week.

Posted by Gus | November 1, 2007 2:22 PM

Great stuff. But how many SEIU member households are even in New Hampshirhire? Will they run media for JRE? Becuase there can't be that many service employees in NH.

Petey:
A lot of Dean's supporters are Obama supporters from what i see. Edwards support in Iowa 04 had a lot to do with Gephart not qualifying for the caucuses. His delegates caucused for edwards in Polk and a lot of other voter rich counties.

Posted by willie | November 1, 2007 4:11 PM

"A lot of Dean's supporters are Obama supporters from what i see."

No doubt.

The CW is that the younger Dean supporters are with Obama and the older Dean supporters are with Edwards. And I think there is some degree of truth there, though it's obviously not the full picture.

My only real point was that there is a coalition out there for Edwards to overtake Clinton without Clinton needing to self-destruct. This is in contrast to Gephardt in '04, who never had much chance of broadening his support beyond organized labor.

Posted by Petey | November 1, 2007 5:29 PM