Talk:John L. Lewis

"The President"
''Lewis traded on the tremendous appeal that Roosevelt had with workers in those days, sending organizers into the coal fields to tell workers that "The President wants you to join the Union." The President in that case was Lewis, President of the UMWA, but if workers thought that it was Roosevelt, no real harm was done.''

I'm not sure if that is entirely correct. Was it not the case that Roosevelt had signed into law the Wagner Act, giving workers the right to organize, which then prompted Lewis to use the phrase? To my knowledge when he said "President," he really meant FDR, since it was FDR who had signed the bill into law.

Daveman 84 05:22, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

WikiProject class rating
This article was automatically assessed because at least one article was rated and this bot brought all the other ratings up to at least that level. BetacommandBot 17:47, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Removed a clumsy section at the end
I took out the "alternative views" section because it just seemed a bit tacked-on. Also, the points it brought up (Lewis was domineering and power-hungry) aren't even really underrepresented in the article as is.

I have no objection if someone wants to re-insert this info into an existing section (here's the text):"Alternate views: Although proclaimed by some as a great labor leader, others during the 1920s and 1930s believed him to be more interested in gaining personal power than advancing the cause of the miners themselves. This spawned the creation of competing unions such as the Progressive Mine Workers which was formed in Gillespie, Illinois in 1932.[citation needed]"I'm not trying to deemphasize these points (they're valid, of course)... but there's already some well-rounded views from all sides throughout the article.

Like I said... no problems with anyone who wants to insert these observations into the the existing article. Just looks real clumsy as its own section.Cadastral (talk) 21:00, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Future of Labor speech reference
I'm hoping to find a better reference to a Lewis speech transcribed at the History Channel site. If anyone knows of an online collection of Lewis' speeches which would include that one, or an academic paper on the subject, I'd be grateful. I want to reference the speech in an article, but I'm not quite comfortable with the web site and I'm not sure I can track down the encyclopedia it references. Thanks! Cretog8 (talk) 04:05, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

POV?
Quote: "Coal miners for 40 years hailed him as the benevolent dictator who brought high wages, pensions and medical benefits, and damn the critics." Aside from the questionable grammar of the above statement, it doesn't seem encyclopaedic. If those words were used in a quotation regarding Lewis, then they should be quoted; otherwise, they should be replaced with something less inflammatory. 152.3.68.5 (talk) 00:11, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
 * "Inflammatory"--well that's a word often associated with Lewis. The statement summarizes what the miners thought of him, and tries to catch their tone. the miners seldom used encyclopedic language and high-flautin language seems inappropriate to express their views.Rjensen (talk) 01:05, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Quote: "Lewis was a brutally effective and aggressive fighter and strike leader who gained high wages for his membership while steamrolling over his opponents, including the United States government. Lewis was one of the most controversial and innovative leaders in the history of labor, gaining credit for building the industrial unions of the CIO into a political and economic powerhouse to rival the AFL, yet was widely hated as he called nationwide coal strikes damaging the American economy in the middle of World War II. His massive leonine head, forest-like eyebrows, firmly set jaw, powerful voice and ever-present scowl thrilled his supporters, angered his enemies, and delighted cartoonists. Coal miners for 40 years hailed him as the benevolent dictator who brought high wages, pensions and medical benefits, and damn the critics.[1]" The adjectives speak to the authors bias. And the last statement, "and damn the critics"--what does that even mean? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.232.122.238 (talk) 02:57, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
 * The use of strong and colorful language is not necessarily an indication of bias. It can be simply good writing.  The quote above is a fair summary of Lewis as seen by his biographers, and captures the reasons why he was such a striking and powerful figure in his day.  The "damn the critics" phrase is an accurate description of Lewis's dismissive attitude toward his opponents and detractors. Dwalls (talk) 15:26, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I do think the language to be inappropriate for an encyclopedia. I take issue with two aspects of the paragraph: "steamrolling over his opponents," and the final sentence, as I have consulted the source material and find nothing to support that statement.  Also in regards to the final sentence, the sentiment of the statement "damn the critics," while it may be illustrative of Lewis' attitude, the voice is completely wrong for an encyclopedia (not to mention the change in voice).  Good writing I think it is not.  A revision would be appropriate.  Tde1208 (talk) 19:31, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
 * the RS frequently use the term "steamroller" when dealing with Lewis. For example: 1) "cheerfully steamrollered the dissidents" (Zieger, John L. Lewis: p 82); 2) "This steamroller policy had been decided upon" (Stolberg, The story of the CIO - Page 253); 3) "pleading with him to come and stop the Lewis steamroller" (Milton, The politics of U.S. labor: p 135). Likewise "Damn His Coal Black Soul" is a chapter title in the Dubofsky-Van Tine biography (and the same quote is used by other scholars); That makes the language appropriate for an encyclopedia. The point is that writers use language to convey the mood of the era, not to hide or bowdlerize the rhetoric of the day. Rjensen (talk) 21:41, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

File:Lewis1946.jpg Nominated for speedy Deletion

 * The Bot would appear to be wrong in this case. An excellent rationale is given on the image page, with a clarification by Rjensen.  Dwalls (talk) 22:23, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

Birthplace
Several times, I have had to correct Lewis's birthplace. People keep changing it to Cleveland Township, Davis County, Iowa, a place with which Lewis had no known association. I think the changes aren't vandlaism, but rather, the result of well meaning people who search for Cleveland, Iowa and come up with that place. Read the Wikipedia page for Lucas, Iowa and you will find ample documentation of Cleveland, a mining camp that was, for practical purposes, a suburb of Lucas. Do we need to promote that former place to full status as a Wikipedia page to prevent this? Should we make a Cleveland, Iowa wikipedia page that disambiguates the three Clevelands in Iowa (one township, 2 former unincorporated communities). Douglas W. Jones (talk) 17:04, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

Election of 1940
I read about this long before there was an Internet, let alone a Wikipedia, but as the 1940 election approached, Lewis told Roosevelt, "I want a place on the ticket." Roosevelt replied softly, "Oh? Which place did you have in mind, John?" Denied the Democratic nomination for the vice-presidency, Lewis angrily threw his support to the Republicans, instead. There may have been several factors at work. J S Ayer (talk) 01:59, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20090416180654/http://www.aflcio.org:80/aboutus/history/history/lewis.cfm to http://www.aflcio.org/aboutus/history/history/lewis.cfm

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Editing, rules, JLL
Hi all I added an edit earlier today and it appears to have been removed. Could somebody tell me why that is? Do I need extra verification of the information?

Thank you Chris Skelton Bigchrisskelton (talk) 13:55, 23 October 2020 (UTC)