The AFL-CIO demonstrated its new-found political strength by winning a high-stakes battle over legislation that would have given President Clinton "fast-track" authority to ignore worker and environmental rights in trade deals with Latin American and other developing nations. Labor’s fierce opposition to fast-track was fueled by its bitter, four-year experience with the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), during which U.S.-based multinationals transferred tens of thousands of good-paying jobs to Mexico where they could hire workers at close to poverty-level wages and receive government assurances of "no labor trouble." Major environmental organizations also joined the protest, angered by the continuing violation of anti-pollution laws and evidence of tainted food crossing the border into the United States. President Clinton, despite his arm-twisting, private deals and promises to provide job training and monetary aid to workers displaced by future trade deals, could not muster the 218 votes he needed to pass the legislation, falling short by an estimated six to eight votes. He was supported by 160 Republicans, led by Speaker Newt Gingrich, and only by about 50 Democrats, one-fourth of the party’s membership in the House. To complicate the President’s problems, the Republicans demanded a price for their support: the denial of U.S. funds to international family planning organizations that do not oppose abortions, a price Clinton was unwilling to pay. The President’s credibility had been damaged when his glowing forecasts about the advantages of NAFTA proved to be a deception. His promises to improve worker rights and the environment in the legislation’s side agreements remained unfulfilled. Understandably, normally friendly supporters of Clinton within the labor movement became strongly reluctant about giving him authority to negotiate trade agreements under fast-track legislation which Congress was to have no power to amend. The AFL-CIO position on international trade is that it wants guarantees on worker rights and the environment at the core of trade agreements, just as intellectual rights are guaranteed, and that the U.S. should apply sanctions against any country that violates the provisions of a humanized trade agreement. In an increasingly globalized economy, workers in all countries need some basic protections; otherwise they will be competing with each other in a "race toward the bottom." After the President had conceded defeat, House minority leader Richard Gephart, who led the fight against fast-track, commented: "The real question before us now is whether we can connect our values of environmental quality, worker and human rights to our economic policy."
Despite Clinton’s apocalyptic warning that U.S. export trade would be severely damaged if fast-track was not approved, opponents of the legislation were not dissuaded. Anyway, it’s a matter of record that the President’s trade representatives, even without fast-track authority, have managed to negotiate more than 100 trade agreements since 1994. Although fast-track legislation was defeated, organized labor still is faced with the difficult task of promoting basic worker rights in countries where they are violated. Politically, the AFL-CIO has emerged as a strong, independent force that both major parties have to reckon with. Labor leaders have watched with increasing concern as Clinton moved to the right, into the Republican orbit, on such issues as the balanced budget, crime and welfare. And now, finally, they have successfully challenged his leadership of the Democratic Party, despite their former cordial relationship with him and his administration. Who knows what lies ahead?
The 1998 congressional elections and the presidential elections in the year 2000 may yield some interesting surprises.