Ronald Robert Carey was an American labour leader and general president, from 1991 to 1997, of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT), the first Teamsters president elected by direct vote of rank-and-file members.
Background
Ronald Robert Carey was born on March 22, 1936 in Queens, New York, United States. He was a son of Joseph and Loretta Carey. His father was a driver for United Parcel Service (UPS). Carey's father had to work Sundays and Christmas Day (often without pay), which taught Ron about workplace injustice, but his father also took him to union meetings where Ron learned about workplace change and how to run a democratic union.
Education
After graduating from Long Island City High School in 1953, Ronald Robert Carey turned down a college scholarship to enlist in the Marines.
Career
In 1956 Ronald Robert Carey was hired by the United Parcel Service (UPS) as a truck driver, and five years later he became a union steward for Teamsters Local 804 in Queens. After running unsuccessfully for local union trustee in 1962 and for recording secretary in 1965, Carey was elected president of Local 804 in 1967. Strikes led by Carey in 1968, 1971, and 1974 resulted in solid gains for his membership, including higher salaries, increased benefits, and improved working conditions.
As a local official, Carey, like many other Teamsters, moved to distance himself from the central IBT leadership, which had become notorious because of its ties to organized crime and its pattern of negotiating "sweetheart contracts" with employers. Rank-and-file Teamsters were threatened or intimidated, or became victims of violence, if they attempted to speak up about workers' problems or the corrupt leadership of the union. In the 1970's, dissident groups began to organize to challenge the union's bureaucracy. The most effective of these alliances, Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU), had grown to more than 10, 000 members and published a national newspaper with a circulation of 60, 000 by the early 1990's.
Although Carey never became a member of TDU, he worked with the group to oppose unfavorable contracts that IBT officials had negotiated for UPS workers in 1982, 1985, and 1987. Then, in June 1988, the United States Department of Justice brought suit against the IBT for violations of the Racketeer-Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). In order to settle the suit out of court, IBT officials agreed to government-supervised, secret-ballot elections for top union posts - the first direct elections in the union's history. With the support of the TDU, Carey secured a place on the ballot as a presidential candidate. In the hotly contested election that followed, Carey ran as an outsider against R. V. Durham and Walter Shea, both of whom had ties to the union's old guard.
Although only 27 percent of IBT membership cast ballots, Carey emerged as the clear winner, getting 48 percent of the vote to Durham's 33 percent and Shea's 18 percent. Once in office, Carey moved to reduce the high salaries, expense accounts, and other generous perquisites enjoyed by the union's leaders. Breaking with the former leadership's consistent policy of supporting Republican Party presidential candidates, Carey led the IBT in opposition to the reelection of President George Bush.
Achievements
Interests
swimming, diving, fishing
Connections
At the age of 18, Ronald Robert Carey married Barbara Murphy, a girl who lived in the apartment above him. The Careys remained married until Ron's death. They had five children.