The reasons given for his victory are varied and vigorously disputed,
depending on the political orientation of the writers. Early observers had attrib-
uted his victory to his exposure of the totalitarian nature of the Communist Party
and to his aggressive militancy, not to repression or "turning to reaction." On the
other hand, two writers on labor, both self-proclaimed radicals, saw Reuther's
success as due to his "red-baiting." Another leftist author concurred about the
red-baiting but added several other factors leading to the defeat of the ATL cau-
cus: "red company unionism," government repression, and the "sectarian poli-
cies of the communists themselves." All these explanations held the conflict with
the CP to be central to the dispute ( Howe and Widick, 1949, p. 171;
Geschwender, 1977, pp. 50-51; Green, 1980, p. 195; Aronowitz, 1974, p. 246).

The actual conflict and its resolution became obscured by the symbolic
value attached to them. The conflict became a battle between good and evil,
totalitarianism and democracy, or left-wing politics and reactionary politics. All
the horrors of McCarthyism and the Cold War were linked in hindsight to the
contest, but it did not deserve such attributions. The elections in 1946 and 1947
were, first and foremost, trade union disputes, and the outcome was predicated
on the way that the caucuses conducted themselves on union issues.

In fact, despite the activities of the CP in the ATL caucus, the Communist
issue had little currency in the 1946 election. For one, this time span preceded
the virulent anticommunism of the 1950s. Winston Churchill had made his "Iron
Curtain" speech at Fulton, Missouri, in March 1946, and Harry Truman had
immediately supported it. Then Truman had second thoughts and modified his
position. Newsweek ( "Churchill: Home View," 1946, p. 49) reported that British
"newspapers generally took the line that Churchill had gone too far in both crit-
icism of Russia and in proposing a virtual British-American alliance." Though
the Communist issue was visible in political life, it was hardly the all-consuming
concern that it later became.

Even Nat Ganley, a leading Communist in the UAW and an implacable
Reuther foe, generally ignored the Communist issue and ascribed Reuther's suc-
cessful bid for the union's presidency to his militancy during World War II and
his fight against the piecework system that the Communists had proposed.
Ganley pointed to Reuther's leadership in the 1945-1946General Motors (GM)
strike and the wartime "opportunism" of the Communist Party as other key fac-
tors that aided in Reuther's victory ( Ganley, 1960, p. 32).

Reuther's anticommunism existed in full measure, but all too often his
detractors intentionally confused his anticommunism with nativistic red baiting.
According to these critics, all criticism of the Communist Party is by definition
red baiting, a view that places the Communist Party beyond the scrutiny that
every institution in a democratic society can expect.

Other pro- ATL writers have mentioned Reuther's very real accomplish-
ments. Martin Halperin has written an impressive, sympathetic history of the role
of the CP and the ATL covering the time of Reuther's victory. Reuther's

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