Victor Bussie

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Victor V. Bussie
Born	January 1919 Louisiana, USA
Residence	Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Occupation	Louisiana AFL-CIO president Former firefighter
Spouse	Divorced from (1) Gertrude Foley Bussie (1918-2005) (2) Frances Martinez "Fran" Bussie (born 1935)

Victor V. Bussie (born January 1919) retired in 1997 as the 41-year president of the Louisiana AFL-CIO, having first assumed the mantle of union leadership in 1956. Observers often described him as the most significant non-elected "official" in his state's politics. Bussie's influence with governors and state legislators became so great in the 1970s that a trade association known as the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry (LABI) was established as a counterbalance to the AFL-CIO. LABI won a huge victory in 1976 with the passage of the state's still-standing right-to-work legislation.

Contents 1 Defender of the Longs 2 Bussie in Shreveport 3 Bussie's home bombed 4 Service on state boards 5 Bussie sues Margaret Lowenthal and Boeing 6 Bussie fights right-to-work 7 Bussie in retirement 8 See also 9 References

[edit] Defender of the Longs

Bussie (pronounced BEW SEE) recalled having been born to a poor family with a brother and five sisters. He is half Choctaw Indian^[1]:

"My mother and father struggled to send us to school because of the high cost of school books. There finally came a time when they could no longer afford to buy books for seven children. We children were told that we could no longer attend school.^[2]

"That very same year, Governor Huey Pierce Long, Jr., persuaded the Louisiana State Legislature to fund schoolbooks for all children attending public schools. Not only did that mean that my brother and sisters and I could finish our education but also thousands of other children could as well. My family never forgot Huey Long and became longtime political supporters of the Long family."^[3]

[edit] Bussie in Shreveport

Bussie, a veteran of the United States Navy during World War II, joined the Shreveport Fire Department and became a leader in the departmental union. He became chief of the Fire Prevention Bureau and the president of the Central Trades and Labor Council. James C. Gardner, who served as mayor of Shreveport from 1954-1958, described Bussie as "well-spoken" and his "polite and reasonable manner made him widely sought as the 'labor member' of various civic boards." As a second assistant chief, a position Bussie obtained without waiting for civil service seniority, his signature was required on all certificates of occupancy for commercial buildings, a position of considerable power.^[4]Some in the business community accused Bussie of requiring work beyond the municipal building or fire code regulations in order to create more employment within the building trades. To check Bussie, officials activated, as permitted by the city charter, a building code board of appeals to prevent abuses.^[5]

Early in 1955, Bussie, acting through the Central Trades and Labor Council during his lunch hour, called a strike of waitresses at Brocato's Restaurant in Shreveport when the company declined to rehire a fired waitress. In retaliation, Shreveport Public Safety Commissioner J. Earl Downs, the brother of an influential state senator allied with the Longs, Crawford H. "Sammy" Downs of Alexandria, the seat of Rapides Parish, demoted Bussie to the rank of captain and assigned him to a fire station. Bussie instead took unpaid leave and appealed Downs' decision to the Fire and Police Civil Service Board. After fourteen sessions and fifty hours of testimony, the civil service board voted 4-1 to uphold the demotion, with the lone dissenter being the firefighters' representative. Bussie announced that he would appeal to the courts. Meanwhile, he became the state AFL-CIO president for the remainder of his working career and lived in Baton Rouge. No action was ever taken by the courts in Bussie's appeal.^[6].

Gardner said that the demotion "turned out to be the best thing that could have happened to Bussie and the labor movement in Louisiana. . . . He was extremely effective as the Louisiana leader of organized labor and brought a level of influence for labor in Baton Rouge that it had not previously enjoyed.^[7]

[edit] Bussie's home bombed

On July 19, 1966, Bussie's Baton Rouge residence was bombed but there were no injuries. Jules R. Kimble, a then 24-year-old proclaimed former member of the Ku Klux Klan, who also claimed to have been the heir to a nonexistent fortune, told police that he had overheard three Klansmen plot the bombing of both the Bussie residence and that of Viola Logan, an African American teacher in Port Allen, the seat of West Baton Rouge Parish. Kimble said the plot was hatched in Kimble's New Orleans home but that he declined to participate in the execution of the plans. It was theorized that the bombing was inspired by Klansmen who favored a state grant-in-aid program to benefit white private academies which would soon mushroom in predominantly black sections of Louisiana with the arrival of court-mandated school desegregation. Kimble was eventually booked with aggravated assault, impersonating a police officer, and carrying a concealed weapon. ^[8]

[edit] Service on state boards

As he had served on Shreveport boards, Bussie also was the union representative over the years on many state boards and commissions, including the Louisiana State University Board of Supervisors,^[9] and was the chairman of the Louisiana Public Facilities Authority.^[10] On his retirement, a Baton Rouge Morning Advocate editorial concluded, "Bussie might well be the most powerful Louisianan never elected to public office."

Bussie, ever with an eye toward friendly relations with the media, once invited the Morning Advocate managing editor, Margaret Dixon, to address the AFL-CIO convention. He also maintained a highly visible public image for himself.

[edit] Bussie sues Margaret Lowenthal and Boeing

On October 15, 1985, State Representative Margaret Welsh Lowenthal, an unsuccessful Democratic candidate for the Seventh District seat in the United States House of Representatives, addressed the Lake Charles Optimist Club at its regular luncheon meeting. Lowenthal claimed that she had been told by an unidentified representative of Boeing that the firm had considered locating a manufacturing facility in Louisiana, but ultimately chose Mississippi because of Louisiana's unstable political climate and its longstanding problems with public education. Lowenthal said that she was told further by the Boeing representative that, "'As long as you have a man named Victor Bussie sitting in Baton Rouge, calling the shots for labor, we don't need to be in your state.'" Her remarks were telecast over Lake Charles television.^[11]

Bussie filed suit against Lowenthal and Boeing alleging that the statements were false and were made with actual malice. Bussie alleged that as such the statements damaged his reputation and held him up to public contempt and ridicule and caused him embarrassment, humiliation, mental suffering, and anxiety. Lowenthal claimed that the statements had been made to her while she was attending a cocktail party given by the Louisiana delegation to the National Conference of State Legislators.^[12]

[edit] Bussie fights right-to-work

The Louisiana State Legislature passed a right-to-work law in the 1952 session at the urging of then Governor Robert F. Kennon. Gardner was a freshman member of the Louisiana House at the time and voted for right-to-work. In 1956, however, when Gardner was mayor, the legislature repealed the law at the urging of Governor Earl Kemp Long. Organized labor took the leading role in the repeal, a reflection of Bussie's growing influence in state politics. Indeed, Louisiana was clearly the most unionized state in the American South. ^[13]

In the 1976 legislative session, right-to-work was again passed by a nearly all Democratic body, a reflection of the growing presence of LABI, which sought to reverse what it claimed had been "socialism" in the heyday of Bussie's influence.^[14] Bussie has since never wavered in his call to repeal the Louisiana right-to-work law, which he calls the "right-to-work-for-less." Supporters of the measure, however, insist that it merely protects employees' freedom to refuse to pay compulsory "fees" to a union which they do not wish to join. Twenty-one other states, including all southern states, have such laws.^[15]

Bussie claims that the effect of the law has been "to drive down wages, . . . particularly in the construction industry." Data furnished by the U.S. Department of Labor and the Louisiana Department of Labor show that construction wages in the state have sharply increased relative to the national average since passage of right-to-work. In 1976, Louisiana construction hourly wages were 77 percent of the national average. By 2000, Louisiana construction wages had risen to 96 percent of the U.S. average.^[16]

Mark Mix, senior vice president of the National Right to Work Committee in Springfield, Virginia, noted that the same trend is evident in manufacturing. U.S. Department of Labor data show that Louisiana manufacturing hourly wages has risen from 102 percent of the national average in 1976 to 108 percent in the 21st century. Because the cost of living in Louisiana has been traditionally lower than in other states, construction workers' real, disposable income is above the national average.^[17]

[edit] Bussie in retirement

Bussie and his second wife, the former Frances "Fran" Martinez (born 1935),^[18] herself a political activist, reside in Baton Rouge. Fran Bussie's parents were John O. Martinez (1906-1990) and Althea Williams Martinez (1914-2003) of New Orleans.^[19] Bussie's first wife was the former Gertrude Foley (October 15, 1918 - September 16, 2005), who died in Round Rock in suburban Williamson County north of Austin, Texas.^[20]

Bussie has long been strongly affiliated with the liberal wing of the Democratic Party. In 1964, he campaigned even in north Louisiana on behalf of U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson, who lost that region by a large margin in the last election prior to passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which thereafter enfranchised tens of thousands of black voters, most of whom became automatic Democrats. Bussie was even closer to Johnson's vice president, Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota, who had attended Louisiana State University in the 1930s.^[21]

In retirement, Bussie joined a group of Louisiana business and political leaders, including the former Republican Governor David C. Treen, in urging President George W. Bush to pardon imprisoned Governor Edwin Washington Edwards. Thus far, Edwards remains behind bars in the federal facility in Oakdale in Allen Parish on his conviction of bribery. Bussie supported Edwards in all four of the Democrat's successful gubernatorial campaigns. Edwards once said that Bussie was the singlemost influential person in his administration.^[22]

In 1994, Bussie was among the second round of public figures inducted into the Louisiana Political Museum and Hall of Fame in Winnfield.^[23] He is a former recipient of the "Racial Justice Award" given annually by the Baton Rouge Young Women's Christian Association.^[24]In 1998, Bussie and former Governor John McKeithen were among recipients named "Living Legends" by the Louisiana Public Broadcasting Service.^[25]

Bussie's papers are in the archives of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.^[26] Victor and Fran Bussie have also completed an oral history for the Louisiana Secretary of State's office.^[27]

In 1997, Bussie received an honorary degree from Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond. Then Southeastern President Sally Clausen described Bussie as "an individual who has distingused himself through his quiet but steadfast work for the underprivileged and his strong stand for justice. He has been a lifelong supporter of education, serving as an advocate for quality instruction and a voice of support for higher education. . . . ".^[28]

[edit] See also

[edit] References