Mr. Shanker is presently traveling in Africa as a representative of the International Federation of Free Trade Unions, for the purpose of exchanging information and ideas on education, and of fostering union solidarity. His guest columnist today is Executive Director of the League for Industrial Democracy, a labor-supported educational society.

Last week a couple of candidates for Democratic District Leaders on Manhattan's upper west side called a press conference which received little notice but provided food for thought on Labor Day. The candidates blessed by the backing of the New Democratic Coalition were upset because the United Federation of Teachers was "interfering" in the leadership race - i.e., Albert Shanker had sent a letter to teachers in the district pointing out that these candidates had been involve in attempts to break the 1968 school strike and in other ways opposed the union. The letter urged support for a pro-union slate, headed by Dorothy Walasek. The NDCers termed this action "shocking."

In days gone by, when people who called themselves liberals could be automatically assumed to have an affinity for working people, the common complaint was that the labor movement was insufficiently involved in politics, excessively preoccupied with narrow "bread and butter" issues. Labor leaders from Sam Gompers to George Meany were admonished to immerse themselves in the larger issues facing society and to look beyond the collective bargaining table.

In recent years, of course, the labor movement has done just that. As for the larger social issues, there is probably no institution in the country, including the political parties themselves, that offers a broader range of comprehensive programs than the AFL-CIO -- in housing, health, civil rights, education, tax reform, consumer protection, and so forth. And it is a matter of plain fact that nobody lobbies as powerfully for these programs, at the local and national level, as the unions do.

As for political involvement, labor has come a long, long way since Gompers' days. The unions almost carried the day for Humphrey in 1968 and bailed out a host of liberal Democrats, doves and hawks alike, in 1970. COPE was developed into a political instrument far more effective and sophisticated that the liberals of the 30s dreamed possible-, as any number of conservative politicians will ruefully attest. We can expect to see labors political efforts spreading at the grass-roots level.

But, lo and behold, no sooner does the erstwhile dream of liberals begin to materialize than some of them start sounding like cheerleaders for the campaign being waged by the Goldwater conservative, Senator Samin, to get the unions out of politics - in the view, I suppose, that the New Democratic Coalition is a more perfect instrument for the advancement of workers' interests than the workers' own unions. One suspects, however, that teachers and other working people, as they feel the unjust pinch of Mr. Nixon's wage freeze, will be looking to George Meany rather than to Eugene McCarthy or Bella Abzug.

While the unions are not officially wed to any political party, a labor retreat from politics would, as an obvious practical matter, most profoundly affect the Democrats, leaving the party to the tender mercies of conservatives Southerners on one side and elitist liberals on the other, with no voice for the people who have historically provided the mass electoral base for Democratic liberalism.

The Stakes

Teachers and other public employees have a special stake in seeing that this does not happen. Indeed, it is not accidental that the expansion of labor's political action programs parallels the growth of public employee unionism. Not only are such employees directly affected by government policies, but their jobs are such as very often to put them in the center of societies racial and class conflicts. What kind of schools teachers will teach in -- or whether, they will teach at all -- is determined by public officials,
and the political parties determine who these officials will be. Political unionism is a necessity.

Meanwhile, that district leadership race on the upper West Side illustrates anew a central problem in American liberalism. At issue is whether an effective labor-liberal coalition can be built or whether politically suicidal factionalists will succeed once again in paving the way for the politics of reaction.