Teamsters and Crime.

Once a union that represented coach and wagon drivers, the Brotherhood of Teamsters dominated the trucking industry by the 1950s. Few industries were as vulnerable to under-the-table or illicit operations as was trucking. In the 1950s the connections between the Teamsters and gangsters became public and ultimately led to the ouster of the Teamsters union from the AFL-CIO.

Suspicions Build.

Trouble started when Teamsters president Dave Beck was accused by the AFL-CIO of abusing union funds. Such suspicions only brought the character of all union leadership into question. The first indication of the seriousness of Beck's activities, and its effect on the entire AFL-CIO, came in March 1957 when Labor Secretary James P. Marshall rejected George Meany's nomination of Beck to serve as a delegate to a committee of the United National International Labor Organization in Hamburg, Germany. On 9 April 1957 AFL-CIO...