Word: brennans
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...stylistically, in the new Administration is Labor Secretary Peter Brennan, a lifelong New York Democrat with a rough-and-ready tongue and no apologies for grabbing all he can for the workingman. Nixon reached deep into the labor movement to pluck out Brennan, president of the New York City and New York State Building and Construction Trades Councils. He is the first rank-and-file union member appointed to the post since President Eisenhower chose Martin Durkin, a plumber. But Brennan speaks the President's language on many issues, especially patriotism and the Viet Nam War. His appointment...
When Peter Brennan, 54, dons his new soft hat as Secretary of Labor, he will be repaid, as it were, for the hard-hat he presented to the President 2½ years ago. At the height of the public outcry over the U.S. incursion into Cambodia, Brennan organized a massive union march down Wall Street in support of the President. An elated Nixon invited Brennan and other union leaders to the White House, and friendship flowered to such an extent that Brennan rallied New York labor to Nixon for his reelection...
...well Brennan's new hat will fit is another matter.* It is surely not one he is used to. Born and bred in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen, given to plain speech laced with profanity, Brennan is a local power, to be sure, but he lacks a national constituency and-some would say-anything approaching national vision. Though he is respected by George Meany, he is not a member of the AFL-CIO executive committee. He speaks for a well-paid labor elite, not for the industrial rank and file...
...more money and benefits for his men, and that he has done. Wage scales for the construction unions in New York City are among the highest in the country, scandalously so in the opinion of many. Starting as a painter at Macy's department store, Brennan served aboard submarines in the Pacific during World War II, then returned to New York to rise in union influence, volunteering for any assignment that came along. When he was elected president of the construction trades council in 1957, he turned a no-show job into a powerful one, mediating disputes among...
Failure. Such is his passion for the trades that Brennan, a Roman Catholic, has been known to trace their origin to Carpenter Jesus Christ. He has a craftsman's feeling for his country. "We build this country," he said at the time of the Wall Street march. "We build these beautiful buildings and churches and highways and bridges and schools. We love this country. We were afraid it was going down the drain and nobody was doing anything about it." Like other members of the craft unions, however, he is choosy about who gets to build. Because...