By ED FINKELSTEIN
Publisher Emeritus
Last week was an especially sad week for the Labor Movement as we lost two great trade union leaders who had strong ties to our St. Louis-Southern Illinois region: Mike Sacco, retired Seafarers International Union (SIU) president; and Ed Smith, former Laborers International Union (LiUNA) vice president from Southern Illinois and until his death, CEO of Union Labor Life Insurance Company (Ullico), the only union-owned insurance and investment firm in America.
Brother Sacco died on Dec. 28, 2023, and Brother Smith died on Jan. 3, 2024.
Both were dynamos in their own spheres of influence, both with personalities that wouldn’t quit, both with a determined commitment to the unions and the union families they served and loved. Their influence, guidance, and sheer determination to create a better world will be missed for years to come.
Brother Mike Sacco
Mike Sacco, 86, was the longest serving SIU president in its history, serving for 35 years. He joined the Seafarers in 1958 as a seaman on merchant ships, (initially, as he put it in a biography, “washing dishes and pots and pans.”)
His leadership skills quickly became evident with his first posting with the Seafarers International Union in 1960, then a number of growing responsibilities over the ensuing years that ultimately led to his role as president.
Along the way those responsibilities included serving as port agent here in St. Louis, vice president of the Seafarers Harry Lundeberg School of Seamanship, vice president of the St. Louis based Atlantic, Gulf, Lakes and Inland Waters division for 35 years, secretary-treasurer of the St. Louis Port Council and Missouri AFL-CIO executive board member.
His impact was captured in his obituary: “His big personality and even bigger heart were relentless in ensuring that working people had a seat at the table in every boardroom and that their voices were heard in every hall of power. Nobody fought harder for our nation’s rank-and-file working people than Mike.”
HONORED BY AFL-CIO
AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler speaking at Brother Sacco’s retirement on Feb. 13, 2023: “Mike Sacco’s distinguished career in trade unionism is an inspiration to all of us. Mike’s leadership at the Seafarers International Union benefited generations of merchant mariners and all working people. Mike led his union with integrity and a fighting spirit that he learned as a rank-and-file member. It’s been an honor to have him serve on the AFL-CIO Executive Council for more than three decades, always quick to offer sage advice and guidance about the future of our Movement.”
SIU President David Heindel described Sacco as “an inspiration to members and officials alike. Under Mike’s leadership, the SIU has become a respected powerhouse in maritime circles around the globe. We’ve been together since I was a trainee back in the early 1970s, and I know Mike has dedicated his whole life to the SIU. We all owe him a debt of gratitude.”
To honor his service to his union, upon his retirement SIU named him President Emeritus.
A funeral mass was held Jan. 6 at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church in south St. Louis County.
Brother Ed Smith
Ed Smith, 70, launched his career as a union laborer at the age of 13, following in the footsteps of his father who was the business manager of Laborers Local 773, Marion, Ill. At the age of 21 Ed was elected Local 773’s business manager.
Noted the Ullico announcement of his death: “…he thought of the Labor Movement as his calling rather than a job.”
The first member of LiUNA to graduate from the National Labor College and the Harvard University Trade Union Program, Brother Smith served as business manager of the Southern Illinois Laborers District Council (where he led 40 organizing campaigns across Southern Illinois in the 1970s and ‘80s, expanding the region from three to 10 states.) He also served as chairman of the Central Laborers’ Pension Fund, international vice president and midwest regional manager (serving over 58,000 members), and ultimately as assistant to the General President. He earned a seat on the LiUNA Executive Board and an appointment to the Illinois State Board of Investments – eventually becoming its chairman.
THE NEXT PHASE
Knowing he could have a much broader impact on the entire Labor Movement by helping it grow financially, and frustrated by investment managers putting union dollars into anti-union companies, in 2008 Brother Smith took over a financially-troubled Ullico as its president, ultimately creating the nation’s only union-owned insurance and investment company where unions’ pension funds would be invested with companies and real estate investments across America that benefitted union members.
In 2011 he was elected the company’s CEO, a position he held until his death.
IMPACT ON THE LABOR TRIBUNE
“Ed Smith will be dearly missed, but his profound impact on Ullico and its employees, the Labor Movement, and those around him will live on through his accomplishments and the countless stories told by all those whose lives he touched,” Ullico noted in its announcement.
One of those he touched was the Labor Tribune.
Brother Smith played a critical role in the survival of the Labor Tribune as it was seeking to retire an unfunded pension liability in order to transfer from private ownership to ownership by the Labor Movement.
In an appeal to Labor for funding to retire the pension liability, Brother Smith, a staunch supporter of the Labor Tribune over the years who realized the importance of the paper to the entire regional Labor Movement, was the first to step forward and commit Ullico funding, which launched the successful fund raising effort that culminated in 2022 in the creation of the paper’s new owner, the unions of the non-profit Labor Tribune Governing Board.
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