Gerald Ford would have been re-elected hands dow if he had kept his promise to Paul Hall, the President of the Seafarers’ International Union. Mr. Hall developed a friendship with President Ford, early in his career as a Congressman from Michigan.
After President Nixon resigned, President Ford addressed the annual Seafarers’ Convention. He was lauded in the union publication. For some years the SIU, other maritime unions, and the shipbuilder unions lobbied for a cargo preference bill that would require that 50% of oil and petroleum products imported into the US be carried on US build and manned tankers. These unions strongly supported President Nixon’s re-election in 1972 and were part of the blue collar hard hat movement to the Republican party.
President Ford indicated that he would support that legislation and the unions worked to get the bill through both the House and the Senate. For reasons that never became clear, President Ford killed the legislation with a pocket veto. Needless to say, the various unions will a couple of million of members switched their support from Ford to Carter and the rest is history.
There is no doubt in my mind that President Ford would have carried New York state and a few other states that he lost if he kept his promise to the maritime unions.
That is certainly interesting, but I don’t think the maritime unions had that much sway. Ford still managed to carry the whole West Coast and East Coast states like ME, NH, CT, NJ, and VA.