The Chrysler Board's Union Label

Chrysler last week named Owen Bieber, president of the United Auto Workers, to its board of directors. That made Bieber the second auto-union chief to serve as a Chrysler director and one of the few labor representatives anywhere to sit on the board of a major U.S. corporation.

Bieber was preceded as a Chrysler director by Douglas Fraser, who retired from the U.A.W. presidency last May. Fraser joined the board when Chrysler needed financial help from the union and soon hit it off with Chairman Lee Iacocca. Iacocca wanted Fraser to stay on as a director after his term ran out; Fraser contended that the seat belonged to the U.A.W., not to him. In contrast, Bieber and Iacocca's relationship was strained when contract negotiations with Chrysler broke down last summer. The two have since warmed a bit toward each other, but it might not last. Bieber wants Chrysler to reopen its U.A.W. contract, which does not expire until October 1985, so that the major automakers can be put back on the same bargaining timetable. Iacocca has opposed that idea.