Porsgrund Outrage

In law-abiding Norway mob resistance to policemen is all but unknown. Suddenly last week 1000 water front workers, on strike at Porsgrund, grew ugly, resisted 120 policemen, drove them back and back until they took refuge in a factory.

So alarmed in Oslo was Norwegian Premier Ludvig Kolstad by this outrage that he despatched to Porsgrund two destroyers, two minelayers, a company of the Royal Guard, a machine gun battery and police bomb squads. Not content with even these precautions, Premier Kolstad called conscripts in and around Porsgrund, thereby compelling a majority of the 1,000 strikers into the Norwegian Army. Should they resist further, they could be shot as deserters.

In Oslo 500 Communists, enraged by the Premier's stern action, mobbed and seriously injured four policemen.

The Government has good reason to be jumpy. For the last two months Norway has been weathering a nationwide lockout imposed by well-organized employers to force superorganized labor unions to accept wage cuts of 15%.

Last week Norwegian union funds were just beginning to run low, Norwegian union leaders were trying to borrow from Danish and Swedish unions.

Norwegian industries at a standstill last week were: shipyards, textiles, leather, tobacco, pulp, paper, rubber, soap, shoes, electro-chemicals, chocolate, clothing, sawmills, building trades, electrical and printing industries.

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