Plain Men in Houston

Unknown to itself and to the U. S. public is the real American Federation of Labor. It is a jack of 1,619 trade unions, a many-millioned mass which has virtually no credo because within it is every credo under the U. S. sun. But there are other A. F. of L.s. The one usually labeled in newsprint as "the A. F. of L." is a tight little club of 17 executive councilmen who expound and at intervals alter the otherwise missing credo. Last is the A. F. of L. which goes on show as "the annual convention of the American Federation of Labor."

Last week the convention and The Club met simultaneously at Houston, Texas. Assembled in the lofty new Coliseum were 600 career men of Labor. Mostly they were gentlemen toilers who had worked up to union office and comfortable expense accounts. Plain men seated along pine tables, they daily went through the conventional motions indicated by their President William Green, a plain man whose career had been a model of its kind. At evening the placid delegates rejoined their wives, retired to the movies or enjoyed simple sociability in hotel rooms. A minority frequented the convention's one play spot, the roof of the Rice Hotel.

There, an escape from Texas' statute forbidding sale of liquor by the glass was provided by a stratagem whereby the ingredients were given away, and a reasonable sum was charged for transportation from bar to tables. The Rice was also headquarters of the Executive Council. In & out the doors of the Council's rooms passed tiny, wax-haired Matthew Woll of the Engravers; smart, tough Dan Tobin of the Teamsters; Dan Tracy of the Electrical Workers; smart, smooth John Coefield of the Plumbers. Still a councilman by virtue of his long service, snow-haired Secretary-Treasurer Frank Morrison ambled about in lonely dignity.

Law-Making. Principal business before the council was the Wagner Act. Having previously determined to amend it in some fashion, they debated just how far to go in rewriting a statute which has not worked out altogether to their benefit. Before the Supreme Court upheld the Act last year, said the council in its annual report, "the administration of the law by the National Labor Relations Board was, on the whole, just and proper. . . . Since the decisions ... the Board has abandoned whatever restraint it imposed upon itself . . . and has brazenly and by official acts declared itself a proponent of the C. I. O. ..."

The councilmen recommended that the law be amended so as "to curtail the unlawful assumption of broad powers by the board, also to curtail unlimited discretion in construing and administering the Act, and to make specific the jurisdictional limits of the Board." Specifically: to restrict or abolish NLRB's power to void contracts between employers and unions, require NLRB to recognize craft lines in designating bargaining units, forbid it to sanction independent or "company" unions, reduce its quasi-judicial powers.

The foundation of the Wagner Act is that employes are guaranteed absolute freedom in choosing any or no bargaining agent, and NLRB is given absolute discretion in deciding how freedom of choice is to be assured. Clearer heads at Houston understood that the issue to be put up to the next Congress will not be simply whether to pass "modifying amendments," but in effect whether to repeal the Act and substitute something else.

One of the clear heads at Houston belonged to A. F. of L. Counsel Joseph Padway. Last week Lawyer Padway said he was for a labor act which would make NLRB a police agency with limited powers, confined largely to forbidding the more obvious forms of intimidation. "Legitimate" national unions (that is, affiliated with A. F. of L. or C. I. O.) and employers would again be left to fight it out. They also would be free to get together on a strictly business basis, with no undue worry about whether a majority of employes share their employers' preference for a particular union. Since many an employer prefers A. F. of L. to C. I. O., this would be to A. F. of L.'s advantage. Joker from employers' standpoint in canny Mr. Padway's idea was that NLRB would not be denied the right of interfering unless the employer concerned gave the union of his choice a closed shop contract.

Mr. Padway's A. F. of L. clients include some vigorous individualists, and they are not wholly agreed upon Wagner Act amendment or anything else. Last week Councilman Tobin aired one of his dissents to the delegates. "As soon as we start amending the Wagner Act," said he, "we will be confronted with amendments by the other side, by enemies of labor . . . and we will destroy the very act. . . ." War & Peace. Franklin Roosevelt sent the convention a message suggesting that A. F. of L. and C. I. O. make peace.

"A very satisfactory communication," droned William Green, who thereupon introduced President Joe Ozanic of the Progressive Miners of America to the convention. Young Mr. Ozanic roundly larruped C. I. O., with particular reference to John L. Lewis' own United Mine Workers. Mr. Green next day notified the Canadian Trades and Labor Congress that it must expel 30,000 C. I.O. members or renounce 120,000 A. F. of L. members.

These responses to the Roosevelt message did not sit well with Mr. Tobin, whose teamsters union (309,200) is largest in the A. F. of L. "The President of the United States ... has prayed to you," said Teamster Tobin. "... I hope and trust that you will pay some attention. . . ." Having announced that it is up to John Lewis to sue for peace, William Green reddened, barked angrily at reporters, adjourned so he could talk it over with the council. That body, through its resolutions committee, proceeded to take an even more resolute line against C. I. O. than was adopted last year. To Mr. Tobin was left no recourse but a wordy fight on the floor, where the council seldom has to put up a scrap to retain control.

Until Mr. Tobin spoke up, C. I. O. was in fact no great issue at Houston. The delegates last week assured themselves that they were winning, that C. I. O. was second dog in U. S. Labor. The council had reported a paid-up membership of 3,623,087, a gain of 762,154 within the past year. The Federation had been able to collect $580,800 to spend on the fray without straining any one union, whereas the delegates believed C. I. O. survived only by the enforced largesse of John Lewis' miners. Thus at the 58th annual convention of the A. F. of L., the plain men were not excited by the news that C. I. O. would hold its first convention in Pittsburgh November 14. Even to those rank-&-filers who are disposed to ignore William Green's forensics and work amicably with C. I. O. back home, the convention call issued in Washington by John Lewis was a final indication that it will take something more than vague Presidential gestures to end Labor's war.

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