23 Men v. Henry Ford

Henry Ford is a U. S. symbol of many meanings: mass production, low cost, high wages for workmen, the open shop. In the eyes of the New Deal the last makes him a maverick. Like an unbroken bronco who has roamed the plains in absolute freedom, Henry Ford had gone his way; many times the New Dealers had almost lassoed him, but never quite. This week the old mustang appeared to be roped at last.

The Supreme Court refused to review Ford's appeal from a Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals decision. The decision had ordered the Ford Motor Co. to reinstate 23 employes who NLRB had found were discharged for union activity. Many months might elapse before Maverick Ford could be saddled and ridden, like other well-regulated industrial horses; many more before he would work in harness with labor and the Government. But the Supreme Court ruling made the Ford Motor Co. and all Ford officials subject to unlimited contempt of court sentences by the Sixth Circuit Court if they intimidate, coerce, threaten or interfere with employes or union organizers. Ford will also have to reinstate with back pay the 23 workers who were fired after the beating up of CIOrganizer Frankensteen at Gate No. 4 overpass to the Rouge plant in May 1937.

Three other Ford appeals from NLRB decisions remained in lower courts: the same discrimination issue in cases at Dallas and Buffalo; and a Long Beach, Calif, case in which the issue is a company union.

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