Holdup Men of Labor

Shall song and music be forgot

When workingmen combine,

With love united may they not

Have power almost divine?

Shall idle drones still live like kings .

On labor not their own;

Shall true men starve, while thieves and rings

Reap where they have not sown? .

This song, to the tune of Auld Lang Syne, is sometimes sung in American Federation of Labor meetings.

Certain Congressmen came to the conclusion last week that something had to be done about the great A.F. of L.

President William Green's federation is infested with racketeers, as C.I.O. is plagued with Reds. Since A.F. of L. leaders seem little inclined to do anything about it, Congressmen, following the lead of Assistant Attorney General Thurman Arnold (TIME, Sept. 8), got ready to move in.

Besides adding heavily to the cost of the defense program, A.F. of L. racketeering (according to Arnold's estimate) costs the U.S. a billion dollars a year. It lays its heavy, sweaty hand on everyone, from cabbage-eaters to movie kings. This week, as Willie Bioff, an ex-pimp, and George Browne, a vice president of A.F. of L., awaited trial in New York's Federal Court for allegedly extorting half a million dollars from four motion-picture companies, farmers coming into Manhattan were shelling out to A.F. of L. unioneers for the privilege of unloading perishable produce from their trucks. In Thurman Arnold's files are stories of fees extorted, flow of trade blocked, employment restricted by A.F. of L. unions--holdups which have added hundreds of thousands of dollars to the cost of building roads, factories, houses, defense plants.

In addition to racketeering, jurisdictional fights have resulted in oppressive restraints on U.S. industry. Building-trade unions have blocked improved methods of construction. Hod carriers and operating engineers have prevented the use of ready-mixed concrete and mechanical truck mixers. Carpenters have fought the introduction of prefabricated parts. Such obstructions have been justified by A.F. of L. leaders on the ground that they must protect their members from technological unemployment. But there is more than a suspicion that A.F. of L. leaders, in many cases, are more concerned about their own jobs than their men's. A shift in methods might mean the end of a craft, the collapse of a union, the disintegration of a dues-paying membership.

Sitting in his shirt sleeves in his small office in Washington, President Green reads of these things with the resigned air of a man who has heard it all before--as in fact he has: ever since 17 years ago when he was raised to the decorative presidency of A.F. of L. In those years he has reached some philosophic conclusions: that boys will be boys; that no one is perfect; that in the long run the laws of economics will fix things up; that, besides, he couldn't do anything about it if he wanted to. The thing that gets him excited is the insinuation that he has been an accessory, before or after the fact, in any crookedness. That is unjustifiable slander. Mr. Green makes the windows rattle with his shouts of self-defense. Were all bankers crooked because Richard Whitney went to prison? he asks. Is Mr. Green a crook because there are a few irrepressible extroverts among the 4,247,443 paid-up members of his union? Mr. Green's rhetorical questions go unanswered. Observers, more interested in Mr. Green's organization than in Mr. Green, go on opening doors and peering into some dark closets.

Outside the Law. The infant A.F. of L. which broke away from the Knights of Labor in 1886 was no idealistic organization. It was a business proposition--"pure and simple unionism"--set up for the economic improvement of its members. After a time that business proposition sprouted some fungi.

Business leaders discovered that some labor leaders, for a price, would cooperate in destroying competitors. That was the beginning of labor racketeering. Sam Parks, Skinny Madden, Bob Brindell, Al Capone, Tom Maloy, "Joe the Greaser" Rosenweig, "Dopey Benny" Fein, Louis Lepke, Jacob Shapiro, et aL, strewed the industrial U.S. with wrecked property, spoiled vegetables, stink-bombed theaters, ruined laundry, the bodies of innocent bystanders, of fellow goons, of banditti who opposed them.

The same sort of fungi can still be found sprouting palely in the darker, danker corners of A.F. of L. For instance: "Umbrella Mike" Boyle. During the lush war years, Mike collected thousands of dollars in "insurance premiums" for guaranteeing that his Chicago electrical workers would not strike. He served two months (on a year's sentence) in the clink for conspiring to break the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. But last week he was still running the Chicago electrical workers.

Also in Chicago is fat-faced Max Caldwell. From a lowly start as a waiter-bouncer and an unsuccessful organizer of hat-check girls and nightclub entertainers, Mr. Caldwell bounced into the food-store field, where his take in dues and initiation fees was said to be terrific.

Branching out, he tried to swallow up a small union of hair-wash demonstrators. Caldwell men made such alleged threats as: "Nice lookin' legs you got in them silk stockings, babe. How do you think they are going to look when we break them for you?" But the hysterical women raised such a shriek that Mr. Caldwell retired. Anyhow, he soon had his hands full with his store clerks, who had revolted and were demanding an accounting of some $910,000 which they had paid to Mr. Caldwell in dues. Further embarrassing Mr. Caldwell, State officials raided a safe-deposit box and found a cache of jewels, including a diamond-studded union pin worth $1,000.

The rebelling clerks were rebuffed by Mr. Green, who snorted: "[They] are a small, impatient group and a good example of the type we have to deal with when we are trying to do something constructive." So far Leader Caldwell, although he has been ousted from the Chicago Federation, has not been publicly repudiated by Mr.

Green.

To Pittsburgh some years ago went hardboiled, sleek-haired Nick Stirone.

There he set about organizing the hod carriers and common laborers. He moved in on Pennsylvania's vast dam-and road-building program.

When farmers refused to pay the Stirone organization a fee for working on the projects, a reign of terror was begun which finally ended in the trial of Stirone unionists--but not Nick. From the stand, Stirone was accused of telling an aide that he wanted a contractor and two C.I.O organizers murdered, that he wanted people to "shiver in their boots when Nick Stirone was mentioned." Last month Stirone was hauled into court by the business agent of a laborer's local, who wanted Nick put under bond to keep the peace because "he said he would cave my head in." But last week Nick was still doing business as the president of his A.F. of L. local.

The law has put its finger on many another A.F. of L. figure: Jake ("The Bum") Wellner, business agent of the Brooklyn painters; Sam Kaplan, on the executive board of Local No. 306, New York Motion-Picture Machine Operators; John J. Dempsey, international treasurer of the ironworkers. Though a little brown around the edges, their careers have not been blighted. President Green has shouted "We disavow racketeering, gangsterism, and disregard for law most emphatically and without reservation"--but they still have their jobs.

Beyond the Law. By a recent Supreme Court decision, certain coercive union practices, not out-&-out racketeering, were placed above & beyond the law. In that still-legal area flourish such robust A.F.

ofL. chieftains as William Hutcheson, Executive Council bigshot.

Hulking, button-eyed Big Bill Hutcheson has ruled the carpenters for 20-odd years. He has fought fellow chieftains in bitter internecine wars. The case which was taken to Supreme Court was a quarrel over whether his carpenters or Brother Harvey Brown's machinists should install machinery in Anheuser-Busch's brewery.

One of his colleagues whom Hutcheson has fought is Brother Dan Tobin, head of the powerful A.F. of L. teamsters. With 500,000 teamsters in his union, Dan Tobin is in a tactical position to tie up almost any job there is.

President Green admits his impotence when it comes to settling brawls between such behemoths. The various national and international unions, loosely bound together as a "federation," are autonomous, a law unto themselves. The best that aging Mr. Green can do is to distract the public's attention from their wasteful and costly conflicts by incessantly standing on his head, like Father William, and emitting such soothing cries as: "The officers and members of the American Federation of Labor are irrevocably committed to the preservation of our common heritage, individual liberty, our democratic form of government and our democratic institutions at any cost."

But inside Mr. Green's A.F. of L., democracy frequently gets pushed around. Heads of the autonomous unions rule their bailiwicks with a heavy hand. This week, the hod carriers and common laborers meet in convention for the first time in 30 years. One of the things convention delegates will ask for: an accounting of millions of dollars which they have been paying in dues.

William Green is part of an entrenched A.F. of L. hierarchy, which will fight to the bitter end any attempt to dislodge it. Purge, shakeup, expulsion mean disruption of the whole carefully erected structure. William Green draws a $20,000-a-year salary but heads of some of the national and international unions do even better. James Caesar ("Mussolini") Petrillo, dark, arrogant son of a ditchdigger and the all-powerful boss of 138,000 musicians, collects $46,000-plus a year.

Next month, big and little shots will march to Seattle for A.F. of L.'s 61st annual convention. Marching obediently behind will be rank-&-file delegates. President Green and the hierarchy will be reelected. Questions of racketeering, jurisdictional disputes, monopolies may come up, some action may be taken. But not much. Indications were last week that George Browne would be ousted from the Executive Council, by the simple device of eliminating the vice-presidency which he now occupies. But it was a safe bet that A.F. of L., corrupt and contented, would not willingly change its spots.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.