Textile Worker's Convention backs Labor Party and Industrial Unionism; Theatens General Strike
Friedman, Samuel H.
Textile Workers'Convention Backs Labor Party and I Industrial Unionism; Threatens General Strike by Samuel H. Friedman K|f earnest, enthusiastic, righting H%»iemblage of 600 textile workj|r...
...That plea won the day...
...Nussbaum's objection was sustained by Magistrate Kross who said this was not a tascisi country ami bhvii questions were improper...
...Support of the strike of about 15,000 textile workers in Alabama was voted, as was aid to the walkout in Tilton, New Hampshire, and in other centers...
...nd U.T.W...
...the Unemployed Citke/is'LcSmic of New Rochelle ,the 4k»wnproved Cttrsen* League of Mt...
...Armed with the manSite of aroused cotton operatives 'and woolen and worsted workers, rebellious toilers in silk and rayon plants nnd militant, highly skilled hosiery nakers, and encouraged by tee enlarged membership of the United Textile Workers of America and the record roster of delegates, the convention took the bit in its teeth and resolved: That unless the collective bargaining provision of the NRA is properly enforced and unless the workers obtain fair and adequate representation on code authorities, a general strike of textile operatives will be called...
...Mrs...
...Mrs...
...Mellon (the greatest Secretary of the Treasury since Mellon) is supposed to be grouse shooting in dear old Scotial d...
...The Communist Party does not...
...All were released, although the magistrate voiced his disapproval of mass picketing...
...Unemployment League of Maryland, the Taxpayers' Protective League of Rending, Pa...
...The agitation for the new 'union' can have but one result, the division of the workers and subsequently the crippling or the strike...
...Gifford Pinchot, wife of Pennsylvania's governor, declared that unions are the only way to have that democracy in industry which is essential to all democracy...
...Organization, unionization and strikes must be relied on to win conditions for the workers, rather than NRA boards rhich are agencies and associations it the employers...
...A number of strikers were slugged, clubbed and kicked...
...William F. Kelly, vice-president of the U.T.W., made a bitter attack on government agencies for their failure to enforce the labor provisions of NRA, "It didn't take the employers long to see that the famous Section 7A didn't mean what it said," the veteran strike leader declared...
...He stated after the trial that this experience with picketing changed his viewpoint...
...convention be instructed to tight for the formation of industrial unions in response to the needs of workers in modern industry, a question that is expected to come to the fore at the October gathering...
...There never has been an NRA," Mrs...
...The unions involved were highly pleased with the work done by the Yipsels on the picket line and by the Socialist Lawyers Association M'the-Marts...
...As The New Leader went to press, a conference was being arranged between the joint council )f knit goods workers (I.L.G.W.U...
...West Virginia had 105 and Pennsylvania I bout 50...
...The delegation from the Eastern Federation seated fraternally presented a resolution calling for a conference of all independent unemployed groups and the NUL within 60 days, to frame a call for a national convention...
...Police Attack on Knit Goods Pickets Stiffens Walkout BOUSED by the brutality of the 9 police against knit goods pickIts in Brooklyn and the Bronx, the 14,000 strikers in the metropolitan (tiea are drawing their lines tighter and pushing the strike with greater rigor...
...In Jefferson Market Court David Kaplan was tried for picketing in the Caldwell electric light fixture strike Two police sergeants and four policemen testifying against him were subjected to able cross examination by Irwin Nussbaum of the Socialist Lawyers' Association...
...Meanwhile the convention floor during the sessions, and the lobbies and gathering places between and after, are humming with activity, Never More has an U.T.W...
...Male Senator Quinn (who introduced some defeated bills in the last session of the legislature limiting injunctions in labor disputes) appeared for the theatre...
...Threatens General Strike by Samuel H. Friedman K|f earnest, enthusiastic, righting H%»iemblage of 600 textile workj|r delegates, with representatives |ajn newly-won Southern territory cntitanding, has been meeting for tie past week at the Hotel Woodstock and in Town Hall in New ttfrk City...
...During the past month a number of party and YPSL members had been arrested on the Caldwell picket line...
...No Strike vi...
...The union is awaiting the National Labor Board decision on its appeal- When the ruling comes, it will be a signal for renewal of mass demonstrations at the Bronx plant...
...While 10.000 strikers are grimly picketing six plans of the Aluminum Company of America in their fight for union recognition and decent living conditions, word comes via Associated Press that Andrew Mellon (another name for the aluminum trust) has just bought a famous Raphael painting for a million and a half dollars...
...At one point the whole West Virginia group, under the leadership of Stanley Glass and Libbie Volpie, rose to their feet ready to march out if they did not get justice...
...Efforts will be made by the Eastern Federation to line up the United Workers Federation of Pennsylvania, the Illinois Workers Alliance, the independent unemployed groups in Wisconsin, Missouri and other states for this preliminary Chicago conference with the National Unemployed League...
...The painting "Alba Madonna"—named for the Spanish Duke of Alba, the Mellon of his day —has been knocking around since early in the 16th century, and has had a variegal'd hit tory...
...3K were arrested and stayed a night in jail in lieu of paying $5 fine...
...Pocketbook Union Meets A general membership meeting of the International Pocketbook Workers Union was in session Thursday night alt Stuyvesant High School as The New Leaderwent to press...
...Among those arrested were two Yipsels, Edward Margolin and Rubin Rosenzweig...
...On the agenda for the meeting was discussion of the labor board executive decision ordering an $18 a week national minimum to workers, above, the class of learners, cementers and pasters...
...At the convention the leadership managed to have this resolution referred to the incoming NEC...
...will inaugurate an intensive drive against company unionism, and will ask the A.F.ofL...
...Pinchot told the throng there...
...The convention likewise voted down a resolution to call a general strike of textile workers in the event of a declaration of war...
...This is obviously what Mr...
...n*t juU<t-»&< National Unemployed Union Forming ACTIVITY looking toward the ** formation of a truly national, non-partisan unemployed organization has been begun by the Eastern Federation of Unemployed and Emergency Workers, with headquarters at 22, East 22nd Street, New York...
...Mass picket lines around She chief factories have shut them down completely, over 200 being closed, and plants in isolated seclions have also felt the impact of trie walkout...
...Local 3, Electrical Workers Union, and Local 44, Upholsterers Union, in sympathy when no agreement could be reached with the movie owners as to union help...
...Dual Union Menaces Rod/o Workers' Strike A dual union at the Dubilier Condenser Factory in the Bronx threatens the workers who for the past seven months have been striking for recognition of the Radio Factory Workers' .Union...
...recognize that the workers are out on strike and insists that the workers inside the factory are not scabs, according to William Beedie, of the real Union, which has been conducting the strike and which has won recognition and better conditions for many radio workers...
...All were discharged...
...convention been so alive, ho awake to the opportunities before organized workers in the t'nited States...
...They were arrested for picketing the De Luxe Theatre, Bronx, during a splendid demonstration of labor solidarity...
...In accordance with the latter proposal, a committee consisting of David la ei and Neil Russel of New York and J, Blaekwell of Haltimore, attended the NUL convention...
...Also this conference should plan for the national march on Washington...
...Union records show the winning of 230,000 new members to the ranks of the U.T.W...
...On Monday the lawyers, serving, of course, without fee, were busy on two fronts...
...But the vote was not a walkover—209 to 177—and the more progressive delegates, including of course the Socialists, are looking forward to the opportunity of again introducing sin h a resolution at the next U.T.W...
...Pinchot left immediately after her speech by airplane for Harriman, Tenn., of Blue Eagle fame, where, she addressed a crowd of strikers and their families...
...Frantic efforts were made by the Musteites to keep the convention in their hand...
...Also arrested at the same time and place were two young Yipsels, Freda Haperstein, 14, and Mildred Klein, 15...
...I/>cal 300 (Moving Picture Operators Union) had pulled out liOcal 1, Stage Hands Union...
...He has worked out a technique to break strikes and his crowning effort was right hcre...
...He said that he had failed to find any Ratification for the attack hy the Police, anil promised representatives of the two unions that those responsible would be punished...
...The outcry against departmental participation in strikes on the side of jthe employers is expected to have jSome effect on the future conduct bj...
...Early in the convention, Sidney Hillman, president of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers, had told the delegates that only strong unions could hope to get proper NRA enforcement...
...Pickets, however, continued to annoy "the public," undaunted and unbeatable...
...policemen towards pickets fn tfhiscity at least for a while...
...There was a complete Musteite control of Ohio and part of Pennsylvania...
...The delegates congratulated themselves on their growth during the past year, and especially on the successful unionization of a large part of the hitherto "untouchable" South...
...to follow suit...
...The assault came when from 500 to 800 pickets were assembled near the Commodore Knitting Mills, 250 Moore Street, Brooklyn...
...Magistrate Robert F. McKiniry, in finding the defendants guilty of "disorderly conduct and contempt of court," was very solicitous about the right of the public (other than knit goods workers) to use the sidewalks unhindered bynaughty strikers...
...F.i-ffgtfA neirroh...
...Later sessions will take up at greater length the subject of a general strike in the cotton textile industry, employing half a million "hands," as well as in the silk, rayon and woolen sections of the trade...
...He flayed those in labor's ranks and out who attacked the NRA instead of backing it, and urged labor to demand and fight for the shorter work week, higher wages, classification for skilled labor, and representation on code authorities...
...An interesting point is that the painting was sold to anti-labor Mellon by the Soviet Hermitage Museum in Leningrad, if the report is collect...
...and the man most frequently mentioned as his probable opponent is Kmil Rieve, the hosiery workers' battling chief...
...It's ItPolice officer's job to remain Btral even when he hay to pre^¦SJgy^fttt order?gtm Inspector Valentine told investigators...
...Once owned by the Czar of Russia, it has now been purchased by the Czar of aluminum and whiskey (and the United States Treasury in the last administration...
...It didn't take the employers long to see that they wouldn't suffer any consequences even if it were enforced...
...in 537 new local unions, making a grand total of 300,000 men and women under the banners of the A. F. of L. Although the delegates heard and applauded the story of the growth of their union and the failure of the NRA to eliminate unemployment, to uphold the wages of skilled workers and to curb profits, a resolution calling for the withdrawal of all officers of the union from any NRA boards on which they may be serving was defeated after a strenuous fight...
...The Regional Labor Board is also trying to bring about a settlement...
...convention, when they expect to be able to carry it...
...fight for whatever control we can get, instead, and use that control to win-better conditions," F.mil Iticvc, president of the American Federation of Hosiery Workers, a constituent body of the U.T.W., urged...
...The second was a decision to approach the National Unemployed League convention which \yaU to be held in Columbus on duly 30-31 and August 1, and propose that a preliminary conference of unemployed groups be called to plan for u large national convention of the non-partisan unemployed groups...
...Humor is rife that Thomas F. McMahon, veteran but aging leader, will have a fight on his bands...
...Attorneys for the defendants were Harry Kavesh of the Socialist Lawyers' Association and Nathaniel Doragoff of.Lorn I 30ft...
...Of special interest is the coming contest for the presidency of the union, which is expected to be the most hotly contested in years...
...Jbey found some 350 delegates from eight states, the Ohio delegation alone having 220 delegates and controlling the convention...
...The same morning in the Sixth District Magistrates Court in the Bronx 24 pickets were tried before Magistrate Ford...
...Socialist Lawyers' Group Active in Freeing Pickets TPHE Socialist Lawyers' Assoeia* tton was kept pretty busy in the magistrates' courts over the week-end defending pickets who had been arrested and charged with disorderly conduct...
...War—Yet...
...The district attorney tried to interject anti-red hysteria when he asked Comrade Kaplan's political belief...
...Prom now on he will oppose such legislation...
...The federation was formed in New York July 21 when 50 delegates from unemployed group in five states met in a oneduy conference...
...General Johnson went in to pile up bigger profits for Wall Street...
...So wide-spread was the indignation and so Fpontaneous the outburst against the action of the officers of the peace in violently attacking and breaking up a peaceful picket, line of 500 strikers that Mayor LaGuardia was forced Jo order an investigation...
...10,000 Aluminum Workers On Strike...
...That delegates to the A.F.ofL...
...and the bosses' orranization, with union representa;ives declaring themselves absolutely opposed to any compromise )n the workers' demands for the 95-hour week...
...Will Push Organization That the union will push forward aggressively for the organization of the million workers in all branches of the textile industry...
...Blake, the president of the CornellDubilier Co., has been trying so hard to accomplish," Beedie declared...
...Don't withdraw...
...Other assaults occurred at the Star Mills, Broadway and Prince St., Brooklyn, and the'Globe Mills, 500 East 134th St., the Bronx...
...That the U.T.W...
...Represented in the Eastern I cderation are not only the New York City groups but also the People...
...Mellon Buys S 1,500,000 Painting PITTSBURGH, Pa...
...will fight for the ,'JO-hour week, the introduction of two, machine shifts and the elimination of the stretchout system,and restoration of wage scales to the 1929 level...
...The great mass of the delegates were politically and organizationally inexperienced, but their indignation showed when they felt they had been unfairly treated...
...The West Virginia delegation, in mood of revolt, was determined not to be led by the nose...
...The latter has written to David Lasser, Chairman of the Eastern Federation, suggesting a conference in Chicago at the end of August...
...The strikers have been out since Monday, and three plants in Pennsylvania and one each in New York, Illinois and Tennessee are involved...
...Charged with juvenils delinquency, they were also discharged (Comrade Kavcsh, attorney...
...Vernon, and the Workers Unemployed League of Bridgeport, Conn Important resolutions affecting the unemployed locally and nationally were drawn up and two proposals of action were made...
...The first was for "a national march of the unemployed on Washington in January, when the new Congress assembles...
...That delegates to the annual national convent-ion of the American Federation of Labor, meeting in San Francisco October 1st, 6c ItMtiucted to fight for the launching of a Labor Party in the Vnited States...
Vol. 17 • August 1934 • No. 33
