RADIO FACTORY WORKERS, REINFORCED BY SYMPATHIZERS, DEFY POLICE; ROUSE BRONX
Draper, Harold
Mike Tighe, 72, May Quit As Head of Steel Union IjllTTS B U RG H.—Michael F. igae, aged and aging president f (Be Amalgamated Association of ¦oil Steel and Tin Workers, may etfra at the end of...
...this week that it would hot renew its quarter-century patt with the union...
...They have been joined by the members ef other unions affiliated with the AFofL, and the good fight goes on for decent pay, hours that conform with the demands of those who would spread employment, and protection to the families of the longshoremen by insuring work to those who carry on the loading and unloading of ships...
...At the ends of these causeways, piers were built poking out like the fingers of an open hand...
...Minimum of $12 a week for 30 wan work, against a $9 a weekly nlnimum now existing...
...The UTW during the past year as engaged in a vigorous and efetrrfvc organizing campaign in the krath, enrolling about 90% of the exttte~workers in this state...
...Copies of the letter to all candidates were circulated among striking longshoremen in San Pedro and San Francisco...
...Local union No...
...Readers of this section will recall that the Socialist Party supported no candidate in the District Council elections, since none was satisfactory to the Socialist League...
...Some see a traitor in ivery loud-mouthed dissident...
...With federal funds, the open shoppers ¦ built riprap walls out in the ocean 1 and enclosed a coast line of thirtyfour miles and called this open roadstead a harbor...
...The manufacturers have declared themselves ready to abide by "unconditional arbitration," but the union submitted a proposed 20point agreement, which it was willing to arbitrate, except in the case of the paragraphs calling for the closed shop...
...Clubbings, manhandlings, raids by the police are of daily record, but they struggle ahead, these strikers of San Pedro...
...The dissidenthave been preparing a new slate which must be presented to thi, union by July 15 in order to go to a referendum vote of the membership in September...
...However, we did urge voting against the Communists' candida/e, because he would be4i puppet in the bands of his party's sectarian purposes and his election would have meant destruction for the union...
...Then the government was commandeered * to build a harbor at San Pedro...
...Recognition of the United Textile Workers of America as representative of the workers for collective bargaining under Section 7-A...
...Depite the fact that the notoriously vw textile code calls for a wage if $18.41, the average Alabama rag* is only $7.60 weekly, -the mion charges...
...Israel Feinberg, William Busick, formerly organizer for the Socialist Party on the coast...
...But by no strajah of any one's imagination was this to be taken as support however s{lent **"«r*V*< cW^^WIV Of this, more later...
...They are driving their way over these long lines of sea-girt roads to" picket the docks, and they are doing it with almost unhoped effect...
...some see a coward or weakling or knave n every pleader for prudence, or at least preparation, for the plunge...
...Opposes Use of Troops In the letter to all candidates for governor calling on them to state their position on the use of militia to break the longshoremen's strike, he wrote: "As one of the candidates for governor, I hereby go on record as opposing the use of troops for strike breaking purppaes...
...Wherever there's a real union, there should be Yipsels and party members backing it up...
...Tighe is attending wage conferences with the Western Sheet and Tin Plate Manufacturers' Association...
...act as being "unfair to labor"-and "thus infuriating the mass of workers whose jobs are being stolen and whose organization is also being Comrade Dempster, who was the principal speaker at the meeting, has spoken to the striking longshoremen in San Francisco and has kept in close touch with the situation from the beginning, Chester Williams, president of the Congress of Youth of Southern California, who has also made a thorough study- of the longshoremen's and seamen's strike, and Herbert Elstein and Michael S. Kerrigan, Socialist Party candidates for Assembly of the 62nd District and for Congress from the 13th District, were also among the speakers...
...but the employers demand the right to keep open a rival hiring hall through which, in these hard times, they hope to beat down the pay scale and conditions won by the battles of the past and ,gurded by the struggle of today...
...Organized labor is on the spot— the white spot, in San Pedro...
...Some would never, never, -never breathe a word that can be construed as iisrespectful to the "bona fide leadership of a bona fide labor movement," Some see burning bushes of anarchy in every sillily rhetorical phrase...
...The union demands: Reduction from 40 hours to 30 lottrs a week...
...Many years ago the big employers of labor picked Los Angeles as their happy hunting grounds...
...Those who promise to end poverty and refuse to help the longshoremen in their present struggle are making fraudulent claims...
...This territory has to be picketed...
...THE whole nasty mess of the painters' election situation is before * the party labor committee...
...and some see real revolution only in ranting and rodomontade, (Look that one up...
...These are the docks...
...i If Mike Tighe doesn't retire t may be forced out by the grow - If strength and increasing disitiafactlon of "rank and file" eleient* in the union, which has reentry attracted thousands of new nd militant workers to its ranks...
...His party runs a dual unjon whose chief business I* h> t» attack the Brotherhood...
...Abolition of the fstretch-out" ystem, or limiting the number of ooms per worker to prevent inTeasing work and reducing peronnel...
...Wherever there's a real scrap against the toss and the indefensible boss system, the branch or circle should be helping with friendship or funds or fists...
...Besides all .these obstacles the strikers have to struggle against a teaming problem that exists nowhere else...
...Harry Scott, Paul Berg, Sophie Goren, B. Sarafsky and Morris Axelrod represented the ILGWU...
...He is 72 para old and has been a union ofbial 36 years...
...If candidates disagree with the Mirriam policy, this Is the time for them to say so...
...This rouW restore the code wage for he 40-hoar week...
...In such conditions the longshoremen of San Pedro joined in the Pacific coastwise strike, now wearing along...
...Comrade Dempster also sent a letter to all gubernatorial candidates asking them to take a stand against the Governor...
...Iucti grumbling has been heard, Iptirtatly among newer members, ecaniae Tighe backed up the plan I A£oL...
...THE EDITOR COMMENTS ' (Continued from Page 1-L) Somewhere youngsters, just wiping the traces of mother's milk away From their maps, cry havoc against the refusal of older and often riser comrades to jump right in—and drown...
...Wherever that's done, the party grows...
...Mike Tighe, 72, May Quit As Head of Steel Union IjllTTS B U RG H.—Michael F. igae, aged and aging president f (Be Amalgamated Association of ¦oil Steel and Tin Workers, may etfra at the end of his term, which zptres in September...
...And"it's all O.K., in a vnrty which allows such latitude of opinion and expression, provided the party carries on and the industrial task la carried forward...
...President Green to pretnt a threatened nation-wide steel frike...
...Puts Epie-ers on Spot While the letter did not specific* ally mention Upton Sinclair and his Epic organization, it did go to Epic candidates and included the following: "Particularly, I wish to point Out that all those working to restore purchasing power and to end poverty must support organized labor by which the~wdTkers get and maintain .decent wages and conditions...
...Dempster asked the governor to refuse the use of state property to shippers at Los Angeles harbor and 4hus stop the unfair competition which prevails to the disadvantage of Northern California citizens...
...They knew they had a harder fight ahead than the workers anywhere else in the marine...
...Between San Pedro docks and Los Angeles stretch five main highways, which total more ^hah-100 miles of roadway...
...Reemployment of all who lost their jobs through union activity...
...Plant officials are using fafoil Dempster Raps California Governor's Use of Troops LOS ANGELES, Cal^A mass meeting to protest against Governor Merriam's calling out the state militia, and to follow up the strong protest telegram sent to Governor Merriam by Milen Dempster, Socialist Party candidate for Governor, was called by the Socialist Party at the Folks' House, 420 N. Soto St, in the East Side district of Los Angeles...
...GENERAL DRESS STRIKE IN LOS ANGELES PROBABLE LOS ANGELES.—With the hearings before the Regional Labor Board of representatives of the ILGWU and the silk and wool dress manufacturers ending in a deadlock, the board is still trying to avert the threatened strike August 1, when the period for the award made last December comes to an end...
...Negotiations there have been threatened — and additional fuel has been piled on the flames of the "rank-and-file" resentment— by the announcement of the Republic Steel Co...
...To give commerce to these "rugged individualists," now running ragged, a shoe String was run from Scissorbill Heaven to San Pedro...
...Dempster's letter to the governor stated: "When you send the militia to San Francisco your administration became a -partner in the effort-tosmash labor organization...
...Geographically, it lies east of Reno, and saves railroad carriage of about three hundred miles...
...With these problems the , longshoremen are ** battling...
...38-82 has enrolled about 1800 longshoremen...
...The corporation was warned a m6ntb ago that a strike would be called unless the, whole shop were unionized by* July 1. The-plant reopened this weak after a two weeks' vacation...
...600 Thread Workers . Strike for Closed Shop FALL RIVER.->-r*efu8ing to work with non-unionists, 600 members of the United Textile Workers employed by the American Thread Co., have walked out, crippling the dye house, bleach house, gas house, carding and copwlnding departments of the plants...
...mlustryT but tTiey were ready, and in spite of dumdum bullets, which have killed two workers and wounded severely seven others, they are fighting on...
...It is my hope that several of the candidates will join in this effort to say to Governor Mirriam that their followers are being advised not to back up this* move...
...I tell the workers in advance that I am on their side and protest the use of militia against them...
...aj^f, juvsW tetf San Pedro Dock Workers Join Strikers CPECIAL Correspondence, Strike Headquarters, San Pedro, Cal...
...I call upon all other candidates to state their position...
...Friends of organised labor will not be quiet in the face of {this use of state force to crush them...
...All along these thirty-four miles, jetties or roads as much as three miles long were thrown out into the sea...
...These could handle all the dock work in San Pedro...
...Los Angeles is peopled from states like Kansas, Nebraska, and Iowa...
...Repre•jentatives of 18,000 Alabama textile workers, who have voted-to go Jut on general strike to improve tthe worst working conditions in W nation," will meet here Sunday §> set a date for the walkout, according to John Dean, personal leprtjsentative of President McV»Won of the United Textile J/voflcers and State Official Albert jf^a^Foi^^^loeals' have met in be past two weeks and voted" to articipate, it is said...
...The opportunities for service are so vast just now, the battle front of the class war is so extended, the chances for political education of the workers are so immense, that one sometimes wonders how we can find the mere time or energy to fight one another...
...Although the opinion of rnrpathetic observers is that the nion was not at all prepared to engage in the bitter struggle that would, follow a general strike call thousands of workers felt that they had been robbed of the oppor tunity to strike a mighty blow foi unionism and for better condition.' in the steel hells...
...To Set Alabama Textile Strike Date J BIRMINGHAM, Ala...
...State, property in this case is not endangered so long as it is not used against organized labor...
...Reemployment • of all workers who lost jobs through "stretch-oiit" system...
...What complicates determination of fraud charges in the balloting is the fact that a strike is in the offing, and the cry is raised, not unjustly, that the workers must now close their ranks against the bosses...
...Besides the geographical difficulties, the teamster's of Los Angeles are unorganized...
...Some have the "united front" mania in malignant form, forgetting :ompletely the broader united front with the working class instead >f with the (so far) confusers and dividers of the working class...
Vol. 17 • July 1934 • No. 77
