Trouble Ahead as Restive Labor, AFL-CIO Split Prompts Tory Attack
Trouble Ahead as Restive Labor, AFL-CIO Split Prompts Tory Attack Wildcat Mine Strike Seen as More Than Anti-Lewis Gesture By MURRAY EVERETT WASHINGTON, D. C—A restive labor membership, the...
...It speaks the truth...
...Trotsky's secretary, Leon Trotsky, Camillio Bernieri, the Italian anarchist and friend of Tresca, murdered in Spain, and literally scores of others...
...Representatives of all progressive labor and fraternal organizations were present as various distinguished speakers eulogized the assassinated Italian editor and pledged their efforts to find his killer and those who hired him...
...Tresca's Friends Rap Whitewashing Of GPU in Slaying of Italian Editor By P1ETRO VIVALDI The investigation of the assasination of Carlo Tresca, clearly established as a political murder, led this week into the political underworld of the totalitarian groups...
...In May, 1942...
...I was at a bomber station and saw the pilots coming back from both raids...
...Falk and said that they would have been present as mere observers, and moreover if he had seen among those present ex-Fascist leaders or Communists he would have left the assembly...
...And that isn't hillbilly talk, but the tight-lipped sentiments of most of the miners...
...and which has been postponed to January 25»th...
...John Wheeler, son of Senator Burton K. Wheeler, one of those protesting to the Attorney General on the manner in which the conspiracy trials are being handled, was the Los Angeles head of the America First Committee...
...Vincenzo \ acirca...
...In another issue, Kullgren, pushing Rep...
...Scrambling to Set on Bond Wagon Now that the storm against racial discrimination is acquiring typhoon proportions, it is •musing to see the communists scrambling to (fet aboard the bandwagon...
...Opens National Conference Jan...
...That is the unanimous opinion of competent reporters covering the strike on the spot...
...Resolutions will cover the war, the domestic political situation, the Beveridge Plan for Britam and social security for America and other vital topics...
...It is straight from the shoulder...
...WwcoBtoiilo and the »teoid Affront Ambitions of Representative Vito Marcantonio, darling of the Daily Worker, to acquire a refunding national platform by getting on the Powerful House Judiciary Committee were cj'Pped this week by sweeping majority in the democratic caucus last Tuesday...
...Paresius resigned more recently...
...Such things as the Food Stamp Plan which gave our food surpluses to humans instead of to pigs or the plow...
...Hogan has not accused Sormenti...
...In March, 1941, Kullgren wrote: "I am surely proud to be associated with Henry Ford...
...He had asked his friend Dr...
...Meanwhile on the national scene, the AFL ex* ecutive council met in session in Miami to consider a proposed joint AFL-CIO committee to settle jurisdictional disputes...
...At present, labor k *lttle or no representation on local ration kardwt-ups...
...Taken by surprise by the first week-end raid, Germans evidently moved flak trains and held fighter crews in readiness for the second Berlin blitz...
...It-raises the question whether America will hive to go needlessly hungry before Peresiusis vindicated...
...They are nothing of the kind...
...The ,\>ic York Post treatment deserves further examination...
...But they don't want it, and that is why they are getting stooges to try to drown out the chorus which cries and continues to cry —investigate the totalitarian...
...Such things, for instance, as Rex Tugwell's Resettlement Administration (now the Farm Security Administration) with its development of cooperatives among the people, ideal housing for workers, etc...
...or by assasins hired by fascist groups cannot be stated positively at the moment...
...Only with this paragraph in mind, as well as those directed against Tresca's Fascist enemies, can one understand the demand made in the Mazzini statement for a "thorough investigation of the political roots of this totalitarian crime...
...and of the fact that Tresca was an enemy of Communism just as he was of Fascism...
...make clear once ajrain what the world knows, that Tresca had two great political enemies...
...that George Hill, secretary to Rep, Hamilton Fish was indicted and convicted and the whole story of how Viereck had attempted to use the Congressional Record to insert pro-Nazi material was exposed...
...Committees on resolution, organization, finance and credentials have already been at work and reports will be submitted to the convention...
...The, rebel mine strike cannot be brushed away simply as a revolt against John L. Lewis...
...McNuff Refuses to See Protest Committee on FEPC War Manpower Commissioner Paul McNutt reached a new high in arrogance this week when he refused to see a delegation of 28 national orgtnixations who "came to protest against his indefinite postponement of hearings by the President's Fair Employment Practices Committee on racial discrimination on railroads...
...The CTO charges that Kaiser signed a blanket contract with the AFL before men were hired...
...Let me congratulate you with my full heart upon your first edition," wrote the Senator and added, "It is just the right size...
...Along with the article there appears a box '"summarizing" the Mazzini statement...
...The Beacon Light...
...In many ways, Paresius' efforts were reminiscent of Morris L. Cooke's in 1940 when the noted engineer unsuccessfully —unfortunately for America —fought to get industry conversion and small toineejs...
...SOLON London Correspondent, The Sew Leader LONDON (By Cable), January gpPawd by the Censor).—The grim story here this week is another tale of two cities—London and Berlin...
...The story of the blitz on Berlin shows quite another thing...
...Delegates will be admitted free to the panel discussions...
...In the meantime, the organized farmers (who are in the main the Big Farmers and not the Httle fellows) have the inside track in the Department of Agriculture under the leadership of the conservative Roy Hendrickson who has displaced the liberals in influence there...
...A pilot told me, "For our second trip there seemed good defensive preparations...
...After the first session of the Conference at 4 p. m., the National Executive .Committee and the New York State Executive Committee will meet sit 8:30 p. m. in the evening...
...It is no small wonder, then, that on December 22nd, 1942, in an appeal for funds Charles Hudson should write: "The fact that Reprs...
...With Farm-Moc and special-interest lobbies pressing to relax the present economic controls, new rising prices may mean a slew of new sti ikes...
...On October 2nd...
...Lee Falk (of the OW1) had called for Thursday...
...of both camps...
...Such things, also, as a special division headed by a Consumers' Counsel to represent the interests of consumers and to spread education among them on food quality and standards...
...If the NLRB orders new elections at Kaiser, the : AFL may launch a campaign to amend the National Labor Relations Act...
...She also revealed that he had an enjoyable visit with Senator Wheeler and "We *trw> eye to eye on every topic discussed...
...William Kullgren, one of those indicted, who used his so-called astrological magazine...
...S.D.F...
...As against the quarter-ton bombs which the Germans carried over England this week, the RAF's Lancaster* carried 2- and 4-ton bombs causing devastating damage throughout Berlin...
...Stalinist chief of the CTAL, is coming to tf»e U.S...
...Until Adam Lapin, Daily Worker and CJ...
...The ,omission of that paragraph, directed against the Communists as well as Fascists, constituted a grave distortion of the Mazzini statement...
...tsbcontractiiig, jui Sat defense' effoi I.Everybody knows now that if the Big Business profiteers and the military procurement Boys had not stopped Cooke's ideas America would not have been caught flat-footed at Pearl Harbor...
...Joseph Coldwell, and others...
...Dilling, Col...
...On January 14th, in defense of the 33, Senator Nye arose in the U. S. Senate and said that the persons recently indicted "are no more guilty of conspiracy than I am" and no more guilty than "millions of other Americans...
...Dilling then revealed that she was thrilled by the defenses of her on the floor of Congress by Congressman Clare Hoffman and by Senators Clark and Wheeler...
...Labor today...
...Vice-President of the Textile Workers...
...It was as a result of this,raid by U. S. Marshall...
...The Octopus was a scurrilous work by Mrs...
...The fact that he has so exposed his hand is taken here as a sign that he is perhaps choosing the lesser of two evils—the bigger one being a further deterioriation of morale in Germany if the Berlin raids went unanswered...
...But the communists were so out of touch with the People's progress they didn't know where to Aow up...
...The result was Mpected to draw a sharp rebuke from the Daily Worker, which probably considers this a Second Affront...
...That method must be stopped here lest it claims more victims...
...and every indication was given that the CIO intends fighting the case through to the end...
...This pretension is well known to be false...
...Won* Lobor Representation Agriculture The OPA Labor Policy Advisory Committee, j^fe up of AFL and CIO representatives, are "yng to obtain Agriculture Secretary Wickard'e *M*oval of the setting up of a Labor Policy *°fc-conrmrttee in Agriculture with power over ""wjj board representation...
...After months of *ork, the first manifestation of communist interest in the subject appeared this week...
...at the rally addressed by Senator Wheeler, Hermann Schwinn and Ellis O. Jones, both indicted, were among those who cheered his words...
...From a pure tactical viewpoint, it might have been far better for Hitler to conceal his hand and to keep the Allies guessing about his reserves...
...In discussing Sormenti, the Communist organ protests against statements which have been made to the effect that Communists may have had a hand in the murder of Tresca, long their implacable foe...
...On September 24th, 1941, raids on the offices of Prescott Dennet, who operated fronts financed by Nazi agent Viereck, revealed bales of frankedenvelopes signed by Senators Nye, Lundeen and D. W. Clark, and by Reprs...
...This is the gloomy picture of the VS...
...Sanctuary and George (Sylvester Viereck were arraigned—leaders of t ie Congressional isolationist bloc prepared to launch a counterattack against various forces engaged in unmasking subversive act vity...
...Whether Tresca was killed by a man Sormenti or by another Communist killer (George Mink...
...The simple facts are that the reply of the Luftwaffe to the RAF blitz on Berlin is unimpressive, scattered and somewhat hysterical...
...and 2 p. m., and the Conference will adjourn at 5 p. m. for the Algernon Lee banquet in the evening...
...January 23, 4 p. m. P»sceeding the Convention there will be a panel discussion arranged by the Rand School...
...Seger for statements on Nazi sympathizers in North Dakota...
...The demand continues...
...But this by no means reconciled him to Stalin's theories or to the political aims of Stalin's followers here...
...Let them produce Sormenti in New York...
...But we got through...
...editor of La Parol...
...America must be saved and America must be saved for Americanism...
...The second panel, on Saturday, January 23, at 2 p. m., will hear Raphael Abramovitch, John Chamberlain, George S. Counts, Abba Leraer on "Is Collectivism Compatible With Democracy...
...It seems likely that only the whiplash of a reactionary drive in Congress will bring the vitally needed labor unity...
...He had been invited to the preparatory meeting which Mr...
...Communists and Fascists, both of whom regard murder as a political instrument, and that he was removed from the scene at the very moment when he was effectively making an issue of both those political movements in an important political situation...
...It is gotten up in a conservative manner...
...The insinuations by OWI representatives that Tresca was becoming reconciled with the Communists are flatly false...
...Looking forward toward the defeat, of the Axis armies...
...What this shows according to informed military observers here is, first, that the Luftwaffe bomber strength has been seriously, perhaps cata...
...Meanwhile the RAF has taken the opportunity to test the new Mark Nine Spitfires and they have proved themselves...
...He is not Hearst...
...The delefition included such organizations as the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America, the Catholic Interracial Committee, the Civil Liberties Union, Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, United Automobile Workers...
...Furthermore, the way in which publicity has been handled is enough to justify disbarment of the Government attorneys...
...It should have its appeal...
...The CIO has demanded representation on the commttee, and Lombardo Toledano...
...Day, Sweeney, Tinkham and Thorkelsoff...
...He had advocated a war food production program which would have involved the small farmer, marginal producers, sharecroppers,etc., in the war effort...
...Every human interest story from the mines stresses the gripes by the miners who repeat "Ain't no use working anyway less we fret enough for food and dresses for the women folk...
...The heavy*piuftl* IivIm*^ Siseuinolat)stf~%Qr the large industrial groups isn't helping t*ie situation any...
...In Washington it may be, but not in the mine collieries and the dreary, soot-heavy Pennsylvania towns...
...It deplores mention of his name, and of Communism, in connection with thfc-Tresca case, lest such mention serve "to shield the killers...
...It looked to me as if there were some serious disruption in the organization of Luftwaffe bombing...
...third, that despite the cost of resuming the bombing of Britain—the Luftwaffe is actually losing between twenty and thirty per cent of formations managing to cross to the British coast — the morale situation in Germany and the desperate need to obscure the Russian defeats are compelling these tremendously expensive headline tactics...
...A thorough investigation must come and all leads explored...
...At fighter stations, pilots returning from clashes with Focke-Wulfs enthusiastically praised new Spitfires which they said outclassed the best enemy aircraft in climbing and speed...
...Leading the attacks , igainst anti-isolationist forces were Senators Wheeler and Nye, who in speeches on the Senate floor denounced the Washington Pout and its star reporter, Dillard Stokes, Drew Pearson and Gerbart Seger, antiNazi editor of the Seue YolkszeitttH.g...
...It hits the bull's eye with every paragraph...
...The final sessions of the Conference will be held on Sunday, January 24, at 10 a. m...
...It is interesting that the Daily Worker leans upon an article which appeared in the Sew York Post of January 18...
...Does the Daily Worker want to expose the killers...
...That article, based on a talk with an OWI representative, declares that Tresca had agreed with the Office of War Information to make no issue of the inclusion of Communists in a projected Italian-American Victory Council...
...Smith reprinted oart of a letter from Senator Reynolds laudingTh'e Cross and The Flag...
...The National Conference will hold its opening session on Saturday...
...New Jersey, Maryland, California and from many New York locals and branches^ Delegates are expected from several other states despite the travelling difficulties...
...The first panel, opening Friday evening, January 22, will hear Bertrand Russell, Algernon Lee, Max Eastman, and Sidney Hook on "How Does Social Theory Stand Up in the Light of Recent Developments...
...The New York Times, the Sew York Herald Tribune, most other newspapers and trade union leaders have taken account of the fact that the OGPU has murdered its enemies in foreign lands almost as often as Mussolini's OV'RA has...
...When Mrs...
...On Saturday morning...
...Trouble Ahead as Restive Labor, AFL-CIO Split Prompts Tory Attack Wildcat Mine Strike Seen as More Than Anti-Lewis Gesture By MURRAY EVERETT WASHINGTON, D. C—A restive labor membership, the wildcat coal strike, and a growing: fratricidal labor war between the AFL and CIO contributed this week to an increased public hostility to Labor, and has ground more antilabor axes in Congress among reactionary groups ready and waiting for a moment to crack down...
...As a result of investigation following these raids the Washington Grand Jury handed down the indictments...
...It follows on the heels demands by large locals of the United Auto Workers and the International Association of Machinists that their leadership take a more vigorous stand...
...It lends heavy weight to the demand of labors representatives that labor be given a voice in policy deliberations and administration and that labor's demands be heeded...
...Credentials for delegates have already come from Illinois...
...Vice-President of the New York Chapter of the Mazzini Society, to accompany him to the meeting called by Mr...
...The Daily Worker says he is in Mexico...
...7 East 15th Street...
...Pennsylvania...
...The wildcat mine strike is symptomatic of the mood of large sections of Labor...
...Carlo Tresca...
...The edict by John L. Lewis raising dues was the straw that broke the camel's back, but the actual story is that of a sick industry and underpaid miners...
...former Italian deputy...
...Gualtieri at noon of the very Monday on which Tresca was assassinated...
...Nye in a Senate speech attacked Mr...
...rwy ' iimais'i nsMifm The testimonial banquet for Algernon Lee, commemorating hie 70th anniversary and nearly haH-century aett«Np4be40MAs4i>Jlstoe*ovetbent, will be held at the Hotel Commodore, 42nd Street "WIu Lexington XveWfe...
...In a statement issued January 18 to contradict the Pott, the Mazzini Society's National Secretary', Alberto Tarchiani, declared as follows: "As for Tresca's attitude towards the Italian-American Victory Council, it u i known fact that he was against an alliance with the ex-Fascists such as Generoso I'ope and with the Communists...
...This declaration was made by Tresca to Dr...
...I have been to the bombed areas and the Luftwaffe's targets are militarily meaningless, and its tactics appeared panicky...
...The demand for as thorough an investigation of trails leading to a possible Communist killer as of those leading to a possible Fascist killer has come from a score of good American and good liberal and good trade union sources...
...The Daily Worker has long been reluctant to discuss Sormenti and was driven to do so only because of Mr...
...then bd the phone disinfected...
...There were no big fires causing effective destruction...
...The Daily Worker of January 20 regards Sormenti as 8 Communist hero...
...Capital Comment Tories Wreck New Deal In Wickard Agency By JONATHAN STOUT [Jonathan Stout continues his War Profits Expose on Page 2 this week.] WASHINGTON, D. C—As dispiriting a spectacle as any in Washington these days is what is happening to the Department of Agriculture...
...5,000 Mourn Tresca at Funeral More than 5,000 persons of the labor and radical movement jammed Manhattan Center to pay their respect to Carlo Tresca at funeral services Saturday...
...She revealed that she "kept in touch with leaders" and added: "Perhaps Senator Reynolds will not mind my telling how he came to call on me to express as he put it, his admiration of my 'wonderful patriotism.' 'You should be proud to be arrested for your country,' he said, with a courtly bow and Southern accent...
...Luigi Antonini was chairman of the funeral meeting which was organized by the Italian American Labor Council...
...It is known that Harvey Brown, powerful head of the Machinists, is opposed to the resolution, as is John P. Frey, head of the Metal Trades Department...
...true libertarian in philosophy, opposed the proletarian dictatorship of Moscow...
...A photograph is available showing Ferenz standing in the corner of the station waiting for Wheeler to arrive...
...George Baldanzi...
...There was no question about the scale of the attacks or the efforts of the Germans to meet them...
...The CIO would vigorously fight this move...
...Connecticut, Massachusetts...
...Gerald B. Winrod, anti-Semitic propagandist, is using a letter from Republican Senator Robert of Ohio, dated August 22, 1942, to raise funds for his defense...
...Dilling.] Flanders Hall was a publishing firm financed by Nazi agent Viereck...
...He advocated overall rationing, no advance announcements on articles 1* be rationed, government subsidies for higher production costs in order to keep prices down, etc...
...Januan 14th...
...trophic-ally, impaired...
...Norman Thomas, Socialist Party spokesman: Giralomo Valenti...
...The net effect thereof is to direct suspicion against Fascists, and against them alone...
...Winrod and Hoffman...
...District Attorney Frank Hogan of New York has declared that he would like to talk about the assassination with one Ena Sormenti, alias Carlos Contreras, an admitted Communist...
...It is a well known fact that Tresca often denounced Sormenti in his newspaper...
...Mrs...
...In many ways, since 1933, this department has been, if not the heart, at least the soul of the New Deal...
...Taft and Wheeler have come to the aid of the innocent defendants, now gives our personal friends something to go on...
...The Daily Worker on its own hook, and through the mouths of several stooges, characterizes such statements as Hearst inventions...
...Hudson used the marking frank of Fish and several Senators in sending through the mail their speeches...
...Carlo Tresca rejoiced in the heroic achievements of the Russian people in resisting invasion...
...From the top of a high building in the center of London I saw but one fire started by the raider's bombs...
...John L. Afros and Sidney Hook Will act as moderators...
...Leading anti-Fascist fighters who are also anti-Communists charge that Sormenti is a Communist gunman who helped liquidate anti-Communist foes of Franco during the Spanish Civil War...
...The recent resignations of Herbert Paresius and Donald Montgomery give evidence of how the soul of the New Deal is fast withering in the tory wind blowing from Capitol Hill...
...He continued publicly to oppose them and the files of the Daily Worker are replete with invective against him...
...Not only did Tresca continue to the last to attack Communists in his paper, II Martello, but he was specifically opposing their efforts to capture the projected Council...
...In the May 14, 1942, issue of II Martello, Tresca -attacked Sormenti, writing "And now Sormenti is moving against the Mazzini Society by orders of Stalin...
...David Dubinsky, president of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union, struck the keynote of the gathering when he stated that the Tresca murder would not become another "unsolved Krivitsky ease...
...We have arrived at the hour when we must have more two-fisted talking and real action...
...Hogan's statement...
...January 16...
...23 The National Conference of the Social Democratic Federation will convene in the People's House...
...Hoffman and Fish, and Sens...
...September 27, 1941...
...L mberto Gualtieri...
...See London Bombing As Desperate Hitler Morale Gamble By S.L...
...to espouse pro-Axis sympathies, wrote in October, 1941, of the fearless patriotism of Senators Wheeler, Johnson and Nye...
...Charles B. Hudson, whose "America in Danger" was widely circulated among Christian Front and pro-fascist groups, mailed out thousands of copies of Congressman Clare B. Hoffman's infamous House speech "Roosevelt is a Judas...
...Other speakers included Adolph Held and Morris Feinstone of the Jewish Labor Committee and the United Hebrew Trades, Angelica Balabanoff...
...The incident recalled to Washington reporters that long before McNutt acquired the title of Manpower Czar he had earned the handier label of "Hoosier Hitler...
...There were waves of Messerschmidts coming up to intercept us...
...Although not indicted, although his publication The Cross and The Flag was cited, Gerald Smith has been attacking the tire rationing, supporting Charles...
...Over Berlin they shot volcanoes of flak at us as we dropped hell on them...
...The District Attorney wants to see their "Sormenti...
...Before speculating on what the present bombing means, here is the background of the news...
...If the tones in Congress are not careful, they may wind up looking like" blooming radicals in comparison with the Administration's own executive departments...
...to press for the affiliation of his body with the Anglo-Soviet Committee...
...They have a disciplined party and money...
...But any stop towards peace seems farther away then efir as the tough Kaiser issue looms as the largest hurdle...
...The AFL Executive this week wireo the White House to curb the National Labor Relations Board for intervening in the Kaiser issue...
...Senator Wheeler was greeted by America First enthusiasts at the railroad station in Los Angeles prior to an address at the Olympic Stadium under the auspices of the America First Committee...
...Originally under "Henry Wallace and more recently under Claude Wickard, some of the >s*ew Deal's broadest-gauged social visions found birth or sustenance in the Department of Agriculture...
...This meeting was exposed by the California American Legion...
...The Washington Post has recapitulated material linking Wheeler and Nye to un-American propaganda...
...on Capitol Hill, phoned Al Hamilton, Socialist Party representative, for the necessary information...
...Since the first of the year, Consumer Counsel Montgomery was forced to resign as the only form of protest left to him when he found himself no longer permitted to do an honest job for consumers...
...These facts, confirmed by other witnesses close to Tresca...
...Stephen A. Day's Flanders Hall publication, "We Must Save the Republic," spoke of it as: "Certainly the most dynamic hnnlr wg have reviewed since The Octopus...
...Signs welcoming Wheeler were painted in the Continental Book Shop in Los Angeles, owned and operated by the now indicted Nazi bundist F. K. Ferenz...
...representative...
...The fact remains that the District Attorney has his reasons for wanting to see Sormenti...
...There are several opinions about Sormenti's character...
...The AFL which had previous contracts with Kaiser terms these contracts a simple extension and denounces the CIO action as a "raid on the AFL" The Kaiser story was the lead this week in the CIO News, official organ of the CIO...
...second, that the rate of German aircraft production is not keeping pace with Nazi losses...
...Elizabeth Dilling, one of those indicted, led a delegation of "mothers" to the Capitol in protest against Bill 1776 (Lendleasei...
...Hamilton told him...
...but his statement implies his interest in the Communist angle to the Tresca murder...
...January 22-23-24...
...Cougbim, as wall as various attacks on pro-democratic forces...
...This summary selects t'rom the "-paragraph Mazzini statement two paragraphs in entirety and one sentence from a third paragraph...
...Socialist leader who had ben active in Italy...
...Additional headaches for the Labor movement may arise with the arrival of the British Labor delegation, headed by Sir Walter Citrine, for session of the Anglo-American Trade Union Committee...
...They will get the investigation they say they want...
...Record Links Congressmen to Pro-Fascists Among 33 Indicted fy WALTER K. LEWIS As the government this week moved to try several of the 33 indicted alleged fascists—in Washington District Court Mrs...
...But that phase died with the November elections...
...As The New Leader stated editorially last week, Tresca's murder introduces here the totalitarian method of political debate which killed the Roselli brothers, ex-GPU Agent Ignace Reiss, Rudolf Klement...
...she reported in her Newsletter of March 21st, 1941, that she was arrested for making a disturbance...
...A round-up by The New Leader shows to what extent the fascist organs in this country have made use of material supplied by Congressional isolationists, and how in several cases Congressional leaders have aided acknowledged pro-fascists...
...The original statement also contained some remarks about Communists, as follows: "It must be added that, early and of late...
...1 was but a short distance from the bombed school and watched the procession carrying out the infant dead...
...It quotes a statement of the Mazzini Society issued on January 16...
...The resolution for a joint AFL-CIO committee was stalled this week because certain membara of the AFL executive committee were absent from the sessions...
...Said Senator Taft: "I feel very strongly that the methods pursued by the Government in their Washington indictments present a real danger to the continuation of freedom in this country...
Vol. 26 • January 1943 • No. 4
