ENDORSEMENT, BUT NO ENFORCEMENT
STOUT, JONATHAN
GOP Line On FERC: Endorsement But No Inforcement By JONATHAN STOET New Leader Washington Correspondent WASHINGTON. D. C. TK SUPPOSITION that any effort to pats an FBPC b*U would...
...But employers are against giving the Government any enforcement powers which would have to be used against employers, and are thus also opposed to FEPC...
...And it is quite consistent with employer views generally to find them- opposed to any idea that gives the Federal Government any right to step into their business and modify any of their traditional prerogatives by saying you can't do this, or you must do that...
...STORY WITHOUT A POINT...
...By playing both sides of the Democratic street in the civil rights fight, the Republicans succeeded in driving their own wedge through the split in the Democratic ranks...
...They wore arrived at by: (1) calculating that 42 internationals on which information was available were worth $360 million...
...When the FEPC iosue » presented to the Senate by the and of this week, or a few days thereafter, the Republicans will join Administration Democrats in voting cloture to shut off the Dfxiecret filibuster...
...There is every prospect that the Republicans will succeed in their strategy, and that the McConnell-Taft Bill will be the one finally presented to President Truman for his signature...
...By working with the Dixteerat* fo kill en Administration bill with teefh in if...
...We commented several weeks ago on the happy prospects facing Michael' Obermeier, who at the time was running for president of Local 8 of the AFL hotel and restaurant workers...
...There is every prospect that Astlsiieisiissliei taottes Wilt be difftltut St tho Senate...
...The AFL executive council has put a light in the window for the biggest of its wandering boys, the International Association of Machinists, and, to mix metaphors, it is expected that the 1AM will see the light some lime this summer...
...sure'enough, $3 or $4 billion...
...The story reads like something out of Ben HecWs memoirs, in which, as a matter of fact, ft may Very well end up some day...
...made a guess of S3 lo 54 billion...
...The editorial, written by Wall, was a vitriolic attack on "professional unioneers" like Phillips and a glowing defense of the Freedoms Foundation...
...When they returned to headquarters, however, they were stricken by doubts...
...Their letter, together with a background story on the foundation, appeared on the first pa^e of the February 13 Paper Maker...
...Wail sent out a press release which described his apostasy with great relish...
...He also commended sadly that Wat had come to the Paper Maker with the best recommendations, and that he had previously agreed fo the decision to return the money...
...But a voluntary bill would be a beginning and we may be able to improve it in the Senate...
...President Paul L. Phillips Of the union and "Ed Wall, editor of the Paper Maker, went to Valley Forge a few weeks ago and cheerfully picked up their $600...
...And so Phillips and Wall, and the union's executive board, decided to return the check...
...President Truman had asked for a Fair Employment Practices Commission with power to go to court to enforce its anti-discrimination orders...
...For one thing, the other prize-winning practitioners seemed to be chiefly such people as Herbert Hoover, Robert A. Taft, Robert R. McCormick and George E. Sokolsky...
...Nothing to it...
...D. C. TK SUPPOSITION that any effort to pats an FBPC b*U would be filibustered to death in the Senate by the Diirieerats is being followed by a shift lit Republican strategy...
...TOO MANY COOKS...
...When the House passed the -Republican arcconnell Bill a number of Administration stalwarts voted against it in the final passage...
...The Dixiecrats voted with the Republicans on that one, under the impression that the Republicans were merely being the silent partners of the Dixiecrats...
...ft hat been a mistake to focus all attention on the Dixiecrats as the only opponents of FEPC- To be sure, the prejudiced Dixiecrats are against it...
...He has not been heard from since...
...Tho most elusive statistic of all, however, is the figure on total union assets, Business Week last year gave $1 billion as a very rough estimate...
...The McConnell Bill adopted by the House last week, and the Taft Bill—both are identical—establish a commission which can listen to complaints of diecrimihation, ^Rr^l»»*ftt)\tfo to court and ask a judge to enforce ltS^gase-and-desist orders...
...THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE HOME...
...So they went an FEPC bill passed to fat thorn off that'hook...
...Last year the Republicans put over the Wherry cloture rule in the Senate, which requires the votes of 64 Senators to shut off debate on any issue...
...The Republican platform pledges its legislators to support FEPC...
...The only thiag*N»MMcConneri-Taft Bill allows the commBSSa^o do is to cooperate with state and locuSsgejacles jn mediation and conciliation effoiT"W' eliminate discrimination because of race, creed or sex...
...The Party also appeared to resent the situation...
...and then working with Aden, the Republicans not only get rrisanslvos off Bie limit ost toetr plelsornt platspst bur have .uiiisiHiwa one* sues* tbp oft-repeated dasape that lh* Kspublieed party is she spokesman and the servant of employer Interests...
...For, with passage of the McConnell Bill in the House, the Repuaaeans this week became busy lining up enough Republican votes to side with the Administration Democrats- (and' not the Dixiecrats) to get the 64 votes needed to shut off a DiiriecrBt filibuster...
...It seems that an organization known as the Freedoms Foundation, with headquarters at Valley forge, began several months ago to give away a total of $80,060 to people who were practicing Americanism, One of the winners wee the AFL Paper Makers' Union, which had practiced $600 worth of Americanism by printing several "contributions to democracy'* hi its organ, the Paper Maker...
...The main' one is that the Administration bill, calling for an FKPC with teeth in h\ win be knocked out in the Senate as it was in the House and that a Republican FEPC bill, introduced by Senator Taft and calling for a spineless FEPC, will take its place in the same way that the Republican McConnell Bill replaced the Administration measure in the House...
...More recently, the public relations firm of Floyd L. Carlisle, Inc...
...SENATOR TAFT predicted a few days ago that at least 40 Republicans will vote for cloture in the Senate...
...It was a Judas-act, a treachery we find it hard to conceive could really have happened...
...3) estimating that these unions represented one quarter of tho labor movement, which brings tho figure to between $1 billion ind $1.5 billion...
...All through the civil rights fight last year and so far this year, the mapority of the Republicans have cooperated with the Dixiecrats in the letter's attempt to keep civil Tights bills, including FEPC, from even being considered...
...and (3) assuming that tho locals ate altogether worth twice as much as tho Internationals, which gives you...
...I can hardly believe," said Phillips, reflecting on this behavior, "that anyone would stoop so low as to drive a knife in our back in this manner...
...An indication of wftattb eiflpsct from liberal Democrats in the Senate came when Senator Herbert Humphrey of Minnesota, who helped fore* the PBPC plank into the Democratic platform, said: "I'm for the (Administration's) McGrath Bill and the Republicans will have a lot of explaining to do in the next campaign if they force anything less...
...Cody cemented to this demotion only after a great amount of pressure had been applied to him, and he appeared to rdfont the fact that Obermeier was being' helped in thejght by the rton-Commwnist tnfernatkmaf office...
...The only source of disharmony in the picture it Big Bill Hutcheson of the carpenters, who has been having jurisdictional diffUhtUiies ufih the 1AM since' Wilson's Administration and evidently sees no reason to call off the fight now...
...The ACTV Labor Leader reports mat the twvhiemu ** sttil battling far effective control of Local 6, fPfttofc ** turn dominates the Hotetfrti&et Council, the oter-eXt barpaining unit for New York hotel workers...
...THE CONDUCT of the Republicans on the FEPC question has been a puzzle to many...
...In order to run for president of Local 6, he had to persuade Martin Cody, the incumbent and also a Stalinoid, to drop down and run en the ticket as general organiser...
...Then he left town...
...Obermeier contrived to win the election, but hit prospects at the moment seem considerably lets cheerful...
...We know that there are about 200 internationals In the country, buf nobody knows how many locals there are (65.000 might be a good guess) or how many members they have (anywhere between 13 and 16 million...
...For another, the Freedoms Foundation turned out to be E. F. Hutton, an old and militant Liberty Leaguer...
...The machinists' president, Al Ha/yes, has already gone on record in favor of returning to the AfL, and his 650,000 members figure to support him in the referendum this spring...
...Its strength vis-a-vis the carpenters was increased recently when it composed its jurisdictional disagreements with another old competitor, the UAW-AFL...
...It appears that his yews of unflinching friendship for the CP may be coming to an end...
...That means the Administration would need to line up only 24 votes to insure cloture, and the Administration can do better than that with very little effort...
...Unfortunately for Carlisle, r-a for tho labor movement, these figures seem to bo loss than tangential to the facta...
...There are "eondtttona" attached to the Republican strategy, of course...
...This wedge, it appears, has a somewhat different angle than the Dixiecrats had sus- - - peuieu...
...To prove that he wasn't kidding...
...in any case", it has been sniping at Obermeier since the election, and the new president has not been helped by the fact that he ran behind Cody in the bslieoMp...
...We offer it to Heeht free of charge, reserving only a cut on the movie and television' rights...
...This would have been the end of the matter, except for a rather stupefying editorial which appeared on page six of the same issue...
...This week the Dixiecrats found out that they had been outfoxed and that they had merely aided in giving the Republicans the wfiiprifind in the Senate...
...We're simply floored...
...We realized," Ihey said in a tart letter to the Foundation, "that we were right smack in the middle of what was just another group promoting the propaganda spewed forth by the National Association of Manufacturers...
...Sauintinq at Labor By Daniel Sellgman THE BIG MONEY, For various reasons, the basic sdttttefte* about the American labor movement have always boon either unreliable or unavailable...
...But an FEPC with teeth in it—as President Truman demandswould make every employer who practices discrimination answerable to a Higher power...
...He threatened to walk out of Vie AFL last month if the machinists came back before a clear and final settlement was reached* Despite this formidable obstacle, the I AM is in a strong position: in five years of independence, it hoe grown enormously properous, and has quietly become the fifth largest union in the country...
Vol. 33 • March 1950 • No. 9
