LABOR: Forgotten Men

For a long time U. S. Labor has been a house divided. Every little squeak for peace has been drowned out by the bickerings of A. F. of L.’s William Green and C. I. O.’s John L. Lewis. Mr. Green has called Mr. Lewis many an unpleasant name: “an enemy of labor … an autocrat . . . consumed with personal ambition.” Mr. Lewis has called Mr. Green a “pusillanimous little man who sees ghosts at night and pays the penalty for his own perfidy … a frightened little man . . . inebriated by the exuberance of his own verbosity … his mind a little weak.” Last week, as usual, there seemed little hope for peace between Lewis & Green. But Labor looked as if it might leave its two squabbling leaders to fight in a corner, while it went marching on without them.

Last Friday, as on every Friday since the beginning of July, 17 men met to confer in the Federal Reserve Building in Washington. Eight of them were subchieftains of C. I. O.; seven of them of A. F. of L.; two were from the independent Railroad Brotherhood. Their chairman: Sidney Hillman, a vice president of Lewis’ C. I. O., president of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers, and Franklin D. Roosevelt’s labor coordinator for the National Defense Advisory Commission. They were working on the problem of U. S. defense.

Of factional strife there was no sign. Labor peace was a working reality on Hillman’s committee. Perhaps it might finally spread its wings over Labor’s whole house. But where were Green & Lewis?

Embarrassed by some of the memberships of his A. F. of L., Mr. Green has been busy defending his policies and himself, chiefly from superheated Columnist Westbrook Pegler, who has kept Mr. Green hopping like corn in a popper. Up for trial last week on a charge of snitching $60,000 from his organization of charwomen, chambermaids, was swarthy George Scalise, ex-president of the A. F. of L. Building Service Employes International Union.

Ever since he broke with Franklin Roosevelt, Lewis has lost prestige in his C. I. O. One after another of his union leaders has defied him. He has sniped at the Hillman committee. At odds with his own followers, he sulked in his tent.

In the slick-working new order of things, the new man of Labor last week was Mr. Roosevelt’s curly-haired, square-faced Coordinator Hillman.