LABOR: Treatise on Civil War

To most newspaper readers, war and the election have canceled all interest in the A. F. of L. -C. I. O. feud. That is not the case among the men of labor. Last week they read the sharpest, most detailed and unsparing record of that costly battle that has yet seen print—Labor’s Civil War, by Herbert Harris (Knopf; $2.50). Two years ago young (34) Historian Harris established his right to be heard on these matters when he published a factual, informative, detached book, American Labor, that summed up labor’s story. There is nothing detached about Labor’s Civil War. Like some Mencken of the proletariat, heaving adjectives at labor’s sacred cows, Mr. Harris sustains a note of exasperation, ridicule, hell-and-damnation for 298 pages to show how American unions are moving toward “a double suicide of majestic stupidity.”

Cold Comfort. Unions have grown from 3,000,000 to 9,000,000 members under the New Deal. But because of the feud, unions face assaults on their social and economic rights, emasculation of the Wagner Act, “political castration,” loss of the ability to strike. Government control of their internal affairs. Although some employers still fight them (“Any employer who fights the growth and functioning of a bona fide unionism, either in his own company or elsewhere, is a saboteur of American business enterprise . . . more subversive than any red”), business cannot be blamed for labor’s danger; the split has come from within labor’s ranks. Why, then, is labor fighting? Mr. Harris ticks off as true or false the explanations that are usually offered:

Industrial v. Craft? No. A. F. of L has 29 semi-industrial unions and 19 trade unions. C. I. O. has six semi-industrial and four trade unions. The jurisdictional fight that brought about the split has become meaningless.

Aims? No. “It is their warfare, and not their philosophy and purpose, that is a menace to American democracy. Both seek to move and have their beings within the framework of capitalism, the private ownership of the means of production and distribution. . . . Both exist primarily to achieve and preserve collective-bargaining agreements. . . . Both stress round-table conferences and negotiations with employers as the most sensible and effective way of settling differences. . . . Both regard strikes as a last resort. . . . Both consider the wage-or salary -earner not as a class-conscious helot, but as a middle-class-conscious American having the same aims and aspirations that animate the rest of the population.”

NLRB Favoritism? No. The Smith Committee revelations have shown glaring flaws in NLRB’s personnel (“arrogant, fresh-from-law-school people, very wet behind the ears”), but it has not favored C. I. O. over A. F. of L. But both organizations have reached the “heights of madness” in dealing with the board.

Politics? Yes and No. C. I. O. chieftains have plugged harder for “planning” than A. F. of L. cautionocrats; Labor’s Non-Partisan League and John L. Lewis’ third-party maneuvers have widened labor’s split.

Communists? Yes. Herbert Harris says that Stalinists have controlling or prominent positions in 40% of the C. I. O. unions. Despite purges in some, the expected upheavals after the Soviet-Nazi pact did not come off, and John Lewis has as his advisers “such ardent party-line sympathizers and fellow travelers as Lee Pressman, C. I. O. general counsel, and Lan De Caux, editor of the C. I. 0. News. . . .” Stalinists not only fight defense, smother rebellions in unions they control by packed meetings, and develop character assassination to a fine art; they also work to spread the A. F. of L. -C. I. O. battle. “The genuine point at issue . . . is that a fusion of forces between the A. F. of L. and C. I. O. would give them both . . . an excellent opportunity to weed out their Stalinists . . . and thus render a great and invaluable service not alone to the labor movement but to the whole cause of intellectual honesty and moral integrity. . . .”

Personalities? Yes. John Lewis “is a man of first-rate quality, even of genius, perhaps. . . . He is bold. He is brilliant. He has on the whole displayed a rare capacity for growing in stature . . . But . . . he seduces the virgins of acclaim. He cohabits with the sluts and sirens of power. He has surrounded himself with Stalinist sycophants and palace janizaries who assure him that, as a man of destiny, he can do no wrong. . . .” William Green is plodding, platitudinous, modest, and no such figure, but if he “were sure his own resignation would insure labor unity he would step down, regretfully, but with dignity, with all the proper Sidney Carton gestures, music offstage, and a slow curtain.”