National Affairs: Printers’ Choice

A. F. of L.’s President Green last week at last resigned from C. I. O.’s United Mine Workers—before they threw him out. But soon he found one subject on which he could crow over C. I. O. Said he: “I congratulate the union printers of the nation on their success in removing … a termite president. . . .”

Occasion for Mr. Green’s pleasure was the failure of C. I. O. co-Founder & Secretary Charles P. Howard to be re-elected president of the potent International Typographical Union. The printers by a 3-2 vote replaced C. I. O. man Howard by their Vice President Claude M. Baker, of San Francisco. Their act as labor men knew was, however, more a repudiation of Mr. Howard than of C. I. O. For in his twelve years as head of I. T. U., his two-and-a-half years of personal affiliation with C. I. O., aggressive President Howard made many an enemy for himself, many friends for Mr. Baker, an able union politician who is no enemy of the C. I. O. A better index to traditionally independent printers’ opinions of A. F. of L. v. C. I. O. was provided by their last I. T. U. convention and by a recent referendum. They voted: 1) to remain within A. F. of L., refuse to pay assessments levied by Mr. Green’s executive council; 2) to stay out of C. I. O., support industrial unionism in the mass production industries.