REPUBLICANS: Love to Jim

Though labor’s political tent is held up by Democratic lodgepoles, the big chiefs of U.S. unions got up a sentimental $20-a-plate testimonial dinner in Washington last week for Labor Secretary James Paul Mitchell. A.F.L.-C.I.O. Secretary-Treasurer William Schnitzler toasted Mitchell as a proved “friend of the working men and women of this country,” although in an unsympathetic Administration it sometimes appeared that he was “fighting with both hands tied behind his back.” Said Amalgamated Clothing Workers’ spade-bearded Jacob Potofsky: Mitchell’s is “one appointment that we believe reflects great credit on the Administration.” Cabled A.F.L.-C.I.O. President George Meany from Europe: “A friend of labor and a fine man.”

In the same vein, Ike Eisenhower, who dropped by to pay his respects, said: “If I’m going to live in history, one of the reasons is my selection of Mitchell.”