The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-06-24
Ex-Mayor Clark smokes a Nugget
AN OPEN LETTER

To the members of the l. A. of M:
 As the nominations for grand lodge officers are all in, and compiled, 1t shows that about 250 lodges out of over 800 took enough interest in the referendum to vote on the proposition, and in most cases less than 15 per cent. of the membership of the diff ferent locals voting on the nomlna- tions attended the meetings and the reason for that is that the majority of our large membership have gotten disgusted at the tactics of the Social istic members of our association try ing to force their doctrine upon them when they don't want it, and also think that if those same members were as active in getting new recruits for our association as they are in trying to swing it over to the Social ist party, the machiniSts would have better conditions than they now en- joy.
 H. Johnston for president of our as- sociation, and when they started the campaign last February they opened headuuarters in Washington with a Press Dispatch News Company, and have been flooding the country with all kinds of literature in favor of Bro. Johnston, and with the aid of the New York Call, and all the Socialistic
 
 to poison the minds of our trades union machinists against President O'ConneH, who has no political party running his campaign, and no political contributions to help his candidacy. It behooves every trades unionist ma chinist in the country to wake up, and to see to it that he votes and has all his friends in the association do the same during the month of July for President O'Connell who is staunch trades unionist, and defeat the attempt of the Socialist party to land their man in the office who would be under obligations to them, and might appoint organizers who would go out in the field and build up the Socialist party at the expense of the trades union movement.
 Literature has been sent out saying that President O'Connell is member of the Civic Federation, which is false, as he severed his connection witA that body two years ago, but that organl- zation must have been some good to the wage earners of the country, when President Kirby, of the Manufactur- ers' Association, condemned it's policy and maligned every member of it in a very bitter speech in New York about a month ago, and just previous to that the Socialistic members of the Miners Union forced John Mitchell to
  ganization, and to the trades union machinists it must look strange to see the Socialistic element in the labor or ganizations lined up with the Manu- lecturers Association in their attack on the Civic Federation. But politics makes strange bedfellows.
 And again we find the Brotherhood of Machinists, a Socialist dual organi- zation, acting as strike breakers against the International Association of Machinists, who have been on strike since May 1st for the eight-hour day in greater New York. and those same fellows will tell you that they are class conscious.
 And now, union machinists, it don't look good to me when we find men who are not affiliated with the trade union movement, and those that are sending out circulars to our lodges signed in such terms as Dear Com rades) and (Yours for the Revolution), therefore we must be up and doing if we want to preserve our organlza- tion. (Signed)
 URaAnEzs UN1ONIsE.