The Connecticut labor news. (New Haven, Conn.) 1921-1925, 1921-04-01
CALL OPEN SHOP
BY RIGHT NAME
URGES GOMPERS
So Called American Plan Onlv
Blind to Cover Real Purpose
of Interests.

AS blind to cover their real pur-
poses, certain of the sO-Called Open
shop advocates have set up what they
term the "American plan" of shop op-
Grafton. This is but another name for
the non-uniOn shop. The "American
plan, has as its main principle bitter op-
position to trade 1nloni5tn
The labor movement insists upon
giving the proper Technology to the
conflict between organized labor and its
employer opponents. The labor move
ment insists that there can be no accur-
ate public knowledge, and therefore no
fair and adequate Judgment of the is
sues, unless the Technology is accur-
ate. 10 render a verdict on the merits
OF the union shop as against the kind
OF shop which hostile employers have in
mind when they use the term "open
shop" is equally as reprehensible as for
jury to render a verdict upon per-
jured evidence.
The labor movement strives for the
union shop because the union shop means
the Introduction of democracy in indus
try. 1t means the beginning of counsel
and conference the end of the long ages
of labOr's silence 1t means the begin
ming of manhood and womanhood for
those who work.
There is no such thing as an |'open
shop campaign in America. Every
person who has the opportunity to speak
or to write, who has the opportunity to
convey information and counsel to his
fellows, owes it as duty to truth to
expose and condemn this fraud
What there is in America is a cam
paign on the part of autocratic employ
ers to kill trade unionis1n in order that
nOn-union shops may be conducted,
wherein conditions of labor long since
abolished in union shops may obtain
without audible protest from silent, pow
erleSS workers.
America, if it understands, will know
how to answer such an Infamous cam
pa1gn.
Incalculable mischief results from
general acceptance of wrong definitions
in relation to public questions and is
sues. Not infrequently the public be-
lies its claim to enlightenment by cling
ing, through year after year, to
falsehOod in the face of the proof of
falsehood The effort of hostile en-
ployers to break down the union move
ment through the establishment of nom
union shop conditions is case in point
Employers hostile to trade unionism
long ago gave to the union shop the
name CLOSED shop" They also coined
the term open shop to describe the
kind of shop which it was their aim to
operate in opposition to the union shop.
The anti-union shop-and that is gen
orally the open shops a shop in
which the employer purSues a militant
policy in opposition to organization. 1t
is the shop of the crusading employer
bent upon maintaining industrial autoc-
racy and upon restoring it where trade
unonism has broken it down.
The kind of shop which certain en-
ployers' associations today are endeavor-
ing to establish under the name "open
shop" is, in reality, the anti-union shop.
The open shop crusade is not what
its name implies. 1t is cruasde against
unionism. 1t is a crusade to break down
the organized labor movement and re-
store industrial oligarchy.
The open shop of the present anti
union campaign is open only to non-union
men. The United States Steel Corpora
ton processes to maintain an open shop,
but its tolerance for union workers i'll
the steel mills has been shown amply
within the past two years. Likewise its
tolerance for union workers in its great
West Virginia coal mine properties has
been shown with equal emphasis. Unions
and all their works and principles are
hated and prosecuted.