The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-12-24
Misleaders in
the American
Labor Unions
By WILLIAM q. FOSTER

Such men as skinny" Madden,
Sam Parks, Simon O'Donnell and
Brindell were highly destructive fac
tors in the labor movement. They
poisoned union progress at its
source. But upon occasion they had
a certain regard for the demands
Of the workers and sometimes made
fights to protect them. This they
did in the realization that if they
we're to be able to advance their
own personal interests basic con-
sidcration was that they maintain
strong trade union organization.
c. nsequently, often their unions of
skilled or strategically situated
workers, were very powerful, usu-
ally at the expense Of the other
trades and the unorganized. But in
many places the building trades
grafters, in their greed and general
spirit of reaction, Killed the goose
that laid the golden eggs by liter
ally SELLING" ,the unions to the
point of their extinction, Philadel-
phia is such place.
Frank Feeney.
One of the chief figures in the
unsavory history of the Philadel-
phia trade unions during the past
quarter of a century is Frank
Feeney. For ten years he was
president of the Building Trades
Council, and for seven years presi-
dent of the Central Labor Union. He
is now president of the International
Union Of Elevator Constructors. For
two decades he has been key man
in the right wing national machine
Of the A. f. of L. Within recent
months he became II ember of the
executive council OF the National
Civic Federation.
Feeney is one Of the group of
trade union leaders whose daTksome
influence has contributed towards
making Philadelphia one Of the
weakest trade union cente.s IN the
country. They have "pe idlcd" the
movement in every conceivable way.
Feeney is cynical about his graft
ing. At the 1914 convention of the
Pennsylvania Federation of Labor,
when Feeney was being tried for
disloyalty to the workers, Jim
Maurer quoted him as saying:
"Suse Pm a CRATER. Whenever
you hear that Frank Feeney goes
after something you make np your
mind he is getting his price. I'm
fer Frank Feeney."
This misleader of labor maintains
| his hold on the trade union move
ment by virtue of his firm seat in
the saddle at the head Of the Eleva-
tor Constructors. He follows pol
| icy of furthering the interests Of
this little group OF skilled workers
at the expense Of tie other related
unions, especially the Machinists.
This is q common trick of the labor
fakcr.
F'eeney has had his hand in every
fora of, betrayal. from running
crooked papers to selling out strikes.
He was on TIE payToll of Martin
Mulhall, the arch betrayer, who re-
lares the following to show how
Feeney earned his nay:
Cher was an agitation on to
amalgamate the printing trades and
that would have been fatal to the
employers; that we didn't want; we
didn't care how loyal Frank Feeney
would be to the typographical union,
so lorg as he prevented the amalga
nation, and that is what we put him
in to prevent, and it was prevented"
A speciality of Feeney's is CAPT
talist politics. He has long been
labor agent of the republican party,
a lieutenant of the reactionaries
Quay, Penrose, McNichol, ct al in
/ the ranks of the workers. For this,
he and his friends have been re-
warded from time to time with we'll
paid political jobs. Of McNichol, an
avowed enemy of labor legislation
and a supporter of the state con-
stabulary, Feeney said: 80 far as
my friend Jim McNichol is con-
cerned, let me say to you that am
proud to call him my friend"
In 1905, largely through Feeney's
efforts, the Philadelphia unions put
up an Independent Labor ticket
Feeney was the candidate for sher-
iff. Labor, enthusiastic, rallied to
the workers. ticket. The Labor Day
parade of that year, consisted chief
ly of floats extolling the labor
ticket. But at the eleventh hour
Feeney withdrew his name ia fa- or
of the republican candidate an1 IN
duced the new party to endorse The
whole republican ticKe:. Els hc.
trayal made Feeney a big cog r.
the local republican machine.
Feeney has sabotaged various i'm
portant pieces of labor legislation in
Harrisburg. Secretary Quinn of the
State Federation of Labor accused
him of being responsible for the
defeat of the Workmen's Compensa-
ton Bill and of facilitating the pas
sage of the State Constabulary
Law. In the past quarter of the
century every attempt of the work
ers in Pennsylvania to move for
ward, on either the economic or po-
litical field, has had to confront the
opposition of Feeney. That is one
reason why their trade unions o.
in such demoralized condition and