The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1929-06-14
BIZ a Worker Correspondent

by a Worker Correspondent
I want to tell what happened at
mass meeting called by the craft
Local Union $40 of the laundry
drivers.
AS a member of Local $40 I was
present at a mass meeting called by
the local for organizational' pur-
poses. This craft local recently
started to organize, not all the laun-
dry workers, but the laundry drivers
only in the Bronx.
A Farce Mass Meeting.
In this letter ! want to picture
to you how a craft union is con-
Quoting an "organizationap drive.
About p. m. I entered the big
hall of the Royal Mansion. Over
300 laundry workers and sympa-
thizers were present. All were talk
ing nervously about the conditions,
and you could hear from everybody
the well-known facts that the con-
ditions We're deplorable. 1t is i'm
possible to make enough for a liv-
ing after working over 70 hours a
week; the bosses do with the drivers
whatever they want. For any little
nothing they are chased off the job
The black combination of The
bosses, ''the bosses association"
control the lives and existence of
every laundry worker, the drivers
included, and when they suspect
somebody of agitating for a union
he is blacklisted.
I heard the knock of the chair
mans hammer. The president of
the local started, in a dramatic
voice, the meeting by singing
clarifying song to the greatness of
the craft Local $40 Laundry Drivers.
A Powerful Organization.
Local $40, he explained. is big and
powerful enough (what a hypocrite)
to show the bosses association what
we can do. He kept on trying to
prove to the newcomers how pow
crful the local is. That local, that
couldn't in the last five years or
ganize more than 200 members, Of
which go per cent are managers and
bosses, out of the 5000 drivers in
Greater New York; that local which
because of its officials incompetency
and yellow craft unionism has lost
every strike in the last three or four
years; which squandered every penny
Of the locals money, weedled out of
small wages of the laundry drivers
(who get S30-S33 a week., in the
form of excessive dues, 81 a month,
refused to make any attempt to or
ganize the unorganized laundry driv-
ers and only under pressure of the
left wingers made even a pretense
of doing something, called the mass
meeting and made a farce out of
it.
Finally, the chairman, now I
thought, will give the floor to the
rank and file, as is done in militant
organizational meetings. If the
rank and file were allowed to get
the floor it would be shown that the
rotten conditions of the laundry
drivers could only be improved by
a strong militant Laundry Workers
Industrial Union, that the drivers
must fight together with the other
laundry workers.
Labor Takers Speak.
But the corrupt officials of the
craft union Local SO didn't like that
idea, and, instead of calling on the
rank and file, the meeting was fed
with speeches by notorious labor
takers.
The first one was a travelling
salesman Of the A. F. of L., in
other words, an Organizer" He
tried to prove that it is a great
honor TO carry card of local af
filiated with such an organization
as the A. F. of L., worth many mil
lions of dollars, as much honor as to
belong to church, synagogue or
democratic club (his own words).
Plan a Sell-Out.
The rest of the speeches of the
labor takers were just as empty and
meaningless. Schechter made mis-
leading statements and Rosenzweig
invoked the bosses for arbitration.
The former, yellow socialist"
said nisleadingly that the drivers
are the main part of the laundry,
that they could tie up laundry.
This he said to divide the drivers
from the other laundry workers.
Rosenzweig gained a shadowy
reputation at the time of the last
big Boro Park strike of the workers
naoa,oobar ~ Nav Thaxr c1cayo in