The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-01-17
AFL Leader ExpelS
Union Which Gusts
Rochester Officer
Continued from Page u

meted out against him, cut up Nc
Dewitt after he consistently discrimin-
ated against him.
These two bull-dozing officials made
no pretense at abiding by the most
elementary rights Of the rank and
file in the union.
Even today, in this same local, after
the International rescinded its open
FaScist-like control of the local,
workers are being terrorized and
beaten up, this time by new Secret
ary-Treasurer Ben Gottesman.
What took place last Thursday
night at the unions headquarters will
serve to illustrate not only Gottes-
mans methods, but that Of every
other A. F. of l.. official.
Election for officers in this local are
to be held tonight, and Julius Fogel,
a member of the opposition group,
was speaking to several workers last
week advising them to vote for the
rank and file candidates.
Alex Geser, strong arm man for the
officials and gangster with record
Of attacking militant workers, APP
preached the group eXclaiming, ''You-
re all bunch of crooks" Having
delivered himself of this, Geser hauled
off and punched F'ogel in the face
splitting his lip so that it required
three stitches to close the wound and
loosing his teeth.
When q summons was served on
Geser he appeared in court with
Attorney Goldstein, the lawyer who
handles all cases for the local off,
Gals.
Denied Job
This same member of the opposi-
ton group has been consistently de-
MED job since Feb. 1898. Secretary
Gottesman knew of Fogel's COM
plants. In fact after he won the
Secretaryship following the shooting
up Of Turkel and Lasher two years
ago, he asked that such complaints
be brought to him. However 2
weeks after Fogel complained, he was
fired from his job, without rause, with
the boss owing him $50 in back
wages.
Gottesman is carefully following
out the tactics Of Lehman, Flore,
Turkel and other previous officials
in the union. He could not do other
wise, for, according to allegations now
being made in the local by Lehman,
now running for reelection, Gottes-
man boozed up Bonnie Glast and
egged him on to shoot up Turke1 and
LaSher so that he, Gottesman, could
get the secretaryship. Only strong
organized rank and file group can be
effective against such gangster Off
Gals.
Members Of this union back in 1880
thought they could use the courts
to make Flore restore local autonomy.
A racketeer, preying on the workers,
had been kicked out of the union by
the membership and then had been
restored to an even greater power by
the International president. Surely,
they reasoned, the courts would give
them justice.
Capitalist justice, however, Is de-
termined along class lines and most
usually ends up favoring the racke-
teer A. F. of L. heads, as the his
tory of this particular case shows
very clearly.
For over q year they yainly sought
action from the courts instead of
building and consolidating a real
rank and file opposition group. In
the meantime Lehman and McDevitt
were exacting tribute, making the
walters pay for their jobs and graft
ing from the bosses at the same
time.
Changes Tactic
And then, Just a month before the
case was supposed to come up, the
International restored the local char
ter with the statement that now the
local would govern itself. Elections
were forced through and Lehman and
his whole crowd came back into Of
flee like hungry leeches. And, the
workers were right where they had
been two years ago.
For now the officials first started
to bleed the workers, as shown in
Mondays article, forcing them to pay
up to $500 for job lasting In one
case only six weeks. Motel Turkel
waxed rich and furnished his home
beautifully with the gifts" such as
rugs, lamps, furniture, ETC., that he
received. The walters, In an attempt
to win a job from him, used to send
their wives to clean up his home.
But the ones who really cleaned up
at the expense of the workers were
the A. F. Of l.. union officials. One
trick OF another local, 302, was the
picketing of opponent cafeterias
after certain understandings" had
been reached with the competitor.
An outstanding illustration of this
lucrative racket took place recently
in the six months picketing of the
107th st. Automat. The "under-
standing was reached with the
Brighton Cafeteria in the same vicin-
ity, and the business of this restau-
rant increased considerably as re-
suit.
Make Graft Agreement
At present these Local 302 officials,
always on the alert for some easy
graft, have signed a secret agreement
with the Stewart and WILLOW Cafe
terias, where the chains make Local
302 into their company union. Both
these chain cafeterias, owned by the
LowenStein brothers, are anxious to
freeze out the Food Workers Indus
trial Union. (In 1929 the Willow |
spent 100000 to fight the F.WI.U. |
and aided in getting the blanket in
i,tY,ctiNr, q yafr1cf tha Ttad,,cfy5oI that /