The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-04-02
A Striking
HackieW rites
TOLaGuardia
Dear Mr.. Mayor


Dear Mr.. Mayor:
I'm cab driver here in New
York I have TO make q living for
myself and my family. which is a
wife and q siZ-year girl who is
just commencing to go to school.
I got to put in long hours at the
wheel to make enough so We can
live like human beings, and so I
can give my girl chance in life.
But I work so long most Of the
time I never get a chance to see
my girl awake since 7 leave the
house before she's awake and get
home at night when she's in bed
sleeping.
Now I'm writing this letter to
you because we taxi men are on
strike because we want to join our
own union and not Join the union
Of the companies. I saw the letter
to you that they wrote in a lot of
newspapers like the Times and the
Herald Tribune and I began to Won
der, It must have cost q lot Of
dough to put these ads in the
papers and I said to myself why
don't they use that money for us
that need it, and work hard for
them, instead Of spending it on
those newspapers that already got
plenty Of dough and don't need it.
Papers Write Lies
I'm good and sore about the COM
panies. Here We are on strike for
our own rights and we have meet
ings and demonstrations and or
ganize the cab drivers and then
your cops come out and start the
funny works. Then the papers say
the strikers start riots and break
up everything when if it wasn't for
the cops doing the dirty work
everything would be jake.
The companies say the plan they
got up, which is supposed to be
made up of drivers themselves. is
working okay and any of us could
see his official at any time to settle
things as they come up, and all
things that come up are peacefully
settled, saying that the proof of
this is the fact that some drivers
are running cabs now anyway. They
say the big majority Of us are not
in sympathy with the strike and
the leaders. From what I know and
from my experience, all this isn't
true at all, even if they say 50 to
you in the open letter in the news
papers. The whole thing amt logi-
cal. and what gets my goat espe-
cially in the letter is what they
say about protecting pedestrians
from attack and the women from
abuse. Those are the words they
use, and it's funny as hell because
it's the cops and the companies
men that start this dirty work all
the time. I'm saying this to you
so you can get it straight from q
cab driver and one Of the strikers.
II Want to Remind You :"
I want to remind you Of what you
said before you got elected. Mr..
Mayor, One thing was that we
could keep the five cents extra fare
which O'Brien put in. That's how
all the trouble started in the other
strike, because we thought we we're
going to get that nickel, but the
companies rocked us out of it. Then
you thought you could have more
fares riding in tsxis and you said
that on Mondays the fares would
pay one third off the regular fare
on the clock. All this did for us was
to make things worse, because the
amount was less. Now it looks to
me like you're getting bawled out by
the companies. I wonder why, be-
cause, even though sometimes you
say things that sound good for us
workers, in the end we always seem
to get it in the neck.
Another thing. Lots of times peo-
pie call me wop, just like they call
Jews hikes and Irish micks and Ne
groes shines. Now they're calling us
strikers reds" Maybe they think
that's the opposite, and 1t makes us
Join together all the more.
I don't know much about the reds
but it looks to me like the only time
when the workers get anything is
when the reds take hand, and if
it means to be a red that a man
fights for his rights and his family
then want to be red Just like
they call me a red now because we
are striking. Well, whatever they
call us. we'll keep it up until We win
AS I see it, that's the only logical
thing for us to do.
Yours truly,