Evening star., 1936-07-05
The Real Issue.

In an ideal world. where the motives
of self-interest were eliminated, there
would be no gathering clouds or i'm
pending battles over the industrial or
ganization of the half million steel
workers. The issue would not be posed,
by the steel industry, as the choice
between the open shop or the closed
shop or the right to work. free from
enforced membership in some labor or
ganization. The issue would not be posed
by the labor leaders as the right of
collective bargaining by workers through
the untramelled choice of their own
representatives.
The issue would be whether the work.
ers in the steel industry desire to con-
tinue their present method of collective
bargaining through the medium of COM
pany fostered organizations and repre-
sentativeS chosen in accordance with
company fostered elections, or whether
they desired to align themselves with
John L. Lewis and the Committee for
Industrial Organization in the formation
Of a new union of steel workers.
The pros and cons of the question
would be presented to the workers by
the spokesmen for the steel industry
and by the spokesmen for the Commit
tee for Industrial Organization and
vote would be taken on the matter, free
from further pressure by either side.
Both the steel industry and the Com
mittee for Industrial Organization would
agree to abide by the results.
But this is by no means an ideal world,
nor has the motive of self-interest been
eliminated from the considerations of
either the steel industry executives or
the leaders of the labor movement. The
country is, therefore, about to witness
a possibly prolonged struggle, full OF
bitterness. to be marked perhaps by
serious industrial tie-ups and even
violence. Upon the outcome hinges in
large degree the future direction of the
labor movement in the United States,
Both the paid advertisements of the
Iron and Steel Institute and the state
ment of William A. Irwin, president
of the United States Steel Corpora
ton. reflect the resentment of the in
dustrialists over the outside" labor in
terests seeking to take over the organi-
Eaticn of their workers and to speak for
them In collective bargaining. The
bitterness is accentuated by the fact that
the attempt from the outside is TO
displace the system of collective bargain
Ing which the industry voluntarily estab-
ushed only three years ago, and which
the Lewis organization regards as a
mere subterfuge, dominated by the en-
ployers. All the steel industry says
about the outside" influence is true.
The outstanding anomaly of the attempt
to organize the steel workers is the
fact that the pressure is exerted from
the outside, mainly through the paid
services of professional organizers. The
impulse does not come from the workers
themselves, though where their SYM
pathies now might lie is question which
may never be answered.
But the main source of bitterness on
both sides is the size of the stakes for
which they contend. Lewis goal lies
beyond the immediate interests of the
steel workers. 1t embraces the union
ization, in articulate, coherent industrial
groups, of all workers. And the steel
industry is joined in spirit, in its opposi-
tion to Lewis, by ali employers of the
unorganized workingmen in the mass
production industries of the Nation. The
questions of the open shop or the closed
shop or the right of collective bargain
ing are relatively unimportant side is
sues. The issue is the unionization of all
those who labor, and the steel industry
merely happens to have been chosen as
the battle-ground.