Evening star., 1937-05-28
UNION AND PRESS
ACCUSED BYFORD
Riot "Staged" to Hide U. A.
W. Failure" and Provide
Story, Company Says.

By the Associated Press.
DETROIT, May 28.-The Ford
Motor Co. said today that a riot at
the gates of its River Rouge plant
was staged" to cover up failure"
Of the United Automobile Workers OF
America to organize Ford workers.
In formal statement the company
attributed the disorder, in which 1S
unionists were hurt Wednesday, to
the U. A. w. A., and unidentified
newspapers, the company said, have
demanded Ford strike story" for six
months.
Charges Of "fascism" and employing
thugs and mobsters" were hurled at
Henry Ford by the unions interna-
tional president, Homer Martin, who
laughingly withheld comment until
later, when he learned of the Ford
statement.
The demonstration Wednesday
against Ford workmen on Ford prop
erty," the company said, was staged
by newspapers which for the last six
months have demanded the produc-
ton OF a Ford strike story and by
the U. A. w., which required some
dramatic occurrence to cover up its
conspicuous failure to influence Ford
employees.
Charges Attack on Workmen.
"The raiders were accompanied by
Government men from Washington,
whose utmost efforts for several
months have failed to involve the
Ford Motor Co. in irregularities af-
fecting labor or otherwise.
"An attempt was made to attack a
peaceable body of Ford workmen, and
it was repelled.
I'VE make this statement reluc-
tantly, because in the present state
of widely organized misinformation
we have little confidence that the
facts can be fully understood until
events are further unrolled."
Company spokesmen had nothing
additional to say in issuing the state
meut lHSL IllSQt.
The union members injured in the
fighting with fists and feet-includ-
ing Richard T. Frankenstein, organ
national director, and Walter Reu-
ther, president OF the West Side To-
cal-have said that company police,
not worhmen, pummeled and hurled
them down q stairway.
Martin Hits "Bhckshirts."
Martin said, THE 'Blackshirts' OF
Dearborn are not going to stop the
of Ford workers" The
committee directing the campaign, he
said. would meet this afternoon.
The attacks upon union repre-
sentatives by henchmen Of the Ford
Motor Co.. is a public admission that
the Ford workers want their own
unions and that Ford's one last hope
of preventing the workers from build
ing their own unions is the use of
brute force through paid thugs and
mobsters.
The Ford workers have long suffered
from many evils" Martin said, "and
1t is our opinion that these workers
are not going to permit this opportu-
nifty for freeing themselves from COM
pany oppression and autocracy to
slip by, nor their rights crushed by
the "Blackshirts" Of Dearborn.
Terms Ford Dictator"
Few people will have reason to
question who the Millionaire is that
Ambassador Dodd says wants to force
Fascism upon the American people.
However, Mr.. Ford will find that his
embryonic Hitler Harry Bennett
(head of the Ford Co. guards, Is q
poor substitute for democracy and
reason.
I'VE will not stop until every Ford
worker In America has been given the
right, free Of coercion and intimida-
ton, to join the United Automobile
Workers of America"
100 Protest Loss Of Jobs.
BOSTON, May 20 P.-Approxi-
mately 100 union men, who said they
were discharged from the Ford Motor
Co.'S Somerville plant last night,
marched to the Federal Building here
today to protest to A. Howard Meyers,
regional director Of the National
Labor Relations Board, against loss Of
their jobs.