The people's voice. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1939-1969, 1940-08-28
THE
WASHINGTON
SCENE

BY HENRY ION

Wendell Willkie opened his cam.
paign by choosing a current lie of
labor's enemies and making it an In
tegral part of his platform.
The lie is that Frances downfall
was caused by the liberal reforms of
the Blum government, which finally
went out of office early in 1888 after
Strengthening the nations social well
fare laws. Said Willkie in his accep-
lance speech at Elwood, Ind:
while Germany was building a
great new productive plant France
became involved in unfruitful political
adventures and flimsy economic the
cries"
Willkie should know better. Hit
ler's friends in high French circles
were not the men who led the popular
front government under Blum. 1t
wasn't the French workers who con-
veniently forgot to blast the bridges
that opened the road to Paris for
Hitler's tanks.
This fake explanation of the French
collapse has recently become popular
among American employers. The
New York Times has issued a solemn
warning on the lesson of
France. In Los Angeles, as reported
by the newspaper PM, the notorious
e Manufacturers Assn. is
liverting funds from its regular union
busting activities to placard the city
with billboards reading: WHAT DES-
rROYED FRANCE? OUR NATION
AL SAFETY DEMANDS: STOP
LABOR ROWSl
The purpose of this propaganda is
obvious: Use of the national emer-
,ency as a bludgeon to beat the life
tut of New Deal social legislation
nd labor itself. II is natural that
hese well-to-do patriots are the same
ersons who have always fought labor
nd social laws, but that doesn't make
heir hypocrisy smell any sweeter
Willkie used the French example
s any shrewd employer would. Re-
erring to it at two other places in
is speech, he said:
Like the Blum government in
rance. so has our government be-
ONE entangled in unfruitful adven-
lres. AS in France, so here have
re heard talk of class distinctions
nd of economic groups preying one
pom other groups. | charge that
ne course this administration is fol
wing will lead us, like France, to
ne end of the road"
Just what are these unfruitful ad
entures of the New Deal? Willkie
sferred to most of them-the wage
our law, the Wagner labor act, the
)cial security laws. And, right down
ie line, he Endorsed every one on his
ST.
This doesn't mean that Willkie is
ding to campaign for Roosevelt.
areful study of the republican can
dates speech shows that on two
1ints he disagrees. Willkie doesn't
ke, first, the cost of New Deal re-
rms and, second, the tax burden
aced on business. He promises to
N the republican brand of New Deal
: spending as little as possible"
Any union man can guess where
e economies would be made. Would
like demand bigger appropriations
r relief? Would he insist on more
oney for low-cost housing? Would
provide the Wage-Hour Division
tn enough funds to stop wage CHS
ng by the sugar daddies of the re-
blican campaign chest?
Would Willkie extend rural electri-
alton at the expense of his consum-
gouging friends in the private util-
business? Would he want the
.RB to have staff adequate to
be with multi-million-dollar corpor-
ons? 1t was the NLRB, remember,
It found that when Willkie was
,sident of Commonwealth C South
/ Corp, the Michigan subsidiary of
company poisoned the sandwiches
a union worker.
from coast to coast, newspaper
1lishers hailed the "candor and
of Wilkes acceptance
,ech. And in that speech Willkie
IT pledged his belief in the New
al reforms, then said that these
ne reforms would lead America,
2 France, to disaster.
come out of that wood