The CIO news. (Cumberland, Md.) 1942-????, 1942-10-26

LOOKING AHEAD
By Len De Caux

that way.
Anyhow, Land is Rear Admiral (retired)."
Don't confuse him with the real admirals whose
pet mates are Jap Dattiesnips and German SUBS,
not union organizers.
No. no. Junior, he isn't called Land because he
doesn't go to sea- No, retired" doesn't mean he's
tirechiseer. And it doesn't mean he's been retired
from his present job-though he should be. Now,
no more questions-papas tired
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The Land story is hard enough to explain TO
anyone let alone Junior
The retired rear admiral and shoud-be-retired
head of the u S. Maritime Commission talked off
the-cu1 and through his brass hat at cosy lun-
cheon Of Investment bankers. He said "organzers
.. :. ought to be shot at sunrise
Afterwards, with the applause and the coffee
still warming his cookies, he made clear to re-
porters he meant union organizers" according
to the United Press.
Came the cold dawn (and still no firing squad.
With stormy waves of protest swapping his decks,
the retired but unretreating rear admiral stood
by the guns he'd leveled at his fleet
He bade his mimeograph crew shoot his whole
broadsde to the press. And his only concession to
discretion to point that in the speech itself
he didn't say what kind of organizers.
But the blunt-spoken Land was not without
delicacy. Lest his banker listeners take offense,
he listed organizers as his No. pet hate" and
profteers only No. 2.
He decreed a sudden and violent death for the
labor boys But the profteers he let off with a
warming if they could keep out of Jail and not trip
themselves up
GAS to profteers" said the tactfu Land, as the
bankers began to fdget anxiousy 1--WE will get them
if the Jail doesn't get them or if they don't get
themselves"
Land might even have been diplomatic enough
to delay sentence on the organizers had he made
his speech couple of days later before 200 union
delegates at the big Navy doings in Washington.
For the u. S. Navy Dept. summoned all these or
ganizers not to shoot them, but to offer them the
glad-hand of "closer cooperation" and to compliment
them labor's splendid production achievements.
After all, there's time and place for every
thing!
The job of the U. S. Maritime Commission
which Land heads, is to get our ships built and to
keep them sailing.
But neither the land-locked Land nor all his
swivel chair sailors can do this job alone-not even
with the help of all the profteers who richly sizzle
on the griddle of their consciences while wait
ing till Land lands EN-
1t takes quite few shipyard workers, laboring
day and night, to build the ships. And it takes
sea-going sailors to keep EN- sailing.
We may as we'll break the news to you Shoot
the-boys Land that these workers are organized.
They're organized in unions like the Industrial
Union of Marine & Shipbuildng Workers and the
National Maritime Union.
They're organized to maintain and build their
morale. They're organized to produce to the limit.
They're organized to risk their lives.
And they're organized to keep their eyes on
people like you, if you talk like fascist, if you lie
down on the job, if you don't remove bottlenecks,
and if you block our about effort for victory
AS to shooting these organizers of production
for victory, the union seamen know what it is to be
shot at. And hundreds of their organizers have
already been shot and drowned-by Nazi torpedoes,
not by bull-shootng ex-admiral
X