The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1943-10-02
Nv WEsTBROOK PEGLER

NEW YORK, - Rear Admiral Emory S.
Land. chairman of the United States Maritime
Commission remarked amid cheers, to the
recent convention of the Industrial Union of
Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of the CLIO
that he was persuaded that union leaders
we're smarter men than the representatives
Of industrial management, having greater pa
tience and endurance in long-drawn-out nego-
tiatons.
This is either silly or a pernicious state
ment from man in Lands position because
it was uttered for purposes OF lngratlation
and I have no doubt, to atone for Lands
earlier crack that union organizers interfering
with war production fought to be shot at
sunrise and because, as Land very well
knows it not only omits but tends to becloud
the existence of the other side of the story.
The important phase that Land didn't dis
cuss is well known to all industrial executives
and all union bosses and is the result of
studied political policy of the new deal gov
eminent. The truth is that union bosses have
nothing else to do but promote their own per-
sonal interests and their unions interests and
have no responsibility under law. The indus
trial executive, on the other hand, has bust
ness problems prorities, contracts, taxes, re-
n negotiation, production, and many laws and
regulations to occupy his time and consume
his energies. In one case OF which nave
personal knowledge, huge manufacturing
Company in the Middle West found itself
snarled in negotiations with five different I'M
Tins at one time, some of them presenting
competitive jurisdctonal claims and w
compelled to maintain on a permanent basis
living quarters in Washington for number
of important executives who were constantly
being dragged away from their vital produc-
ton jobs in the war plants to sit through
conferences with the unoneers and the Labor
Relations and War Labor boards in which
the unions deliberately stalled. The employ
ers wanted to sign contracts and get on with
the Job but the unions had plenty of time and
they raised petty issues for no other purpose
than to gum up the works and wear down
the anagement men.
The new school of unioneer developed and
encouraged by the new deal, is an expert
shyster, schooled in a repertoire OF time
wasting and in some cases. the company
which is being harassed and victimized in
these negotiations is compelled to pay the
wages of men who do productive work
whatever in the shops but occupy themselves
solely with the promotion of grievances cali
ing for negotiations and sometimes leading to
deliberate showdowns. This happened at a
Brewster Aeronautical plant when the man.
agement refused to fire guard enrolled in
the Coast Guard Reserve who had reported
a union steward for loafing one hour and
Is minutes in the Mushroom. The guard was
slugged next day by three men and required
hospital treatment and the union dismissed
him from it's rolls and called on the company
to him. The company refused but gave
in after five days of retarded production and
thus another of Admiral Lands smart I'M
ioneers had won another victory a COM
pany but at the expense of American soldiers
and sailors fighting in
Moreover, it is union policy nowadays to
require mutual agreement between the COM
pany and the union the preparation of
lists of men for whom deferment is to be
asked, and this means that the smart union
official is given the right TO write his own
deferment merely by refusing to okay the list
unless his own name and the names of his
friends are it. I have no knowledge of
any actual case of the selling of deferment
by this means, but knowing the character
of many unioneers I would not put it past
them to shake down eligible Stacker for
hundred or a thousand dollars, very
obvious business opportunity. Joe Curran S
communist front Maritime Union regularly |
holds its own courts-martial and condemns
sailors for "antiunion" activity which includes |
anticommunist activity and lese majesty to |
Curran, dismissng them from union men,
bership; which means that they are then re-
ported to their draft boards as no longer
eligible LOT QelerIneQJ as merchant SGdInen. |
The temptation to a corrupt unioneer to |
threaten a rank and-file sailor with charges
calling for union trial and probable dismis-
sal and certification to his home board as an
eligible draftee need not be dwelt upon.
The unioneer is, of course, smart as
Admiral Land says but unlike the manage
ment man, he may be a criminal with rec
ord or living under false many
OF them do and yet the law is all on his side
and stacked against the company and the
fighting men who need the factory production
and against the people of the United States
who today are buying bonds to pay for such
delays and idling.
The law and all procedure encourage the
smart unloneer to promote grievances and
keep negotiations endlessly in progress, but
Land could honestly have said in justice to
the management men that in their futile
struggles against such activities t e y are
more likely patriotic and conscientious than
dumb