Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1943-02-20
Rucketeerinq Issue

The controversy which is develop
ing around the Hobbs bill to bring
unlawful labor activities within the
scope of the Federal anti-racketeer-
ing law seems to be generating more
heat than light.
In decision last March the Su-
preme Court held that Congress had
not intended to apply the racketeer-
ing law to unions. At the same time,
however, the court suggested that
Congress might appropriately deal
with this question through legisla-
ton, and that is what Mr.. Hobbs is
asking his colleagues to do.
Involved in the Supreme Courts
decision were the activities of Ger
tain members of the Transfers
Union in the New York area. The
evidence showed that these union
members lay in wait for trucks COM
ing into New York, forced their way
onto the trucks and, by beating or
threatening to beat the drivers, ex-
acted payments of sums of money
equivalent to the union scale for a
days work. In some instances the
union men assisted or offered to as
sist in unloading the trucks; in
others they simply took the money
and disappeared. Since the law pro-
vided an exemption for Legitimate"
union activities, the court held that
Congress had not intended to cover
practices of this sort-a view which
brought from Chief Justice Stone
the dissenting observation that such
theories would render common law
robbery an innocent pastime" 1t
was to overcome the effect of this
decision that Mr. Hobbs offered the
amendment now under conSidera-
ton, which, as he describes it, would
make the racketeering statute ap-
plicable to ANY one who unlaW-
fully interferes with interstate COM
merce, whether he carries a union
card or not"
Spokesman for organized labor
have denounced the Hobbs proposal
IN its entirety. In the opinion of
Philip Murray, president of the CLIO,
1t is nothing more than a Subter-
fuge to eliminate the language now
n the bill which protects "legiti-
mate labor activities. And Joseph
A. PadWay, general counsel for the
ALL, contends that what the bill
really does is to limit labor's peace
full and ordinary activities" 1t is
safe to assume, however, that neither
Of these men believes that the con-
duct ascribed to the teamsters is
either Legitimate" or a peaceful
and ordinary form of labor activity"
Yet, taking at face value their oppo-
sition to the Hobbs amendment and
their failure to propose any alterna-
tive, it is difficult to escape the i'm
preston that what they really want
is to preserve the racketeering law
as interpreted by the court, which
would have the effect of granting a
continued immunity to the worst sort
of labor practices.
1t may be, as Representative Walter
has suggested, that the Hobbs pro-
posal is not the best remedy. Per-
haps it is SO broad that it might be
applied to the detriment of legiti-
mate labor activity in the real sense
Of that term. But if this is the case,
spokesman for labor would render
greater service to their own cause
and to their country by suggesting
constructive changes instead of rely
ing on infammatory denunciations
of the one effective change that has
been proposed. Particularly in this
period of wartime stringency, labor
leaders ought not to be demanding
the perpetuation of abuses which
waste the Nations manpower and
exact a toll of millions of dollars
from those who want to work.