The people's voice. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1939-1969, 1943-06-11

with the proof that congress thinks
$4,000 year is not enough for the
boss, while wages are being stabilized.
Such policies as these do not make
very inspiring leadership for the mil
lions who must do the actual work
of this war
The-dollar patriots in congress and
on the newspaper editorial pages are
now pointing the accusing finger at
unauthorized work stoppages, and
quoting labor's no-strike pledge.
So be it, but this does not convince
the workers that other pledges which
wer made to them are now being kept.
The workers are not convinced that
a pledge of fair treatment at the
honored when they must wait for
months or even a year to get deci-
sion on requests for wage and griev-
ance adjustment, only to find that the
signals have been changed against
them while the government delayed
their cases.
The month of May brought to the
American worker elimination of a
series of disillionments about the eco
nomic administration of the war. The
bitter truth that they are being be-
trayed is being driven home to them
There is another gap" besides the
one which the economists call infla-
tionary, a gap" which nobody is do
ing anything about. That is the enor-
nous gap between PERFORMANCE
and those noble promises of fairness
and equity which were made to the
working people before the New Deal
became the wars first casualty.
Economic sacrifices there will be,
and we shall bear them cheerfully.
But we are determined that the sac
rifices of one shall not be the profit
of another"
That was the promise President
Roosevelt made to a nation of people
facing war in his message to congress
on July 81, 1941. The President, how
ever, reckoned without his congress.
The words were only promise They
have not been proved pro-
phetic
This trouble on the labor front in
he midst of war is but a reflection
If this continuing failure of the gov
to make good it's pledge to
he workers. Unauthorized work
'toppages are to be deplored, and we
leplore them as short-sighted and in
effective and even dangerous, but they
will not be cured by decree. In last
nalysis all the anti-strike pledges pa
riotic labor officials may give will
lot make industrial robots out of dem
cratic American workers.
These strikes are but straws in an
vii wind that blows nobody good in
he gale of a reactionary economic
olicy which blows from the halls of
ongress, wreaking havoc with our
var effort throughout the length and
readth of the nation
In this hour of crisis organized Ia
or does not propose to allow the
oliticians on Capitol Hill to provoke
omestic strife on such a scale as to
Utility the military campaigns of the
Inited Nations, which are geared as
ever before to American assembly
mes. Nor does labor propose to per-
lit the fifth column within this ma
on to undermine our war effort by
'eezing the worker in an untenable
economic position.
There is a way out The dilemma
an be resolved by closer cooperation
etween the government and the or
anized labor movement. Such COOP
ration can be translated into effec-
We action if the anti-labor elements
Re driven out of the war administra-
on and Labor given its proper rec
5nition in the war councils of this
alton. Let the OPA for example be
IN by an administrator who stems
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