The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1943-10-04
BY WEsTBRooK PEGLER

BY WESTBROOK PEGLER
NEW YORK; want to use the incident of
the Endorsement of Matthew M. Levy for the
New York Supreme Court by the American
Labor Party as an occasion to demonstrate
again the utterly cynical and dishonest char
acter of this parasitical paper organization.
1t is, as I have written before, wholly mis-
named. 1t is not American, but European, in
method and political philosophy, and it does
not represent labor, but is just a political
blackjack in the hands Of small group of
pushful opportunists.
Levy, who formerly was counsel for local
306 Of the malodorous BroWne-Bioff theater
and movie racket, was hand-picked by Alex
Rose, the boss Of the Hat, Cap and Millinery
Workers Union of the AFL who is also state
secretary of the American Labor Party. Levy
then received also the Endorsement of the
Democrats who felt called upon to repudiate
their regular nominee, Magistrate Thomas A.
Aurelio, because Aurelio had been exposed as
a devoted associate of an underworld racke-
teer known as frankie Costello.
The pretense was, of course that Levy was
fine man by contrast with Aurelo and that
he was friend of labor. The fact show
ever, as Rose and David Dubinsky, president
of the International Ladies' Garment Workers
Union, both must well know, that he was a
complacent associate of some of the foulest
scoundrels in the dirtiest of all underworld
union rackets. Dubincky also is power in
the American Labor Party, and some of his
unions well as some of Roses, have mani
tested the Europeanism of their political in
stinct by ordering the members to turn out
for political rallies for their candidates under
penalty of a fine for failure.
Fiorello La Guardia also Endorsed Levy,
but, of course. La Guarda would, because
Levy had the support of the New Deal and
Washington, and was accepted by the New
York Democrats under Washington pressure
and for no other reason.
Now Rose, Dubinsky and La Guardia all
must have known very well that Levy had
not only been counsel for a local of the
Browne-Bioff mob, but had added his voice
to the clamor in defense of Browne at a
time when independent newspaper initiative
had revealed indisputably that Browne was
ruling by terror and preyng on the workers
as well on the employers. They knew
that whereas Aurelio's friend. Costello, was
just an underworld crook dealing in slot ma
chimes and crap games Levy's gangster en-
ployer was brutal enemy and betrayer of
labor.
Yet to win political office for their party,
these men indorsed Levy as friend of labor,
let nobody tell you that any of these men,
Levy himself, ignorant of the charac-
ter of this union at the time that Levy at
tended its convention in Louisville In June,
1910, and publicly eulogized its president,
George Browne. The criminal nature of the
mob had been thoroughly exposed all over
the country and Levy, by being counsel to
the local union had a chance to study it.
Nevertheless. at that convention there we're
presented great outpouring of resolutions
of sympathy for Willie Bioff, the old brothel
keeper, and Brownies personal representative,
who at that time had been extradited from
California to serve six months in Chicago for
running a house of prostitution there some
years before. And Levy attempted to hearten
the racketeers by denouncing as poison the
expose of his friends. Showing the attitude
of union bosses toward one of their partners
caught in treason to the workers. resolutions
were presented from a dozen individuals and
unions, expressing great sympathy for, and
| confidence in, Bioff.
Among those who wired Bioff his personal
wishes for the best of luck in your present
difficulties" was Meyer L. Lewis of San Fran
cisco, the authorized ambassador plenipoten-
| tiary of William Green on the West Coast.
Another who hoped that Bioff would soon re-
turn to Hollywood, where he was notorious
for his racketeering, was j. w. Buzzell. the
secretary of the Central Labor Council of Los
Angeles.
| just mention these Endorsements of a his.
toric scoundrel by way of imrressing on you
the calous dishonesty of the professional
unioneer
1t is now possible that even with possession
OF the facts about Aurelio and Levy, the voters
will elect one or the other, rejecting George
Frankenthaler. the Republican, the only clean
man in the field. That however. is the
voters right.