The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1945-03-22

views Of Mr.. Pegler, and often disagree
with them as much as many OF his read,
ers. His articles serve the good purpose
of making people thinko
BY wEsTBRooK PEGLER
Copyright, 1915, by King Features Syndicate)
The trial is over and Joe Fay and James
Bove, two more crooked union officials of ths
American Federation of Labor, stand convict
ed of exploiting workers in a system Of ex-
tortion The trial was short but the preparation
was long and difficult and Frank Hogan, the
New York district attorney who prosecuted the
case, encountered on the way the obstacle OF
favor even in the court system.
Both Of these gangSters are notorious, Fay
the more so, and their loot came in part from
federal funds but although violations OF fsder-
al law thus were inherent in their crimes, the
national Department of Justice has never mo-
Tested them even to the extent OF grand jury
investigation. In the same connection, atten-
ton may be invited to the fact that Fay is a
New Jersey politician of the Frank Hague
machine which is recognized ruling subsid-
larry of the Roosevelt party and is influential
as well in democratic politics in New York.
My interest in their depredations began more
than five years ago. 1t was first aroused by
letters from practical, day-Wage workers and
by a conviction that such men should not be
prosecuted by political satraps placed over
them by a creeping dictatorship. One story led
to another and more letters came. Some were
from educated young engineers learning the
business the hard way in the great Delaware
auueduct, a tunnel being driven under noun
tains and rivers to bring water to New York
Others were from horny handed workers who
could not express themselves well and whose
educational lack obviously precluded future
much better than the bread they could earn
by the sweat of their brows. On the way down
to now, / found two republican politicians in
the pay of the crooks and constantly found
William Green, the president OF the American
Federation of Labor, unwilling to take the mi
tative against traitors to the people whom he
pretends to represent, and to the cause of
labor
This data was examined, in turn, by various
departments of the federal and state govern
rnents and by Mr. Hogan's assistants. some OF
whom ampfiled it with information from their
own sources Except as a general guide and
as clews, it was not important to Mr.. Hogan,
whose own preserving work now deserves the
gratitud. Of labor with capital but prob
ably will earn him the taunt of 'labor-balter'
from active and passive accomplices OF the
racketeers.
OF course. the conviction Of these two is
victory and a satisfactory reply. by jury, to
those motived union propag andists OF the Roose
welt following, who have denounced as tasclsm
nand union-busting the long campaign against
corruption in the union movement under
Roosevelts political patronage. But Mr.
Green's tolerance of such characters in power
full union positions and the passiveness of the
Department of Justice in the presence OF Grim
inal acts against federal levy have not been
shaken. The higher powers of unionsim In the
A. F. of L. and the national government are
still arrayed against that figure whom they
describe as the common man.
To call Fay drunken, brutal thlevlng thug
is not to abuse him but merely to describe
This iS his character He IA
all of these.
Yet, Fay is vice president OF the OPP
Grating Engineers union, whose members
have to do with excavating machinery, drill
ing in rock and kindred dangerous operations.
The union, incidentally, made many mock jobs
for common buns who infest big projects at
$40 day for strictly theoretical duties. They
are political tramps, utterly useless, and are
known as hamburger men because, in the
days when we had hanburgers, their only
duty was to fetch sandwiches from the corner
lunch wagon for the real workers This was
system Of political patronage for political ma
chine loafers.
Bove was until recently vice president of
the Hold Carriers and Common Laborers' union
whose members perform the humber, man.
ual tasks. The two unions are foul rackets,
the worse because they exploit and prey on
the men who do the work They divide juris-
dction in great construction jobs. Fay is
contractor as well as a union boss, a fact
well known to all who were interested and
often proved, and this worked both sides of
the street.
Like many OF his colleagues, Fay grew rich
through charter of the A. F. of L. and had
his winter home in Florida as well as other
homes in the north William E. Maloney, the
president of Fay's union, has, or did have, a
racing stable and Information place in that
section of the Florida east coast which j. Ed
the criminal scum. He also has an opulent
Illinois farm
Mike Carrozza Of Chicago, an immigrant
who began his American career as padrone of
a chain store system of brothels was neigh
Dor of Maloney in Florida and had near Chi
cago both a guady home estate and farm
for the culture of delicately symbolic SWINE.
He died owing the federal government debt
of $3.50, 600 representing income tax deficiency,
plus penalties. His total income we do not
know but he was able to amass this debt out
Of the wages of unionism as practiced in the
A. F of L. under Green presidency.
Joe Moreschi, the president of the Hod-car-
riers, also has big farm in Illinois. Several
members of his family were planted on the
unions payroll for sedentary, it not nominal
duties, and he became president during Pc
'riod of 81 years in which gangsters flourish
ed and died and elected their own successors
without holding a single national convention
man in Morschis racket and in the Chicago
City hall. He kept concrete pavement off Chi
Cages streets because he had power both in
l, L. -