The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1945-03-23
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Copyright, 1915, by King Features syndicase)
As in the case OF George Browne and Willie
BioH. the jury which convicted Joe Fay and
James Bove on shaking down contractors on
a $780, 0OO, 900 aqueduct job in New YORK had
tn decide whether the crooks extorted the
money by threats of labor trouble or accept
ed 1t as brides for the same purpose.
The graft proved in court by Frank 5.
Hogan, the district attorney, who personally
ran the inquiry and personally conducted the
states case, amounted to $36S,00 This was
only q portion and probably minor portion
of the loot which the people have paid Fay
and few other thieving officials OF unions
of the American Federation Of Labor in ex-
cessive costs of public works The people
ultimately pay this impost because 1t mas
become common practic among big contract
ing firms and combinations of such firms to
reckon such costs in preparing their bids. 1t
has become fixed item in their system as
well recognized as similar gratis in China and
in France.
Mr. Hogan was able to prove that in the
specific cases in which the jury found Fay
and Rove guilty, the initiative and the pres
sure came from the union bosses. However,
it is definitely known that some other con-
tractors, have been just crooked as Fay
and Bove Theirs has become, if it has not
always been, a dirty, corrupt business in
which cynical men submit to such exactions
without a struggle knowing that they can pass
the burden to the clients who hire them Tor
big construction whether the clients be tax
payers in public works or the stockholders
in private projects. They have the ethics OF
underworld gangsters and when the opportuni-
ty came to expose and destroy Fay and Cove
some of them shirked their duty as citizens
and could not be used as witnesses. In their
gangsters' code that would have been holler-
ing copper or blowing the whistle.
In the beginning, of course, the relation of
the crooked unioneers and the contra tors was
that of extortioner and victim. Inherently it
has remained so. But the crooked contractors
tough, greedy, unprincpled men, most of
them politicians - learned that the extortion
needn't hurt them and rather liked the sys-
tenn Usually, it spared them annoyance from
the actual labor on their jobs and prevented
delays in completion which call for financial
penalties under their contracts
1t surely was no surprise to Hogan that Fay
could claim personal friends among these
racketeers They are temperamentally alike
They get drunk together at their club in New
York and some Of these crooks know that if
they should try to push Fay around, Fay could
unfold few tales himself about political graft
in the distribution Of contracts. Possibly, like
Browne and Bioff, Fay and Bpve could be
tempted to testify against some of these po-
ltical gangsters in ensuing proceedings in re-
turn for lenity. In the case of Fay, at least,
that is not a promising thought, however, be-
in the underworld scale, whereas Joe has al
ways shown a correct respect for the hood
lums' code. He is vicious, thief, a brutal
thug and a bra Wing drunkard but he has his
pride as well as his price.
The status Of the actual worker in this COM
bination probably is not well understood even
by the worker, himself.
For fact his wages have risen under the
rule Of the gangsters and, in an unrea soning
and Bove benefactors True, he has no
voice in the affairs of his union and has
to accept terms and conditions as arranged
for him in private deals between the boss
unioneers and the contractors. But not all
workers are sensitive about their rights in
unionism and if crooked labor agent az
ploits them to graft fortune for himself by
threatening to call them out on strike, many
Of them justify that as legitimate reward
for his benefcent service to them.
They know, also from many painful ex-
| amples, that if they should try to run their
union affairs themselves and abolish the
crooked understanding between union officials
and employers they probably would be hurt
If not killed, and at best would be thrown
OUT OF their JOBS. Inc membership took to
heart the fate of a brother in Chicago who
tried to reform his union and went to an Of
flee of the United States Treasury to ask for
an inquiry into the income of some of the
union officials
The union bosses heard of this and one
night he telephoned Treasury agent in panic
to report that he had been chased in a down
town street and threatened by two of them.
The next night as he arrived home a street
light near his house had been knocked out
and he was shot dead, leaving large desti-
tute family.
| One OF the officials whose income this muir
dered man had brought under scrutiny was
William E. Maloney, the president of the
international Union of Operating Engineers
Fay is vice president The victim previous.
ly had pleaded with William Green, the presi.
dent Of the American Federation of Labor
for help, protesting that for his attempts at
reform he had been black-listed by the union
After an exchange of correspondence, Green
holding Maloney Green, on two notable oc
| casions has attended the rowdy social festv
ties of the ruling gang in Chicago and the
record suggests that there is nothing to be
gained but grief by appeal to him.
| 1t smacks of ,defeatism to say that the
situation seems beyond hope of reform am
not quite that lugubrious but I am convinced
that reform will never come under Green.
presidency. The A. F. of L., has never, tt
my knowledge, performed the duty of all good
citizens and its own special duty to the work
ers, to help the public prosecutors expose anc