The Wilmington morning star., 1945-01-11
BY WEsTBROOK PEGLER
Copyright, 1945. by King Features Syndica

BY WESTBROOK PEGLER
Copyright, 1915. by King Features Syndicate)
NEW YORK,-James Byrnes, the man who
wrote the supreme court opinion imputing TO
Congress an intention to legalize hight lacking
by union ~acketeers, recently remarked that
he now thought Congress should draft law
that would treat the Petrillos and the Averys
alike. He referred to the contrast between the
calm and successful defiance of the War La
Dor board by Jimmy Petrillo, the president
of the Musicians union, and the seizure for
the second time of the properties of Montgom-
cry Ward, whose chairman, Sewell Avery al
so defied the board.
Both orders lacked the force of law but
Petrillo's offense, although legal, was preda-
tory whereas Avery merely refused to inter-
fere with the rights of Ward employees and
to perform, at the expense of his stockholders
the services of bill collector for union of
the CLIO. Petrillo was demanding sales tax
on millions of musical records payable to
the national treasury of his union by the
manufacturers and subject to no accounting
He had SAID that he intended to amass a
| treasury OF one hundred million dollars He
not only defied the board but rejected hum
BILE request from President Roosevelt to waive
his demand or modify it. He finally got his
sales tax.
In discussing the two cases recently DR..
Frank Graham, a radical New Dealer who is
ostensibly public or impartial member
of the board, said all cases were decided on
their respective merits and not by rule. This
means that no defendant before the board can
know what his rights are. Doctor Ora
ham said Wards offense was more serious
than Petrllo's because it offered greater
detriment to the war program.
To make Wards defiance look more serious
| rioters of the familiar CIO-New Deal type
turned out and vandalized Ward retail store
in Detroit and the national government said
in all seriousness, that if other CLIO members
in no way connected with Wards should quit
their war jobs in mass to picket or riot the
fault again would be Wards. This reasoning
reminiscent Of situations in which Hitler blam-
ed small nations for bloodshed because they
resisted him, has directed labor or union re-
lations throughout the Roosevelt regime.
1t simply did not occur to Mr.. Roosevelt
or the War Labor board that the heads of
such unions should be blamed for violation
of their contracts with war manufacturing
plants if the workers should quit their places
to picket and riot at Wards. There was no
thought OF shutting off the strikers rations
by way OF compulsion priority materials
may be withheld from employers who re-
sist the boards orders, however unfair and
illegal
1t is doubtful that Mr. Byrnes means that
he now believes Congress should pass laws
which would treat unions and employers alike
in all respects. That would mean revision of
the Wagner act, the anti-racketeering act and
OF some OF the tax laws, all of which confer
privileges on union bosses and racketeers, in
Guiding those common underworld gangsters
who were innocent of crime in his own no.
torious opinion in the hgh-jacking case be-
cause they held cards in the Transfers I'M
ion If he did mean that he would be reading
himself out of the party. If he meant it he
would be obliged by conscience to say a word
now for the revival of the Hobbs bill which
passed the house by a good majority but was
blocked by sly and dishonest device in the
Senate until it died in committee.
The Hobbs bill would have amended the
anti-racketeering act so as to rescind the
special immunity from punishment for high
way robbery enjoyed by union racketeers
which Eyrnes, himself, read into the original
law.
1t probably would have passed the Senate,
too, if the committee had reported it out.
However, the committee never even consid-
cred it and only few days ago, Congressman
Sam Hobbs, of Alabama, its author, said that
about 1000 trucks still were being hgh-jacked
every "a hours by members of the union whose
president, Daniel Tobin, is Roosevelt's great
personal friend and political henchman. The
standard rates of extortion come to about 50
per truck but, according to Mr. Byrnes, it
could be $1OO or $1,000 just as we'll This
means that while Mr.. Byrnes is now trying
desperate measures, not all of them legal,
to persuade, lure and coerce workers to take
and keep war production jobs about 1000
able bodied loafers a high proportion of
them low, criminal buns of the Frank Hague
chapter of the Roosevelt party, doing moth
ing for 50 day.
What Mr.. By-nes probably does mean is
that Congress should add the force of law
to the decisions of the war labor board which,
at present, are only advisory, and make this
force applicable to boss union racketeers as
we'll to employers. That, however, is en-
| tirely up to Roosevelt whose influence has
| blocked in the Senate two excellent remedial
bills that passed the house The house, to its
credit stopped it's own flight from the on
slaught of the new deal union mob several
years ago, came to stand and counter-at-
tackled strongly.
Not only did it pass these two bills but its
committee investigations of the labor relations
board under Communist control, of thievery
and other rascalty in war construction jobs
and of treacherous organizations allied with
the Roosevelt party, have yielded priceless
information. The Senate, however, obedient to
tn White House lobbyists, has frustrated all
reforms and, with Roosevelt and Byrnes, is -e-
sponsible for an appalling waste of man-pow-
err and deterioration of national spirit
They still place the interests of their political
party and of unions above the interest of men
fighting in the by excluding from war
Jobs workers who refuse to join.