The Wilmington morning star., 1946-02-06
Fair Enough
By WESTBROOK PEGLER
Copyright, 1916, BY King Features Syndicate

sense. the most heartening popular dernonstra
ton by an important element of the American
people since the passage Of the Wagner Ac
and the rise of the c. l. O. disregarding, FOL
moment the question of mutiny, this revolt
has been a concerted protest against totalita
rian rule by American citizens, the overWhelm
ing majority of them civilians at heart viii
memories of freedom The homesick soldiers
angry over nasty little impositions and great
Illustrations may not have been conscious o!
the deeper reason for their threatening con-
duct. But, on analysis of hundreds OF letters
| from individuals in many far parts OF the
world ard in dreary camps here at home !
| find that they are almost unanimous IN a
fierce resentment against servitude under Z
privileged class, the officers, to which they
were reduced by their government.
Now it is not inconsistent to maintain that
communists in the Army and out have en-
couraged this disruption even though it indicts
their own political system. They work tor I'M
mediate objectves on the way to the achieve
ment of their final purpose. Disorder, insen-
safe anger, revolution and anarchy are
steps on the way to the rise OF dictatorship.
The debility OF the American Array and Navy
would be an important victory in their cam
paign.
For the information Of these angry men,
would point out that the system of privilege
volceless subjugation which they find 50 irk-
some exists in the union movement among
civilians and waits to claim them as subjects
when they get out. This system was imposed
by the Roosevelt government by means of the
Wagner Act and a Labor Relations Board
which, from the beginning and certainly not
by accident, was infested and cetrolled by
communits. Under this law, millions Of men
and women were drafted into unions whose
q or ~
human and civil rights and 50 contrived that
appeals, while theoretically possible, only
mock the victims
Does general select chateau and sur
round himself and his staff with luxury while
the enlisted soldier sleeps in shacks and sub.
sists On canned rations? As to that have
only hearsay and II it Is true then the free
American press has been guilty Of naiser-
able failure to report conditions truly and
damn the censors and pleasant social relations
between high officers and the civilian cores
pondents.
But tell you that the soldier who resents
this contrast in the Army will suffer it again
when he comes horne if he goes to work in
any OF the many occupations controlled by
the Transfers Union Of the A. F. of L., for
example. He will not be asked whether he
wants to join. He will join or 60 hungry and
cold. The Wagner Act, which processes to con-
fer on him right to choose his own collective
bargaining agent, will choose the agent for
him. Then, having joined he will receive no
lavish pay but, in most cases, mere living
and, in many cases, for very dangerous work,
freighting veritable box-cars over slippery
roads, sometimes with explosives In the car
go. And he will contribute to the royal living
which the big brass Of the union long ago
voted for Dan Tobin, the president his prince
ling sons, and themselves. Does the soldier
know that he will have to pay for the pur
chase and luxurious maintenance Of winter
palace for this big brass at Miami Beach!
Is it heinous offense in a military force
to strike or threaten a general or even show
him impudence? It is, to be sure, but the
soldier has right to theoretically fair trial
and appeals under the authority Of his ma
tiona1 government. But does the soldier realize
that, in their vast arrogance, the big brass Of
the teamsters, and other unions have made
themselves precious, special class and pro-
vided that similar violence to any Of them
constitutes an offense of special gravity? II
not let him protest at his peril for he will
not be tried by his peers but by his big brass
and will do we'll to remember that Dan Tobin
long ago laid down the dictum that teamster
who appealed to the public courts for redress
of wroags inflicted within the union was lower
than a scab who, of course, has neither hui
man nor civil rights in union jurisprudence.
Let the soldier remember that, II II is mis-
behavior under military law to get up peti-
ton to Congress over the heads OF his big
brass, then, recently in Boston, two union
men were expelled and deprived of their jobs
because they exercised their constitutional
right as free, civilian citizens to express to
committee of the state legislature their ap-
proval of a bill then pending
These are not unusual conditions in that I'M
ionism which waits to absorb and consume
the American soldier and sailor, officers as
well as enlisted men, when they come home.
They are typical Of the totalitarianism which
the Roosevelt government imposed on millions
of workers, doggedly refusing ever since, to
guarantee that the subjects of this big brass
shall oe protested in their constitutional rights
and human rights.
Those unioneers who have expressed opin-
ions the soldier rebellions have upheld the
the soldiers against the big brass in the Army.
But let those same soldiers rebel against the
big brass in the unions and they will be damn
ed as scabs, rats and finks, fascists and dis
rupters, threatened perhaps beaten, fired
from their jobs and blacklisted throughout en-
tire industries.
49,