The Wilmington morning star., 1947-01-13
As Pegler Sees 1t
BY WEsTBROOK PEGLER
Copyright, 1s47, BY King Features Syndicate.

racketeer against punitive" and 'vlndlctlve
laws. he found himself again walking the
picket line with the leg-breakers and black
mailers who live on labor but never for or by
labor.
Just as the Bolshevik traitors decry red
batting" so also the Joe Fays, the Brownies
and Bioffs and hundreds OF other dirty parasites
have howled against every proposal to drive
them out Of the union movement.
Is that law punitive which forbids an EN-.
ployer to send ~sluggers at night to beat up
workers who have undertaken to form a union?
If so, then the Wagner Act should be expung-
ed for that reason alone. Are these laws vindic-
tive which compel a corporation to account for
its money and, particularly, forbid the comp
any to dump a million, more or less, into a
campaign to elect its own man governor and
its own corporate officials to the legislature
or congress?
These laws were passed to place restraints
on reckless and corrupt business and they are
regarded as punitive and vindictive only by
those who are restrained from evil.
What are the proposals as to unions which
would be regarded as punitive and vindictive?
These terms are applied to all proposals
that are offered to curtail the powers OF union
bosses, to erase the union dollar-sign from the
ballot and to protect the rights OF the com
munity and the individual worker. 1t the ma
ton should wait for the sanction Of the pro-
fessionals of unionism no reform ever could
be wrought. In their selfish judgment, all sug-
g~estions are punitive and vindictive.
Who would be punished, however, by a
legal provision that a worker. who is COM
PEELED to join a union or starve, shall have a
right to a fair trial, not by some group OF I'm
derWorld acketeers but by an impartial body,
when he is brought up on charges of 'un-union.
like conduct" My friends in the union move.
ment reproach me for taking extreme views
* ~, 7 e~oal, IF 1,pIor -aoEAfoArc DC tho
controllers of unions. I acknowledge that these
are not typical groups, although they are more
numerous than my union friends admit. These
underworld gangs, be it remembered, do not
become such until they have been publicly ex-
posed, and thus many typical ruling bodies
enjoy a false seeming OF virtue until they are
exposed. Others remain respectable indefinite
|1y only because there are not enough man
hours in the lives of the newspaper reporters
to attend to them. Be this noted, too, that the
American Federation of labor is forbidden by
its constitution and by the jealousy of the little
kings who command the internationals to elm
mate crooks from its subordinate unions.
This being the acknowledged fact, it is
clear for even President Truman to see that
the worker and the community, and even the
A. F. of L. itself, at present have no protec'
ton against racketeers and tyrants. I am will.
ing to waive the word 'underWorld' and direct
the attack against those racketeers who are
respectable but racketeers, nevertheless, such
as Jimmy Petrillo, of the musicians, and Oar
Tobin, of the Teamsters. When a union collects
money from employers for unnecessary work
or for standby work which is not at all ano
often does not even call for the presence OF
the idle standby, that is a racket. The principle
here is that of the robber barons.
The limitations on the right to work can.
not be judged by the sober conduct of the ex-
emplary unions. They must be judged by the
l.: f~~ - = I@-~ 49, .@ -&4I
the evil dramatized, and yet Mr.. Truman is one
of those who would regard as punitive a law
to limit these powers.
I have submitted the cases of needlework
unions, Dubinsky's and Hillman's, which
ordered the members to come to political
rallies for candidates who were, at best, radi
calls themselves, and had carried on flagrant
political traffic with the Communists. In Cali
fornia, in 1914, the actors and radio perform.
ers were assessed 81 each for Roosevelt's cam
paign fund by order of the politicians Of the
executive body acting under their general
The late Bill Fields paid under pro.
test and Cecil B. De Mile abandoned a lucra-
tive radio program rather than pay one dol.
lar. These citizens were ordered to contribute
to a political candidate who was repugnant to
them and no man can say that a law to for
bid that kind of assessment would abridge any
right Of labors.
Much has been made of the new Massa,
chusetts law to compel unions to file a public
accounting of their money. That, too, is said
to be punitive, but mere ccountability means
nothing. A union crook accounts for the
money if he merely reports truthfully that he
took in so much and that, under his %constitu-
tional power, he cast his own unanimous vote
to give it to himself.
The purposes for which money may be
spent must be limited to legitimate uses OF
that union itself for its own benefit as a col
lective bargaining agency, otherwise, the boss
es or even a majority Of the members may col
lect a days pay, as some unions did during
the war, to support an "underground' system
Of political and military espionage in foreign
lands.
This purpose should be illegal and prob
ably is, although it would be childish to be.
lieve that the Department Of Justice would
An underground movement never was con-
templated as a legitimate mission of a labor
union. |
In Petrillo's union and in several others,
the worker charged with ''un-unionlike" con-
duct appears to enjoy a right to a fair trial and
appeals, but that right vanishes in the final
appeal to the President, whose powers are
final and absolute. In most Of the others the
right to a fair trial and appeals is frustrated
by the tediousness, expense and risk which re.
duce the individual to the status of serf.
Reform would punish and restrain no man
of good intentions, and certainly labor could
not be hurt by a provision that unions, which
enjoy special rights under federal law, as
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