The union times., 1947-11-29

NEED S1RONO OOUNOIL The defeat of the six Connecticut COngressmen who voted for the Taft-Hartley Law was listed by Barry as the leading problem now before labor in this state. A strong state building trades council is necessary if this and other meas ures are to be accomplished, Barry said.
 John J. Murphy, New England Re gional Director of the American Fed eration of Labor, presided at the meet ing. Speakers also included John J Egan, State Labor Commissioner Joseph M. Rourke, secretary-treas- urer of the Conn. Federation of La bor; and Attorneys William s. Cor don, Jr., and Harold Strauch, both o1 Hartford.
 JOINT RESPONSIBILITY
 Barry dealt with the joint respon- sibility of labor and management tc stabilize the economy of this country and predicted that labor would be forced to ask for increased wages be- cause of the zooming cost of living. In his address, he said in part:
 q want first of all to bring you the greetings and best wishes of the Con- necticut State Building and Construc- tion Trades Council. The building trades have their problems, just as all sections of the labor movement have. But we have all learned one great lesson in the last few months: that IS, all the trades, building trades as well as service trades, manufacturing trades, and what have you-the day has come for joint action.
 WHY BILL PASSED
 ''One of the reasons for the pass age of the Taft-Hartley Act was that we were not working together. In almost every city in the state, a few locals carried the ball. The other locals went for a free ride. Sometimes when 1 read in anti-la- bor papers about labor being. a highly-organized group. l have to smile. 1 don't believe that more than 30 per cent of the full strength of organized labor was mobilized against the Taft-Hartley Law. This was not because the other 70 per cent favored the law. Far from it. They simply sat back on their over-stuffed chairs, and let the next fellow do it.
 
 Maybe nothing could have stopped the Taft-Hartley Law. The unholy alliance of Republicans and poll-tax Democrats were determined to cruelty the working man, and they succeeded in passing the law. But we learned our lesson-the hard way. If we are to beat back any more attempts to en- slave labor, we must have strong state building trades council, strong central labor unions, strong state as sociations, and a strong state federa- ton.
 DEFEAT ''THE SIX'
 Furthermore, i'll my opinion, we must begin nO1V to plan to defeat the six Connecticut congressman who voted for the Taft-Hartley law. Where possible, we should work to prevent them from being renominated. If this cannot be accomplished, we should see to it that they are opposed by liberal candidates who will repre- sent all of the people of their district, not just those in the high income brackets.
 ''There's a lot of talk about pre- serving democracy abroad, and Pm aH for 1t. But how about preserving at home? At a time when we're planning to spend bill lions abroad, the right of the work ing man in this country to organ ize, to strike, and use his joint strength for the betterment of him. self and his family, is restricted. that democracy?
 ''We are almost the only labor