The Wilmington morning star., 1947-02-22
As Pegler Sees 1t
BY WESTBROOK PEGLER

(Copyright by King Features Syndlcate, Ahc')
In the mournful act Of contrition performed
before the Labor Committee of the house by
J. David Stern, the Philadelphia publisher, ne
Stunned the problem of communism IN the
Newspaper Guild and obliged the bolsheviks
by substituting for honest language a Watery
reference to a mysterious motivation. The time
has come when even so QueaSy a CRUSADER
for the right-and left may speak out in
something palmer than jargon and louder than
a whisper.
Ever since Roosevelt gave diplomatic rec.
ignition to that government which later IN a
petulant moment, he was to condemn as a
dictatorship as absolute as Hitler's, our 5olos
have enjoyed an advantage Of uncompromis-
ing Americans in the verboten against Red
batting. Red-baiting was and is actually a viz
tuous activity. Like our sanitary services it
is unplea SAINT, exposing one to disagreeable
odors and sights, but if we had left it to J.
David Stern to do, and to Harold lckes and
Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt. the corruption might
have claimed our all by now, and theirs as
well, including their precious rights to riches.
These three, be it observed, are members of
that minute minority held so despicable by
some of their political colleagues, the Few hun
dred thousand who control all but a few
dollars OF our wealth.
Stern signed the first contract with the
Newspaper Guild and received as quid pro
4oO III LIN - LlllOll.
GERS, including the communists of the CLIO.
None of them was more sincere than he.
These were citations of obvious value as he
could not have been too stupid to know, having
been a man of wealth and competitive affairs
for many years. In the sullen words Of the
Philadelphia guild published soon before Stern
suspended and sold his papers, this recogni-
ton of the guild 'helped to make him a
power in the new deal at Washington which
was good for his vanity and his fortunes.
From its beginning, communism has been
not merely an issue but a pestilence in the
guild. 1t has been fought over in conventions
and a"ntl-communist tickets have been offered
for election. In New York. David Dubinskv.
OF the garment workers. a Red-baiter himself.
by the way, fought to get a charter for the
editorial staff OF his union publications to lib
crate them from a unit which he called a
communist cell, organized to contain a miscel-
laneous lot Of occasional pamphleteers and the
stalls OF outright communist papers. He de-
1eated the communists who were running the
snow IN New York, but not until he had been
abused as a boss. which he was, interfering
IN the union problems of his own little passel
o. lnk-stained wretches, as he certainly did
Unaccustomed to union life, parliamentary
tricks and politics, the genuine editorial work
ers OF the New York dailies were sitting ducks
for the communists at a time when Stern
could have helped them. Not sinfully trustful
myself, l had attended several meetings of
the World-Telegram unit before it occurred to
me that a man who was always on the plat
form and running our meetings was a stranger
to all OF us veterans of the Elwell and Hall
Mills murders, the Nick Arnstein and Bill Fal-
Ion sagas and even the meaningless little GIN
matlneeS arranged by the press-agents of
those days to introduce publicity in the guise
OF feature material. He was, it turned out. a
trade journal man but a sure-footed argumen-
tartan who somehow had come to firm but
smiling authority over us and was hell for
striking the World-Te gram. Thereupon some
OF our circulation would have gone to J. David
Stems New York Post. The net result to us
OF the World-Telegram would be an undeter-
mined spell o. payless paydays and the weak
enlng OF our paper for the benefit of a rival
SO, on the night of the strike vote, we out
stayed them and beat them. though it kept us
in a sinking hall until 2 pm. Hevwood Broun
of the World-Telegram. the national president
OF the guild. was for the strike. too. KNOWING
MS contract wouldn't be renewed, and was
planning to go to the Post. About that time
began to inspect Broun's proposals for IN.
personal motives.
Ahotner time, the New York guild ran
through a resolution against CONSUMPTION at a
sum meeting, causing some of the vaalv
brothers to circulate a letter among them selves
e.hortlng their set to attend all meetings there.
alIer: one OF these admitted that the COM
n1unlsts mad been responsible for this resol,.
lion, Stain and Hitler being allies at the time
but an eminent book-reviewer denied that com.
inuhlsts were meant at all. There were some
VIZ could spot a fascist in any Catholic but
wouldn't know a communist if tkey met Earl
BroWder face to face.
For his gunption, I could remind Stern that
III IS no longer smart to be shiftv and that
even 1aroId Ickes recently admonished Henry
~aLace mat his new little group OF Serious
thlnkers' called the Progressive Citizens 81
should have declared that commun
lists were barred and would be kicked out if
they slipped in by stealth. Mr.. Ickes. like Du-
olnSky IN his union. now has means to identify
them. Further for his heartening, l instruct
Sterr that Mrs. Roosevelt's little rival set.
called the Americans for Democratic Action,
association with communists and
their sympathizers and that Franklin, Jr., OK
the American Veterans Committee, recently
that it's growth had abated because
the AVG, like the newspaper and lawyers
guilds, had refused to bait Reds within its
ranks. For that matter even Milton Murray,
the present president of the Newspaper Guild,
took the air against Earl Browder last October |
to denounee the communists as disrupters,
plead with them to reveal themselves and say,
II think we should do something about
it-identify them"
How else to identify them except by Red
batting, Mr.. Murray did not say, but all these
little signs reveal a change. 1t would be safe
and stylish now for Mr.. Stern to speak more
frankly than he ever did when communism
was the great taboo of the new deal, and
Ickes and the widow held open fellowship with
the comrades.
Stern said he was making "atonement'' for
the disservice he did when he gave aid and
comfort to the guild and accepted pay i'll the
same coin. He may think he is, but that isn't
COR him to say. Atonement means expiration
and reparation. We're Hitler alive. Stern
wouldn't say that he had atoned for his errors
merely by saying, "excuse it, please"