Toledo union journal. [volume] (Toledo, Ohio) 1942-current, 1948-12-24
Cavil~Cade
By Les Finnegan
Labor Press Associates

The big news of the week for the work
ing classes of the world came from Emily
Post, supreme dictator of etiquette and man.
ners. Mrs. Post advised us plebians that ANY
man, tycoon or truck driver, could learn to
act like gentleman if he'd slip into dinner
jacket before he digs into his caviar or corned
beef and cabbage And the little woman would
get a lot more respect if she'd serve up the
ham hooks in long-flowing dress instead of
slacks and an apron" The problem really
goes much deepr than that. It's even reported
from some sections of the country that men
have been coming to work at mines and ma
chine shops NOT wearing striped pants and
morning coats. An even greater threat to
American manners and the gentle life is the
rumor that some wage earners wives wash
their own dishes do their own laundry, take
care of the children, do the shopping and pre-
pare the meals. And they compound this mad
toward the nations self-destruction by
not wearing "long flowing dresses It's nice
world Mrs. Post lives in. AS far as she's con-
cerned labor-managem spats are something
negotiators wear to cover up their expensive
silk socks.
FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover announced
that "a major crime is committed in the nation
on the average of once every 1877 seconds"
And that doesn't count the employers who are
still paying the 4Oc-an-hour minimum wage
Chemists employed by General Electric
are said to have invented the worlds thinnest
paper-so thin that it disappears after one
handling. This is the ideal material for pay
checks which have the same characteristics.
On Dec. 3rd the Gallup Poll found that
Americans suffer more from insomnia than
the people of any other nation On Dec 49,
L. Gerald Koch, founder of 'Be-Kind-To-
People-Week" announced he wanted to put
everyone to bed for seven days and nights
That's not the sort of thing to do year before
we're taking national census, but the point
of the story is that Koch was found to be a
bed manufacturer. When his employees sug-
gested that he set the example by giving them
days and seven nights in bed Koch fell into
deep and prolonged sleep.
Through the ages union members have
given million and one different kinds of rea-
sons for getting pay raises, but this one is
positively unique. A worker at the Bureau of
Printing & Engraving, in Washington, where
the country's currency is printed, proposed
that he and his fellow employees should get
the highest salaries in the government. His
reason: I'VE handle millions of dollars a day
at work; we develop mental state which
tends to make us extravagant with our own
money after work. You can't have healthy
respect lOF 9zU Dill Oh your own Wnen you
kick around $1,000 bills all day long at work.
Most of us are in debt because we can't appre-
ciate the value of money like other people"
P. S.-No raise.
Some editorial writers are still complain
ing that they can't understand why labor op-
poses the Taft-Hartley law. Well, here's one
reason that's happened five different times re-
Gently An ant-union employer saw his first
chance in Is years to get rid of militant
union in his plant. Deliberately he refused
to negotiate wage increase and forced the
union to call strike Immediately the boss
hired several hundred scabs and strikebreak-
ers At his instgation they asked for an
NLRB election to decertify the legitimate
union. This was quite proper, declared the
NLRB, and then acting as though it were a
major stockholder in the company the Board
ruled that the strikers would not be permitted
to vote. The union out, the jobs were
gone and a company union of goons was rec
ognized. Even with evidence like this the edi-
torial writer's can't understand why labor now
contends that the initials NLRB stand for New
License for Reactionary Bosses.