The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1948-12-23
Humphrey Wants Labor
Active In Politics Full-Time

IxNkx vS Ill i III
New York LPA)-Labor and
liberals in the US must not be
satisfied with election day wins
only. They must stay in politics
the year round, Senator-elect HUI
bert Humphrey Cd, Mimi told a
League for Industrial Democracy
dinner in his honor last week.
Chairman Of the dinner was LID
President Nathaniel Minkoff, sec
retary of the New York Dress Joint
Board, Int'l Ladies Garment Work
ers Union-AFL. Among the pro-
minent unionists present were
ILGWU President David Dubinsky,
New York State CIO President
Louis Hollander, and President A.
f. Whitney of the Brotherhood of
Railroad Trainmen.
Labor can no longer content it
self with being merely a campaign
partner in the fight for a liberal
program" Humphrey told his list
eners, many of them leaders of un-
ions which elected him to office
over anti-labor Sen. Joseph Ball
OR, Mimi.
"Organized labor and liberals flex
their political muscles every two
to four years. 1t is the decisive
factor in winning elections for the
Democratic party-my party. But
it has never been accepted or fore
ed its way into the inner councils
of the strategy board and planning
committees of the party structure" !"
the new Senator declared.
Urging labor to take advantage
of its victory, Humphrey said:
! an this year of 1948, victory for
liberal democracy will be deter
mined and evaluated not by the
celebrations over the vote count
ing on Nov. 2, but by performance
on the pledges Of the platform of
July 1948. The people in America
voted on issues. The people voted
for an expansion and continuation
of the beginning that was the New
Deal"
Discussing foreign policy issues,
Humphrey said that "our national
leadership must clearly under
stand that democratic rehabilita-
tion of Europe is to be found in
the cooperative movement, the
trade unions, the social democratic
parties-those who during the
'thirties had the courage to resist
the onrush of fascism and the tenn
ptations of Communism"
Just as the election was a rebuke
to reaction it was also a mandate
to make "no compromise with Com
munism abroad, or fuzzy-thinking
parlor-pink Communist frontism
at home," the Minneapolis mayor
pointed out.
ILGWU President ID b n s k y
warned that the reactionaries left
in Congress will talk compromise"
when the new legislature meets.
He said that they will attempt to
deprive labor of the fruits of its
victory, for within those velvet
gloves there is the nailed fist of
antagonism to union labor"
The ILGWU leader also remind
ed the Democratic party that labor
has not given it "an unconditional
vote of confidence" He declared
that the administration and the
new Congress will be judged by
their adherence to the liberal-la-
Dor policy of the Democratic plat
form.
Despite the fact that "the Com
munist-created Wallace adventure
has served to discredit and make
obnoxious the idea of a third
party" such independent political
action was long the hope of sin
cere liberals and union people,
Dubinsky said. If they suffer "dis-
illusionment' at the hands of the
people they elected in November,
there will be a drastic and pro-
found change in their attitude to-
wards the Democratic party and
its leaders"
In such situation, Dubinsky as
A. L e.
the iiberal-labor line will seek
other channels of political express
sion. New life and new substance
will be infused into the idea of
third party, of a party that will
have the blessings and support of
the entire labor-liberal front as no
such political undertaking has had
before"