The Daily Alaska empire., 1948-05-07

 | ents. foremen and office help. Art. 2 states that the union will elect committee to be known as the shop committed We did not specifically i include barge loading. It has been said the longshoremen had a con- tract with MT. Rutherford that ex- tended to the Juneau Spruce On December l, 1945 the Coos Bay com- pany purchased a plant, IS miles out of Coos Bay. At the time the plant had contracts with two un- ions. We did not purchase any of the contracts. Even though these contracts had some time to run, they did not cover us and an elec-. i tfon was held to determine the bar 1 gaining agent.
 Moore: Elections can be held at any time.
 Card; An existing contract is 8 bar to an election.
 Carter: Any questions?
 Card. Here is Glen Kirkham who was present at the drawing of the contract. Glen, were you President of the L w. A. at the time the con- tract was signed?
 G. .Kirkham: Yes.
 Card Did you take charge of the negotiations?
 Kirkham: Yes.
 Card: Was there any discussion as to which employees would do the work of loading?
 Kirkham: We even wrote below and in a wire Secretary ODay said if there was any trouble with the longshoremen to let them know. We also informed the longshoremen that we could not allow them to load the scows.
 Card: This contract was to cover everything at the plant?
 Kirkham: We said we would not touch anything that went on sea- goirg vessel that had it's own rig ging. We never made a move without word from headquarters.
 Ninnis: What is the feeling now as to loading barges?
 Kirkham: They only refuse to cross the picket line.
 Ninnis: Regardless of the picket line, what is their feeling?
 Kirkham: They do not want the h, n time the contract was drawn we wanted all the work ourselves, we did not want anyone to have any of the work.
 Card At that time you wanted to do all the work?
 Kirkham: Anything.
 Ninnis: And on big ships? | Kirkham: We delivered to the Bull Rail. On the small barges we would load up to a certain number of feet.
 Ninnis. Was that in the con- tract?
 Kirkham: No. That was verbal among the rest. Card: At the time, did the union have in the wage book issued by the headquarters wages for this work? Kirkham: Yes, when low wages were $50 an hour.
 Card: Tn that book was there any wage rate for loading barges? Kirkham: think remember that there was at $1.55 and we talked about it and asked for 10c more an hour, $165
 Card. If that was not your work, there would have been no reason for having it in the book?
 Kirkham: That is right.
 Ninnis: In other words, your union did everything?
 Kirkham: That is correct. They wanted to take over green load and other things. They wanted what was impossible do not see why we cannot load our own scows with our own equipment. Our head quarters said anything for the hold we could not load; only anything that went on deck.
 Ninnis: Did you load anything below deck?
 Kirkham: No
 Card: On ships where there was tackle the longshoremen loaded
 Kirkham: Our men want to handle this because it gives them overtime. Sometimes g hours with out stopping; that means some thing They still want to load these scows and barges.
 Hendrickson: Is the Secretary there now? MT. ODay?
 Card: Mo- he is in Sitka, with the Pacific Lumber Inspection Bureau. Hendrickson: Who is the Presi- dent now?
 Kirkham: William Flint.
 Carter: This is my idea of the situation. From the evidence sub- mitted to the committee. the only point is as follows: The I.L.W.U claims all juridiction because of an agreement with the Juneau Lumber Mills. The Company contends that TO agreement is binding on the Juneau Spruce except the one with 271.
 Card: That is fair estimate.
 Car+er. We r,lan to ask the long,