The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1950-01-05
\ Union-Eye View of Progress i'm 1949

"the greatest organizer of our
time"
President Truman presented to
Congress an 11-point economic pro-
gram along with the report of his
Council Of Economic Advisors. I'm
qualified approval of Truman's
message was voiced by William
Green. The convention of United
Auto Workers concerned itself
chiefly with the economic crisis,
declaring consumer purchasing
power must be kept up. The union
applied for a strike vote at Ford
Motor Co.
August: The House approved
75-cent minimum wage, 361 to 35.
Representatives sympathetic to
labor We're forced to accept a dras-
tic slash in the number Of workers
covered by the Fair Labor Stand
ards Act.
Labor Press Associates was bar
red from membership in the Con-
gressional Press Galleries on
grounds that labor is a special
interest" A natural gas bill so
bad that it was defeated even by
the infamous 80th Congress pass
ed the House 1873 to 131. Federal
Power Commissioner Leland Olds
predicted it would cost consumers
billions of dollars. The Brannan
farm bill was killed in a Senate
Committee.
AFL Executive Council, meeting
in Toronto, approved a plan where
! by LLPE would ask each AFL
member to contribute 81 toward the
defeat of Sen. Robert A. Taft and
other enemies of labor in the 1850
Congressional elections.
Ford workers in Michigan voted
65,001 to 9540 to back up their
leaders with strike if necessary
to win economic demands of United
Auto Workers.
September: AFL President Will
lam Green predicted labor unity in
this country as result of the
new determination of the CIO to
purge itself of Communist leader
ship"
| President Truman, in a Labor
Day speech, called for farmer
worker alliance, against forces Of
special privilege. A farmer-lab
unity rally was held in Chicago
under LLPE auspices.
The 22-month Chicago strike of
Int'l Typographical U i 0 n-AFL
ended in victory All Taft Hartley
tactics against the union had fail
ed, 1900 printers got a so raise,
the laws of the ITU were recog-
Inized. Both AFL and the CIO had
backed the typo fight as a major
struggle against the Taft-Hartley
act.
Consumers scored one of their
few victories when the Senate con-
firmed the nomination of John Car
son to the Federal Trade Commiss-
ion, 45 to 25.
The Sheriff of Niagara County,
New York, dropped tear gas and
lsmoke bombs from a company
owned helicopter onto a picket line
of strikers and their wives at the
bell Aircraft Corp. A United Labor
Defense Committee of LAM, AFL
and CIO unions worked with Unit
ed Auto Workers to keep the
strikebound plant closed. UAW
asked for government intervention.
Labor Press Association, new CO.
operative news service for trade
union papers, held its first meeting.
Ruben Levin, staff writer for Labor
newspaper, was elected president;
Allan l.. Swim, editor of CIO News,
vice-president; Glen Slaughter, re-
search director of LLPE, secretary
treasurer.
More than 100 days after nego-
tiations began, Ford finally made
its first pension plan offer to Unit
ed Auto Workers. Coal operators
stopped payments into United Mine
Workers Welfare Fund and the
nations miners left the pits.
Throughout the month US Steel
and other giant steel companies
hedged on Presidential boards |
recommendations for industry-paid
pensions. After appeals from the
government showed no effect, 50O,-
600 members of United Steelwork-
ers walked off their jobs at mid
night, Sept. 30. AS the month
ended the great steel strike of
1949 began.
OCTOBER: The 81st Congress
ended its first session with most of
its work still unfinished business.
The oil industry won and the pub
lie lost when the Senate, SO to Is,
rejected the nomination Of Leland
Olds for a third fve-year term on
the Federal Power Commission.
Olds had saved consumers of cleo
tricity and gas millions of dollars.
On October 26, President Truman
signed the bill raising the mini
mum wage from 40 to rs cents,
first change in the law in II years.
Members of the United Auto {
Workers at Ford plants overwhelm- {