Evening star., 1950-09-09
The PoEticdI Mill
The PoI;tiedI Mill
Organized Labor Cracks
Whip on Fair Dealers
Democratic Leaders Are Told
Whom They May Nominate
By Gould Lincoln

ny Soul0 Lincoln
With a congressional campaign now
fully underway, organized labor is crack
ing the whip over the backs of the Tru-
man Fair Dealers-or If you prefer,
the Democratic Party. 1t tells the Dem
ocratic leaders whom to nominate or
not to nominate and whom it will
support. In very considerable number
of cases, when the organized labor whip
cracks. the Democrats jump through
the hoop. A recent example-Louis' Hol-
lander. State chairman of the CLOS
Political Action Committee, turned
thumbs down on Judge Albert Conway
of the New York Court Of Appeals.
selected by the Democratic leaders Of
New York City to be the party nominee
for governor. The result-Judge Conway
withdrew from the race. Mr.. Hollander
charged that Judge Conway was anti
labor. anti-Negro and Taft-like in his
conservatism. Apparently the five New
York City leaders, including Ed Flynn.
boss of the Bronx, had overlooked these
traits in Judge Conway when they
picked him for governor.
This power of life and death over
Democratic nominees for high Office
assumed by the CIO and the AFL-is
NOT new. Back in 1914, when the selec.
ton of vice presidential candidate to
run with the late President Franklin D.
Roosevelt was very much up in the air,
the instructions were to clear it with
Sldney'-the late Sidney Hillman ma
tional chairman of the CLOS PAC. 1t
was cleared with Sidney" and Senator
Harry S. Truman of Missouri, now Presi-
dent, was nominated for Vice President.
hot
President, Alben S. Barkley, then Sena-
tor from Kentucky, and James F.
ByrneS, now Governor ELECT of South
Carolina, were turned aside as not
cleared"
Really Wanted Wallace.
Mr.. Hillman and the other labor
leaders really wanted Henry Wallace for
the vice presidential nomination in that
year. but they couldn't get him. So they
took Mr.. Truman, and might have taken
Associate Justice Douglas of the United
States Supreme Court except that Mr.
Truman was given the first chance by
President Roosevelt and his Democratic
national chairman. the late Bob" Han
negan of Missouri.
The power to OK and to veto can
didates for public Office is a tremendous
power 1t is more difficult for the leaders
of the CIO and AFL to exercise such
power in a direct primary, but in Dem
ocratic national conventions, as in 1914,
and in Democratic State conventions,
whele nominations are really made by
the leaders, it is quite easy.
In New York, the CIO was not able
to get one of the four men it tapped
for the gubernatorial nomination-Rep-
,fo%; n
Oscar r. Ewing, Federal Security Ad-
minstrator; w. Averen Hartman, rowing
ambassador, or Robert F. Wagner, son
of Senator Wagner, resigned, and bor-
ough president of Manhattan. But it
got Representative Walter A. Lynch.
an ardent Fair Dealer and entirely
To that extent alone-the failure to
accept one of the four named by the
CIO-PAC as acceptable-the New York
Democrats appeared to retain their in
dependence.
Emergency" Dinner.
Last night, President Truman dined
behind closed doors with fifty rep
resentatives of the CLOS PAC and AFI,
League for Political Education at the
Statler Hotel in Washington. It was
explained that this meeting was to dis
cuss labor's role in the national emer-
gency." Since the President was meeting
with the political experts of the labor
organizations it was surmised that the
national emergency" might mean the
coming congressional election just as
much as the war emergency.
In considerable measure, this election
is an emergency and national one. 1t
&c +al oT
it will determine whether the country is
to continue going down the rosy road
outlined by the socialistic Fair Deal.
Up to date, the Fair Dealers and their
organized labor allies have met number
of rebuffs in primary elections-for ex-
ample when Senator Pepper of Florida
and Graham of North Carolina were
defeated for nomination and more
conservative Democrats named. Some
thing similar happened in the Presi-
dents own home State, when the Mis-
souri, Democrats turned down a Truman
Fair Dealer for the senatorial nomi-
nation and nominated Democrat of ths
Harry Byrd type.
The President and his labor allies,
therefore, had plenty to talk about
for example, how they were to knock
off Senator Robert Taft, Republican, in
the Ohio election, and save Senator
Thomas, Fair Deal Democrat and chair
man of the Senate Labor Committee.
in Utah. Senator Thomas is running
against q former president of the
National Manufacturers Association.
Should the Democrats and the labor
leaders lose in both those contests, the
blow really would be severe.