The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1950-09-21

italist sentiment has been cloakeC
in such phrases as making capital
ism work, saving free enterprise
etc. Government determination tC
prescribe the direction and func.
tions of the economy has also beer
made clear in numerous officia
documents. For proof we need only
study the recommendations of the
congressional report on the Pres
ident's report March 1950) that
government take a hand in pricing
steel and determining the conduct
of that industry.
The very suggestion of such
regulations in peacetime speaks
volumes. 1t illustrates the spreac
of collectivist thinking and the
depth of its inroads. Last, it throws
into relief the view of Earl Browd-
er, former communist chieftain in
the u. S., that:
Estate capitalism, in substance
if not in formal aspects, has
progressed further in America
than in Great Britain under the
labor government. -. The
actual, substantial concentra-
tion of the guiding reins of the
national economy in govern
ment hands is probably on a
higher level in the U. s."
\ !. !.
To return to the scramble that
marks the ascent of the all-power-
full state. The reasons for labor's
lack of foresight and its unread
mess to accept responsibilities
commensurate with power are not
far to seek. If there was one single
instrument that paved the way for
labor's spectacular rise, it was the
New Deal. Whatever ideas took
root in the workers movement of
post-Gompers days were planted
and nurtured by the bright young
men of FDR's first administration.
Practically nothing of the phil
osophy and hand-out practices of
the new American order sprang
from organized labor itself.
There were exceptions to the
rule, among them Walter Reuther,
whose political and social credo
stemmed from his early associa-
tion with the Socialist movement
However, he and many labor union
lists soon accepted the basic pre-
misses Of New Dealism and march
ed in the direction indicated by
election returns.
J. \ i
Labor's growing dependence on
government is further proved by
the wholesale Identification of
many unions with the interests of
the ruling political party. Most
union resolutions of recent years
conform basically with the postu-
lates and policies of what by then
had come to be known as the Fair
Deal. Thus influential union seq
ments resignified approval of
broad state intervention and will
ingness to leave industrial rela-
tions issues to the dictum of bur
eaucrats, presidential fact-finding
boards, etc.
The explanation vouchsafed for
this departure from the Gompers
concept of an industrial relation
ship freely entered into by both
sides is that union concessions to
the state have paid ample divid-
ends in membership, economic
standing and public prestige. But
such being the case, it is obvious
that labor is no longer free to
make its own decisions and that the
union hosts of the nation
have became hostages and auxili-
aries of government, so to speak.
Moreover, by bartering theirl
souls for temporary gains, thel
unions are being welded into thel
new collectivism born of the pro-
misses of the benevolent state and
the hopes fostered by the New
Fair Deal-the deal which disin-
herited the American socialist
and converted its spirit
lal values into governmental poll
teal coin.
:: I: i
Can organized labor continue tol
meet political and economic emer-
gencies on purely pragmatic
basis? Will it, as the junior part
ner in an alliance that worships at
the affairs of strange gods, be able
to cope with the challenges of to-
The answers are not altogether
Unable to create a new
labor philosophy or to add to Com
pers' spiritual legacy, not a few