The Union Review (Galveston, Tex.), Vol. 20, No. 39, Ed. 1 Friday, January 19, 1940 Page: 1 of 4
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Ohe LCnion eview
Vol. 20. No. 39.
GALVESTON, TEXAS, FRIDAY, JANUARY 19, 1940.
Subscription Price $1.50 Per Year.
EHBHHHHHHHHHHHHHHeeeHaee-a*epagaeHeHHHHH
TO A FRIEND
ganization. First of all was the resig- increase protection for women work-
and
(Continued on Page 4)
*
A. F. OF L ENDORSES U. S. FINANCIAL
EDUCATION ASSISTANCE TO STATES
Federal Grants-in-Aid, Administered by State Authorities, Are
Held of Primary Importance in Equalizing Educational Op-
portunities in Every Locality; Equal Right of Negroes to
Education Must Be Protected.
Reduction of Hours, Vocational Education, Indigenous Work-
ers' Employment Contracts, and Recruiting of Migrant
Labor Listed Among Subjects Recently Considered by the
Geneva Labor Body.
ORGANIZATION DRIVE PLANNED BY
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR
AMERICAN
FEDERATION
OF LABOR
Regional Conferences of Delegates From State Federations of
Labor, Central Labor Unions and Local Unions Scheduled
for Every Section East of Mississippi and Texas; Pres. Green
Will Address the Atlanta Conference.
ACHIEVEMENTS OF INTERNATIONAL
LABOR ORGANIZATIONS STRESSED
states like Delaware, New York
California.
Local Wealth Syphoned Off
To Financial Centers
So friend: Please lead my pathway ever up,
Guide my footsteps along the paths of light,
And as you grow beyond my small perception,
Please draw me to your realm of height.
Please hold me firmly in your clasp
As we stand in awe beside a storm-swept sea—
Serene in faith that ’ere the storm is past,
Together, we shall glimpse eternity.
Official Organ of Galveston Labor Council, Dock and Manne Council
and Affiliated Unions
Endorsed by the Texas State Federation of Labor
Model Contract Signed
By Retail Food Groups
LOCAL VOICE
OF THE
As you seek mountain heights—so shall I,
Because you hold the boundries of my soul
in your power.
As you dwell in the valley of the shadow—
I, too, will be in the shadow, struggling in that
hour.
When you seek a glimpse of eternity
Your aspiration shall beckon mine own.
When you rest in the solitude of shadowed places—
Two souls shall rest therein—it shall be home.
You understand my search for lofty heights,
Because you, too, have searched along that way.
You hold my very stature within your hand—
To shape, to mold as soft, damp clay.
TEQs
Tabor
RRESS
ASS’
t
f
I
I
I
MUNICIPAL ORDINANCE
SETS HAIRCUTS PRICE
By AFL News Service.
Columbus, Ohio.—The Columbus City
Council has approved an ordinance setting
minimum prices of 50 cents for haircuts
and 25 cents for shaves, with only one
councilman objecting on the opinion that
the council was without power to fix
prices.
Advocated by Columbus Barber’s Un-
ion No. 204, the ordinance was approved
following a public hearing. Speaking for
the passage of the ordinance were Walter
Ballard and Harley D. Smith, represent-
ing the Barbers’ Union; George Walker,
president of the Columbus Master Barb-
ers Association, and John C. Getreu,
president of the Columbus Federation of
Labor.
S —Doris Bangeman. g
Washington, D. C.—A gigantic organ-
ization drive covering a large portion of
the United States is under way by the
American Federation of Labor.
The campaign, managed by Frank Fen-
ton, A. F. of L. Director of Organization,
is a continuous one mapped to meet the
economic conditions which face working
men and women in the new decade be-
ginning with 1940.
Confronted with approximately 31,000,-
000 unorganized workers who still have
substandard conditions imposed upon
them because they are not union mem-
bers, the task of the A. F. L. is to take
the message of trade union benefits to
every one of them.
To promote this stupendous organ-
ilzation plan, conferences of union rep-
resentatives will be held in various
regions.
This article contains the statement of
Mr. Fenton outlining the scope and pur-
pose of the organizing campaign.
The genius of American Labor is more
than adequate for the gaint task of or-
ganizing that faces us today.
Our task—to establish orderly collec-
tive bargaining in the modern production
By AFL News Service.
Akron, Ohio.—Model agreements, par-
allel in most respects, were negotiated
here between Local 372 of the Amalga-
mated Meat Cutters and Butcher Work-
men of North America and Local 860 of
the Retail Clerks International Protective
Association, A. F. of L. affiliates, with
members employers of the Akron Re-
tail Grocers and Meat Dealers’ Associa-
tion. The agreements, covering hours,
wages, and working conditions, are said
to be the first model agreements of the
kind in this area.
By AFL News Service.
An instructive account of the activi-
ties of the International Labor Organ-
ization in the interest of working men
and women throughout the world was
included in the declaration on the I. L.
O. made by the 1939 convention of the
American Federation of Labor at Cin-
cinnati, Ohio.
Robert J. Watt, international repre-
sentative of the American Federation
of Labor, is a member of the governing
body of the I. L. O., and James Wil-
son, formerly a member of the A. F.
of L. Executive Council, is an I. L. O.
labor adviser.
During the last year the Interna-
tional Labor Organization had before
it such important world-wide labor
questions as the recruiting and labor
conditions of migrant workers, employ-
ment contracts of indigenous workers,
vocational education, and apprentice-
ship.
The activities of the International
Labor Organization were brought to
the attention of the convention in the
following report of the Committee on
International Labor Relations, which
the convention adopted:
Winant Succeeds Butler.
“The year that has passed has wit-
nessed some important changes in the
work and personnel of the Labor Or-
American education that still exist be-
tween North and South stem out of the
exhaustion of the South as a result of
four years of the Civil War.
“The World War marked the second
milestone in grants-in-aid with the enact-
ment of the Smith-Hughes Act. But the
origin of this act was the need of labor
for more adequate industrial education.
This act itself was for the most part the
projection of labor thinking and owes
much to labor’s championship. It has de-
pended from the first on labor coopera-
tion.
“The Smith-Lever Act for agricultur-
al extension embodied another acceptance
by the nation off grants-in-aid. In the
field of public health and now in our
social security legislation fereral grants
are a settled part of public policy.
“Grants-in-aid for public education in
America thus has a long history in the
nation. It is a history which labor helped
to shape. It is a policy of which labor is
committed. But with it labor is per-
suaded that local initiative and control of
educational policies are indispensible.
Educational Inequalities In
Various States Cited.
“Education may be the nation’s biggest
business venture, but in some sections
of our land that business is still small. It
is small because per capita wealth is small
And the tax burdens are heavy for those
who are called upon to bear them.
“While some of these States with meg-
er resources are making heroic efforts
for their schools, they are unable to pro-
ide the quality of education needed. So
long as a fifth of the nation’s children
live in States where the amount available
per child is less than one-half of the
nation’s average, we shall continue to
have educational inequalities.
“In concrete terms the average re-
venue available per pupil in the nation
is approximately fifty-two dollars but
that average concels the wide range,
which extends from twelve dollars and.
twenty-one cents per pupil in States like
Mississippi and Arkansas to over one
hundred and forty dollars per pupil in
affiliated organization east of Texas and
the Mississippi. Delegates from every
State Federation, Cenrtal Labor Union
and, Local Union in this area will be in-
vited to attend for a Saturday and Sun-
day conference.
The tentative schedule of meetings
with the approximate time, place and
region covered is as follows:
January, Dallas, Texas, Southwest.
Early February, Philadelphia, Pa.,
Middle Atlantic States.
Mid-February, Detroit, Mich, Ohio,
Michigan, Indiana.
March 2-3, Atlanta, Ga., Southeast.
March (2nd week), Hartford, Conn.,
New England States.
April, Chicago, Ill., Illinois, Wiscon-
sin, Iowa, Missouri.
Extensive plans are now under way
for the Atlanta Conference' which will be
attended by some 3,000 representatives
from all the Southern States. President
Green will address this conference.
These conferences will bring together
trade union representatives for two pur-
poses :
1. To lay out plans for organizing and
educating the unorganized, these plans
to be carried back home and put into
action.
2. To assist unions in carrying on their
activities, in securing facts for collective
bargaining, in handling cases before La-
bor Relations Boards and Wages and
Hours Boards, in dealing with problems
under Social Security, in promoting legis-
lation.
Leaders from State Federations will
address the conferences, and persons com-
petent to discuss problems of Social Se-
curity, Labor and Wage Board problems.
The outstanding success of a conference
of this type held in New Englana last
spring, attended by 650 union del gates
and the recent conference in Utah of
representatives from 11 States, has led
me to inaugurate this series of meetings
as the planning graund for new organ-
izing work and service to union members.
Inspiration comes from combining our
thought and effort; practical plans grow
out of our joint experience.
These conferences may become a great
forward step for American Labor.
nation of Harold Butler as director,
who had sereved this institution so ef-
fectively for twenty years—first as dep-
uty director and then as director.
"As his successor, Mr. John G. Win-
ant, former governor of New Hamp-
shire, and long interested in labor
problems, was elected to the post of
director. Thus, twenty years after this
institution at Geneva, which owed so
much to the initiative of a great Amer-
ican, Samuel Gompers, has now another
distinguished American as its directing
head.
Reduction of Hours In Industry
Postponed.
“In the second place the Internation-
labor Organization felt compelled, in
the face of the war emergency, to fore-
go any further discussion of the reduc-
tion of hours of work in industry.
“Thus this world forum, which had
done so much to ventilate the whole
question of reduction of hours as a
means to reduce unemployment, had to
recognize that today they were con-
fronted in the world with a fact, not a
theory.
“The supreme fact was that in the
feverish rearmament race the first ne-
cessity was to increase production of
war materials; not finding work for
idle men. The delegates voted to refer
the matter of hours to work the gov-
erning body for resubmission at a later
date. It was an act of wise statesman-
ship. But one may well speculate as to
the date for the re-submission of that
question.
Agenda of 1939 Conference.
“With these two items on reduction
of hours eliminated from the agenda
of the annual conference, the delegates
turned to a consideration of four
topics:
“Regulation of hours of work in
transport.
“Technical and vocational education
and apprenticeship.
“Regulation of contracts of employ-
ment of indigenous workers.
“Recruiting, placing and conditions
of labor of migrant workers.
Tobin and Woods Lauded for
Work at the Conference.
“In the first of these items, Daniel
J. Tobin, the American Workers’ rep-
resentative on the commission, per-
formed a distinctive service in secur-
ing an agreement among the nations
represented on the commission. Your
Committee on International Relations
feels that Brother Tobin’s statesman-
like service is deserving of the com-
mendation of this convention.
“The annual conference adopted two
recommendations on the second of the
items dealing with vocational educa-
tion—the one dealing with apprentice-
ship and the second with vocational ed-
ucation. In view of American labor’s
long and active interest in the subject
of vocational education and appren-
ticeship, the conclusions reached by
this second commission are of special
industries—callenges every vestige of the
trade union spirit' that built up the Amer-
ican Labor movement. ffl
There are more than 6,000,000 unor-
ganized workers in manufacturing in-
dustries tdoay; there are some 25,000,-
000 unorganized in all industries.
Each one of these workers needs to
understand what the trade union can
do for him, needs to join a union and
learn to act with his fellows through col-
lective bargaining.
It is a colossal task of education—ed-
ucation for membership, for resonsibility,
for constructive action:
Yet, I repeat, the American Federation
of Labor is equal to the task. We have
among our leaders and our active mem-
bers the ability, the wisdom born of ex-
perience, the new ideas for a new era; in
a word, the genius to undertake this giant
task and carry it through.
To organize these workers who as yet
have no voice in their wages or condi-
tions, to give them a chance to share the
wealth they create, to make them staunch
an loyal trade unionists with full under-
standing and power to act—this is our
task.
No one union or central body, state
federation or international can accomplish
this alone. But by coordinating our ef-
forts, by focusing our thinking action, by
planning to use all our resources it can
accomplished.
That is why the Federation decided,
with the help of international officers
and those locally concerned, to hold a
series of regional conferences to inaugu-
rate this campaign.
The Building Trades, Metal Trades
and Union Label Trades Departments
have endorsed this plan.
The conferences will be held in the
first half of 1940 and will reach every
interest. In this connection the serv-
ices rendered by Herbert Woods of the
Operating Engineers’ Union deserve
commendation.
Indigenous Workers Employment
Considered.
“In the matter of contracts of em-
ployment of indigenous workers the
International Labor Organization was
directing its consideration of problems
primarily concerning native workers,
and with special reference to colonial
territories. While this subject is not
ont that immediately involves the
United States, the representatives of
our own country joined with the other
delegates in adopting two conventions
and two resolutions on this question.
Migrant Labor Discussed.
“The fourth and last active item on
the agenda dealing with the recruiting,
placing and conditions of labor of mi-
grant workers is again a problem that
is concerned with the continent of
Europe. Out of the discussion of this
commission a convention was evolved
and subsequently passed by the con-
ference.
More Protection for Women
Workers Ured.
“In addition to the official action
taken by the International Labor Or-
ganization, an important resolution
was passed directing further efforts to
ers, to assure equal pay for equal
work. Other resolutions dealing with
the follow-up of the ratification of the
decisions of the annual conference was
adopted; also a study on the establish-
ment of special labor courts.
Sympathy for China and Czecho-
slovakia Expressed.
“Two other resolutions which were
adopted by the workers’ group—one
expressing sympathy for the Chinese
people in their struggle against Jap-
anese aggression, the other for the
people of Czechoslovakia who were so
ruthlessly suppressed by the Nazis.
The worker’s group also gave their
wholehearted support to President
Roosevelt’s plea for an international
conference to lay the basis for ‘an hon-
orable and enduring peace.’
Watt and Wilson Represent
A. F. of L.
“While the work of the International
Labor Organization comes to a unique
and significant focus at the annual con-
ference, the work of this organization
in its meetings of the governing body,
the research and consultive service of
the office continues on throughout the
year.
“At the quarterly meetings of the
governing body, Robert J. Watt has
been in regular attendance and has
represented the interests of the Ameri-
can Federation of Labor.
“Moreover, the service of James Wil-
son, as American labor’s representa-
tive in the office, has insured not only
an adequate safeguard for the interests
of American labor, but has provided
the movement at home with a capable
and understanding interpreter.
“While the work of the organization
is presented through the pages of the
American Federationist and through
pamphlet literature to our members,
the liaison work performed by Brother
Wilson is invaluable and should be
continued. He has helped to lay a basis
of understanding on the part of Amer-
ican labor for the work of this inter-
nationally important agency that it
would be difficult to overestimate.”
By AFL News Service.
Complete endorsement of the prin-
ciple of liberal appropriations by the
United States Government to aid the
States in providing adequate public
school education was expressed by the
1939 convention of the American Fed-
eration of Labor at 'Cincinnati, Ohio.
The convention pointed out that bills
now before the Congress of the United
States providing Federal aid for the
schools are not new proposals and
cited in support of this claim the law
enacted during the Civil War to create
hand grant colleges, the Smith-Hughes
Act passed during the World War to
aid industrial education, and the Smith-
Lever Act establishing agricultural ex-
tension.
While supporting Federal aid to the
States for the development of public
schools, the Federation insisted that the
Federal funds should be administered ac-
cording to State laws, that the equal right
of negroes to education should be safe-
guarded and that the prevailing wage
rate should be paid on all school con-
struction work financed by Federal funds.
The general subject of Federal grants-
in-aid for education was presented to
the convention in the following report by
the Commitee on Education, which the
convention unanimously adopted:
American Labor Has Always
Supported Public Education.
“American labor’s struggle for the
establishment and adequate maintenance
of a system of public education in
America is a struggle which began early
in the 19th century. It was largely
through the efforts of workingmen’s as-
sociation in Massachusetts, New York,
and Pennsylvania, during the 20s and 30s
of the last century that the American
public school system was finally estab-
lished.
“In the nearly 60 years since the
American Federation of Labor was
founded its leaders have worked consis-
tenly for the development of our school
system. Labor’s deep interest in public
education rests upon a recognition of the
fact that the practical success of demo-
cratic government is predicated upon the
interest and participation therein by an
informed, enlightened, alert citizenry. In
the public schools are among the great-
est bulwark of democratic government.
Hence, labor has determined that our
public schools shall beadequately sup-
ported.
Some States Lack Adequate Funds
To Provide Education.
“We look upon education as a distinct
* funcition of the State. We believe that
thespublic school must interpret the social
. experience and ‘hopes’ of the community.
It must be an intergral part of the com-
munity if it is effectively to serve the
community. Yet we realize that during
the last quarter of a century some state
and local communities have been unable
to raise the necessary funds to maintain
schools and schooling at a proper level..
Federal Aid Began With Creation
of Land-Grant Colleges.
“The present economic depression did
not produce the inequalities in our ed-
ucational system. It merely laid bare a
condition that had existed for long and
had never been adequately repaired. Nor
are grants-in-aid a new device to meet
such inequalities. Federal grants date
back to the middle of the last century,
when this nation was engaged in a Civil
War to determine whether any nation
‘conceived in liberty and dedicated to the
proposition that all men are created
equal’ could long endure.
“President Lincoln in the nation’s ciri-
sis realized that one of the surest guaran-
tees of the perpetuation of the American
way was to remove inequalities in educa-
tional opportunities. The Morrill Act for
the creation of the Land-Grant Colleges in
the midst of a civil war is a monument to
his vision of the need for equalization of
educational opportunities. It marks the
beginning of grants-in-aid for public ed-
ucation in our land. It filled out in broad
out-line the American ideal of education
for all the citizenship. This act had the
cordial support of labor. But it is well
to remember that the inequalities in
“The long depression which revealed
some of the weakness in our economic
system has revealed the initiation of some
of our long established practices in fin-
ancing public education. Where real
estate values decline in a community due
either to a depression or in the trends
in local business activity the tax base is
seriously affected and with it the basis
of school taxes.
“Because of the national organization
of our business structure there is a dis-
position to syphon off wealth as it is
created locally into the large financial
centers. To meet this condition Federal
aid is more adaptable to our national
economy and more elastic to our modern
needs. By support through grants-in-aid
we have developed a method of remov-
ing some of the more glaring inequalities
in education.
Federal Grants-in-Aid Necessary
To Remove Inequalities.
“To remove such inequalities in our
educational system is one of the purposes
of labor. To aid in such a purpose,
grants-in-aid have received the constent
support of labor over the years. But
equality of educational opportunity does
not mean identical educational oppor-
tunities. Indeed indentical opportunities
might lead in turn to inqualities. Educa-
tion must be adopted to the needs of
the citizens and be related to the cultural
standards of the community. In educa-
tion, as in other areas of life, uniformity
is dullness and may lead to mediocrity.
But while diversity is needed it must
never be at the expense of preserving the
democratic principle of adequate educa-
tion for all our citizns.
Local Initiative and Control
Must Be Preserved.
“Your committee therefore recommends
the endorsement again of the general
principles of grant-in-aid as a character-
istic American device to aid in the equal-
ization of educational opportunities. We
Official Organ of the
X 'veston Labor
CounT^ nd Building
ades
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The Union Review (Galveston, Tex.), Vol. 20, No. 39, Ed. 1 Friday, January 19, 1940, newspaper, January 19, 1940; Galveston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1438418/m1/1/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Rosenberg Library.