Skeleton Uncloseted

The American Federation of Labor has a closet well stocked with skeletons. One of them has recently been rattling the door handle with embarrassing persistence. Last week, to the horror of President William Green, the door flew open.

In Chicago, Gangster Frank Nitti and four aides faced a judge and jury on charges of conspiring to "seize" the Federation's local bartenders' union. Slated for chief witness against them was George McLane, the local's business agent. McLane, assured of police protection, had been frank enough in secret grand-jury hearings. But when it came to saying it out loud in open court, he had a change of heart, refused to testify. The judge had no choice but to order the jury to bring in an acquittal. Last week Nitti & aides went free.

But put on public record by the State's Attorney's office was the story which McLane in bolder mood had breathed to the grand jury. Two years ago, Nitti had summoned him to a conference. Present, according to McLane's testimony, were Willie Bioff, a convicted pander; Nick Dean, alias Circella, a convicted crook; Louis Romano, who McLane said was a former Capone bodyguard; and fleshy George E. Browne, recently raised from fourteenth to twelfth vice president of A. F. of L.

McLane was told, said he, of a plan to elect him international president of the Union of Hotel & Restaurant Employees (of which the bartenders' union is a local), with the understanding that, as president, he would also work for the mob. Testified McLane: "He [Nitti] said he made Browne," and Gangster Nitti gave McLane to understand he could "make" him. If he refused to run for the office, it was implied that he "would be found in an alley." McLane ran, secretly passed the word to his friends in the Federation not to vote for him, and was not elected.

Thwarted Gangster Nitti, said McLane, thereupon took over the Chicago local, ousted McLane from his job as business agent. Nitti's aides told McLane: "We are taking over. . . . You won't do anything we want you to do and we are taking over. . . . You got to go away." McLane went. In this simple manner, said he, Nitti gangsters had taken over Chicago waiters, hotel clerks, hat-check girls, cooks, soda jerkers, organized the "Local Joint Board & Council of Chicago," and obliged all union members to pay tribute.

Last week, with Nitti free and McLane mum, only hope for the Chicago bartenders seemed to be a court-appointed receiver, who was temporarily in possession of the local's treasury. From President William Green, who had subscribed to a pious anti-racketeer resolution* at the last Federation convention, came no word or action. Louder still was the silence from Vice President George E. Browne.

*"There have been men of ill repute who . . . have succeeded, through stealth and armed force, in securing control of existing local unions . . . using the power they have acquired for il legal purposes. This is a most difficult evil to eradicate. It calls for the application of every means available."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.