Strike-Ho

The U.S. Government, which had already taken over a private shipbuilding plant,* last week went into the shipping business.

Latest Federal move into private enterprise was the result of a long-boiling agitation among U.S. seamen, who wanted to be paid extra for extra risks on the seas made more dangerous by war. Some of their demands for war bonuses had already been met. But as hazards increased, seamen had shouted louder for still bigger bonuses.

The U.S. Maritime Commission, headed by profane, salty ex-Rear Admiral Emory Land, was busily trying to work out a formula for a permanent settlement of maritime wage disputes. Bonuses to sailors already included $60 a month for voyages into belligerent waters, $45 to $75 for each particularly dangerous port of call. The Commission's idea was to figure out a scale based on war-risk hull insurance rates. But A.F. of L. seamen along the East Coast would not wait for the Commission to finish its arithmetic. In defiance of the Commission's warning, and in violation of their contracts, they struck.

Stranded in New York, Mobile, New Orleans, Norfolk, Tacoma, were freighters and passenger ships. Chiefly affected were ten vessels of the Alcoa Line, which carry supplies to defense bases in the West Indies, bring back bauxite from Surinam (Dutch Guiana). Bauxite is the raw material of aluminum, which is the most publicized of defense-program shortages.

When the union turned down the Commission's proposal to arbitrate, "Jerry" Land moved in, seized three of the strike-stranded ships.

Making a "shipping agent" of the Alcoa Line (which had been willing to arbitrate), the Commission set up its own hiring hall, began signing on men. At week's end, after a seven-day tie-up, two of the struck cargo vessels, the Alcoa Banner and the Alcoa Trader, steamed out of New York Harbor. Others would follow as fast as they were loaded and the Commission could man them.

Whether the strike was yet broken was far from clear this week. Instead of fizzling out, the trouble spread. Crews had walked off a total of 20 ships. As A.F. of L. chiefs on the East Coast threatened to tie up all the lines with which they had contracts, its West Coast brother union struck several Pacific Coast ships tied up in New York harbor. Bad as it was, the strike could have been worse. Great majority of East Coast vessels are manned not by A.F. of L. seamen but sailors of pinko Joseph Curran's C.I.O. maritime union. Mr. Curran, who ceased being an isolationist when holy Russia was invaded by Germany, is now an advocate of all-out aid. Last week he kept his 40,000 East Coast seamen, who would also like bigger bonuses, at work.

*Federal Shipbuilding and Drydock Co., at Kearny, N. J., which the Navy seized when management refused a National Defense Mediation Board's recommendation that the company grant a shipyard workers' union a "maintenance of membership" contract (TIME, Aug. 18). The plant was temporarily operating last week under the Board's original proposal. For a Canadian answer to the defense strike problem see p. 28.

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