U.S.A. Comes of Age

U.S. labor last week did something new: one of its major unions published a full, audited report of its finances, including exact figures on the income of every district and local, which too often hide their "take" from the public eye.

The union making this frank report was Philip Murray's United Steelworkers of America, admittedly one of the best-run labor outfits of the land. In taking the step, it threw overboard the tradition that unions cannot reveal district and local contributions, since they would give management important clues to membership, organizing drives, etc.

The steelworkers' 56-page financial statement revealed that U.S.A. is indeed big business. It covered the seven months from last May (when the Steel Workers Organizing Committee became the United Steelworkers of America) through November. During the period U.S.A.'s 725,625 members in 1,800 locals poured a total of $3,545,000 into the international's treasury, got back $947,000 for local expenses. After all expenses, U.S.A.'s seven-month surplus stood at $301,200. It had cash of $1,416,000 v. total liabilities of $156,300, plus a fine new $300,000 office building in Washington. The detailed reports that followed were even more interesting :

> A breakdown of the international's expenses listed the number of employes with separate totals for each category (e.g., four officers, $30,250; four publicity workers, $8,854; seven researchers, $11,473). Biggest single expense item, besides the $179,200 "tax" paid to C.I.O., was $70,999 for Steel Labor (U.S.A.'s monthly). Most revealing insight into what it costs to run a bang-up union: $19,478.15 for "buttons, emblems and badges." > A separate table showed the expenses of each of U.S.A.'s 39 districts and four super-district offices. They were broken down into 16 categories so detailed as to give any management a clear picture of just what U.S.A. has been up to. Biggest expense item was the $107,100 U.S.A. poured into its Bethlehem office to win its bitter exclusive-bargaining fight with Bethlehem Steel.

> Most unusual of all in point of ordinary union practice was the final table: 35 pages listing dues and initiation receipts for every one of U.S.A.'s 1,800 locals (an almost exact mirror of new membership as well as of membership in good standing). Biggest dues contribution was $52,900 from local 1014 (Carnegie-Illinois) in the Calumet district; biggest initiation fee gain, $15,000 from local 2194 (Crucible Steel) in the New York City district.

Most spectacular single item in U.S.A.'s report was a $960,000 increase in the international's net worth (bringing it up to $1,775,000). U.S.A. explained it as a "cancellation by the Executive Board of C.I.O. of certain advances," which was accurate enough from C.I.O.'s standpoint, but must have made John L. Lewis grind his teeth.

For most, if not all, of that comfortable sum represented advances from Lewis' United Mine Workers in the days when Lewis and C.I.O. were synonymous--and both eager to organize steel. Lewis and C.I.O. split over the very issue that now swells U.S.A.'s net worth: whether U.M.W.'s advances were repayable loans or gifts for the then-common cause.

But whatever the legalities of the financial shenanigans between Lewis' U.M.W. and Murray's U.S.A. might be, the fact remains that U.S.A.'s financial report as a whole was a contribution to the cause of all U.S. labor. For it proved that when a union has come of age it can afford to be frank about its business.

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