Open Break?

For the first time in a dozen years, a big part of organized labor was good and mad at The Man in the White House.

C.I.O. President Philip Murray, who never got quite all he wanted from Franklin Roosevelt, and has long suspected that he was getting the run-around from Harry Truman, nearly burned out the nation's radio tubes with his accumulated rancor. What did labor think of the President's new strike plan (TIME, Dec. 10)? Just this, said Phil Murray:

"[It is] legislation that can have but a single purpose--the weakening of labor unions, the curtailment of the right of free men to refrain from working when they choose to do so.

"I am profoundly disturbed. . . . The Federal Administration is embarked upon a policy of continued appeasement of American industry. . . . The Administration yields in abject cowardice. . . . The C.I.O. shall mobilize its entire membership to defeat this specific measure and all similar attempts directed against labor."

Muttering In the Chorus. In various harsh words, other C.I.O. leaders shouted amen. John Lewis called the Truman proposal "an evil, vile-smelling mess . . . full of dozens of loopholes that would make it unworkable." Even mild Bill Green cheeped: "Unacceptable to labor. . . ."

Two days later, on a rainy afternoon, Bill Green visited the White House, came out carrying an umbrella and feeling somewhat appeased: "I disagree with Mr. Murray . . . that the President is seeking to destroy unions. I don't feel that he is trying to do that." The President had told him, he reported, that the plan was designed to avoid really "vicious" anti-labor laws. But Bill Green, though mollified, was still dead-set against fact-finding boards and cooling-off periods.

Shifts in the Strategy. Was this the end of a beautiful friendship between organized labor and the Democratic Party? Some labor leaders thought so; one C.I.O. chieftain said darkly, "Harry Truman can never be a candidate for re-election." Strategists in the C.I.O.'s Political Action Committee, which has played a mighty role in swinging recent elections to the Democrats, began taking another look at their long-term plans.

Even before Harry Truman hurt their feelings, some of P.A.C.'s leaders had dropped hints that they considered Republican Harold Stassen a mighty promising presidential candidate. Yet talk of an open break between labor and the Administration appeared highly premature.

Labor's best political bet still seemed to be pressure on politicos who need its help--if necessary, by flirting with their rivals; if necessary, by threatening divorce.

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