The Colonel & the Company

Canadian law requires an employer to rehire a World War II veteran "under conditions not less favorable" than those he enjoyed before entering the service--or pay a penalty. To Marathon Paper Mills of Canada, Ltd., this seemed like expensive nonsense in the case of Colonel Alfred Louis Johnson. The case became the first court test involving a senior executive, under the Reinstatement Act.

Big, affable Al Johnson, now 47, was running the General Timber Co., Ltd. when Marathon took it over in 1938, retained him as general manager of its pulpwood operations near Port Arthur. His contract called for an annual salary of $7,500 plus a production bonus.

In mid-1942, U.S.-born Mr. Johnson, a West Point graduate, left Marathon to rejoin the U.S. Army, participated in Allied strategic planning at Cairo, Yalta and Quebec, got the Legion of Merit for helping get supplies across the Hump to China. Last fall Colonel Johnson asked Marathon to give him back his job.

Nothing doing, said Marathon. Reason: while Johnson was away, Marathon had spent about $20 million on expansion, had boosted its output at Marathon, Ont. from 50,000 to over 200,000 cords a year; thus Johnson's annual income under his bonus contract, instead of being about $20,000, would now be over $30,000. Rehiring him at this figure was "not . . . feasible."

The Crown took his case to court. Last week at Port Arthur, Magistrate Walter Russell found Marathon guilty of "lack of intention or refusal to obey the law," fined it $400 (plus costs), ordered it to pay Colonel Johnson $12,158 (twelve weeks' salary and bonus). But Johnson did not get his job back. For Marathon, which had made no bones about its penny-pinching objective, this was cheap. Said jobless Colonel Johnson of the court's award: "With Christmas so close, it's very nice."

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