Horatius & the Great Ham

(See Cover)

As the Great Ham stalked into Judge T. Alan Goldsborough's courtroom last Tuesday morning, he suspected something of what was in store for him. Drawn Venetian blinds excluded the sun and gave the oak-paneled chamber the fashionable decorum of a high-class cafe. It took the judge about 40 minutes to overrule all defense objections and accept the Government's findings of fact. Would Mr. Lewis be permitted to speak? He would, said the judge, and Lewis rose, clutching three typewritten sheets of paper.

In the dim light he looked ashen grey. His eyes were sunken, his skin flabby, his once thick mop of hair was grey, dry and scraggly. He looked his full 66 years. But his mien, as usual, was impassive.

The Bridgehead. Early in the battle, he had taken a position where all of organized labor could view him, where all of organized labor would have to applaud him, whether it liked him or not. His legal position was debatable; his moral position was worse. The court had merely ordered him to postpone--until the legal questions of his coal contract could be adjudicated--an action which would do the country great injury. This was the order he had defied. The order was the first step to an injunction, a word which labor mortally hated and feared. So on the bridgehead of Injunction Horatius took his stand.

"The history of the labor injunction prior to 1932 is a sordid one," he read that Tuesday morning, in the weary tones of a tired preacher who knows his text by heart. The Norris-LaGuardia Act, he said, barred such injunctions as the court had issued; and--looking straight at the judge --the act was written "in plain language which any intelligent citizen can understand.

"On Oct. 21 this union asked for conferences to discuss our grievances. Outstanding among these grievances which cries aloud for immediate adjustment is the deadly, brutal 54-hour work week underground in American coal mines."*

He spoke, he said, as president of 600,000 coal miners, vice president of almost 8,000,000 members of A.F.L. Did he imply the threat of a general strike? He could not permit, he said, letting his voice rise a bit, "the ugly recrudescence of government by injunction." Labor must stand on its "constitutional rights."

Judge Goldsborough wiped his glasses, hooked them back on his nose, rocked ruminatively back & forth on his red-leather chair. Then he ruled that Lewis and the United Mine Workers, notwithstanding, were in contempt of court. Lewis would return the next day, the judge ordered, to receive his sentence.

In the days of maneuvering, Lewis had talked to men like his old friend & enemy Harry Moses, of U.S. Steel, and Cyrus Eaton, of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad; it was gradually borne in on him that Harry Truman might be calling his bluff. Eaton was anxious to bring about negotiations; Moses was willing--on his terms. But Harry Truman was adamant. And now the impossible had happened. Lewis had actually been convicted of contempt. Horatius heard the tramp of the Tuscans' feet.

On Wednesday morning, bright & early, Lewis marched into court. He joined A.F.L. Lawyer Joseph Padway in the corridor. Convoyed by his legal retinue, he flapped ponderously in & out of the court and another room, conferring. According to the U.M.W. version, the judge was trying to find a last-minute formula for peace. Goldsborough declared a recess until after lunch.

One proposition was this: Judge Goldsborough would formally order the Government and the miners to negotiate, which would save Lewis' face. Meanwhile the judge would postpone his sentence, which would save Horatius' neck.

No Martyr. That Wednesday noon, while Lewis brooded, U.S. Attorney John Sonnett telephoned Attorney General Tom Clark. The proposition was presented to the President. The answer came back: the Government would sit down and talk, but only if Lewis first ordered his miners back to work. That would mean an abject surrender by Lewis. There was nothing to do now but play the hand out. Grimly, fearing the worst, Lewis marched back into court.

He listened in silence as Sonnett, at the invitation of the court, made recommendations for punishment. For the United Mine Workers, Sonnett said, a fine of $250,000 a day (one-tenth of the estimated daily loss in Government revenue) would be "appropriate." The miners had been out 14 days, which added up to the formidable sum of $3,500,000.

As for Lewis, a jail sentence would make a martyr of him, Sonnett thought. He recommended a fine for him too, but he left the amount to the judge.

Shame & Double Shame. A.F.L. Lawyer Joseph Padway was the first man on his feet. At first he could only sputter. When he had pulled himself together, he orated at length. "The concept [of the fine] is that it will put the U.M.W. out of business." Then he had a second thought. "There will always be a United Mine Workers," bellowed Mr. Padway hastily.

Lewis' chief counsel, quiet, urbane Welly Hopkins, a man with a Texas drawl, stood up. He warmed up fast, came to a racing boil. The Federal Government, he shouted, was fastening its hand on the money earned by the miners who sweat "in the bowels of the earth." He raged at Sonnett: "Shame upon a government representative that would undertake to perpetrate such an outrage. I say to you, sir, that it is ... cruel and inhuman punishment. . . ."

Lewis' pasty, masklike face was fixed on his counsel. "I denounce it with all my heart and soul," Hopkins shouted at the top of his lungs. "I denounce it as a day in infamy when you come to this court and ask that a crown of thorns be placed upon a man merely to satisfy the political program of an Administration. Shame upon you." He stamped his foot. "Double shame."

He flailed his arms. A lock of hair fell over his forehead. "The recommendation made by the Government . . . seeking to break them [the miners] politically . . . financially . . . morally is malicious and should not be entertained by this court." He had spoken. The crowded courtroom let out its breath. Lewis rose and wrung his hand. "Mr. Hopkins, may I shake your hand?" he said. "I associate myself with every word you have uttered."

"It was from my heart, sir," said the perspiring Hopkins, overcome by this accolade from the Great Ham himself.

A Matter of Money. With a casual wave the judge indicated that Lewis too could make a statement--about his personal finances, with reference to the amount of his fine, which Sonnett had left up to the court. Lewis said he had a salary of $25,000, a life tenancy in a house in Springfield, IlL. and a house in Alexandria, Va. * but he remarked, acidly, that Sonnett had "lied" in telling the court that he was the sole judge of his expense accounts. (Sonnett said he was merely reading from the U.M.W. constitution.)

"Aside from that," said John Lewis to the court, "I have nothing except enough money to pay my bills, but don't let that deter you from levying any amount that you wish to levy on me personally."

"Don't get into contempt of court, Mr. Lewis," said the judge.

"Sir, I have been adjudged in contempt of court."

"I know, but that is another contempt."

John Lewis glared, and sat down.

Father, Forgive Them. Quietly, almost musingly, searching the ceiling, gazing at his polished desk, Judge Goldsborough himself took the stump.

"This is not the act of a low lawbreaker," he said, speaking of the strike. "But it is an evil, demoniac, monstrous thing that means hunger and cold and unemployment and destitution and disorganization of the social fabric; a threat to democratic government itself, and it is proper for me to say at this point that if actions of this kind can be successfully persisted in, the Government will be overthrown, and the Government that would take its place would be a dictatorship and that the first thing the dictatorship would do would be to destroy the labor unions. . . .

"As far as the miners themselves are concerned, it is a case of 'Father, forgive them for they know not what they do'. ... As far as the individual is concerned . . . the court thinks that nothing would suffice except a prison sentence."

However, the sentence for the U.M.W., he said, would be $3,500,000; "the sentence as to the individual, John L. Lewis, will be a fine of $10,000."

Other Weapons. Labor unions have been fined before, notably in the Danbury Hatters case in 1912, when union members were forced to cough up almost $300,000 because they organized a national boycott of D. E. Loewe & Co. hats. The hatters were sued under the Sherman antitrust act. In other ways unions have been forced to pay through the nose for various unwise acts. In 1922, when U.M.W. members killed 19 strikebreakers and wrecked the mine of the Southern Illinois Coal Co. near Herrin, the U.M.W. settled out of court for around $700,000. But never had any union treasury taken such a sock as last week's. That is, it would be a sock if the Supreme Court upheld the sentence. The Court said it would hear arguments next month.

Lewis and his lawyers were sure they had a case. There is a law against the use of injunctions in labor disputes--the Norris-LaGuardia anti-injunction act. But the Government maintained that it, as the sovereign, was not bound by the act. Also an injunction may be issued (even under the Norris-LaGuardia Act) if the plaintiff can show that otherwise he will suffer "irreparable injury." And if the Supreme Court upholds Goldsborough, Lewis might indeed be in the soup.

As he stomped from the courtroom and out into the December afternoon, eyed by young & old who had gathered on E Street, John Lewis had much to think about. The U.M.W. had approximately $13,500,000 in its treasury; $3,500,000 would be an awful bite. And obviously the Government had other legal weapons in its locker; for instance, the Smith-Connally Act, which provides fines and imprisonment for union bosses who obstruct Government operation of a plant.

"Mandate"--1919. Lewis had bent to the Government before. In 1919 Woodrow Wilson had ordered Lewis to call off a threatened coal strike which would block the nation's economic recovery from a war. In the end Lewis had said: "We will comply with the mandate of the court. We cannot fight our Government."

Padway had cried: "There will always be a U.M.W." Could Padway, as a matter of fact, be sure of that? There hadn't always been a U.M.W.; it was only 56 years old. Nor had the U.M.W. always been the power it was now. Twenty years ago, in the chaos of competition and throat-cutting which has marked the operation of the mines, the U.M.W. almost expired. In 1932 its enrollment had dropped to less than 100,000. The only thing that saved Lewis and his U.M.W. then was NRA. And now there was ominous handwriting on the wall: the declining curve of employment in the mines as machinery replaced men. Operators planned to spend at least $200,000,000 on further mechanization in the next five years.

The coal miners had stuck with Lewis since 1932. But would they stick if the

U.M.W. was torpedoed by those terrifying fines? The miners had been out for 59 days last spring. It was a fact that 32,915 men, many of them union men in outlying strip mines, were working despite the strike. And the number of rebels, instead of dwindling from day to day as it did last spring, had slowly but surely increased.

Pit & Pendulum. Furthermore, as Lewis pondered at week's end, the Navy announced its intention to move power shovels and other machinery into the strip mines. Would his faithful miners stand by him indefinitely in the face of all this?

There was still another factor. The rest of labor was fed up with him. Steel plants were closing down; 70,000 men were out at week's end. Auto plants were closing down; 40,000 workers were out at week's end. As a result of the railroad curtailment, 50,000 workers were out.

Union labor all round the nation was hurt. Labor leaders great & small were bitter at Lewis.

They were wrathful because he had plunged them into this fight before they were ready for it. But publicly they had no choice but to support him. At week's end C.I.O.'s Philip Murray hysterically proclaimed: "There is a deliberate and monstrous movement under way to cripple, if not destroy, the labor movement of this country." He called for a united labor front against the "predatory interests." His words reflected the panic of shrewder labor leaders, who had read the election returns.

Just over the ridge was the Tuscan host. Provoked by this latest demonstration of organized labor's willfulness, the leaders of the 80th Congress thumbed over pages of proposed antilabor legislation. Above the coal pits, above all of organized labor, the pendulum of public opinion swung. Lewis himself had given it a big push towards intolerance. A general strike in Oakland, Calif, was hastily called off by A.F.L. labor leaders who saw the way the pendulum was swinging.

The Great Ham considered all this. He was beginning to feel uncomfortable in the role of Horatius, and Mr. Truman was getting ready to go on the radio.

Five years ago Lewis won a coal strike on the day the Japs struck Pearl Harbor. In 1943 he had called off a strike 15 minutes before Franklin Roosevelt went-on the air to make a personal plea to the miners to return. Last spring he had announced a truce three hours before he was due to answer a summons to the White House for a showdown with Harry Truman. Now-In the Basement. On Saturday afternoon Washington newsmen got a terse notice that Lewis would speak to them at U.M.W.'s massive headquarters (once the University Club) on 18th Street. The meeting was in the basement auditorium, the walls of which are covered with Lewis cartoons. There, in a brutal "trial," Lewis had booted out of his union a quavering and tragic Phil Murray, until then Lewis' steadfast friend. Now Lewis had no friends around him, only sycophants. He had few friends anywhere, only worshipers or enemies. He had maintained his authority with his goon squads. He was the king. There was no heir apparent; he had let no one rise that far. This was something he might have mused upon, thinking of Padway's "There will always be a U.M.W."

Standing on a dais, clutching a cigar, looking more than ever like a horned owl, he hammed through his carefully written lines.

"The statement is wholly mine, 'tis a poor thing but 'tis mine own.* I'll read it myself." He looked a little mussed but he was now playing the statesman, quiet and dignified, standing above the caterwauling of his enemies. The statement was an order to his miners.

The Flight. "The Administration's 'yellow dog' injunction has reached the Supreme Court. . . . The Supreme Court is and . . . will ever be the protector of American liberties." He trembled on the verge of tears. "During its period of deliberation the Court [must] be free from public pressure superinduced by the hysteria and frenzy of an economic crisis."

Therefore--all miners would return immediately to work under the same conditions as prevailed when they walked out on Nov. 20. They would stay at work until March 31, 1947, the usual expiration date of his coal contracts. He ended:

"Let there be no hesitation upon the part of any individual member with respect to the effectuation of the policy herein defined. Complete unity of action is our sole source of strength. We will, as always, act together and await the rendition of legal and economic justice." His voice shook with exaltation: "I salute you, beside whom I have been privileged to fight."

The word went out over the radio to the nation's coal miners, who had lost $61.000,000 in wages while standing beside Lewis in the fight. In mid-afternoon of a mild Dec. 7, John Lewis emerged from U.M.W. headquarters and climbed laboriously into his chauffeur-driven Cadillac limousine. Labor leaders rubbed their eyes and stared in the direction of the bridgehead. Horatius had fled.

This week, after 17 days on strike, miners thankfully started streaming back to work.

*John L. was talking through his hat. Average weekly hours worked by coal miners in September: 41.4, for which miners were paid an average $1.48 per hour. Average pay of other industrial workers -- iron & steel: $1.24 (40-hour week); autos: $1.37 (39-hour week). *A Colonial antique, now badly in need of a coat of paint. *More or less from As You Like It: "A poor virgin, sir, an ill-favored thing, sir, but mine own."

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