Narrow Squeak

For three weeks tough, scow-prowed Joe Curran, president of the National Maritime Union and once a loyal follower of the Communist line, had been fighting the Commies at the N.M.U.'s convention in Manhattan. It had been hard going; the N.M.U. is one of the most Communist-riddled of all U.S. unions.

Curran's battle stategy was to make no deals with the opposition, to get his help from the rank & file. He hammered hard at his Communist opponents, battled hour-long heckling and gallery demonstrations, threatened to quit if the Communists got their way.

Last week the showdown came. Cocky, cigar-chewing Joe Stack, ousted by Curran as vice president last April, made his own appeal for reinstatement. Sure, said Stack, he was a Communist Party member, but that fact would never interfere with his conduct of N.M.U. business. Replied Joe Curran, who likes to talk about himself in the third person: ";Curran and Stack cannot work in the same office." When the vote was taken, it was a narrow squeak: the ouster was upheld 353 to 351. Grinned Joe Curran:"Communist control of the union is speedily slipping away."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.