Page:William F. Dunne - The Threat to the Labor Movement (1927).pdf/4

 headed by Presirlent Sigman. The right wing was insistent on the acceptance of the findings of the commission appointed by Governor Smith—in other words, it was in favor of compulsory arbitration under the auspices of the state government controlled by Tammany Hall.

The stubborn attitude of both the manufacturers and the jobbers, who put up the fiercest resistance in the history of needle trades struggles, is a result of their knowledge that they had powerful allies inside of the union—the right wing leadership. The attacks of the bosses upon the left wing is proof of this.

Even if we give such factors as the long period of unemployment which preceded the strike and the tremendous profits which the American capitalist class has at its disposal for aiding its various sections in their conflicts with the workers, it still remains true that the greatest weaknes of the union was the treacherous character of the right wing activities.

The Amalgamated Clothing Workers' officialdom; in contrast to its previous unstinted aid in I. L. G. W. strikes, gave a paltry $25,000 to a strike which has cost about $100,000 per week.

ITH 20,000 workers out of employment due to the unsettled condition of the industry after the settlement of the strike, when every effort was needed to enforce the new agreement, the right wing in the needle trades got busy. To its aid came the officialdom of other unions in which the left wing was showing strength—the United Mine Workers of America and the United Textile Workers.

A conference of trade union officials, attended by Vice-President Woll of the American Federation of Labor, was held in New York during the week of November 28. Plans were made at this meeting to start a new offensive against the left wing in the trade unions.

The next week a conference of officials which claimed to represent 35 unions was held in the Rand school. This meeting did three things:

1. It adopted a manifesto calling upon the labor movement to exterminate the Communists.

2. It formed a permanent organization calling itself the "Committee for the Preservation of the Trade Unions."

3. It arranged for a larger conference to be called a "General Trade Union Conference," to which all unions in New York are invited to send three delegates and which was held Tuesday, December 21, in Beethoven Hall, New York City.

The manifesto is too long to reprint here, but the introduction denounces the Trade Union Educational League as "an integral part" of the Workers (Communist) Party. It recites a number of alleged Communist misdeeds and states that the Furriers and Cloakmakers' unions in New York have Communist leadership.

The "Call to Action" concludes with:

The time has come when the