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@ BERT WHYTE REPORTS ON

The ‘Kuzych case’

: HAT’S the simple history of the Myron Kuzych case? Why is this fellow such a threat to the
W cae union movement? What forces are behind him? What is their purpose? Why must the
trade unions unite to deteat Kuzych and his backers? More and more labor men, unfamiliar with the details

of the “Kuzych case”, are seeking the answers to these questions.

And they will have an opportunity to

get them at an all-in trade union conference to be held at Pender Auditorium on June 7, when Bill Stewart
of the Marine Workers and Boilermakers’ Union relates the full story.

For readers who are not con-
nected with the trade union move-
ment, here is the story in capsule
form. 3

It begins in 1942, the year of
Stalingrad and El Alamein. While
the Russians were “tearing the
guts out of the Wehrmacht,” as
Churchill phrased it, the people
of Europe looked anxiously to the
Western allies, hoping for the
opening of a Second Front. In
Canada, the battle of production
was in full swing.

Vancouver shipyards were ex-
panding rapidly, building cargo
vessels to replace disastrous losses
in the Atlantic (500 ships were
sunk in the January-October
period). The big Boilermakers
and Iron Shipbuilders Union was
enrolling hundreds of new mem-
bers at every meeting; non-union
workers were being hired at shop
gates, and taken into the union
later.

In November, 1942, one Myron
Kuzych, a worker who had been
expelled from the AFL Hod Car-
riers Union in 1941 for disruptive
activities, got a job in North Van
Ship Repairs (now Pacific Dry
Dock). He immediately became a
loud-talking critic of union leader-
ship at union meetings. It wasn’t
until a check-up in March, 1943,
that shop stewards discovered the
vociferous Kuzych wasn’t even a

Kuzych ran to the boss, pleaded
to be allowed to remain outside
the union. Informed of the con-
tract terms, he reluctantly took
out a union card, then “dropped
out of sight” for several months,
attending no more union meetings.

In 1943,’ the Boilermakers, to-
gether with eight other unions,
was seeking a union shop agree-
ment with the West Coast Ship-
yards. The case went to a con-
ciliation board. Proceedings last-
ed a week, then a week later,
while the union was waiting for
the board to bring down its find-
ing, a second session was called to
hear “new evidence.”

The “new evidence” was Kuzych,
who launched a venomous attack
against the Boilermakers’ Union,
and stated under oath that he was
unalterably opposed to the prin-
ciple of the closed shop, and that

there was not a trade union which

he considered to be legitimate.

Union charges were levelled
against Kuzych, he was tried and
investigated in the manner pre-
scribed by the union, constitution,
and on recommendation of the

trial committee, he was expelled —

from the Boilermakers.

union member. “re

‘

There had been a technical slip-

up. Kuzych received the letter
notifying him of the charge six
days before the union meeting, in-
stead of seven (as outlined in the
CCL constitution).. Kuzych sued

for reinstatement and was sub-

sequently taken back in,

The little man was now feeling
his oats, and in the next period
of time made numerous radio
broadcasts attacking the closed
shop principle and the policy of
the union. He wrote articles to
the ‘daily press, too, and became
known as an anti-union spokes-
man.

In the spring “of 1945 Kuzych
Was expelled again. Once more
he sued the union.

Nahe:

.

“In 1942 Vancouver shipyards were expanding rapidly . . :
non-union workers were being hired at shop gates and taken into

the union later .. .

in November one Myron Kuzych, a worker

who had been expelled from the AFL Hod Carriers Union in
1941 for disruptive activilies, got a job in North feat Ship

Repairs . . .

In this period the main CCL

unions set up a Shipyard General
Workers Federation. The Boiler-
makers’ Union went out of exist-
ence. The Marine Workers and
Boflermakers Union, Local No. 1,
‘came into existence. .

e
Kuzych began to make a “car-
eer” of suing the union. Unable

to secure a card in the new union, »
he refused to take other jobs, ©

concentrated on his attempts to
win damages.

On October 6, 1949, Mr. Justice
Whittaker held that Kuzych was
illegally expelled and ordered him
reinstated in the Boilermakers
and ‘Tron Shipbuilders Union of

Canada, Local No, 1, and assessed
damages against the union of
$5,000 plus legal “cost,

The Marine Workers and Boiler-
makers Union refused to admit
Kuzych, pointing out that his ac-
tion was against the Boilermakers
and Iron Shipbuilders Union,
which had gone out of existence

in 1945.

‘Union officials Bill ‘White and
Bill Stewart were committed to
‘Oakalla Jail on a contempt charge,
for failure to issue, Kuzych a union
card. Stay of proceedings action
was immediately launched, White
and Stewart were released within
24 hours, and the Court of Appeal
in British Columbia quashed the
contempt order last month.

“At the same time the Court of
Appeal upheld, by a 3-2 verdict,
the judgement awarding Kuzych

«

‘

$5,000 for “wrongful expulsion
from the union” and ordered his
reinstatement.

This decision, which raises ques-
tions of fundamental importance
to all trade unions, is being ap-
pealed to the Privy Council,
es

.

If the decision stands, it could
make it possible for employers to
wreck many trade unions. If a
union loses the right to expel a
member even for cause, bosses’
stooges could be sent wholesale

é : : «
into the union movement to do

their dirty work.

This decision, therefore, repre’

sents a threat to the entire Cana-
dian labor movement. The ‘whole
principle of free trade unionism is
at stake.

In carrying the battle to ‘the
Privy Council, Bill White and Bill
Stewart are defending the rights
of every trade union from coast
to coast. Judicial interference

with the internal affairs of trade

unions must cease; unions must
have the right | to determine who
may constitute its membership.
Kuzych himself is a nonentity.
He is a threat to the union move-

ment because he has the moral —

support of every anti-union em-
ployer who sees in this bitter little
man a tool to be skilfully used in
union-smashing campaigns. For
this reason the “Kuzych case” be-

comes the concern of all union

men who value their hard-won

trade union rights.

Hl

‘World War II.

What the German-

French steel pact...

By ISRAEL EPSTEIN

( TERMANY’ S armament mak-

ers, her coal and steel
kings, were basically respons-
ible for both world wars, With-
out their financing, the Nazi
party could not have arisen.
Without their schedules
“guns before butter,” neither
Hitler’s nor the Kaiser’s armies
could have committed’ aggres-
sion, Breakup of the German
trusts, and trial of the leaders
as war criminals, was therefore
written into Allied war aims.

The German appointed by the
U.S. and Britain to run western
zone coal industry is Dr. Hein-
rich Kost, head of the Rhine-
Freussen Coal and Gasoline
Trust, a Nazi. To head steel
production they have appointed
Heinrich Dinkelbach, who ran
German Big Steel (Vereinigte
Stahlwerke) under the Kaiser
and Hitler and subsidized the
Nazi SS.

“Decartelization” in Germany
has therefore given place to re-
cartelization, under some of the
most dangerous men in the
world. And U.S. financial in-
terests are helping German big
business revive, as hetogs

One of the great aims of the
German industrialists always
was to control the coaliand steel
production of all western Eur-
ope. When they were not try-
ing to buy into French steel,
for example, they tried to sup-
press it by military means,

et

Now the U.S.-backed agree-
ment providing for integration
of French-German steel produc-
tion, announced during U.S.
Secretary of State Dean Ache-
son’s conferences in Europe, is
restoring it. The pact was
proposed by French Prime Min-
ister Robert Schuman, whom
the New. York Times recom-
mends as “a typical continental
diplomat educated at the uni-
versities of Bonn, Munich, Ber-
lin and Strasbourg.”

Business Week magazine
wrote May 20 that, as‘a result,
“the shutdown of high-cost
French steel plants, represent-
ing 20 to 30 percent of total
capacity is certain. ... French
metropolitan and colonial mar-
kets will be opened to German
competition. Politically dang-
erous unemployment will show
up.” :
“.The magazine also says
French businessmen consider
that “the Schuman pool project
is really a German scheme. It
was first sold to Secretary Ach-
eson and then forced down the
throat of the French govern-
ment in exchange for the prom-
ise of U.S. aid in Indo-China.”

Thus the U.S. has forced a
corrupt French government, in
return for aid in suppressing
freedom in Indo-China, to sell
out to the Germans and drive
its own workers into the
streets. Is this what Canadian
soldiers fought for in France?

. ». really means

By RICHARD SASULY

JN Duesseldorf, by the Rhine,
stands a huge building, gran-
diose in style, spectacularly
ugly, solid and grim-looking.
This is Steé] House, once the
headquarters of the Ruhr bar-
ons. A pre-war empire of coal
and steel centered here. .

Now Steel House is used by
British occupation units. The
building is shabby and it looks

and smells like an old prison, —

ready to be abandoned.
Some blocks away is a much

, smaller and still shabbier build-

ing. Here a new steel organ-
ization for Germany. is being
designed by a board of 12 Ger-
man trustees.

The 12-man board operates
with Allied approval. Its
sweeping grant of authority to
reorganize the Ruhr comes
from law No, 75, a decarteliza-
tion directive. The law is still
not in effect after more than a
year of delay, but the trustees

are going ahead with their
work.

The chairman of the German —
trustees is a man,named Hein- |

rich Dinkelbach, “4

In 1925 he had a hand in
organization
Stahlwerke, main cog in Ger-
‘man steel between the two
world wars. He became one

of the managing directors of

Vereinigte Stahlwerke.

I asked an American official
if reports that Dinkelbach had

been a Nazi party member

were correct. The official re-
marked wearily: “I guess so.
But he wasn’t the only one.
Anyway there were bigger
shots who didn’t jdin the party,
because they didn’t have to
bother.”

é
_ Whatever

‘

his past record,

_ Dinkelbach has grabbed hold-
of his new job with confidence

and authority.

He is a ertihiig subject for
, interview. In the course! of an

; " nour’s talk with me he never
showed the least uncertainty on

any point, Not once did he seek
shelter in the phrase: “off the
,record!: _ F ‘

of Vereinigte —

Dinkelbach remarked that
he had had 40 years’ experience
in Ruhr steel, During those 40
years the Ruhr industry estab-
lished itself as the most feared
competitor in the C

market. Included in the period —
were the 12 years in which |
Ruhr steel turned unhesitat- |
ingly to the production of arms |

for the Nazi war machine.

. Hesitation _ would,
have been ingratitude.

During  Hitler’s build-up,
from 1933 to 1939,Ruhr steel
profited mightily. And in the
Pay-off years from 1939 to 1942,
when the Wehrmacht ranged
from the Bay of Biscay to the
Volga, the Ruhr barons ac-
cepted as their feudal due the
conquest of most of the rest
of the steel mills of continen-
tal Europe.

in fact,

Not a whisper of these 12
fat, rapacious years crept into
Dinkelbach’s conversation, al-
though he had been one of the

responsible leaders of Germgn

steel.

Instead, his talk was a

strange blend of pompous bro-

the future of his industry.
‘e

Asked to comment ‘on the
Possibility of ~ Over-production

in European steel, Dinkelbach

said:

“Has it not always been tc.

that? First, they plan too large
-" He waved a pudgy hand

ii a sweeping gesture over the |

lesser steel industries of half
a dozen countries.

“Then they find they have
too much capacity. Then they
fight for markets. And then

. .” He paused again and the
lines of his face were blurred

by a broad smile. “Then uk {

make cartels.”

Dinkelbach left no doubt that

he expects Ruhr steel to take

markets and formation of a
-new cartel. He remarked with

pride on the rapid -Tecovery of
German steel.

Then he said soberly: “As we
complete our reorganization,

Germany must again become ‘

competitive on the yor mag
ket.” e

:

mides and frank predictions of

its natural part in the fight for

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| PACIFIC TRIBUNE — JUNE 2, 1950 — PAGE 5