History of the I.W.A.

Continued from page eighteen

strike” pledges by its unions. Harold Pritchett
became a leading seller of Canadian war
bonds, winning Government recognition for
his efforts.

All of this had a logic that was apparent and
conclusive to devoted party members: the So-
viet Union was communism’s home (from
their point of view, socialism’s home, their
“Mecca”). If it could be kept out of the war, it
could develop while its antagonists destroyed
each other. But if it was forced into the war,
its communism’s defenders from around the
world would have to join the struggle on the
Soviet side.

But to rank and file Canadian forest work-
ers, even those with a general commitment to
the left, who did not have an overriding oblig-
ation to the Soviets, this sequence of policies
seemed at best an unfathomable shifting of
positions, and at worst, an unprincipled dal-
liance with fascism.

Neither the support of early U.S. “isolation-
ism” nor the subsequent all-out support of the
war effort changed the hearts of its implaca-
ble foes in Canada or the U.S. Even after the
war broke out, R.C.M.P. intelligence regarded
pro-fascist groups only as a “secondary objec-
tive,” after pursuit of known and suspected
communists and “sympathizers,” Cabinet
member Jack Pickersgill advised the Prime
Minister: “From a casual reading of these
(R.C.M.P._) ‘Intelligence Bulletins’ one would
scarcely realize that Canada was at war with
Germany...”

Hostility against Communists was much
greater and pervasive in the U.S. Harold
Pritchett was called before the “House Com-
mittee on Un-American Activities,” then
chaired by Congressman Martin Dies, known
as virulent a “red-hunter” as McCarthy was to
be in the fifties. Harold denied that he was a
communist, but evidence that, for example,
he had spoken at the funeral of a communist
in Surrey, B.C., in 1935, was more than suffi-
cient for Dies.

But in addition to this formidable source of
hostility, Harold and his supporters had to
deal with the menacing John L. Lewis.
Though strongly anti-Communist, Lewis had
from earliest C.I.0. days made use of dedicat-
ed and experienced communist organizers in
the mass industries, especially in auto plants.
(Closer to home, Syd Thompson organized for

the I.W.A. in Winfield, Alberta in 1938. Syd
was then a devoted member of the Canadian
Communist Party).

Others were worried about the influence
the party would achieve through reliance on
their organizers, but Lewis assured them by
asking: “Who gets the bird, the hunter or the
dog?” To ensure that in the case of West Coast

loggers the hunter would get the dog, Lewis
appointed Adolph Germer to lead the forest

industry organizing campaign, for whi
C.1.0. provided initial funding.” pick the
Germer was an old socialist, active in
American labour since 1894, an observer at
the Founding Convention of the I.W.W. in
Chicago in 1905, sent to prison with Eugene
Debs during World War I.» A veteran of the
intense struggles between U.S. communists
and socialists, he needed no urging to provide
all support to the anti-Communist I.W.A.
forces centered around the Columbia River
District Council. 7
rganizing was crucial to control. In
those days of explosive C.I.O growth,
organizing possibilities were every-
where. Who would be organized first,
Vancouver Island loggers, who would almost
certainly send delegates supporting commu-
nist policies and leaders, or Portland
sawmills, who would just as certainly support
the “white bloc”? Who would select organiz-
ers, and who would assign them targets? The
stakes were high and the struggle for control
of the program correspondingly bitter.
Charges and counter-charges led to official in-
quiries that filled thousands of pages of testi-

mony.

The “red” leadership had to contend not
only with hostile government machinery, de-
termined and ruthless A.F. of L. forces, anti-

z
g
<
=
é

e In 1943 the I.W.A. led a successful delegation of East Indian activists to the parliament buildings in Vic-
toria B.C. to demand voting rights for minorities. Front row: Didar S. Bains, Niranjan S.Sidhu, Naginder S.
Bill (Secretary of the Khasla Diwan Society), Garib S. Lehli, Phangan S. Gill, Unknown. Back row: Sir
Harold Holland, Harold J. Pritchett, Mohinder S. Sangha, Darshan S. Sanga, Arjan S. Rhandawa, H.S. Gar-

cha, and "Tikka" S. Bains.

Communist C.I.0. leadership, but employers
from both sides of the border who sensed in
anti-communism an opportunity to avoid mili-
tant trade unionism. They joined the cam-
paign, which was then centered on whether
Pritchett would be allowed to stay in the
U.S. He had lived mainly in the U.S. since
1933, by repeatedly extended short-term
visas. But by early 1940, despite strenuous ef-
forts on his behalf by supporters.from both
sides of the line, the jig was up. His final re-
quest for a renewal was denied on August 22,
1940, and Harold was compelled to return to
Canada. Pritchett was succeeded by O.M.
(Mickey) Orton, a supporter, and the, vacancy
was filled by an able young logger from the
mid-west, Ilmar Koivunen. In 1941, the Inter-
national Convention passed a resolution, later
endorsed by referenduni, forbidding Commu-
nist party members from ‘holding union office,
or even being members. :

PRITCHETT AS B.C. COAST DISTRICT PRESIDENT

Pritchett was active in B.C. union activities
throughout his term as International Presi-
dent, and upon his permanent return to Cana-
da, he immersed himself totally in them, part-
ly to ensure the survival of the last safe haven
for communist leadership in the I.W.A. He
succeeded Hjalmar Bergen as District Presi-
dent in December of 1941, at a time when the
province’s union forces were concentrating
on securing improvements to provincial
labour law. Union organizing was at that time
greatly hampered by shortcomings of the In-
dustrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act of
1937. Workers could form unions, but compa-
nies did not have to recognize them or bar-
gain with them. Especially when labour was
restricted from striking, either by law or self-
imposed no-strike policies, as a means of
achieving and enforcing settlements, this was
a severe limitation that made labour progress
extremely slow and difficult.

The campaign for improvements bore fruit
on March 11, 1943 when the B.C. Legislature
passed amendments requiring that, where a
majority of employees at a work place vote to
be represented by a union, the employer must
recognize that union as the “collective bargain-
ing agent,” and negotiate with it. Successes in
I.W.A. organizing and bargaining followed im-
mediately. The first agreement reached under
the new law was achieved by the one year old
Courtenay local, just a few days after the law
came into effect. There had of course been ear-
lier agreements, more or less informal. For ex-
ample, the Lwmberworker of July 25, 1936, an-
nounced an agreement between local 2782 and
two logging operations, covering union recog-
nition, a wage increase, hours of work and a
safety committee. But such agreements were
not enforceable in law.

In June of 1943 year, an arbitration board
moved to end a Queen Charlotte Island log-
gers’ strike by awarding union recognition in
the camps of J.R. Morgan, Kelley Logging and
Pacific Mills, involving about eight hundred
men.

But the real breakthrough came in Decem-
ber, when a “District-wide” agreement was
reached between the union and twenty of the
largest “association” operations, represented
by R.V. Stuart (later to become F.LR.). The
thousand forest industry workers had in that
agreement essentially become I.W.A. mem-
bers.“

It was a major, historic accomplishment.
Stuart then spoke of it as only providing a ba-
sis for war time arbitration, but he was to
learn in 1946 that it went far beyond that.

NEXT ISSUE: We will take a break
from the historical thread, and discuss
some of the notable characters that have
contributed to the I.W.A. over the gener-
ations; J.M. Clarke, Arne Johnson, Bruce
Magnuson, Grant MacNeil, Syd Thomp-
son, and Tulio Mior.

References

(@) Magnuson, Bruce, “The Untold Story of
Ontario’s Bushworkers: A Political memoir
by Bruce Magnuson.” Toronto. Progress
Books, 1990. p27: see also Radforth, Ian,
“Bushworkers and Bosses: Logging in
Northern Ontario, 1900 - 1980.” Toronto,
Pmiverelty of Toronto Press 1987. pp 135 -
142.

(2) Magnuson, op cit. pp 29 - 35.

(8) Christie, Rob’t E, “Empire in Wood: A His-
tory of the Carpenter’s Union._ Ithaca,
New York. Cornell University press. 1956.
p 116.

(4) Jensen, Vernon H, “Lumber and Labor.”
New York. Farrar and Rinehart. 1945. pp
225 - 230.

(5) Proceedings of the Third Constitutional
Convention of the International Wood-
workers of America. I1.W.A. CANADA
Archives.

(6) Proceedings of the Third Annual Conven-
tion, LW.A. B.C. District Council. Jan. 3 - 4,
1940. I.W.A.CANADA Archives.

(D Notes of an Interview of Hjalmar Bergren
by Myrtle Bergren. I.W.A CANADA
Archives,

(8). History of the Second World Wars.
Recorded by Military and Political Histori-
ans of the U.S.S.R. I.W.A. CANADA
Archives.

(9) Kealey, Gregory S. and Whitaker, Reg,
“R.C.M.P. Security Bulletins: The War Se-
ties, 1939 - 1941.” St. John’s. Committee on
Canadian Labour History. 1989. p 114.

(40) Cochrane, Bert, “Labor and Communism:
The Conflict that Shaped American
Unions.” Princeton, New Jersey. Princeton
University Press. 1977. p 97. See also Lem-
beke, Jerry and Tattum, William M., “One
Union in Wood: A Political History of the
International Woodworkers of America.”
New York. International Publishers and
Madiera Park, B.C. Canada. Harbour Pub-
lishing, pp 75 - 102.

(11) Proceedings of the First Annual Conven-
tion of the B.C. Industrial Union Council,
C.1.0. June 22 and 23rd, 1940.

ie Lembcke and Tattum, op. cit. p 77.

13) B.C. Lumberworker. Various 1943 issues.
LW.A. CANADA Archives.

LUMBERWORKER/JUNE 1996/19