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So LS Alsen ee

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1955

At TUC convention

James Barton, re-elected president of the B.C. Trade Union

Congress, is seen here with Claude Jodoin, president of the’

_rades and Labor Congress of Canada, at last week’s TUC

convention.

Continued

CRA —

have been shocked by charges
of corruption in the police force.
They want to know how much
deeper this situation goes in
other civic departments.

“Experience, in, major cities
in Canada and the U.S. has
shown that where a_ political
machine fastens its grip on a
city, corruption follows.

“The NPA, which has held
Vancouver in its grip for more
than 20-years, is directly re-
sponsible for the situation in
the police department. It is
in the public’s interest that the
NPA monopoly at city hall be
broken.

“The public wants a full in-
vestigation into all branches
of civic government. The light
will only be able to penetrate
into these departments if the
NPA monopoly at city hall is
broken this December.

“The NPA has a long record
of surrendering the public’s in-
terest to big real estate groups
and monopolies such as the B.C.

Electric.

“The Civic Reform Associa-
tion is calling on all citizens to
join-in a great crusade to clean
up our city, to give Vancouver

good, clean government, and

to end the NPA monopoly. As
a step in this direction the CRA
will immediately launch a drive
‘to enroll citizens into member-
ship.” :
Applications for membership
should be addressed to Mrs.
Sylvia Friedman, CRA secre-
tary, 2456 Galt Street, and in-

formation may be obtained by | _
answer.

phoning DExter 1985-R.

Continued ©

MR. BIG

30. with’ Eddie Scosky, drug
trafficking suspect, now sought
as a bail-jumper. : :

The officer said he asked
Scosky who the “Big Boy” was
and was told: “I don’t know.
But he’s buying tall ones in the
P.A. Club and he doesn’t care
if it costs $15 a round. ' He
never comes down here. You
guys should get him.”

But Mr. Big is still at large.

The public would like to
know why. It would like to see
the drug question raised at the
Tupper Commission probe.

If gamblers can buy protec-
tion—as has been charged at
the probe — obviously under-
world drug kings would try to
do the same.

Two months ago Mrs. Effie
Jones demanded in an open
letter to Commissioner R. H.
Tupper that Mayor Fred Hume,
chairman of the police com-
mission, be called. before the
police probe to give an account
of his stewardship.

“The public wants a full air-
ing of the narcotics branch of

the police department,” wrote,

Mrs. Jones to Tupper. “You
are to be congratulated in air-
ing corruption charges in the
gambling and bootlegging de-
tails. However, I am sure you
will. agree with me that the
public has a right to know how
it is the narcotics trade is
able to flourish in Vancouver.
And why it was that the Royal
Commission found it necessary
to single out Vancouver’s anti-
narcotics activities for criti-
cism.”

These questions still await an

CCCL parley

seeks labor unity

By GERARD FORTIN

QUEBEC CITY

The issue of labor merger dominated this year’s sessions of the 100,000-memb@
Canadian and Catholic Confederation of Labor. :
Favoring unity of the Canadian trade union movement, a five-point resolution
adopted by delegates declared that the CCCL was “‘ready to undertake studies to reallt
the complete unity of labor in Canada, while safeguarding the spirit of indepengen®

and respect of the characteris-

‘ties of each group.”

President Gerard Picard told
delegates: :

“Even though parent U.S.
unions have realized benefits
for Canadian workers, this is
no reason for allowing Canada
to become an American satel-
lite.”

In his main report, Picard
said: t

“We don’t want settlement of
our problems to be made in
Washington.

“Tt
that the Americans profit by
the inferiority of our govern-
ments, and exploit our natural
resources without letting them
take control of the labor move-
ment in the Province of Que-
bec.”

Picard told over 400 delegates
representing some 200 locals,
that unity of the labor move-
ment could be achieved in Can-
ada by other means than or-
ganic merger.

He cited a cartel, such as
that set up to fight provincial
anti-labor Bills 19 and 20, as
an alternative form.

The convention proposed, as

‘a start; inviting the other two

centres to participate in a car-
tel with the aim of going to
Ottawa to raise the question of
unemployment which threatens
to grow this winter.

On merger the convention set
up a committee of nine mem-
bers who will undertake, with-
out delay, a full study of the
question and make a report to
the next convention.

A resolution on strikes, pro-
posing that they should be auth-
orized by the CCCL executive
before they could be declared
by affiliated locals or federa-
tions, opened a heated debate.

Delegates declared themselves
formally against this proposi-
tion. The debate showed that
delegates and the membership
they represent want to guard
their local autonomy and that
of their federation, just as
zealously as they are for aut-
onomy of their centre. It also
showed how determined they
were to maintain democracy in

“the CCCL:

Discussion on political action
was not as lengthy as last year.
This was inevitable because
what preoccupied CCCL lead-
ers was the question of the
merger and the inner organiz-
ational changes necessary to
setting a course for the CCCL
in the light of the coming TLC-
CCL merger. 2

In: the debate, a Duplessis
spokesman, Rene Belanger, at-
tacked political action by the
CCCL. He claimed that wher-
ever the syndicates presented
aldermanic ‘candidates, they
were not elected. (In St. Hya-
cinthe, two CCCL officials were
elected to the council.)

Answering Belanger, a Vic-
toriaville delegate said:

“For the first time, because
we presented a mayoralty can-
didate in our town, all the
locals united their forces, in
the municipal election battle.:

“The man we chose did not
get elected, but the mayor that
was elected had his majority

, foreigners.

is bad enough already

cut from 1,800 to 300 votes, de-
spite the fact that he stole the
election with Duplessis’ elec-
toral machine. I consider this

a victory for the Syndicates, of
Victoriaville.”

Another delegate declared
that “to be against political
action, means giving a free hand
to those who pass anti-labor
legislation and those who give
away our natural resources to
I say that to take
political action means to occu-
py oneself with the common
interests of the workers.”

The question of peace was
the weakest aspect of the con-
vention. CCCL leaders carried
on as if the matter of war and
peace did not concern their
100,000 members in a province
which is traditionally against
imperialist wars. Not a word

. t
was said about the imported
changes that have occurre
the world.

ive
. Proposals by the executlv’

to change the name ° ‘
CCCL and remove the %
“Catholic” were turned over we
a committee elected by fhe
convention to consider for
question of a new name:

the organization. a

. . s rep
in his maim 30-yeat”
dherin&

Picard,
pointed out that the

1:
and composed almost en
of French-speaking Cana aa
nonetheless did make 2.

e.

peal to all regardless of oe
: agen aa,

creed, color: or langu é enolies

permitted entrance

were Is view

CCCL members.
was that retention of
“Catholic” was discrim!

Anti-lynch law demanded ue

DETROIT

Rep. Charles Diggs Jr. (De-
mocrat, Michigan) served not-
ice last week that he will
challenge the seating of every
Mississippi congressman until
every Negro in that state is
given his right to vote.

The Detroit congressman fur-
ther said he will bypass the
U.S. Justice Department and
go directly to the White House
to seek justice against
lynch - murderers’ of Emmett
Louis Till.

Diggs’ declaration highlight-
ed a mounting protest move-
ment here following acquittal
the two white men charged with
the lynch-murder of Emmett
Louis Till, 14-year-old Negro
from Chicago, in Mississippi.

Walter Reuther, president
both of the CIO and the United
Auto Workers, denounced the
trial in. Mississippi as “a mock-
ery of civil liberties and the
judicial process.”

Renfrew vets
spurn offer

Veterans living in the Ren-
frew Heights development who
have been asked to pay from
$8,000 to $10,000 for their

homes don’t think much of am

offer by Central Mortgage and
Housing Corporation to reduce
the purchase price by $1,000
after two years of payments.
“Even if the government
knocked off $2,000, the homes
wouldn't be: worth the balance
in many cases,” said W. A.
Ostrom, president of Renfrew
Heights Community Associa-
tion, which is now preparing
a brief demanding that purchase
prices be cut drastically.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — OCTOBER 7, 1955 —

Labor assails
lynch verdict

the.

-the past 20 years.

neh
Reuther said that the ae
slaying of Till “was 4 «dice
ing instance of race a.
and naked maori,
He .was_ particular ‘tal
about the verdict of acd iy:
returned by an all-wht es in
“The trial which resU chats
the acquittal of the me? ock-
ed as murderers makes ve “¢he
ery of civil liberties @

‘judicial process,” he SAC") and

The handling of the tt# evi-
the verdict in view ° é
dence was, he said, 4 bas all
the democratic rights °° ond
Americans and the thing
the UAW would do evet¥" ind
in their power to proves sage
correct this gross misc@
of justice.

Reuther, howeve!?,
indication as to what |
the CIO or the UAW
take.

UAW locals were
tion on their own.
Dodge and Ford Jecals 2
nounced the lynch pefore
more. than a week }
Reuther spoke up.- , 0

Carl Stellato, president 600;
the 60,000-member_
at the Ford’s giant R p
stated: we
“The justice department tan
an obligation to the j
people . . . to move
case and prove that #
is everybody’s se

“Many governmenD®, a
and ener committer’ ive
busy investigating SUP" :
activities. in:

‘We can think ;o0 B0yne
that subverts the tenets "the
mocracy more thai f
Till lynching. pil

Konstan has had a for
lynch law in the porinetee

fifty-six would be 4
for taking it out of the
and putting it on
IDOOKS: 3

pace