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From Labor Action, Vol. 14 No. 19, 8 May 1950, p. 3.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
PHILADELPHIA, Apr. 22 – A panel composed of Irving Howe, James T. Farrell and Miss Aleine Austin led the highly successful symposium on Labor Tells Its Story at the Labor Educational Association’s quarterly conference this afternoon at the Broadwood Hotel in Philadelphia. The chairman was Dr. Albert A. Owens of the city Board of Education.
The LEA, a cooperative endeavor of the Board of Education and the labor movement in the Philadelphia area, directs labor education programs in the community and in the union movement. Its quarterly conferences usually include a panel of trade unionists of government representatives discussing some concrete collective-bargaining problem.
Departing from this practice of more than 10 years, the April conference brought together the above three writers in the labor field to discuss the general question of |he state of American labor? The many questions, the spirited discussion and the favorable comments from many of the more than 200 individuals and representatives of labor and welfare associations that participated in this forum attested to the success of the conference.
Miss Austin, author of The Labor Story, made the first presentation, tracing the effect of the depression, the union struggles and the war on the consciousness of the workers and concluding that the American worker has now reached a stage of semi-socialism in which he looks to the government for welfare advances and gains. A crisis, she warned, would set these masses in motion; but whether they would follow a socialist course or a fascist course with “socialist” trimmings depended on the effectiveness of the education these workers received before the crisis occurred. Her report was inclusive and well documented and provided the necessary background for the other presentations and much of the discussion.
Farrell drew on his personal experiences to show that labor’s advances thus far consisted of losing its fears and intimidations and gaining greater “social space.” Its big problem now was to train its big members for the responsibilities that they may be called on to assume. Farrell stated that he was in general agreement with Miss Austin’s analysis.
Irving Howe, co-author with B.J. Widick of The U.A.W. and Walter Reuther, posed the three challenges that faced labor today. In the unions themselves, the challenge arises in the conflict between democracy and growing bureaucratism. On the national scene there is the choice between forming an independent labor party or continuing to tail after the Democratic donkey as at present. Internationally, Labor must head for a Third Alternative that would offer to the workers – not only of America but of all the world – a means of avoiding both Stalinist slavery and A- or H-Bomb destruction.
Howe’s discussion was clearly the most provocative. All but three of the questions were aimed at him; probing his views on independent labor action, the British Labor Party; the role of intellectuals, the meaning of democracy and the idea of a Third Camp. Not a single question was directed to Farrell; but he managed nevertheless to throw the only discordant note into the discussion.
This was typified by the manner in which he injected himself into a question answered by Howe on the role of the intellectual in the trade-union movement. Missing completely the meaning of the question, ignoring the nature of the audience and the context of Howe’s reply, Farrel seized upon the question to launch into an attack on intellectuals in the labor movement and to ridicule and berate them because they “have to write to New York for instructions on how to vote" whenever an issue came up.
This uncalled for and mendacious attack on “politicals” (NOT intellectuals) in the labor movement got the treatment that it really deserved. It must be remembered that there wdle only a few “politicals” in the audience and Farrel’s attack was meaningless to the others. For this reason, no doubt, as well as the fact that the problem had been dragged in by the ears, both Howe and others who understood the slander kept silent.
But one of the trade-unionists, smarting under Howe’s criticism of bureaucracy, took Farrell’s remark for what it appeared to be to most of the audience: a carte-blanche defense of the old-line bureaucrat. He likened the bureaucrat who had a million members in his union to a woman who raised children. This woman he said, doesn’t have to read a book to tell her how to raise her children. She knows how to raise them; she is doing it. And the trade-unionist (i.e., bureaucrat) doesn’t need any intellectual to tell him how to run his union. He knows. And moreover he not only doesn’t need the intellectual in the movement but he doesn’t even need the books the intellectuals write. And intellectuals should stick to lecturing and avoid even the subject of trade-unionism.
This vulgar extension of Farrell’s more subtle remarks incensed the audience, many of whom leaped up to reply to the speaker. After several people had spoken, Farrell felt he had to get out from under. He arose to say, “I don’t completely agree with the speaker.” He then turned to him and with the utmost seriousness softly said: “After all books should be read and ideas are important,
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