PAGE 4
UNITED AUTOMOBILE WORKER
R. J. THOMAS ' GEORGE F. ADDES
President Secretary-Treasurer
RICHARD T. FRANKENSTEEN and WALTER P. REUTHER
Vice-Presidents
International Executive Board Members:
ARNOLD ATWOOD PERCY LLEWELLYN
MELVIN BISHOP WILLIAM McAULAY
WILLIAM BLAKELY JOSEPH MATTSON
GEORGE BURT LEW MICHENER
ARNOLD COXHILL PAUL MILEY
RICHARD GOSSER RICHARD E. REISINGER
CHARLES KERRIGAN THOMAS STARLING
LEO LAMOTTE WILLIAM STEVENSON
JOHN W. LIVINGSTON CARL SWANSON
EDWARD LEVINSON, Editor
(pMAid&nO&u
falum/L
** By R. J. THOMAS
President, UAW-CIO
Washington has no scarcity of self-appointed labor
experts. Representative Albert Engel, for example, who
wont on a Cook’s tour of war plants and discovered that
workei3 were “profiteering’* on the war. Or Howard
Smilh of Virginia, the Great Investigator, and co-author
of the Smith-Connally Act, who has chaired smear com
mittees against everything from labor relations to OPA.
Then there are the committees: standing committees,
subcommittees, special committees.
A GOOD COMMITTEE
As a matter of fact, the House has one committee of
which it has every right to be proud: the Labor Committee
of which Representative Mary T. Norton is chairman.
Mrs. Norton spoke up for the true interests of all the
people as well as for labor recently when she addressed
the House on the infiationary prohibition against sub
sidies.
In a recent letter to the UAW-CIO Washington office,
Mrs. Norton said:
“The problems of organized labor, as you know,
arc especially vital today when the enejnies of labor
are making such constant attacks but you may be
sure that I shall do all within my power t 6 maintain
the benefits gained by laboring men and women dur
ing the past eleven years. I feel that the job they have
done on the production front during this war would
alone justify this support.’*
That expresses the view of a Congresswoman who
stands out among the blustering, irresponsible politicians
for her serious and objective attitude.
Do you remember the furore Rickenbacker and others
stirred up last spring over absenteeism? And how sud
denly it seemed to die down a few months later? At the
height of the hysteria, the House Labor Committee held
hearings on the subject, calling in those who really knew
what was going on. They called responsible government
officials concerned with production, sincere employers,
and union representatives, including the legislative rep
resentative of the UAW. They assembled a mass of genu
ine, objective evidence which showed that the problem
of absenteeism was not a problem of unpatriotic workers
but was a problem of extreme and shocking hardship in
living conditions, which in fact the workers were meeting
the best way they could, and with as little loss to their
jobs as could well be imagined.
The publishing of the straight story helped us to
blow away the smoke clouds being raised by less re
sponsible individuals, including many Congressmen. But
in the meantime—see if you can laugh this off—a bill had
been introduced, a bill to draft absentee workers.
THAT VINSON COMMITTEE
Did this bill go to the committee which was schooled
and experienced in the understanding of labor problems?
No. It was written by the Naval Affairs Committee’s
chairman, Carl Vinson of Georgia, as a bill covering
Naval contracts and therefore came back into the hands
of that committee. But when the committee got hold of
the bill, they proceded to take out the phrase limiting it
to Naval contracts and extend it to cover all war pro
duction.
The cooling influence of Mary Norton’s absenteeism
report headed off this reckless .measure and it did not
pass.
So the next time you write or see your Congressman
on a labor or anti-labor bill and he gives you the old line
about “I haven’t had an opportunity to study this measure
yet,” remember this: He doesn’t have to study it. He has
a competent, conscientious Committee studying labor
matters. They can give him facts on a silver platter any
time he cares to ask them. h. -
OFFICIAL PUBLICATION, International
Union, United Automobile, Aircraft Se Agricul
tural Implement Workers pf America, affiliated
with the ClO—Published semi-monthly; yearly
subscription to members 00c, to nonmembers
$1 —Entered as 2nd class matter April 26, 1937
at the postoffice at Detroit, Mich, under the
act of Aug. 24, 1912.
Publication Office: 411 West Milwaukee, Detroit
TRinlfty 1-6600
UNITED AUTOMOBILE WORKER DETROIT MICHIGAN JANUARY 15 1944
-e=S3fii>-
Art Young, Cartoonist of Labor; v
Dies at 77, A Rebel to the End
Most American workers will not
even recognize the name when
they hear that Art Young is dead.
Yet there are few Americans to
whom labor owes so much for
its improved economic and social
status.
Art was an artist, a cartoonist
who had few peers during the
many years when he was produc
ing his best drawings. He worked
for New York, Chicago and Den
ver newspapers. He drew cartoons
for the old Metropolitan magazine
and could always command top
prices for his work.
But Art’s best work was drawn
for labor papers and compara
tively obscure radical magazines.
His income for this work was so
little that he died a poor man.
This work always featured Art’s
humor. But it was a deadly form
of humor for those at the receiving
end of his wit—and they were al
ways the idle rich, the exploiters
of labor, the yes-men of press,
pulpit and our educational sys
tems.
Young followed the precept that
it was the duty of a rebel “to
afflict the comfortable, and com
fort the afflicted.” His cartoons
about labor, even when they drew
a laugh, were always distinguished
by understanding. Thus he drew
a picture of a washer-woman be
rating her tired, bedraggled hus
band. The old biddy said, “There
you go. You’re tired! Here I be,
standing over a hot stove all day,
and you working in a nice, cool
sewer.”
Again, Young drew a picture of
a slum child looking up at a sky
full of stars. The child exclaims,
in Art’s caption: “Chee, Annie,
look at the stars, thick as bed
bugs.” r
Young was one of a company of
great artists who some thirty
years ago and thereafter devoted
their talents to drawing for and
about workers, their struggles
and hopes. They included also
Boardman Robinson, Robert Mi
nor and Clive Weed. The latter is
dead. Minor no longer draws,
while Robinson is head of one of
nens
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The skyline of New York, as it looks to one who has (one down in Urastranie. **
Soldiers Voite Coofideate in UAW-CIO
That the United Automobile
Worker is warmly welcomed by
our soldiers is apparent in letters
received from union members
now with the armed forces
abroad.
Cpt. Stanley S. Cutcher, mem
ber of Local 12. UAW-CIO, Tole
do, Ohio, states:
“As I haven’t been receiving my
paper regularly since being over
seas, I would like to have you put
me on the mailing list again. Am
always glad to receive news of
the organization on the home
front.
“WONDERFUL COOPERATION**
“I am proud to say that I ‘am a
member of Electric Auto-Lite,
Local 12, Toledo, Ohio. I have
been in foreign service 16 months.
It has been a hard struggle for us
boys, hut with the wonderful co
operation wt arc getting from the
• CMOCAATIC /iz\
a j
Sketches by Art Young for
a Political Primer (1920)
the country’s greatest art schools,
ip Colorado.
Young was 77 when he died in
his New York hotel room. He had
been suffering for years from a
heart ailment. During one of his
recent years, as Art related in an
autobiography, I met him in the
street. He looked tired, and shuf
fled along like a sick man. A few
inquiries revealed that Art was
not only sick but broke as well.
So well-loved was Young that it
took but a few days to collect sev
eral thousand dollars from friends
and admirers to help put Art on
his feet again. One of those who
sent a check for SIOO was Arthur
Brisbane, the Hearst editor. Bris
bane also wrote that there was
SIOO waiting for each cartoon Art
would draw for the Hearst papers.
Bleak as his outlook, Art could
not get himself to draw a line for
Hearst.
There were many times when
neither Hearst nor any other con
servative publisher would come
home front, well, we just can’t
lose.
•“Would like to congratulate the
officers and membership for the
wonder; progress they have
made in legislative and the field
of organized labor. I know they
will do their best to keep labor
united so that we can make it a
grand slam victory over here.”
FROM THE PACIFIC
Ralph A. Richards, of the 60th
Naval Construction Battalion,
reads the United Automobile
Worker somewhere in the Pacific,
and writes:
“My mates that live in the same
tent with me get to it before I do,
so they Know most of the news
before I get to read it.
“Hoping the brothers keep
things rolling while we keep the
road open to Tokio.”
FOR A QUICK VICTORY
Mrs. Evelyn Garnet, of Local
near Young. One was durinff the
first World War, which Young op
posed because he felt it was an
imperialist war. He and other
editors of The Masses were in
dicted and placed or trial. During
the trial Art* drew a picture of
himself asleep in a courtroom
chair. He labeled the picture, “Art
Young on Trial for His Life.”
The Government failed to con
vict Young, after two trials. Partly
this was a tribute to his obvious
honesty and sincerity, which won
over two juries.
Almost twenty years ago, Art
spoke to me of his fear—of grow
ing old. He said he had only one
fear in that connection—that with
age he would lose his rebellious
ness and grow conservative. That
anxiety proved to be completely
unfounded.
By some standards Art Young
may not rate a place in heaven. He
once drew a cartoon on the occa
sion of the death of Enrico Ca
ruso, the great tenor. As Caruso
approached the pearly gates, St.
Peter was seen telling the heaven
ly choir: “Shut up! Now we’re
going the hear some real singing.”
But if Art finds himself today
in the lower regions, it won’t be
completely new to him. At th*
turn of the century, Keir Hardie,
the great British laborite, paid a
visit to the United States. In Chi
cago he saw the vicious degrada
tion of the packinghouse workers.
Hardie later described Chicago as
“a pocket edition of hell.”
Perhaps taking his cue from
Hardie’s remark, Art drew a book
about hell. In it he pictured the
fire and brimstone, the boiling oil
and the emery wheel. Hell, as Art
Young saw it, turned out to be
much like America in the- earlier
days of capitalism. Its slums, its
poverty and hunger, its speed-ups •
and industrial accidents were, as
Art saw it, only a duplication of
what we knew ' n earth.
That was the way—with humor,
irony and compassion—Art Young
indicted the cruelty and injustices
of wage-slavery and exploitation.
So, if Art is there again, sitting
over his drawing board, he can
exclaim, “Hell holds no great ter
ror for me; I’ve seen capitalism at
its worst.”
E. L.
595, UAW-CIO, Linden, N. J., clips
the United Automobile Worker to
send to her soldier husband over* ‘
seas. She writes that she recently
received a couple of letters from
him with the following comments
on the clippings:
“There is an article by sis
Frank Tuttle who scsm to,
think that we in the armed
forces might believe that the
folks back home aren’t loyal to
ns. No such thing. We know
that yon back home feel the *
same war about things as wt do *
here, and that yon are golnf
through the war just as .
asweare... .
“There’s nc doubt that we’B win
the war. You can bet your hoots
on that. What we want is td win
it quick and get home quick*with
victory. Put that into your ma
chine ana grind it into tanks and
planes.”