VOL. XXI: NO. 12 CHARLOTTE, N. C, THURSDAY, JULY M. 1251 — '"I i .1 » SubsrriDtion Price S2.00 Per Year I PHILIP F. HUGHES* President Charlotte Building Trades Council Charlotte Bunding Trades Council Hanes Officers Yen 1951-52 Philip F. Hughes was elected president of Charlotte Building Trados Council at its regular meeting on July 19. A. B. Dixon was named vice president, and C. P. Murphy was elected secre tary-treasurer. Mr. Hughes is business mana ger of the Charlotte Sheet Metal Werfeers -union and re cently had considerate additional territory added to his local un ion here. He now covers territory from Asheville to Wilmington over an almost direct line through the southern part of North Car olina. Mr. Hughes is one of the most active union officials in North Carolina and his union has grown large under his leadership. The other brother officers named with Mr. Hughes are active in their local union affairs and The Journal predicts the building trades will experience consider able growth and new activity un der their leadership during the coming year. PROFITS BOOM AS THE GUNS BOA* Despite the excess profits tax, net profits of corporations in creased 86 per cent in Janaary, February and March of this year over the figures for the same months of 1950. The rise in corporate profits, after taxes, during the Korean war was reported July 5 by the Federal Trade and the Securities and Exchange Commissions. Uncle Sam Says J. A. SCOGGINS, President CLAUDE L ALBEA, Vice-President H. A. STALLS, Secretary New officers for the year 1951 52 were elected nt the regular bi-monthly meeting of Charlotte Central Labor Union Thursday night. J. A. Scoggins was named president; Claude L. Albea was .elected vice president; H. A. Stalls secretary, and John Lovett, treasurer. The board of trustees, consisting of three members, was named as follows: Paul A. Mar tin. Odie Heath and Phil Hughes. [-TT • Delegates were named to the North Carolina State Federation of Labor meeting in Asheville in August as follows: J. A. Scog gins and E. A. Tarver. Phil Hughes and H. A. Stalls were named alternates Thursday night’s meeting was one of the best held in months. A good attendance was on hand to participate in the deliberations. Many communications were read and acted upon and reports of delegates from local unions were interesting to all present, all of the unions reporting full employ ment and conditions very good. New delegates from both the carpenters and electrical workers union No. 379 produced their cre dentials and they were received and seated. For the carpenters Bros. W. E. Seymour, John Lov ett, P. A. Martin, L. E. Glenn and F. G. Hahn were received, while for - the electrical workers local i3T9 Bros. Odie Heath and Ches ter A. Martin were the new del egates from their local. Treasurer John Lovett made a. comprehensive report of tee CLU’s finances and the conditksa of the treasury was shown to be very good. The retiring president, Bro. Walter Hooker, made a talk be fore he left the chair he has held for the past two yean, saying that while he was not a candi date to soecoed himself he will I delegate from his local. He is business manager of electrical workers local 379 and stated that I his union’s affairs have grown to j the extent that he will be com pelled to devote more of his time to his union during the next few months than heretofore. The convention call of the North Carolina Federation of La bor was read. The meeting this year will be held in Asheville at the Langren Hotel, beginning Monday, August 13 and lasting for three days or until all the business of the convention has been transacted. Hotel rates of the many Asheville hotels were also received and read. The Journal will reprint the entire convention call next week. ROSSER CAUTIONS MOTOR ISTS TO BE CAREFUL WHEN GOING THRU TOBACCO BELT RALEIGH, N. C. —Motor Ve hicles Commissioner L. C. Rosser today asked that vacation bound motorists be especially cautious when traveling the tobacco pro ducing regions of Eastern North Carolina. The Commissioner said that he had personally noticed a great number of farm boys and girls at work on tobacco sleds which are usually pulled from field to field along the shoulders of the highway. These children, he add ed, are prime targets for the speeding or careless driver. Rosser was particularly anxious for out-of-state motorists to heed the prsciaortna “Many of onr tourists driving througl) North Carolina ha said are ponied at the bulky, mole drawn sleds. Ho urged all motorist a noroach iu Mm tobacco-laden sleds to alow down and pane with caution. Children along the highway, the Commissioner said, should be watched by the driver just as Mtomv hi ss si alma a* eieswol CtOociy ®i bH/ * Hbrp® 9* ilJBai* i WASHINGTON WEEKLY COLUMN The Facto of Ufa Brent Spence (D., Ky.) is chair man of the House Banking Com mittee. That’s the group which had charge of the House measure to control prices. Tt held many hearings on controls. This is what Spence told the House June 29 about what went on in the hearings: “Every witness that came there came to speak for his own inter ests. Every one who spoke for an interest that he was engaged in intimated that it would be sat isfactory if they took the con trols off him and put them on others. “We send the boys to the front and they give all they have. But I tell you, you do not see that spirit of sacrifice very much in industry. Every fellow that came in wanted to grab something and give nothing. “Now they come here and they pool their interests. ‘You scratch my back and I will scratch yours, and we will get out from under all controls.”* . Senator Feels People Are Betrayed . * - / The reactionaries in the Senate who played potitics with your pocket-book and voted for the profiteers and against the con sumers when they rammed through a watered-down price controls bill led Sen. Herbert Leh man (D., N. Y.) to tell them June 28 something they should have heard long ago. It is this: They are ruining the Senate. But let Lehman tell it: “I have had a lone public life. I was president of the Senate of njy State for four years. ! was governor for 10 years. I have been in the U. S. Senate going on two ys “I came to the Senate in the belief which 1 had always held that it eras the greatest delibera tive body in the world. I still want to believe that. But cer tainly what has occurred here in the last few moments and in the last few days makes me doubt it altogether. "Here we are engaged in a life and-death struggle, a struggle for survival against the most ruth y in history, fighting on two fronts, on the military and on the economic. We ought to be engaged exclusively in consider ing legislation to benefit all the people of the country, legislation to keep our country on a sound economic “Yet, here I see and hear Sen ator after Senator rise, not to concern himself with the issues before us, but to play politics, to blast the Administration, to at tack those who have given up the comfort of their home towns and circles of friends and the profits of their business, to come to Washington and to serve their fellow Americans. “I tell you, Mr. President, it las made it heart-sick to hear all this. It makes me feel that wo are betraying the people who seat us down boro, that we are not eoneentiag ourselves with es oontial legislation, that we are net devoting ourselves to protect ple, but ore moving to pass leg illation which far from reducing the eost of living, will inevitably increase and advance the coot of Uvin.* ta 1962 will Congressman And Newspaper Urge Strong Wage Stabilization Board Rep. Jack Shelley Rep. Jack Shelley (D.) of , San Francisco says the Wag* Stabili zation Board (WSB) should be strengthened. The U. S. Chamber of Com merce and the National Associa tion of Manufacturers (NAM) want to make WSB so weak it won’t be able to settle labor-man agement disputes. “From my long experience I know that the matter of wages and other issues are inextricably intertwined in the give and take over the collective bargaining table/’ Shelley, long active in the California labor movement, told the House on June 2b. “I . . . recommend that the Wage Stabilisation Board be giv en specific authority ... to con sider such side issues and to' giake decisions thereon during the pe riod of emergency. The Washington Peat The Washington Post, which follows a conservative economic line on economic questions, warns against wrecking the Wage Sta bilisation Board (WSB). “Industrial peace would be jeo > pardised and strikes would multi ply if the WSB machinery for peaceful settlement of disputes over non-wage issues were put out of commission,” says an edi torial in the July 1 Post. The U. S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Man ufacturers (NAM) want to do just that. “The sponsors of the proposed changes (in WSB) or . . . play ing with Are in trying to abandon a wage control program that, by insuring labor’s support, will en courage peaceful settlement of wage disputes . . Here’s Why Beef Prices Must Be Cut ■ w ». Price Stabiliser Mike DiS*lk tells why beef prices must be rolled beck: “Cattle ’ prices rose way out of line with wages and other prices. Between January, 1950, the date of the wage stabilisation base, and March, 1951, cattle prices rose: “Over five times as mucn as wages. “Over four times as much as prices paid by farmers. “Over five times as much as . . . consumer prices. “Over three times as much as the price of (all) food items. “Beef accounts for about 13 per cent of the consumer’s food bill and for almost half of the meat consumed in this country.” DiSalle made these statements in a letter to The Washington Post published July 9. SAD MEWS Economic Stabilizer Eris John ston said June 19 Congressional action forbidding price rollbacks is “sad news to every American housewife who is struggling with her own family budget” vdiiMaiipppM VIRGINIA LEGISLATION THREATENS UNIONS Richmond, V*.—Virginia work ers, preparing for the 1962 poli tical campaign, are looking over the records of members of the 'House of Delegates to see cow they stood on the so-called Boat wright amendment. This legislation would prohibit the collection of working assess ments. Thus it would have the effect of destroying anions—par ticularly in the building trades— because it would kill their financ ing. < It would also permit “free riders” to enjoy the benefits won by unions — such as hours and conditions of work—without sup porting them. The amendment lost last year by just two votes. TAFTI8M “The emergency is more threat ening than real," Sen. Robert Taft (R., Ohio) told Washington reporters, June 7. “It is on our backs.” Joe Stalin is just a mirage, eh, Senator? changes as follows: furniture, ~ down 1,000; Transportation, up 14,500; Stone, Clay and Glass, up 4,400; Machinery, up 9,900, and Instruments, up 700. Grots average weekly earnings of factory production workers ranged from $42.48 in Mississippi to 851.05 in Alabama. Orer-the yesr increases ranged from $6.35 in South Carolina to $2.64 in Mis sissippi. All states, with the ex ception of Tennessee, had a longer -vorkweek than in 1950.- Average weekly hourj in May, 1951, va ried from a low of 38.3 in North Carolina to a high of 42.9 in Flor ida as compared to the national average of 40.6. Average hourly earnings in all states were sub stantially over 1950 levels. In creases ranged from twelve cents an hour in South Carolina to four cents in Mississippi. Data for the eight southeastern states were prepared by state agencies in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, North Car* Una, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia in co-op i ratten with the' U. S. Department ef Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics. Any person Interested in re* eeiving this materiel may do so by writing to Mr. Brunswick A. Begdon, Regional Director, Bu reau of Labor Statistics, V. 8. Departmen of Labor, Room 664, 80 Seventh Street, N. KL, Atlan ta 5, Georgia. Election day thU year in sev> •ml state* and eitiea srfll be November i. $14