The Potters Herald

Labor In Canada
(The following is taken from an article published in "Labor.")

Washington, D. C.—A meeting of international significance took place in Washington this week between the Executive Council of the A. F. of L. and the chiefs of the Canadian Trades and Labor Congress—President Tom Moore and Secretary-Treasurer R. J. Tallon.

One of the major questions disposed of was that of jurisdiction over central labor bodies in Canada.

Heretofore both the A. F. of L. and the Trades and Labor Congress had authority to issue charters to city and provincial central bodies in the Dominion. That caused some confusion and overlapping and the 1939 A. F. of L. convention empowered the Executive Council to end the dual authority.

This was done by the Council. It voted that hereafter the Canadian Congress will be vested with exclusive power to issue such charters.

"We believe this will be for the best interests of all concerned," explained President William Green. "We think our action will definitely refute false assertions made in some quarters that we are trying to interfere in the affairs of the Canadian workers."

In this connection, Moore and Tallon also told of the surprising move of John L. Lewis' United Mine Workers in affiliating with the All-Canadian Congress of Labor, a development that was reported recently in Labor.

The "All-Canadian" group has always been opposed to "international" unions and has sought to stir up national prejudices against such organizations. It is headed by A. R. Mosher, president of a rail employes' union on the Canadian National, which is dual to the Brotherhood of Railway Clerks.

"Some other CIO locals are also affiliating," Moore said, "and the result has been one of the strangest alliances Canada has ever witnessed. On the one hand, the 'All-Canadian' body has had to swallow all its old nationalistic slogans, and the Mine Workers now become bedfellows with their old enemy.

"Of course, John Lewis intends to use that medium to carry on his warfare against the A. F. of L., but we are prepared for any and all of his attacks."