SERIOUS SITUATION

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22774, 7 July 1937, Page 14

SERIOUS SITUATION

STRUGGLE FOR POWER MR. LEWIS' ACTIVITIES REACTION OF PUBLIC OPINION "WASHINGTON, June 2C, In the United States the industrial and political scene is being dominated more and more by the titanic struggle by Mr. John L. Lewis' Committee for Industrial Organisation to impose itself on the map. It is engaged in a twofold endeavour to usurp the place of the old-time American Federation of Labour and to force industries, great and small, into signing contracts. The great steel strike has now continued for more than a month, with 100,000 men idle and a, loss of wages amounting to £4,000.000 Australian. These figures, while staggering, are not more significant than the reaction of public opinion, coming with the realisation that President Roosevelt appears to be involved completely with the success of the Lewis campaign, and with the political entanglements necessarily tied into the whole picture.

Troops have been called out, a dozen people have been killed and hundreds injured or gassed. The outstanding development of this serious situation came this week in Washington with the opening of the Strike Mediation Board.

Thousands of people who voted for Roosevelt at the last election are blaming him for selling out to Lewis, and are talking of some kind of drastic move to unseat or recall the President.

Nothing, of course, will come of that, but the violence of the feeling of that part of the public who are unsympathetic to the C.1.0. is most surprising. There is a likelihood that President Roosevelt will call a halt to Lewis when he believes that the latter has gone far enough in favour of getting better wages and shorter hours for Labour supporters.