Jay's Portfolio: A.F.L. Ignores W.L.B. Session on Steel Wages
Wants All Ceilings Raised; 600,000 Are Affected by Case To Be Heard Today
New York Herald Tribune
October 31, 1944
By Jay Reid
In a short article published on Halloween, Jay captured the defeatist mood of those in the labor movement seeking to force President Franklin Roosevelt to remove some of the wartime restrictions on wages.
A few weeks earlier, labor had some leverage and put the president in a tough spot.
But time was always on FDR’s side.
As the last grains of sand slipped through the fingers of the labor leaders who held some sway over the National War Labor Board (WLB), a group of them from the American Federation of Labor faced a final decision before the presidential election: stand firm, or pivot and try to salvage some gains.
The leaders chose to stand firm.
In the moment, it is a choice that carries an air of defeatism. However, life would go on after the election, and each day that passes brought the country closer to the end of the war.
From a strategic perspective, keeping the labor movement united was probably the right move.
No doubt, though, the move left everyone in the movement feeling rather ghoulish on Halloween.
