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Moe FonerMoe Foner
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Session:         Page of 592

Q:

Your relations with White were bad because historically he was an ally of Turner's.

Foner:

Oh yes. Not only that, but for a period White, we thought was with us. When Davis had private meetings in his basement, in his home, David White attended, and David White at those meetings, he decided that maybe we ought to try to stop --

Q:

When he realized Turner's election was a mistake.

Foner:

Yes. David White said -- I remember vividly, because when David White broke the fact that there were private meetings and he wants to excuse this-that I was there too, I said, “David” -- to the executive council -- “I remember vividly that one of the things you said is that the election of Doris Turner would be a disaster for this union.”

Q:

He had said that in the meetings.

Foner:

That's his belief! He told me yesterday. I said, “The rise and fall.” He says, “She should have never risen. You guys built her. She never” -- and what he said is pertinent now. I was asking David, because we were getting philosophical yesterday. “Well, you know, what do you think?” He says, “Moe, that woman was never interested in anything but herself from the very, very beginning, and I'm not talking about since she became an officer of the union. From the very, very beginning.” He says, “That woman was born and raised in Harlem. That woman never became a member of any organization in the black community. Either then or when she became an officer she was not interested in the members. During the strike” -- he told me about the two weeks thing. He started to pile on things about Turner again, that her concern was never for the membership, never for the membership. So I said, “The union leadership now has a real problem.” I says, “They need help.” He says, “Look, I'm going to take it easy now. I did my thing. They'll have trouble running the union, but they're honest people. They're interested in the members. Whatever will happen will happen.”

I said, “How do you figure you lost the election?” We know, we went through a whole lot of things. He said, “One of the reasons is that she and her staff are lazy.” He said, “I, with rank and filers, in “Save Our Union”, would get up and be in front of hospitals at five o'clock in the morning. We never came across an organizer. Organizers came at two o'clock for afternoon shifts. That happened all the way through.” He says, “Those people don't really care about anything. They only were





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