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Moe FonerMoe Foner
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Session:         Page of 592

Q:

I'm not clear as to why Corbett was out to undermine you and why Meany, who had been contacted earlier by Van Arsdale for support--

Foner:

This is before the Beth El strike.

Q:

I see.

Foner:

When Meany had been contacted by Van Arsdale for support was in 1959. It was not legislation.

Q:

Was he unsympathetic to your cause, or was the AFL-CIO hostile to the new maverick union, or what was it?

Foner:

No. It think that the state AFL-CIO, its major role is legislation. It's headed by Ray Corbett at the time from the building trades. It was mainly concerned about legislation that's introduced that may have effect on other unions in general, but on the building trades in particular. Therefore, when anything comes up with compulsory arbitration, as a matter of principal the labor movement is opposed to it, all out. However, there are ways of winking at it. You could say very easily, “These are hospital workers. Listen. Let's let them do it because it's a big thing. It's important that they get a union. It will be thirty, forty thousand members -- blacks, Hispanics. It's big for the labor movement.” They didn't care about that.

I remember battles I had walking in the legislature. I remember walking on the second floor in the balcony with Corbett for hours, just pouring my heart out on why he should be for it, and thinking that I'm dealing with a logical person, that if I convince him with an argument, that he would support it. And he didn't care about us. The best way of putting it was by Kempton, his column on March 30th in The Post, '62. It says, “Raymond Corbett, the AFL-CIO lobbyist here, is a normal human being. You may be certain that when a principle seems more important to him than the needs of 40,000 people, the needs of those 40,000 people aren't very important. He is a man who would violate every relevant one of the ten commandments to serve the aspirations of twenty plumbers.” Now, that is maybe an oversimplified statement, but it's, nevertheless, true.

Also, we had the opposition of the church, Cardinal Spellman. We had a lot of other opposition. As long as Rockefeller wasn't for it, we didn't really have a chance. So we're down with that.

Q:

Okay. So you are going to continue on this story.

Foner:

Right. So the Beth El strike is set up not exactly to get the legislation changed, but primarily to keep the Beth El management





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