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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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of the A.F. of L. He came back, and that was all right.

There were a number of other things that were done. I don't clearly remember what they did in the A.F. of L. at that time. Things which might make it a good plan or might make it a difficult plan. But I knew Lewis, a little, all through this period, the early thirties.

Interviewer:

And you must have known him in the forties.

Perkins:

Oh yes, I knew him, naturally, all the way through.

Interviewer:

So you and up with a pretty complete knowledge of what the man's about?

Perkins:

No, I don't. That's one of the elements that you never can be sure of. You know what John L. Lewis says, and you know what he does, but you still are bewildered as to what he will do the next time, or what he will say the next time. He never reveals his whole hand. He never lays his whole hand out on the table. When he appears to lay his whole hand out on the table, you can be perfectly certain that he is not laying his whole hand out on the table. He has laid on the table what he wants you to know, to hear, and to believe.

I don't mean to say that he cheats, because he doesn't. He simply does not inform you. I mean, he lays great stress on the things he puts out on the table for your consideration.





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