U.S. Operates Security Check On Seamen

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 16, Issue 31, 11 December 1950, Page 4

U.S. Operates Security Check On Seamen

United States Pacific coast port officials, charged with ousting seamen of doubtful loyalty from seagoing jobs, have established a screening routine without provoking trade union reprisals. Lieutenant Commander John A. Rylander, United States Shipping Commissioner here, who has directed the waterfront loyalty check, has reported that only 59 seamen have been barred from the 300 vessels checked. Of the 59 rejected, 12 have been reinstated upon appeal to higher Coast Guard authorities. Union opposition to tbe process, originally adopted on a volunteer basis by the majority of workers and shipowners when the Korean war started and now authorised by Federal law, is practically non-ex-istent. Even the waterfront unions still under the titular leadership of Harry Bridges, the Australian-born labour leader who has been brand- 1 ed a: Communist, have accepted the necessary of the disloyalty check. Still officially opposed to the screening, on the grounds that the process is designed to establish an antiLabour “Blacklist,” is the Leftwing Marine Cooks and Stewards’ Union.

Attempts to separate the loyal from the disloyal seamen were started last August because port and military authorities decided San Francisco Bay and other Pacific coast ports were rich targets for saboteurs in event of hostilities involving the United States. “Getting Tough”

Senator Warren G. Magnuson, of Washington, summed up the official attitude during an address before the American Association of Port Authorities.

“It would be folly to presume that a potential enemy does not know the terrific value of the guns and tanks and manpower now going over the docks,” he said. “We are getting tough about who works on the piers and what ships come into the harbours—and we are going to get tougher. 1 * “I am not trying to alarm anyone, but I am told it is perfectly feasible for an enemy to plant an atomic explosive in a harbour, depart, and, two weeks later have a time mechanism detonate it.” The greatest effort to eliminate saboteurs has been made in the screening of seamen seeking to sign articles on' vessels which start voyages here. This has caused the marine cooks and stewards to repeat their argument that the check is merely the compilation of a labour blacklist.

Procedure, for the loyalty check is relatively simple. When a vessel, is ready to sign a crew, the deputycommissioner in charge of checking the, validity of the seamen’s papers is accompanied to the ship by a screening officer. The commissioner sets up office in a conveniently located compartment and invites the seamen to sign the ship’s articles. The screening officer, goes to another compartment and remains there alone, unseen by the applicants. When a seaman offers his papers to the deputy commissioner they are given to a messenger who takes them to the screening officer. He checks the name and identification number against a secret list of individuals who have been labelled a “poor security risk” by the Federal Government.