COMBATTING COMMUNISM

Chronicle (Levin), 2 December 1949, Page 5

COMBATTING COMMUNISM

(ly./j.R.A.

—Reuter.

U.S. Trade Unionists Urge Positive Action

CopyriQtii)

Received Friday, 10.20 a.m. LDHDON, Dec. 1. 'The voice of the American trade union movjement dominatgd toel&y's session of the free world labour conference, which discussed the econpmic and. soeial policy of the New Trade Union International it plans to inaugurate on Monday. The American delegates, representing the powerful American Federdtion of Labour and Congress of Industrial Organisations, pleaded "that the new International ; needed a positive programme of social and economip action as the oniy adequate reply to Commun-: lsm. Mr. William Green, president of' the American Federation of Labour, m pledging his union to the new. International. warned that the great trades unions of the ■ world were facing a conspiracy to destroy them. He ridiculed the promises. of economic security off ered by ! Russian principles and said that: social security and forced labour were the very opposite of •eaeh other. The new International's programme should include the exposure and elimination of the Russian" system of forced labour. The leader of the American C.I.O. delegation, Mr. Walter ReutheJ1, fcold the conference it had to prove democracy had the practical knowledge of how to give the people what they wanted. Mr. Reuther said: "We have the tools for the first time in the hisr tory of the world to conquer human insecurity. Our problem is that we do not know how to distribute the things we have in abundance." He warned of a possible new str-uggle for world markets, with mass production at one end and mass unemployment at the other. He said that mass unemployment was always solved by war. Americans believed that they could solve their basic economic problem only on an international scale. "We shall find a solution only to the extent that we help the Gther countries of the world to solve their problems."