Rough, jimber-jawed Joseph Curran, boss of the C.I.O. National Maritime Union, and slim Harry Bridges, boss of the West Coast's C.I.O. longshoremen and warehousemen, speak in the same Communist accents, out of different corners of the mouth. Both, for years, have sought one big union of maritime and dockside workers, 200,000 strong on both coasts and the Great Lakes.
In Washington last week, after three days of wrangling with the Marine Engineers' Samuel J. Hogan and other leaders, Curran and Bridges happily announced their maritime amalgamation. Six C.I.O. unions and one independent* drew up a merger agreement, to be put into effect...
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