With only one struck plant remaining closed last week and with no agreements signed, it was apparent that John L. Lewis had about lost his strike in "Little Steel." "The C.I.O. failed to meet its first major test successfully," gloated A. F. of L.'s William Green, calling for an intensified campaign to stave off restrictive labor legislation. "We cannot permit all organized labor to be penalized because of the stupid mistakes of C.I.O." Sneered the leonine C.I.O. boss: "Droolings from the pallid lips of a traitor."
Contemptuous also was John Lewis last week when asked what he thought about an American Institute of Public Opinion poll showing A. F. of L. favored over C.I.O. 2-to-1. In the manner of the late William ("Public-be-damned") Vanderbilt, Mr. Lewis tossed his mane and snapped: "If the public wants to approve of C.I.O., it can; if the public doesn't want to approve, it can."
Superficially it looked as if John Lewis had picked a poor time to assume one of his haughty poses. Washington newshawks noted that he appeared tired and harassed. But fundamentally there was little reason for him to admit a general defeat. "Little Steel" was only one sector of the steel front; he still had the majority of the industry in his pocket. Moreover, steel is only one of C.I.O.'s many fronts. In other mass-production industries like oil, glass, rubber, motor, mining, there have been no serious setbacks. C.I.O.'s Transport Workers Union has been sweeping the field among Manhattan's taxi-drivers and subway and bus employes. Its office workers are invading Wall Street. Here & there C.I.O. has lost minor collective bargaining elections to A. F. of L.. but the defections of A. F. of L. unions into C.I.O.'s ranks still continues. Even Cigar Makers International Union Local No. 144, the local of Samuel Gompers. longtime pillar of the A. F. of L., lately voted to throw in its lot with John Lewis. C.I.O. membership is now nearly as large as A. F. of L.'s (3,000,000 as against 3,600,000). Said sarcastic Mr. Lewis last week: "If C.I.O. continues to lose ground at the present rate, I don't know how we'll handle all the applications that are pouring in."
Far from taking the defensive, John Lewis was last week busy extending his long, long lines. Already launched under the friendly eye of his brother, Alma Denny Lewis, was a drive to organize 800,000 Federal Government employes, a move which brought an official frown from the Chief Executive of the biggest employer in the U. S. (see p. 9). He chartered a new organization called the State, County and Municipal Workers of America, hoped for 2,000,000 members, declared that strikes and picketing would not be included in the organization's policy. And last week John Lewis was taking more than official pleasure in preparing to welcome into C.I.O. the 100,000 lumberjacks and mill hands in the Federation of Wood-workers, hitherto a unit of A. F. of L.'s Carpenters & Joiners, headed by William ("Big Bill") Hutcheson. A stanch Republican, Big Bill Hutcheson was the man John Lewis knocked down in a fist fight at the 1935 A. F. of L. convention.