Nation: THE CONGLOMERATE OF CRIME

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several forms. One of the simplest is extortion. The gangsters might thus inform a small businessman, who has perhaps only a dozen employees, that from that minute on his enterprise is unionized. Though the employees may never know that they belong to a "union"—and never receive any of the benefits of being in a union —the employer nevertheless pays the "union organizers" the workers' initiation fees and monthly dues. In another variation, the bogus union settles for "sweetheart" contracts that are grossly unfair to the workers it is supposed to represent. The difference between what a legitimate union might win for the workers and what the Mob union actually obtains is split between the mobsters and the company owners. In one such contract, writes Donald Cressey in his definitive work, Theft of the Nation, the president of a paper local won his union only one paid holiday a year: Passover. His membership was exclusively Puerto Rican.

In other ways as well, union racketeering can be as profitable to a company as it is to the Mob. Once the gangsters have taken over a union—they find their easiest prey in unskilled and semiskilled occupations—they can guarantee both labor peace and a competitive edge over other companies in wages and benefits. There is, of course, a fee, but that is often lower for the businessman than the real costs of strikes or higher wages.

∙ BUSINESS INFILTRATION is the organization's fastest-growing source of revenue. Its interests extend to an estimated 5,000 business concerns. Indeed, Cosa Nostra's penetration of the above-ground world of finance and commerce is probably the greatest threat that it poses to the nation today. A business can be acquired in any number of ways, from foreclosure on a usurious loan to outright purchase. LCN, after all, has more venture capital than any other nongovernmental organization in the world. New York's Carlo Gambino and his adopted family own large chunks of real estate in the New York area valued at $300 million. Until recently, they also ran a labor consulting service. Marcello of New Orleans, another real estate millionaire, has been buying up land in the path of the Dixie Freeway and hopes to make a bundle in federal highway funds.

Once brought under the Mob's umbrella, a business almost always ceases to operate legitimately. If it is a restaurant —favorite targets—or a nightclub, it buys coal or oil from one LCN affiliate, rents linen from another, ships garbage out through still another. Its entertainers, parking-lot attendants and even its hat check girls must always be approved by the Mob—and sometimes they must kick back part of what they take in. When the gangsters were big in Las Vegas, they sometimes used skimmed cash to supplement the fees paid to featured performers. The under-the-table funds went untaxed and left the compliant performer with an obligation. This was repayed by appearances elsewhere at the Mob's request.

Unfortunately, the gangs' business methods do not stop with such relatively innocuous, if illegal, tactics. The giant Atlantic & Pacific grocery can testify to that. Taking control of a company that manufactured detergent, the powerful New York-New Jersey gangster brothers, Gerardo and the late Gene Catena, tried to put the product on A. & P. shelves. When the A.