From 1935: Labor Parley Told Threat Is Fascism

The following article is from exactly 75 years ago today, published in the Hartford Courant of December 5, 1935.

Arthur Garfield Hays was a celebrity lawyer in 1935; having served as defense counsel in three trials which received universal and sensational coverage in the media. He was one of the defense lawyers in the trial which convicted John Scopes, a high school biology teacher, who defied the Tennessee laws banning the teaching of evolution, he defended Ferdinando Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, two Italian immigrants and anarchists who were executed for the murder of two men in an armed robbery, and he defended the Scottsboro Boys, black teenaged boys sent to prison after being accused of raping two white girls.

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Arthur Garfield Hays, on Wesleyan Program, Says Government Must Encourage Unions

“The real danger of the United States is Fascism, the violation of the people’s civil liberties,” Arthur Garfield Hays told a large audience at Wesleyan University tonight during an address on “Labor and the Law.”

The occasion was the opening night of Wesleyan’s twelfth annual college body parley, which will extend through Friday night. “Labor Relations” is the general subject, and many eastern colleges are sending representatives to the discussion.

New York Lawyer.
The program opened with an address by Henry Clifton, member of the New York law firm of Gleason, McLanahan, Merritt & Ingraham, which represented the company in the Danbury hatters’ strike case. Mr. Clifton was substituting for Walter Gordon Merritt of the company, on the conservative side of the same subject discussed by Mr. Hays.

Mr. Hays, taking the liberal view, is national director of the American Civil Liberties Union, and was among defense counsel both in the Sacco-Vanzetti case and the Scopes evolution trial.

After the two addresses the floor was opened to discussion which however resolved itself mainly into an argument between the two speakers.

Mr. Clifton expressed the thesis that labor unions have rights and powers which employers and other institutions do not possess. His plea was that unions should be restricted and prevented by law from exercising privileges which are not granted to all other institutions.

“Labor must remain necessarily within the law, else by its own excesses it might commit suicide,” he said.

He suggested a code for fair dealing: (1) to outlaw a strike if its purpose is to break a law, (2) to regulate internal organization of unions, especially retarding the accounting of funds, and democratic voting, and (3) ot make the labor union responsible for all destruction done by any of its agents.

Hays Replies.
Mr. Hays accused Mr. Clifton of unfamiliarity with the territory he was covering and with conditions as they exist.

“I disagree with the whole point of view of my friend,” he said. “Labor rather than being restricted should be given as many rights and privileges as belong to the employer. As things stand labor has all the worst of it. The courts are unfavorable to labor since most judges come from families which hold views antagonistic to labor.
“Employers and not unions are ordinarily the violators of the law. They prevent labor from exercising the right of protest, of picketing, of holding meetings, of openly expressing themselves, of freedom of speech and association which are fundamental American rights.
“Men must join unions if they are to be other than industrial slaves. The United States Government must actively encourage unionism, thus giving the laborer a chance to make a decent living and protection against losing his fundamental American rights.”

Today’s Session
Thursday morning’s session will witness a discussion on the place of the white collar and professional workers between John Goss of Waterbury, a member of the State Board of Meditation and Arbitration and Granville Hicks, an editor of New Masses. In the afternoon, John P. Frey, president of the International Typographical Union, and David Saposs, author and economist representing the company unionist, will discuss the issue of company unions, craft unions, and industrial unions.

In the evening, Gilbert Montague, lawyer and author who has acted as counsel for the Federal Trade Commission in numerous trade cases, and Abraham J. Muste, national secretary of the Workers Party, will discuss the Industrial Disputes Act. Both men are listed as opposed to the act, but for widely different reasons.