March 9, 1949
Memorandum to the Secretary of State, Dean Acheson, by the International Labor Relations Committee, American Federation of Labor
The efforts of the free peoples to promote reconstruction, democracy, and lasting peace are approaching a critical turn. The progress of the Marshall Plan and the growing solidarity of the democratic nations have, at least in Europe, checked the expansionist offensive of the imperialist Communist dictatorship which holds totalitarian sway over Russia and its satellites. Hence, the frantic and redoubled drive of the rulers of the Cominform to prevent the restoration of west European economy, to promote social chaos in the democratic countries, and to paralyze every endeavor to secure enduring international harmony.
The recent threats of the Communist leaders of France, Italy, and other countries to aid the Russian armies in the event of a war brutally confirm this. Moreover, in view of the fact that Russian policy is quite often reflected in advance in the line of the Kremlin's Communist agencies (parties) abroad, these declarations may have an even more sinister significance. The Thorez-Togliatti threats may well foreshadow a plan of the Russian imperialists to invade western Europe in the near future. These declarations are only a brazen notice to the victims-to-be that the Soviet fifth column is already at hand to stab them in the back when the Communist hordes from the East move down upon them.
Under these circumstances, it is primarily up to our country to lead in international cooperation to insure the triumph of human freedom, to achieve economic well-being, and to assure world-peace founded on equitable relations among the nations. Towards the attainment of these great goals, America can contribute much more than even its vast economic prowess and enormous military potential. We are even far richer and stronger. Our people are bound together by unshatterable bonds of devotion to human liberty. We have a vibrant democratic idealism which can inspire the peoples of other lands with a firm faith and an unconquerable determination to be free and prosperous nations. In the fulfillment of these vital international responsibilities, the active participation of organized labor is absolutely necessary.
In this light, the American Federation of Labor stresses that the foreign, as well as the domestic, policies of our country must aim not merely at warding off the blows and defeating the subversive activities of Communist totalitarianism, not merely at defending ourselves successfully against the militant aggressionism and ruthless expansionism of imperialist Russia. That is why our Sixty-Seventh Annual Convention, held at Cincinnati last November, declared:
"We must enable them (the E.R.P. nations) to rebuild so soundly as to defeat Communism and become a magnet of attraction, an economic example and a political hope, for the oppressed and depressed behind the Iron Curtain."
It is true that since the military defeat of Nazism, totalitarian Communism has become the most dangerous enemy of human liberty and peace. But this does not mean that Communism is the only type of totalitarianism implacably hostile to human dignity and freedom. Every brand of totalitarian dictatorship is diametrically opposed to and is the very antithesis-in a moral as well as political sense-of democracy. Therefore, in order to pursue consistently and vigorously a democratic foreign policy, our government must do nothing which might directly or indirectly lend aid and comfort to any expression of totalitarianism-whether it be Communism, Nazism, Fascism, or Falangism, or DeGaullism and the fellow-travelers thereof. We must everywhere support only the democratic elements who show by their actions that they are determined to safeguard and strengthen democracy.
In accord with our convention decisions and in line with the above, the American Federation of Labor calls upon the State Department to pursue a policy guided by the following:
1. Our country should not only put its own defenses into complete readiness and invincibility, but should also provide arms and enter into a defensive military alliance against totalitarian aggression which may threaten friendly nations in Europe, Asia, or elsewhere. In this connection, we heartly indorse the projected Atlantic Pact. We emphatically urge upon our government the proposal of our San Francisco Convention (October, 1947) that "economic recovery in Europe must be buttressed by an increasing degree of cooperation covering Western European countries similar to the Inter-American Defense Treaty." Of course, to be effective the Atlantic Alliance must encompass every democratic country inclusive of Italy which occupies a pivotal position in the highly strategic Mediterranean and which has great potential value to the economic, political, and military forces of international democracy.
2. Our government delegation to the U.N. should render and rally the fullest support in behalf of the proposal of our Cincinnati Convention to have the United Nations make a decision that "it is a crime against international law and an act of aggression against the peace for any government to organize or support (directly or indirectly) any fifth column or fifth column activities in any country with which it is at peace."
The validity of our proposal and the urgency of energetic support of the same by our government has just been dramatically confirmed by the arrest in New York of individuals serving foreign interests hostile to the welfare and security of the American people.
3. We reiterate our demand for the economic and political integration of all zones of Germany not occupied by Red troops into an independent German state with a democratic constitution freely adopted by themselves so that it can serve effectively as a member of the community of independent and democratic nations of Europe devoted to reconstruction and peace. We further demand that no industrial or financial magnates who have been friends and supporters of German militarism and Nazism like the steel overlord Heinrich Dinkelbach, the Nazi Krupp director, Guenther Sohl, and the chief administrator of the coal industry, Heinrich Kost, and the others proposed by the Bizonal Economic Administration to the Western Allied Military Governments as managerial trustees of the Ruhr iron and steel works should be given any position of authority in the rebuilding of Germany. To put these enemies of free labor and democracy into the seats of economic control is to discredit the E.R.P. for the success of which a democratically reconstructed Germany is indispensable. Surely it is unnecessary for us to point out that if our government were to approve the proposed trustees for the steel industry, it would be in violation of the Six-Nation London Agreement of December 28, 1948 in which the democratic nations pledged "to prevent persons who furthered the aggressive designs of the Nazis from acquiring ownership interests or positions of direction and management in those industries."
To nurse and favor the builders and breeders of Hitlerism plays into the hands of the Communist demagogues and robs us of a major moral issue against Russia which has been resorting to widespread mobilization of notorious Nazi military and economic forces for the purpose of imposing on the German people a new totalitarian tyranny.
We further propose that the bond fide German free trade unions in the iron and steel industries and metal trades be accorded adequate representation in this trusteeship and that American labor as well as industry be accorded a responsible voice in the directing commission.
4. In order to give the world the democratic and constructive leadership it needs, our country must not shut its eyes to crimes against humanity and freedom-no matter by whom such bestialities are perpetrated. We must not condemn assaults against human liberty when they are committed by Communist totalitarians and condone, by our silence, similar crimes when they are perpetrated by the Franco Fascist regime which, according to the General Assembly of the United Nations, "was imposed by force upon the Spanish people with the aid of the Axis powers." The continued torturing and murdering of free trade unionists and liberals by the Franco regime are as reprehensible and deserving of condemnation by our government as the vile crimes against human dignity and freedom of conscience which we have so promptly and properly denounced when they were perpetrated in Hungary, Bulgaria and other Iron Curtain countries. In stressing this truth, we cannot reiterate too forcefully our hostility to Communist machinations in Spain-no less than anywhere else. The Communist everywhere only hurt the cause of democracy when they pretend to intervene in its behalf.
Our government should, therefore lose no time in taking under consideration the policy of expressing its unmistakable disapproval of all proposals to lend military aid or private financial loans to the totalitarian dictatorship now terrorizing the Spanish people. No such aid should be forthcoming until such time as the rights of the workers and other democratic rights are restored to the Spanish people. We therefore, call upon our government to reaffirm its support of the Tripartite Declaration in re Franco adopted by United States, France, and the United Kingdom (March 4, 1946) and the resolution thereon adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 12, 1946.
5. America's vigorous opposition to totalitarian crimes and persecution should likewise be reflected in our policy towards South America. Our government should make its voice clearly heard and its influence fully felt against the totalitarian depredations against democracy and free trade unionism now rampant in Venezuela and Peru. Here, the identity of aims and practices of all totalitarians have been brought into bold and painful relief by the intimate association and close collaboration of Communists, Falangists, and Peronists, in the joint offensive against the forces of true liberalism and democratic labor-the forces most friendly to the American people and to the role of our country in world affairs.
6. One of the most encouraging features of the present world situation is the increasingly active role of free labor in behalf of human liberty and peace. This has only recently been dramatized by the decisive role of organized labor in rallying Norway and mobilizing support in the other Scandinavian countries for the Atlantic Pact. In our own country, the American Federation of Labor has in recent years, vastly expanded its international activities in behalf of democracy and peace and carried the fight to the totalitarians of all stripes everywhere. In view of the expanding activities and increasingly important role of free labor in world affairs, we propose the following:
(a) Our government should do what other democratic countries have already done: to include labor advisors (representing the trade union movement in our country) in its official delegations to the Economic and Social Council and the General Assembly of the United Nations.
(b) We ask the Secretary of State to designate someone in his department who shall be charged with the task of keeping our top governmental leaders fully apprised of labor's undertakings in international affairs and to facilitate the cooperation of our government with the independent activities of democratic labor on the world scene in behalf of democracy and international peace.
The person so designated should be competent, experienced, and fully acquainted with the strategy and tactics of totalitarian Communism as well as the aims and practices of the bona fide international free trade union movement. The person designated should be given adequate authority and organization facilities so as to get the maximum results. It should also be his task to insure the closest possible cooperation with the Department of Labor and to serve as an integral part of the political offices of or be attached to the Under Secretary of State.