Ben Gold
Encyclopedia
Benjamin Gold was an American
labor
leader who was prosecuted for his communist
political views under McCarthyism
. He was president of the International Fur and Leather Workers Union from 1937 to 1955.
living in Bessarabia
, a province of the Russian Empire
. His father was a jeweler, active in the revolutionary movement and a member of the local Jewish self-defense corps, institutions which existed in many towns as a precaution against pogroms launched by anti-semitic
Black Hundreds groups.
The Golds emigrated to the United States in 1910, where 12-year-old Ben took a variety of jobs to help support his family, working in box factories, making pocketbooks, and working in millinery shops. He eventually became an operator in a fur shop. In 1912, the 14-year-old joined the Furriers Union of the United States and Canada, which changed its name a year later to the International Fur Workers Union of the United States and Canada (IFWU). He attended Manhattan Preparatory School at night to complete his education, intending to go to law school
.
The same year he joined the Furriers Union, the 14-year-old Gold was elected assistant shop chairman by his local union during the first furriers' strike
in the United States.
Politically active, Gold joined the Socialist Party of America
in 1916.
In 1919, at the age of 21, Gold was elected to the New York Furriers' Joint Board, a council of furriers' unions whose jurisdiction covered all of New York City
. In September of that year, he joined a group which broke away from the Socialist Party to form the Communist Labor Party
.
and trade unionism intertwined to shape much of his career as a labor leader. He was an occasional political candidate of the communist movement, running for U.S. Congress in the 23rd Congressional District of New York in 1928.
In 1924, Gold was suspended from the Furriers for engaging in dual unionism
because of his activities on behalf of the Communist Party of America (with which the Communist Labor Party had merged in 1921). He was reinstated in 1925, and appointed manager of the New York Furriers' Joint Board.
of 8,500 workers on February 11, 1926. The union responded by calling a general strike of all 12,000 fur workers in the city on February 16, 1926.
The strike quickly turned violent. On February 19, New York City police
attacked a picket line of striking workers and arrested 200 workers. On March 8, Gold called out 10,000 workers for mass picketing throughout the furriers' district. Police used clubs to beat hundreds of strikers, and then drove cars at high speed into the crowd to try to break up the pickets. Only when Gold ordered the picket to break up were law enforcement authorities able to regain control; 125 workers arrested. The police response was so brutal that a city magistrate later excoriated the police department for "undue coercion" against the striking workers.
As the strike commenced, President Shachtman went into hiding, leaving Vice President Isidor Winnick to take over as Acting President. Shachtman's disappearance significantly hindered the Joint Board's ability to stop furriers outside New York City from engaging in strikebreaking
.
Certain developments seemed to indicate an early end to the strike. On March 13, a New York state judge refused to grant the employers an injunction which would force an end to the strike. In mid-April, the Eitingon-Schild Company, the wealthiest fur importer in the United States, broke with the employers' association to settle with the union. The company agreed to a five-day, 40-hour work week; equal division of work; no subcontracting; and a 10 percent wage increase.
But the strike continued despite this agreement. In early April, Hugh Frayne, an organizer with the American Federation of Labor
(AFL), met with a moderate faction within the Joint Board. Frayne and the moderate furriers asked AFL President William Green
to personally intervene in the strike. Green and Shachtman (who had reappeared in Washington, D.C.
) drew up an agreement establishing a 42-hour work week and a 10 percent wage increase. But when the proposal was presented to the membership on April 15, they overwhelmingly rejected it. The AFL barred Gold from the meeting, but the membership chanted his name and nearly rioted until he was admitted to the hall. In part, the workers rejected the proposal because they had had no hand in making it. But they also rejected the proposal because it did nothing to help Jewish workers, who needed the five-day work week provision in order to protect their Shabbat
observances. Shachtman accused "radicals" of leading the near-riot and coercing the workers into rejecting the settlement. Shachtman and Green tried to get the membership to adopt the proposal a second time on May 2, but it was again turned down.
In retaliation for Shachtman and Green's attempt to end-run the local leadership, and to increase pressure on the employers, Gold asked the Joint Board to initiate a drive for the 40-hour work week which would involve every union in the city. The Board agreed, and soon the New York State Federation of Labor, the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America
, the Teachers Union
, the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union
, and a number of other unions agreed to join the effort. On May 22, 1926, a mass rally filled the newly-built Madison Square Garden
, making it the largest labor meeting held in the city up to that time. Gold denounced labor leaders who did not attend, and declared that winning the 40-hour work week in New York City would lead to a nationwide movement which would gain the limitation throughout the nation.
The Joint Board faced a crisis, however. By May 27, only $70 remained in the Joint Board's strike fund. Gold spoke at every union hall in the city within four days of the revelation of the fiscal crisis. The union asked workers and other unions to buy "40-Hour Liberty Loan Bonds" which would be redeemable in six months. By May 31, more than $100,000 had been raised. Even though strike relief funds were paid on June 1, the Joint Board kept up the bond drive to maintain the pressure on the employers.
The fund-raising success of the union and the pressure from the 40-hour work week drive pushed the employers to agree to a new collective bargaining agreement. The manufacturers signaled their willingness to talk on May 26, but the union kept up its demand for the 40-hour week. A mediator was called in, and a new contract reached on June 11, 1926. The contract provided for the 40-hour, five-day work week; an end to overtime from December through August; time-and-a-half overtime pay for half-days from September to November; a 10 percent wage increase; 10 paid holidays; and a ban on subcontracting.
, forcing workers to join the Communist Party, coercing workers to participate in the strike, prolonging the strike on the orders of the Communist Party, and lying to the AFL investigating committee. On January 13, 1927, the AFL's final report was issued, in which the AFL demanded that the IFWU purge the Joint Board of all communists or expel the locals in question. On February 17, the New York City Central Labor Council expelled the Joint Board and its member locals; the IFWU expelled Gold and 36 other local leaders from the union on March 2.
On March 17, 1927, Gold and 10 other leaders of the Joint Board were arrested for allegedly breaking into a furrier's shop near Mineola, New York
, during the 1926 strike. Although the AFL successfully pressured Clarence Darrow
to not take Gold's case, it was unable to prevent Frank P. Walsh
, former chairman of the federal Commission on Industrial Relations
and the National War Labor Board
, from doing so. Walsh formed a "Committee of 100" to provide financial and moral support to Gold and the others. The AFL tried to persuade the members of the committee to resign, but none did. At Gold's trial, which began on April 14, the prosecution repeatedly asked if Gold was a member of the Communist Party, if he knew communists, and if he endorsed the party's principles. Walsh protested that these questions had nothing to do with the alleged crime of burglary
, but the judge overruled his objections. Nevertheless, Gold and one other person were acquitted, but nine others were not.
The AFL also accused Gold of allegedly bribing police officers to give the union favorable treatment during the 1926 strike. Charges were filed on March 4, 1927. Gold's trial opened on March 30, 1927, as his trial for assault continued on Long Island and the AFL-dominated Joint Council was attempting to take over the fur unions in New York City. Several witnesses testified that the police received $3,800 a week from the Joint Board, but Gold, the Joint Board and their supporters (which included the New York State Federation of Labor) alleged an AFL-led conspiracy to frame them. The trial was suspended on June 3 after two prosecution witnesses revealed they had perjured themselves in an attempt to implicate Gold. Gold and the other defendants were found innocent on July 21, 1927, after the court could find no evidence of any misuse of funds. Indeed, most testimony focused on police brutality against the union and its members, significantly undermining the prosecution's claim of police favoritism.
Although Gold was on trial for assault and bribery, he led the Joint Board in a counter-organizing campaign against the AFL-dominated Joint Council. He personally led mass pickets and protests in the fur district of New York City in late March 1927. The AFL attempted to undercut the Joint Board by releasing statements that the Gold-led union was seeking a "peace treaty" with the Joint Council, while accusing the Joint Board of coercing workers into joining. Despite AFL assertions that workers were stampeding into the Joint Council, the Gold-led Joint Board had the support of the vast majority of workers in the New York City fur industry. The Joint Board's strength among the workers was so strong that on May 3, 1927, the Fur Trimming Manufacturers' Association broke with the employers' group and signed a contract with Gold's Joint Board—reaffirming the 1926 contract and restoring working conditions to their June 1926 level.
Gold began threatening a new strike to force the employers to honor the terms of the 1926 contract and win recognition of the Joint Board again. The AFL accused the Joint Board of being a communist front, and pleaded for the public to withdraw support for it. In confidential talks with the New York City police, the AFL conceded that Gold's union had the support of the workers and that the only way to defeat the "Red-led" union was a massive show of police force which would intimidate the strikers. Mass arrests and heavy fines, coupled with long jail terms, would bankrupt the Joint Board and terrify the protesters, AFL officials and staff told the police. The strike began on June 3, 1927, with several thousand picketers taking to the streets and police arresting hundreds of workers. When the police proved unable to control the large number of strikers, they began isolating groups of two or three people (often women) and beating them with clubs. The extreme police response led Gold to call strike after strike, most of which were broken up by police attacks on peaceful picketers and which led to scores of arrests and jail sentences. The AFL and its leadership again accused Gold and the Joint Board of terrorizing workers in order to force them to join the union, and claimed that only the Joint Council had the support of the majority of workers.
But by mid-July 1927, the AFL's claims were proven to be false. The Joint Council lost most of its support, and the Gold-led Joint Board received recognition by companies employing a majority of workers in the fur district. Most employers no longer compelled their workers to join the Joint Council, and the Joint Board's 1926 contract was re-established and enforced.
President Shachtman issued a call for the biennial convention of the IFWU to be held in the Executive Council chamber at the AFL Building in Washington, D.C.
, on July 13, 1927. The union's constitution required the convention to be held in May, but AFL leaders (including the influential Executive Council member, Matthew Woll
) demanded that Shachtman delay the meeting until such time as he could guarantee that a large majority of delegates would be pro-AFL. "As you well know, your International Union is today being financed to a great part by the reorganizing activities going on here in New York City," Woll and two others wrote Shachtman, "and that without this income your organization would be practically bankrupt." The letter was thinly-veiled blackmail
, and Shachtman knuckled under to it.
Nonetheless, Gold and 35 other delegates from New York City appeared at the convention and demanded to be recognized. The Credentials Committee refused to seat them, even though the Joint Board represented about 85 percent of the total IFWU membership. AFL President Green—tired of the constant conflict in New York City, believing Shachtman and the leadership of the IFWU were incompetent, and convinced that fighting the Joint Board was a waste of money—persuaded Shachtman to at least let Gold and the other Joint Board delegates speak before the convention to make their case. Gold delivered an impassioned speech in which he denounced the attacks on the political views of the Joint Board's leadership, argued that the union should be spending its money building solidarity and fighting employers, and pushed for strong internal democratic procedures in the IFWU. But despite his pleas, the convention refused to seat the delegates, and then revoked the charters of the locals which comprised the Joint Board.
These efforts to undercut Gold and the Joint Board also failed. Several IFWU locals outside New York City passed resolutions criticizing the International Union's actions, and worker support for the Joint Council dwindled even further. On July 6, 1928, the AFL notified the Joint Council that it was withdrawing all staff and monetary support for the rump union. When the news leaked to the leaders of other needle trade unions, President Green was forced to publicly reiterate the AFL's support for the non-communist union. But the new flow of funds and staff did nothing to resuscitate the Joint Council. Worse, from the AFL's perspective, the Joint Board then called several strikes in July 1928 and won major wage increases from the employers.
In the summer and fall of 1928, Gold began building support for a new international union of fur workers. He met with the leaders of eight non-New York City fur workers' locals as well as a left-wing group of fur workers who were attempting to disaffiliate from what remained of the Joint Council. Included in the new union were 15,000 dressmakers and other garment workers comprising the left wing of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union. The new Needle Trades Workers Industrial Union was formed on January 1, 1929. Louis Hyman was elected President, and Ben Gold was elected Secretary-Treasurer. The thirty-nine member General Executive Board included African American
s, Russians
, Poles
, Greeks
, women and even a youth delegate.
began, leading to thousands of layoffs in the fur industry and strong downward pressure on wages. But even as early as February 1929, as the economy slid toward depression, Hyman and Gold were announcing a series of strikes designed to raise wages. The new union's first strike occurred in the garment industry in February 1929. A second strike in the New York City's fur industry occurred in June 1929, as NTWIU sought to organize AFL-affiliated locals of fur workers into the breakaway union. With nearly all the city's fur workers already in the NTWIU, however, Gold made little headway against the anti-communist AFL locals. Meanwhile, press reports implied that most of the city's fur workers belonged to the AFL, inverting the true situation. On occasion, violence broke out between the two groups. The AFL also sought to strip the NTWIU's New York City locals of the right to use the phrase "fur workers" in their name.
As the internecine union struggles continued, Gold led strikes in both the garment and fur industries. Sporadic violence also broke out during these events. More than 3,500 union members struck for shorter working hours and higher wages on June 17, 1931, collective bargaining goals which were considered madness by nearly all labor leaders. Yet, Gold won an increase in working hours, leading to a guaranteed 40-hour work week well as increased pay—an achievement important in the establishment of the standard American work week. In August 1932, Gold won yet another agreement retaining the union's work-week and pay goals in the fur industry despite the worsening depression. The union also launched an assault on sweatshop
conditions in the garment industry in early 1933, an effort the AFL-led Joint Council labeled communistic.
Battles with the AFL-led Joint Council continued to occupy much of Gold's time. The stridently anti-communist labor leader, Matthew Woll, had been placed in charge of a three-person committee of AFL Executive Council members charged with assisting the IFWU and breaking the NTWIU. Woll and the two other council members funneled funds and staff into the IFWU and assisted the IFWU in strategizing ways to win back the loyalty of the majority of fur workers in New York City. Violence broke out when AFL supporters stormed NTWIU offices in April 1933. Gold, leading the fur workers' division of the NTWIU, led a series of counter-protests and marches through the fur district in May and June 1933. The AFL also continued to work closely with the New York City police, providing law enforcement officials with information on dates, times and places Gold's union would strike or protest and pushing hard for a strong police response to intimidate the communist-led union. In July, police clashed repeatedly with marching workers led personally by Gold, leading to a number of arrests and hundreds of worker injuries. In one case, police on horseback charged at a full gallop into a peaceful march on July 5, 1933. Despite the police violence and opposition of the AFL, the "dynamic leadership of Communist Ben Gold" helped the fur workers in 1933 to salvage a 35-hour work week and win an increase in pay from $38 to $50 a week.
When the Communist Party formed the Trade Union Unity League
in late August 1929, Gold affiliated the NTWIU with the umbrella labor group. The League was shuttered in 1935 when the Communist Party abandoned its strategy of dual unionism
and "boring from within" in favor of the Popular Front
.
Gold also worked hard to integrate
the NTWIU. While other unions actively discriminated against African Americans and other minorities or ignored the issue of race, Gold encouraged a bottom-up attack on racism. He actively involved members in "trials" of union members who had used racist language or engaged in discriminatory behavior, and his efforts were largely successful in weeding racism out of the union.
Meanwhile, Gold also was heavily involved in writing the "Fur Code." The National Industrial Recovery Act
, enacted on June 16, 1933, established the National Recovery Administration
and authorized the agency to establish voluntary agreements within each industry regulating working hours, pay rates, and prices. Hundreds of industry codes were created, including a code governing the fur industry. Gold was appointed to the panel crafting the Fur Industry Code, and on July 21, 1933, the panel established a preliminary "blanket code" providing a 40-hour week and a minimum wage of $14 a week (about $216 a week in 2008 inflation-adjusted dollars).
In late 1933, Gold served a brief prison sentence after having been arrested for participating in a hunger march in Wilmington, Delaware
. Hunger marches had been occurring throughout the United States since 1931. Catholic
social activist Dorothy Day
herself encouraged Gold to participate in a march from New York City to Washington, D.C. Gold was one of 315 marchers who left New York City on November 29, 1932, bound for Washington. The marchers reached Wilmington on December 2, their number having increased by several hundred. Their permit to march in the city was withdrawn. That night, the police herded most of the marchers into a warehouse downtown, but Gold, most of the women and most of the marchers from New England stayed in a rented church two blocks away. That night, the marchers at the church were refused permission to hold a meeting in the street, so they held it on the church steps. When the police tried to stop the meeting, the marchers resisted. The police began beating the people listening to the speaker, and the marchers fled into the church and barricaded the doors. The police fired tear gas through the windows of the building, then broke down the doors and entered the building with weapons drawn. The marchers resisted by hurling chairs at the police, but were beaten and gassed repeatedly until subdued. Twenty-three marchers, including Gold, were arrested. Four police and three marchers were hospitalized. Gold was convicted of incitement to riot, and served a brief prison term in Wilmington in late 1933 and early 1934. Gold participated in additional hunger marches in 1933 and 1934, and was arrested again in Albany, New York
, in late October 1934.
Gold's battles with the AFL also continued in 1934. Joint Board and Joint Council supporters fought with fists, bricks and clubs in January 1934. But the AFL group continued to shrink as the Great Depression worsened, and IFWU leaders feared for the survival of their union. To forestall any peace talks, AFL President Green launched a major initiative to drive communists and communist sympathizers out of all AFL-affiliated local, national and international unions. AFL accusations against Gold and his union also continued.
In 1934 and 1935, Gold led the garment and fur workers in two successful strikes which propelled his union into a merger with the IFWU. The first was week-long strike by 4,000 fur workers in late August 1934, which led to additional wage increases and stricter enforcement of contract provisions. The second was a strike by 10,000 garment workers in April 1935 which led to a contract guaranteeing a minimum weekly wage.
, President of the ILGWU, for an infusion of funds. Dubinsky turned him down. Lucchi next appealed to AFL President Green, who appointed a committee composed of Woll, Dubinsky, and Sidney Hillman
(President of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers) to consider a fund-raising effort. But the committee would not meet until June 18, and by then the union would have collapsed. Given Green's disinclination to support the IFWU in 1927, some scholars conclude that Green purposefully delayed the committee meeting in order to let the IFWU collapse.
At the IFWU convention in Toronto
, Canada
, the week of May 19, 1935, delegates voted to establish a Unity Committee whose charge was to seek and win immediate merger with the NTWIU. The committee met on May 27, 1935, with its NTWIU counterparts, and quickly hammered out a merger agreement.
The merger convention opened on June 20, 1935, at the Manhattan Opera House
. In a final attempt to stall merger, on June 19 Green announced that any union which admitted communists as members would have its charter pulled by the AFL Executive Council. The merger proceeded despite Green's threat. More than 3,000 delegates from the NTWIU met on an upper floor, and about 2,500 delegates (nearly all the union's members) from the IFWU met on the ground floor. The same speakers addressed both conventions, although by prior agreement Gold was not permitted to speak. When Gold appeared about an hour after the two conventions opened, he was greeted with chants of "We want Gold!", "Let Gold speak!", and "Gold! Gold! Gold!" Gold sat impassive in his seat while he received a standing ovation, and it was clear that a wide majority of the members of both conventions supported him. On June 21, Lucchi and the executive board of the merged organization met in Long Island City, Queens
, and reinstated Gold as a member in good standing of the IFWU.
Under an agreement reached by the merger conventions, leadership elections for the New York City locals of the merged IFWU took place 40 days later. Gold was elected to his old position of business manager of the Joint Council on August 10, 1935, defeating a candidate put forth by the AFL by a greater than 2-to-1 majority.
had infiltrated many union shops.
The contracts controlled by the Joint Council expired on February 1, 1936. Gold faced a difficult task: In just six months, he had to rebuild the locals which had remained with the IFWU while preparing the union for a strike in the depths of a depression. A strike was authorized on January 18, but Gold quickly accepted the services of an impartial mediator to assist with the negotiations. In the final few days of January, Mayor
Fiorello H. La Guardia intervened and heard presentations from both sides. The intervention by government officials worked, and a new contract reached on February 1.
Gold also led a number of organizing drives among fur and garment workers in New York City, so that by May 1937 the union had nearly 35,000 members. Continuing a campaign he began in 1927, Gold also purged the union's locals of organized crime influence.
law. Former IFWU presidents Morris Kaufman and Pietro Lucchi, the IFWU itself, several of IFWU locals and local leaders, as well as 68 employers and several organized crime figures were also included in the indictment. The indictment alleged that Louis "Lepke" Buchalter
and Jacob "Gurrah" Shapiro
—co-founders of the infamous Murder, Inc.
murder-for-hire organization—formed a group of employers known as the "Fur Dressers Factor Corporation" to fix prices
and eliminate competition. The employers allegedly paid higher wages to unions which agreed to participate in the scheme by striking uncooperative businesses, and Buchalter and Shapiro provided the muscle to force other furriers out of the business (which included bombings, acid throwing, kidnapping, arson and more).
After several defendants were granted their own separate trials and charges against others dropped, the court reached its verdict on December 16, 1937. Gold was convicted of violating the Sherman Antitrust Act
and sentenced to one year in prison. It was the first conviction of a labor union official or labor union under the Sherman Act. After the convictions, the government undertook additional investigations against the IFWU and now-defunct NTWIU for violations of the Sherman Act.
But Gold and his union co-defendants appealed their convictions, and on December 19, 1938, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
overturned the convictions of all but three union officials. Gold's conviction was among those voided.
The government then reinstated charges in February 1940 against Gold, the NTWIU and 28 other labor leaders based on allegations not pursued in 1933. Charges against six labor leaders were dropped on March 20, 1940, and four others but Gold and 17 others were tried. Despite one witness recanting most of his accusatory testimony on the witness stand, Gold and IFWU Vice President Irving Potash were convicted of these additional antitrust charges. As the union raised a $100,000 defense fund for Gold and Potash, the government brought a fresh set of charges against Gold on May 17, 1940, accusing him of jury tampering
during his first trial. As the jury deliberated Gold's fate, a group of employers sued Gold and the NTWIU for $3 million in damages under the Clayton Antitrust Act
, and accusations of witness tampering
were levied against Gold.
A mistrial occurred in the Gold jury tampering case on June 28, 1940, after the jury was unable to reach a verdict.
Gold's second jury tampering trial (which now included the witness tampering charge) began on July 1, 1940. Gold and his three co-defendants were acquitted on July 11, 1940.
Meanwhile, Gold's appeal on the second set of Sherman Antitrust Act violations was winding its way through the courts. On May 27, 1940, the Supreme Court of the United States
issued its ruling in Apex Hosiery Co. v. Leader 310 U.S. 469 (1940). In that case, a union had engaged in a sit-down strike which shuttered a hosiery company's operations and prevented it from fulfilling its interstate contracts. The union was indicted and convicted for violating the Sherman Antitrust Act. But the Supreme Court disagreed:
Following the reasoning laid down by the Supreme Court in Apex Hosiery, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit once more voided the antitrust convictions imposed on Gold and the others in the case. The government declined to prosecute Gold further.
(CIO). The change in affiliation was driven almost solely by Gold, and shocked the members of the union. He was elected to the CIO executive council.
CIO affiliation did not, however, protect the IFWU or Gold from political attacks. John L. Lewis
, then the president of the CIO, was a strong anti-communist. In late January 1938, Lewis publicly announced that he would pursue a policy barring communists from membership in the CIO. Moderates within the IFWU denounced Gold for using "Hitler methods" to retain power, and pleaded with Lewis to intervene. In May 1938, the U.S. House of Representatives
established the House Committee Investigating Un-American Activities
as a successor to the Special Committee on Un-American Activities (which had spent the last three years investigating Nazi Germany's
attempts to influence American public opinion). Rep.
Martin Dies, Jr.
was named chair of the committee, and charged with continuing the investigations into Nazi propaganda and initiating new investigations into the activities of the Ku Klux Klan
. When committee members voiced support for the Klan and ignored the Nazi threat, Dies concentrated the committee's work on communist infiltration of the labor movement. Dies eagerly permitted the AFL time before the committee to denounce the CIO and the IFWU as riddled with communists and communist sympathizers—accusations CIO representatives called "nonsense" and Gold denounced as redbaiting
.
Gold continued to pursue an aggressive collective bargaining policy until the beginning of World War II
. Within weeks of taking over as president, he authorized a sympathy strike
of 13,000 fur workers in New York City to support striking fur workers in Canada
. The protests, rallies and spot strikes continued as Gold pushed to organize the remaining fur shops in New York City. Signed contracts were reached with newly-organized employers in July 1937.
Employers, however, often fought back, and in the spring of 1938 a lengthy strike nearly ended in defeat for the union. The U.S. economy had risen to its pre-depression levels by the spring of 1937, but a strong recession
began in late summer (triggered in part by large reductions in federal spending, higher bank reserve requirements, and reductions in disposable income brought about by implementation of the Social Security Act
). Between August 1937 and May 1938, industrial production fell by 30 percent, the economy contracted by more than 6 percent, and unemployment rose from 5 million to over 9 million. The steep recession led many employers to resist union demands. On February 11, 1938, employers locked out 4,000 fur workers as the IFWU contracts expired. Gold hesitated calling a strike for seven weeks, seeking peace with the manufacturers, but finally called all fur workers out in a general strike on March 30. Hoping for a quick end to the strike and alarmed by the lockout, Gold initially kept pickets and rallies small. But locked out workers attacked a fur dealer on April 1, and police retaliated against the pickets with clubs and beatings. Infuriated, Gold ordered all the union's members out into the streets. The police responded by attempting to use violence to intimidate the strikers, and the union responded in kind. For seven weeks, the fur district in New York City was in a state of near-riot. The union filed unfair labor practice charges against the employers, and the NLRB moved on May 6 to investigate. Mass picketing and mass rallies continued, and the employers asked Mayor LaGuardia and the police to end the strike. On May 13, the parties agreed to submit their disputes to Dr. Paul Abelson, an impartial arbitrator with the National Recovery Administration. Thirteen days later, Dr. Abelson announced a tentative agreement, and IFWU members ratified the contract on May 26. Although Gold publicly characterized the strike as a victory for the union, he privately conceded that the strike had been a very near thing.
Determined to expand the union, Gold merged the IFWU with the National Leather Workers' Association (NLWA). The IFWU had organized leather workers over the years but never concertedly. The NLWA was formed by four local unions in Massachusetts
in 1933, and affiliated with the CIO in 1937. By 1939, however, the NLWA had only 14 locals (half of which actually functioned) and only 5,000 dues-paying members. The two unions agreed to merge in March 1939. The NLWA approved the merger during its 5th National Convention in Boston, Massachusetts, April 29 to May 2, and the IFWU approved the merger at its annual convention in New York City on May 14. Ben Gold was elected the president of the newly amalgamated union, which adopted "International Fur and Leather Workers Union of the United States and Canada" (IFLWU)as its new name. The new union maintained distinctly separate fur and leather divisions. Each division had its own executive board and conventions and maintained its own finances. But the amalgamated union was nonetheless effective: Within a year, the union had organized 25,000 new workers into 42 new locals.
Gold was a staunch supporter of CIO President John L. Lewis. In 1940, when other left-wing unions challenged Lewis' handling of CIO finances, Gold defended him. He also applauded Lewis' refusal to endorse Franklin D. Roosevelt
in the 1940 presidential election
, but unlike Lewis did not endorse Wendell Wilkie or Montana
Senator
Burton K. Wheeler
(whom Lewis supported as a third party candidate).
After the United States entered World War II
, Gold proved an ardent patriot. As war approached, in November 1941, he led large rallies in New York City urging union members to buy war bond
s. When the CIO advocated a no-strike pledge for all American unions, Gold wholeheartedly and strongly supported the pledge. He readily agreed to the seven-day work week after the United States declared war on Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan
, sent aid to the Republic of China
, and implemented a campaign to donate 50,000 fur-lined vests to British sailors as part of the war effort.
As the war came to an end, however, Gold began to press for major salary and benefit increases for IFLWU members. Refusing to break the union's no-strike pledge, Gold submitted the union's demands to the National War Labor Board
in February 1944. The War Labor Board subsequently granted the union a minimal wage rise in line with its "Little Steel Formula," but granted it substantial fringe benefit increases and ordered employers to end seasonal layoffs. The Board's order was vigorously opposed by employers, and Gold used the dispute as leverage to win a new collective bargaining agreement. The new agreement did not without a price, however, as Gold was forced to threaten to break his union's war-time pledge not to strike.
Gold also strongly advocated a third political party
which would more strongly support unions and working-class Americans. Gold first backed a third-party candidate in 1947 when he asked former Vice President
Henry A. Wallace
to form a third party. In 1948, Soviet
leaders ordered American communists to support the third party candidacy of Wallace against incumbent President Harry S. Truman
, and Gold actively supported Wallace despite the CIO's refusal to do so.
Gold was a strong supporter of statehood for Israel
. He was president of the American Jewish Labor Council in 1948. In March 1948, Gold led a parade of 10,000 people in a parade and rally to support the emerging Jewish state. When American recognition of Israel drew protests in April 1948, Gold defended the Truman
administration's actions.
(an institute of higher education which taught the works of Vladimir Lenin
) for a short time during the winter of 1930-1931, and was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party from 1936 to 1948. His commitment to the party was occasionally tested, but never broken. For example, in 1939, the American Communist Party endorsed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
. Gold initially walked out of a party meeting to express his dismay at the decision. He changed his mind a few days later, and followed the party line.
In the post-World War II
period, relations between the CIO leadership and communists within its member unions deteriorated. The first sign of a break came in May 1946. CIO President Philip Murray sponsored a denouncing Communist Party interference in the affairs of the CIO. Gold voted to approve the resolution. When asked why, he allegedly replied, "I have no problem being a loyal American, that's all the resolution asks. We just don't agree on the Truman foreign policy. We'll work with anyone on legitimate union business. We can't worry about Jim Carey and Reuther. They have their axes to grind." But when the CIO established a committee in November 1946 to purge the labor federation of communists and communist influence, Gold denounced the effort and said it would "destroy" the CIO. In May 1947, CIO leaders met to discuss the International Union of Mine, Mill, and Smelter Workers
, where locals representing thousands of members had recently disaffiliated due to the communist politics of the international union's leadership. CIO President Philip Murray
proposed that the CIO run the international union for a time, but Gold and seven other communists voted against Murray's proposal. An outraged Murray declared, "Any man who goes into a shop ostensibly as the representative of the workers and then devotes his time to furthering the interest of the Communist Party is a goddamn traitor. I'm tired of defending Communists and I'm tired of hearing C.I.O. officials defend them. The time has come to kick them out wherever and whenever we find them."
The breach widened throughout 1947. The CIO was extremely supportive of President Truman, and Soviet opposition to the Marshall Plan
in the summer and fall of 1947 (opposition supported by most communists in the CIO). This led to a significant rupture between Murray, Walter Reuther
and other leaders of the federation on one side and the communist leaders and staff in the CIO member unions on the other. The situation deteriorated further when Soviet leaders ordered American communists to support the Wallace candidacy for president. Then on June 23, 1947, the Republican
-controlled Congress passed the Taft-Hartley Act
over President Truman's veto
. The Act amended the National Labor Relations Act
to require union leaders to file affidavits with the Department of Labor
declaring that they were not supporters of the Communist Party and had no relationship with any organization seeking the "overthrow of the United States government by force or by any illegal or unconstitutional means" as a condition to participating in NLRB proceedings.
The NLRB acted to aggressively enforce the provisions of the Taft-Hartley Act. Although the level of enforcement was not certain at first, many unions quickly filed the anti-communist affidavits. Gold declared the affidavit and increasingly anti-communist atmosphere a threat to the survival of the IFLWU, and sought contract language which would lock in employer recognition of the union if its leaders failed to sign the oath.
Political pressure on Gold also increased. Rep. John Parnell Thomas, chairman of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), subpoena
ed fur industry employers to testify before the committee about Gold's political beliefs. Their September 8, 1948, testimony blasted Gold for establishing a "dictatorship" within the union and ruining the fur industry through mass picketing and intimidation. HUAC then forced Gold to testify. Gold denounced and denied the testimony of the employers, proudly declaring that he had been a member of the Communist Party for nearly a quarter century.
The CIO subsequently acted to expel Gold and the IFLWU. Over Gold's protests, the CIO expelled the Greater New York CIO Council, of which the IFLWU's Joint Council was a member, in November 1948. Gold began fighting a drive at the national level of the CIO to expel all communist-led or communist-dominated unions. The CIO censured Gold and nine other communists on its Executive Council in May 1949 for allowing the Communist Party to control their unions, and he lost re-election to the CIO Executive Council in November 1949 as the federation's leaders purged itself of all communists. A few days later, the New York State CIO banned communists from being members, and expelled Gold from that body as well.
The attacks on Gold's politics had collective bargaining consequences as well. In August 1949, a tanners' employers' association in Massachusetts refused to bargain with the IFLWU so long as Gold was president of the union, on the grounds that Gold was a communist. The labor dispute with the tanners escalated in late 1949 (leading to some limited violence and vandalism), before a new contract was signed in January 1950.
These pressures took a considerable toll on Gold and the IFLWU. Gold told delegates to the union's convention in May 1950 that the communist political views of the union's leadership could cause the organization much difficulty, yet he also defied the CIO and urged a united union front rather than caving in to redbaiting political pressure.
Nonetheless, the IFLWU agreed to order its leadership to sign the Taft-Hartley Act's non-communist affidavits.
argued that Gold had not really resigned, and indicted him for perjury in August 1953 one day before the statute of limitations
ran out.
At trial, Gold was charged with three counts of perjury
. He was accused of continuing to be a member of the Communist Party; accused of being affiliated with Communist party; and accused of being a supporter of an organization which advocated the overthrow of the United States government by force, illegal means, or unconstitutional methods. Numerous famous character witnesses appeared on Gold's behalf, including W. E. B. Du Bois. Nonetheless, Gold was convicted on the "membership" and "supporting" counts, and sentence to 1 to 3 years in prison.
Gold appealed, and his conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court of the United States
.
Gold raised six grounds for reversal: 1) The trial court refused to apply the rules of evidence
for perjury to the case; 2) The circumstantial evidence offered at trial was not sufficient to convict him under the rules of evidence; 3) The trial court's instructions to the jury regarding the definition of "support" were unsupported by law or common usage; 4) The trial court erred in permitting expert testimony regarding his resignation (e.g., the fact of his resignation was a matter for the jury, not expert witnesses, to decide); 5) Government employees on the grand
and petit juries
were biased (as they themselves had to take an anti-communist oath to retain their jobs); and 6) Law enforcement officers discussed anti-communist oaths with members of the jury while investigating an unrelated case. A deeply divided 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals
upheld his conviction. The court of appeals then asked for an en banc
rehearing sua sponte
. An equally divided en banc court upheld his conviction. Gold appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which overturned his conviction in Gold v. United States, 352 U.S. 985 (1957). An FBI
agent, investigating another case in which falsity of a non-Communist affidavit was at issue, telephoned or visited three members of the Gold jury or their families during Gold's trial. The Supreme Court held that although the FBI intrusion was unintentional it prejudiced the case against Gold. Relying on its recent decision in Remmer v. United States, 350 U.S. 377 (1955), the Supreme Court reversed and remanded the case to the district court with instructions to grant a new trial.
Although the government initially expressed interest in prosecuting Gold further, all charges against him were dropped in May 1957.
The first case was a major test of the National Labor Relations Board's
(NLRB) enforcement of the Taft-Hartley Act. In 1951, Lannom Manufacturing Co. refused to honor its contract with the International Fur and Leather Workers Union on the grounds that the union's officers had lied when making their Taft-Hartley anti-communist oaths. The union filed an unfair labor practice
charge against the employer with the NLRB. The Board found against the employer, but after Gold's conviction in April 1954 it reversed itself. The union, already embroiled in a similar case, asked the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals
for a stay; the court declined. The U.S. Supreme Court, however, granted certiorari
. In Meat Cutters v. NLRB, 352 U.S. 153 (1956), the Supreme Court (relying on a decision released earlier that day, Leedom v. Mine Workers, 352 U.S. 145) held that the National Labor Relations Board had no authority to refuse to provide the protections of the NLRA to unions not in compliance with the Taft-Hartley Act. "[We] conclude that the sole sanction for the filing of a false affidavit under 9 (h) is the criminal penalty imposed on the officer who files a false affidavit, not decompliance of the union nor the withholding of the benefits of the Act," the court ruled.
The second case led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling on whether an attorney was an "officer of the court." After the grand jury
had indicted Gold for perjury, Harold I. Cammer
(an attorney noted for representing communists in the United States), took Gold's case. Within two days, Cammer mailed a letter and questionnaire to all members of the grand jury who were employees of the federal government. He told the grand jurors that he was Gold's attorney and that he was trying to learn the effect of the federal government's loyalty program
on federal employees. Cammer undertook this action because of developments in another Taft-Hartley anti-communist oath case. In Emspak v. United States, 203 F.2d 54 (1952), the Justice Department convinced a district court that grand jurors who were federal employee were not biased. In particular, the government had argued that "there is not the slightest indication in the long motion and offer of proof that an attempt has been made to interview a single one of the persons." To prevent the government from making a similar claim in the Gold case, Cammer polled the jury. The Contempt Act of March 2, 1831 (4 Stat. 487) gave federal courts the authority to penalize officers of the court for misbehavior. For questioning the grand jurors, the district court found Cammer guilty of contempt and fined him $100. Cammer appealed. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals
upheld his conviction. Cammer appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which granted certiorari. In a landmark ruling, a unanimous Supreme Court overturned Cammer's contempt citation, holding that a lawyer is not a court "officer" in the same category as marshals, bailiffs, court clerks or judges. The district court erred in subjecting Cammer to summary punishment, the Supreme Court concluded, and the high court order the contempt ruling reversed.
, a labor union affiliated with the AFL that represented retail butcher
s and packinghouse workers
. AFL leaders, however, expressed strong reservation against bringing the "Red-led" union into the federation.
Although the merger talks had moved forward aggressively, Ben Gold retired as IFLWU president on October 3, 1954, in order to remove AFL objections to the merger.
Gold's resignation at age 56 provide crucial in winning AFL approval for the merger. A new effort to merge the IFLWU and Meat Cutters began the day after his retirement. Eventually, the merger was consummated in 1955 after the AFL announced it would bar the IFLWU from joining the federation directly but not from merging with an AFL affiliate. The fur workers' division underwent additional purges of communist leaders and members after the merger.
Ben Gold spent the rest of his life in Florida. He published his memoirs in 1984. He died on July 24, 1985 at his home in North Miami Beach, Florida
.
, where he ran unsuccessfully for judge in 1928; he received one of the lowest vote-totals in the history of New York state judicial elections. He ran for the New York State Assembly
in 1931 and 1936, and for president of the New York City Board of Aldermen
in 1933. He also ran for justice of the New York Supreme Court
in 1932. All of his campaigns were on the American Labor Party
ticket, and all failed.
. In 1948, he wrote Mentshn, published by the Needle Trades Workers Committee. His last work of fiction was The Storm in Riverville, published in 1972. It is a semi-fictional account of garment workers in the 1920s, their fight against organized crime, and their attempt to win a 40-hour work week.
Gold himself appears as a character in the fiction novel
Union Square. The book, published in 2001, is about two Russian Jewish families—one Marxist, the other socialist
—who are forced by pogrom
s to flee to the United States. Sarah Levy, one of the most prominent characters in the novel, meets a slightly fictionalized Ben Gold in her attempt to unionize women garment workers in New York City.
Gold also appears as a character in the stage play I'm Not Rappaport
. Actor Ron Rifkin
played Gold in the film version of the play.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
labor
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
leader who was prosecuted for his communist
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
political views under McCarthyism
McCarthyism
McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by...
. He was president of the International Fur and Leather Workers Union from 1937 to 1955.
Early life
Ben Gold was born September 8, 1898 to Israel and Sarah (Droll) Gold, JewsJudaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
living in Bessarabia
Bessarabia
Bessarabia is a historical term for the geographic region in Eastern Europe bounded by the Dniester River on the east and the Prut River on the west....
, a province of the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
. His father was a jeweler, active in the revolutionary movement and a member of the local Jewish self-defense corps, institutions which existed in many towns as a precaution against pogroms launched by anti-semitic
Anti-Semitism
Antisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
Black Hundreds groups.
The Golds emigrated to the United States in 1910, where 12-year-old Ben took a variety of jobs to help support his family, working in box factories, making pocketbooks, and working in millinery shops. He eventually became an operator in a fur shop. In 1912, the 14-year-old joined the Furriers Union of the United States and Canada, which changed its name a year later to the International Fur Workers Union of the United States and Canada (IFWU). He attended Manhattan Preparatory School at night to complete his education, intending to go to law school
Law school
A law school is an institution specializing in legal education.- Law degrees :- Canada :...
.
The same year he joined the Furriers Union, the 14-year-old Gold was elected assistant shop chairman by his local union during the first furriers' strike
Strike action
Strike action, also called labour strike, on strike, greve , or simply strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to work. A strike usually takes place in response to employee grievances. Strikes became important during the industrial revolution, when mass labour became...
in the United States.
Politically active, Gold joined the Socialist Party of America
Socialist Party of America
The Socialist Party of America was a multi-tendency democratic-socialist political party in the United States, formed in 1901 by a merger between the three-year-old Social Democratic Party of America and disaffected elements of the Socialist Labor Party which had split from the main organization...
in 1916.
In 1919, at the age of 21, Gold was elected to the New York Furriers' Joint Board, a council of furriers' unions whose jurisdiction covered all of New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. In September of that year, he joined a group which broke away from the Socialist Party to form the Communist Labor Party
Communist Labor Party
The Communist Labor Party of America was one of the organizational predecessors of the Communist Party USA. The group was established at the end of August 1919 following a three-way split of the Socialist Party of America...
.
Communism and early trade union career
Gold's adherence to communismCommunism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
and trade unionism intertwined to shape much of his career as a labor leader. He was an occasional political candidate of the communist movement, running for U.S. Congress in the 23rd Congressional District of New York in 1928.
In 1924, Gold was suspended from the Furriers for engaging in dual unionism
Dual unionism
Dual unionism is the development of a union or political organization parallel to and within an existing labor union. In some cases, the term may refer to the situation where two unions claim the right to organize the same workers....
because of his activities on behalf of the Communist Party of America (with which the Communist Labor Party had merged in 1921). He was reinstated in 1925, and appointed manager of the New York Furriers' Joint Board.
1926 strike
In 1926, Gold led a massive furriers' strike in New York City. The Joint Board's contract with the city's furriers expired on January 31, 1926. Among the union's demands were a reduction in working hours to the five-day, 40-hour work week; union inspection of shops; a 25 percent wage increase; an employer contribution of 3 percent of each workers' salary to an unemployment insurance fund; a single paid holiday; and equal division of work among employees (to eliminate favoritism). The employer's association refused to negotiate over the work week, unemployment fund or equal division of work, but agreed to seek a settlement on the other terms if the union would withdraw the other three demands. Led by Gold, the Joint Board was on the verge of doing so when IFWU President Oizer Shachtman accused the Joint Board of being infiltrated by communists. The Joint Board made its recommendation to the employers all the same, who—aware of Shachtman's opposition—promptly rejected it. The employers then instituted a lockoutLockout (industry)
A lockout is a work stoppage in which an employer prevents employees from working. This is different from a strike, in which employees refuse to work.- Causes :...
of 8,500 workers on February 11, 1926. The union responded by calling a general strike of all 12,000 fur workers in the city on February 16, 1926.
The strike quickly turned violent. On February 19, New York City police
New York City Police Department
The New York City Police Department , established in 1845, is currently the largest municipal police force in the United States, with primary responsibilities in law enforcement and investigation within the five boroughs of New York City...
attacked a picket line of striking workers and arrested 200 workers. On March 8, Gold called out 10,000 workers for mass picketing throughout the furriers' district. Police used clubs to beat hundreds of strikers, and then drove cars at high speed into the crowd to try to break up the pickets. Only when Gold ordered the picket to break up were law enforcement authorities able to regain control; 125 workers arrested. The police response was so brutal that a city magistrate later excoriated the police department for "undue coercion" against the striking workers.
As the strike commenced, President Shachtman went into hiding, leaving Vice President Isidor Winnick to take over as Acting President. Shachtman's disappearance significantly hindered the Joint Board's ability to stop furriers outside New York City from engaging in strikebreaking
Strikebreaker
A strikebreaker is a person who works despite an ongoing strike. Strikebreakers are usually individuals who are not employed by the company prior to the trade union dispute, but rather hired prior to or during the strike to keep the organisation running...
.
Certain developments seemed to indicate an early end to the strike. On March 13, a New York state judge refused to grant the employers an injunction which would force an end to the strike. In mid-April, the Eitingon-Schild Company, the wealthiest fur importer in the United States, broke with the employers' association to settle with the union. The company agreed to a five-day, 40-hour work week; equal division of work; no subcontracting; and a 10 percent wage increase.
But the strike continued despite this agreement. In early April, Hugh Frayne, an organizer with the American Federation of Labor
American Federation of Labor
The American Federation of Labor was one of the first federations of labor unions in the United States. It was founded in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions disaffected from the Knights of Labor, a national labor association. Samuel Gompers was elected president of the Federation at its...
(AFL), met with a moderate faction within the Joint Board. Frayne and the moderate furriers asked AFL President William Green
William Green (labor leader)
William Green was an American trade union leader. Green is best remembered for serving as the President of the American Federation of Labor from 1924 to 1952.-Early years:...
to personally intervene in the strike. Green and Shachtman (who had reappeared in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
) drew up an agreement establishing a 42-hour work week and a 10 percent wage increase. But when the proposal was presented to the membership on April 15, they overwhelmingly rejected it. The AFL barred Gold from the meeting, but the membership chanted his name and nearly rioted until he was admitted to the hall. In part, the workers rejected the proposal because they had had no hand in making it. But they also rejected the proposal because it did nothing to help Jewish workers, who needed the five-day work week provision in order to protect their Shabbat
Shabbat
Shabbat is the seventh day of the Jewish week and a day of rest in Judaism. Shabbat is observed from a few minutes before sunset on Friday evening until a few minutes after when one would expect to be able to see three stars in the sky on Saturday night. The exact times, therefore, differ from...
observances. Shachtman accused "radicals" of leading the near-riot and coercing the workers into rejecting the settlement. Shachtman and Green tried to get the membership to adopt the proposal a second time on May 2, but it was again turned down.
In retaliation for Shachtman and Green's attempt to end-run the local leadership, and to increase pressure on the employers, Gold asked the Joint Board to initiate a drive for the 40-hour work week which would involve every union in the city. The Board agreed, and soon the New York State Federation of Labor, the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America
Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America
The Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America was a United States labor union known for its support for "social unionism" and progressive political causes. Led by Sidney Hillman for its first thirty years, it helped found the Congress of Industrial Organizations...
, the Teachers Union
United Federation of Teachers
The United Federation of Teachers is the labor union that represents most educators in New York City public schools. , there were about 118,000 in-service educators and 17,000 paraprofessionals in the union, as well as about 54,000 retired members...
, the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union
International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union
The International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union was once one of the largest labor unions in the United States, one of the first U.S. unions to have a primarily female membership, and a key player in the labor history of the 1920s and 1930s...
, and a number of other unions agreed to join the effort. On May 22, 1926, a mass rally filled the newly-built Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden, often abbreviated as MSG and known colloquially as The Garden, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the New York City borough of Manhattan and located at 8th Avenue, between 31st and 33rd Streets, situated on top of Pennsylvania Station.Opened on February 11, 1968, it is the...
, making it the largest labor meeting held in the city up to that time. Gold denounced labor leaders who did not attend, and declared that winning the 40-hour work week in New York City would lead to a nationwide movement which would gain the limitation throughout the nation.
The Joint Board faced a crisis, however. By May 27, only $70 remained in the Joint Board's strike fund. Gold spoke at every union hall in the city within four days of the revelation of the fiscal crisis. The union asked workers and other unions to buy "40-Hour Liberty Loan Bonds" which would be redeemable in six months. By May 31, more than $100,000 had been raised. Even though strike relief funds were paid on June 1, the Joint Board kept up the bond drive to maintain the pressure on the employers.
The fund-raising success of the union and the pressure from the 40-hour work week drive pushed the employers to agree to a new collective bargaining agreement. The manufacturers signaled their willingness to talk on May 26, but the union kept up its demand for the 40-hour week. A mediator was called in, and a new contract reached on June 11, 1926. The contract provided for the 40-hour, five-day work week; an end to overtime from December through August; time-and-a-half overtime pay for half-days from September to November; a 10 percent wage increase; 10 paid holidays; and a ban on subcontracting.
AFL investigation
Gold's success in leading the 1926 furrier workers' strike was short-lived. On July 19, 1926, President Green sent a letter to Gold demanding that the Joint Board turn over all books, papers, ledgers and materials related to the conduct of the strike. In a secret letter, Hugh Frayne assured IFWU President Shachtman that the International Union was not under investigation, and that the AFL intended only to purge the Joint Board of "radicals" and "communists." Despite his reservations, Gold turned over the Joint Board's books, and the AFL conducted its investigation throughout August and September. The goal of the investigation soon became clear: The AFL accused Gold and the other strike leaders of debauchery, wasting union money, briberyBribery
Bribery, a form of corruption, is an act implying money or gift giving that alters the behavior of the recipient. Bribery constitutes a crime and is defined by Black's Law Dictionary as the offering, giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to influence the actions of an official or...
, forcing workers to join the Communist Party, coercing workers to participate in the strike, prolonging the strike on the orders of the Communist Party, and lying to the AFL investigating committee. On January 13, 1927, the AFL's final report was issued, in which the AFL demanded that the IFWU purge the Joint Board of all communists or expel the locals in question. On February 17, the New York City Central Labor Council expelled the Joint Board and its member locals; the IFWU expelled Gold and 36 other local leaders from the union on March 2.
On March 17, 1927, Gold and 10 other leaders of the Joint Board were arrested for allegedly breaking into a furrier's shop near Mineola, New York
Mineola, New York
Mineola is a village in Nassau County, New York, USA. The population was 18,799 at the 2010 census. The name is derived from a Native American word meaning a "pleasant place"....
, during the 1926 strike. Although the AFL successfully pressured Clarence Darrow
Clarence Darrow
Clarence Seward Darrow was an American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union, best known for defending teenage thrill killers Leopold and Loeb in their trial for murdering 14-year-old Robert "Bobby" Franks and defending John T...
to not take Gold's case, it was unable to prevent Frank P. Walsh
Frank P. Walsh
Francis Patrick "Frank" Walsh was an American lawyer. Walsh was especially noted for his advocacy of progressive causes, including decent working conditions, decent pay for workers, and equal employment opportunities for all, including women. He was appointed to several high-profile committees...
, former chairman of the federal Commission on Industrial Relations
Commission on Industrial Relations
The Commission on Industrial Relations was a commission created by the U.S. Congress on August 23, 1912. The commission studied work conditions throughout the industrial United States between 1913 and 1915...
and the National War Labor Board
National War Labor Board
The National War Labor Board was a federal agency created in April 1918 by President Woodrow Wilson. It was composed of twelve representatives from business and labor, and co-chaired by Former President William Howard Taft. Its purpose was to arbitrate disputes between workers and employers in...
, from doing so. Walsh formed a "Committee of 100" to provide financial and moral support to Gold and the others. The AFL tried to persuade the members of the committee to resign, but none did. At Gold's trial, which began on April 14, the prosecution repeatedly asked if Gold was a member of the Communist Party, if he knew communists, and if he endorsed the party's principles. Walsh protested that these questions had nothing to do with the alleged crime of burglary
Burglary
Burglary is a crime, the essence of which is illicit entry into a building for the purposes of committing an offense. Usually that offense will be theft, but most jurisdictions specify others which fall within the ambit of burglary...
, but the judge overruled his objections. Nevertheless, Gold and one other person were acquitted, but nine others were not.
The AFL also accused Gold of allegedly bribing police officers to give the union favorable treatment during the 1926 strike. Charges were filed on March 4, 1927. Gold's trial opened on March 30, 1927, as his trial for assault continued on Long Island and the AFL-dominated Joint Council was attempting to take over the fur unions in New York City. Several witnesses testified that the police received $3,800 a week from the Joint Board, but Gold, the Joint Board and their supporters (which included the New York State Federation of Labor) alleged an AFL-led conspiracy to frame them. The trial was suspended on June 3 after two prosecution witnesses revealed they had perjured themselves in an attempt to implicate Gold. Gold and the other defendants were found innocent on July 21, 1927, after the court could find no evidence of any misuse of funds. Indeed, most testimony focused on police brutality against the union and its members, significantly undermining the prosecution's claim of police favoritism.
1927 strike
The IFWU, meanwhile, organized a new "Joint Council" to replace the Joint Board. On March 2, 1927, the Joint Council announced it was the true collective bargaining agent for all New York City fur workers, that it alone administered their union contracts, and that they must become members of the Joint Council or be fired by their employers. Thousands of workers refused; many were fired, and some had to be forcibly removed from their place of employment in protest. Gold and the Joint Board fought the Joint Council's actions. As the dispute between the Joint Board and Joint Council continued, employers ceased to honor the 1926 contract. Soon, the work week crept as high as 70 hours over seven days. Overtime pay was eliminated, wages were cut by as much as 50 percent, and subcontracting became rampant.Although Gold was on trial for assault and bribery, he led the Joint Board in a counter-organizing campaign against the AFL-dominated Joint Council. He personally led mass pickets and protests in the fur district of New York City in late March 1927. The AFL attempted to undercut the Joint Board by releasing statements that the Gold-led union was seeking a "peace treaty" with the Joint Council, while accusing the Joint Board of coercing workers into joining. Despite AFL assertions that workers were stampeding into the Joint Council, the Gold-led Joint Board had the support of the vast majority of workers in the New York City fur industry. The Joint Board's strength among the workers was so strong that on May 3, 1927, the Fur Trimming Manufacturers' Association broke with the employers' group and signed a contract with Gold's Joint Board—reaffirming the 1926 contract and restoring working conditions to their June 1926 level.
Gold began threatening a new strike to force the employers to honor the terms of the 1926 contract and win recognition of the Joint Board again. The AFL accused the Joint Board of being a communist front, and pleaded for the public to withdraw support for it. In confidential talks with the New York City police, the AFL conceded that Gold's union had the support of the workers and that the only way to defeat the "Red-led" union was a massive show of police force which would intimidate the strikers. Mass arrests and heavy fines, coupled with long jail terms, would bankrupt the Joint Board and terrify the protesters, AFL officials and staff told the police. The strike began on June 3, 1927, with several thousand picketers taking to the streets and police arresting hundreds of workers. When the police proved unable to control the large number of strikers, they began isolating groups of two or three people (often women) and beating them with clubs. The extreme police response led Gold to call strike after strike, most of which were broken up by police attacks on peaceful picketers and which led to scores of arrests and jail sentences. The AFL and its leadership again accused Gold and the Joint Board of terrorizing workers in order to force them to join the union, and claimed that only the Joint Council had the support of the majority of workers.
But by mid-July 1927, the AFL's claims were proven to be false. The Joint Council lost most of its support, and the Gold-led Joint Board received recognition by companies employing a majority of workers in the fur district. Most employers no longer compelled their workers to join the Joint Council, and the Joint Board's 1926 contract was re-established and enforced.
Creation of a new union
As the Joint Board sought to re-establish itself in New York City during the June–July 1927 strike, the IFWU moved against Gold in yet another way.President Shachtman issued a call for the biennial convention of the IFWU to be held in the Executive Council chamber at the AFL Building in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, on July 13, 1927. The union's constitution required the convention to be held in May, but AFL leaders (including the influential Executive Council member, Matthew Woll
Matthew Woll
Matthew Woll was president of the International Photo-Engravers Union of North America from 1906 to 1929, an American Federation of Labor vice president from 1919 to 1955 and an AFL-CIO vice president from 1955 to 1956.-Early life:Born in Luxembourg in 1880 to Michael and Janette Woll, the Roman...
) demanded that Shachtman delay the meeting until such time as he could guarantee that a large majority of delegates would be pro-AFL. "As you well know, your International Union is today being financed to a great part by the reorganizing activities going on here in New York City," Woll and two others wrote Shachtman, "and that without this income your organization would be practically bankrupt." The letter was thinly-veiled blackmail
Blackmail
In common usage, blackmail is a crime involving threats to reveal substantially true or false information about a person to the public, a family member, or associates unless a demand is met. It may be defined as coercion involving threats of physical harm, threat of criminal prosecution, or threats...
, and Shachtman knuckled under to it.
Nonetheless, Gold and 35 other delegates from New York City appeared at the convention and demanded to be recognized. The Credentials Committee refused to seat them, even though the Joint Board represented about 85 percent of the total IFWU membership. AFL President Green—tired of the constant conflict in New York City, believing Shachtman and the leadership of the IFWU were incompetent, and convinced that fighting the Joint Board was a waste of money—persuaded Shachtman to at least let Gold and the other Joint Board delegates speak before the convention to make their case. Gold delivered an impassioned speech in which he denounced the attacks on the political views of the Joint Board's leadership, argued that the union should be spending its money building solidarity and fighting employers, and pushed for strong internal democratic procedures in the IFWU. But despite his pleas, the convention refused to seat the delegates, and then revoked the charters of the locals which comprised the Joint Board.
These efforts to undercut Gold and the Joint Board also failed. Several IFWU locals outside New York City passed resolutions criticizing the International Union's actions, and worker support for the Joint Council dwindled even further. On July 6, 1928, the AFL notified the Joint Council that it was withdrawing all staff and monetary support for the rump union. When the news leaked to the leaders of other needle trade unions, President Green was forced to publicly reiterate the AFL's support for the non-communist union. But the new flow of funds and staff did nothing to resuscitate the Joint Council. Worse, from the AFL's perspective, the Joint Board then called several strikes in July 1928 and won major wage increases from the employers.
In the summer and fall of 1928, Gold began building support for a new international union of fur workers. He met with the leaders of eight non-New York City fur workers' locals as well as a left-wing group of fur workers who were attempting to disaffiliate from what remained of the Joint Council. Included in the new union were 15,000 dressmakers and other garment workers comprising the left wing of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union. The new Needle Trades Workers Industrial Union was formed on January 1, 1929. Louis Hyman was elected President, and Ben Gold was elected Secretary-Treasurer. The thirty-nine member General Executive Board included African American
African American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
s, Russians
Russians
The Russian people are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Russia, speaking the Russian language and primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries....
, Poles
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
, Greeks
Greeks
The Greeks, also known as the Hellenes , are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighboring regions. They also form a significant diaspora, with Greek communities established around the world....
, women and even a youth delegate.
Secretary-Treasurer
As chief strategist as well as secretary-treasurer for the Needle Trades Workers Industrial Union (NTWIU), Ben Gold pursued an aggressive and militant policy of collective bargaining. The formation of the union was inauspicious: Within the year the Great DepressionGreat Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
began, leading to thousands of layoffs in the fur industry and strong downward pressure on wages. But even as early as February 1929, as the economy slid toward depression, Hyman and Gold were announcing a series of strikes designed to raise wages. The new union's first strike occurred in the garment industry in February 1929. A second strike in the New York City's fur industry occurred in June 1929, as NTWIU sought to organize AFL-affiliated locals of fur workers into the breakaway union. With nearly all the city's fur workers already in the NTWIU, however, Gold made little headway against the anti-communist AFL locals. Meanwhile, press reports implied that most of the city's fur workers belonged to the AFL, inverting the true situation. On occasion, violence broke out between the two groups. The AFL also sought to strip the NTWIU's New York City locals of the right to use the phrase "fur workers" in their name.
As the internecine union struggles continued, Gold led strikes in both the garment and fur industries. Sporadic violence also broke out during these events. More than 3,500 union members struck for shorter working hours and higher wages on June 17, 1931, collective bargaining goals which were considered madness by nearly all labor leaders. Yet, Gold won an increase in working hours, leading to a guaranteed 40-hour work week well as increased pay—an achievement important in the establishment of the standard American work week. In August 1932, Gold won yet another agreement retaining the union's work-week and pay goals in the fur industry despite the worsening depression. The union also launched an assault on sweatshop
Sweatshop
Sweatshop is a negatively connoted term for any working environment considered to be unacceptably difficult or dangerous. Sweatshop workers often work long hours for very low pay, regardless of laws mandating overtime pay or a minimum wage. Child labour laws may be violated. Sweatshops may have...
conditions in the garment industry in early 1933, an effort the AFL-led Joint Council labeled communistic.
Battles with the AFL-led Joint Council continued to occupy much of Gold's time. The stridently anti-communist labor leader, Matthew Woll, had been placed in charge of a three-person committee of AFL Executive Council members charged with assisting the IFWU and breaking the NTWIU. Woll and the two other council members funneled funds and staff into the IFWU and assisted the IFWU in strategizing ways to win back the loyalty of the majority of fur workers in New York City. Violence broke out when AFL supporters stormed NTWIU offices in April 1933. Gold, leading the fur workers' division of the NTWIU, led a series of counter-protests and marches through the fur district in May and June 1933. The AFL also continued to work closely with the New York City police, providing law enforcement officials with information on dates, times and places Gold's union would strike or protest and pushing hard for a strong police response to intimidate the communist-led union. In July, police clashed repeatedly with marching workers led personally by Gold, leading to a number of arrests and hundreds of worker injuries. In one case, police on horseback charged at a full gallop into a peaceful march on July 5, 1933. Despite the police violence and opposition of the AFL, the "dynamic leadership of Communist Ben Gold" helped the fur workers in 1933 to salvage a 35-hour work week and win an increase in pay from $38 to $50 a week.
When the Communist Party formed the Trade Union Unity League
Trade Union Unity League
The Trade Union Unity League was an industrial union umbrella organization of the Communist Party of the United States between 1929 and 1935...
in late August 1929, Gold affiliated the NTWIU with the umbrella labor group. The League was shuttered in 1935 when the Communist Party abandoned its strategy of dual unionism
Dual unionism
Dual unionism is the development of a union or political organization parallel to and within an existing labor union. In some cases, the term may refer to the situation where two unions claim the right to organize the same workers....
and "boring from within" in favor of the Popular Front
Popular front
A popular front is a broad coalition of different political groupings, often made up of leftists and centrists. Being very broad, they can sometimes include centrist and liberal forces as well as socialist and communist groups...
.
Gold also worked hard to integrate
Racial integration
Racial integration, or simply integration includes desegregation . In addition to desegregation, integration includes goals such as leveling barriers to association, creating equal opportunity regardless of race, and the development of a culture that draws on diverse traditions, rather than merely...
the NTWIU. While other unions actively discriminated against African Americans and other minorities or ignored the issue of race, Gold encouraged a bottom-up attack on racism. He actively involved members in "trials" of union members who had used racist language or engaged in discriminatory behavior, and his efforts were largely successful in weeding racism out of the union.
Meanwhile, Gold also was heavily involved in writing the "Fur Code." The National Industrial Recovery Act
National Industrial Recovery Act
The National Industrial Recovery Act , officially known as the Act of June 16, 1933 The National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA), officially known as the Act of June 16, 1933 The National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA), officially known as the Act of June 16, 1933 (Ch. 90, 48 Stat. 195, formerly...
, enacted on June 16, 1933, established the National Recovery Administration
National Recovery Administration
The National Recovery Administration was the primary New Deal agency established by U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933. The goal was to eliminate "cut-throat competition" by bringing industry, labor and government together to create codes of "fair practices" and set prices...
and authorized the agency to establish voluntary agreements within each industry regulating working hours, pay rates, and prices. Hundreds of industry codes were created, including a code governing the fur industry. Gold was appointed to the panel crafting the Fur Industry Code, and on July 21, 1933, the panel established a preliminary "blanket code" providing a 40-hour week and a minimum wage of $14 a week (about $216 a week in 2008 inflation-adjusted dollars).
In late 1933, Gold served a brief prison sentence after having been arrested for participating in a hunger march in Wilmington, Delaware
Wilmington, Delaware
Wilmington is the largest city in the state of Delaware, United States, and is located at the confluence of the Christina River and Brandywine Creek, near where the Christina flows into the Delaware River. It is the county seat of New Castle County and one of the major cities in the Delaware Valley...
. Hunger marches had been occurring throughout the United States since 1931. Catholic
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
social activist Dorothy Day
Dorothy Day
Dorothy Day was an American journalist, social activist and devout Catholic convert; she advocated the Catholic economic theory of Distributism. She was also considered to be an anarchist, and did not hesitate to use the term...
herself encouraged Gold to participate in a march from New York City to Washington, D.C. Gold was one of 315 marchers who left New York City on November 29, 1932, bound for Washington. The marchers reached Wilmington on December 2, their number having increased by several hundred. Their permit to march in the city was withdrawn. That night, the police herded most of the marchers into a warehouse downtown, but Gold, most of the women and most of the marchers from New England stayed in a rented church two blocks away. That night, the marchers at the church were refused permission to hold a meeting in the street, so they held it on the church steps. When the police tried to stop the meeting, the marchers resisted. The police began beating the people listening to the speaker, and the marchers fled into the church and barricaded the doors. The police fired tear gas through the windows of the building, then broke down the doors and entered the building with weapons drawn. The marchers resisted by hurling chairs at the police, but were beaten and gassed repeatedly until subdued. Twenty-three marchers, including Gold, were arrested. Four police and three marchers were hospitalized. Gold was convicted of incitement to riot, and served a brief prison term in Wilmington in late 1933 and early 1934. Gold participated in additional hunger marches in 1933 and 1934, and was arrested again in Albany, New York
Albany, New York
Albany is the capital city of the U.S. state of New York, the seat of Albany County, and the central city of New York's Capital District. Roughly north of New York City, Albany sits on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River...
, in late October 1934.
Gold's battles with the AFL also continued in 1934. Joint Board and Joint Council supporters fought with fists, bricks and clubs in January 1934. But the AFL group continued to shrink as the Great Depression worsened, and IFWU leaders feared for the survival of their union. To forestall any peace talks, AFL President Green launched a major initiative to drive communists and communist sympathizers out of all AFL-affiliated local, national and international unions. AFL accusations against Gold and his union also continued.
In 1934 and 1935, Gold led the garment and fur workers in two successful strikes which propelled his union into a merger with the IFWU. The first was week-long strike by 4,000 fur workers in late August 1934, which led to additional wage increases and stricter enforcement of contract provisions. The second was a strike by 10,000 garment workers in April 1935 which led to a contract guaranteeing a minimum weekly wage.
Merger with IFWU
The success of the NTWIU and particularly Gold's aggressive leadership of the union's fur workers division significantly undermined support for the AFL-supported IFWU. Gold asserted in August 1934 that the IFWU was in financial trouble and had too few members to ensure viability, but the IFWU denied his claims. IFWU President Pietro Lucchi, however, knew that Gold was correct. In May 1935, his union near bankruptcy, he approached David DubinskyDavid Dubinsky
David Dubinsky was an American labor leader...
, President of the ILGWU, for an infusion of funds. Dubinsky turned him down. Lucchi next appealed to AFL President Green, who appointed a committee composed of Woll, Dubinsky, and Sidney Hillman
Sidney Hillman
Sidney Hillman was an American labor leader. Head of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, he was a key figure in the founding of the Congress of Industrial Organizations and in marshaling labor's support for Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the Democratic Party.-Early years:Sidney Hillman was...
(President of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers) to consider a fund-raising effort. But the committee would not meet until June 18, and by then the union would have collapsed. Given Green's disinclination to support the IFWU in 1927, some scholars conclude that Green purposefully delayed the committee meeting in order to let the IFWU collapse.
At the IFWU convention in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, the week of May 19, 1935, delegates voted to establish a Unity Committee whose charge was to seek and win immediate merger with the NTWIU. The committee met on May 27, 1935, with its NTWIU counterparts, and quickly hammered out a merger agreement.
The merger convention opened on June 20, 1935, at the Manhattan Opera House
Manhattan Center
The Manhattan Center building, built in 1906 and located at 311 West 34th Street in Midtown Manhattan, houses Manhattan Center Studios , its Grand Ballroom, and the Hammerstein Ballroom, one of New York City's most renowned performance venues...
. In a final attempt to stall merger, on June 19 Green announced that any union which admitted communists as members would have its charter pulled by the AFL Executive Council. The merger proceeded despite Green's threat. More than 3,000 delegates from the NTWIU met on an upper floor, and about 2,500 delegates (nearly all the union's members) from the IFWU met on the ground floor. The same speakers addressed both conventions, although by prior agreement Gold was not permitted to speak. When Gold appeared about an hour after the two conventions opened, he was greeted with chants of "We want Gold!", "Let Gold speak!", and "Gold! Gold! Gold!" Gold sat impassive in his seat while he received a standing ovation, and it was clear that a wide majority of the members of both conventions supported him. On June 21, Lucchi and the executive board of the merged organization met in Long Island City, Queens
Long Island City, Queens
Long Island City is the westernmost neighborhood of the borough of Queens in New York City. L.I.C. is notable for its rapid and ongoing gentrification, its waterfront parks, and its thriving arts community. L.I.C. has among the highest concentration of art galleries, art institutions, and studio...
, and reinstated Gold as a member in good standing of the IFWU.
Under an agreement reached by the merger conventions, leadership elections for the New York City locals of the merged IFWU took place 40 days later. Gold was elected to his old position of business manager of the Joint Council on August 10, 1935, defeating a candidate put forth by the AFL by a greater than 2-to-1 majority.
Business manager once again
Gold was business manager of the New York City Joint Council for two years. Since the IFWU had just held its biennial convention in May 1935, new elections for officers of the international union could not be held until 1937. So, despite overwhelming member support, Gold had to wait to run for president of the IFWU. He was not idle, however. Relations between various New York City locals were acrimonious after years of inter-union warfare, many employers were openly ignoring provisions of the contract because the union's attention was elsewhere, and organized crimeOrganized crime
Organized crime or criminal organizations are transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals for the purpose of engaging in illegal activity, most commonly for monetary profit. Some criminal organizations, such as terrorist organizations, are...
had infiltrated many union shops.
The contracts controlled by the Joint Council expired on February 1, 1936. Gold faced a difficult task: In just six months, he had to rebuild the locals which had remained with the IFWU while preparing the union for a strike in the depths of a depression. A strike was authorized on January 18, but Gold quickly accepted the services of an impartial mediator to assist with the negotiations. In the final few days of January, Mayor
Mayor of New York City
The Mayor of the City of New York is head of the executive branch of New York City's government. The mayor's office administers all city services, public property, police and fire protection, most public agencies, and enforces all city and state laws within New York City.The budget overseen by the...
Fiorello H. La Guardia intervened and heard presentations from both sides. The intervention by government officials worked, and a new contract reached on February 1.
Gold also led a number of organizing drives among fur and garment workers in New York City, so that by May 1937 the union had nearly 35,000 members. Continuing a campaign he began in 1927, Gold also purged the union's locals of organized crime influence.
Antitrust prosecution
On November 6, 1933, Gold and about 80 other individuals were indicted for violations of federal antitrustCompetition law
Competition law, known in the United States as antitrust law, is law that promotes or maintains market competition by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies....
law. Former IFWU presidents Morris Kaufman and Pietro Lucchi, the IFWU itself, several of IFWU locals and local leaders, as well as 68 employers and several organized crime figures were also included in the indictment. The indictment alleged that Louis "Lepke" Buchalter
Louis Buchalter
Louis "Lepke" Buchalter was a Jewish American mobster and head of the Mafia hit squad Murder, Inc. during the 1930s. After Dutch Schultz' request of the Mafia Commission for permission to kill his enemy, U.S. Attorney Thomas Dewey, the Commission decided to kill Schultz in order to prevent the hit...
and Jacob "Gurrah" Shapiro
Jacob Shapiro
Jacob "Gurrah" Shapiro was a New York mobster who, with his partner Louis "Lepke" Buchalter, controlled industrial labor racketeering in New York for two decades and established the Murder, Inc. organization.-Early years:...
—co-founders of the infamous Murder, Inc.
Murder, Inc.
Murder, Inc. was the name given by the press to organized crime groups in the 1920s through the 1940s that resulted in hundreds of murders on behalf of the American Mafia and Jewish Mafia groups who together formed the early organized crime groups in New York and...
murder-for-hire organization—formed a group of employers known as the "Fur Dressers Factor Corporation" to fix prices
Price fixing
Price fixing is an agreement between participants on the same side in a market to buy or sell a product, service, or commodity only at a fixed price, or maintain the market conditions such that the price is maintained at a given level by controlling supply and demand...
and eliminate competition. The employers allegedly paid higher wages to unions which agreed to participate in the scheme by striking uncooperative businesses, and Buchalter and Shapiro provided the muscle to force other furriers out of the business (which included bombings, acid throwing, kidnapping, arson and more).
After several defendants were granted their own separate trials and charges against others dropped, the court reached its verdict on December 16, 1937. Gold was convicted of violating the Sherman Antitrust Act
Sherman Antitrust Act
The Sherman Antitrust Act requires the United States federal government to investigate and pursue trusts, companies, and organizations suspected of violating the Act. It was the first Federal statute to limit cartels and monopolies, and today still forms the basis for most antitrust litigation by...
and sentenced to one year in prison. It was the first conviction of a labor union official or labor union under the Sherman Act. After the convictions, the government undertook additional investigations against the IFWU and now-defunct NTWIU for violations of the Sherman Act.
But Gold and his union co-defendants appealed their convictions, and on December 19, 1938, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals...
overturned the convictions of all but three union officials. Gold's conviction was among those voided.
The government then reinstated charges in February 1940 against Gold, the NTWIU and 28 other labor leaders based on allegations not pursued in 1933. Charges against six labor leaders were dropped on March 20, 1940, and four others but Gold and 17 others were tried. Despite one witness recanting most of his accusatory testimony on the witness stand, Gold and IFWU Vice President Irving Potash were convicted of these additional antitrust charges. As the union raised a $100,000 defense fund for Gold and Potash, the government brought a fresh set of charges against Gold on May 17, 1940, accusing him of jury tampering
Jury tampering
Jury tampering is the crime of unduly attempting to influence the composition and/or decisions of a jury during the course of a trial.The means by which this crime could be perpetrated can include attempting to discredit potential jurors to ensure they will not be selected for duty. Once selected,...
during his first trial. As the jury deliberated Gold's fate, a group of employers sued Gold and the NTWIU for $3 million in damages under the Clayton Antitrust Act
Clayton Antitrust Act
The Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914 , was enacted in the United States to add further substance to the U.S. antitrust law regime by seeking to prevent anticompetitive practices in their incipiency. That regime started with the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, the first Federal law outlawing practices...
, and accusations of witness tampering
Witness tampering
Witness tampering is harming or otherwise threatening a witness, hoping to influence his or her testimony.-Witness tampering in the USA:In the United States, the crime of witness tampering in federal cases is defined by statute at , "Tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant"...
were levied against Gold.
A mistrial occurred in the Gold jury tampering case on June 28, 1940, after the jury was unable to reach a verdict.
Gold's second jury tampering trial (which now included the witness tampering charge) began on July 1, 1940. Gold and his three co-defendants were acquitted on July 11, 1940.
Meanwhile, Gold's appeal on the second set of Sherman Antitrust Act violations was winding its way through the courts. On May 27, 1940, the Supreme Court of the United States
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
issued its ruling in Apex Hosiery Co. v. Leader 310 U.S. 469 (1940). In that case, a union had engaged in a sit-down strike which shuttered a hosiery company's operations and prevented it from fulfilling its interstate contracts. The union was indicted and convicted for violating the Sherman Antitrust Act. But the Supreme Court disagreed:
The mere fact that strikes or agreements not to work, entered into by laborers to compel employers to yield to their demands, may restrict the power of such employers to compete in the market with those not subject to such demands does not bring the agreement within the condemnation of the Sherman Act.
Following the reasoning laid down by the Supreme Court in Apex Hosiery, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit once more voided the antitrust convictions imposed on Gold and the others in the case. The government declined to prosecute Gold further.
Presidency
Gold was elected president of the International Fur Workers Union in May 1937. Immediately after his election, Gold disaffiliated the IFWU from the American Federation of Labor and joined the Congress of Industrial OrganizationsCongress of Industrial Organizations
The Congress of Industrial Organizations, or CIO, proposed by John L. Lewis in 1932, was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 required union leaders to swear that they were not...
(CIO). The change in affiliation was driven almost solely by Gold, and shocked the members of the union. He was elected to the CIO executive council.
CIO affiliation did not, however, protect the IFWU or Gold from political attacks. John L. Lewis
John L. Lewis
John Llewellyn Lewis was an American leader of organized labor who served as president of the United Mine Workers of America from 1920 to 1960...
, then the president of the CIO, was a strong anti-communist. In late January 1938, Lewis publicly announced that he would pursue a policy barring communists from membership in the CIO. Moderates within the IFWU denounced Gold for using "Hitler methods" to retain power, and pleaded with Lewis to intervene. In May 1938, the U.S. House of Representatives
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...
established the House Committee Investigating Un-American Activities
House Un-American Activities Committee
The House Committee on Un-American Activities or House Un-American Activities Committee was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. In 1969, the House changed the committee's name to "House Committee on Internal Security"...
as a successor to the Special Committee on Un-American Activities (which had spent the last three years investigating Nazi Germany's
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
attempts to influence American public opinion). Rep.
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...
Martin Dies, Jr.
Martin Dies, Jr.
Martin Dies, Jr. was a Texas politician and a Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives. His father, Martin Dies, was also a member of the United States House of Representatives.-Biography:...
was named chair of the committee, and charged with continuing the investigations into Nazi propaganda and initiating new investigations into the activities of the Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan
Ku Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...
. When committee members voiced support for the Klan and ignored the Nazi threat, Dies concentrated the committee's work on communist infiltration of the labor movement. Dies eagerly permitted the AFL time before the committee to denounce the CIO and the IFWU as riddled with communists and communist sympathizers—accusations CIO representatives called "nonsense" and Gold denounced as redbaiting
McCarthyism
McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by...
.
Gold continued to pursue an aggressive collective bargaining policy until the beginning of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. Within weeks of taking over as president, he authorized a sympathy strike
Sympathy strike
Secondary action is industrial action by a trade union in support of a strike initiated by workers in another, separate enterprise...
of 13,000 fur workers in New York City to support striking fur workers in Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. The protests, rallies and spot strikes continued as Gold pushed to organize the remaining fur shops in New York City. Signed contracts were reached with newly-organized employers in July 1937.
Employers, however, often fought back, and in the spring of 1938 a lengthy strike nearly ended in defeat for the union. The U.S. economy had risen to its pre-depression levels by the spring of 1937, but a strong recession
Recession of 1937
The Recession of 1937–1938 was a temporary reversal of the pre-war 1933 to 1941 economic recovery from the Great Depression in the United States.-Background:...
began in late summer (triggered in part by large reductions in federal spending, higher bank reserve requirements, and reductions in disposable income brought about by implementation of the Social Security Act
Social Security (United States)
In the United States, Social Security refers to the federal Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance program.The original Social Security Act and the current version of the Act, as amended encompass several social welfare and social insurance programs...
). Between August 1937 and May 1938, industrial production fell by 30 percent, the economy contracted by more than 6 percent, and unemployment rose from 5 million to over 9 million. The steep recession led many employers to resist union demands. On February 11, 1938, employers locked out 4,000 fur workers as the IFWU contracts expired. Gold hesitated calling a strike for seven weeks, seeking peace with the manufacturers, but finally called all fur workers out in a general strike on March 30. Hoping for a quick end to the strike and alarmed by the lockout, Gold initially kept pickets and rallies small. But locked out workers attacked a fur dealer on April 1, and police retaliated against the pickets with clubs and beatings. Infuriated, Gold ordered all the union's members out into the streets. The police responded by attempting to use violence to intimidate the strikers, and the union responded in kind. For seven weeks, the fur district in New York City was in a state of near-riot. The union filed unfair labor practice charges against the employers, and the NLRB moved on May 6 to investigate. Mass picketing and mass rallies continued, and the employers asked Mayor LaGuardia and the police to end the strike. On May 13, the parties agreed to submit their disputes to Dr. Paul Abelson, an impartial arbitrator with the National Recovery Administration. Thirteen days later, Dr. Abelson announced a tentative agreement, and IFWU members ratified the contract on May 26. Although Gold publicly characterized the strike as a victory for the union, he privately conceded that the strike had been a very near thing.
Determined to expand the union, Gold merged the IFWU with the National Leather Workers' Association (NLWA). The IFWU had organized leather workers over the years but never concertedly. The NLWA was formed by four local unions in Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
in 1933, and affiliated with the CIO in 1937. By 1939, however, the NLWA had only 14 locals (half of which actually functioned) and only 5,000 dues-paying members. The two unions agreed to merge in March 1939. The NLWA approved the merger during its 5th National Convention in Boston, Massachusetts, April 29 to May 2, and the IFWU approved the merger at its annual convention in New York City on May 14. Ben Gold was elected the president of the newly amalgamated union, which adopted "International Fur and Leather Workers Union of the United States and Canada" (IFLWU)as its new name. The new union maintained distinctly separate fur and leather divisions. Each division had its own executive board and conventions and maintained its own finances. But the amalgamated union was nonetheless effective: Within a year, the union had organized 25,000 new workers into 42 new locals.
Gold was a staunch supporter of CIO President John L. Lewis. In 1940, when other left-wing unions challenged Lewis' handling of CIO finances, Gold defended him. He also applauded Lewis' refusal to endorse Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
in the 1940 presidential election
United States presidential election, 1940
The United States presidential election of 1940 was fought in the shadow of World War II as the United States was emerging from the Great Depression. Incumbent President Franklin D. Roosevelt , a Democrat, broke with tradition and ran for a third term, which became a major issue...
, but unlike Lewis did not endorse Wendell Wilkie or Montana
Montana
Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...
Senator
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
Burton K. Wheeler
Burton K. Wheeler
Burton Kendall Wheeler was an American politician of the Democratic Party and a United States Senator from 1923 until 1947.-Early life:...
(whom Lewis supported as a third party candidate).
After the United States entered World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Gold proved an ardent patriot. As war approached, in November 1941, he led large rallies in New York City urging union members to buy war bond
War bond
War bonds are debt securities issued by a government for the purpose of financing military operations during times of war. War bonds generate capital for the government and make civilians feel involved in their national militaries...
s. When the CIO advocated a no-strike pledge for all American unions, Gold wholeheartedly and strongly supported the pledge. He readily agreed to the seven-day work week after the United States declared war on Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan
Empire of Japan
The Empire of Japan is the name of the state of Japan that existed from the Meiji Restoration on 3 January 1868 to the enactment of the post-World War II Constitution of...
, sent aid to the Republic of China
Republic of China
The Republic of China , commonly known as Taiwan , is a unitary sovereign state located in East Asia. Originally based in mainland China, the Republic of China currently governs the island of Taiwan , which forms over 99% of its current territory, as well as Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu and other minor...
, and implemented a campaign to donate 50,000 fur-lined vests to British sailors as part of the war effort.
As the war came to an end, however, Gold began to press for major salary and benefit increases for IFLWU members. Refusing to break the union's no-strike pledge, Gold submitted the union's demands to the National War Labor Board
National War Labor Board
The National War Labor Board was a federal agency created in April 1918 by President Woodrow Wilson. It was composed of twelve representatives from business and labor, and co-chaired by Former President William Howard Taft. Its purpose was to arbitrate disputes between workers and employers in...
in February 1944. The War Labor Board subsequently granted the union a minimal wage rise in line with its "Little Steel Formula," but granted it substantial fringe benefit increases and ordered employers to end seasonal layoffs. The Board's order was vigorously opposed by employers, and Gold used the dispute as leverage to win a new collective bargaining agreement. The new agreement did not without a price, however, as Gold was forced to threaten to break his union's war-time pledge not to strike.
Gold also strongly advocated a third political party
Third party (politics)
In a two-party system of politics, the term third party is sometimes applied to a party other than the two dominant ones. While technically the term is limited to the third largest party or third oldest party, it is common, though innumerate, shorthand for any smaller party.For instance, in the...
which would more strongly support unions and working-class Americans. Gold first backed a third-party candidate in 1947 when he asked former Vice President
Vice President of the United States
The Vice President of the United States is the holder of a public office created by the United States Constitution. The Vice President, together with the President of the United States, is indirectly elected by the people, through the Electoral College, to a four-year term...
Henry A. Wallace
Henry A. Wallace
Henry Agard Wallace was the 33rd Vice President of the United States , the Secretary of Agriculture , and the Secretary of Commerce . In the 1948 presidential election, Wallace was the nominee of the Progressive Party.-Early life:Henry A...
to form a third party. In 1948, Soviet
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
leaders ordered American communists to support the third party candidacy of Wallace against incumbent President Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...
, and Gold actively supported Wallace despite the CIO's refusal to do so.
Gold was a strong supporter of statehood for Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
. He was president of the American Jewish Labor Council in 1948. In March 1948, Gold led a parade of 10,000 people in a parade and rally to support the emerging Jewish state. When American recognition of Israel drew protests in April 1948, Gold defended the Truman
Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...
administration's actions.
Communist purges
Gold was an active member in the Communist Party, and rose to important positions within its ranks by the late 1940s. He attended the Lenin Institute in MoscowMoscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
(an institute of higher education which taught the works of Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...
) for a short time during the winter of 1930-1931, and was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party from 1936 to 1948. His commitment to the party was occasionally tested, but never broken. For example, in 1939, the American Communist Party endorsed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, named after the Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and the German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, was an agreement officially titled the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Soviet Union and signed in Moscow in the late hours of 23 August 1939...
. Gold initially walked out of a party meeting to express his dismay at the decision. He changed his mind a few days later, and followed the party line.
In the post-World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
period, relations between the CIO leadership and communists within its member unions deteriorated. The first sign of a break came in May 1946. CIO President Philip Murray sponsored a denouncing Communist Party interference in the affairs of the CIO. Gold voted to approve the resolution. When asked why, he allegedly replied, "I have no problem being a loyal American, that's all the resolution asks. We just don't agree on the Truman foreign policy. We'll work with anyone on legitimate union business. We can't worry about Jim Carey and Reuther. They have their axes to grind." But when the CIO established a committee in November 1946 to purge the labor federation of communists and communist influence, Gold denounced the effort and said it would "destroy" the CIO. In May 1947, CIO leaders met to discuss the International Union of Mine, Mill, and Smelter Workers
Western Federation of Miners
The Western Federation of Miners was a radical labor union that gained a reputation for militancy in the mines of the western United States and British Columbia. Its efforts to organize both hard rock miners and smelter workers brought it into sharp conflicts – and often pitched battles...
, where locals representing thousands of members had recently disaffiliated due to the communist politics of the international union's leadership. CIO President Philip Murray
Philip Murray
Philip Murray was a Scottish born steelworker and an American labor leader. He was the first president of the Steel Workers Organizing Committee , the first president of the United Steelworkers of America , and the longest-serving president of the Congress of Industrial Organizations .-Early...
proposed that the CIO run the international union for a time, but Gold and seven other communists voted against Murray's proposal. An outraged Murray declared, "Any man who goes into a shop ostensibly as the representative of the workers and then devotes his time to furthering the interest of the Communist Party is a goddamn traitor. I'm tired of defending Communists and I'm tired of hearing C.I.O. officials defend them. The time has come to kick them out wherever and whenever we find them."
The breach widened throughout 1947. The CIO was extremely supportive of President Truman, and Soviet opposition to the Marshall Plan
Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan was the large-scale American program to aid Europe where the United States gave monetary support to help rebuild European economies after the end of World War II in order to combat the spread of Soviet communism. The plan was in operation for four years beginning in April 1948...
in the summer and fall of 1947 (opposition supported by most communists in the CIO). This led to a significant rupture between Murray, Walter Reuther
Walter Reuther
Walter Philip Reuther was an American labor union leader, who made the United Automobile Workers a major force not only in the auto industry but also in the Democratic Party in the mid 20th century...
and other leaders of the federation on one side and the communist leaders and staff in the CIO member unions on the other. The situation deteriorated further when Soviet leaders ordered American communists to support the Wallace candidacy for president. Then on June 23, 1947, the Republican
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
-controlled Congress passed the Taft-Hartley Act
Taft-Hartley Act
The Labor–Management Relations Act is a United States federal law that monitors the activities and power of labor unions. The act, still effective, was sponsored by Senator Robert Taft and Representative Fred A. Hartley, Jr. and became law by overriding U.S. President Harry S...
over President Truman's veto
Veto
A veto, Latin for "I forbid", is the power of an officer of the state to unilaterally stop an official action, especially enactment of a piece of legislation...
. The Act amended the National Labor Relations Act
National Labor Relations Act
The National Labor Relations Act or Wagner Act , is a 1935 United States federal law that limits the means with which employers may react to workers in the private sector who create labor unions , engage in collective bargaining, and take part in strikes and other forms of concerted activity in...
to require union leaders to file affidavits with the Department of Labor
United States Department of Labor
The United States Department of Labor is a Cabinet department of the United States government responsible for occupational safety, wage and hour standards, unemployment insurance benefits, re-employment services, and some economic statistics. Many U.S. states also have such departments. The...
declaring that they were not supporters of the Communist Party and had no relationship with any organization seeking the "overthrow of the United States government by force or by any illegal or unconstitutional means" as a condition to participating in NLRB proceedings.
The NLRB acted to aggressively enforce the provisions of the Taft-Hartley Act. Although the level of enforcement was not certain at first, many unions quickly filed the anti-communist affidavits. Gold declared the affidavit and increasingly anti-communist atmosphere a threat to the survival of the IFLWU, and sought contract language which would lock in employer recognition of the union if its leaders failed to sign the oath.
Political pressure on Gold also increased. Rep. John Parnell Thomas, chairman of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), subpoena
Subpoena
A subpoena is a writ by a government agency, most often a court, that has authority to compel testimony by a witness or production of evidence under a penalty for failure. There are two common types of subpoena:...
ed fur industry employers to testify before the committee about Gold's political beliefs. Their September 8, 1948, testimony blasted Gold for establishing a "dictatorship" within the union and ruining the fur industry through mass picketing and intimidation. HUAC then forced Gold to testify. Gold denounced and denied the testimony of the employers, proudly declaring that he had been a member of the Communist Party for nearly a quarter century.
The CIO subsequently acted to expel Gold and the IFLWU. Over Gold's protests, the CIO expelled the Greater New York CIO Council, of which the IFLWU's Joint Council was a member, in November 1948. Gold began fighting a drive at the national level of the CIO to expel all communist-led or communist-dominated unions. The CIO censured Gold and nine other communists on its Executive Council in May 1949 for allowing the Communist Party to control their unions, and he lost re-election to the CIO Executive Council in November 1949 as the federation's leaders purged itself of all communists. A few days later, the New York State CIO banned communists from being members, and expelled Gold from that body as well.
The attacks on Gold's politics had collective bargaining consequences as well. In August 1949, a tanners' employers' association in Massachusetts refused to bargain with the IFLWU so long as Gold was president of the union, on the grounds that Gold was a communist. The labor dispute with the tanners escalated in late 1949 (leading to some limited violence and vandalism), before a new contract was signed in January 1950.
These pressures took a considerable toll on Gold and the IFLWU. Gold told delegates to the union's convention in May 1950 that the communist political views of the union's leadership could cause the organization much difficulty, yet he also defied the CIO and urged a united union front rather than caving in to redbaiting political pressure.
Nonetheless, the IFLWU agreed to order its leadership to sign the Taft-Hartley Act's non-communist affidavits.
Trial for communist beliefs
Gold resigned from the Communist Party on August 24, 1950, and signed the Taft-Hartley oath. However, he made it clear that he had resigned only so the Fur Workers could receive the protection of federal law. The Justice DepartmentUnited States Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice , is the United States federal executive department responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice, equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries.The Department is led by the Attorney General, who is nominated...
argued that Gold had not really resigned, and indicted him for perjury in August 1953 one day before the statute of limitations
Statute of limitations
A statute of limitations is an enactment in a common law legal system that sets the maximum time after an event that legal proceedings based on that event may be initiated...
ran out.
At trial, Gold was charged with three counts of perjury
Perjury
Perjury, also known as forswearing, is the willful act of swearing a false oath or affirmation to tell the truth, whether spoken or in writing, concerning matters material to a judicial proceeding. That is, the witness falsely promises to tell the truth about matters which affect the outcome of the...
. He was accused of continuing to be a member of the Communist Party; accused of being affiliated with Communist party; and accused of being a supporter of an organization which advocated the overthrow of the United States government by force, illegal means, or unconstitutional methods. Numerous famous character witnesses appeared on Gold's behalf, including W. E. B. Du Bois. Nonetheless, Gold was convicted on the "membership" and "supporting" counts, and sentence to 1 to 3 years in prison.
Gold appealed, and his conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court of the United States
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
.
Gold raised six grounds for reversal: 1) The trial court refused to apply the rules of evidence
Rules of evidence
Rules of evidence govern whether, when, how, and for what purpose, proof of a legal case may be placed before a trier of fact for consideration....
for perjury to the case; 2) The circumstantial evidence offered at trial was not sufficient to convict him under the rules of evidence; 3) The trial court's instructions to the jury regarding the definition of "support" were unsupported by law or common usage; 4) The trial court erred in permitting expert testimony regarding his resignation (e.g., the fact of his resignation was a matter for the jury, not expert witnesses, to decide); 5) Government employees on the grand
Grand jury
A grand jury is a type of jury that determines whether a criminal indictment will issue. Currently, only the United States retains grand juries, although some other common law jurisdictions formerly employed them, and most other jurisdictions employ some other type of preliminary hearing...
and petit juries
Jury
A jury is a sworn body of people convened to render an impartial verdict officially submitted to them by a court, or to set a penalty or judgment. Modern juries tend to be found in courts to ascertain the guilt, or lack thereof, in a crime. In Anglophone jurisdictions, the verdict may be guilty,...
were biased (as they themselves had to take an anti-communist oath to retain their jobs); and 6) Law enforcement officers discussed anti-communist oaths with members of the jury while investigating an unrelated case. A deeply divided 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals
United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals...
upheld his conviction. The court of appeals then asked for an en banc
En banc
En banc, in banc, in banco or in bank is a French term used to refer to the hearing of a legal case where all judges of a court will hear the case , rather than a panel of them. It is often used for unusually complex cases or cases considered to be of greater importance...
rehearing sua sponte
Sua sponte
In law, sua sponte describes an act of authority taken without formal prompting from another party. The term is usually applied to actions by a judge taken without a prior motion or request from the parties...
. An equally divided en banc court upheld his conviction. Gold appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which overturned his conviction in Gold v. United States, 352 U.S. 985 (1957). An FBI
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
agent, investigating another case in which falsity of a non-Communist affidavit was at issue, telephoned or visited three members of the Gold jury or their families during Gold's trial. The Supreme Court held that although the FBI intrusion was unintentional it prejudiced the case against Gold. Relying on its recent decision in Remmer v. United States, 350 U.S. 377 (1955), the Supreme Court reversed and remanded the case to the district court with instructions to grant a new trial.
Although the government initially expressed interest in prosecuting Gold further, all charges against him were dropped in May 1957.
Aftereffects of the Gold trials
Gold's indictment and conviction led to two other U.S. Supreme Court cases as well.The first case was a major test of the National Labor Relations Board's
National Labor Relations Board
The National Labor Relations Board is an independent agency of the United States government charged with conducting elections for labor union representation and with investigating and remedying unfair labor practices. Unfair labor practices may involve union-related situations or instances of...
(NLRB) enforcement of the Taft-Hartley Act. In 1951, Lannom Manufacturing Co. refused to honor its contract with the International Fur and Leather Workers Union on the grounds that the union's officers had lied when making their Taft-Hartley anti-communist oaths. The union filed an unfair labor practice
Unfair labor practice
In United States labor law, the term unfair labor practice refers to certain actions taken by employers or unions that violate the National Labor Relations Act and other legislation...
charge against the employer with the NLRB. The Board found against the employer, but after Gold's conviction in April 1954 it reversed itself. The union, already embroiled in a similar case, asked the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals
United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts:* Eastern District of Kentucky* Western District of Kentucky...
for a stay; the court declined. The U.S. Supreme Court, however, granted certiorari
Certiorari
Certiorari is a type of writ seeking judicial review, recognized in U.S., Roman, English, Philippine, and other law. Certiorari is the present passive infinitive of the Latin certiorare...
. In Meat Cutters v. NLRB, 352 U.S. 153 (1956), the Supreme Court (relying on a decision released earlier that day, Leedom v. Mine Workers, 352 U.S. 145) held that the National Labor Relations Board had no authority to refuse to provide the protections of the NLRA to unions not in compliance with the Taft-Hartley Act. "
The second case led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling on whether an attorney was an "officer of the court." After the grand jury
Grand jury
A grand jury is a type of jury that determines whether a criminal indictment will issue. Currently, only the United States retains grand juries, although some other common law jurisdictions formerly employed them, and most other jurisdictions employ some other type of preliminary hearing...
had indicted Gold for perjury, Harold I. Cammer
Harold I. Cammer
Harold I. Cammer was an American lawyer who co-founded the National Lawyers Guild. He was known for his participation in labor law, civil rights, peace and justice issues, and freedom of speech cases; in particular, defending those accused of communist leanings.-Early life:Cammer was born in June...
(an attorney noted for representing communists in the United States), took Gold's case. Within two days, Cammer mailed a letter and questionnaire to all members of the grand jury who were employees of the federal government. He told the grand jurors that he was Gold's attorney and that he was trying to learn the effect of the federal government's loyalty program
Loyalty program
Loyalty programs are structured marketing efforts that reward, and therefore encourage, loyal buying behavior — behavior which is potentially beneficial to the firm....
on federal employees. Cammer undertook this action because of developments in another Taft-Hartley anti-communist oath case. In Emspak v. United States, 203 F.2d 54 (1952), the Justice Department convinced a district court that grand jurors who were federal employee were not biased. In particular, the government had argued that "there is not the slightest indication in the long motion and offer of proof that an attempt has been made to interview a single one of the persons." To prevent the government from making a similar claim in the Gold case, Cammer polled the jury. The Contempt Act of March 2, 1831 (4 Stat. 487) gave federal courts the authority to penalize officers of the court for misbehavior. For questioning the grand jurors, the district court found Cammer guilty of contempt and fined him $100. Cammer appealed. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit known informally as the D.C. Circuit, is the federal appellate court for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Appeals from the D.C. Circuit, as with all the U.S. Courts of Appeals, are heard on a...
upheld his conviction. Cammer appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which granted certiorari. In a landmark ruling, a unanimous Supreme Court overturned Cammer's contempt citation, holding that a lawyer is not a court "officer" in the same category as marshals, bailiffs, court clerks or judges. The district court erred in subjecting Cammer to summary punishment, the Supreme Court concluded, and the high court order the contempt ruling reversed.
Merger with the Meat Cutters and retirement
Gold was re-elected as IFLWU president in May 1954 despite his conviction for perjury. But the problems created by the Taft-Hartley Act, expulsion from the CIO, and prosecutions of the IFLWU's top leadership led Gold to seek merger with another union to strengthen the union's finances and collective bargaining power. A month after his re-election, Gold announced that he was discussing merger with the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North AmericaAmalgamated Meat Cutters
The Amalgamated Meat Cutters , officially the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America, was a labor union that represented retail butchers and packinghouse workers.-History:...
, a labor union affiliated with the AFL that represented retail butcher
Butcher
A butcher is a person who may slaughter animals, dress their flesh, sell their meat or any combination of these three tasks. They may prepare standard cuts of meat, poultry, fish and shellfish for sale in retail or wholesale food establishments...
s and packinghouse workers
Meat packing industry
The meat packing industry handles the slaughtering, processing, packaging, and distribution of animals such as cattle, pigs, sheep and other livestock...
. AFL leaders, however, expressed strong reservation against bringing the "Red-led" union into the federation.
Although the merger talks had moved forward aggressively, Ben Gold retired as IFLWU president on October 3, 1954, in order to remove AFL objections to the merger.
Gold's resignation at age 56 provide crucial in winning AFL approval for the merger. A new effort to merge the IFLWU and Meat Cutters began the day after his retirement. Eventually, the merger was consummated in 1955 after the AFL announced it would bar the IFLWU from joining the federation directly but not from merging with an AFL affiliate. The fur workers' division underwent additional purges of communist leaders and members after the merger.
Ben Gold spent the rest of his life in Florida. He published his memoirs in 1984. He died on July 24, 1985 at his home in North Miami Beach, Florida
North Miami Beach, Florida
North Miami Beach is a Miami suburban city in Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. Originally named Fulford in 1926 after Captain William H. Fulford of the United States Coast Guard, the city was incorporated in 1927 as Fulford, but was renamed North Miami Beach in 1931. The population was...
.
Political career
At the height of his career as a labor leader, Gold resided in The BronxThe Bronx
The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...
, where he ran unsuccessfully for judge in 1928; he received one of the lowest vote-totals in the history of New York state judicial elections. He ran for the New York State Assembly
New York State Assembly
The New York State Assembly is the lower house of the New York State Legislature. The Assembly is composed of 150 members representing an equal number of districts, with each district having an average population of 128,652...
in 1931 and 1936, and for president of the New York City Board of Aldermen
New York City Council
The New York City Council is the lawmaking body of the City of New York. It has 51 members from 51 council districts throughout the five boroughs. The Council serves as a check against the mayor in a "strong" mayor-council government model. The council monitors performance of city agencies and...
in 1933. He also ran for justice of the New York Supreme Court
New York Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the State of New York is the trial-level court of general jurisdiction in thestate court system of New York, United States. There is a supreme court in each of New York State's 62 counties, although some smaller counties share judges with neighboring counties...
in 1932. All of his campaigns were on the American Labor Party
American Labor Party
The American Labor Party was a political party in the United States established in 1936 which was active almost exclusively in the state of New York. The organization was founded by labor leaders and former members of the Socialist Party who had established themselves as the Social Democratic...
ticket, and all failed.
In literature
Throughout his life, Gold wrote short stories in Yiddish that often dealt with labor relations and Jewish immigrants. His 1944 novel Avreml Broide included illustrations by fellow communist William GropperWilliam Gropper
William Victor "Bill" Gropper , was a U.S. cartoonist, painter, lithographer, and muralist. A committed radical, Gropper is best known for the political work which he contributed to such left wing publications as The Revolutionary Age, The Liberator, The New Masses, The Worker, and The Morning...
. In 1948, he wrote Mentshn, published by the Needle Trades Workers Committee. His last work of fiction was The Storm in Riverville, published in 1972. It is a semi-fictional account of garment workers in the 1920s, their fight against organized crime, and their attempt to win a 40-hour work week.
Gold himself appears as a character in the fiction novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
Union Square. The book, published in 2001, is about two Russian Jewish families—one Marxist, the other socialist
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...
—who are forced by pogrom
Pogrom
A pogrom is a form of violent riot, a mob attack directed against a minority group, and characterized by killings and destruction of their homes and properties, businesses, and religious centres...
s to flee to the United States. Sarah Levy, one of the most prominent characters in the novel, meets a slightly fictionalized Ben Gold in her attempt to unionize women garment workers in New York City.
Gold also appears as a character in the stage play I'm Not Rappaport
I'm Not Rappaport
I'm Not Rappaport is a play by Herb Gardner originally staged by Seattle Repertory Theatre in 1984. Its Broadway debut production, directed by Daniel Sullivan, starring Judd Hirsch, Cleavon Little, Jace Alexander, and Mercedes Ruehl, opened on November 19, 1985 at the Booth Theatre, where it ran...
. Actor Ron Rifkin
Ron Rifkin
Ron Rifkin is an American actor. He is best-known for his roles as Arvin Sloane on the spy drama Alias and as Saul Holden on the American family drama Brothers & Sisters.-Personal life:...
played Gold in the film version of the play.
Works
- Who are the murderers? Who paid for placing the bomb that killed Morris Langer? The ring of racketeers in the fur industry exposed. New York, General executive board, Needle traders workers industrial union, 1933
- The Palestine crisis: an open letter to the Interim Committee, American Jewish Conference. with Alex BittelmanAlexander BittelmanAlexander "Alex" Bittelman was a Russian-born Jewish-American communist political activist, Marxist theorist , contributed a more complex analysis , and writer. A founding member of the Communist Party of America, Bittelman is best remembered as the chief factional lieutenant of William Z...
New York, Morning Freiheit Association 1946 - The storm in Riverville New York, Ben Gold Book Committee, 1973
- Memoirs New York, W. Howard, 1984
External links
- Famous Cases: The Fur Dressers Case. FBI History. Federal Bureau of Investigation. U.S. Department of Justice.
- Guide to the International Fur and Leather Workers' Union. Records, 1913-1955. Collection Number: 5676. Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives, Cornell University Library, Cornell University