LABOR: Promotion

Last month American-Hawaiian Steamship Co. in San Francisco promoted ten of its waterfront clerks from daily to monthly pay ($160). Last week 7,500 men were idle and a general Pacific Coast maritime strike was imminent because of this seemingly appreciative gesture.

As hourly workers, the clerks had to be hired through a C. I. O. union; as monthly salaried men, they may be employed independently of the ship clerks' hiring hall. C. I. O.'s West Coast Director Harry Bridges, scenting a sly device to undermine his forces and promote an "independent" association of American-Hawaiian employes, forbade his longshoremen to load the company's ships. San Francisco waterfront employers in retaliation closed the port, contending that issues beyond the pay status of ten clerks were involved. While both sides fussed over the terms by which this tempest in a pay envelope might be arbitrated, A. F. of L.'s seamen cooperated with C. I. O.'s shore workers in refusing to pass picket lines, Bridges unionists made noises about a coastwide tie-up.