LABOR: Teamster Rebellion

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Lobster-red with ire, Teamster President Dave Beck gabbled away to newsmen last week in his $30-a-day, two-TV suite at the Galvez Hotel in Galveston, Texas, where he was on hand to attend a meeting of the Teamsters' General Executive Board. "This whole damn business don't bother me a damn bit," he huffed, meaning the Senate investigation in which he dodged behind the Fifth Amendment 142 times in reply to questions about his handling of $320,000 in union funds (TIME, April 8).

Why had he pleaded the Fifth so often? Explained Beck: it was all to keep from embarrassing politicians who got campaign contributions from the Teamsters. "If I did go ahead and talk, it might blow the lid right off the Senate." Next day South Dakota's Republican Senator Karl Mundt, a member of the special investigating committee, threatened to call Beck in again to "put up or shut up" about that lid. Beck hastily protested that he had been "misquoted."

When it came time to waddle into the closed-door executive board huddle, Dave Beck looked tense and twitchy. Five hours later he bounced out beaming. The General Executive Board had resolved that 1) the A.F.L.-C.I.O.'s suspension of Beck as an A.F.L.-C.I.O. vice president was "illegal," and 2) the Teamsters would refuse to appear before the A.F.L.-C.I.O. Ethical Practices Committee "on May 6, 1957 or at any other time" until they got guarantees of a "fair" hearing.

But the other Teamster chieftains made it plain that the resolutions were not to be interpreted as a personal victory for Beck. Growled Jimmy Hoffa, Teamster boss in the Central States: "I don't think anybody won a victory." If Dave Beck had been the only top Teamster in trouble, the others might have dumped him overboard. But with Central Conference Chairman Hoffa facing federal charges of conspiracy and bribery and with Western Conference Chairman Frank Brewster thickly splashed with scandal, the Teamsters decided to put up a united front—even if it was only a front.

Tough-minded A.F.L.-C.I.O. President George Meany was unimpressed. In his prompt retort to the Galveston resolutions, Meany made it clear that the united labor movement would go ahead and pass judgment on Beck & Co. whether they showed up to defend themselves or not. "The only accuser of Mr. Beck," said Meany, "will be Mr. Beck—his own testimony, his lack of testimony, and the record."