Communist infiltration of Hollywood motion-picture industry : hearing before the Committee on Un-American activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-second Congress, first session (1951)

COMMUNISM IN MOTION-PICTURE INDUSTRY 487 There were about 3,000 to 4,000 members of what we call the office workers' union, and they were organized in the Screen Office Em- ployees' Guild, an affiliate of the painters. Since then they have changed and are in the A. F. of L. Office Employees' International Union of North America—I think that is the official title today—but at that time they were organized in the Screen Office Employees' Guild, and one of the organizers was Bernard Lusher. Mr. Tavenner. Spell it. Mr. Brewer. L-u-s-h-e-r, Bernard Lusher. Mr. Hayden testified that the secretary of the cell which he was in—he identified two people, one by the name of Hjalmar and one by the name of Bernie, who represented the office workers. Bernard Lusher was a very active individual in all the programs that had to do with the Communist Party line, and as soon as the Screen Office Employees' Guild became a part of the International Office Em- ployees' Union, Mr. Lusher disappeared and is now an organizer for the United Office and Professional Workers' Union recently expelled by the CIO for Communist domination. He recently figured in a case in California where a Jewish organization refused to bargain with his group because of Communist domination, and the court ruled they did not have to deal with them. They began to have a very powerful organization, and all the time they were using it as a sounding board to damn IATSE. IATSE had gone through a very serious period because of the Browne-Bioff scandal, and it is generally recognized by those who know that a very fine job was done in cleaning it up, but, of course, these groups did not let the matter rest. Every place we turned it was thrown into our face that this was still a part of that racketeer union, and they built up a great deal of prejudice, not only within the Holly- wood community, but within our own unions themselves, and there began to appear dissident factions. In local 44 it was led by Irving Henschel. In August 1944, without any apparent reason, local 683 resigned from the Conference of Studio Unions. It was a little strange to us why that happened. There didn't seem to be any logical reason for it. But in October of 1944 the first jurisdictional strike was called against the studios. Mr. Walter. Who were the officers of that local at the time it withdrew ? Mr. Brewster. The same officers, Norvel Outlier, Russell Mc- Knight, and John Martin. Up to that time the Conference of Studio Unions had taken the position they would not interfere with local unions, but after local 683 withdrew, they called a jurisdictional strike to force the studios to recognize the painters' union as bargaining agent for set decora- tors. Set decorators have charge of the property. If they were going to photograph this room, it would be the responsibility of the set decorators to see that all objects in the room were set properly. They had been members of our union for many years, but Mr. Sorrell was demanding to represent them. The National Labor Relations Board asked them to go back to work and they immediately went back to work, and the matter be£an to boil from then on, and on March 12, 1945, the day I arrived in Hollywood,