Jurisdictional disputes in the motion-picture Industry : hearings before a special subcommittee of the Committee on Education and Labor, House of Representatives, Eightieth Congress, first-session, pursuant to H. Res. 111 (1948)

MOTION-PICTURE JURISDICTIONAL DISPUTES 1487 ourselves and the plumbers, but being as the committee \Yas coming out they let it lay and did not consummate the agreement. There is some talk in the record about an agreement between local 80 of the grips orannization and the carpenters organization. Uv. Kkahns. Wh;it about that? Mv. Walsh. I saw in on that agreement. The agreement was nego- tiated between the two local unions, with Cambiano, the international representative of the carpenters' organization sitting in, and with me, tlie international president of the lATSE sitting in. Wlien the agreement was drawn U]) and agreed to and it came time to sign it, I said to Cambiano, "Sign that agreement, Joe, and make it official for your organization, and I will sign it and make it official for our organization." Joe said, "I can't do that, I've got to take it up with the chief first." To this day I don't know whether he ever took it up with the chief or not. I don't know. I haven't received any word. The chief, I think, was Big Bill, I am not sure. However, I was asked at the meeting of the council of the American Federation of Labor in Miami, in January 1946 if our organization would live up to that agreement, and I told them, "Yes we would live up to that agreement." Since I have listened to some of the testimony here I have found out that the carpenters' organization has to approve the agreement, and I have received no approval, I don't know what the status of that agree- ment is as of today. That was the only agreement which we could consummate out there. We sat down witli the carpenters' organization and tried to arrive at an agreement with them as to the building of props, and so forth. They got nowhere. It broke up in 2 days. In the first place, they could not define what a prop was, so they could not draw up an agreement as to who was going to build the props, if they could not find out what a prop was. Now, we come to the time when the committee was to come out there. Now. you understand these experts you have been talking about here who are sup]iosed to be able to do the job on their own home grounds and play ball on their own home field—-thoy were playing ball all the time. They played a full game out there and they hadn't done any better than Brooklyn does sometimes, so out comes the committee. I sympatliized with the committee, then and now. The committee started to hold hearings. They brought all the organizations in and outlined the procedure as to how they were going about deciding this jurisdiction. All these organizations agreed to that, as to how they were going to go through v/ith tliis i)rocedui'e. I understand that the carpenters' organization was present at the time the i^-oceclure was outlined by the committee. I understood the carpenters' organization, and all the other organizations received the same notification to be there that I did. I was interested enough in this ])ro])lem to be in Hollywood. I would like to tell you that since the HollyAvood situation has prevailed, I have traveled better than To.oOO miles trying to adjust the differences out in Hollywood. Every meeting that has been called, no matter where it was in these United States, I was there.