(From the Wall Street Journal, September 1, 1981)

=

Teamsters '76 Fine Was Based on Perjury

By Great Coastal Employes, Judge Finds

By a WALL STREET JOURNAL Staff Reporter
WASHINGTON

has made the finding that a union was the
A federal judge con-
cluded that a $962,000 judgment against the victim of an employer's self-inflicted vio-
Teamsters union was based largely on perlence." The case will bolster claims by la-
jured testimony blaming the union for dam-bor leaders that some of the strike violence
ages that Great Coastal Express Inc. did to attributed to unions is whipped up by em-
its own trucks.
ployers to discredit the labor movement.

U.S. District Judge Robert Merhige Jr. of Richmond, Va., made the "findings of fact at the request of a federal appeals court, through which the union is trying to get its money back from the Richmond-based truck

line.

Judge Merhige's conclusions stemmed from a July 1979 hearing at which the union contended Great Coastal employes sabotaged company trucks and then schemed to blame the damage on the Teamsters. The sabotage scheme was said to have occurred during a bitter 1971 strike. Great Coastal subsequently collected $962,000 from the Teamsters union for its alleged damage to the property.

After the 1979 hearing, Judge Merhige refused to set aside the 1976 judgment because the statute of limitations had expired. The Teamsters union appealed and a three-judge appeals court panel in Richmond ordered Judge Merhige to determine the facts of the

case.

Ira Mitzner, an attorney representing the Teamsters, said, "We believe this is the first time in the history of litigation that a court

"It is possible that we mightn't get back" the nearly $1 million judgment from the appeals court, conceded Barry Levine, another Teamster attorney. But the record of alleged perjury "is very, very convincing right now," he said. The union hopes to recover over $2 million, including interest and legal fees.

In his fact-finding memorandum, Judge Merhige noted that several Great Coastal employes admitted at the July 1979 hearing that their 1972 testimony was false. For instance, the memorandum said, driver Robhis truck, throw bricks, puncture tires and ert Seward testified he was told to shoot at give false testimony to the federal jury that found the Teamsters liable for damages after the strike.

Contacted yesterday, Charles Estes, nial of the Teamster charges. "One side of president of Great Coastal, reiterated his dethe story isn't the facts," he said. "Our lawyers have advised me that while it's under litigation, not to discuss it. But the Teamsters are telling lies or half-truths in not explaining the situation."

APPENDIX Q

--Brownsville,KY, July 13, 1972. Eugene Hampton, 27, father of three, was shot to death as he served on strike duty at the Kellwood Co. Arrested and charged with murder was Harvey Gonterman, husband of one nonstriking employee and son of another. Gonterman was tried and acquitted of the murder. No other suspect was arrested, according to the Edmonson County Cricuit Court Clerk's Office.

--Vacaville, CA,

--Martinez, CA,

August 21, 1978. Randy Hills, 24, was picketing on the shoulder of a road near the Lucky Stores distribution center when he was struck and killed by a car driven by a replacement worker leaving the plant. The nonstriking worker was driving at 55 mph with his headlights turned off when he hit Hills at 8:20 p.m., according to the San Francisco Examiner. The driver did not stop but continued driving home, where he later was arrested and charged with felony hit and run and manslaughter. But the charges were dropped and the incident ruled accidental.

Jan. 5, 1969. Richard Jones, 50, was run over by a Standard Oil tanker truck as he picketed the entrance to Standard's Avon transfer station. Jones later died of his injuries. Police considered the incident accidental and did not bring charges against the driver. But four days later two Martinez policemen were knocked down and injured by another truck that reportedly rammed through picket lines without slowing down, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. In this case the driver was charged with assault with a deadly weapon. And on Jan. 17 police arrested another truck driver for knocking down a picketer with his truck and then threatening her with a gun, according to the Chronicle.

--Tracy, CA,

Aug. 6, 1976. Norman Ray Lewis, 33, father of five, was picketing the Handy Man distribution center when a truck driven by a company supervisor ran over and killed him. The driver was charged with felony vehicular manslaughter. Certain testimony suggested that the killing was intentional, but the jury believed it was accidental and the supervisor was acquitted, according to the Stockton Record. A settlement of $190,000 was made to Lewis' family in a civil suit against Handy Man.

TABLE 9.-BOMBING INCIDENTS BY MOTIVE, INCLUDING PROPERTY DAMAGE FOR 1979-80

Estimated dollars losses are listed in thousands. Amount of property damage was not reported in all incidents. 2 These percentages do not reflect 460 incidents in 1979 and 498 incidents in 1980 for which the motive was undetermined. 3 This category reflects those incidents where the motive was undetermined.

From: "Explosives Incidents. 1980." Annual Report by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Department of the Treasury.

STATEMENT OF REED LARSON, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL RIGHT TO WORK COMMITTEE, ACCOMPANIED BY REX REED, ATTORNEY Mr. LARSON. Mr. Chairman, I believe you have me first on the list?

Senator MATHIAS. I will be glad to take you all in whatever order you all decide you would like to go, but as of now you are first.

Mr. LARSON. All right. Mr. Chairman, for the record I am Reed Larson, the president of the National Right to Work Committee, and I have associated with me today Mr. Rex Warner, an attorney, who can I think help us considerably if there are technical or legal questions in connection with this.

I am president of the National Right to Work Committee, which is a single purpose citizens organization made up of about 11⁄2 million Americans who have banded together for the sole purpose of combating compulsory unionism.

At this point I think it is very important that we correct the record. I appreciate your inviting us here today, but we are not part of a business panel. The very fact that somebody has inadvertently recognized this issue as one between business and labor really focuses on the underlying problem we have in dealing with the excessive and violent power of union officials.

I think it is very important that you understand that we are not representing business. We have a lot of business people that support us. We have a lot of union people that support us. We are a citizens organization, and I am very glad to be joined here by some responsible business spokesmen because this is an issue on which

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business should be very much concerned, and some of it is and some of it isn't.

I am going to ignore the intemperate remarks by Larry Gold as far as his unsupported attacks on our organization. I am reminded of the old saw that we have all heard that when a lawyer is weak on the facts, he argues the law; when he is weak on the law he argues the facts; and when he is weak on both, he just shouts and pounds the table and denounces the motives of his adversary. I think that is what we saw here today for just about an hour and a half.

Incidentally, could I inquire, Mr. Chairman, about how much time you will be able to give us? We are way behind your schedule. Senator MATHIAS. We are very much behind schedule, for which the Chair apologizes, but you see what an interesting subject we have uncovered here. Now we are going to have one problem in that we have a vote on cloture at noon, I believe.

Mr. LARSON. Noon? I believe Mr. Gold was given an hour and a half.

Senator MATHIAS. Well, we will see that you get equal time.

Senator BIDEN. It could be since Mr. Gold pounded on the table so much, he could have done it, had he had the facts, in 15 minutes. Maybe you can do it that way.

Mr. LARSON. Well, there has been a lot of erroneous information put before this committee and-

Senator MATHIAS. I am mistaken. The vote is at 1. So you will have the better part of the next hour.

Mr. LARSON. Mr. Chairman, we appreciate your giving us this opportunity, and I am not going to burden you with reading the entire statement, which was presented in writing. I know you have it for the record and I want to just hit some of the highlights in the early part of it and then hopefully address some of the specific concerns that have been raised by members of the committee this morning.

Getting back to Mr. Gold, he of course, in attempting to defend this union special privilege, has attacked the veracity of some of our material and some of the cases that we cited. Well, I want to point out for the record that we had requested an opportunity, if the committee could have found the time, to present the individuals specifically whose experiences are recounted in our material so that members of the committee could have an opportunity to determine the facts for themselves.

Several of those employee victims are here in the hearing room today and it is quite apparent that we are not going to have time. But if anybody on the committee is interested in getting to the root of this dispute, as far as these individuals and the experiences typified by the abuse they have suffered is concerned, we will have them available after the hearing.

Let me just summarize some of the first part of my written statement, which I think sort of sets the tone, and then address some specific concerns that have been mentioned this morning.

Our organization's concern with compulsory unionism extends not only to the contractual form, in which an employer agrees to fire employees who decline to pay dues to an unwanted union, but also to the imposition of unwanted union membership through vio

lence or threats of violence. The latter has been aptly described as the pickhandle closed shop. That of course is the subject to which we address ourselves today in connection with S. 613, and that effort to achieve equal application of the Hobbs Anti-Extortion Act to every American.

This bill, S. 613, will close a loophole in the Hobbs Act so that union officials will be treated exactly like every other American, and thus would be subject to prosecution for violence perpetrated in pursuit of extortionate objectives.

The words of Nobel Laureate Friedrich Von Hayek provide a sobering but realistic backdrop for the examination of this issue. Dr. Hayek observed that the United States has reached "a state where labor unions have become uniquely privileged institutions to which the general rules of law do not apply. Unions have become the only instance in which governments signally fail in their prime function: the prevention of coercion and violence."

Ironically, 13 years after Professor Hayek made that statement, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its infamous Enmons decision, and thereby made a bad situation even worse. Under present law, union officials and only union officials enjoy a wide array of special privileges and legal immunities, available to no other group of Americans.

But among all those privileges and immunities, none is so outrageous and utterly indefensible as that established by the Enmons decision: the immunity from Federal prosecution for violent acts of extortion perpetrated in pursuit of legitimate union objectives.

Actually, the case in support of S. 613 rests on only one issue. Should any group of Americans be above the law? I think the answer to that question is obvious, but the results we have seen, after some 8 years of experience under the Enmons doctrine, indicate that the practical results, as well as the violation of principle involved, have seen an increasing wave of violence. They have shown also the inadequacy of local and State law enforcement officials to deal with the well-coordinated, orchestrated, and international union-instigated campaigns of violence.

Mr. Gold mentioned the report of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, and reported I believe with some satisfaction that instead of leading the statistics as to the causes of bombings and other violence, that labor disputes are now down to a smaller proportion.

Well, whether those facts are accurate or not, if even 10 percent of the bombings and property destruction acts reported by that Bureau are caused by union-instigated activities, it is still a problem that really needs to be dealt with.

Senator MATHIAS. Now since this seems to be one of the statistics that is in dispute in this hearing, what year's statistics are you looking at?

Mr. LARSON. We were looking at the statistics in 1977 and 1978, when that Bureau reported that-

Senator MATHIAS. I think that explains part of the discrepancy. If you look at the Annual Report by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms for 1980, you get the 4.3 percent figure that Mr. Gold quoted, table No. 9.

Mr. LARSON. Well, if that is indeed accurate, that is an encouraging development, but it does not do away with the problem. If there is any violence at all that is attributed to union activity, it is something that we ought to be concerned with, and whether this Bureau has found it or not, the record is indisputable.

I would like to bring to your attention now a chart that we have prepared over here based on a 6-year survey of reported acts of union violence. You see here, this is the aftermath of Enmons. Publicly reported acts of union violence in 1976, and we have the documentation available on this if you are interested in pursuing it further. In 1976 we had 188 incidents of union violence that were publicly reported so far as our survey data, and I am sure those were incomplete. But on the same basis, it has grown today until just in 11 months of 1981, we are up to 449 acts of violence. That is more than one a day.

Now the opponents of S. 613 would have us believe that unioninspired violence is limited to what they euphemistically call minor picket line scuffles. Well, in the more than 2,000 recorded and reported acts there in the last 6 years, nearly 800 of these involved circumstances where picketing wasn't even taking place. And certainly the facts of Enmons itself would indicate whether or not picketing was taking place, the violence at issue had nothing to do with a picket line dispute.

So as long as this Enmons loophole exists, it provides union terrorists an additional shield behind which they can practice their illegal activities, and I expect that there is every reason to believe that this upward trend in the incidents of union violence will continue unless something is done, unless some action is taken, and hopefully this committee will take the first step.

Now those who try to defend the union officials' unique immunity to commit violence contend that the problem should be left entirely to local and State officials.

Senator MATHIAS. Can I interrupt you to say, because I do not want to forget it at a later point, if we could have that documentation for the record?

Mr. LARSON. OK. I think I have a computer printout.

Senator MATHIAS. You can supply that for the record at a later time.

Mr. LARSON. Yes, here it is.

Senator MATHIAS. Just by chance.

Mr. LARSON. Senator, I am glad you asked.

Senator MATHIAS. Thank you. We will look at it at a later point. Mr. LARSON. There is, based on our own data, and I am sure that anybody who has looked at it would agree that it is incomplete, but it is at least an idea of what is going on.

Let me turn now briefly to some of the concerns that were raised in the discussion earlier, particularly by members of this commit

tee.

Mr. Chairman, you yourself and other members raised the question of the budget and the cost of this law enforcement. Well, I think most Americans agree that the No. 1 function of government is to protect its citizens from violence perpetrated by other citizens. If government is able to do one thing and one thing only, it is to prevent the use of force by one citizen against another.