12/20/00 1:11 PM

Apostle of the Dock:

Archbishop Edward J. Hanna’s Role as Chairman of the National Longshoremen’s

During the 1934 San Francisco Waterfront Strike

Jaime Garcia De Alba

_T

he Reverend Edward Joseph Hanna (1860-1944) served as Archbishop of San Francisco from 1915 through his retirement in 1935. On June 26 1934, at the height of the San Francisco Waterfront/Pacific Coast Longshoremen’s Strike, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt named Archbishop Hanna chairman of the National Longshoremen’s Board (NLB). The significance of Rev. Hanna’s role as chairman served as a model of the American Catholic hierarchy’s cooperation with the President and the New Deal. Presidential appointments of Catholic leaders represented a new era for the Church, which viewed the federal government’s depression program as a response to Papal doctrine for social reform. Archbishop Hanna entered as arbiter in the 1934 Strike with a solid record for civil service and moderate support of organized labor. Although Rev. Hanna and the Presidential board contributed minimally after its initial introduction into the conflict between longshoremen and shipping employers, tangled in a seemingly unbreakable stand off by late June 1934, the NLB proved beneficial after both sides agreed to let the board arbitrate their grievances. Archbishop Hanna then found an opportunity to demonstrate Catholic doctrine as a guide out of the city’s turmoil, and the board’s potential as an example of Church’s support with the governmental recovery program.[1]

In 1912, then Archbishop of San Francisco William Patrick Riordan made a considerable effort to appoint Rev. Edward J. Hanna as auxiliary Bishop. Rev. Hanna brought with him a tremendous reputation from his hometown of Rochester, New York, as not only a prominent theological scholar, but also an active participant in social causes. His early career in Rochester, from the 1890s to his appointment in San Francisco, involved a committed effort to alleviate the plight of the immigrant community, which provided him his first experiences with labor. After the passing of Archbishop Riordan in 1915, Pope Benedict named Rev. Hanna Archbishop of San Francisco.[2]

Archbishop Edward J. Hanna began as prelate amidst a power struggle to settle labor policy between San Francisco’s business community and workers’ unions. In 1916, the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA), culinary workers, and structural ironworkers unions led three major strikes; yet, the future of the closed shop in the city surpassed the issues. The business community tested its ability to regain control in a city where organized labor reigned, and supported organized labor strongly. San Francisco Chamber of Commerce President, Fredrick Koster began the Law and Order Committee to weaken labor’s power in the city, and advocate the open shop.[3]

Proponents of the open shop took advantage of The Preparedness Day bombing in July 1916 to discredit unions. Labor activists stood accused of the incident, and capital used sentiment to gather citizens against a pretense of labor radicalism. Koster then formed the Committee of 100, a group of prominent San Franciscans to justify the efforts of the Chamber of Commerce. Koster invited Archbishop Hanna to join. His prestige as archbishop and previous participation on civil service boards defiantly qualified him as a leading figure in San Francisco, but Rev. Hanna declined, and turned his efforts toward support of organized labor.[4]

As the three strikes progressed, Archbishop Hanna announced his praise for the achievements of labor from the last fifty years in a speech given at the Labor Day celebration in Golden Gate Park on September 4,1916. Reverend Hanna affirmed that working men must not stand alone, but use, he said, the “inborn right of men to organize for mutual assistance and mutual protection,”[5] the utmost goal of labor’s purpose. The archbishop continued to stress workers’ right to bargain collectively for an adequate living standard while they uphold peace, the law, prevent radicalism to achieve public acceptance, and reduce class struggle through the realization that labor and capital must collaborate equally as both are essential to each other’s well being.[6]

Mayor James Rolph, also partial to labor’s cause, named Rev. Hanna chairmen of the General Arbitration Board, proposed for the 1916 strikes, on the basis of his stand with labor. Catholic labor scholar Richard Gribble quotes Mayor Rolph’s words about the archbishop, “There is no other member of the community who posses, in such a unique degree, the confidence of all classes.”[7] However, the 1916 General Arbitration Board never formed. The Law and Order Committee refused to send members to the hearings because organized labor advocates represented the majority. Labor prevailed for the moment, and gained favorable awards for all three strikes in 1917. Nevertheless, the move toward the open shop proved more significant as capital initiated anti-labor sentiment. For Rev. Hanna, those years showed not only his position on labor, but also his appeal that attracted the attention of both capital and labor.[8]

Toward the end of the Progressive Era in San Francisco, closed shop prominence declined. The Red Scare of 1919 and 1920 advanced suspicion of communist leadership within organized labor. The city also tired of what Richard Gribble called union’s “unrealistic expectations and proposals in the post-war economy,” backed away from its grip. In this context, the archbishop also redefined his view on issues between labor and capital. Rev. Hanna and the Catholic Church stood against communism, and believed that private property provided workers with incentive, filling society with productive and patriotic members. Rev Hanna also often chastised both sides for their uncooperative nature. The Monitor quoted the archbishop as saying, “in seeking adjustment neither the employers or their workmen have been sufficiently mindful of the rights of the people as a whole.”[9] Gribble also noted, “like many Americans, Hanna shifted from ardent support of labor to a more neutral position.”[10]

An instance of that change in Hanna emerged when acting Mayor Philip McLaren appointed the archbishop chairman of the impartial Wage Arbitration Boards, which he served on from 1921 to 1924. In 1921, the capital backed Builders’ Exchange proposed an industry wide wage cut, which affected all construction trades represented by the labor-backed Building Trades Council (BTC). Both sides then agreed to resolve differences in arbitration. The BTC representatives argued that the proposed wage reduction insufficiently met the rising standard of living costs, and asked that it remain at $7.85. The Exchange believed that construction workers received an adequate wage at $7 per day for a comfortable living, and the cut seemed justified as the outlook for the city’s economy appeared prosperous.[11]

Rev. Hanna and the board decided to favor the Builder’s Exchange, and against BTC protest, authorized the wage cut. The matter reappeared before the board in 1922, and again it denied labor claiming, “a general raise for all trades was not practicable nor necessary based on current economic conditions in San Francisco.”[12] Both decisions surprised the BTC, particularly in light of Rev. Hanna’s previous record with the workers. Evidently, the council expected a reversal in 1922 especially when prior to the award announcement the archbishop said, “that kindliness of thought will prevail, and that our aim will be to maintain a standard that will award a decent living.”[13]

Certainly, the archbishop had not reversed his support of labor, but evidently maintained impartiality, which established his new reputation for considering the position of both labor and capital under existing circumstances. Gribble argued, “By example, Edward Hanna showed colleagues and the general populace how to change with the needs and times of society.”[14] Nevertheless, the Builders’ Exchange victory in 1922 opened the way for employers to reassert the open shop in San Francisco as labor’s former power staggered during the 1920s economic boom. Rev. Hanna dropped out of the following board session in 1924 due to union criticism.[15]

Even though Archbishop Hanna set a precedent for impartiality for wage arbitration during the prosperous 1920s, Catholics’ opinion viewed that decade as a time of exuberance, an outlook the Church chastised at the start of the Great Depression. Monsignor John A. Ryan, nationally recognized Catholic labor activist, denounced the consumption economics of the era, which he argued fit hand in glove with laissez-faire individualism. The excesses of the capitalist economy pushed the American public to consume abundantly, which in turn pushed industry to over produce, and weighed pressures on the worker. Monsignor Ryan feared that an economy driven by materialism deteriorated ethics, morality and the humanistic preservation of society.[16] Benjamin Hunnicutt quoted Monsignor Ryan who wrote that overproduction “was a squirrel cage concept of progress unenlightened by considerations of the other ethical and human claims of the individual or the church. It has produced a culture sunk in materialism without a transcendent vision.”[17]

Even prior to the depression, congregations had turned to their local Archdiocese for assistance. Lizabeth Cohen wrote, “Catholics…in the 1920s increasingly recognized that religious affiliation offered material, not just spiritual, salvation.”[18] The depression added to the Catholic Church’s responsibilities to its congregation, as stricken parishes clamored for support. San Francisco’s Catholic Community Chest fund for relief efforts expended all available resources by 1932.[19] Other urban parishes such, as the one led by Cardinal George Mundelein of Chicago, concentrated efforts in raising funds and maintaining benevolent work and relief for the largely working-class immigrant congregations.[20]

In 1931, Pope Pius XI published his latest encyclical on the social question, the Quadragesimo Anno, which detailed a Christian basis for social reform through the promotion of a moral economy. Because the Papal proposal to reform the devastations of unrestricted capitalism arrived during the depression, it attracted more attention than previous encyclicals. Pope Pius XI called for a stronger government role in the curtailment of industrial exploitation. The Papal plan designed global resolutions of class conflict through the formation of vocational associations, a centralized organization, legislating with industry and government to humanize capitalism: eliminate stringent competition, curb laissez faire individualism, and above all, promote cooperation between industry and labor for improved wages, hours, working and living conditions. Archbishop Hanna referred to the idea as a revival of the medieval guilds, which guaranteed the worker, he said, “just demands and gave unto labor a dignity which it has not since obtained.”[21]

The 1930s American Catholic hierarchy of bishops faithfully embraced the Quadragesimo Anno, as an ideological basis, but by 1933 also sent support to FDR and the New Deal. They interpreted the plan as a response to Pius XI’s vision because distressing depression conditions forced an endorsement for the governmental plan, as it promised a practical means toward a resolution to the crisis. Catholics, optimistic of the forthcoming plan, seemed even more enthusiastic that a United States President had finally envisioned a plan that closely resembled the papal encyclical. George Q. Flynn, writer on Catholics and the Roosevelt administration, compared, “Both schemes defended the ideal that government should act to relieve the country of economic disaster, that is, both rejected the laissez faire theory of the state and would substitute industrial order in place of unlimited competition.”[22]

Association of the encyclical to the President’s program assured a greater role for Catholics under the new administration. “Perhaps the most attractive thing Roosevelt did during the 1932 campaign was to quote from the papal encyclical Quadragesimo Anno,” Flynn noted.[23] However, FDR’s real basis for the New Deal lied “in the context of general American reform ideas.”[24] Nevertheless, Flynn wrote, “Roosevelt demonstrated an acute awareness of his Catholic backers and managed to solidify this support through his cordial relationship with the American Hierarchy.”[25] Catholics occupied high government posts for the first time in American history and finally enjoyed a voice in national politics. As of 1933, Catholics participated fully with the National Recovery Administration (NRA). FDR, having catered to the Catholic vote during the 1932 election, appointed members of the hierarchy to prominent positions within regional federal administrative boards. Archbishop Hanna’s chairmanship of the NLB appeared among those appointed. And, as head of the National Catholic Welfare Conference, a committee that interpreted federal legislation and its compatibility with American Catholic society, the archbishop “spoke for the entire hierarchy of the United States when he proclaimed Catholic support for the presidents’ recovery program,” Flynn wrote.[26]

Certainly, the new outlook toward the federal government in the 1930s transformed the Church. Catholic thought and consciousness, still considered unprogressive because of its stance against birth control and criticism of America’s moral character, changed with Catholic leaders’ enthusiasm for the New Deal, which Catholic labor scholar David J. O’Brien wrote, “helped soften some of the traditional American suspicion of the Church.”[27] Support for the Presidential program also signified an acceptance of American institutions. For instance, the Chicago Archdiocese re-established its image through an Americanization program initiated to repel criticism that it harbored a foreign institution within the nation. In San Francisco, Archbishop Hanna praised the President and a larger federal government role in American society. Rev. Hanna wrote in the San Francisco Monitor upon FDR’s inauguration,

Pray upon our new Executive clear vision and abundant strength that he may be equal to the task which now he assumes as he becomes an instrument in the hands of the Almighty to direct our people into that measure of spiritual and temporal welfare which is the high purpose of all governments.”[28]

The majority considered the federal plan to institute collective bargaining a derivation of the Papal vocational association design. O’Brien summarized that plan to have been “controlled by boards representing management, labor, and the public.” Papal plans resembled essentially the cornerstone of NRA plans for collective bargaining, and government regulation of big business.[29] Yet, a split appeared among leaders over interpretations between the encyclical and recovery plans. O’Brien theorized, “The Quadragesimo Anno left open many questions regarding the character of the Christian social order, the role of the state within it, and the means by which it might be brought into existence.”[30] Even though the majority of Catholic leaders asserted the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) mirrored Papal doctrine, critics disapproved. One critic wrote in the Monitor,

There are features in [Nira] such as the minimum wage standards, the approval to the juridical order of industry, that may seem as approaches to the ideal set forth by the Pope. They would be, if the administration of the Act were in the hands of men friendly to the principles of human freedom espoused by the Father of Christendom.[31]

Catholic critics believed the NRA lacked the scope of the Quadragesimo Anno. They argued that the vocational association system would have asserted greater control over production and distribution of wealth. Other criticisms of FDR’s policies entailed federal impositions on personal liberty, excessive Executive power, and even sympathy toward communism. Another criticism in the Monitor noted, “The [Nira] program can very deftly be turned into an American brand of Communistic state.”[32] The Catholic Worker Movement of 1934 believed the collective bargaining scheme merely compromised agreements with capital, ultimately furthering worker exploitation. However, critics remained a minority, and never maintained an agenda to the extent of New Deal supporters, who set the tone for Catholic opinion throughout the depression.[33]

Catholics returned to support organized labor, but upheld a moderate position. O’Brien stated, “Catholic support for organized labor was qualified by defense of private property, condemnation of violence, and hostility toward radicalism and strikes.”[34] Yet, as strikes became more prevalent throughout the 1930s, the Church adjusted. Catholic leaders encouraged congregations to unionize, and approved of assistance to resolve strike disputes, even though O’Brien noted, “there was almost no consistent support for compulsory arbitration during the decade.”[35]

The lack of support for compulsory arbitration would be part of a greater challenge Archbishop Hanna faced as a selected arbiter for the 1934 Pacific Coast Longshoremen’s Strike. Throughout the twenties, Rev. Hanna added experience and credibility to a long list of civil service positions as director and chairman of numerous boards. The archbishop served under Governor James Rolph on the California State Unemployment Commission, State Planning Board, a fact-finding committee in the 1933 California Cotton Strike, Commission of Immigration and Housing, Emergency Relief Administration, and locally, administered the Archdiocese Community Chest and the San Francisco Chapter of the American Red Cross. The situation of the 1934 Waterfront strike, however, represented his greatest challenge toward the end of his active career in Church and State.[36]

The 1934 Waterfront Strike returned longshoremen to an extended dispute with shipping industry employers that stretched back to 1865. Since the formation of the ILA in 1892 through to 1934, the union organized primarily for control of hours and hiring, because that outlook ensured equalized distribution of work, improved wages, and conditions. At the same time, writes David F. Selvin, “employers joined forces, not to deal with unions, but to evade or destroy them.”[37] For example, during the 1919 strike, employers contracted the Blue Book union to end prospects of another dock strike. Dockworkers, amply exhausted from ILA union radicalism prevalent during the early twentieth century, accepted the employers’ proposal reluctantly. However, through control of the Blue Book union, employers maintained an open shop on the waterfront for the next fourteen years. Ship companies only prolonged issues with longshoremen, which turbulently surfaced again in 1934.[38]

The ILA re-emerged in 1933 with incentive from the then recently enacted, yet loosely enforced Section 7(a) of NIRA. Dockworkers claimed their right to organize, strike, and bargain collectively in early 1934. They demanded union recognition, $1 an hour ($1.50 overtime), a 6-hour day, 30-hour week, and a longshoremen controlled hiring hall. Section 7(a) equipped longshoremen with, Selvin explained, “an effective tool and freed them from apathy, hopelessness, and inaction. It gave rise to a new militance, directed not at revolutionary upheaval but a down-to-earth matters of wages and hours, of status and dignity.”[39]

Section 7(a), amidst the Great Depression, prompted dockworkers to present demands. A ready labor supply, due to the high unemployment turnout from other industries safeguarded waterfront employers. To suit the labor demands of the day and the depression stricken shipping market, employers hired and dismissed dockworkers frequently. Longshoremen experienced undetermined periods between work and unemployment, and widespread abuses that continued unchallenged until ILA members voted to strike on May 9 1934. The strike evolved through the following June and July into what Selvin quoted as “an open fight between organized labor and the open shop.”[40]

The strike also convinced the shipping industry that a communist radical conspiracy possessed the ILA, and planned to justify the conflict as a means toward a revolutionary end. Yet, Selvin wrote, “For dock workers, the strike represented, aggressive and affirmative steps to correct the evils they had endured.”[41] Nevertheless, ship companies and city government, lead by Major Angelo Rossi, readily labeled ILA leaders, under Harry Bridges, as radical and uncompromising, “The key to his leadership rested more in his advocacy of militant tactics and job-oriented goals than in the left wing,” Selvin reaffirmed.[42] Bridges led the union to refuse three proposals on April 3, May 28, and June 16. Employers offered a joint control of the hiring hall in the latter proposal, but in each instance, denied complete union control. At that point, ship companies, banded into a coalition titled the Waterfront Employers Union (WEU), also stood firm, and dismissed demands for a union controlled hall, which constituted a closed shop.[43]

ILA refusal of joint control prolonged the strike into July 1934. Dockworkers erupted because of the WEU decision to operate the dock with the use of strikebreakers, protection from the San Francisco Police Department, and State National Guard. Tensions climaxed on July 6^t, thereafter remembered as Bloody Thursday. Selvin had theorized, “Strike violence is almost invariably the product of a clash between two, sharply conflicting, powerfully asserted rights.”[44] The conflict of ideologies between the ILA and WEU generated more animosity than the debates over the issues. Employers implemented what Selvin called their “unlimited claim on the authority of the city, state, and nation” to exercise their free use of private property, open access to labor, and the ability to conduct business with minimal interference. Similarly, Longshoremen affirmed that holding back their labor provided, Selvin explained, a “basic source of economic influence with employers, their ultimate source of equality at the bargaining table.”[45]

Strike violence dominated San Francisco Chronicle and Examiner coverage to such an extent that, Selvin argued, the stories “underscored the negative aspects of every phase of the strike, emphasizing reports intended to discredit, divide, and discourage the strikers.”[46] Print media moguls throughout California had already aligned to oppose the President’s recovery policy, so Bay Area papers generated publicity that projected the belligerence of organized labor. Local papers bellowed striker belligerence without mention of the shipping industry’s accountability. Publishers knowingly shifted attention away from issues relevant to the exploitation of longshore labor; instead, commentary suggested that Americanism along with the city of San Francisco lay as victims of a threatening radical menace.[47] Yet, the rank and file disregarded news coverage of the strike, and deemed statements as false that also exaggerated triviality. Longshoremen read strike articles more as a source of amusement rather than reliable information. Fully aware of the biased news, dockworkers believed actual events proved, Mike Quinn noted, “nothing more or less than a showdown between capital and labor on the issue of the open shop.”[48]

On June 26 1934, FDR sent a Western Union telegram that notified Archbishop Edward Hanna of his appointment as chairman of the NLB. Rev. Hanna responded to the President and wrote, “Honored by your confidence I will do all in my power to carry out your mandate.”[49] The Catholic Church’s influence among the largely working class population in San Francisco, and its willingness to administer the then recent federal recovery policy, determined the President’s selection of the archbishop. Today magazine journalist Eustace L. Williams also pointed to Rev. Hanna’s, “famed sense of fair play; his well known passion to help faltering humankind, that brought him as an arbitrator into this strife.”[50] Because of Hanna’s Catholic perspective on labor the Archbishop also denounced leftist or communist party promotion of class rivalry. As William Issel pointed out, “championed private property as well as the right of workers to dignity and a fair share of business profits.” Hannah maintained a moderate profile that appealed to both sides of the dispute.[51] Selvin too wrote, “The presence of Archbishop Hanna (who could hardly be accused of sympathy for communists) was intended…to divert the employers’ focus from the ‘red’ issue to a fair settlement.”[52]

The Examiner and San Francisco News portrayed Archbishop Hanna as the leading advocate for peace, unity, and resolution. Elected to act as the board’s spokesmen, the archbishop made a radio broadcast asking both sides to end their differences and submit grievances to arbitration. The Examiner printed Rev. Hanna’s action and wrote, “His understanding of the human problems entering into such disputes is of incalculable value.”[53] The archbishop’s involvement in matters, the News anticipated,

Will be the crowning achievement for Archbishop Edward J. Hanna of a lifetime devoted to the service of human relationships. Probably no Catholic prelate has a more brilliant record than he in untangling snarls between groups of citizens, bringing warring factions together for the advancement of the communities interests, creating understanding and good feeling, and establishing public relief upon a firm foundation.[54]

Based on the archbishop’s previous reputation for impartiality and views against labor radicalism, the Examiner portrayed him favorably. In an article titled “Archbishop Hanna’s Efforts on Behalf of Labor Cited,[55] “the paper noted his competency, experience, and standing as a well respected participant in civic affairs. The News concurred with Rev. Hanna’s attributes, and stated, “His official acts, both as a Church man and a citizen, have repeatedly demonstrated the warm sympathy he feels for those who toil.”[56] Thus, according to local newspapers, Rev. Hanna’s role pertained to what the Examiner described as a religious icon, “battling to bring dock peace,“[57] and confidently labeled him a “champion of working men.”[58]

Both the Examiner and News used the archbishops’ photographs on the front pages to project the image of a neutral Catholic labor figure who advised Christian doctrine as the solution. William Issel wrote, “The archbishops cited the encyclicals as authority for their calls to resolve differences between labor and capital through compromise and arbitration.”[59] The newspapers printed Rev. Hanna’s moderate religious lesson on industrial relations, as he seemed to cover a broader notion rather than specific details of the waterfront strike. On June 29, the Examiner quoted Rev. Hanna, as saying

When both labor and capital attain a deeper understanding of the obligations they owe to the moral law, to Christ and his teachings of brotherly love, and the people as a whole and to each other, then, and not until then, will come solution of the grave industrial problems of the day.[60]

Thus, the News readily titled Rev. Hanna, “The Apostle of Peace.”[61]

The archbishop showed eagerness to commence arbitration. On June 29 1934, the headline in the News read, “Stand by President Hanna urges,” and quoted Rev. Hanna, as saying, “We want to convince the men that they can depend on the President and upon the men he appointed to give them justice.” The Labor Clarion wrote, “The venerable Archbishop Hanna, in earnest and impressive manner, added his appeal to that of his fellow members on the board and asked them to sink their differences by referring the whole subject matter of the controversy to the decision of the board.”[62]

On July 9 1934, a funeral march along Market Street for two slain longshoremen, caused by the July 6 Bloody Thursday violence, minimized the newspaper’s inflammatory remarks against the strikers. The march generated deep sympathy within the community for the strike cause, and solidarity among dockworkers intensified. Consequently, the Bloody Thursday catastrophe pushed the rank and file to support plans for a general strike for the purpose of “an ultimate expression of support, a demonstration of common class,” Selvin stressed, rather than an exercise to force ultimatums.[63] Nevertheless, the shippers and local government interpreted moves toward a general strike as another instance of unwarranted insurrection. [64]

Meanwhile, the three NLB members, who also included Assistant Secretary of Labor, Edward P. McGrady, and legal advisor Oscar K. Cushing, seemed unable to break the deadlock between the WEU and longshoremen over who would control the hiring hall. The President, by executive order, granted the board wide powers under NIRA authority in order to investigate the issues that had obstructed interstate commerce, yet they proved ineffective until both sides agreed to submit their grievances to arbitration. The major difficulty for the President’s board involved the dockworkers that wanted the seamen/marine trade unions, also out on strike, from ports in Seattle, Portland, and San Pedro, included in an all inclusive coast-wide settlement. Then, the San Francisco Labor Council, which had consolidated with all striking unions to form the General Strike Committee, voted on a general strike set for July 161934. Throughout that period, the board functioned merely as an advocate for arbitration; they and the capital backed San Francisco Industrial Association could only make pleas to the Labor Council not to carry out the proposed general strike.[65]

The NLB lacked full comprehension of the situation, and knew less about the nature of the maritime industry. In fact, the Labor Council kept the NLB informed of developments. The President’s board contributed minimally, and when it held opening hearings from July 9 to the 11 1934, Mike Quinn, very much on labor’s side, nevertheless wrote, “Their minds had no more practical application to the subject than would a group of bricklayers called to judge the merits of a medical controversy.”[66] At best, the President sent “three men fighting to ward off the threat of a general strike, with all its implications of suffering and bloodshed,” remarked Quinn.[67]

After the proposal for the general strike, the Examiner returned to themes that expressed the archbishop’s demands for Christian unity. On July 14, 1934, the headline read, “Archbishop Declares Rights of Public Shall come First.” Rev. Hanna stood firmly on the middle ground through his general Catholic ideology. The Examiner quoted the archbishop as saying; “A bargain cannot be just if a worker is forced out of necessity to accept wages and conditions that make it impossible for him to support his family in a reasonable and frugal comfort.”[68] At the same time, Rev. Hanna would not support any action on behalf of labor that would encourage further conflict. On July 14, Rev. Hanna advised, “There should be, in the dispensation of Christ, no conflict between class and class,” which had sustained, the Examiner highlighted, “underlying principles which have been the teaching of Christianity during 2,000 years.”[69]

The piety in the archbishop’s announcements facilitated the media’s notion that through the general strike the ILA delayed resolution toward arbitration. The 1934 San Francisco General Strike followed on Monday July 16^.On July 17, 1934, the News clarified the NLB position, which stated, “The law recognized the right of employers to strike or engage in other concerted activities,” but the News continued to explain that the board would not support unlawful behavior or acts of violence. The newspapers, thus, manipulated the archbishop’s moderate position to further their overall depiction of the general strike as a menace to the city of San Francisco.

On July 21 1934, the Monitor placed the archbishop in command, acting under Presidential and NRA authority. The Catholic periodical underscored Rev. Hanna’s collaboration with federal unionization and collective bargaining initiatives, which the Examiner buried. The Monitor quoted the archbishop as saying, “We believe in the principles of collective bargaining, we believe that the workingmen have the right to be represented by men of their own choice…and have the right to deal directly with their employers.”[70] The Archdiocese press portrayed Rev. Hanna and the NLB as the force toward an agreement, and seemed to invoke federally allowed power to achieve it. The archbishop intended to inspire all those involved to participate with the nation’s recovery program in order to demonstrate its effectiveness. The Monitor depicted Rev. Hanna authoritatively in the effort to uphold federal policy, and in Hanna’s words, “to induce and maintain united action of labor and management.”[71]

While Archbishop Hanna and the board continued their effort, John Francis Neyland, legal advisor and publisher to William Randolph Hearst, held other confidential negotiations to end the standoff. Neyland convinced the WEU and the Industrial Association to appeal to the conservative faction of the Labor Council for a resolution. The longshoremen, who represented the minority within the Labor Council, firmly refused to submit their position on the hiring hall issue to arbitration. However, after the employers agreed to put all matters before the NLB, the conservative faction of the Labor Council outvoted the longshoremen, and consented to arbitrate all disputes before the Presidential board on July 25. Neyland solved the stalemate, and the longshore strike ended on July 31 1934.[72]

Bridges and the ILA, forced by the vote, remained disappointed that the Council collaborated with the manipulative capitalists in the Industrial Association, and most of all with Neyland, whom strikers viewed as the purveyor of anti-labor propaganda. Longshoremen feared an unfavorable outcome under these circumstances, and continued to show signs of reluctance and skepticism. The Labor Clarion also wondered, “will the International Longshoreman’s Association agree to submit to arbitration by the National Longshoremen’s Board the issues in dispute in the longshore strike and to be bound by the decision of the board?”[73] However, at that point, guarantees that either side would be bound to the NLB decision appeared uncertain. Yet, the ILA failed to appreciate its momentary gain. Even though the Labor Council agreed to put the longshoremen’s demands to chance in arbitration, Quinn points out,

Once the principal employers made up their minds to do it, the assent of all companies up and down the coast to negotiate a uniform collective agreement with the men was obtained within a few hours. And this was the position which for three long months the employers had argued was utterly impossible and beyond achievement.[74]

The NLB convened proceedings for the presentation of testimony on Wednesday, August 8, 1934 at the U.S. Post Office and Court-Home Building on Seventh and Mission Streets, San Francisco. The three appointees assembled representatives from the San Francisco ILA and WEU. Union and employer representatives also gathered with the board in Portland, Seattle, and Los Angeles. Testimony dealt with issues on working conditions, hiring, wages, and employer manipulation of total earnings.

On August 10, acting as counsel for the ILA, Henry P. Melnikow of the Pacific Coast Labor Bureau asked the board for an official statement to relieve the longshoremen witnesses’ concerns of later employer discrimination due to their testimony. However, the archbishop’s response deemed a request for written assurances for those that gave testimony unnecessary. For decades, longshoremen feared the waterfront employers’ blacklist, which included the names of those engaged in strike activity. Somehow, with the slightest reassurance from Rev. Hanna, who presided on behalf of the federal government, and on public record, those concerns diminished. The longshoremen revealed complaints openly, and presented testimony they believed would persuade the board to classify as waterfront employers’ abuses of longshore labor.[75]

Longshoremen testimony opened with instances of employer’s negligent methods and practices regarding work hazards. ILA leader Harry Bridges testified that companies such as the Seaboard Stevedore, Isthmian Line, and California Stevedoring & Ballast, along with company foremen promoted a system of inner-employee competition for the purposes of a speed-up. The competition system caused serious injury and in some cases death. Bridges emphasized the severity of hazards when companies forced dockworkers to compete; he said, “This was absolutely due to the fact that we were competing against each other.”[76]

The archbishop inquired interestingly. For instance, Bridges described dockworkers involved in competition placing poorly packed copper onto slings, and Rev. Hanna asked, “In what condition was the copper?”[77] When Bridges testified that employers increased loads, the archbishop would ask, “How many gallons to a drum?”[78] Longshoremen handled steel up to 70 feet in length at 60 loads an hour, and Rev. Hanna seemed shocked. He asked, “It is not pipe?” Bridges answered, “It is not pipe. It is steel.”[79] Bridges added more testimony of immense overloads. Rev. Hanna asked the manner in which workers handled iron sheets, “Was it rolled?” and continued, “They pulled them by hand into the box car?”[80] “When Bridges complained of 100 to 120 pound sacks, less heavy than usual loads, but paced to load continuously, the archbishop asked, “What would be in the sacks?”[81]

The Bridges testimony also included remarks about the Blue Book Union. The WEU refused to recognize the ILA until they agreed to the arbitration. Up to that time, Waterfront employers maintained that their Blue Book union stood as the only legitimate longshoremen union. However, dockworkers argued that the Blue Book union existed as a front that collected unjustified dues while it covered up an open shop policy. Bridges testified, “The only dues that were paid into it were those dues that were forced to be paid by men who wanted to earn a living on the waterfront. That is the only reason I ever paid into the thing. It meant that or losing my job.”[82] The Blue Book collected 75 cents a month, or a yearly amount payable in advance for working privileges, yet the union never addressed any of the workers’ grievances. Refusal to pay resulted in immediate dismissal. The system of collection perplexed the archbishop and the board. Rev. Hanna commented. “Of course, I deal in mysteries all the time, and this blue book is very mysterious to me. I don’t know what it means.”[83]

In addition, the waterfront companies’ brass check policy also raised the interests of the board. The investigation uncovered an intricate money loaning operation, which boiled down to employers’ use of longshoremen’s paychecks as collateral for loans paid out at five to ten percent interest. Dockworkers used it as a supplement between paydays. Selvin described, “The lender would then use brass checks to collect the men’s paychecks, deduct their loans with interest, and return the balance, if any, to the men.”[84] Longshoremen witnesses recalled use of brass check loans against hours worked but yet paid, and in some cases owed payment to the loan with future paychecks, trusting that there would be hours to work given the inconsistency of employment. Nevertheless, whatever the circumstances, ILA members testified that employers deduced brass check percentages from their paychecks, which the board found manipulative.[85]

The Archbishop and the board meticulously investigated weights of loads, loads moved per hour, types of material loaded or unloaded, and sizes, in order to assess if in fact those loads, weights, and rate placed longshoremen in hazardous conditions. Dock worker Henry Schmidt, called to testify for the longshoremen, described that while working on the Thompson, Admiral, and Pacific Lighterage Lines, he moved sling loads to excesses of up to three thousand pounds along with the speed-up. Longshoremen W.L. Gehm also testified that International Stevedoring, and Admiral company docks also sped up work regardless of bigger loads.[86] Longshoremen F.J. Reiley described the limited space men had to work in because of the density of loads, particularly the long length of lumber. He added that employers increased loads under those conditions, and concluded, “men are driven harder.”[87] After examination of load volume and testimony of its difficulties, Hanna simply posed the hypothetical question, “then it is a question of space?”[88]

Consecutive hours that longshoremen worked, and consecutive hours without a meal break also raised Archbishop Hanna’s interests. W.L Gehm testified that after having worked eighteen hours straight, his employers asked that he show up again six hours later. Gehm did not return, and had not worked since he refused. Hanna asked, “Any definite or any particular reason given why they were kept at that work so long?”[89] However, the longshore witnesses had no definite answers. Archbishop Hanna continued this line of inquiry. He asked Henry Schmidt how long he worked without a meal, Schmidt said fourteen hours. And, when the Archbishop asked longshoremen Gehm, he replied that thirty-two hours spanned his longest shift, nine straight without a meal break.[90]

ILA member John J. Finnegan presented an excerpt from Exhibit no.1, Bulletin 507 of the U.S. Department of Labor as statistical evidence during his testimony, which ranked longshoreman work among the leading occupations with the highest degree of hazard. Finnegan pointed out that the rate of accidental death between longshoremen and other occupations rose 37 percent higher. The report read that 7.7 percent of deaths derived from all causes compared to the 50 percent that resulted from accidents. Rev. Hanna asked if those statistics also included suicide, and Finnegan confirmed that it did.[91]

As Archbishop Hanna continued his investigation, he also demonstrated an interest in the arbitrary hiring and firing conditions on the dock. Hiring methods on the dock proved upsetting for Rev. Hanna. Seattle dockworker Philip M. Taylor testified that longshoremen spent hours in the day waiting the mere notice of possible work. Rev. Hanna remarked. “You mean they would have to stand in the rain all that time? No shelter?” Taylor replied, “no shelter.”[92] And, according to longshoremen, the ship companies preferred employees that had the ability to keep up with the rapid loading and discharge of ship cargo. Dockworker R. Carter said, “So many tons an hour are to be moved…and that it is to be moved or else.” Hanna replied, “or else you can’t work?” Carter replied, “Absolutely.”[93]

The issue of wages, coinciding with hiring and firing, also appeared particularly interesting for the Archbishop. Rev. Hanna investigated the surprisingly low wage rate from most San Francisco employers at fifty cents an hour, and at the weekly rate of $15 a week. The board gathered that in order for a longshoremen to earn a least $15 a week, he would have to work a minimum of twenty hours; however, twenty hours straight time occurred rarely for most that waited in the hiring hall or for the arrival of a ship, which went unpaid.[94]

Admittance to a task gang precluded the hope of permanence for those few longshoremen who managed to work long stretches. Gang work required preferential or random hiring by foremen, and for whichever trivial reason the foremen dismissed, or denied re-admittance into the work gang at whim. Moreover, employers noted a particular worker’s failure to perform under the grueling conditions previously testified. Because of the ready supply of labor caused by the depression, foremen selected greenmen over those dockworkers, such as Gehm, who had returned to the dock to reclaim their jobs after recovering from injury. The archbishop clarified, “you mean greenmen that were not longshoremen?” Gehm replied, “They were not longshoremen; they were just hanging around the dock.”[95] Thus, further testimony showed the board the difficulties employees faced not only retaining consistent hours and wages, but also their positions on the dock.[96]

The ILA testimony appeared plausible and compelling. The argument that the WEU used in their defense, on the other hand, came across as vague and seemingly complacent. The archbishop, concerned over the issue of safety, asked WEU member Byron O. Pickard if any of the stevedore contractors ever instituted or prepared a manual that provided information on safety habits for longshoremen. Pickard answered that a Gray Book or Pacific Coast Marine Safety Code for Stevedoring Operations existed, but it had little success in enforcement. Furthermore, Pickard testified the safety committee failed to publish a rulebook and illustrated safety manual that remained in progress. Nevertheless, the work of the safety committee, at work since 1929, Pickard admitted seemed, “not anywhere near completed.”[97] Rev. Hanna also asked Pickard about the status of the first aid stations. Pickard answered that a competent staff remained available to provide first aid, but not a medically trained staff.[98]

Harvard lecturer and shipping industry researcher F.P. Foisie, for the WEU, testified that conventional overtime did not pertain to longshoremen because of the irregularity of work. Employers preferred to pay higher wages for short-term periods of work between the arrival of cargo rather than for a full eight-hour day in which case companies paid stagnant dockworkers during stretches of down time. Foise termed this the decausualization method. He stated bluntly to the board, “There is much leisure time, which often times is loafing time. The constant change of activity is, itself, one of the interesting things in the job which attracts many who do not like routine work.”[99]

Thomas G. Plant, operating manager for the American-Hawaiian Steam Ship Company and President of the WEU, stated his opinion before the board. Plant said, “The Waterfront Employers Union have dealt very liberally with longshore labor, according it wages and conditions equal to or possibly more advantageous to longshoremen than in any other port in this country.”[100] Thus, Plant’s argument rested merely on a comparison to possibly worse conditions in other ports across the country, yet failed to justify the then present conditions on the San Francisco docks.[101]

On October 12 1934, after nearly three months of arbitration, the NLB granted the ILA a favorable award. Archbishop Hanna signed the award on October 18. Thus, his inquiries throughout the hearings proved significant because the board’s award to the ILA addressed every issue that he earnestly investigated. For instance, section 2 of the award read, “When men are required to work more than five consecutive hours without an opportunity to eat, they shall be paid time and one-half of the straight or over-time rate, as the case may be, for all time worked in excess of five hours without a meal hour.”[102] The NLB awarded San Francisco longshoremen 95 cents hourly and $1.40 for overtime, and gave ten cents above the basic rate for handling materials such as fertilizer or lumber in excess of thirty tons.

The award also included other resolutions that pertained to longshormen’s disputes and concerns. In section 4, the board addressed the most critical issue that determined hiring would be done through one central hiring hall. In section 9, the award established a labor relations board in each port coast wide. Section ten described that board’s duties: maintain and operate the hiring hall, monitor the supply of men needed, and most importantly it read, “adjudicate all grievances and disputes relating to working conditions.”[103] Section 11 resolved that that board also regulates the organization of gangs and methods of dispatching. And, in regard to methods of cargo discharge, the employer may introduce labor saving devices so long as those methods are not, section 11 specified, “inimical to the safety or health of the employees.”[104]

After the award announcement, Mayor Angelo Rossi sent a brief letter to Rev. Hanna saying, “Your Excellency…the assurances of harmonious cooperation given by all concerned must be a matter of satisfaction to your Board, as it is to us. This is a most happy harbinger of industrial peace for the Pacific Coast.”[105] The longshoremen’s efforts throughout the strike had embittered Mayor Rossi, a supporter of shipping interests. His efforts, in speeches and with mayoral authority, contributed greatly to the right-wing repression of the strike.[106] Accordingly, the Recorder wrote, “In the crucial matter of control of the hiring halls, the award was regarded as a victory for the waterfront employers.”[107] However, the ILA gained joint control of the hall and establishment of the labor relations committee from the award, which increased the union’s previous influence on matters concerning dockworkers.[108]

The board continued to hear testimony with Archbishop Hanna as chairman until his resignation on November 22, 1934. On March 9, 1935 the front page of the Monitor read, “Responsibilities Become Too Heavy.”[109] The Reverend Edward Hanna, then 74 years of age, retired because of, according to auxiliary bishop of San Francisco John J. Mitty, “the infirmities of advancing years.”[110] Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins, among many, sent a letter of regret upon the archbishop’s resignation from the NLB and retirement. Perkins expressed to Rev. Hanna, “The public service you have rendered helped thousands of people and was most effective. I want you to know of my sincere appreciation for your patriotic service.” Bishop John J. Mitty replaced Rev. Hanna in 1935 and wrote, "His great activity was not confined to Church affairs. He was vitally interested in civic matters and his own community as well as State and Nation made frequent calls upon his services.”[111]

The archbishop’s retirement, the lead article of the March 9 1935 Monitor, contained no listing of his contribution in the 1934 Strike in the section titled “important events in career of distinguished churchman,” yet it did appear in the chronology of his life upon his passing on July 15 1944.[112] Archbishop Hanna never wrote any memoirs of his experience on the NLB. Only his record of benevolence toward the working class stood that might have influenced the board to favor the ILA. The establishment of the labor relations committee capped the previous WEU proposal for joint control as a precaution for longshoremen, in addition to the granted increase in hourly and overtime wage. The additional improvements granted in the award, in wages, and in working conditions resembled gains Rev. Hanna had hoped for from his propositions for industrial justice influenced by Catholic doctrine. Nevertheless, the entire board functioned to further the ideals behind Presidential policy to strengthen the position of organized labor. Yet Rev. Hanna showed once again his method of adjusting awards to the demands of the times. However, unlike his previous decision during the prospering economy of San Francisco in the 1920s, the Great Depression threatened the longshoremen’s right to an adequate subsistence, a point that the archbishop supported vigorously. Therefore, as his final act of justice for the workingman, the 1934 Waterfront Strike created the opportunity for Rev. Hanna to live up to his reputation for fairness during a time when, depression stricken dockworkers needed assistance the most.

In conclusion, Rev. Edward Hanna’s benevolent work early in his career developed into a moderate support for organized labor that focused on an adequate living standard and denounced radicalism. In the context of San Francisco in the 1920s, the transformed political and economic climate influenced the archbishop’s fairness in his decision between labor and capital, which characterized his method in labor arbitration to come. The 1922 wage arbitration board established his reputation for impartiality and adapting to the needs of the circumstances of the times.

However, at the onset of the Great Depression, the Catholic Church viewed the 1920’s as a period of overindulgence and greed. Catholics focused on Papal doctrine as the depression hit working class congregations. The Quadragesimo Anno, the plan to curtail the damaging effects of lassiez faire driven economics, called for the organization of labor to create an active role with government and industry. The historiography of the American Catholic church in the 1930s argued that the resemblances between the Papal encyclical and Roosevelt’s New Deal appeared strikingly similar. More importantly, the similarities between Pope Pius XI’s pragmatic approach and FDR’s recovery plans brought the Catholic hierarchy into the fold of national depression policy, and participation restructured the church as a wholly American institution.

Church supporters of Presidential action set the agenda for Catholic leaders. FDR’s appointment of Archbishop Hanna to chair the NLB during the 1934 San Francisco Waterfront Strike gave Hanna the opportunity to demonstrate not only the church leaders’ newest role in NRA participation, but also re-affirm his reputation as impartial arbiter and moderate labor advocate. Because of Rev. Hanna’s previous experience, Bay Area newspapers underscored his views on labor based on Catholic doctrine, which overrode his capacity in matters as an agent of the federal government authorized to reach an agreement, and bring both sides to arbitration.

The President’s board did not perform effectively until both sides agreed to submit to arbitration. John Neyland and the conservative faction of the labor council proved the real forces behind the solution to end the stalemate. Moreover, the Labor Council made its own decision regarding moves to end the general strike and push the ILA into arbitration. Nevertheless, Rev. Hanna and the board reassured justice for the dockworkers that testified in the NLB proceedings. ILA witnesses convinced the board that hiring and work conditions on the dock required dire needed reforms. As employer arguments to the contrary fell short, the later award revealed that the board favored the longshoremen. Even though Rev. Hanna and the board did not grant the union full control of the hiring hall, their decision improved the workers situation on the dock dramatically.

Therefore, the board’s role became vital at the end of the conflict in mediating the grievances. Archbishop Hanna proved once again his ability to address workers needs due to the graveness of the times. His role contributed much more than just a materialization of the Church’s cooperation with the federal recovery program. He also empirically advanced the goals for the vocational association designed in the Quadragesimo Anno. The archbishop showed that industry and labor proved capable of resolving differences, and in the case of the 1934 strike, Rev. Hanna made sure that government also held up its end toward a mutual agreement for improved industrial relations. Certainly, Archbishop Hanna’s role marked a notable event in New Deal Catholic activism.