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From Labor Action, Vol. 6 No. 29, 20 July 1942, pp. 1 & 4.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’ Callaghan for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line (ETOL).
The latest attack on the workers’ wages via the road of boosting prices has come from the landlords. In the war against the standard of living of the workers, there is no lack of fronts.
Just as the Office of Price Administration has “cooperated” with the food monopolists in raising the ceiling on canned goods, so it works agreeably, with the landlords in raising rents on workers’ dwellings.
Half a million workers in the Detroit area are faced with the now familiar picture of the OPA itself inflating the cost of living this time by yielding to the pressure of the landlords for higher rent.
Every hovel in the Detroit area is rented and nets the owner plenty, but that isn’t enough for those who own the roofs over the workers’ heads. They want to reap a war harvest equal to the demand for housing – according to their own profit-seeking light. So they have put in a demand for a 10 to 15 per cent increase.
The OPA has indicated its willingness to go along to the extent of 5 per cent. But the 100,000 members of the United Automobile Workers are not going to pay a penny more for rent than they paid on April 1, 1941. In this, at least, they have the backing of their leaders.
Victor G. Reuther, in charge of “consumer problems” of the union, stated to reporters that the unrest among the Detroit workers is growing daily. In the last year there has been a 14 per cent increase in living costs. Prices continue to rise. The government blesses the bosses and landlords seeking to boost the prices of their commodities. At the same time it mutters curses under its breath and shouts its opposition to the workers’ demands for a higher price for their commodity.
Detroit workers know a thing or two about rent strikes. During the depression – when jobs were not as plentiful in Detroit as they are for war work – UAW members organized militant squads to see to it that the need of people for, a place to live in took precedence over the workings of capitalist justice. When a family was evicted, these squads appeared and in short order moved the victims back where they belonged. Many times they materialized on the spot to prevent evictions and save themselves the trouble of moving their fellow workers back to their homes.
In recent weeks members of the UAW living in trailer camps in Detroit engaged in a rent strike. They stopped paying rent to force the OPA to extend the Rent Control Act to cover them. There was plenty of rent profiteering in these trailer camps. The workers won the fight, compelling the OPA to extend the ceiling. This is merely a pocket edition of what a rent strike of 200,000 UAW in Detroit will look like.
The landlord front against labor extends pretty nearly over the entire length and breadth of the country. Not only in Detroit are the property owners getting out their big tanks for action. In New Haven, Conn., there have been attempts at wholesale evictions of tenants refusing to pay more than ceiling rentals – this in spite of the fact that the law presumably forbids evictions on this ground.
In Newark, N.J., landlords are trying to maneuver around the penalties for evicting tenants who refuse to be gouged for housing. In Mobile, Ala., property owners have petitioned the federal court to block enforcement of the rent freeze in that district. In South Bend, Ind,, the “constitutionality” of the rent freeze is also being questioned in court by the landlords.
Finally, from Seattle, Wash., comes the announcement of a nation-wide gathering of property owners to force rent ceilings upwards. One Floyd Oles, the head of this newly organized landlords’ organization, states that it has representatives from 24 cities.
THE EXAMPLE OF RESISTANCE SET BY THE 200,000 UNITED AUTOMOBILE WORKERS IN DETROIT WILL HAVE TO BE FOLLOWED BY ORGANIZED LABOR THROUGHOUT THE COUNTRY. THE OPA HAS A LARGE AND SOFT SPOT IN ITS HEART FOR THE OWNERS OF PRIVATE PROPERTY. THE WORKERS CANNOT TRUST THE OPA. THEY MUST DRAW ON THEIR OWN ORGANIZED STRENGTH TO DEFEAT THE ENCROACHMENTS OF THE WAR PROFITEERS ON THE WORKERS’ STANDARD OF LIVING.
A complete understanding of the Detroit situation cannot be had without relating the part Henry Ford has played in support of the real estate men of that district. This “benefactor of labor” is fighting tooth and nail the government housing project designed for 60,000 workers’ families near the Willow Run bomber plant.
Ford’s representatives are in Washington using money and legal phenagling to stop the housing project. The landlords of Detroit – needless to say – are backing Ford to a man. He has strengthened their hand in demanding higher rents – which Ford workers and others are NOT going to pay.
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Last updated: 11 September 2014