June 4 Workers Beaten by Thugs

On this day in labor history the year was 1946.

That was the day the Detroit Free Press reported that a Grand Jury had been convened to investigate the severe beatings of four Briggs UAW local 212 officers over the previous 15 months.

Recording secretary Ken Morris had been the latest victim. He was brutally beaten May 31 behind his home.

Arthur Vega, leader of Local 212’s Flying Squadron was viciously attacked by thugs in March 1945 and suffered a broken arm and other injuries.

Next, Local 212 Sergeant-At-Arms Roy Snowden was clubbed on two separate occasions, suffering permanent injuries.

Then, in October 1945, Genora Dollinger, heroine of the 1937 Flint Sit-Down Strike and founder of the Women’s Emergency Brigades, was beaten so severely as she lay sleeping, that she was hospitalized in critical condition for weeks.

Since her Flint years, Dollinger had become active with Local 212.

She served as a leading member on the union committee established to investigate the earlier beatings.

Both the local and the international led investigations into the beatings and offered sizable rewards. Union militants noted the beatings benefited the company to be sure.

Briggs had fired all four victims at one point or another for union activity.

And strike preparations were underway when Morris’ wife found him with his head cracked open.

The UAW waited for the Grand Jury’s findings.  

By years’ end, another local 212 shop steward had been beaten.

By 1951, union officials demanded a second Grand Jury investigation.

They accused Briggs of awarding a lucrative scrap contract to local mob boss Carl Renda in exchange for anti-union thuggery.

No charges were ever brought against the company, which insisted the violence stemmed from intra-union disputes.