The CHAIRMAN. May we have a copy of this? I don't want to take your original records. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. You have a copy, I suppose, Senator. Mr. MUNDIE. That is the only one we didn't have. The CHAIRMAN. Have this audit report that the witness presents from July 1, 1952, to June 30, 1953, apparently made by Leo Herbert, CPA, made into a photostatic copy and let the photostatic copy be made exhibit 33. Return the original to Mr. Griffin. (The document referred to was marked "Exhibit No. 33" for reference and may be found in the files of the subcommittee.) Mr. ADLERMAN. Mr. Griffin, will you describe what the records are in my hand? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. They are cards that I-I guess you would use the word-looked up or found Mr. ADLERMAN. What do they purport to be? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. That were supposed to have individual revenue derived from the Pine Bluff job by those not members of local union 706. I notice in there were Mr. ADLERMAN. To be fair to you, I notice there are some notations in there of members of 706. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. Yes; I noticed that. Mr. ADLERMAN. Do I understand you clearly that these cards would contain the names of anybody who worked on the job who paid any contributions to the union? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. If all of them were gathered up. There may be additional ones, but of all that we have, that is what they are. Mr. ADLERMAN. I am not taking the S's down to the Z's, but at random we took H, N, and A. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. If you will understand that from 1955 until I got into this work in the afternoon on Monday, everything that I retained-well, there have been, probably, I would guess, over a dozen girls that had no training in office work or bookkeeping, or high school girls, or girls that maybe filed and nothing else, if you will take into account that there could be some few cards missing, very few, that is the record of the people who not only worked there but who were employed and never reported back the second day to go to work. Mr. ADLERMAN. I can understand that you might have an occasional card missing. The CHAIRMAN. This might become important. I don't want to get too entrapped anyway in the thing. These were intended to be a record kept of all of the moneys you received on that job from each individual? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. It was intended to be a record of every penny we received from employees not members of our union as well as a record of each individual who was employed on the job through the El Dorado local. Now, there were men employed from Little Rock, Pine Bluff, Hot Springs, Fort Smith, and other locals direct that never came by the office. The CHAIRMAN. I mean that you handled, where you handled the money. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. Or where we recommended that he go to work. But housing was scarce, so they would go hire out and look for a house and couldn't find it and wind up in Knoxville. Mr. ADLERMAN. I am confining myself to people that you represented from 706. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. That is what the record is that I hope to gather for you gentlemen. Mr. ADLERMAN. We have in the testimony a statement from some 65 men who worked for the Lion Oil Co. who went on strike, and they were referred, according to their statement, by you to the Pine Bluff Arsenal job. Is that correct? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I don't know how many, but all of them who were qualified pipefitters or who were material men were, that wanted to work. Mr. ADLERMAN. In this statement we have the men who say that they paid $3.50 each week while they were on the job and that they received no receipts. I will go further Mr. GENTRY. Actually, isn't that a statement of somebody else that says he has talked to those people and that is what they told him? Mr. ADLERMAN. And they signed the statement individually. This is not an affidavit. I didn't say it was an affidavit. I said it was a signed statement by each individual, and on the foot of it is an affidavit. Mr. GENTRY. I am trying to see. There were two or three of them in there. I had a chance to glance through the record this morning. Mr. ADLERMAN. I am referring to page 49 of the record. The CHAIRMAN. This was not an affidavit and wasn't inserted as such. Mr. ADLERMAN. This was a statement. The CHAIRMAN. This is a statement where the man claims he wrote out the statement and went around to the people he knew worked there. Mr. ADLERMAN. I just call your attention to this; that we checked out the letter "H" on this list from these cards and, strangely enough, even though these men stated that they paid $3.50 a week, we don't find a single name listed in these cards under the letter "H." I mention particularly Joe E. Haile, Knowland E. Harris, Bobby O. Hearin, and on the letter "A," M. P. Arledge, and on the letter "H," C. E. Hambleton, Ralph E. Hampton, and T. J. Ames. We just took that as a spot check. According to these men, they paid $3.50. According to you, they should be in these records. Can you account for that? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I won't deny that they paid it. I say that if they paid it they should be recorded on a card similar to that in that group. I know this: that when they settled their strike and went back to work, we got a very complimentary letter from this group of people, or their organization. The only reason that I would doubt them paying it is that during their tenure at Pine Bluff-I can't testify at this time who the committee members were the strike committee or some committee representing this group of men came to me trying to compel me, trying to have me compel them to pay into a strike fund or have them pulled off of the job. I explained as best I could that men secured jobs because of their qualifications and they held them by the same reason and that I wasn't crazy enough, due to the laws of our land, to try to compel a man to pay to hold his job. For your information, I don't know that you are interested in this, but here is another reason that I am short of records, most likely, particularly on our own members. The antikickback law worked against many unions following World War II and the Korean conflict. A lot of testimony such as this, or claims such as this was evidently given to another committee of the Federal Government, which one or what kind I don't know. But they came into my local union when the records were all available. How long they stayed I can't be sure, but they stayed days. They came to my house and asked if they could go to the bank the next morning to see the records of the union, and I agreed to meet them at 9 o'clock. I was on long distance and was a few minutes late. I was followed by others to the bank. When the president got there, I am advised, they were waiting for him to open and came inside so there could be no money shortage. At any rate, we came in and examined the bank records and all the cash boxes, to see if there was any cash in boxes or things of that nature, and then two or three or four of them went with me to the local. I wasn't a habitual in attending the office, sometimes for 3 or 4 weeks I wouldn't be there, so I instructed the girls who were employed that these men represented the Government and to make every record turned over to them, and a thorough survey of our records was made on this kickback. When I was exonerated of that I never felt that I would have to go through this, a similar investigation, again. Mr. ADLERMAN. When was this investigation made? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. Shortly after-we will have to look into the minutes of the local union meeting to determine the exact date. Mr. ADLERMAN. What committee was that? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I can't tell you. Maybe Dr. Herbert can. Mr. ADLERMAN. Did you ever advise Mr. Duffy to that effect? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I wouldn't swear that I did. I talked to Duffy on different occasions. He would know whether I did or not. No, I didn't talk to Mr. Duffy. I was thinking I talked to Mr. Mundie more about our records than I did Mr. Duffy. Mr. ADLERMAN. Do you know whether it was an agency of the Government or a committee? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. Honestly, I couldn't. Mr. ADLERMAN. Are you implying that they may have taken some of these records? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. No, sir; I don't believe they took any records. I believe they left all of our records. But we just stacked them in our offices. Mr. ADLERMAN. I thought you were trying to explain why these records were missing, and I thought you were implying that some other agency took them. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. No; I am stating here that these men, I know, and it was a known fact by their local union and mine, that they were demanding that the men either pay into their strike fund or get off the job, and I refused to be a party to anything of that nature. The CHAIRMAN. There may be other questions and other matters we will have to clear up in this thing. I am trying to finish tonight, if we can. I want to go into another aspect of it. In the meantime, I may suggest to you, Mr. Duffy and Mr. Adlerman, that I will expect you to handle the interrogating regarding the accounts, the expenditures for merchandise. I want to go into this matter of the election in local 798, which was in December 1955. Do you want to give us an explanation of that? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. Šenator, I would much prefer to be asked, but The CHAIRMAN. I will be glad to ask you. Did local 798 have an election in December 1955? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. 1955 or 1956. I am inclined to think it was 1955, Senator. The CHAIRMAN. Did you participate in that election in any way? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. It is possible, to this extent: It is possible that I attended the local union meeting in Tulsa, as the meeting was open, and then no further participation in it. The CHAIRMAN. Were you an international organizer at that time? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I was a special representative or an international organizer. The CHAIRMAN. In other words, you were an international organizer at that time? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. You say you took no interest in it but you might have been present at an open meeting? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. No; I thought you said did I participate in it. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. Senator, I am cognizant of rumors and the investigation of it, so, naturally, I can assume what you mean. The CHAIRMAN. You said you wanted to be asked, so I am trying to ask questions to bring out the facts. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I took part in it to this extent: The election you are speaking of, if I recall correctly, was conducted in this manner: The local union did not petition me, but they petitioned the general president to allow them several places to poll or to cast their ballots. The CHAIRMAN. There is no objection to that. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. And it was granted. They went into Nebraska, or Colorado, into Texas, Louisiana, maybe into New Jersey, I don't know where, but they have 33 States where they have jurisdiction over pipelines. The ballot box was to be started in Tulsa. I think I was at the meeting in Tulsa when it was opened. I can't swear that I was. Then the committee was to take the ballot box in rotation from one city in their jurisdiction to another and the ballot box was to be sealed at night by a notary public, with a metal seal, I assumed, and opened the following morning of the metal seal, and the committee was in charge of the election. I differ with Mr. Craddock The CHAIRMAN. I don't care about those issues. Let's get down to what you did. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I say I differ with Mr. Craddock, because I understand in talking with him since this date, in fact, talking with him 2 or 3 months ago, whenever it was that he was visited by your investigative staff. He says that he asked me to assist him in his election. I won't deny that he did. I won't deny that I did. I didn't understand, I mean, I didn't recall that that was what it was, but for the record, I won't deny that he asked me and I won't deny that I said he was a good and experienced officer. The CHAIRMAN. Nobody is charging him Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I thought that was what you were getting at. Outside of those things I had no further association with it. The CHAIRMAN. Did you undertake to cooperate in securing his reelection to the office and promoting the election of the slate of officers that he wanted elected? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. It is possible that I did, Senator. I wouldn't deny it. The CHAIRMAN. Is it not only possible, but is it not a fact that you gave instructions to your own union or to its officers, local 706, to persuade a number of your members of local 706 to clear their cards into local 798 so that they might vote in that election? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. That I gave orders to my local to clear them in? The CHAIRMAN. That you gave instructions to them to arrange to do that? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. That I gave my local union instructions to clear? The CHAIRMAN. Yes. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. Senator, I would have no reason to deny it, if I remembered it. I think it was like this, if you would like to knowThe CHAIRMAN. Yes. Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. I think that this would be an accurate statement of fact in 1955, as I remember it now. Every day in the week, and most times on Sunday, I will receive one or more communications, either personal, telephone, or letter, asking me this is the normal statement in our vernacular-where is the next boom? In 1955, right after the Republicans went into office, from then for 2 or 3 years we had very little prospects of continuous employment. The pipeline industry, if you will look back on the record, you will see, was booming. There is no doubt that I was asked that question of where is the next boom? There is no doubt that I have recommended members clearing into 798 for the reason of securing employment, being in a position to enjoy employment, and there is little likelihood that if any of them did clear in, that I failed to recommend to those clearing in that certain men were good officers if the subject came up. The CHAIRMAN. That is a rambling and roundabout, getting-nowhere statement. Let me ask you something specific. Did you discuss this approaching election with Mr. Craddock? Mr. EARL GRIFFIN. He says I did. The CHAIRMAN. He said Earl asked me. This is his sworn statement. Has this been made a part of the record? Mr. DUFFY. Yes, sir; printed in the record. The CHAIRMAN. He says Earl asked me how the election looked, and I told him that we needed all of the help that we could get. |