Word: brouning
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When Heywood Broun died last month at 51 he left the American Newspaper Guild, which he had organized and pre sided over for six years, in a ticklish spot...
Because he was loved for his humanitarian spirit by most newspapermen, be cause he was gracious and a subtle theorist, Heywood Broun's own personality had kept harmony in the Guild. But with Broun gone, there was more than a possibility that these subterranean dissensions might erupt into open revolt...
...before Broun fell ill, his one-time friend and neighbor, Red-fearing Westbrook Pegler, wrote in his own syndicated column of the Guild: "I have long sensed a strong pull toward Communism in its official list. The masthead, so to speak, includes two officers out of five who are, to my satisfaction, either Communists or determined fellow travelers." And of Heywood Broun: "I can quote from his own writing an affirmation which goes far beyond a mere expression of sympathy for the show-window aims of the Moscow government." That such beliefs were harbored by many a Right-thinking dissenter...
...first radicalism in the Guild amounted to little more than sentiment on one side, suspicion on the other. Under Heywood Broun's benevolent influence the Guild at various times made resolutions in favor of freedom for Tom Mooney, industrial unionism, Franklin Roosevelt's plan to reform the courts; against fascism, war, Father Coughlin. But as the Guild grew in size and complexity its control was increasingly concentrated in the hands of a small circle of executives. Not their social sympathies but their power laid them open to suspicion...
...week after Broun died, the Executive Board sent out a letter urging Guild locals not to make nominations for a new president, to wait instead until next summer's national convention. Local officials looked up the Guild constitution, saw that the Board's proposal was unconstitutional...