Word: hoffa
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Once acquitted of the bribery charge, Hoffa, before the McClellan committee, boldly took the "I don't recall" amendment. As the committee rolled out evidence of his sordid dealings with Dio and other racketeers, Hoffa's close friend and unofficial chief of staff, Harold Gibbons, Teamster boss in St. Louis, spoke the defense that seems to satisfy a lot of Teamsters: "Is it all right for Dulles to deal with a whore like Saud, or a bum like Franco to get his objectives? Hoffa found he had to work with Dio to bring his people into the union...
Chugging along like a twelve-cylinder diesel, Hoffa devotes his bottomless energies to his panoramic job. He paces his office floor in Detroit's Teamsters building, barks orders into one of four telephones, pounds his fist hard in his hand. "The future of labor-management relations," he insists, "is big labor and big business. There is no room for the small business or the small union." Neither, if he had his way, would there be room for education. Snarls Hoffa: "I don't have a man working for me who don't come off a truck...
...critics, Hoffa claims only contempt. "I don't give a damn what they say," he says. "Jimmy Hoffa can take care of himself. Why don't the newspapers go out and ask my members what they think of Jimmy Hoffa? They can't prove I've misused my union power...
...Boston milkwagon driver who said: "The court didn't find him guilty [of bribery]. For my dough he's a go-through guy." More ominous and often just beneath the surface was the reaction of a Philadelphia truck driver when asked what he thought of Hoffa: "I'd rather look at that river over there than float...
Some knowing assessment of Hoffa comes from his longtime foe, August ("Gus") Scholle, president of the Michigan C.I.O. Council. "Hoffa," says Scholle, "figures he can always buy what he wants." Adds a West Coast lawyer: "Jimmy Hoffa believes that anything can be accomplished and will seize a way to do it. You could count Dave Beck as being tough, but he's an angel alongside of Hoffa. Hoffa is just plain ruthless. Beck rants and snorts. As a last resort, he would use group physical violence, but he wouldn't have anyone bumped off. Hoffa wouldn...