◆ SpookStack

AMENDING MIGRATORY LABOR LAWS 373 One must first understand that a farm labor contractor does not contract work in the full sense of the word. He contracts, actually he buys and sells, human beings. His profit is based on the sweat and toll of the workers and not on any special skills or business acumen of his own—as would be true in the building trades tield. AU the farm labor contractor does is to promise hourly workers at the lowest price he can find men to work at, The sum of his job is to say: I promise 40 wen for 20 days at $1.15 an hour, or the lowest be can get them for. Senator Wuuitams. That’s pretty strong language. Now, in the theatrical agency we have the agent. r Munpur. Yes, we do, the same type of fellow, and I had lots of experience with him, because I found in one case where the became the producer and also the distributor, so he had a com- plete monopoly. as long as 15 years ago I went to work on that one, so thatwas broken up. Columbia Broadcasting System set up a Colum- bia 4 ’ Bureau so they became the contractor, and they represented the wefker, George Murphy in that case, and also the fucer, Colum- bia Badcasting System in that case, and we decided that that was im ical and not ethical, so that we broke that up, too. fr, CHavez. You had a union to do it with, I imagine. Senator Murruy. That's right. Mr. Ciravez. We don’t have a union. Senator Murriy. I was one of the founders of the union. Mr. Cuvez. Iknow. I’ve read about that. Senator Murriry. We had a good shop. Mr. Cusvez. Now, the other thing is that — Senator Mcrpuy. You indicate by your remark that you don’t have a union? Mr. Cuavez. At least not one that’s recognized. Now, of course, the labor contractor provides many services to the grower. He is a recruiter, he is a supervisor on the job, he provides transportation, does the bookkeeping, and so forth. And we found in some cases we were able to talk to growers, not the growers in Delano that we have a strike with, but other growers in the vicinity of Delano, and we talked about wages and many other things to some of the sym- pathetic growers, some of the growers that were not afraid to come and talk with us. And there was some agreement. Most of them that as long as we Bet a union powerful enough to bargain with, he will do it, on wages and so forth. But when we came to the subject of the labor contractor we found immediate opposition, very, very hostile opposition to the idea of replacing the farm Iabor contractor. Well, what’s happening in Delano on this strike, the farm labor contractor becomes the professional strikebreaker, You see, the grow- er does not know—— mnosnater Morrzy. You put him out of business, in other words, you in Mr. Cuavez. We'd love to, yes. The grower directly doesn’t know the work force. He will know those who are employed by him year around, which amounts to perhaps 2 or 3 percent of the total work. Now, the labor contractor, being that he was a worker once upon a time, does know the labor force, and so in Delano we have the farm Tabor contractor being the biggest recruiter of scab labor or strike- breakers, with one exception, DiGiorgio Fruit Corp. They do their own recruitment. 81-6340 25