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Show An Sees it 11 g WeMbrook Pegler Btlctued bj WNU Fc.ture. AS I perceived at the time, the trial of a section of the Taft-Hartley Taft-Hartley law before Judge Ben Moore, in Washington, was suspicious suspi-cious business. Justice Frankfurter later remarked that he saw evidence of an inside Job. The defendants were the C.I.O. and its psalm-singing president, Philip Murray, the Gethsemane kid. THE C.I.O. AND MURRAY ARE LATCH-KEY PALS OF PRESIDENT TRUMAN. Frankfurter, in effect, accused the department of justice of slipping its own client a mickey finn. Actually Ac-tually we know, and so does Frank- I f I'M ' ' l furter and so aia Moore, that the D. of J. was politically opposed to this law. It is a Republican Repub-lican law. The C.I.-0. C.I.-0. and Murray are not only Democrats but big contributors. contribu-tors. By the deci- sion of Moore, who is also an avowed Democrat, his party, Mr. Truman's party and the party oi the defendants would gain or lose a slush fund of millions. Judge Moore's party hopefully looked to him to ratify the use of that money with which it could corrupt the ballot in the 1948 Presidential election. In an opinion opin-ion supporting the casuistical clap-trap in the defendant's own political pamphlets, Moore justified justi-fied their hopes. Old Ben Moore came through. I put it straight to Moore to say whether he ever was or never was a partner in a Charleston, W. Va., law firm which represents John L. Lewis and the United Mine Workers. Work-ers. I asked him to say also who plucked him out of Charleston to sit in Washington and who assigned him to this case. Moore wouldn't an-Gets an-Gets swer and, although yVo my questions obvi-Answer obvi-Answer ously had no bearing on the Taft-Hartley case, he threw in a slantwise mention men-tion of contempt. Well, any citizen had a right to ask those questions and the bluff just made me more suspicious. However, if it was contempt con-tempt he should have done his stuff. NOW LET HIM CITE FRANKFURTER FRANK-FURTER FOR CONTEMPT. We may get a more thorough statement of Frankfurter's suspicions suspi-cions and objections to the conduct of the D. of J. when the opinions of the supreme court are written. I now have discovered an opinion opin-ion of the fourth circuit court of appeals unanimous, too which lays Moore out with the most violent flogging of a federal judge by a higher court that I have ever read. A baby boy, 13 months old, wandered wan-dered onto the railroad tracks and a yard engine cut off his hands. The first jury disagreed. The second gave the baby $100,000. The verdict was reversed on errors, but the court of appeals said also that the judgment was excessive. In the third trial, before Judge Moore, the jury gave the baby $160,000. He refused re-fused to set it aside as excessive, but the court of appeals said it certainly cer-tainly was and figured that the boy could have an income of $4,800 a year for life and still leave an estate of $160,000. Recognizing the painful nature of the case, the court of appeals still condemned Moore for inciting the jury's sympathy and for "an argumentative ar-gumentative presentation which must have prejudiced the defendant's defend-ant's case." One juror even Moore made an affidavit Is that they all wrote Partial down a big figure, added them up and divided by 12 to get $160,000. But it was for his treatment of-the of-the locomotive fireman and his partially par-tially to the plaintiff that the court of appeals gave Moore the worst of his bawling out. The fireman was corroborating the engineer. The engineer said he did not take his eyes off the tracks to wave to three little boys about 300 feet from where the baby was. Incidentally, two of the little boys were brothers of the baby. They said the engineer waved THE THIRD KID SAID HE DIDN'T. The fireman said "Not to my knowledge" was the engineer waving. Moore said: "The question was, do you know that he wasn't'?" A. "No sir; I didn't see him waving at anyone.' Moore "That isn't the question. ques-tion. Do yon know he wasn't waving?" A- "I didn't see him." Moore "Answer, do yon know he wasn't waving?" A "No, he wasn't." Moore-"That isn't the question. ques-tion. Do yon know he wasn't waving?" wav-ing?" A. "Well, sir" Moore (interrupting) "Yon know whether yon do or not. Do you know that he wasn't waving at somebody?" A"I didn't see him wavin no fir." |