Mr. O’Connell. And my expenses, yes. I knew nothing about Mr. Budenz’ discussion with the Communist Party headquarters or anything. I got a call from Mr. Shipka. I am sure it was Mr. Shipka, the treasurer of the organization, who asked me first to do these two specific jobs which I did within a short time. Then later he called me to make these speeches on a plan for plenty.
Mr. Tavenner. Now I have before me an excerpt from the May 29, 1941, issue of Montana Labor News. The title is, “IWO Names O’Connell Rocky Mountain Director.” It is datelined New York, May 10. I will read it:
“Former Representative Jerry J. O’Connell, labor’s fighting Congressman from Montana, has been appointed regional director for the International Workers Order in the Rocky Mountain area, Herbert Benjamin, executive secretary of that organization, announced today. “Mr. O’Connell will be able to continue his effort on behalf of the labor movement on a much broader scale in his new post,” Herbert Benjamin declared, “since the IWO is labor’s foremost and largest fraternal benefit society. Our national membership of 155,000 supports the trade-union movement and its individual members on many fronts; providing insurance, sickness, and accident benefits at low rates, a rounded program of club and fraternal social life, plus a nationwide campaign for improving living standards, and social security embodied in our plan for plenty.”
Mr. O’Connell. That is the first I knew—nobody told me that I was to be regional director of the IWO. As far as I can remember, as far as their clubs were concerned out in the Rocky Mountain area, they had one in Butte, which was the only one they had in the whole State of Montana. I think they had one down in this town called Steamboat Springs, Col. Those were the only two clubs that I know of in the Rocky Mountain area. There were certainly no—at least on my part, there was no idea I was to be regional director, because the first 2 assignments that I got were first to go down to advise this club in Butte and the other to go down to this Steamboat Springs, in Colorado, and clear up the question that the judge and the examiner were raising there. The judge at the time thought that the IWO and the IWW were one and the same. I brought Mr. Charles Cunningham, I think his name was, commissioner of insurance of the State of Colorado, to the judge to point out that the IWO was a fraternal benefit organization.
Mr. Tavenner. You have explained all that in exactly the same detail.
Mr. O’Connell. Yes, but the concept that I was a regional director——
Mr. Willis. I am not so sure I followed you on the reason for the dismissal of the suit you filed.
Mr. O’Connell. I did not dismiss the suit.
Mr. Willis. I do not think I caught the point. Was it a jurisdictional question? Specifically, what was it?
Mr. O’Connell. It was a motion to quash. Actually, it arose on the motion to quash the service of the summons.