ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL Department of Justice DEC 2 2 1970 Mr. Joseph L. Rauh Rauh and Silard 1001 Connecticut Avenue, N. W. Dear Mr. Rauh: This will refer to your letter dated November 3, 1970, addressed to the Honorable William D. Ruckelshaus, Assistant Attorney General, in which you requested that further action be taken in Hodgson v. United Mine Workers of America, which is pending in the District Court of the District of Columbia (Civil Action No. 662-70). A copy of your letter was sent to Under Secretary of Labor L. H. Silberman. You stated in your letter that all of the documents to support the allegations made as to the use of the United Mine Workers Journal will be made available to us on request. In Mr. Silberman's reply of November 24, 1970, he invited you to submit any evidence which you have of intimidation, coercion, or other harassment by the United Mine Workers Commission or by the incumbent officers or Union members because of their activities in connection with the 1969 election of International officers. We assume that you will respond promptly and furnish us this material. With respect to the second cause of action in the complaint filed in the District Court, you are advised that Judge Bryant has set the Government's motion for a preliminary injunction for hearing on January 18, 1971. After the Court acts on this motion, we shall, of course, give consideration to taking such further steps as may be appropriate. Sincerely yours Patrick Gray... L. PATRICK GRAY, III Mr. Joseph L. Rauh 1001 Connecticut Avenue, N. W. Dear Mr. Rauh: This will refer to your letter dated November 3, 1970, addressed to the Honorable William D. Ruckelshaus, Assistant Attorney General, in which you requested that further action be taken in Hodgson v. United Mine Workers of America, which is pending in the District Court of the District of Columbia (Civil Action No. 662-70). A copy of your letter was sent to Under Secretary of Labor L. H. Silberman. You stated in your letter that all of the documents to support the allegations made as to the use of the United Mine Workers Journal will be made available to us on request. In Mr. Silberman's reply of November 24, 1970, he invited you to submit any evidence which you have of intimidation, coercion, or other harassment by the United Mine Workers Commission or by the incumbent officers or Union members because of their activities in connection with the 1969 election of International officers. We assume that you will respond promptly and furnish us this material. With respect to the second cause of action in the complaint filed in the District Court, you are advised that Judge Bryant has set the Government's motion for a preliminary injunction for hearing on January 18, 1971. After the Court acts on this motion, we shall, of course, give consideration to taking such further steps as may be appropriate. Sincerely yours, L. PATRICK GRAY, III U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR OFFICE OF LABOR-MANAGEMENT AND WELFARE-PENSION REPORTS December 28, 1970 Mr. Joseph L. Rauh, Jr. Rauh and Silard 1001 Connecticut Avenue, N.W. Washington, D. C. 20036 Dear Joe: Your December 10 letter contains two minor errors which I want to comment on before getting into more important matters. I do not consider a quarter to two Wednesday morning as "Late Tuesday night". (Apparently Chip doesn't either.) My wife was most upset when we were awakened at that hour and when she learned the purpose of the call she was outraged. Secondly, I did not say what you quote me as saying. Chip had mentioned some alleged evidence and I told him that I saw no point in continuing the discussion at that hour; that just the night before I had heard him and you try to smear and destroy a reputation on the basis of no more evidence than your own say-so. But that is not really important. During the period when I was one of the relatively few government employees who were outspoken in their condemnation of Joe McCarthy and McCarthyism and you were one of the even fewer lawyers who were defending government employees being attacked by McCarthy and his ilk, you were one of my heroes. I have, therefore, become increasingly distressed by your use of the tactics of McCarthyism. In your December 8 statement you place on Under Secretary Silberman the full responsibility for the Department's refusal to intervene in the UMWA prior to the election and accuse him of a "post-election policy that wavers between inaction and obstruction." Both of those allegations are false and you know it. Shortly after Mr. Yablonski announced his candidacy, you spoke to several officials of this Office. You were given technical advice and assistance concerning the law which may very well have led to your filing three successful preelection suits. You were also informed at that time of the Department's policy against intervention during an election campaign, and the reasons for that policy. That has been and continues to be the policy under the five Secretaries of Labor who have been in office since the passage of the LMRDA. It is a policy which the law requires, which was first urged and adopted by the bureau which was the predecessor of this Office, and has been followed consistently and approvingly by this Office. To lay this at Mr. Silberman's door is to give him far greater credit than he deserves. Not only has Mr. Silberman not followed a policy of inaction in the lawsuit to set aside the UMWA election of officers, I know of my own knowledge that he has been pressuring both this Office and the Solicitor's office for ever faster action. Your charge that the Department has failed to press the suit is an unwarranted reflection on the tremendous amount of work already accomplished by Department of Labor attorneys, auditors and investigators. The actions taken to bring the election case to trial and the speed with which those actions have been pressed are a matter of public record. Some of these you are aware of. The others could have been checked very easily, had you wished to do so. Both sides have filed extensive interrogatories. We have objected to some, answered others, and have opposed motions for extensions of time. We were successful in obtaining an order for production of documents for inspection and copying. In this connection it was necessary to move for and obtain a protective order. - 3. We conducted and recently completed audits of the records of the International and all but a few of the UMWA Districts for the years 1967, 1968 and 1969. We took depositions and depositions were taken from a number of our employees. It is unnecessary to go into a blow by blow description of all of the actions which have taken place in this suit. The record is public. I think it sufficient to note that we obtained an order that the UMWA respond to all of our discovery by December and file its answer by December 14. The court, incidentally, has set January 18, 1971 as the date for a hearing on our motion for a preliminary injunction. As a lawyer, you must know that there has been no delay in the processing of this case. I am informed, indeed, that Judge Bryant told you so. I see no purpose in an item by item reply to your ten points. I do not expect you to withdraw any of them, regardless of the true facts. You choose to ignore the requirements of the law and the limits placed by the law upon the authority of the Department when you attack the Department for "refusing" to take the action you want. The Department is not entirely blameless. I make no claim to perfection for my Office or for any part of the Department. There can be no real justification for the six year delay in bringing the trusteeship case to trial. Hopefully a trial date will be set on January 15, 1971. We have been lax in not prosecuting thousands of unions which file late reports. Were we to file suit every time a report is filed late, we would have time for very little else. But that is my responsibility, not Mr. Silberman's. Inasmuch as your attack is directed against him, I do not see how in good conscience you can blame him for the failures of my Office any more than, in the trusteeship case, you can fault him for the mistakes of his predecessors. Sincerely, Lev Leonard J. Lurie 70-632 O 72 pt. 2 14 |