Clear Cut

In the midst of the furor over newsmen who were members of the Communist Party (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS), the 27,302-member American Newspaper Guild last week took a clear-cut stand on a problem that has been worrying it for years. At its 22nd annual convention in Albany, N.Y., the Guild unanimously voted not to defend the employment rights of any member who is an admitted or proved Communist Party member.

Said the Guild declaration: "The A.N.G. and its locals need not resist the dismissal of any employee who has admitted [party membership] in an open hearing by a competent governmental agency [or] who has finally been adjudged by a court of competent jurisdiction to have been a member of the Communist Party." The Guild's action, which applies to anyone who has been a member of the party within six months of being fired, takes the place of a proposed change in the Guild's constitution barring Communists from membership altogether (TIME, Aug. 16). "If anyone wants to exercise his right to be part of a conspiracy," explained St. Louis Guildsman Rollin Everett, "then let him seek employment from those who agree with him."

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