Morton Schutz Papers

Morton Schutz was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1911. He entered the postal service in 1937 and immediately joined the Railway Mail Association. From 1947 to 1950, he served as Legislative Chairman with the New York Branch 2nd Division of the National Postal Transport Association. He also served the Branch as Corresponding Secretary from 1950 to 1953; as President from 1953 to December 1956 and as Financial Secretary from December 1956 to March 1958. He served as Treasurer of the Joint Conference of Affiliated Postal Employees of Greater New York and vicinity from 1952 to 1958.

Schutz was forced to resign from his union post on February 19th, 1958, when he was charged by the NPTA, NY Branch, with not fulfilling his duties. It was unanimously recommended by the NPTA that he be removed from office, which was an unprecedented occurrence. During the 1950s the labor movement was being purged of left wing elements. Union officials within the Civil Service were fearful of losing their jobs and shied away from protesting the grievances of their members. Schutz did voice the grievances of his members and lost his union position in the process.

Schutz remained a union member and continued working for the postal service until his retirement in 1974. In the late 1950s, Schutz was informed by his mother in Brooklyn and his neighbors in the Bronx that the F.B.I. had been questioning them about the newspapers he read and his general activities.

In 1989 he gained access to approximately 100 of the 494 pages of information on him that had been gathered by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. All substantive information had been censored. However, he did discover that he had been under constant surveillance from 1958 to 1964 and there after until 1971 a "tickler" had been placed upon him so that he was checked up on every six months. He also discovered that the New York F.B.I. had requested permission from the main Bureau in the Washington D.C. to interview him, but this request had been denied.