The Daily Worker Newspaper, January 24, 1924, Page 3

= — January 24, 1924 THE DAILY WORKER HOUSE CHILDREN OF LABOR IN FIRET Board of Education Shows no Indication of Taking Action; Daily Worker Will Give Facts Firetrap school buildings, where the lives of the pupils are further wretched sanitation, are considered good enough for children in the working class districts of Chicago, it is revealed in an investigation which the DAILY WORKER is conducting. 3 The DAILY WORKER'S investigation was begun because the Board of Education has given no indication of taki: CAPITAL IS AGOG OVER NEW OIL GRAB EXPOSURES D. of J. Hears Some- thing May Be Wrong (Continued from page 1) Arkansas, for immediate cancella- tion of the lease of the Teapot Dome naval oil reserve to the Sinclair oil interests, . Caraway’s motion that the senate intervene immediately probably will be opposed on the ground that the public lands committee is investigat- ing the whole question and should not be interfered with until its in- quiry is finished, This is likely to lead to a spec- tacular fight with Democratic sen- ators seeking to put the Republicans on record, Teapot Dome ig consid- ered certain now to figure in the campaign. Caraway and Senator Heflin, Ala- bama, have already served notice that they intend to disclose to the senate certain information regarding Teapot Dome. Developments Are Sensational New and sensational developments brought nearer the climax of the Teapot Dome _ investigation, which has stirred governmental and politi- cal circles to their depths. These developments included: Peremptory summons to Albert B, Fall, former secretary of the inter- ior, who leased Teapot Dome naval oil reserve to the Sinclair interests and about whom the storm centers, to appear at once before the senate public lands committee investigating the transaction. Fall, who is in New Orleans, will arrive Friday to testify. A request to Harry Sinclair, oil magnate who leased the rich naval oil reserve and who last Wednesday sailed for Europe to return and show the committee the books of the Hyva Corporation, which are presumably in his possession, as they were given to him just before he sailed and were not returned to his office, Coolidge Finally Acts, Announcement on behalf of Presi- dent Coolidge at the White Hous that he had directed Attorney Gen- “erai Daugherty to take a Sait in the case because of rumors too grave to be overlooked which have reached the president. Mr. Coolidge has or- dered Daugherty to have a man at the senate investigation and if evi- dence is disclosed warranting it, to prosecute anybody who is guilty. Announcement by Senator Cara- way, Arkansas, that tomorrow he will ask the senate at once to act on a resolution cancelling the lease of Tea- pat Dome. A statement by Fall at New Or- leans that it was not necessary for the committee to subpoena him as he wag ready to testify, A statement by Sinclair at Ply- mouth, England, where the ship touched, that he never gave Fall any money. Caraway’s demand tomorrow that the senate act at once is expected to be the signal for a heated discus- sion of the whole Teapot Dome scan- dal in the open senate and demands for summary action against certain individuals are in prospect. After hearing: testimony late to- day from Sinclair’s counsel, the sen- ate committee adjourned subject to the chairman’s call. Somebody Lied. Fall will be asked to explain where he got $100,000 to buy a New Mex- ‘ico ranch, His story and that of E. B. McLean, Washington publisher, from whom Fall said he borrowed the money, conflicted. Zevely will be asked to explain what he did with $30,000 Sinclair stock and $25,000 Liberty bonds, which G. D,. Wahlberg, Sinclair’s secretary, told the senate investigat- ing committee were given to Zevely. Senator Caraway, Arkansas, today gave notice in the senate that he would move tomorrow to have the senate public land committee re- lieved of further consideration of a resolution for cancellation of the Teapot Dome and other naval oil reserve leases and have it consid- ered at once by the senate. Want Sinelair The senate committee today on resuming its hearing, asked counsel for Harry Sinclair, oil man who leased Teapot Dome, Jaan ont appear as soon as le. G. EB. Stanford, Sinclair’s counsel, said he ps cable Sinclair at once to re- with developments at the Business Street, Chicago, Illinois, Miners’ Unions! Order Bundles of the Daily Worker Now and Get Daily News of Convention ‘The miners’ convention is now on! . Our Staff Correspondent is ending the big news over the wire to the DAILY WORKER. Every miners’ local in the United States should keep in touch thig convention, The not give the facts. It never does. The DAILY WORKER will. Order your bundles of Daily Workers today. Write or wire Manager, The DAILY WORKER, 1640 N, Halsted imperilled b; re being brought out at the hear- ings before the buildings and aber 9 committee of the Board of ducation of Chicago, indicating that scores of school buildings are a menace to life and health and should be replaced by new ones. Official Probe Not Started It was first declared by the board, that the buildings and grounds com- mittee would investigate all such buildings, but this was afterwards narrowed down to a statement that the investigation would be limited to the J. N. Thorp school, 89th street and Burley avenue, which was con- sidered the worst. The business Manager of the Board of Education and the superintendent of schools were ordered to conducte the investi- gation, Henry D. Hatch said yester- day, that far as he knew they had not begun the investigation. The DAILY WORKER’S own in- vestigation began with the J. N. Thorp school which the committee seems to be avoiding. The Thorp school is located in the heart of the South Chicago industrial district. It is attended by the children of work- ing class parents. Most of the pu- pils are the children of foreign born workers. The neighborhood in which it is situated is populated mostly by Poles and Slavs who »work in the steel mills of South Chicago. Hole-in-the-Wall Kitchen In addition to the regular classes there are classes for subnormal chil- dren and former truants. There is also a penny lunch room, run in con- nection with the school which serves ™more than two hundred children a day. Many of the children during the morning recess, buy their break- fast. The equipment for the lunch room is of the miserably inadequate sort found in sehool lunchrooms. The kitchen is nothing more than a one- time cupboard, with a hole in the wall, connecting it with the lunch room proper. All the food is cooked and the dishes are washed in this tiny den. The three employees are continually forced to crowd each other in the kitchen and walk on each others toes. The class room for subnormal chil- dren is in a regular class room: It is crowded to overflowing with the special equipment together with the tables and chairs. Otten 24 pupils are attending a single class for sub- normals, It is impossible to teach so many satisfactorily at one time. They are sent from schools outside the district regularly served by the Thorp school, The class ‘for former truants is crowded into one room. Manual training equipment and a loom, in addition to the regular desks, are all jammed into the same room. The loom is crowded dgainst one window where it cannot be handled because of the proximity of the stationary desks. Firetrap of Worst Kind The Thorp school building is a vari- table firetrap. The original building was put up about 1893,, with an ad- dition in 1896, The addition is above the floor level of the old building. The old building’s stairs are still used. They are winding, narrow stairs with two landings from one floor to an- other. If @ fire should break out in \the older part of the building, the children would either have to pass far to the front of the building or down these narrow stairs. The light on the stairs is wretched. In spite of city ordinances, no fire- \and is damp most of the year. action on the facts which of either of the buildings. The stor- ge facilities of the school are so in- adequate that they add to the fire hazards. There is no doubt that the whole place would go up like tinder if a fire started. The sanitary arrangements of the school are nothing short of an out- rage. The boys toilet is on the ground floor below the street level. The entire equipment cf the toilets of the most antiquated sort. In o: der to keep down toilet odors it is necessary to flush the floors twice a day. They are continually wet as @ result Foul Toilet Smells The school is built around a light well on the south side of which the boys toilet is situated. During the time school windows are kept open, which igs most of the school year, odors from the toilet permeate the entire building. A fan ventilator was put in the toilet a few years ago, but it only runs to the first floor above the street permitting the odors to be blown thru the building. The boys play room is next to the toilet The manual training room is in the base- ment below the street level and, like the play room, is damp. The base- ment also contains a room for shower baths, It is dark, damp and poorly ventilated. Pupils Frozen Out During the summer new boilers ‘were put in the heating plant, but in the sub-zero weather last Monday the school was so cold that it was necessary to dismiss the classes. The Board of Education building rogram says that “no building which an be made safe, sanitary and us- able will be replaced ‘under present building conditions.” The Thorp ‘school is neither safe, sanitary or fit ,to be used. The program of the Board of Education for new build- ings and the remodeling of old ones does mot contemplate doing anything about the Thorp school which is in a working class neightborhood and which is attended by the chi‘dren of workers. A portable building was put up at the Thorp school in 1822. Last sum- ,mer the board ordered the removal of \the portable building which accomi- dates 150 pupils and it was only the vigorous protest of the principal, Mr. Hatch that prevented it. Half-Day Education About one-third of the 800 pupils now attending the school are attend- ing half days, bécause of the crowded condition of the school. This means that many mothers who want to go to work are unable to leave home because they must take care of their children. If the children were going to school a ful] day, they could go to work sure that they were being taken care of. Mothers frequently come to the school and ask that their children be put in full time classes in order that they might work. The Board of Education will get a report of the buildings committee on the Thorp school in 1922. Last sum- what they will do to remedy condi- tions which are outrageous, The vile conditions existing in South Chi- cago would not be permitted to con- tinue in any but a working class nelghbortigdd: Because the workers. in the South Chicago district are foreigners and for the most part, not voters, their interests have been ignored and the lives and health of their children put (proof materia] is used in the interiorin continual danger. Sinclair is in Europe, his ship having touched at Plymouth, England today, The committee wants to get the books of the Hyva Corporation, one of Sinclair’s companies. The request for Sinclair’s return Pde L geval ruil Renters toda: sot irmed te: on; iven_ yes' y Archie It, to the effect that these books were taken to Sinclair at his orders two days before he sailed for Europe. * * * . Sinclair Denies Everything. PLYMOUTH, Eng.—“I never gave any money to Fall,” F. Sin- clair told the United Press ota G ‘upon his arrival here on the Frenc! yg ng “was referring to charges press will made before the senate investigat- ing committee in Washington thru which details of the Teapot Dome oil lease -have become known and thru which former Secre of the Interior Fall is alleged to have re- ceived money from some mysterious source. Sinclair further denied that he had left New York secretly, as al- leged by Archie Roosevelt in testi- mony before the senate committee. Sinclair is accompanied by Vice- President Day of his company. “I do not, see how it can be said that I sailed secretly for Europe,” said Sinclair, “when everybody knew I was in New York and also knew that I was sailing. The trip obvi- ously has nothing to do with avoid- ing an appearance the senate hearing, as that has been in prog- ress for two months, I have al} testified four or five times and been excused.” . * * * Fall Will Appear. NEW_ ORLEANS. Albert B, Fall to senate committee “Tovestigating the today. Fall was in the lobby of the Roose- hotel when United States Dep- hal C. Moseley read r bf the first of three contemplated GAMBLER CLIMBS INTO UNIVERSITY BOARD IN VIENNA Academic Life Prosti- tuted Under League (By The Federated Press) VIENNA.-The University of Vi- enna, one of the most ancient cen- ters of learning in Europe, has en- tered a new stage in its career. The government of Austria, which has been reduced to a propaganda office for the League of Nations, is not prepared to meet the university's deficit. It has therefore accepted the offer (which it courted) of Sigmund Bosel, banker and gambler, to act as trustee for the state-owned uni- versity. While such an act is not uncom- mon in America, it is unprecedented in the annals of European univer-| sities. The organ of Austrian s0- cialists, the Arbeiter-Zeitung, calls | this act “undignified and dangerous.” | Simultaneously, it is reported that private capitalists are showing an interest in the state-owned theaters, the museums, high schools and other public institutions. Hitherto, most of these have been operated at a loss, But it has been the first duty of the state to cover that loss. Now, financiers and manufacturers talk of making “paying propositions” of Europe’s cultural institutions. They have already made vast in- roads into the industries and public ‘utilities formerly controlled by the state. In Germany, Stinnes is man- euvering to acquire the state rail- roads, Bosel, the man who has purchased | a share in the control of the Unt-| versity of Vienna, is a young man who used to operate a garment fac- tory before the war. He secured government contracts for military ‘uniforms, and grew rich. He bought a bank, then a newspaper, then a sanpegd 6 Today, he rivals Stinnes sas a financial power on the contin- ent. He is 32 years old, and his possessions extend from the coal mines of Silesia to the money-chang- ing houses of the Balkans, . Austrian labor is indignant at the delivery of the university, with all its traditions, to the tender mercies of an upstart speculator, Viennese citizens are asking whether this is what is meant by the League of Nations’ relief for Austria, It is but an episode. But it is re- garded as another proof that the league is more interested in restor- ing “safe and sane” capitalism in Europe than in reviving trade and industry in the interest of all classes of the population, Karolyi Memoirs Banned as Red by Hungarian Rulers (By The Federated Press) BUDAPEST—The Hungarian gov- ernment has suppressed the recently published memoirs of Count Michael Karolyi, ay of the first Mag- republic. Karolyi’s book, which volumes, “is an indictment of the venerable Austro-Hungarian aristo- eracy. Karolyi himself belongs to one of the foremost families of the aristocratic caste. But Karolyi’s sympathy with the aims of revolu- tionary rr have led him far from the path of the hierarchy of land- lords. His book js a frank confes- sion of the failure of the clads to which Karolyi was born. Its sup- sion in Hungary will doubtless increase its circulation in countries unvisited by white terrorism. RAP SCHOOLS United States Government on Trial in Borah Hearing for Recognition of Soviet Russia By JAY LOVESTONE. WASHINGTON.—The United S' the Senate hearings on the Borah re Russia. Listening to the presentation of of the witnesses, analyzing the metho above all examining the pivotal point by the very weight of the evidence to conclude that this is a class inves- tigation. _ On this Committee are represented the various layers of our present ruling class. There is Senator Pepper, of Pennsylvania, who speaks for the powerful railway and coal interests of the Ke: manages to hide his invaluable serv- ices behind a dense smoke screen of the finest, of the thinnest juridical sophistries. There is Senator Swanson, of Vir- ginia, who personifies that hybrid combination of the dying Southern land baron and the rising anti-union | Southern coal magnate. | In Lenroot, of Wisconsin, there is crystallized that renegade type of petty bourgeois progressive spokes-| man, who prefers the whole cake of | the big capitalists with all its filth to the stray crumbs of the small fry | owners struggling to hold their own between the rising capitalist industri- alism and atrophying small scale agri- culture. | Finally Senator Borah, of Idaho, the Chairman of the Committee, speaks, and in a rather effective, clear | cut voice, for the small owners, for the middle class vised in between the devouring jaw of big capitalism and the ever-more threatening jaw of the exploited, dispossessed working and farming masses. Private Property the Issue Property, capitalist private prop- erty, is the central point of the whoie investigation. Whatever information or misinformation that is given about Soviet Russia which, in the opinion of the senators, is conducive to the perpetuation of our present capitalist system of the exploitation of the fworkers, is judged by all the com- mittee members to be a point in favor of the Soviet Republic. The only defender of the Soviet Government on the Commitee, Sena- tor Borah, plays as his trump card the facts arising out of the conditions which have compelled Soviet Russia to adopt policies which he can show as not hostile to the system of capi- talist private property. Hence, the difficult position in which Senator Borah finds himself surrounded by the spokesmen of the biggest capitalist interests. United States Is On Trial Under these circumstances it is obvious that the decisions of. this Committee and the disposition of these decisions by the Senate, will be ‘largely determined by the economic class interests of the capitalist’: dom- inating the Government. The United States Government is on trial in the whole Russian ques- tion. It is openly appearing as the centralized defense agency of the capitalist private property interests the world over. The workers and farmers of America will judge it in its true role, Kelly Not So Selfish Robert E. Kelly, of the eastern European division of the state de- partment, who is representing Secre- tary Hugh¢s in the fight against rec- ognition of Soviet Russia before the senate foreign relations’ subcommit- tee, had a peculiar theory as to why England had resumed trade relations with Russia, when quizzed by Sena- tor Borah. “England recognized Russia be- cause she was selfish and wanted trade,” elucidated the state depart- ment’s expert. Nine Countries Recognize Russia Nine countries have recognized the Russian government and six others have established trade rela- tions, Kelly admitted. But, the anti- soviet pinch hitter pleaded, in re- these instructions who are also soviet Banks Bar News of Clerks’ Frolic in Official Sheet loyees of Chicago banks, mem- an the Bank Beiploynes’ Union, affiliated with the American Federa- tion of Labor, have been prevented ee sovertin or ee age! to their social affairs in the po hi of The American Banker, official organ of the American Insti- tute of Banking, according to J. Shafir, secretary of the union. reason assigned for the cen- thet tee aslon, poliey is. oppored, to it ion 8 oppose that of the In: Rute and its publica- tion, A Wants It Weekly. To The DAILY WORKER: I would like to have “A Week” issued week- ly. For what is a magazine section ‘without this famous novel? It could be printed much better in magazine than it would be in the daily, and the installments prolonged.— Louis Levin, Chicago. Klan Loses in W. Va, Town WF abt hy Me ape: gre Mayor er and election of the Democratic Sieket for the first time is attributed to an anti-Klan ice, by the McDowell Times. The negro vote was an important facto The Land for the Useral | 4 us sponse to a leading question by Sen-) officials, ator Pepper, five qf the nine recog- nized Russia only to save their own independence and Germany, because of the Brest-Litovsk treaty. Borah forced Kelly to concede that no} (Staff Correspondent of the Federated Press) | country had withdrawn recognition, once granted. tates Government is now on trial in solution for the recognition of Soviet evidence, considering the examination ds pursued by the sub-committee, and of the whole survey, one is compelled ystone State, tho he usually court is not so omnipotent as in America. Appeals ean be taken from the Soviet Supreme Court to the |Central Executive Union of Soviets, ieonsisting of 371 delegates elected at National Soviet Congress and functioning between the latter’s ses- sions. Borah made the point the Kelly simply proved supreme court re- sponsible. to legislative executive body. Borah forced Kelly to admit that in the United States it is the same as appeals to congress against | Supreme Court Decisions. Pepper as- sisted Kelly by claiming that the Communist Party is the only legal party, therefore, communist party | believes supreme court case is still| good. Lectures on Communist History A. W. Clayton, next State De- partment witness, described history of the first, second and third Inter-| nationals, and gave the develop-} ment of the American communist | movement from expulsion of 40,000 members of Socialist Party. Answer- | ing Borah regarding difference in American party’s principles before and after affiliation with the Inter- | given to the senators “in executis session.” He had nothing with whic to prove to. the American public tha the Russian government is endeavo) ing to destroy the American ment by a propaganda of video Hughes sent a letter to the sul committee, along with a great mas of photostatic copies and parti translations of Russian report speeches and so forth. These doct ments were in charge of Evan J Young, chief of the division of Has ern European affairs in the depar ment. Can't Read Russian, But when Young admitted that b could not read Russian, he we shelved, and R. F, Kelly, an inte per attached to the division, toe ig place, During the first day Kell offered in evidence nearly 100 <¢ these Russian statements, the sul stance of which wag disclosed j Senator Lodge’s speech some tir ago, The argument of the departmer was that the Russian Comment: Party controls the Russian govern ment, and that it also cones 2 Third International. If the International should be found 1 have expended money on fogeig propaganda, it assumed, this wou |be equally the act of the panty an the government. Senator Borah asked the witnes point-blank, whether he would pr: sent proof that the Russian goven ment furnished any money for th foreign revolutionary propagand and received the reply that the was no such evidence “made public but that “we shall be able to con municate in confidence, in executis session” some evidence of such: ut of Russian government funds, Bore answered that he, for one, did m want any evidence given in oonl dence. He saw no reason for & erecy, especially after the witne: conceded that nobody’s life would } imperilled if the testimony we: | made public, Forgets About Forged Document national he said the American party subsequently advocated force and vio- It was evident immediately th: Hughes had dropped the use of ti ESSEN,—Charles M. Schwab, it was me Charlie Schwab in the Ruhr Thinks Perhaps He’ll Solve Europe’s Tangl American capitalist, arrived tod reportedly for the purpose of negotiating with Ruhr industrialists. Schw: refused to disclose the purpose of his visit to the occupied areas, intimati ly for the purpose of informing himself on conditions her was driven underground and sub- jected to raids and deportations but he would not give Borah any figures of the numbers convicted and de- ported, : Clayton read from Secretary of ‘Labor Wilson’s deportation ruling and asserted that all courts and state departments since have decided | against communists and the Soviet | Government. The statement ignored the fact that Superior Court Judge | Anderson of Massachusetts ruled) that membership in the communist} party was not ground for deporta- tion. Post’s Book Put in Record Borah compelled Clayton to admit }that Ludwig Martens had not been sent from the country because of | |any anti-government activities on his | {part During the afternoon session | orah inserted sections of Louis F.) Post’s book on the “Deportations’ Delirium of 1920,” proving that Mar- tens was not deported because of his activities. Borah forced Clayton to admit that force and violence literature and propagandists in this country existed twenty years before the establish- ment of the Comintern. Clayton con- tinued reading documents and min- utes of the Comintern about organ- ization of the Workers Party and \the struggle in the party regarding the same. Followed exact method of Michigan prosecution. Swanson oc- casionally interrupted Clayton with request to insert in record the ngmes of the Comintern officials giving, ee # CALL HUGHES’ BLUFF. lence. He. said the American party) f By LAURENCE TODD WASHINGTON, — Secretary of | State Hughes’ bluff was called, on) Kelly opened his argument by|the opening day of Senator Borah’s| reading from Trotsky’s speech to the| subcommittee investigation into rea-| Tenth Congress of the All-Russian| sons why the American government | Soviets the statement that: “Soviet boundary is front line be-| Hughes’ reply yond which no counter-revolution don fidential” can go.” What this attempted to prove was not made clear. He also read a let- ter to Claude McKay, regardin; work among negroes. Senator Boral countered by proving that McKay had never used the letter here. Kelly then read portions of speeches by Zinovief, Radek, Bukarin, Steklov and the Red International of Labor Unions eens, the Industrial Work- ers of the World and the California Seamen's strike and the Comintern proclamation on the Vorovsky mur- | Shudders at Workers’ Hopes Russian hopes for world soviet re- iblics were voiced in extracts which elly read from the Federated Soviet constitution regarding the division of the world into imperialistic and pro- letarian camps, ‘was empha- sized by the state department's rep- resentative as showing a policy from which the American government should shrink, In another reading he showed that Russia ig @ country whose supreme refuses to recognize Russia, and) was 4 suggestion of | information, to be inoviev document dealir with the “ree: House.” Moreover, it was cleap the State Department spokesman not want Borah to bring it up. B: of the witness sat Wm. J, ‘Burr chief detective for the Departme of Justice, with J. E. Hoover, ma ager of the Palmer “red raids sponsors of the Zinovievy documer Across the room were seated Samu Gompers and his editorial secretar Chester M. Wright, while the spe allotted to the public was divided b tween reactionaries lberai crowding to hear the State Depa: ment’s revelations. Borah pressed the witness repes edly to prove his assertions as_ the responsibility of the Communi Party of Russia for the governme and for the Third International. } pointed, for example, to the sha contrast in policy toward Italy shov by the Russian government and t Third International, and to the ¢ velopment of the new economic icy against the resistance of Zinovie and asked how the department re onciled these historic facts with ! theory. Postal Clerks for International VIENNA.—The National Feder tion of Postoffice Clerks of the Unit States has recently applied for a mission into the International of t Postoffice and Telegraph Employes. Work Daily for “The Daily!” orged. Ta paaeaaabaabaabababhahiidd Workers of Brooklyn! Buy Your DAILY WORKER and other literature at the WORKERS HALL 1844 Pitkin Ave., Brooklyn. 2 GREETINGS. The ARMENIAN BRANCH of the Workers Party, at Whitinsville, Mass., hail the advent of a Daily Paper for the American Workers. fsermncownemn ' J. LOUIS ENGDAHL will speak on the BRITISH LABOR PARTY, THURSDAY NIGHT, JAN. 24TH, 8 P. M., at Workers Lyceum, 2733 Hirsch Boul. Auspices Maplewood Branch, Young Workers League.