The Daily Worker Newspaper, August 30, 1924, Page 18

| er ae or ae Oo By J, LOUIS ENGDAHL, HE steel czar has spoken, Judge Elbert H. Gary, chairman of the United States Steel Corporation, has expressed himself on the outlook for the 1924 presidential campaign. His optimism may be stimmed up in the three short words: “I AM PLEASED!” * . * Nonpartisan in Politics. The billion dollar steel trust is sat- isfied that the results of the Novem- ber elections will not disturb the equanimity of the capitalist system. It indulges in this self-assurance two months before the elections. But the reason for this optimism, is readily understood when the non-par- tisanship in politics of the steel in- dustry is analyzed. * * * For Donkey and Elephant. Judge Gary is republican in polities. . The Fascist, Charles Gates Dawes, re- publican candidate for vice-president, is Gary’s ideal. When Dawes talks about getting the “commen sense” vote, Gary knows that Dawes means the vote that will allow the steel trust to continue its heavy profit-taking. Charles H. Schwab, head of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation, perhaps the largest among the independents, is also republican. But down in Alabama, Oscar Under- wood, of the Gulf Coast Steel Co., is the democratic senator from that state, and the perennial aspirant for the presidential nomination in demo- cratic conventions. “24 for Alabama —24 for Underwood!” was one of the monotone exclamations repeated al- most without ending at the Madison Square Garden convention of the dem- ocratic party. The steel industry is republican in republican Pennsylvania. It is demo- cratic in dethocratic Alabama. That's because the steel industry is non-par- tisan in politics. * * * Coolidge Talks Nonsense. Big business will permit the two old parties to claim, im as loud tones as they desire, that they are the friends of labor. In fact, that has al- ways been its policy. The Republican Campaign Text Book for 1924, just out, issued by the Republican National Committee, de- votes Chapters XVI, XVII and XVIII, in telling what the republican party has done for labor. The chapter head- ings are “Labor Record of the Presi- dent,” six pages; “Labor and the Re- publican Party,” ten pages, and “Wo- men and Children in Industry,” seven pages. But, the whole philosophy of the re- publican party toward labor may be summed up in “Cautious Cal” Cool- idge’s own declaration, prominently featured, that “No progress was ever made by regarding mankind as cheap.” That was Coolidge’s stand in veto- ing the bonus for the soldiers. He wouldn’t cheapen their patriotism by putting a cheap price on it. Perhaps that is why nothing is done for the unemployed. It would cheapen the jobless to be paid doles equal to their regular pay, to get a few crusts of bread. If Coolidge intended any oth- er meaning for his silly nonsense, an alienist ought to be appointed to con- duct an investigation and try to dis- cover it. nti . . Democrats Will Perjure Selves. - The democratic campaign book had not been issued at this writing. But it will carry the same bunk about the friendship of John “Wall Street” Davis and Charles W. Bryan, for the working class. In order to make a case for them- selves, the democrats will have to lie a little better than the republicans. This will be easy, for they are on the outside at the*present time, look- ing in, and they would commit any brand of-perjury in order to get on the inside. ’ Davis will claim again that he de- fended “Mother” Mary Jones and Eu- gene V. Debs, against the czarist rule of the West Virginia coal barons, whereas it has been shown that di- rectly the opposite is true; he prose- cuted and persecuted them to advance and safeguard the interests of the mine owners. The democratic and republican can- didates are, therefore, alike in their pretensions of friendliness for labor. All old party candidates are friendly to labor—before election day. They are just as friendly as they can be. Some of them even kiss the babies of the workers on their campaign tours. But that is before election day. Even Benito Mussolini, the Fascist dictator of Italy, claims he is the friend of the working class of Italy. The assassin of the workers in Italy, with hands dripping blood, professes to be the friend of his victim. That it HRU theft, fraud, corruption, tunes for themmselves.” * « I to mobilize the workers and inal syndicalist laws to suppress of these industries.” s > is about the position of the candi- dates of the democrats and republi- cans in this campaign. + * * Get “Labor Lieutenants” Cheap. It is not surprising that there are labor officials endorsing both the po- litical expressions of Wall Street in this campaign. It is an easy thing to buy up American labor leaders. They come cheap. Major George L. Berry, the Ameri- can Legion head of the Printing Pressmen’s Union, éontinues to lick the boots of the demogratic party. He has come out in support of the “Davis- Bryan” ticket, after being kicked in the face at Madison Square Garden and told to take his vice-presidential aspirations elsewhere. But at least he was allowed to have his name placed in nomination, John L. Lewis, president of the United Mine Workers of America, was merely mentioned, long before the re- publican convention met at Cleveland, as a vice-presidential possibility. His name was never considered, however, by the Cleveland convention. Lewis, like Berry, nevertheless, would rather get kicked in the face by the bosses, than fight the bosses on behalf of the working class he is sup- posed to represent. Lewis, the head of one of the most radical organizations of American la- bor, has done the well-nigh impossible thing of endorsing the “Coolidge- Dawes” candidacy. But he has com- mitted that crime against the great membership of his organization. Lewis is now a member of the ad- visory committee of the Coolidge Campaign. Only the campaign itself can develop the kind of advice that Lewis intends handing the Fascisti From the Communist Platform of profit taking, this capitalist class has become the owner of the land, raw materials and machinery of production upon which the workers and farmers are dependent for a livelihood.” (("J"HEY (the workers) are compelled to accept a low standard of living in order that the capitalists may amass ever greater for- (THE Workers Party declares its purpose to continue the struggle ticket of the republican party in or- der to win a few straggling labor votes. Both Berry and Lewis are as alike as two peas in that they have shown themselves good strikebreakers for the bosses. Berry’s yellow leg activi- ties in breaking the strike of the New York pressmen and the bosses’ war that Lewis helped wage against Alex- ander Howat, in Kansas, are so well known to the readers of the DAILY WORKER, that they only need men- tioning here. The records of Berry and Lewis compare well with the strikebreaking records of the old party candidates they have endorsed. Coolidge’s strike- breaking record in Massachusetts, bribery and the capitalist system exploited formers for independent political action thru a mass Farmer-Labor Party.” * * ("HE Workers Party calls upon the workers and exploited farmers to fight with it against the use of injunction in labor disputes, intimidation of strikers thru police and soldiers, and the use of crim- ~ the demands of the reolutionary workers, as well as other infringements on the rights of the workers.” it) E demand the nationalization of all means of transportation and industries engaged in the preparation and distribution of farm products, with participation of the farmers in the management s("f"HE Workers Party is fighting for the rule of thirty millions of workers and their families in the United States. be established thru a Proletarian Revolution which will create a Soviet.Government and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat.” <a eo This rule will iT} OTE against the three capitalist candidates and for the Com- munist candidates—Foster and Gitlow.” where he smashed the policemen’s strike, need not now stand out in such great prominence. It has t record of John L. Lewis, president of the Miners’ Union, in Kansas, Nova Scotia and elsewhere, to keep it com- pany. *>- ¢+ # This Smell Goes Far. Just by way of parenthesis it. may be mentioned that the strikebreaking records of both Berry and Lewis have been endorsed, one hundred per cent, by Samuel Gompers,; president of the American Federation of Labor, who has come out for Senator LaFollette for president. The smell of a scab goes far, like that of a polecat. So there is enuf for LaFollette, too. Per- haps Gompers thot that LaFollette’s program for his so-called, imaginary “clean government” extended even tc the cleansing of polecats. That might explain the strange alliance of the hea@ of the American Federation of Labor with the Wistonsin senator. * *£ & “Big Biz’ Knows Where to Go, Steel is republican in Pennsylvania and democratic in Alabama. When Wall Street picks its labor lieuten- ants it gets its democrats, either among the Tammany Hall ranks in New York, or it goes into the “Solid South.” ‘“Majah” Berry comes from Tennessee. Wall Street gets its re- publican “labor” stool pigeons from somewhere in the north. Lewis comer from Illinois. T. V. O'Connor, of the shipping board, formerly of the Long- shoremen’s Union, is out for Coolidge. O'Connor is from the North. *._ * &€ Nonpartisan on Klan. This nonpartisanship of Big Busi- -to the LaFollette-Wheeler ticket. LE LLL LLL LLL LLL LL LL LLL LLL LL LLL LAL, Workers! Give Judge Gary Your Abswerl ness, in the selection of its labor lieu- tenants, also extends to its support of the Ku Klux Kian. In a northern state, like Indiana, rock-ribbed repub- lican, the Klan is also republican. The same is true in Maine, where “Brass Tacks” Dawes’ran into this is- sue on his recent Bastern trip. Dawes, better than anyone else, sees the Fas- cisti possibilities of the Klan, and altho he apparently denounced its tactics he lauded it for its attacks on the workers, especially its attacks against-the coal miners in Southern. lillinois and elsewhere. When the time comes “Hell an’ Maria” will in- vite all the Klansmen to join his “Minute Men of the Constitution.” But in the South, in Oklahoma and Texas, where the democratic party happens to dominate, there the Ku Klux Klan is democratic. Big Busi- ness doesn’t care whether it wears the skin of the G. O. P. elephant, or the hide of the democratic donkey, as long as it dominates the local situa- tion. ** 6 Mask May Be Torn Off. It is possible that Big Business, after this years’ campaign, will be compelled to throw its mask aside and come out into the open, definitely naming its political expression. It cannot always continue its Punch and Judy show. : There should be no doubt this year about who is to gain by the elec- tion of either the democratic or re publican candidates. Coolidge is the figurehead of the biggest open shop- pers. His campaign’ manager is Wil- liam Morgan Butler, the textile multi- millionarie, proud open shop lord over New England’s unorganized textile mills. Dawes is the head of the Cen- tral Trust Company, one of Chicago’s biggest banks. A ‘million hoops of steel couldn’t tie the republican ticket closer to the predatory business inter- ests of the nation. On the democratic side it has already been shown that Davis is the lawyer of the House of Morgan. Davis says he-has renounced his Wall Street connections for the purposes of the campaign: But that is easier said that done. Davis remains the corporation lawyer, the legal lackey of his class, the defender of the open shoppers of his own state of West Virginia, and of the great robber bar- ons of his adopted New York City. *- * * Face Oppressors Both Ways. Whichever way the workers turn, as between the two old parties, they are face to face with thelr oppres- sors. Millions have discovered this fact this year, and are blindly turning La- Follette, the repubilcan! Wheeler, the democrat! Both the enemies of the class interests of the workers and farmers. Both the defenders of the present order of things. But the La- Follette candidacy has been ably dealt with in the series of artfcles by Jay Lovestone appearing in these col-— umns.. These articles should be read and reread, *e2 ¢ Vote Communist in November. It should be apparent to the millions of American workers this year that their interests are only ehampioned by the Communist candidates of the Workers’ Party; William Z. Foster, for president, and Benjamin Gitlow, for vice president. This year the Conimunist standards are flung to the breeze for the first time in a national campaign in this country. Let the oppressed workers de- sert their enemies and their betrayers, Let them rally to the rapidly growing Communist ranks and.give their sup- port to the Foster-Gitlow ticket. Only in so doing will they make progress for their class in this election. * * * Give Gary Your Answer. Only in so doing will they freeze the words, “I am pleased,” upon the lips of the arch oppressor of labor, Judge Gary, head of the great Am- erican Steel Trust, Workers! Give Gary your answer!