The Daily Worker Newspaper, April 18, 1925, Page 10

The Struggle in Nova Scotia By MAURICE | SPECTOR HE immediate causes of the Nova Scotia: struggle were the refusal of the. British Empire Steel corpora- tion to restore. the credit to the miners at the company stores and to provide work of. at. least four days work a week. The twelve thousand miners of Nova Scotia inclusive of the main- tenance staffs, affecting fifty thousand men women and children, went out on a strike that Has already lasted over seven weeks, But behind the provocative cutting off of credits and sabotage of produc- tion was the determination of BESCO to force.a ten per cent wage cut be- low the 1924 rates, a determination in line with the Whole past policy of the corporation to reducs the living standards of the miners to the level of coolies and no less in line with the whole world wide capitalist offensive on the miners of the world under Dawes capitalism. HE: present one hundred per cent | strike’ is by no means the first great struggle of the miners against this ruthless corporation. At the pres- ent time when the Canadian middle classes, the politicians, priests, pars- ons, social service workers etc. are systematically confusing the root ‘auses of the struggle and blurring the class issues involved by their “relief” propaganda, it is necessary to shout from the house tops that cap- italism and only capitalism is respons- ible for the oppression, starvation and degradation of the miners. Nova Scotia is one of- the, sorest spots in Canadian capitalism. It is dominated by the gigantic British Empire Steel corporation, one of those war and post war products of capital- ist, concentration and monopoly. ESCO was formed by the merger of all the coal, iron and steel and shipbuilding companies of Nova Sco- tiag ‘Ghe merger was considerably facili- tated by the codl-land leases by which the kept politicians of the provincial government graciously gave to Besco practically all the coal in Nova Scotia —one of the richest fields in the world. ROM its inception, the policy of Besco has been par excellence to get something for nothing. _In the process of trustification, the already inflated capitalization of its consti- tuent companies was still furthered watered to the tune of over $19,000,-: 000: Successive governments have pampered Besco to a sickening degree. It has received over $8,000,000 in bounties and nearly three-quarters of a million dollars in remission of du- ties at the hands of kindly capitalist politicians. who will not hear a word about “demoralizing doles” for. the unemployed. r services to government depart- mel ts, e8CO | has received no less than $77,138,459. It has charged the government $39 a ton for rails which it was able to deliver to the foreign market for $24 a ton. But the ap petite of a corporation whose aim is to batten by restricting output and intensifying exploitation, is insatiable. Besco demands a still higher tariff from the government and still further wage reductions for the men. ACED by such an incarnation of capitalism as Besco, the miners of Nova Scotia have been driven along the channels of militancy and ‘class consciousness. Their condition has been that of direct poverty, and semi- starvation. Theirs has been the low- est wage scale of any district in the coal industry of North America. Work- ing an average of about one hundred and fifty days a year in the last three years, the Nova Scotia miner has av ed between $500 and $1,000 a year, a consequence of such condi- tions the miners have been forced to strike for a wage contract every year. As at the beginning of this year, the corporation has always demanded a wage-cut. Their experiences with the policies of Besco has developed these Canadian miners into one of the most eee radical sections of the United Mine Workers of America and the best class fighters in the Canadian labor movement, To the great alarm of the Canadian bourgeoisie and the trade union bureaucracy, this radicalism manifested itself in‘the miners’ at- tempt early in July 1923 to obtain permission (refused of course) from the U. M. W. of A. executive board to affiliate with the Red Labor Union International. The Communist Party became very influential in:the district. N July 1923 about 4,000 steel work- ers employed by Besco in Sydney went out on strike for recognition of their union and better conditions, At the behest of Besco the government rushed in thé militia, The miners de- manded the withdrawal of the military and when this was refused, went out on strike. At this point, the govern- ment, the military, and Besco were joined by their ally Lewis the bu- reaucrat head of the U. M. W. of A., who outlawed the miners’ strike as a “violation of contract.” The military coerced the miners, the government threw the strike leaders into prison on trumped-up charges of sedition, and Lewis served for his masters by arbitrarily deposing the radical miners’ executive and oppoint- ing his own henchmen, HE strike was mercilessly broken —but let it be remembered, not a mufmur of protest from the middle classes and uplifters. They enjoyed the spectacle as cheerfully~ as the breaking of the militant Winnipeg general strike a few years before. _ In September of the same year, the royal commission appointed to invest- igate the causes of the strike reported among reasons which are irrelevent, the low rate of wages, the long hours, the refusal of the company to recogn- ize the Steel Workers’ Union, irregul- ar employment, unemployment and the high cost of living: The report of the commission -broughtwith “it, of course, ‘nor improvement ~of* condi- tions. On the contrary, Besco pre- pared to present the miners with an- other ten per cent wage cut at the be- ginning of 1925. HE miners meanwhile seized their first opportunity when permission was finally granted to hold a conven- tion and to elect another executive which was regarded as left-wing and as likely to continue the fighting policies of Jim McLachlan who since his release from prison’ has been editor of the Maritime Lab In spite of the’ utmost ation of Lewis, the miners held*a firmly. to their unity.“ The : clique in Winnipeg who while not a union have large funds: accumulated from their profitable gambling compe- titions, endeavored to split the miners away from the U. M.-W. of A. but when they did not succeed, they man- | aged to split off'a few hundred miners in Pictou county. - Following Besco’s announcement that wages must be reduced, the min- ister of labor, the notorious Jimmy Murdock who had done so much to break the postal workers strike last summer, appointed a conciliation board under the Lemieux act to in- vestigate the dispute. About the same time the privy council in London decided that the Lemieux (industrial disputes investigation) act was in- valid as “ultra vires” of the federal house which had enacted it. But re- gardless of this decision, the “con- ciliation board” could have acecom- plished nothing much more than it did—which was merely to shake its head wisely, say it was too bad, and recommend another inquiry by royal commission. While applying for the board, Besco was going right ahead with its provocative arrangements for the lockout, , ge corporation resolved to pre- cipitate matters by the drastic weapon of starvation, Besco ordered its company stores to immediately eancel all further credits to the miners already on the brink of star- vation, and to extend its lockout at the southern collieries 2, 4 and 6. en the corporation refused to One. Big Union heed the ultimatum of the miners’ executive to restore credits and im- mediately provide at least four days work a week, the miners walked out: solidly taking the maintenance men with them. John L. Lewis at once wired Premier Armstrong that the withdrawal of the maintenance men was contrary to the laws and policy of'the U. M. W. But the miners paid no attention. HE strike was on—a one hundred per cent strike but from the very outset its leadership has been giving all true working class friends of the miners the gravest concern. The bour- geoisie adopted a way of trying to break the strike, in accord with a changed situation, The directors of Besco itself were unblushing in their frank avowals of determination to starve the miners out. Vice-President McLurg of Besco in a public interview openly declared his reason for believing that the miners couldn’t win to be that “they could not stand the gaff” that is, star- vation. But the bourgeoisie as a whole worked more cunningly. IRST, there is an election in the offing and military intervention by the King government, would be political capital for the tory opposi- tion thirsting for the fleshpots of of- fice. The tories have already exploited the Nova Scotia situation to discredit the liberals. Cynical tory politicians have slobbered all over the miners and have demanded from King that he send relief, knowing very well tha: he would take refuge behind the in- evitable British North America act and that they themselves were let out of dong anything. EXT, there is the genuine fear among the middle classes of the hold and progress of the ideas of the class struggle among the miners. They havea’ real fear and hatred of the’ influence of McLachlan, of the policies of the Maritime Labor Herald, of the prestige of the. Communist Party. They remember the applica- tidn for affiliation to the R. I. L. U. And they remember the militant strike of solidarity on behalf of the steel workers. So the cry has gone up among them as expressed by Canon Scott in his letter to Premier King that the dis- trict myst be “saved from Bolshe- visni.” The method of capitalist inter- vention’ ‘that has been adopted there- ore in this instance is not coercion but throttling the strike with “kind- liness.” HOWL suddenly goes up in the capitalist press and forums that a calamity has struck Nova Scotia. Re- lief must be sent immediately. The capitalist game is.to represent the crisis: as due to some sort of natural catastvéphe some earthquake or tidal wave or famine disaster—a pure case | for philanthropy. There was never word from these same sudden philanthropists when the miners of Western Canada were starving as they still are from the effects of a five wonths’ long struggle against the western coal operators. HE trade union bureaucracy has taken its cue as usual from the bourgeoisie. On behalf of the Trades Congress, President Tom Moore don- ated the paltry sum of $500 towards relief. He visited’ the scene of hos- tilities gave it the “once-over” and complacently returned to report in his Congress Journal that the days of “red” leadership of the district were over. Other than that $500—nothing. This Trades Congress affiliated with the Amsterdam International which in the emergency of the outbreak of war is pledged to declare a general strike, has not even convoked an emergency conference to consider active aid to the miners, The business of the Trades Congress was to mobilize such forces as it had to prevent a repetition of the disaster which overtook the isol-| ated struggle in District 18 (Western Canada) where company unionism has raised its head, ; ® UT all that Moore can think about is to “save the district from Bol- shevism.” To the same end Lewis himself jorneys down directly to ‘par- ticipate in the negotiations for a set- tlement. And what of tie leadership of the strike, the present miners’ executive? President McLeod obtained his office by virtue of support he received from the militants on the district, who were led to believe he was a sincere sym- pathizer of the left wing program and of the former Livingston-McLachlan executive, deposed by. Lewis. EVERTHELESS, consciously ‘or unconsciously McLeod ‘has been abandoning the 'roadof class struggle and has leaned on the charity-and the. « good will of themiddle )classes «andouf: trade union bureaucracy, "He “went so 2f°' far as publicly to deny tlrat the pol icies of his executive and those of the _ Maritime Labor (Herald under the editorship of Jim McLachln, were the same, This is a one hundred per cent strike but there has not been a single mass meeting of the men called since its beginning seven weeks ago. The maintenance men have been with- drawn but there has been no picket- ing of the maintenance men, the cor- poration has maintained. UT the worst action of McLeod and his associates on the execut- ive—an action tantamount to a be- trayal--and one, that evoked sharp protest from the rank and file has been his behaviour towards the $5,000 that the Russian workers sent in the name of international solidarity. The McLeod executive had allowed all relief activity to fall into the hands of the bourgeois’ citizens committee formed in Glace Bay, The Russian money was sent thru Jim McLachlan to the miners and when he offered it to the citizens’ committee, the gang of parsons, priests; politicians, lawyers, etc., who make it up flatly turned it down on the ground that its accept- ance would hinder the “public” from giving. This was a bare faced piece of sahotage of the class interests of the workers and internationalism, It was an insult and slap in the face to the Russian workers. and the R. I. L. U. but neither McLeod nor any of his executive registered the angry and categorical protest that was due on behalf of the miners, IHESE actions of McLeod’s have evoked sharp warnings from the Communist .Party.. The C Party would not and will not do any- thing that could be interpreted as dis- rupting the ranks of the miners at the moment of. struggle. But that is pre- cisely why it has not.-been able to remain silent without warning the— thiners of Nova Scotia against the poison of class collaboration and the example of Sherman in District 18 who was. also once elected on a left wing ticket and then went over to the reactionaries, The capitalist press is already ex- ultantly drawjng its conclusions from the “moderate” tactics of McLeod, Whatever the outcome of. the. strugele,, the left wing and the Communists , have been a thousand times justified in their program— when they demand- ed amalgamation, a clean sweep of the yellow bureaucracy from the of- fice, when they demand Canadian trade union autonomy, a Trades Con- gress with real executive power and international trade union unity, § Keedcoong the outcome of the struggle, the Communists and the left-wing continue to make the nationalization of the mines under workers’ control more of an issue than ever before. The immediate program that the Communist Party has been propagating, mines nationalization, @ six hour day, a minimum wage and closer ,unification..of the miners or- ganizations in Canada shust be push- . ed with the greatest possible vigor, Get a sub for the DAILY WORKER. from your shopmate and you will make another mem. ber for your branch, ———,)