The Daily Worker Newspaper, September 4, 1925, Page 6

i } i workers are also discussing a security pact—against, cap- : Whieago judge is hardyon n grons. eet usually hard on each after: «Published by the DAILY WORKER PUBLISHING CO. | 8118 W. Washington Blvd,, Chicago, In. Phone Monroe 4712) es Gane SUBSCRIPTION RATES By mail (in Chicago only): By mall (outside of Chicago)? $8.00 per year $4.50 six months | $6.00 per year $3.50 six months 5 $2.50 three months $2.00 three months Address all mail and make out checks to THE DAILY WORKER, 1118 W. Washington Bivd., Chicago, lilinofe J. LOUIS ENGDAHL WILLIAM F, DUNNE MORITZ J. LOEB Business Manager er een ED Watered ay second-class mail September 21, 1923, at the post-office at Chi- cago, Itl, under the act of March 3, 1879. * Se ______~CM A vortining rates om application: Butler May Not Ran There ‘is a report current in republican party headquarters that Wm. Butler, grand strategist of the G. O. P. council of war will not stand for the senatorial seat vacated by the death of Henry Cabot Lodge and which was filled by Butler by presidential: appointment. Butler is one of the biggest mill barons of the country. Despite ——__—| bi Speech by Comrade C, E. Ruthenberg on the Labor Party Campaign of the ~eWorkers (Communist) Party at the Fourth Convention Just Adjourned in Chicago. \ OMRADES: ‘This resolution we are now discussing provides the basis for a continuation of the labor party policy. It lays down the detailed pol- icy which our party is to follow in carrying on this campaign. However, comrades, it is equally important in relation to this resolution that our party be mobilized for this campaign, that also the party secure a funda-| mental understanding of why, in the United States, at the present time, the labor policy must be one of the chief policies of our party, if not the chief policy of our party. Why is it, com- rades, that we must carry on this cam- paign? It is not sufficient that the member- the protection of a high tariff wall, the owners of the textile industry claim they are unable to pay their employes anything like a living wage. Only recently the textile slaves were given a ten per cent slash in wages, and President Coolidge saw nothing in this except a ‘Justifiable effort to help the industry. The textile workers who had to reef in their belts a little more after the latest wage cut do not hold the same high opinion of But- ler that Coolidge does. Butler is an able servant of his class. He is| very satisfactory to them and his place is in the senate. But even capitalist candidates need votes to get elected. And it quite possible that the workers of Massachusetts and the textile workers in par- ticular, might be so lacking in enthusiasm for the textile baron that his opponent may slip in. Not that his opponent will do any more for labor in the senate than Butler did. But he is not, at least not yet, as closely hitched to the big business machine as Butler is. Tf Butler contests the election against Walsh, the democratic candidate, and loses, it will be a great blow to the prestige of the re- publican party, and will have the effect of defeating the Coolidge myth. If he fails to enter the fight, it will be a confession of weak- ness and this will only be little less injurious to the prestige of the G. O. P. Like the religious fatalist, who believed he was born only to go to hell, Butler is “damned if he does and damned if he doest’t.” What the workers of Massachusetts should do in order to use the election for the purpose of exposing Butler, the mill exploiter, ‘the , capitalist system and its harlot political parties is to raise the stand+ ard of working class political action under the banner of a labor Calles Made Good Before his inauguration as president of Mexico, Plutarco Calles visited Europe and on his return via New York he ‘participated in a parade organized by the socialist party in that city. ; _ On last May Day, Mexican labor celebrated the workers’ inter‘ national holiday with red flags and revolutionary hymns. Calles’re- viewed the parade and tipped his hat to the red flags. i _ Shortly afterwards the employés of the American oil kings wetit on strike and Calles threatened to’use'the army against them. Bank clerks struck and Calles brought the mailed ‘fist down on their; heads. Wall Street was chuckling. “Calles was doing nicely. But ‘Wall Street is not easily satisfied. It‘knows that half a loaf is better than no bread. But it wants the entire loaf when it can have it: Suddenly, like a bolt from the blue sky came the harsh state ment of Secretary of State Kellogg, eriticizing the Mexican govern- ment for its failure to protect American lives. Calles came back like a ton of mortar and the socialists shouted: “Atta boy, Plutarco;)| you are givin’ ’em hell.” Only the Communists advised all and sundry, to ‘wait for developments. ‘ } . Since the exchanges between Calles and the U. 8. secretary of state things have moved fast in Mexico. Calles has proceeded to write off the books whatever reforms were accomplished by the revo- lution. A few days ago it was announced that a law would be in- troduced to make so-called unofficial strikes illegal. There is reason to believe now that the United States government is satisfied with the progress made by Calles in preparing the way itt Mexico for complete domination of that country by American capital. Calles may still tip his hat to the red flag. But to him it means no more than the red flag that flies over an open manhole. Which is| further proof that a person’s loyalty to a principle cannot be judged by the button on his coal lapel or even by the words that flow from | his lips. Actions speak louder than words. | *| gulf between the working masses who ship of our party agree to the carry- ing on of the campaign; it is equally necessary that the party be educated to an understanding of what underlies the policy and the campaign ‘we are proposing. It was one of the chief weaknesses of our party in the labor| party campaign in the past that our party as a whole did not grasp, did not understand, the reason why we had such a slogan and waged such a campaign, WANT to present as my contribu- tion to this part of the discussion briefly the underlying motives that make this campaign necessary. In the United States we know that the masses of workers have not yet’ be- come class conscious. We. know that the masses of workers are still sup- porting the republican and democratic parties and we know that the masses of workers have not developed a mass party of the workers to fight their bat- tles on the political field. In each of the European countries we find the development of capitalism ‘and the working class has reached the point that the workers have cut loose from the capitalist parties . . they were sufficiently conscious to form mass Parties thru which they carried on their struggle. Social-democratic par- ties and the labor pafties have de- veloped in European countries. So we heve an entirely distinct situation in the: United States as compared with the, European capitalist countries and We, must find a means of bridging the are still republicans and democrats and. the revolutionary party of the workers, the Communist Party. It is 1¢ Jabor party which serves as the wridge fo that gulf. We may ask our- selyes why it is, why is the labor party the form of organization which we must advocate, fight for, in. order | to.draw the workers out-of the old par- | ties and draw them into independent | Political action as a class, | ATHY the labor party as the means ‘YY of arriving to that goal? What is there peculiar to the labor party| ‘which makes it the effective means of he Basis f HE DAILY WORKER that the workers havé’ developed or- gans of struggle for the immediate de- mands in the factories. They have or- ganized trade unions; they have or- ganized these as the means of carry- ing on the struggles of various sec- tions of thé working class against their employers for better conditions and better wagés. These organs, however, represent today the means of fighting the struggles of various groups of the workers. The miners have their union, the needle workers their union, the railroad workers their union. They represent not or- gans of struggle in tHe ‘interests of their class, but in the ferest of cer- tain sections of the ‘Working class. Now, our Communist dit}, our funda- mental Communist aim, ‘must be to de- velop out of these instruments for struggle in the interest of sections of the working class, an instrument, a means for struggle in the interests of the workers as a class.’ In other words, we must find a unifying slo- gan;; we must find a method of bring- ing together the worker's in the mines, the workers in the textile industries, which will give them a cdmmon basis of action, a common organ thru which they struggle against capitalism. We must find the means of unifying the struggles of groups of workers into a struggle of the working class. That is our central Communist pur- pose in this’ stage of development of the working class and it is just be- cause the Labor Party is such a unify- ing organ of struggle that it is the most effective policy at this stage in the United States. The Labor Party will unify the workers of the machine shops, in the mines, in the railroads, in the textile factories in a common struggle for class interest common to all groups as agtinst the trade unions which is the organ of struggle for the interest of sections of the working class, And & ‘second reason that the labor party slogan is.s0 important to our present ‘situation,, We must not only develop struggle ds& claws but we must develop a struggle politically against the capitalist government by the working class. This is the sécond part of the immediaté tasks of the Communist Party in +this country. First unifying the strugéles of the workers: Secondly, ditecting the struggle against the capitalist state Power and the labor party, drawing the workers into political struggles as a class also “drawing them into a struggle against the capitalist state Power, The: labor party therefore serves effectively to %achieve the two fundamental: tasks ofthe Communist Party in the United States at the pres- ent time and for that redten it is and must be one)of «the: mst’ important weapons, the most important policy of the Communist: Party*}w'this country at the present time, 2si>) owe: rps, comrades, must be part of the immediate program “of ‘our party that we discuss this which “I have stated not in a ten minute spéech, but in discussion in the patty press, in achieving that end? Comrades, what We find in the United States today is| educational work amongst our party members in wrder that the party “un- ar the Continuation of the Labor Party Policy this struggle and when we have that understanding we will be able to mo- bilize our party for the struggle and actually make achievements in cafry- ing out this policy to build a labor party. Now as to the resolution itself. We have laid down:in this resolution in detail, thé methods which we shall use for this campaign. We have first said that we must base it upon the im- mediate demands and experiences of the working class, And comrades I submit that that was always true in our labor party campaign. I know that I have never written an article or a manifesto for the party or a leaf- let for the party that the labor party policy was not based upon an argu- ment—the capitalists use injunctions against you, the capitalists use the state power against you in strikes, the capitalists use the state power in leg- islative work against the working class, These experiences of yours should teach you that you must or- ganize a party of your own, that thru which you can struggle against this capitalist state power. Just as we have done that in the past, just as we have shown thru the interference of Harding in the miners’ strike thru the use of the Daugher' injunction inl the railroad strike, thi these are the reasons why the wor! ers must mobilize their strength poli- tically in a labor party, so locally, so on a state scale, so nationally, we must use the experiences and demands of the workers for their immediate: struggle as an argument pointing to the labor party as the means of car- rying on the struggle for these de- mands. The resolution states so. Our policy is that we shall go into the local unions to fight there for the resolutions to put the organization on record for a labor party but we shall not stop with resolutions. We shall organize in these unions where we are able to carry our resolutions, committees to carry on agitation in the trade union movement for the la- bor party. We shall go into the or- ganizations of the C. P. P. A. which sti exist and have support in the trade union movement and we shall there carry on the agitation for a labor party and if we are able to put such organizations on record for a labor party we shall tiére form committees to carry on the agitation on a broad scale and if we succeed in organizing such committees in the trade unions and in the C. P. P. A. then we shall bring them together to earry on a common agitational cam- paign for a labor party. y= we shall also go into non-par- tisan committees which have mass support from the local unions and there carry on the campaign for a labor party. We shall go into the central labor bodies and there carry on the agitation thru resolutions and set up committees where we succeed in-achieveing an endorsement for con- tinued agitation in the whole trade union movement of a city for the la- bor party thus developing the basic ‘support in the trade unions, in the derstands thut we are carrying on By EDMUNDO PELUSO (Rome) When history repeats itself, the repetition in invariably a caricature of the original event. Mussolini has | looked on whilst the Soviet Union suc- cessfully fought the battles of the grain and of the ruble; and this has now induced him to declare that he is | going to fight the battle of the grain The Riffians Score The joint campaign conducted against the Riffian tribesmen | of Morocco is hitting snags. French commanding generals are being | capi which is a sure indication that things are not going well with the invaders. ‘ The French and British censorship is clamped down tight and “the correspondents are not allowed to send out any news. This Prohibition, however, did not prevent the story of the greatest dis- ister suffered’ by ‘the French and Spanish during the war. ~~ A’Spaiiish transport with 1,000 foreign legion troops aboard was sunk by Riffian fire and all the troopers perished. This does not bear out the lowing reports issued @ few days ago by a Chicago | nothing more nor less than the Italian and of the lira. He has called together his general staff, in order to discuss the strategy of the campaign. His officers are | | big landowners and big peasants, and | the object of the campaign is to dis- cover how agrarian production can | best be carried ‘on at the expense of the Italian proletariat. One can see) how much resemblance there is be-| tween the battles fought by Mussolini | and those fought by the Soviet Union! In the Soviet Union the grain | battle was fought by the working and peasant class to their own advantage, | Tribune reporter who pictured the advance of the Spanish-French 2 forces on land, sea and air, in a way’ that left nothing but defeat ~ staring Abd-tl-Krim in the face. ~ The disdstér to the Spanish.transport’may cause serious political disturbances in Spain. It is known that the vice-president of the directory, who is second in command to dictator Primo De Rivera, Was Uppoxed’ to the landing of the»treops at the point where the sinking took place. This disagreement in addition to the dissatisfac- tion at home over the costly Morocean campaign may bring about the downfall of the dictatorship. The Riffians appear to be holding up their end pretty well. The surrender of tlie British and Japanese to the Chinese gives them additional encouragement. The imperialist. powers are not partic- ularly fortunate in their efforts to press the crown of thorns farther down.on the brow of the subject peoples those days. And, in the , + . fords of the comic strip artist: The worat is yet to,come, t “phe European capitalist powers are still discussing the security This is not surprising. POET! on. a OA ta ay f he local hog market displiys strength” says a~headline, “So e odor from the stockyards, tanbertrovnine In Italy precisely the contrary is tak- ing place. What decision must a general staff of big agrarians, under the chairman- ship of the leader of fascism, in- evitably arrive at? Could they come to the conclusion that the right | method of obtaining more corn is to| increase the area under cultivation, to improve the methods of cultivation, to’provide the peasantry with more efficient agricultural stock and im- plements, to sell them fertilizers at possible prices, and to ease the heavy load of taxation—the methods taken by the government of the Soviet Union? Such a de¢ision cannot be ex- pected from such a body. for the big agrarians are only capable of draw- ing up a strategic plan defending their own interests and privileges, and thrusting the whole of the burdens of the struggle upon the working peas- ants. " Italy, as is well known does not pro- duce snfficient corn for its consump- tion “It is obliged to buy consider. ble quantities abroad, and.to pay for this in gold. On the othef hand, the area in Italy which could be em- ployed for partially coveting the de- ficit is at present cultivated with History Repea Sugar beets and tobacéd. Land -emin- ently adapted for growing corn, and for the production of raw materials required by the textile industry, and entirely unsuited ta growing beets and tobacco, is still being used for this latter purpose. But what does that matter? The government has to sup- Port the sugar industry, and pays high premiums to the cultivators of Sugar beets and tobacco. The big agrarians abandon all patriotism when their money bags are threatened! Thus Mussolini will ‘not take away from the “big “ is a hand’s breadth of théir land inorder to force them to charige the kindof crops they cultivate. He will inue to pay them high premiumis, Hut has at the | Same time isued the Ofder that the yield per hectare of under corn cultivation has to be" The peasant may moisten earth with the sweat of his he may buy machines if he can; h purchase fertilizer if the prices Wictated by the trusts permit him to tfo'so; the tas- cist government has "% eart for the big agrarian only. Thi rotective tar- iff has rendered the of agricul- tural machinery unattainable for the majority, and where thé peasants’ co- operatives have con ed to buy a machine, the fascists Nave destroyed the co-operative by fir } and sword, The taxes, made so iy for the big agrarians, have been fiicreased again political organization of labor as the tle. The depreciation of the lira, now very serious (during the last few weeks the dollar has risen to 27-29 lire as compared with a pre-war par of slightly over five lire!) tho partially to be ascribed to the enormous debts owing by Italy to America and Eng- land (about 100 milliard lire!), is also greatly due to the adverse foreign trade balance consequent on the pur- chase of grain and other nidispensible raw materials and necessities of life, and on the general mistrust felt to- wards fascism, and spreading even in bourgeois circles. The depreciation of the lira in July was such as the exchanges of Italy have never before experienced. The small investors and petty bourgeoisie, living on a few million lire invested in state bonds, have been séized with complete, panic. The medium manu- facturers are equally alarmed, Musso- lini, and even more the notorious party secretary Farinacci, were at first of the opinion that the best means of alaying the panic was to at- tack it with a cudgel. But tho Far- inacci regards historical évents with Ro more comprehension than felt by a cow looking at a picture of Raphael’s, in this case he has been obliged to see that he was on the wrong track. A better means had to be sought. High finance has pointed this out. First of all it has demanded the head of the minister of finance, Stefani, as and again for the boor peasantry, un- til many of them have fled to France, where conditions are not quite so bad. Manures and fertilizers have become the property of a monopoly in the hands of the Society Montecatini, and this company yells them at prices almost equal to that of ‘bread, Briefly stated, Mussdlini has lost his battle before he has in to fight it at all, “But perhaps it'was merely a demagogic bluff. ‘Thé'big agrarians and the “big industriafists of Italy Paved the way for ism, called it into existence, and they are not Ukely to allow Mi Ml to carry on 4 fight against them, pyen if he had The other battle, that of the lira, is closely bound up with the grain bat- f : WN ever had any intentio# of doing so. | scapegoat, and has insisted on his be- ing substituted by the confidential ag- ent of high finance, Count Volpi. The dismissed minister of finance and the exchequer, Stefani, is‘a uni- versity professor. He is in ‘or of theories harmless to bourgeois inter- ests so long as they remain theories; but as soon as the interests of capital- ism are endangered, the bourgeois in- dustrial magnates lose their respect for even their university professors. What crime did Stefani, a leading fascist, then commit? After having balanced the budget at the expense of the working class, reducing or abolish- ing the taxes paid by the owning| ‘The: classes and, discharging tens of thousands of officials, he was seized with the idea jing the value Committee: of» Action, é . That is basically the policy laid down in this resolution. We shall use the municipal elec- tions this year for the propagating of the labor party idea thru first propos- ing a united labor ticket, and com- rades, to-show you that there can be achievements I cite the fact that in Lima, Ohio, where the central labor council adopted a resolution after their experiences with the LaFollette movement to’keep out of all politics for the future, we had an active mem- ber of our party, Scott Williams by name, who in spite of this resolution of the central labor council expressing the disgust of that body and its ex- periences jn. the last election, went into the local unions to carry on agi- tation, secured endorsement and got the endorsement. of the central labor body for a labor party for which a committee was, formed. The commit- tee nominated candidates in the city election and succeeded in nominating two of them in'the final city election showing that it is possible today to secure results for our labor party ‘ATURALLY we must not get the notion, comrades, from the use of the election campaigns for agitation for the labor party that the labor party is merely a machinery for enter- ing into election campaigns. That comrades, would be a wrong concep- tion of the labor party. Not only for eletcion campaigns but for other struggles of the working class for parliamentary action, yes, but also for political action outside of the election campaigns, must the labor pwty be an instrument for work anigig the masses of this country. Our resolution goes farther, lays down our relationship to the existing farmer-labor parties. on the basis of the C. I. decision. It declares that we shall in’ the existing farm- er-labor les. We shall work build up a labor bloc and form the labor party and make a united front with the. organizations of the farmers in a bloc form. of some character and further then thet, the resolution also teaches another phase which is of the utmost importance and that is the role of our party in the labor party. We have made errors in that respect in the.past..,,You remember how in April-May.of dast year we had certain opportunistic.developments in Detroit, We had certain comrades in Minneso- ta who. bi d.aWrong policy, the wrong tactics inothat respect and it. is vital that our,party.at,the same time that it reorientates itself to an understand- ing of thedahor, party policy. also has a clear go} tion of the role of the Workers im such a labor party. vq GEL £ WwW agolare, that wherever a labor Party.; organization exists we shall enter-inte it. We shall affiliate with, it. We shall participate in its work, We. declare that where such a labor party. enter into the election campaigns;we shall nominate Com- munist ¢amdidates on the labor party ticket in the primaries and these Com- Progressive Political of the lira by restricting the bank notes in circulation. The ceremonies which he performed in the Banca d'Italia, where he caused millions in bank notes to be burned before a large number of spectators, verged on the ridiculous. The Italian banks, whose steel chambers contained tons of in- dustrial papers bought at high prices, and accumulations -of state bonds, found themselves obliged to throw quahtities of these papers on the mar- ket in order to have necessary bank- notes for their operations. This meant considerable: losses to the banks. The fall of the lira in July filled the cup to overflowing. In view of the re- bellion onthe part of high finance, Mussolini had to sacrifice his minister and to accept as confidential agent T the . ‘st national cong! of many, printed statistics were submit- ted giving .the most detailed parti- culars for, the period from October 1924 to April 1925 as to the number of trials, accusations, the sentence: to fortreds. impr: mment, inary im. prigsonment, and’ penal servitude, 2! well fines imposed, The total statistics | regarding the’class justice against the working class (January Ist 1924 to’ April 31st '1925) show that the Ger- man class judges accomplished a ter- rible work in these 16 months. The figures show a total of: 981 trials, 7,000 accused persons, 5,786 condemned persons, 959 years 8 months fortress im-) prisonment, ' “oN 969 years 1. month imprisonment with hardlabor, 2,256 years 4 months imprisonment, 283,261 marks fines. j From this it is to be seen that 6,786 | not include the yeurs, it while awaiting ures and the enforced suicides; “aswell those persons why Aldstsnc.- gles. There is no doubt whatever that Terrible Statistics as to German Class Justic the International Red Aid in Ger-| fro: ‘Hounced three death sentences, 71 munist, eandidates shall run not a¢ labor, party-ites, but as Communigts, standing on’ the Communist’ progfam of the Soyiet government and the dic tatership.of, the proletariat as the wl- timate:aims, but carrying on the struggle while at the same time ‘rais- ing immedate issues of the class struggle. If our candidates are nom: inated on the labor party ticket. they will run in the election campaign’ as Communists with a full Communist program and when they are elected to office they will enter into their du- ties aé/-Comunists and carry on a Comhiunist struggle in the legislative bodies to which they are elected. We deelaré, therefore, that we must at all times ‘carry on our Communist prop- aganda:” Yes, the labor party is’ the means’ of reaching’ the masses of workers with our propaganda, not hid- ing ourselves, not obscuring oursélves, not minimizing our program, but’ ¢ar- tying on systematic ‘agitation among the ‘workers we draw into the labor party for the Communist princtplés; for, the Communist program and re- cruiting from labor party the most, active elements\for our Communist Workers Party. coe ae 8 % It-is on! we follow both parts of the labor party policy that we will make the fullest. use of that? policy. The first part is to draw the workers out of the old, parties, to draw t workers into the class political tion, to draw the workers into a strug- gle against the capitalist state.. The second part is to use the labor party as the means of developing the power and strength of our Communist Party. As a means for propaganda, as-a means for recruiting to our party in strengthening our party, building it into a mags Communist Party. Com- rades, if we can mobilize our party for an effective efficient campaign on the basis laid down in the present resolution, if we can develop the en- ergy, the enthusiasm which was put into that campaign in 1923, if we can again reach out among the masses, establish our prestige and influence among them, our party will be on the right road again and we will have substantial. progress in extending its influenceeand in building its member- ship... te ae OMRADBS,.I'think that from this brief‘ statement of the situation the meaning of this resolution you will recognize how important this part of our policy is,"how necessary it is that the party understand it clearly, apply it energetically. and make a fight 4 really buil@-a labor party in the’ Unit, ed States and-in the process of that, build the Workers Party into a mass Comntunist’ Party of the United States. I amv-not' going to enter into any con- troversial questinos on this issue: am going to ask merely that the com- rades who* are~here, the who aré Here will go back to their party “units, go back to the party branches ‘atid help in this mobilization help ‘in bringing our party into this fight, not scatteringly, not only here and there, but as an organized whole, because. ofthe influence we will gain for our party in this struggle. ts Itself in Mussolini’s Battles Count Volpi, one of the mightiest profiteers of Italian capitalism, a lead- ing manager of the Banca Commerci- ale, and possessing interests of his own in all the great capitalist under- taking of Italy. The aid of the Banca Commerciale is a much mightier aid to Mussolini in his battle than the strokes of Farinacci’s cudgel. The ¢o- operation of the Banca Commerciale with the fascist regime signifies a strengthening of this regime, and the transition of Italian big finance to fascism, But the economic battles to be fought by fascism are much more difficult to. wim than its fraction strug- the field of economic battle is more likely to witness Mussolini's defeat than the field of political battle. aire still languishing behind |‘walls ym the time previous to the “dst ‘of Junuary 1924. Further, these figures ‘do'hot include the terrible judgement é “Tscheka trial”: against 16 ac: d ‘persons there have beén pro- yéars ‘and four months hard labor, 9 ‘years 11 months. imprisonment and ‘The number of those ‘persons feo are"pinning behind republican prison ’ according to the statements of Dr. Seckel, a barrister, exceeds 8,000. : by the enumeration of the cases in which the Juridical department of the Communist fractions of the Reichstag andthe Prussian diet have 3 ES