The Daily Worker Newspaper, September 12, 1925, Page 7

“The idez becomes power when It pene- trates the masses.” o—Karl Marx, SPECIAL MAGAZINE SUPPLEMENT THE DAILY WORKER. SATURDAY, SEPT. 12, "1928 EB 200 SECOND SECTION This magazine ‘supple ment will appear every Saturdayin The, Daily. Worker. Problems of the Railroaders’ Left Wing By EARL R. BROWDER, ITH the meeting of the Interna- tional Conference of the Commit- tee for the Amalgamation of the Railroad Unions, in Chicago, . Sept. 12-13, thefe ‘will be, value in taking a 45 look ‘Over the “transportation industry 4° in ‘the United States, the place of railroads in the economic life of the country, cond¢itions of organization on both sides of class war battle front, etc., as a background for better esti- mating the tasks of the left wing con- ference of railroad workers. Growing importance of Railroads. Comparison of a few statistics of 1890 and 1920, the- period of. emerg- ence of American capitalism. into the: stage of imperialism, will show the growing dominance of railroad trans. portation, In this 30-year period the total pop- ulation increased by 67.93 per cent; the number of miles of main track operated increased 78.42 per cent; number of locomotives — increased 123.10 per cent; investments in- creased 165.94 per cent; average ton- miles of ffeight per person increased 223.21 per cent; while the total ton- miles of freight increased 442.86 per cent. ; Railway operating revenue increas- ed from $1,052,000,000 to $6,311,000,- 0(0, an increase of syateetnneyy 600 per cent. Increasing ;Exploitation of Workers. But if. the railroads have grown enormously in economic importance _ and revenue, the wages and conditions of the workers have not improved cor- respondingly. No, there has been no improvement, but on the contrary, a decided downward tendency. This was somewhat obscured by the war- time increase in wages, which looked big, altho it immediately was more _ than offset by rising prices. Real wages, in terms of purchasing power, SUUAv0cvenneseneanvnpnnneenvoaneenugeuuuaasnaguatvanaeanenasastongeUOUUUANSSUESUUUOTESOEOGUGEEN GOGO OOO DMENLRURE OOOOH AEANTLTALE:, A CONTEST! are lower than 30 years ago. Since 1920, however, and especially. in the past year, there has beena tremendous drive by the. employers. to increase the rate of exploitation of’ the workers, to make fewer Inen han- dle more traflic_for less ‘wages, there- by to increase-the rate: of profit on railroad capital. This offensive has been quite successful from the capi- talist point of view. : Volume of freight traffic ig increas- ing steadily.» The year 1923 was high | above 1922, and 1924 almost held up to the previous high year, while 1925 is setting a record for volume -. of freight, the figure being 15 per cent above normal for the*period of Jan. 1 to Aug, 22, 1925. The growth in volume of freight is well illustrated by a comparative table of car-loadings for the first 32 weeks of the past five years, just is- sued by the American Railway Assoc- iation, as follows: Cars loaded, Jan, 1 to Aug. 8 (32 weeks: ) 1921... .csesnessesereonsssB8,2 79, 208 1922.. +0: 24,957,727 1923... 29,953,453 1924.. 28,597,081 -++-30,280,136 But what happened’to the workers? The number employed to handle ‘this increasing volume of transportation has constantly diminished, and the wages paid has as constantly de- creased. From. the . epproximate 1,850,000 employed in.1920, a red: to 1,827,425 is registered in 1923 (in- cluding numbers of scabs to break 1922 strike); in 1924°a further reduc- tion to 1,770,96; and in 1925 still fur- ther to 1,729,134. (Figures of April each year from Monthly Labor Re- view, except 1920. which is from Occu- pation Census). This means that 57,000 workers were eliminated from the railroads from 1928 to 1924, and more than 40, 000: were” eliminated between April 1924 and April 1925. The smaller.,working force not only handled: ‘the larger traffic—it did this for less, waged: while hours of labor were indrgaged. Thus, the amount of railroad. wages, ‘April. 1923, $239,000, 1000, is reduced in 1924 to less than $230,000;000,-more than $9,000,000 per month reduction: while. 1925 shows a further reduction of $2,300,000 per month. Employers’ Organizations Stronger— Workers’ Weaker. During’ the first post-war years, the railroad unions grew enormously, un- til, from a few hundred thousand mem- bers they had in 1921 about 1,500,000, or 85 to 90.per cent of all workers in the industry. These masses were de- moralized and dissipated, however, be- cause the lack of. fighting policy of the union leadership, and the. grow- ingly systematic “class collaboration,” left the workers helpless before the employers’ offensive. After the dis- astrous 1923 strike there remained not more than 750,000. This number is now. still: smaller. ; There is only a pretense of organiz- ed unity between the groups which are organized. The only nucleus of a cen- ter for common action is the Rail- way Employes’ Department of the A. F. of L: This was so completely shat- tered by its criminal incompetence in handling the 1922° strike» that its yction| memborship- dropped--from-520,000-in 1922, béfore the strike, to less than 122,000 at the beginning of 1925. While the workers’ organizations have been broken up and rendered helpless, the railroad employers have continued to concentrate and consoli- date their power. In addition to the well-known fact that 25 men, organ- ized in inter-locking directorates, unite 99 of the principal railroads, op- erating 211,280 miles, or 82 per cent of the entire steam transportation of the country, we also have the recent government sanction, thru Coolidge, of the formal amalgamation of all nail roads into a small number of’systems. The unity of the railroad émployers, always comparatively high, is hegom- ing absolute, ° Left Wing’ Has Tremendous Taék. In the above figures we have some measure of the immediate tasks of the left wing of railroad labor. It is the function of the left wing to bring or- ganization, unity, and a fighting work- ing class policy in the ranks of the 1,700,000 railroad workers in America. This méans, also, that the historic task of the working class to take over and administer the machinery of pro- duction, and the necessary meané to that end—the conquest of state power—must be made an integral part of the consciousness and pro- gram of the revolutionary, railroad workers, _— A tremendous task, but -it fs ‘one which has been well begun by the In- ternational Committee for Amalgama- tion of the Railroad Unions, LENINGRAD FORMS TAXI SERVICE WITH SWEDISH CONCERN PARTICIPATING MOSCOW (By sy Tams) =8The, Lenin. . grad “runicipality “Has aeeepted ¢ proposal éf Messfé= Karfebe | and Rulonder, Stockholm, concerning the establishment in Leningrad of a mixed society for taxi-motor serv- ice. Fifty-one per cent of the new society will belong to the Lenin- grad municipality, the rest going to the firm Karlebe and Rulender. saree aan een | f FOR INTERNATIONAL PRESS ; DAY ISSUE—SEPTEMBER 21 iy This issue of the ‘DAILY WORKER will be written as much as possible by the workers from the shops, PRIZES story for this issue of the DAILY WORKER will receive To all workers sending in a news story (whether it is printed or not) a copy of factories, mills and the farms. A special page— or two—or es (or more if necessary!) will be de- voted entirely to Worker Correspondence. Write at once! Tell us-about condi-. tions you live and work un- der. Help to make the In- ternational Press Issue of the DAILY WORKER a re- flection of the lives of the workers in America. the LittleRedLibrary book- let Worker Correspondents s by William F. Dunne will | + . from the catalog his choice of $5.00 Worth of Books. Second best story $3.00 Worth of Books. Third best story $2.00 Worth of Books. 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