The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 14, 1926, Page 2

Page Two SENATE DEBATES PROPOSED TAX REDUCTION BILL ‘Millionaries’ Cl ub’ Cuts Contribution to State (Special to The Daily Worker) WASHINGTON, D. C., Feb. 12—The “Millionaires’ House,” as the senate has been well designated, thru its ap- proval of the tax reduction bill, has saved its wealthy patrons sums run- ning up into the millions, Members of the senate itself, such as. Smoot, will benefit substantially. The principal fight occurred over the question of repealing the inherit- ance or estate taxes. Senator Fletcher of Florida, demanded that the federal government should not have the right to levy a higher tax on inheritances in a state than was levied by the state itself. Florida has passed a consti- tutional amendment prohibiting the laying of such duties. This was done to attract the wealthy into making that state their legal residence. Hun- dreds of millionaires have taken ad- vantage of the law and settled within its limits, Fletcher, who is a hireling of the e aristocracy of Florida, be- lieves it is undemocratic. to confiscate even for the use of the politicians who serve the wealthy a part of the values ‘extracted by them from the workers during their life, Senator Lenroot, Wisconsin's anci- ent mariner, brot out the fact that the inheritance tax law was passed during the year that Professor Wilson ruled the country, under the slogan of “He kept us out of war.” Senator Simmons, of North Carolina, whose state lynches a negro now and then to demonstrate its high civilization, strode up and down the aisles of the senate for 45 minutes talking for the benefit of the Congressional Record. The growing ill-feeling between the millionaire senator from Michigan, Couzens, and the well-fed apostle of the Mormon church, Smoot, over the tax controversy nearly led to blows. Couzens has threatened to “drive a golf ball thru Smoot's head” rather an easy job, it might be concluded, from the Utah man’s exhibition of mentality. Andy Mellon, whose financial rela-| tions to the government have been under investigation for some years, has been repeatedly referred to in the course of the debate. Senator Reed, ef Pennsylvania, who in addition to “representing” the 158,000 striking miners’ of that state is a director in the Mellon banks and alaw partner of the firm which obtained for the sec- retary of the treasury a refund of $91,000 in federal taxes, became so alarmed by the publicity over this rul- ing that he proposed an immediated investigation of the facts in the case. Not to be outdone by the other ora- tors, “Windy” Jim Reed, of Missouri, who is sometimes termed “Gumshoe Bill,” delivered a ‘Characteristically demagogic speech in the course of which he declared that “There never was a time in the history of this re- public when the great financial inter- ests were so compeletely in control of the government as the present hour.” Jim can weep gallons of briny tears ‘ever such issues and never lift a fin- ger to help the workers of his-state, Altogether “a grand and glorious time” was had by the representatives of the dear “peepul” in the extended discussion of whether Rockefeller’s taxes should be cut 40 or 50 per cent or eliminated entirely. IN CHICAGO! “The Story of the Earth” and “History of Mankind,” by, Samuel 641 W. 0 8721 Cottage Grove estions and discus- | Ave, 7:45 P.M. sion from the floor, Uniontown, Pa.! DANCE Given by the Slovak Workers” Society on MONDAY, FEBRUARY 15 at Franklin Hall, BE THERE! NEW YORK FOREIGN-BORN | COUNCIL WILL HOLD A CONFERENCE, FEB, 21ST NEW YORK, Feb. 12.—The New York Council for the Protection of Foreign-Born Workers will hold a conference at the Central Opera House, 206 East 67th street, Sun- day afternoon, Feb, 21, at 2 o'clock. At this conference delegates from different trades unions, fraternal organizations, workers’ clubs and political organizations will gather to plan ways and means of voicing the protest of the New York work- ers against the infamous bills that are before congress to finger-print, photograph and card-index the for- eign-born workers, Every workers’ organization should send delegates to this meeting. ¢ CAPMAKERS WIN 12-WEEK STRIKE IN CHICAGO SHOP Win Union Conditions in Bran ly Shop Union hours, union wages, union working conditions and union recog- nition are now granted by Isidor Brandy, Chicago cap manufacturers, after a/12-week strike successfully carried thru by Local 5, Cloth Hat Cap and Millinery Workers International union. Brandy is also forced to con- tribute the regular 3 per cent of pay- roll to the unemployment insurance fund which is managed by the union tho the cash is paid in by the manu- facturers, without any deduction from wages. In this respect the capmakers have improved the unemployment scheme first formulated by the Amalgamated Clothing Workers. The Amalgamated plan calls for equal 114 per cent con- tributions from employer and em- ployes. Fruitless efforts by Brandy to obtain an injunction during the strike elated the pickets and discouraged him, Trial of Coal Miners at Zeigler, Illinois, Nears the Verdict (Continued from page 1). porter of the Fox-Cobb machine in the miners’ union, Fox-Cobb “Tale” Blows-Up. Frank Skibinski, chairman, and Matt Crnoevich, sécretary of the meet- ing last August, have effectively dis- posed of the account of the meeting given by the Fox-Cobb gang. It’ was claimed that the meeting was in an uproar, that Fox and Cobb were pre- vented from speaking, that the meet- ipg broke up in confusion and that threats were shouted against them. Skibinski and Crnoevich have shown that the meeting was orderly and ad- journed in the regular manner, and that no threats were made and no speeches made in foreign languages. George Starcovich and John Vlay, who were among the last to leave the Hall, testified that they saw Cobb wield a blackjack at the door as he was going out, This contradicts the statements that Cobb was an upright | and peaceful man who was beaten up by a wild gang of ruffians. | Klansmen Attack Aged Miner, Another angle of that eventful union meeting that the prosecution ignored was the attack on Bart Far- thing, 70 year old minér, by the Wilson brothers. Many witnesses de- clared that the old man was beaten to the ground by these Fox-Cobb sup- porters. Marian Sejat, a defendant, took the stand and told of that fight and the part he played in it by knock- ing down one of the Wilsons to pro- tect Bart Farthing. The defense has introduced a mo- tion of Misnomer regarding Mike Ka- radich who was arrested under the name of Mike Krodich. Bankers, law- yers and miners have testified that they have always known him as Mike Karadich. But since he was elected pit committeeman once in opposition to the Cobb-Fox followers it is not hard to guess why he is on trial. In Washington, D. C.! 4 WASHINGTON, D. C., Feb. 12—~ Haunted by the fear that she would be unable to provide for her old age, Miss Sarah Beall hung herself in her apartment. IN CHICAGO, ILL.! FOURTH ANNUAL Red Revel MASQUER ADE BALL Saturday, February 27, 1926 “TEMPLE HALL, Marshfield Ave. and Van Buren St. CASH PRIZES FOR BEST MASQUES. Admission 50 Cents in Advance, 75 Cents at the Door. Workers (Communist) Party, Local Chicago. WORKERS FIGHT THE PASSAGE OF ANTI-LABOR LAW Form Councils Against Fingerprinting Bill (Continue from Page 1,) shop organization in the country. _ “Among the worst these bills for the registration and deportation of foreign-born workers,” Ruthenberg pointed out, “is the one introduced by Congressman Aswell of Louisiana, This bill proposes to register annual- ly every unnaturalized worker. _ The bill, if it becomes a law, will enable any police officer to stop any worker, whether native or foreign-born, at any time, and question and hold him to see whether this worker should regis- ter or has registered. The bill gives the president full power to order foreign-born workers to move away from one place to any other place he wants—in the case of a strike by these workers, He also pointed out that the slight- est charge of violation of any of the provisions of the notorious Aswell bill will mean that government agents will immediately throw the accused work- ers into jail and hold them for depor- tation. In many instances, such de- portation will bring the workers jail, horrible torture, and even death at the hands of fascist and white terror- ist governments like the Italian, Hun- garian and Polish. “The Aswell bill and the other bills, if made law, will bring into the United States the blackest practices of Russian czarism and Prussian mil- itarism which the Russian and Ger- man workers have, years ago, over- | thrown,” emphatically declared the secretary of the Workers (Commun- ist) Party. “These bills against for- eign-born workers are strike-breaking bills of a most dangerous character. The foreign-born workers in the min- ing, steel, textile, clothing and other industries have shown that they can fight and fight hard against the bosses, for the trade unions and for better conditions. By means of these bills, the bosses are trying to destroy the effectiveness of the foreign-born workers as strikers, as union men, as fighters for the interests of the whole working class. “The strike-breaking government of Washington is always fully prepared to use the army and navy to force weaker countries,” went on Ruthen- berg, “like Mexico, China and the La- tin-American republics to give special privileges to the wealthy foreigners, the American bankers and manufac- turers, exploiting these working masses and plundering the national wealth of these peoples. At the same time, this scab government of, by and for the capitalist class is preparing to use all of its resources to oppress and crush the millions of foreign-born workers, é “You ask why is the capitalist Coo- lidge administration so anxious to op- press and degrade the wealth-pro- ducing American foreign-born workers at home, and to protect and subsidize the wealth plundering American for- eign-born bankers and manufacturers abroad, in Central America, Mexico and China?” he went on, “The answer is plain. The American government today is a bankers’ and bosses govern- ment and not a workers’ and farmers’ government. It is high time that the American workers and farmers should force-the government to give the same treatment- to the American foreign- born workers that it is now giving to the American foreign-born financiers in Mexico, Germany, China, and in other countries, We demand protec- tion for the foreign-born workers, in- stead of degradation and persecution.” In order to effectively combat this attack of the lalyr-hating Coolidge ad- ministration he pointed out that it was necessary for every trade union to answer this open-shoppers’ attack by lauriching a campaign to bring into the unions all unorganized workers, particularly the unorganized foreign- born workers in the basic industries, and that every labor union, workers’ education society, fraternal and pol- itical organization join in the forma- tion of councils for the protection of the foreign-born workers. “Only in this way” he explain- ed, “will the native as well as the foreign-born workers be able to throw back the labor-haters, the scab-herd- ers, the strike-breakers, and their ROv- ernment agents now trying to divide and defeat the whole working class. Let us answer the suspicions and pre- judices spread in our ranks by the bosses, by a united front of the Am- erican working class on every field. “Let us get together and unite pol- itically in @ party of our own,” he went on, “a Labor Party, as a step towards taking away from the capital- ists the political power, their control of the government which they have been using to help them in their ex- ploitation and oppression of the native and foreign-born workers, A Splendid CONCERT will be part of the program given by the. Bugene Barnett Branch of the I. / THE DAILY WORKER Cleveland Socialists Blocked R'elief to the Anthracite Miners (Continue'from Page 1.) against the Cleveland workers confer- ence? The Oleveland Federation knows that it can and does reach only a small part of the workers of this city. It knows that the majority of the workers in Cleveland do not belong to trade unions—which is an unfortunate fact. It knows that it cannot reach these workers—whereas the Cleveland workers conferenece can, It knows that there are trade unions which will cooperate in a cam- Paign that has more energy and en- thusiasm in it than the Cleveland Federation of Labor has manifested. How much did the Cleveland Fed- eration of Labor, which contends that 75,000 workers of Cleveland are affi- liated to it, contribute to the relief of the anthracite miners? Just $500 —a sum that ¢ . Federation should not boast about. ‘at has the Cleve- land Federation ie to make the workers of this wealize that the strike of the miners Is a strike of the entire organized labor movement of the country? What. has the Cleveland Federation done to arouse the work- ers of the city to help the miners? Nothing—except to allow representa- tives of the United Mine Workers to speak at the meetings of the locals and of the Federation, which are attended by only a small percentage of the union members, : What Conterence Planned, The Cleveland workers conference intends to bring the issue squarely be- fore the workers of Cleveland, and for that reason has arranged mass meetings in all sections of the city. The Cleveland workers conference in- tends to hold a tag day, so that the workers and the entire population of the ctiy will recognize the serious- ness of the mining situation. But no. The socialist party, thru its rep- resentatives, the agents of the Jewish daily Forward, went to the Cleveland Federation of Labor, and thence to the safety director of the city who has announced in advance—even be- fore application has been made for a permit for the tag , day—that the Clveland workers ¢gonference will not be permitted to id @ tag day. The officiaidom of the Cleveland Federation, the soclalist party and the city officials are ynited In their at- tempts to prevent widespread relief of the miners, i Expose Yellow Socialists. The attempt of the socialists to sabotage the relief is exposed to the workers of the city. /After unity was achieved between the two conferenc- es, one of the representatives of the Jewish daily Forwand, notified the col- lector of some mpney at a cap factory that he id not hand over the money to the rellé¥ committee, The Cleveland rkers conference es in the miners’ struggle the strug- gle of the whole Ing c! is determined to do its part In helping the miners win thelr fight. The trade unions, members of the fraternal or- ganizations, ete, affiliated to the Cleve- land workers conferénce belong to the organized labor movement. They will do their part, despite all stupid threats, charges @nd attempts at sabotage. Soft Coal Operators Jump Prices as Hard Coal Mines Strike WASHINGTON—(FP)—P rices charged the government fuel yards in Washington by smokeless coal opera: tors in Fayette and McDowell coun- ties, West Virginia, jumped from $2.41 last March to $6.50 a ton in Novem- ber, when the anthracite strike was in its third month. This was the testi- mony given the joint congressional in- vestigating committee on coal profit- eering, by Geo. Pope, chief engi- neer of the yar Pope showed that,when weather be- came milder than was anticipated, in December, the West Virginia opera- tors dropped their price to $5.60, and when prospects of a settlement of the strike looked brighty-early this month, they offered coal at-$4.76. Now they are sending prices rapidly upward again. 3 Bulgarian 1. W. W. Defense Dance Tonight. The Bulgarian members of the I. 'W. W. in Chicago have arranged an entertainment and, dance for the benefit of class wan’ prisoners, to be given at American Musician Hall, 777 W. Adams St., Chicago, The enter- tainment will con¥ist of Bulgarian music, folk-songs and folk-dancing. All workers are invited to attend. Dancing will last until one o'clock, Wants Electrie Roads Out. WASHINGTON—(FP)— Charles L. Henery for the American jectric Railway Association at hearings on the rail labor bill before the senate !n- terstate commerce committee asked that it be not applied to electric roads not part of steam railroad systems. Lecture and Concert SUNDAY NIGHT, FEBRUARY 14 _ NORTH-WEST HALL, Corner North and Western Avenues Kiwanis Clubs and the Chicago Tribune Clash on “American Ideals” By J. LOUIS ENGDAHL. Oren the Chicago Tribune enters into a-controversy with the All-Chicago Kiwanis~Clubs, constituted of timid petty bourgeois elements, over the question of print- ing crime news on the first pages of the capitalist dailies, The Tribune has heard from the self-righteous Kiwanians thru a letter from their chairman, Mr. Edward W. Schoe- nenberger. The Kiwanis outfit is modest. It makes no great demands. It merely requests that crime news be pushed off the first page during American Ideal Week, Feb. 6-12, The Tribune held up the letter until American Ideal Week was over and then declared. editorially that it had no intention of degrading its crime news to an. inside page position. . ° ° e Chicago’s bourgeois press is now glorying in the fact that the “open shopper” and “red-baiter,” Henry ‘Barrett Chamberlain, director of the so-called Chicago Crime Com- mission, has issued a report showing that the percentage of convictions in the criminal courts of Cook County has jumped from 34.35 per cent in 1921 to 61.53 per cent in 1925. The Tribune gloats exultingly: “That, we feel, is one evidence that the publication of crime news is a deterrent instead of a provocation of crime.” * * * * It is difficult to understand the Tribune's logic. The courts may grind out guilty verdicts, or “hanging verdicts,” one of the pet phrases of the anti-labor State’s Attorney Crowe, but that does not lessen crime, not even if the story is told in the most lurid type to be found in the composing rooms of the yellow press, If this were true then the Tribune would be compelled to yield the crown to the Hearst press as the more able suppressor of “crime.” * * ° ° If this were true, then why not return to public hang- ings, or executions with the ax in the town square, where the thousands of criminals in the making might look on and be frightened out of wrongdoing, as it is determined under the capitalist law. Chicago is going to have another hang- ing soon. If the Tribune is correct, then the victims of the rope should be “drawn and quartered,” in the best style of centuries past, and their ungodly remains—since all Kiwani- ans are devout churchgoers and the Tribune is a christian sheet—exhibited to public view, preferably from the most conspious spot on the Boulevard Link Bridge, the busiest in all the world and adjacent to Tribune Square. Or the heads of the victims might be stuck upon lances, as was once the practice, and exhibited before the Art Institute, on Michigan Avenue, where all might see. That is the Tribune’s reason- ing carried to its only logical conclusion. * * * . Crime is a violation of law. We live today under capital- ist law, the law ofthe dominant class in society today. American capitalism, (the north), in its struggle with the remnants of semi-feudalism in the backward south, com- monly called the American Civil War, plastered two amend- ments on the sacred American constitution, the bulwark of all American capitalist law. The 14th amendment was es in 1868, supposed! to grant citizenship rights to the Negroes, and the 15t amendment in 1870 to give the Negroes the right to vote. But just as soon as the capitalist north had broken the power of the southern semi-feudal aristocracy, then the rights.of the Negroes were forgotten. The South today dis- franchises and outlaws the Negro masses at will, with the consent of the North. . This is one of the greatest crimes being committed in the United States today, involving 12,000,000 of the Amer- ican Negro population. It is a violation by the capitalist class in power against its own basic-law. The Tribune knows this to be true, but no mention of this greatest crime gets space on the first page of today’s issue that appears on Abraham Lincoln's birthday. This is a fitting time to bring this outlawry to the attention of the American people. That is left. to the Communist press, * * - * Instead the Chicago Tribune uses its first page head- line on Lincoln's Birthday, Feb. 12, to exploit the so-called crime situation in Chicago as part of its war on the “foreign- born.” It draws in the author of anti-alien legislation now before congress, Secretary of Labor Davis, and glories in the fact that it has the support of this hater of foreign-born workers on its side. Thus the real Chicago Tribune is revealed. It is not in- terested in the suppression of crime. It is using the slayings and shootings among the beer runners, the hi-jackers and bootleggers generally, who are supported by the politicians of all nationalities, including ‘native born, of both capitalist parties, as an excuse to create prejudice and arouse hostility against the foreign-born masses, especially that section of it that seeks thru organization and struggle to better its conditions. i Ric In Mr. Chamberlain's report, already referred to, it was stated that out of 2,458 criminals convicted, 126 were found guilty of burglary at night, 46 were charged with robber: with a gun, 14 with assault to murder, 9 with rape, 4 wit assault to rape, 12 with receiving stolen property, 8 with conspiracy, 33 with embezzlement, 25 with forgery, and 8 with confidence game, the most inconsequential fruits of the whole criminal capitalist system. Plans are afoot to build a bigger jail in Chicago with a special prison for women. But the real criminals will never be confined there. The day will come, however, when The Tribune, and all the kept press, will be placed by the working class in the pillory belere America’s millions, as the sj nelly subsidized mouthpieces of criminal American capitalism. That will be a step toward placing the real criminal—CAPITALISM— upon the gallows and ending its carreer upon this continent, and thruout the world, forever. ‘ at the Chicago, Ill. PICKETS MARCH THRU. CLIFTON; PULL NEW MILL 400 Forstman-Huffman Workers Join Strike (Continued from page 1). he fellows who have helmets should put them to use,” he shouted. Then he {called to the police and asked: “Isn't it better for you to stand and look on than to be clubbing us as you did the other day?” “Your damn right,” replied one cop, “We went to war to fight the kaiser,” continued the soldier, “but now we are here*to fight the katser ‘n our own country, They tald us we went to fight for democracy, and, by- god, we are going to take them at their word.” Company Union Silent, There is a company union headed by the bosses that has roped ‘in some of the workers in the Forstmann and Huffmann mill and this “labor union” did not even offer a resolution against the brutal attack upon the strikers the other day, The strikers and members of the United Front Committee have noticed this and realize that a fake union run by the bosses in worse than. no union at all. In the United Front Committee only the workers have any say. The bosses never come near, “We are one people,” declared Weis: bord “to the strike meeting “and not ‘|Botany or Garfield or Gera workers Ralph Chaplin Noted I. W. W. Poet, Lectu ~ former class war Leavenworth penitentiary “EUGENE BARNETT AND OTHER , CENTRALIA CASES" alone, If we do not get together, they will cut your wages and keep you it slavery as they are doing in the other’ mills, You may be sure that if the Botany loses your bosses will cut you to the bone also.” Jail Better Than Workshop. Felix Panariso who had been sen- tenced to 30 days in jail-was released on bonds on appeal, and was given an ovation when he entered the hall. “The jail is fine compared with the hellish mills in which we have to work,” he sald. “In jail we eat three meals a day and we can sleep as long as we want to. In the mill we have to, work day and night and have to get up before daylight to go to our jobs,. and after all we get such small wages that we have to worry all the time and cannot afford to get as good food as they have for us in jail. We must stick togethér and get our rights so that we can get decent wages and better hours and make life worth while. It’s a shame to have -work Places that are worse than jails.” “Iam ready to go on the picket line again in spite of the beating I got Tuesday,” said Gustav Deak. “Wé must have a picket line of 5,000 if ne- cessary and show the bosses that there is nothing for them to do but to grant us our demands.” Police Club Plute Reporter, One reporter of a capitalist paper of New York got clubbed badly by mistake on the day the police clubbed the strikers and this got up his fre to the highest pitch. It was such an insult to make a mistake like that and he has had the police chief, mayor and even the bosses busy apologizing for such a blunder, The police threatened to smash thé’ camera of a fellow who later proved to be a reported, but whom the policé thought was a striker. The class liné is drawn as keenly as is the line be- tween Passaic and Clifton, “Strike and Work”—Slogan, “This strike means work,” saf@d Weisbord to the meeting at the Rus sian Hall, “You all have to work while you are striking, on the picket line, setting relief, helping in every way to make this fight so definite that ft may be over soon as the bosses will be compelled to give in. Strike and work is the slogan.” 4 Your patronage invited on our 18-year record for serving the finest food, pies and pastry In this vicinity, West Inn Cafeteria 734 West Madison St., 2nd Floor 3 Doors East of Halsted St, We also serve, “Sensation” Sandwiches; “so good" and "so aiters ent; two or three layers, Dinner 10:30 to 2:30 = Supper 4:15 to 7:15 One Trial Will Convince You of Our Quality For Quick Noon Service C - venient Before 11:30 of ‘Atter t.50™ Telephone Lehigh 6022 DR. ABRAHAM MARKOFF jeon Dentist ; 249 East wae Py Cor. Second Ave, hae’, : K CITY ice Hours: 9 to 12 A. M.; 2 to 8 P, Batty, pt Friday; Sunday 9 to 1 B aE s P. Members J. KAPLAN MERCHANT TAILOR Suits Made to Order at Reasonable Prices $546 ARMITAGE AVENUE Phone Albany 9400 and Writer ner at will speak on