The Daily Worker Newspaper, April 6, 1926, Page 4

sn ~ \ Page Four THE DAILY WORKER Undermining the Reformist “Leaders” {international Press Correspondence) OSCOW, VU. S. 8S. R., March 3—(By Mail)—The thirteenth session of the enlarged executive of the Commu- nist International was opened under the chairmanship of Comrade Geschke with the following declaration of the German delegation upon the speech of Comrade Clara Zetkin: “(L) We do not share the attitude of Clara Zetkin to the complex , of questions of the year 1928, neither do we share her opinions as to the tac tical lessons to be drawn from the events of 1923. “(2.) The German delegation stands how as before upon the basis of the Comintern criticisms in accordance with the decisions of the Fifth Con- gress in the estimation of the events of October, 1923. “(3.) The German delegation ac- cepts the basio criticisms of Clara Zetkin against the Ruth Fischer-Mas- lov group.” | Good Prospects in Belgium. | HH trade union discussion then opened with a speech of Comrade Jacquemotte (Belgium): “At the present time in Belgium there exists the possibility for the creation of a Communist mass movement. The partial stabilization of capitalism af- fects the situation of the working class adversely. “Seventy per cent of the state bud- get is applied for the payment of in- terest upon the war debt and. for new armaments, For this reason the Bel- gian capitalists are not in a situation to satisfy the demands of the work- ers. “Even the Vandervelde government declared that the introduction of s0- cial reforms was impossible. The dis- satisfaction of the workers is favor- able for the growth of Communist in- fluence. A left wing opposition is making itself apparent in the trade union movement. The reformists are beginning to sense the danger and they are intensifying thejr resistance. ‘They are attempting to reduce the Communist influence by the policy of expulsions. The party has to remain very cool in order to avoid a split. “Tt would be comparatively easy to exploit the dissatisfaction and the syn- dicalist tendencies of the workers to form an independent trade union fed- eration. It is much harder to fight inside the trade unions and to organ- ize a strong oppositional movement there. We must nevertheless take the more difficult way and attempt to win the trade, unions from within. “The accusation of Losovsky that we do not fight enuf against the expul- sions is incorrect. The case of Loo- tens which Losovsky quoted was very difficult. ‘he reformists threatened that unle8s the workers permitted the expulsion of Lootens, they would expel the whole branch consisting of 900 men. It is better to sacrifice a few comrades than to lose our basis in the trade union movement. “The situation in Belgium is to a certain extent similar to the situation in England. From 1,500,000 workers, 800,000 are organized. Of these 600,000 are organized in the social- democratic unions and the remaining 200,000 in the Christian unions. Given cool and elastic tactics we shall be able to win great successes in these trade unions before long. | Amsterdam and the Orient. “Losovsky remarked correctly that the Amsterdamers are showing great activity in connection with the colonial working class movement, “They.are recognizing the danger of our work in the colonies for reform- ism. Vandervelde for instance wrote that the whole civilized world must oppose the Bolsheviks in their at- tempts to utilize the colonial move- ment, this movement had nothing to do with them. “The reformists are attempting either to prevent any organization of the colonial movement or to get the Jeadership of it into their hands.” Wages Low in Czecho- Slovaki MRADE KOHN (Czecho-Slovak- ja): “The attack of the bour- geoisie upon the standard of living of the working class has now lasted for several years. This attack expressed itself in great economic struggles, “The policy of deflation was a con- Plete victory for bank capital which 4s in a position to force industrial capital into the struggle whether the latter wants to or not, as for instance in the textile workers’ strike. The real wages in Czecho-Slovakia are ac- cording to the official statistics of the league of nations just half those of the English workers and less than in Lodz and in Berlin, “The wage cutting, the weight of taxes and the rise of prices makes it possible for Czech industry, to enter into competition and bring about a certain stabilization of Czecho-Slovak- fan capitalism. By utilizing the unem- ployment, capitalism forces the work- ers to permit themselves to be used for attempts to introduce American- zation which damages the worker, The. bourgeoisie leaves the main weight of supporting the unemployed the trade unions and gives only 4 ag support from the state, a ~~ | Working Class Division (HH) economic struggles of the pro- letariat are made tremendously more difficult by the divisiops amongst the working class, There are 11 trade union central committees and 450 individual trade unions. Of these, four central committees recog- nize theoretically the class struggle. Of 3,000,000 workers 1,000,000 is or- ganized, of these 850,000 in the latter four central committees. “We are utilizing the existing un- clear left wing for the struggle for ing conditions, are becoming the necessity for struggle. ing capitalism of Europe. the united front. When the reform- ists observe the sympathies of the workers for unity, they provoke joint action in order to lead those actions consciously to defeat and thus to compromise us. “For instance in the Maehrisch-Os- trau miners’ strike - where despite certain successes in the beginnning when 3,000 Communists led’ 150,000 workers, we made great mistakes, We overestimated our own stretigth and had to pay dearly for the lack of fractions. This struggle taugiit’us to be more careful, naturally not to avoid necessary struggles, but to cdtsider the prospects, “In the last textile workers’ strike in which the reformists attemptea to repeat their provocation, we actéd so carefully that we achieved good suc- cesses and broke thru the resistance of capitalism. The feelings of solid- arity and the demand for unity in the preletariat grew very much in these economic struggles, “Losovsky is correct when he says that we commenced the struggle for the united front very late. We, how- ever, needed time for the necessary preparatory work. We had, first of all, to overcome the separatism tend- encies in our own ranks, we had to convince our own members that the united front was not a maneuver. We had to convince the comrades of the importance of fractional work not only in the reformist, but also in the revolutionary trade unions, “Our good work has had the result that the reformists are now ready to negotiate. It is true, under impossi- ble conditions. We insist upon a unity congress and demand the new formation of the trade union organ- izations upon the basis of the class struggle. The struggle for the estab- lishment of unity with the reformist unions issmade more diffieult by the fact that the revolutionary unions themselves are not united. The lack of fractions is partly responsible for this, “We received an object lesson upon the importance of fractional work when the Red International Labor Union demanded that the independ- ent revolutionary ‘unions should enter into the revolutionary national organ- ization which several leaders of the revolutionary building and wood work- ers’ unions, for instance, Tetenka, re- jected. They showed themselves €o be reformists. And after expelling a few comrades who are loyal to the party, they commenced a sharp cam- paign against the party. From this we learned to organize fractions en- ergetically and we were successful in winning influence. We agitated for the calling of an extraordinary con- gress of the union at which we hoped with the assistance of our fractions, to carry thru our policy, * bi wie reformists are talking very much just now about the unifica- tion of the German and the Czech trade union central committee, that is to say the unification of the leader- ships with the retention of the paral- lel unions and thus to keep the work- ers from a real unity, They will, however, be unsuccessful in this, for the urge of the workers towards a real unity is becoming ever greater. The party is carrying on a sharp struggle against tendencies towards liquidating the revolutionary trade unions and 4s carrying On an ener Unmasking the “Greens” of Europe. getic and successful recruiting cam- paign amongst the unorganized work- ers, We must, hoWever,, stress that we shall be able to make no progress unless our weak positions in the re- formist unions are strengthened, “after the successful elections we issued a call for the recruitment of 60,000 new workers for the party and as far as these new recruits were members of reformist unions, they were to remain in them and form fractions, Our task is therefore to strengthen the red trade unions and at the same time to strengthen the oppositional elements and the Com- munist fractions in..the reformist The so-called “stabilization” that certain countries of Europe have achieved thru inflation or loans from American bankers has been made possible only by the most intensive exploitation of the working masses. leaders of the reformist unions are in open alliance with the bourgeoisie in the latter's efforts to “stabilize” industry. These so-called leaders play the role of pacifiers. reduction of the living standard of the workers, these lack- eys of capitalism do everything possible to prevail wpon the workers to pursue the path of “peace” and “co-operation.” The workers however, under the great pressure of ever-worsen- The social-democratic | At every disillusioned with the social- democratic “leaders” of their trade unions and are realizing The Communist parties in the European countries are the only working class organizations that consistently unmask the betrayals of the social-democrats and call upon the workers to declare warfare upon the decay- The reports of delegates to the enlarged session of the Comintern Executive printed here- with, dealing with the trade union activities of the Commu- nist Parties, show how the Communists are winning the work- ing masses away from their reformist leaders by the applica- tion of the United Front policy, the building of fractions in the reformist unions and the advocation of open working class struggle against the bourgeoisie. ee trade unions. Only in this way will we be able to achieve lg acl | Two Federations in France. OMRAD E.. MONMOUSSEAU (France): “The most important fact in the present French trade union movement is the existence of two trade union federations which, according to the official statistics, have approximately the same mem- bership, In reality, however, our in- fluence is greater. Recently the re- formists have had a few successes, as for instance in the affiliation of the teachers’ union, On the other hand a definite left wing formed itself in the same period inside the reformist trade unions. The connections of the re- formist leaders with the bourgeoisie strengthened, particularly after the access of the left bloc to power. The chairman of the reformist federation, Jouhaux, is at the same time the rep- resentative of France in the league of nations in which he carries on a reactionary and nationalist policy. “This connection with the bour- geoisie was strengthened still more after the formation of the so-called na- tional economic council, in which re- formist leaders sit side by side with the representatives of the bourgeoisie, the banks, etc. The workers are nat- urally discontented with such an open Policy of cooperation between capital and labor and this discontent has led to the formation of left fractions in the various unions. In the question of the unity congress for both federa- tions, we suffered a certain defeat. The reformists carried on a campaign against us, even with the assistance of the authorities. A partial success for us was the fact that the reformist congress decided to listen to our dele- gation despite the resistance put up by Jouhaux and that in the voting which followed a strong minority of approximately 300 organizations, vot- ea for the acceptance of our pro- posals. “When the reformists raised the question of ‘trade union discipline’ and threatened the unions who wished to establish unity with us, with ex- pulsion, a few of the ‘left’ leaders abandoned the unity proposals, And this treachery had such a demoraliz- ing effect that only 24 repfesentatives of the reformist unions appeared at the unity conference. Nevertheless we were successful in discussing vari- ous practical questions, altho our or- iginal aim was not achieved. Our activity strengthened the left wing in the reformist unions, Altho in our agitation we had never expected com- plete success for the unity congress, nevertheless the hopes amongst the party membership based upon our first partial successes, were so great .|that later on a certain disappointment showed itself, particularly of estab- lishing unity. Other comrades be- Neved that we should only work in- side the revolutionary unions, We had to fight against both tendencies, Increase of French Stri HE worsening of the conditions of the working class recently has led to an increase of strikes. Previously all economic struggles of the French working class took ‘place under our leadership. The ‘reformists busied themselves chiefly ‘with high politics and did not bother about concrete working class questions, Now, how- ‘|concrete tasks and the’ general po- ever, they have begun to increase their activity in this latter respect and this created difficulties for us. “The reformisf¥ carry on an ener- getic policy of destruction. Every- where where we have fractions, they try to expel them and in this they are assisted by the employers who lock out our comrades, The reformist leaders even attack whole reformist unions who wish to unite with us, EH have also made mistakes. A few comrades permitted them- selves to become engrossed with high politics and this led ‘sometimes to a neglect of the concrete® daily ques- tions and to an isolation from the working masses. But ‘mistakes in the other extreme were alsd made. Local interests were overestimated, there was too little connection between the Some Mistakes in France. litical tasks.” The speaker quoted the example of the good application’! of the united front tactic in connection with the cane: Workers (Communist) Party English as an ‘Instrument of Bolshevization By WILLIAM SIMONS, HE vicious onslaughts of the Amer- ican Legion, the ku klux klan, and other one hundred per cent organiza- tions against forelgn languages have served to intensify the jnterest of the foreign-born workers in their own language, to make them fight hatder to preserve it. In proportion to the drive against the use of foreign lan- guages, the foreign-born rally closer to them. The language becomes the embodiment of the fight of the for- eign-born against the hundred per centers. The close connection be- tween these two phases is evident from the introduction of bills aimed at foreign language papers, at the same time that congress is flooded with bills to blacklist the foreign-born workers thru registration and finger- printing, The Duty of a Communist. railwaymen, In Januaryiwe appealed toall organizations fér joint action. The reformists naturallystefused. But the pressure of the masses forced the catholic trade unions’¢o act with us in concert, And thisdin:turn forced the reformists to withdraw their or- iginal rejection. We were the ad- vance guard of the ‘movement, we forced mixed committees, organized joint meetings, etc. This showed that a correct application of the united front is possible and useful. The general strike on Oct. 13, was a@ great success for us. It showed the French workers that we really are in favor of peace, that we would never commit the treachery that, the social patriots committed in 1914, Further, the strike was important for the development of the working class movement in Morocco and Syria. The strike showed the colonial workers that their only defendgrs are the Comintern and the Rea prerastional of Labor Unions, The condition of th’ relationship between the Communist Party and the trade unions in Fratice is different from the other countries, In France a strong syndicalist tendency exists in the working class mévement, The left wing formed itself in the trade unions earlier than inthe socialist parties. Apart from this there exist two federations. In working out the prinicples governing the felations be- tween the Communist parites and the trade unions, this must be taken into consideration. (Applatise. SPRING FESTIVAL WILL AID YOUNG WORKERS’ SCHOOL Chicago Womén Sthee That the working class women of the Chicago district realize the im- portance of the education of the working class youth is being demon- strated by their holding of an entirely new and different affair ip Chicago, April 10. In the form of an international spring festival to be held in Imperial Hall, 2409 N. Halsted St., with enter- tainment and dancing for two days, Saturday night, Sunday afternoon and Sunday night, they are raising funds for the establishment of a Young Workers’ School, A District Affair. This weekend affair will be a dis- trict affair, Whole familiés are taking the opportunity, thruout the district, to come into Chicago tor the week- end. Numbers for the distinctive pro- grams on Saturday and Sunday nights represent various parts’ bf the district —from Waukegan on the north to Gary on the south. There will be dancing each night and'all of Sunday afternoon, All working class men and women —and most certainly aft°young people —who are intrigued the idea of having all this fun and entertainment and dancing while solidly supporting such an excellent cause—put down April 10 and April 11 ds two red let- ter days on your calender, Working Womén of N.Y. Want to Shores Hours NEW YORK, April 4—Working wo- men of Utica, N. Y., cotton textile and knitting town, want a shorter work week even if it might mean less pay, returns of the Utica Associated Industries survey published by the women's joint legislative conference fighting for a state 48-hour law show, The employers’ questionnaire aimed to prove women workers’ opposition to the law but in spite of unfair em- phasis on possibly decreased earn- ings did not succeed, “Shorter work hours have not had the tendency to decreage earnings, ac= cording to reliable ithorities,” the women’s conference lares, Why Not Become a or er Correspondent? A communist must not simply go with the stream. He must fight thru the fetichism of language; must resist the trend toward language separatism. While fighting for the foreign-born and for the right to keep foreign lan- guages and foreign-language papers, he must endeavor to draw them closer into the stream of American working class life. And in this- process, the need for English becomes more and more obvious. In the period of Bol- shevization, of getting the nuclei to function, composed as they are of workers of all languages, the impor- tance of English is apparent. Now, when we have the task of joining the unions and functioning properly in them, English becomes an ever more pressing need. Now, when we wish to. destroy the viperous company unions, and other schemes of class col- laboration, and to bring the American working class closer together, a com- mon language becomes more and more compelling. Why English. How often in nuclei, do we hear comrades say: “I can’t accept as in- dustrial organizer, (or other position) because I can’t speafk English?” Some- times, this is said in fairly good Eng- lish, but sometimes it is true that the comrades cannot speak well. The lan- guage handicap -is, however, no bar to accepting an office in the nucleus or other party unit. It is a handicap, which must be overcome. At nuclei meetings, where the lan- guage spoken is, of course, English, the contribution of a comrade toward the work of the party, and what he gets from the meeting depend to a great extent on his knowledge of English. In the trade unton, the effec- ‘tiveness of our work depends to a great extent on the ability of com- Tades to make motions, to defend their position, to argue with those who know no other language but English. In some industries, itis pos- sible to speak a foreign language in the shops, before and after the meet- ings; but the union meetings are in English. And with our present deter- mination to turn more to the basic in- dustries, where more of the workers are foreign-born, the problem of get- ting the workers to speak English be- comes more essential. The case of a United Mine Worker local is not an isolated one, where the membership was foreign-born, and had to entrust the secretaryship to a conservative because he was the only one who could handle communications and an- swer them. It is often difficult to secure a nuc- leus secretary because of lack of ability to write English. The same difficulty shows itself in our work in ENROLL NOW FOR CLASSES IN THE WORKERS’ SCHOOL New Semester Will Open Monday, April 12 The Workers Schoo) starts its third term April 12. Due to the growing interest in the classes conducted by the Workers School of Chicago and the development of real ipterest in education on the part of ‘the com- rades, the Chicago workers have de- cided to offer a third term of Six weeks, which begins April 12 and ends May 21, Courses Offered. Courses which have met with great success are to be continued. The Workers Journalism class with Eng- dahl in charge, which has resulted in many additional worker correspond- ents for The DAILY WORKER will be continued. Also the class in “Cap- ital” which began last fall and has run for two terms. In addition the Trade Union Problems class which numbers in its ranks some of the best progressive fighters in the Chicago labor movement will also “continue, |meets. with Arne Swabeck as director. The class in Elements of Communism with Dolsen will be continued The class in English on the South Side will also continue. A new class in Party Organization and Functioning with Abern in charge is especially designed to meet the needs of nuclei functionaries, Each nucleus must send at least one comrade to this class. A new class in Elements of Communism will be held with William Simons. A class in English will be started on the North Side for which enrolments have already been received. All classes meet at 19 S. Lincoln street, except the Workers Journalism and Trade Union Problems which will meet at 1113 W. Washington Blvd, The North Side class in English will meet at 2644 LeMoyne street. ‘The South Side English class at Vilnis, 3116 South Halsted. Schedule of Dates. Monday, April 12. Workers Corre- spondence (Engdahl) Capital (con- tinuation) Trade Union Problems (Swabeck) Tuesday, April 13; Elements Communism (Dolsen) 2nd term, Wednesday, April 14: Party Organ- ization, and Functioning (Abern), Thursday, April 15: Elements of Communism (Simons) 1st term. Friday, April 16: American Umper- lalism (Gomez), ‘Tuesday and Thursday, April 13 and 15: English North Side, 2644 Le- Moyne, : Sunday, April 11, 11 a, m, English South Side, 3116 South Halsted. Workers Correspondence and Trade Union Problems meet at 1113 W. Washington Blvd. Other ¢l ex- cept where otherwise noted, meet at the School, 19 South Linéoln street. The fee for each course fy one dollar. ot Send fee together with fame, ad- dress and courses a to the Workers School, 19 Séuth Lincoln tres we t unions, and other organizations, All class conscious workers must possess the will to participate in om ganizations with workers of all lan- guages, and to prepare themselves for such work. The study of English must be taken up by those comrades eagerly. Neither age nor language activities can serve as an excuse for not learning or improving one’s Eng- lish, All language fractions must con- sider as a vital part of their work, the improvement of their members in Eng- lish. Sympathetic workers of language organizations must be induced to join classes in English, Where Shall We Study? Shall the classes in English be ¢on- [aucted by class conscious workers, or shall we use the, classes in the public night. schools?...The public school courses are a Dart of the Americaniza- tion scheme of the financiers, and many workers are opposed to. thém on that score. However, if they would serve our purpose, we would urge workers to attend. But the classes do not serve our purpose. The swhbject matter being taken is patriotic, and the classes take’so much time (usugl- ly four times a week) that it leaves practically no time for working class activitiy. Our classes in English on the other hand, have a working class content, the subject matter being taken from The DAILY WORKER and other party literature, dealing with workers, strikes, wages, Communism. The com- rades learn to read, write and express themselves on the problems, in the Party, the union, and other working class organizations. ’ Our policy must be to draw workers into workers’ classes in English as given by the Workers’ School in Chi- cago, New York, and other party cen- ters. Problems of the Pittsburgh League By ound PAPCUN. » hago Pittsburgh district has a’ very hard task before it, especially in the “headquarters city. At the time of the reorganization the league in this city consistéd*6f°one Jewish and one English branéh! ‘Because of in- experience, the reorganization was put thru more or less'‘mechanically and since the reorganization of the city into nuclei and concentration groups there has been a condition of chaos. Even now the comrades do not fully understand the reorganization prob- lem and the work under the new sys- tem of organization, The best way to liquidate it is for each and every com- rade to attend the meetings of. his unit. The excuse that some of the com- rades have is that they have to attend to party activity and have to devote their time to party work. That they are at some sub-committee meetings each time their unit. of. the league This is an unhealthy condi- tion for the league, for if'the units do not meet regularly we do not have the machinery to bring in new mem- bers, nor do we have the machinery thru which to do work among the working-class youth. The problem of coming to the meetings is a real se- rious one and the slogan must be, “Meetings and Work of the Y. W. L. First.” This must not be taken as a joke. The party has shown in this district that it is willing to’co-operate and go to the limit in helping to build up the Young Workers’ League, but the efforts of the party to‘ help will bring no fruit if the league members do not try to help also. The question comes up that in some units in Pittsburgh there are 3 or 4 members of the district executive com- mittee who are responsible comrades of the league and yet the units which they belong to do not function. For this there is no excuse. We have found sfhce the last district conven- tlon that the league in Pittsburgh, where it is supposed to be the back- bone of the district, which is usually the case in other districts, is the weakest in the district. We find that on the outside new units are being built up, new members are coming into the league. This is hardly the case in Pittsburgh. The leading com- rades in Pittsburgh can remedy this without very much hard work, They must drop some of the activities of the party if it in any way interferes with - OF REGULAR MONTHLY MEETING — CHICAGO LOCAL GENERAL GROUP OF THE TRADE UNION EDUCATIONAL LEAGUE ’ will be held on WEDNESDAY, APRIL 7th, 8 P. M. at the NORTHWEST HALL, Corner North and Western Aves, | All Militants Should Attend This Meeting! ADMISSION. FREB,\ the work of the league. This fs neces Sary if the league is to be a real func- tioning organization. All the com- rades realize the fact that ff our own units are not functioning we cannot bring in new members, nor can we carry out decisions of the higher committees, | ‘The next. problem which faces the district committee is that its sub committees. must function. In the past we have ¢lected sub-committees for different departments. These com- mittees did not. function in spite of the fact that we have tried to Mmit the comrades to one or two sub-com- mittees. The sub-committees must meet regularly at least twice a month. They must send plans and a letter of suggestions and bulletins for them at least once a month. Another problem which faces the dis! is how each unit will have plenty ‘wf work and dis- cussion during its meetings and how the members will have work to do be- tween the meetings of the unit. This the district committee and the units will have to solve together. The best way is to get busy on factory cam Paigns. The units must.discuss and find a factory on which they can con- centrate. Connections must be gath- ered and real efforts must be made to carry on an effective campaign in this particular factory. Each and every member must read The Young Worker and must push the circulation of The Young Worker among the working-class youth, espe- cially in the factories. The district committee must make plans for ac- tivity in the district as a whole, that is district campaigns, which will co- ordinate the work and which will untty the membership in general over the district. There-must be at least one district campaign going on all the time. (Watch tomorrow’s column for article two on Pittsburgh's problems.) Northwest Barnett Branch of the I. L. D. Meets Tuesday Night The Northwest Barnett branch of the International Labor Defense will meet at the Workers’ Lyceum, 2733 Hirsch boulevard, Tuesday evening, April 6, ue o'clock. There will be a speaker each member is expected to come and bring a sympathizer, xe \