The Daily Worker Newspaper, May 8, 1926, Page 6

(Continued from page 1) world can the situation ever be exactly the same after the British general strike. It is no exaggeration to say that for at least ten years every fundamental question of poliey and_ tactics discussed in any American trade union will be discussed with some thought of the British gencral strike in the mind of every speaker. All questions of the solidarity of labor will have to be met in a clearer atmosphere. The question of the amalgamation of craft unions will be influenced by thoughts of the effect of amalgamation in the solidarie action of can speak in a light manner of the matter of the world trade union unity. After the Russian workers’ revolution it was impossible anywhere in the world to discuss the questions of political action of the working class in the same way that they were discussed before. And just so, it will never again be possible anywhere in the world, after the Britsih general strike, to discuss the forms of political action in the same manner as before. (The Communists’ arguments will be based upon the same Marxian principles, but fortified and sharpened with more concrete quality than ever before.) If the strike were to come to a close and to be followed by an electoral victory of the labor party, as has been suggested by bourgeois writers, this would give a brief respite for shouting by social-democrats in a strained voice. But subsequent and very early events would hush the voices of the social-democrats. The strike event, no matter what its immediate outcome, inevitably leads to a sharper crisis. As John Maynard Keynes, the British economist, puts it, any “terms, good or bad,” on which an agreement may be reached, “will settle nothing.” Keynes is quoted by the Chicago Daily News as saying: “On some terms, good or bad, offered by the government, the men will go back. But such termination will settle nothing. The problem of evolving a better way of conducting our business in industrial society is as complex as that in the United States, but we are no longer assisted out of our difficulties and mistakes as Great Britain used to be and as the United States still is by a crescendo of material progress.” It could hardly be stated better. British imperialist-capital- ism can no longer moderate its class conflicts with labor. by means of the capacity of its capitalists to buy off the “aristocracy of labor” with the “crescendo of material progress” which con- sisted in the world-loot of imperialism. “Great Britain used to bo”—and “the United States still is’—able to corrupt and divide the working class thru the surplus profits of imperialist plunder- ing of the colonial and semi-colonial world. ‘That is the story of the present differences between, the British labor movement and the American movement. “The United States still is’—but it will not permanently be—able to maintain Gompersism, divi- sion and betrayal within the labor movement. Great Britain no longer is. A bourgeois writer, Edward Price Bell, writing in the Chicago Daily News, crudely plunges into an anticipation of the future, in the hope of serving the capitalist cause by fright: “Great Britain’s overshadowing question has risen from the sub- ordinate planes of national life to the supreme plane—that of what man- ner of government the people shall have.” He continues: “Democracy versus bolshevism Is the Issue. True, the bulk of organized workers in Great Britain repudiates nominal bolshevism. True, the bolshevik party in the nation is almost microscopically small. But what are these executives of organized labor proposing to do? They are proposing to overthrow the government, to destroy the democratic principle, to back their class point of view with force, Is this not essentially bolshevism?” And he offers the only solution he can think of: “Conservatism and proletarian revolutionism—or, If one prefers, fascismo and bolshevism—will fight it out in a political arena immemorial- ly consecrated to freedom.” The bourgeois world knows that profound effect is to be ex- pected from this strike. Wall Street has shut off all plans for big financing in all countries of Europe. The proposed joint loan from New York and London bankers for “Belgian stabilization” has fallen thru as an admitted result of the strike, and Belgian francs, together with the French, have hit the bottom of their history. Not to finance Continental Europe, but to seize the world trade of Great Britain in coal and steel, is the present thought in American capitalist circles. That, and to escape the consequences of the revolution which American capitalism fears in its newly bought-up Europe. American exports to the United Kingdom has been running nearly one hundred million dollars a month, and during the nine months ending with March it was $782,022,658. The loss of this export trade for even a few weeks is no joke to American cap- italists. But thruout all of their anxiety about other things, there runs the yellow streak of fear of the effect of the British example on American labor. It is interesting that the New York Times’ Washington correspondent, apparently fresh from a talk with “a spokesman of the president,” writes: “President Coolidge, it was added at the White House, Is unable td find any analogy between labor con: s = bo Mh roe le conditions In Great Britain and those In This means that Coolidge is thinking about what we are thinking about. The British general strike is also an American affair. It must be made so in every trade union local in the United States. The call for solidarity with British labor will meet a thunderous response. The urgent need for preventing strike-breaking efforts from ths side of the Atlantic cannot be successfully resisted if the honest workers in America now do their duty for their British brothers. ‘ R. M. Clear the Way (Written In Moscow on the occasion of May Day, and dedicated to the Young Communist International). By CHARLES ASHLEIGH (CLEAR the way, you vermin! We're coming! We're coming! Back with you against the sides of houses! Back with you into the dull alleys! Splash your feet quickly thru the mud, As you run, Black-coated vermin! Run with your little shiny feet quickly, When you hear us. Ho, there! What is that, cutting the sky in two? What new lightning is it? What is that red ray, Eating up the clouds? We're coming! } What is this laughter, Coming over the edge of the hills, Like a tropic storm? . What thunderous song is that, | Shouted From the scarred throats : Of a score of craters? Listen: “We go to pay a visit On the fat ones who smile. And, when we meet them, They may still be fat—perhaps, But they will no longer smile!” A strange song, Young men— I fear You have put aside polite lutes, And are fingering cannon! come, Tossing on uneven roads, With our cannon. We come Out of the black houses Where you have forced your slaves To bed in dung. Look! We are young And your world is dying. We come to blaze the cobwebs From your walls. We come to wave a Red Flag Before your pale pompous faces, Black-coated vermin! Listen ! Youth is the time of love, They say, And of jewelled adventure. Your sweet tame poets have sung of it; And we have read, sullenly. 2 Such youth was not for us; For you have drained our blood | Before we were born. ° Bu there is one joy for our youth, And one deep fever— The fever of battle! Oh, stand back, You vermin! Here comes YOUTH! RED YOUTH! Triumphant! . The death of your creaking idols, The end of your long decay! Stand back, Black-coated vermin! (Your fashion is now dead.) WE COME TO CLOTHE THE WORLD IN RED! Moscow, May the First, 1923,