The Daily Worker Newspaper, June 17, 1926, Page 2

Page Two THE DAILY WORKER Stee! Workers to Hold Protest Against Horro (Continued from page 1) and hushed up by the officials. Such a case was the blast furnace explosion in 1924 in which 18 or 20 workers were Killed, while the official report was 2 or 3. Only The DAILY WORKER at that time carried the facts regarding the actual number of dead. The Disaster, With a terrific roar that was heard for miles the great slate and steel roof and the second etory of the giant building was hurled into the air and shattered into splinters, then the brick walls seemed to sway inward and a second explosion threw brick, slate, Pieces of steel] and other particles of the Building a distance of 150 feet Workers crowded in the plant were blown to ents, Arms and legs were tor: ‘om their so and scat- tered thru the air with the other ma- terial used to turn the by-products of the coke pl into profits for the steel trust. Blazing coals from the 840 ovens added to the horror, while acid vats at the Sides of the bullding burst and the scalding fluid poured over the men lying pinioned beneath the wreckage or t ng to escape, Within a few seconds after the ex- plosion in the main plant the flames reached an open-air section and ignited by-product stills filled with hot tar and creosote. This flaming liquid poured in streams thru the holes in the shattered walls of the main build- ing covering the wreckage with its imprisoned victims in the basement of the building to a depth of five feet. Company fs Responsible. Carelessness of the company is directly responsible for the frightful disaster as workers in the plant had complained for weeks of the escaping gas from pipe lines. It is not known and probably never will be known where the explosion started as the entire by-products plant is devoted to extracting highly inflammable and explosive material from the residue left over in the process of turning ooal into coke for the furnaces of the steel mills. Benzol, napthalene and toluene, crude material used for the manufacture of the high powered ex- plosive, trinotrotoloul (TNT) are ex- tracted as part of the by-products. ‘The company declares that it will not make any statement regarding the Probable cause of the disaster until a thoro investigation has been made. Suppress Information, As soon as the explosion occurred orders were sent out to the company Police force, a small sized army that guard the plants night and day, not to permit anyone to enter. Hundreds of relatives of workers in the by-products plant besieged the gates, but were all refused admittance and in reply to queries regarding the fate of the work- ers were told that it was the affair of the company and they would get in- formation when the company chose to give it to them and not before, Ambulances and undertakers Wagons rushed in and out the gates at break-neck speed, carrying away the dead and wounded. Most of the victims were taken to the big brick company hospital that sits outside the gates and across the railroad tracks of the New York Central where they were laid out in Tows in the halls on improvised cots and many of them on the floor when ots were no longer avatilable. The groan of the victims could be heard for a block, until the attendants succeeded in administering ether and other anaesthetics to quiet them, After a few hours relatives were permitted to enter the hospital, which had the appearance of a slaughter house. Many of the victims still alive are doomed. The hospital authorities state that at least twenty of the sur- vivors will die of their injuries. Most of them are Negro workers, who were the majority employed in the plant that, for want of another name, is sometimes referred to as a “labora- tory.” Undertakers Terrorized, At two andertaking establishments in the Negro district that covers an enormous territory, no information could be obtained regarding the iden- tity of the dead men, altho it was possible to view the bodies. Within @ short time after the disaster The DAILY WORK! representative was on the scene and when he first viewed the bodies of the victims they were still in their working clothes. Seven Negroes in all were in the two estab lishments—four in one and three in the other, The undertakers refused to give the names of the victims and when press- ed for the reason for their refusal said that it was orders from the com- Pany. One of them said, “They give us business and we have to respect their wishes.” Some of the corpses are burned be- yond recognition with flesh burned off their faces and chests, Jn one establishment standing be- side the body of a young Negro was one of his friends who roomed with him. The young man told the repres- entative of The DAILY WORKER that the victim's name was Marvin Kinibro (wrongly reported Killegrew (4m the capitalist press) and that he worked in the by-products plant for a wage of $4.18 per day of eight hours, At another place only the check which indicated which unit of the giant industry the victim was em- ployed was mute evidence that he had ever been a human being, When work- ers enter the steel mills they cease to be anything but so much labor-power designated ‘by numbers. The dead man’s number was “26023.” In all the undertaking establish- ments of Gary the representative was able to locate twelve who had died as a result of the explosion, Enters Yards, In spite of attempts of the company police to keep out newspaper men, The DAILY WORKER representative succeeded in entering the yards and got a view of the by-products plant on the lake front which was a mass of ruins where fireman were working amidst dense smoke in an effort to clear away the debris and remove those buried in the explosion. Company police ordered us out of the yards and threatened arrest for trespassing in case of refusal to go. (Had they known which paper we represented they probably would have taken more drastic action.) Visits Homes of Victims. In the evening the homes of a dozen or more of the victims were visited. Without exception there was evidence of the most appalling poverty; bare Tooms, crowded with inhabitants, huddled together wide-eyed with fear, many of them unable even to talk of the disaster, At one home of a worker who is in a dying condition at the hospital his wife, a middle-aged woman with a small child in her arms related her visit to her husband and incoherent- ly described the amputation of a shat- tered leg and told us that his head was swollen twice its size and “burn- ed white’—he was a Negro named James Floyd. His wage was also $4.18 per day. The highest wage of any of the victims was that of Ozer Parker, who escaped with slight burns and a broken leg, which was $4.38 per day. Attempt Public Funeral Some of the more aggressive work- ers in the steel hell endeavored to secure the consent of the relatives of the victims for a public funeral in an effort to get the thousands of steel workers out of the mill in masses for a demonstration against the incessant slaughter of workers, but the com- pany tools had succeeded in inducing them to hold private funerals, However, arrangements are being made for a great mass meeting Satur- day night in Turn Hall, 14 and Wash- ington streets at which prominent la- bor speakers will address the workers and take steps to see that families of the dead and wounded are aided, Lone Robber Steals $50,000 in Jewelry CLEVELAND, O., June 15.—Jewel- ry valued at $50,000 was stolen from the home of Mrs, H. A. Parsons, daughter of the late Mark Hanna. The loot, taken by a lone prowler seen by Mrs. Parsons, consisted of a $25,000 necklace, seven diamond rings and other articles valued at another $25,000. I. L. 6. W, HOLDS UNEMPLOYMENT REGISTRATION r Union to Pay Benefits to Its Unemployed The first unemployment registration since the establishment of the unem- ployment fund on February 1, 1925, is now taking place in the headquarters of the Chicago Joint Board of the In- ternational Ladies’ Garment Workers. The union unemployment fund at pres- ent has between $29,000 and $30,000 in its treasury. It is expected that it will take sev- eral days for a full unemployment reg- istration to be made of the members of thé International Ladies’ Garment Workers. The unemployment fund was created by having the workers contribute three-fourths of 1 per cent of their wages and the bosses 214 per cent, The proponents of the fund in arranging for these assessments be- lieved that a fund of $70,000 would be raised, Workers Seek Changes. The objections of the workers to the present arrangement of the un- amployment fund is steadily increas- ng. The workers declare that the $10 a week benefit which the fund pro- vides for a period of 12 weeks in every year is inadequate and that the amount of the benefit should be increased. The workers also raise objections to their paying three-fourths of 1 per cent into the fund out of their earn- ings. They insist that in order to make a real substantial unemployment fund to increase the assessment to 5 per cent and that the bosses should bear the cost of the fund, and not the union member. Union to Make Changes. It is expected that in the next con- tract which the union will negotiate that it will make many changes in the present unemployment fund. Between 500 and 800 workers are ex- pected to register in the two-day regis- tration. Because of the small sum that has been gathered together, the union will only give half of the benefits to the workers at first. After the unemployed will have been given half the benefits they are entitled to the union will then distribute the balance of the funds between those asking for ben- efits and will make arrangements to leave a substantial sum in the fund. ‘This fund at present only applies to the 1,800 workers in the cloak making trade, POLISH WORKERS been received in Chicago, in the name. of the Polish workers. The cable- gram reads: “Warsaw, Poland, “In Polish labor’s name we protest against criminal persecution of the in- nocent workers Sacco and Vanzetti, sentenced to death by capitalist courts. We demand their immediate freedom. “Communist Fraction of Polish par- liament, “Adolf Warski-Warszawski, deputy, chairman.” This message of protest is one of the many that have been coming to America from all the countries of Europe and Latin-America in behalf) of the two innocent Italian workers, | WASHINGTON, June 15.—The| United States on June 30 will hang up a half-century favorable trade balance of approximately $19,000,000,000, REPRESENTATIVES OF “PUBLIC” NOW REPRESENT GOVERNMENT ON NEW WATSON-PARKER LAW BOARD WASHINGTON, D, C., June 15.—If the railroad workers who opposed the U. 8. Railroad Labor Board hoped to gain a great deal from substituting the new board of mediation created by the Watson-Parker law, they will be dis- illusioned, judging from the four members of the new board today appointed by President Coolidge. In fact they get some of the same men on the new board that robbed them of wage increases and managed to reduce wages as members of the United States railroad labor board, 4————____ Stack Cards Against Labor, The four men so far named by Coolidge, of the five to finally compose it, are as follows: Ex-Governor Edwin P. Morrow of Kentucky, now a member of the rail- road labor board representing “the public.” Morrow has been a lawyer, a politician and after dinner speaker thruout his career, He was the United States district attorney in eastern Kentucky between 1911 and 1915. He is 46 years old. G. Wallace W, Hanger, also a pres- ent member of railroad labor board, also representing “the public.” He, also, has lived as a politician since he left the fleld of culture as a professor at the Maryland College for Young Women years ago. From 1887 tf 1915 he drew his pay from the U. S. bureau of labor, From 1913 to 1920 he was attached to the U. 8. board of media- tion and conciliation, He was assist- ant director of labor in the U. 8. rail- road administration during and after the war. He is 60 years of age. Knows Labor—it Works for Him. Samuel 8. Winslow of Worcester, Mass., is @ new figure on the horizon, He was not on the old railway labor board, but he knows something about labor from hiring it to work in his factories, He gained his first fortune as owner of the Winslow Skate Manu- facturing company of Worcester, He is interested in the U. 8, Envelope company, and connected with the Me- chanics National Bank of New York City. He belongs to all the exclusive millionaires’ clubs of the east, in- cluding the Army and Navy Club of Washington. He is 64 years old, Proved He Was All Right—To Coolidge FOR SACCO AND VANZETTI A call of solidarity, thousands of miles away from the death chair which threatens the lives of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vahzetti, has just H CHICAGO COOKS KNOW NOTHING OF INJUNCTION Supplies Cut Off at Lone Scab Eat Shop It there is an injunction against picketing by the Chicago Cooks and Pastry Cooks’ association Local 865, as claimed in Tuesday’s capitalist pa- pers, the union knows nothing of it, declared union officials yesterday. The union has been picketing nine places, mostly Greek restaurants who are members of the Greek Restaurant Owners’ association since 4 week ago Monday, and has won seven of them, according to the union, to sign up for the union shop. The main place hold- ing out is an obstinate open shop owner of a restaurant at 14th Place and Morgan street. This scabby joint is owned by an officer of the Greek Restaurant Own- ers’ association and is pretty well paralyzed. Solidarity ,of the other union workers of Chicago has cut off supplies of ice, pastry, and so on and the place is losing its former trade of from $350 to $400 a day. Only three scabs are holding the place, Reports published that Judge Hugo M. Pam has issued an injunction against the pickets, were first ob- tained from the capitalist press, says the union, which has its office at 166 West Washington street, Jensen’s Claim to Re-Election False, Say Progressives While the returns from the elec tions of officers of the Chicago Car- penters’ District Council are not yet complete, a very few of the small out- lying locals among the 38 in the dis- trict being yet to hear from, the pro- gressives laugh at, the claims of Harry Jensen, the present president, that he has been re-elected. The lead of some 1,100 for the pro- gressives in the locals reported is too much to overcome by Jensen in the few small locals yet to send in re- turns, too much by several hundred even if he won all the votes there is left, and the progressivés are not dis- posed to accept a counting out by Jensen. Jensen’s claim to re-election is being spread by’ ‘the capitalist DEMAND LIBERTY Adolf Warski Well-Known Fighter for the Cause of Labor in Poland, ANTI-FASCIST ALLIANCE. IN BIG PROTEST Objects to Aid Given Black Shirt Terror NEW YORK, June 15—Cooper Union was packed with 4,000 Italians in a meeting held under the auspices of the Anti-Fascisti Alliance to com- memorate the death of the famous fascist victim, Giacomo Matteotti, three years ago. Every time Mussolini was mentioned there was a storm of boos and hisse: while point was given to protest against America’s collaboration with There Are By-products of Gary Steel Disaster That Can Benefit Labor By J. LOUIS ENQDAHL. — — “TY-PRODUCTS” in the steel in- dustry are many. Along the shores of Lake Michi- gan, at Gary, Indiana, stands the by-products plant of the great Illi- nois Steel company. From its acid vats gnd its hot tar stills pour the by-products that help make the steel profiteers richer and richer, Here come the by-products of the coke ovens, benzol toluene and naphthalene, all extremely valuable, and because of their value more wealth in the pockets of the steel trust stockholders, it an The by-products plant is @ danger- ous place in which to work, The parasite stockholders do not come there. Only the workers who toil at miserable wages under petty bosses, enter its portals. There they inhale the poisonous fumes that send them to early graves. They slave in the midst of ever-present dangers. ‘The explosive gasses col- lect under conditions favorable to ‘the inevitable blast that kills and maims. Such blasts occur frequent- ly among the far-flung steel trust ‘plants, in Alabama, in Pennsylvania, in Mlinois and in Indiana. 35% All labor now knows that there was another such blast in the by- products plant of the Illinois Steel company, at Gary, Ind, on early Monday morning, shortly after the day shift uad again gone on the treadmill for another week of dan- gerous and gruelling toil. It is claim- ed that there had been a fatal col- lection of benzol in a huge am- monia condenser. Then the explo- sion and more by-products of the steel industry. Not only benzol.as a by-product, but many workers dead, some killed instantly, others in great agony dy- ing in the “company” hospital as by- products. The exact number will never be’ known, Some leave wid- ows and children behind, who will, be compelled to shift for them- selves. Others, “unidentified dead,” leave perhaps a small trunk or only a erip in some “boarding house.” Their relatives will never hear more of them. eee Other by-products! The injured, scores of them; burned, charred, crippled, disabled for life, wrecks of industry. Death for many of these would be a welcome escape. But they will cling to a living death. The memory of the inferno thru which they passed is all that is left to them; of workers buried alive under masses of burning coal and white hot coke; others caught in clouds of suffocating steam; of oth- ers being hurled great distances by MELLON ATTACKS HAUGEN FARMER RELIEF MEASURE Speaks for Coolidge Op- ry position (Special to The Dally Worker) WASHINGTON, June 15,—Secre- tary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon in a declaration today denounced the Haugen farm relief bill now before the senate. In this statement, Mellon can be taken as the spokesman for the Coolidge machine in its opposition to farm relief measures now before the two houses, Mellon’s attack was based on the “economic unsoundness” of the pro- posed legislation. Actually he is’ plainly rationalizing the Coolidge op- position to subsidy for the farmers. He claims the Haugen bill will raise the cost of farm products to the con- sumer. _ Industry Also. ; “If a subsidy of this kind ig given to agricultural commodities,” gaid Mellon, “the government could not log- ically refuse to give the same treat- ment to the boot and shoe, coal and other industries which are finding some difficulty in disposing of their products.” What About Railroads, Farm representatives are recalling that the government has already made subsidies of millions of dollars to both the railroad and shipping in- Hywell Davies of California, the fourth man named, is little known, but he has proven his worth to the capitalist government of Coolidge dur- ing the past year as a conciliator of labor disputes. These men, with one yet to be name, will be the board of mediation to settle disputes between rail lines and their employes when they fail to agree. We need more news from the shop: and factories, Send It int, we fascism by a telegram to Washington authorittes protesting against the de- portation of anti-fascist workers back to Italy to suffer the criminal venge- ance of the black shirts; Speakers were T. Camarda of the Workers (Communist) Party; Arturo Giovannitti of the Italian Chamber of Labor; Emea Sormento’ef the League of the Persecuted; Frank Dellicanco of Il Nuovo Mundo; J. Lupis of the New York Anti-Fascist League; Carlo Tresca of Il bart and Petro Alle- dustries, The farm bloc may have alieniated the semi-support it was receiving from Vice-President Dawes by submitting an amendment calling for an addition- al subsidy of $75,000,000 to be applied to the cotton growers of the South, This is a concession to win democratic votes for the farm relief measures, Put a copy of. the DAILY met eee aman Metin WORKER in your when | , you go to your union 1 eeting, _ the blast and having the life crushed out of them against the first ob- struction, or of legs, arms or other bones broken; others caught in a basement under a flood of liquid, sprayed in their flight by streams of acid and other scalding fluids. For the rest of théir lives many of these “injured” will be helpless de- pendents. The agony of those few hours on Monday morning, at Gary, that will live down thru the years, is worthy of a master’s pen to describe. For the story should sear itself deep into the minds of all steel workers, ‘into the mind of the whole working class, just as the acid sears its way into the tender flesh. The steel industry has its by- products of benzol, toluene and napthalene; of dead,.crippled and diseased workers, of widows and or- phans. Just so should this disaster have its by-products. It should stir the workers, especially in the steel industry, to definite action. It should arouse them to their own needs, to their own weaknnesses, and to the shortcomings of their own class. se @ Steel labor is helpless in the grip of Judge Elbert H. Gary’s United States Steel Corporation and Charles M. Schwab's Bethlehem Steel Company. It is helpless be- cause it is not organized. Because it is helpless, Gary and Schwab need-lose no sleep when disasters slaughter their slaves. They know that there are many others waiting the beck and call of the unemploy- ment, agents at the gates. They need not worry. But they will-worry if mass pro- test becomes a living, fighting by- Product of this wholesale massacre of the workers. The great sacrifice of workers’ lives on last Monday morning must not~have ‘been in vain. It must raise the demand for the “Organi- zation..of the Unorganized” steel workers. It must result in shop committees of the workers, who are acquainted with the conditions in the plant, and who will see that bad conditions on the job are remedied. It must result in the demand for the Labor Party that will pave the way for workers’ rule. The city of Gary, like all other steel centers, is in the hands of the worst capitalist political reaction. There is no better time than now to begin in earnest to take this power from the steel capitalists. These should be by-products of the Gary disaster that will help all labor forge abead towards the day when capitalism will be deposed forever, when the protection of hu- man life will displace the safeguard- ing of profits. Examine 343 Veriremen in Picking Jurors for Martin Durkin ‘A panel of four prospective jurors, which if accepted, will complete the jury for the trial of Martin Durkin, on trial for the mumer of the red- baiting federal agent Edward Shan- ahan, was ‘tendered the defense by the state. The last of the four accepted tenta- tively by the state was the three hundred and forty-third venireman ex- amined. It was expected that some, if not all, of the panel will be challenged by the defense. PASSAIC STRIKE HEAD, WEISBORD, ARRIVES AT NOON To Speak with Darrow Albert Weisbord, youthful leader of the Passaic textile strikers now in the fifth month of their struggle, was scheduled to arrive in Chicago at noon today. He will speak at a meeting under the auspices~of Inter- national Labor Defense at Ashland Auditorium, Van Buren and Ashland, at 8:00 p. m. tonight, Clarence Darrow, famous criminal lawyer and orator will be one of the speakers. The purpose of the meet- ing is to protest against the police terrorism that has been directed against the sixteen thousand Passaic textile strikers. Several hundred have already been arrested and Weisbord himself faces grave charges. Rebecca Grecht, field organizer for the Passaic General Relief Committee, Stanley J, Clark, prominent speaker BRITISH MINE STRIKE SHUTS COTTON MILLS “Will F at Poorkouses But Not Surrender” ‘Special to The Dally Worker) LONDON, June 15.—Four hundred and twenty cotton mills of Lancashire, employing 100,000 workers, id down today owing to coal shortage and general trade depression... These mills are engaged In spinning American cot- ton. Seventy-five per cent of the mills spinning Egyptian cotton will clot down this week, many not to reopen even if the coal strike ends. Government Baits Hook for Scabs. In an effort to induce the starving miners to break away from union dis- cipline and go back to work, the gov- ernment, after consulting the mine owners, announces its intention to sus- pend the seven-hour law, by this means insuring those miners who can be got to act_as strikebreakers a little extra pay over what they would earn under the seven-hour law. The million miners, who are stand- ing like a rock despite great privation -—the report being that even the great relief fund from the Soviet Union la- bor unions is spent already on the re- lief of the most needy—are appealing thru their union officials for financtal aid from the other British unions and have asked the transport unions to order their members to not handle coal shipments. Union Reasserts Demands. Expecting the Baldwin government to go to the parliament with some sort of proposal aimed at breaking the strike, the miners’ union again an- nounces its terms: 1. Immediate reorganization of the industry to remove waste and inef- ficiency revealed in repeated investi- gations. 2. Maintenance of the material basis of the wage agreement. 3. Maintenance of wages at no less than those before the lockout. 4. Maintenance of hours and other conditions as before the lockout. “Will Fill England’s Poorhouses.” If these are not fulfilled, says the miners’ union statement, we will fill all the poorhouses in the United King- dom before we resume work. ‘The Daily Mail says that the Trades Union Congress has ordered all union workers who were employed thru the general strike to donate 5 per cent of their wages to the miners. REICHSTAG HEAD ASSAILS LETTER OF HINDENBURG Claims President’s Act Unconstitutional (Special to The Daily Worker) BERLIN, June 15.—When President Hindenberg wrote a letter to Federal Minister Von Loebell placing himself on record against the expropriation of the German princes he overstepped his rights and violated: the constitu- tion, according to Paul Loebe, presi- dent of the Reichstag. To Inform Followers, Loebe charges that Hindenberg’s letter, which Loebell made public, was sent for the purpose of letting his followers know where he stood on the question that és agitating Ger- many and will come up for referen- dum on June 20, next Sunday. ‘The president of the German repub- Me, according to the constitution, must remain non-partisan on politi- cal questions at issue. Sets Dangerous Precedent. Loebe defends the expropriation of the German nobility on the ground tion of the nobies will be a forerun- ner to the expropriation of other classes. British Government Denies Issue of Visa to Winnetka Pacifist Mrs, Lola Lloyd of Winnetka, Tl, left Chi¢ago on her way to Paris to renew her fight for a British visa on her passport so that she may attend the International League for Peace in Dublin beginning July 12, Mrs, Lloyd, one of hte founders of the league, declates the British visa has been denied her because she fafled to endorse the English women’s con- tention that defensive wars should be permitted. Chicago Settlement Aids Milwaukee. MILWAUKEE— (RP)— Jane 16— Contractors fighting the 12% cent raise to $1.37% an hour demanded by Milwaukee union plasterers are dis-