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

a Page Six THE DAILY WORKER Published by the DAILY WORKER PUBLISHING CO. 1113 W. Washington Blvd. Chicago, Il, Phone Monroe 4733 ee Ce SUBSCRIPTION RATES By maii (in Chicago only): By mail (outside of Chicago): $8.00 per year $4.50 six months | $6.00 per vear $3.50 six months $2.50 three months $2.00 three months Address all mail and make out checks to THE DAILY WORKER, 1113 W. Washington Bivd., Chicago, MlInots J. LOUIS ENGDAHL } WILLIAM F, DUNNE {™ MORITZ J, LOE... See aca INLAAAAASRISSNASARALANORI ASR Ch SSE SY Entered as second-class mail September 21, 1923, at the post-office at Cni- cago, lil., under the act of March 3, 1879. < 290 Advertising rates on application. No Arbitration of the Garment Strike We are glad to learn that Louis’ Hyman, manager of the New ¥ork Joint Board of the International ‘Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union and chairman of the strike committee, has come forward with a warning to the manufacturers, that the: attempt of Governor, Smith to force compulsory arbitration and. the bosses’ intention to sabotage direct dealings in conference withthe governor’s backing, will not be tolerated. As we pointed out yesterday, the manufacturers took advantage of the letter of the union to Governor Smith, and showed that they would enter conferences with the union only to break them up by rejecting the union terms and appealing to the governor to. force, arbitration on the workers. Hyman certifies that our view of this was correct when he says: . “These manufacturers take this position because they infer from Governor Smith’s letter that, when they disagree with us on every point and the conferences break up, the governor sill compel us to refer the entire dispute to arbitration. “The union will not refer ourdemands to arbitration,” Hyman continues. “We would like the leaders of the Industrial Council to know this before the conference begins.” This is the proper attitude, and we are certain that Hyman will be supported by the membership in this correction of a mistake which opened the way to injury of the union and a defeat, of its demands. As Hyman points out, arbitration has been rejected time and again by the membership, and the right wing attempt to compromise the strike will be repudiated by the workers, as they repudiated the right wing proposal in the last convention that the union accept arbitration in principle. It remains for the left wing to rally the workers in defense of the present stand of Hyman—against arbitration and for direct dealing between the union and the manufacturers and jobbers, to remain vigilant against the right wing compromises and make that vigilance effective by taking the leadership which their support by the rank and file fully justifies. Business Manager The Zeigler Cases One of the darkest chapters in the history of Frank Farrington, suspended president of the Illinois Miners’ Union, was written when he aided and abetted the Franklin county proseentor’s office in bring- ing about the conviction of several progressive leaders of the Zeigler miners on framed-up charges. One of those victims of Farrington’s.treachery. was the president of the Zeigler local and was long a thorn inthe side of the Leiter coal interests and their tools in the sub-district office of the Illinois Miners’ Union. In order to oust the progressive leadership, many schemes were tried and finally the courts were resorted to with sue- cess. Even tho it cost the life of Mike Sarovich, who died from a bullet fired by a ku klux klan gunman, thé bloody conspiracy went thru, for the coal interests must be served. Farrington’s men went bail for the. killer... Later on he was white-washed and an innocent man charged with the crime. This was only a bluff, to detract attention from the real culprit. The authorities were not anxious to punish anybody for the killing of Sarovich. The dead man was a progressive. : When the International Labor Defense stepped in -to assist the coal company’s victims, Farrington issued a decree denouncing the I. L. D. as a “dual organization” and threatened to litt the charter of any local identifying itself with the I. L. D. Now the miners of Illinois know who the dual unionists are and they will have Ittle difficulty in understanding why Farrington, the Peabody servant, made a united front with Leiter, the K. K. K. and the prosecution to get rid of Henry Corbishley, former president of Local 992, U. M. W. of A., and his associates. : Those workers are now free on bail and unless the miners wake up and take appropriate action, they are liable to go to jail. Now, more than ever, the miners of Tllinois need the assistance of every progressive to clean up after Farrington. Mussolini, Servant Not Master The real bosses in the black shirt dictatorship of Italy are big bankers, one of them being Count Volpi, -the gentleman who nego- tiated the debt settlement with the United States. Mussolini is merely a figurehead and a prisoner of finance-capital tho a voluntary and willing one. : i The tinsel is stripped from the personality. of Mussolini in an article that will appear next Wednesday in Tue Dairy Worker, written by a man who knows his Italy and his Mussolini. That the decrees robbing the masses of every vestige. of elective power, issued by Mussolini with startling rapidity are caused by a progressive weakening of the fascist power is the inference to be drawn from the article. The followérs’ of Ferinacci, the deposed general secretary of the fascist party, are resorting to violence against Mussolini's eut-throats and exposing each other as bands of embezzling experts. This is good. The fascist dictatorship is based-on the small. group of bankers and heavy industrialists and is exereised for their benefit. Contrast this with the dictatorship of the workers and peasants in the Soviet Union, based on the suffrage of the great masses of producers and you have the difference between a revolutionary form of government with its face to the future and a reactionary tyranny with its face to the past. Fascism represents antocracy. The Soviet form of government represents the democracy of the future, How the mighty sometimes fall! Harry Daugherty, once the big mogul of the Harding administration, injunction specialist and red baiter, is now about to stand trial without a confederate on a charge of defrauding the government of $7,000,000 thru collusion with the head of the alien property eustodian. The noisiest patriots are usually the biggest crooks. Ty ay SUBSCRIBE TO THE DAILY WORKER! ‘ Se a nar Te ae tate a Do We Be By C. E, RUTHENBERG. HE high prosperity which Ameri- can industry has been enjoying during the past year has developed a tendency toward pessimism in some sections of the party. The argument is being made, that because there is general employment in most indus- tries, the workers will not engage in struggle against the capitalist bosses and that under these conditions the party cannot make headway in the fight against capitalism and in build- ing its strength. Such an analysis of..the present situation in the United States and the possibilities for building the party in this situation is based upon the theory that the workers will fight only in pe- riods of increasing misery, that is, when their wages are reduced, their hours lengthened and their working conditions and standards of life gen- erally become worse. This theory of increasing misery and its relation to the workers’ strug- gle does not make its appearance for the first time. Decades ago, in the socialist party, there was to be found in such periods agitators, whose slo- gan was “Wait till hard times come and you will see the party grow,” The socialist-labor party was strongly in- tested with this theory of increasing misery and postponed the struggles of the workers until the pinch of capi- talism became sharper. Is this theory that the workers will only fight under increasing misery cor- rect and do we as Communists, accept it? This is the question which those comrades should ask themselves who haye become infected with the idea that because of the high rate at which American industry is operating, we are.unable to build our party. because the workers will not engage in fights. It is of course true that the work- ers will fight in a period of increasing misery, but is this the only time in which they engage in struggle? 28.8 Conditions Which Compe! Struggle. WHE fundamental answer to this question has been given by Marx in “Capital”: in analyzing the factors which'determine the’ value of the la- bor-power of the workers. He did not eomé to the conclusion that the value of the labor-power of the workers was determined by the cost’ of reproducing that labor-power. ‘He did conclude that the value of the labor-power of fHE DAILY WORKER the workers was determined by the cost of reproducing that labor-power under the historically developed stand- ards of life of the workers of various countries. ie In the qualification “historically de- veloped standards of life’ we have the answer to the question posed at the beginning of this article, The workers do not only fight when the capitalists seek to force down their standard of life below a mere subsistance, that is, below their abil- ity to secure the barest, poorest kind of food, clothing and shelter thru which they can maintain themselves. They will fight when their histofically developed standard of life is threat- ened and when this includes the own- ership of an automobile (as it does for many American workers today), a vic- trola and piano and; the opportunity to go to the movies regularly, they will fight in order to maintain the standard of life which includes these things. Furthermore, the standard of life of those who exploit them and gen- erally of the country in which they live, has a determining effect upon the struggles of the workers. ‘Boasting about the great wealth of the United States, immense productive power and its high prosperity, which is carried in the capitalist press, does not leave the worker untouched, Higher wealth production and improvement of the position of the country as a whole, stimulates the workers to struggle to share in this “prosperity.” The worker says to himself: If the capi- talists are making such great profits, if the country is so wealthy, why should I not improve my standard of life and share in this “prosperity.” see Workers Struggle In Period of Prosperity, VERY period of so-called prosper- ity in the cycles thru which indus- try in this country has gone, has been accompanied by movements of work- ers for higher wages and better work- ing conditions. It is in these periods that the worker has courage. for strug- gles. Jobs are plentiful. There is no great army of unemployed. The con- ditions for success are better. The year 1912, for instance, was not a period of industrial depression, still it was a period of struggle in which we had the great strikes at Lawrence, Paterson, McKees Rocks, Akron, Me- saba Range, ete. lieve in the Theory o The years of from 1915 to 1919 were. the periods of war prosperity. Em- Dloyment was more general than it was before. The workers were need- ed. It was during this period that the American Federation of Labor had its greatest growth in membership and in which the greatest industrial strug- gles in the history of this country took place, In 1919, the war time needs of the capitalists were over, but there was still great industrial prosperity. We find, during that year, that the great steel strike took place. The half mil- lion members ofthe United Mine Workers wént oni strike for an in- crease in wages and at the same time the railroad: workers threatened a strike, which was only averted thru eoncessions, ‘giving. them higher wages. These great struggles took place in a period when industry was working at a high rate and prosperity for the capitalists had reached a height prev- iously unknown, The year 1922 was again a period of great industrial struggles. In that year capitalist production had to a degree pulled itself out of the deep crisis of 1920-21, The tendency of industry was again upward altho so- called prosperity did not yet exist. The struggle of the United Mine Workers in that year was a defensive struggle. But that of the railroad shopmen was based on a demand for increased wages and therefore an of- fensive struggle. *. The Present Prosperity. INCE the development of the pres- ent period of prosperity, we see accompanying it struggles of the workers for higher wages and better working conditions. The anthracite strike, altho ending in a defeat, was a fight for increased wages and im- proved working conditions. The Fur- riers’ strike was also based on new demands of the workers, as is the present strike of the New York Gar- ment workers, In Massachusetts the ishoe workers are answering capitalist attacks by demands for higher wages. The workers on the railroads, altho tied up by the new Watson-Parker bill insofar as strikes are concerned, are making demands for higher wages. RSH: Thus we see -that.at-the present time, in place of prosperity resulting in contentment and»: indifference. to ‘ struggle on the part of the workers, there is a growing wave of struggle for increased wages and better work- ing conditions,’ This is true in indus- tries other than those in which specfal crises exist, such as textile and bitum- inous coal, where the workers are re- sisting by their struggles efforts to lower their standards of life. The conclusion to be drawn from these facts, briefly presented, is that there is no basis for the theory that the workers will not struggle in times of prosperity. Quite the contrary, it is exactly in such times of prosperity that demands for, higher. wages and better working conditions are made and that movements for organization of the. unorganized workers to attain these better wages and improved con- ditions. are developed. . The Party and the Present Situation. IHOSE party members who are mak- ing. excuses for lack of ‘progress on the grounds of the existing ecofiomic conditions. and refusal of the workers to carry on fights, have not a leg to stand on. They are trying to excuse their own pessimism and lack of en- ergy in the struggle by a theory which has no basis, in fact, It is.true that the party must fit its policies, thru which it seeks to move the workers into. action, to the eco- nomic conditions, existing in a.particu- lar period. In a period of prosperity and general employment, the. organ- ization of the unorganized workers, demand for higher wages and better- working conditions must be the slo- gan of the party for the workers’ strug- gle. On the basis:of such: slogans. and such demands, the Party can. move masses of workers into struggle. It has shown this in those sections of the country’ where ‘it has put itself at the head of movements for organiza- tion and demands for higher wages and better conditions. At the present. time, altho.the future is somewhat in doubt, general employ- .ment and prosperity is still true of American industry. We must base our slogans upon this situation. If we take up -earnestly.,and . energetically the struggle for organization. of the unorganized, the fight for increased wages and better working conditions, we will find that the workers will re- spond and are ready to fight. Thru such struggles we will build.our party in times of prosperity even as we build it in times of industrial crisis. WHY DOES GREEN INVESTIGATE? Left Wing Leadership Wins a Strike— — 'N yesterday’s issue The DAILY WORKER published the answer of the New York Joint ‘Board of the Fur- riers’ Union to the letter of William Green, president of the American Fed- eration of Labor, who insists on a hos- tile and star chamber “investigation” of the conduct of ‘the recent success- ful strike of the New York union, ap- parently because Green is angry that a strike was won. This unprecedented action is being forced upon the union against the will not only of the Joint Board, but of the membership, and in the following let- ter, also addressed to Green, the shop chairmen voice the protest of the membership against this extraordinary attack upon their union and set forth why the membership supports the left wing leadership of the Joint Board. Their letter says: se @ Mr. William Green, President, American Federation of Labor, Washington, D. C. Dear Sir and Brother: At a meet- ing held Wednesday, August 11, 1926, the shop chairmen representing the shops employing union labor in the fur industry of New York City, hay- ing heard and considered the report. of the Joint Board representatives con- cerning the decision of the American Federation of Labor Council to con- duct an investigation of our recent strike, elected a special committee of shop chairmen representing the New York fur workers. Hit at Kaufman Gang., In order that you may understatnd our feelings regarding your. investi- gation, we beg you to,consider the following brief sketch of. the recent history of the New York Joint Board: For a number of years prior,to May, 1925, our union, contrary, to the will of our membership, bad been in the hands of an unprincipled, unscrupulous and corrupt group ot office holders, Dur- ing these years union conditions in our industry had sunk to the very lowest level. Our trade. evils had grown and multiplied. ; Organization work was at a stand- still and the fur workers had been completely at the mercy of their em- ployers who had taken full advantage of the criminal indifference and negli gence of the Joint Board officials. The agreement had been flagrantly vio- lated by the manufacturers and the rights of the fur workers had been trampled upon by both employers and union officials. By the use of organized strong-arm methods and of people of notorious and questionable characters, the of- ficials in control of our Joint Board had succeeded in terrofizing’our mem. Smashes Employers’ Attack on Fur Wace Cieca, Frayne and Company Fails to Save’ the Bosses——Green Orders Hostile Probe—Union Membership Supports Left Leaders bership and converting our union into an agency serving their own selfish interests. Every attempt.made by us to put an end to these grievous con- ditions was met with the full force at the disposal of the clique in power. Leadership Change Good. In order to wipe ont the evils pre- vyailing in our organization, it required an unselfish leadership prepared to run the risk of personal physical in- jury to inspire and guide the discon- tented membership. Such a leader- ship was provided by, the fur workers whom we have chosen to occupy the responsible positions of our present Joint Board and who served us on the strike committee, It is well remembered and appre ciated by all fur workers that, in ad- dition to their own work, it was the untiring efforts of our present leader- ship—efforts which on a number of oc- casions they paid for with their very blood—that enabled them to free themselves and the organization from the sinister control of the unprincipled elements. Successful Organizing. During the brief period in which the present leadership have been in con- trol of the Joint Board they have suc- ceeded in arousing the real support of the fur workers, a spirit laid dormant and discouraged. They instilled into our organization new Hfe and fresh vigor, They condueted several suc- cessful organizational drives which brought into our organized ranks large numbers of exploited workers thus adding strength to our union and to thd organized labor «movement as a whole. " : Their inspiration and education en- abled us to recognize our rights and to realize that we possess the ability and the power to,safeguard these rights, Utilizing our awakened spirit to the fullest extent, they compelled the manufacturers, to respect the terms of our agreement and thereby enormously improved our living and working conditions, Victorious Strike. And, finally, their leadership suc- cessfully conducted us thru our recent 17-week strike which enabled us to wrest from the manufacturers a 40- hour week and a number of other sub- stantial concessions improving our conditions and those of our families. Every one of us feels proud of our union, of our fight, of our devoted lead- ership and of our victorious strike, Is Winning Strike An Evil? Your instituted investigation, lowing our recent guecessful strike, which will undenlablf encourage and inspire the entire lapor movement to greater efforts, such an investigation strikes us as thotigh a victorious ‘A fol- strike is being investigated as an evil to be avoided in the future, Why institute an investigation with- out informing those to be investigated of the charges preferred against them, if such exists? Is not this the only and usual procedure before an investi- gation, What emergency called for thé disregard of this recognized elemen- tary right of the accused? We have always been loyal to the American Federation of Labor and desire to remain loyal. Furthermore we declare unreservedly that we have never found our present leadership of the Joint Board wanting in loyalty to the American Federation of Labor, On the contrary such loyalty has been preached by-them to the fur workers on numerous occasions. However such loyalty does not and must not deprive us of the sense of right and fairness of our duty to ex- press our views. We state unhesita- tingly that our numerous doubts cause us to question the wisdom of your action, . Methods Won Because Militant. You vaguely intimate that the in- vestigation wifl éxtend to the methods employed in the strike and to the ex- isting friction in our organization, Our methods are widely known? Mass picketing, widest rank and file con- trol of every branch of activity and participation therein and widest con- sultation’ of shop chairmen and of workers in general on all important policies—these were the methods em- ployed. ° And those were the methods that led to victory. If those methods are not in accordance with the American Federation of Labor practices then in- deed such practices are obsolete and it ig no crime to.supplant them with new and better ones, Full ‘Confidence. We havé' the’ fullest confidence in our present leadership of the Joint Board and in the strike committee, and we know that they neither fedr nor desire to place any obstacles in the way of an investigation, More- over, we fully agree with their policy of submitting under protest to your investigation. But we ask whether the internal differences existing with- in our international should be within the province of an investigation to be conducted by the American Federation of Labor. Are we not competent and intelli- gent enough to adjust our internal dif- ferences ourselves? Are we less en- titled to the exercise of this right than any other organization in similar circumstancg’? ‘These questions com- pel us to fee} that the investigation is uncalled for, unprecedented and un- justifiable. " Demand to Be Present. In yiew of the role played by the hop chairmen as individuals and as a yody, the chairmen instructed me to vequest that a delegation of shop chairmen be present at all hearings of he investigation committee. The chairmen further request that,all hear- ‘ngs be, made public. and open.to the press. 7 : ‘ We earnestly hope that the opinion and requests of the shop chairmen will be_given due.ronsideration. .. ” Fraternally»yours, ; . Shop Chairmen Committee. By the Secretary. , 2: * + :7 Membership Voices Protest. The following is a resolution adopt- ed unanimously at a meeting of fur workers, members of the New York Joint Board: of the -Furriers’, Union. The mass meeting was held on Wednes- day, August 18, 19: wy , at Cooper Union City. . Over. 3,500 .| workers filled the. hall to capacity and emphatically voiced their protest against the investigation instituted by the American Federation of Labor: Whereas, the American Federation of Labor has instituted an investiga: tion into the conduct of our recent strike and into the internal contro- versies of our international, and ; Without Hel, ‘Whereas, suoh an investigation is not only without parallel in the his- tory of the A..F. of L., but also con- stitutes an invasion of the autonomy of our union and a violation of the constitution of our international, and _ Whereas, the general strike com- mittee-and the present’ leadership of the New York Joint Board success- fully,conducted us thru our recent 17- week, strike, which .resulted in great gains for all fur workers and in vic- tory for the entire labor movement; be it therefore bedi Official Intrigue. 5 lved, that we, the fur workers assembled at Cooper Union on August 18, 1926, hereby emphatically protest against this qbsolutely unjustifiable in- vestigation and against this latest in- trigue of our international officers, and be it further Resolved, that we express our full- est confidence in those who served us on the géneral strike committee and in our present militant leadership of the Joint Board, against whom this inves- tigation is aiming, ahd we pledge ‘to support them against this latest at- tack on our union; be it also “Demand Public Hearings. Resolved, that we demand the hear- ings of the investigation committee to be public and above board, and that they be open to the press representa- tives and to the workers. f Misery? (Ernst Haecke on “Last Words on Evolution” CHAPTER II. THE STRUGGLE OVER OUR GEN EALOGICAL TREE, (Continued from previous issue.) These paletontological facts are among the most important proofs of the descent of man from a long se- ries of higher and lower vertebrates. There is no other explanation possi- | ble except evolution for the chrono- logical succession of these classes, which is in perfect harmony with the morphological and systematic distri- bution. The anti-evolutionists have not eyen attempted to give any other explanation. The fishes dipneusts, am. phibians, reptiles, monotremes, mar- supials, placentals, lemurs, apes, an- «thropoid apes, and ape-men (pithecan- thropi), are inseparable links of a long ancestral chain, of which the last and most perfect link is man. Cf. the ta- bles pp, 166-168.) One of the paleontological facts: I have quoted, namely, the late appear ance of the mammal class in geology. —is particularly important. This most advanced group of the vertebrates comes on the stage of the Triassic period, in the second and shorter half of the organic history of the earth. It is represented only by low and small forms in the whole of the mego- zoic age, during the domination of the reptiles. Thruout this long pe- riod, which is estimated by some ge- ologists at 8-11, by others at 20 or more, million years, the dominant rap- tile class developed its many remark- able and curious forms; there were swimming marine reptiles (halisau- ria), flying reptiles (pterosauria), and colossal land reptiles (dinosauria). It was much later, in the Tertiary pe- riod, that the mammal class attained the wealth of large and advanced pla- cental forms that secured its predomi- nance over this more recent period; The many and thoro investigations made during the last few decades into the ancestral history of the mammals have convinced zoologists who were engaged in them that they may be traced to a common root. All the mammals, from the lowest mono- *remes and marsupials to the ape and man, have a large number of striking characteristics in common, and these distinguish them from all other ver- tebrates: the hair and glands of the skin, the feeding of the young with the. mother’s milk, the peculiar for- mation of the lower jaw and the ear- bones connected therewith, and other features in the structure of the skull; also, the possession of a kneecap (patella), and the loss of the nucleus in the red blood-cells, Further, the complete diaphragm, which entirely separates the pectoral cavity from the abdominal, {s only found in the mam- mals; in all the other vertebrates there {s still an open communication between the two cavities. The mono- whole mammalian class is therefore now regarded by all competent ex- perts as an established fact. In the face of this tmportant fact, what is called the “ape-question” loses a..good deal of the importance that was formerly ascribed to it. All the momentous consequences that follow it in regard to our human nature, our past and future, and our bodily and psychic life, remain undisturbed whether we derive man directly trom one of the primates, an ape or lemur, or from some other branch, some un- known. lower form, of the mammalian stem. It Js important to point this out, because certain dangerous “at tempts have been made lately Jesuitical zoologists and zoological Jesuits to cause fresh confusion on the matter. fs : In a richly, illustrated and widely vead work that Hans Kraemer pub- lished a year ago, under the title ‘The Universe. and Man,” an abie and learned. anthropologist, Professor Klaatsch ot Heidelberg, deals’ “the origin and development of the human race,” and admirably describes the primitive history of man and his civilization, However, he denounces the idea of man’s descent from the ape se;” he grounds this severe cen- sure on the fact that none of the Hv- ing apes can be the ancestor of human- ity. But no competent scientist had ever said anything so foolish. If we look closer into this fight with wind- mills, we find that Klaatsch holds sub- stantially the same view of the pil coid theory as I have done since 1866. He. says expressly: “The three 1 thropold apes, the gorilla, chimpanzee, and orang, seem to diverge from a common root, which was near to that of the gibbon and man.” I had long ago given the name archiprimas to this single hypothetical root-form of the primates, which he calls the “primatoid.” It lived in the earliest part of the Tertiary period, and had probably been developed in the Cre- taceous from older mammals. The very forced and unnatural hypothesis by meang of which Klaatsch goes on to make the primates de, very widely from the other mammals seems to me to be quite untenable, like the similar hypothesis that Alsberg, Wil- ser and other anthropologists, who deny our pithecoid descent, have lately (To be continued.) phyletic (or single) origin of the ’ ‘{rrational, narrow-minded, apd. .