The Daily Worker Newspaper, April 12, 1927, Page 1

“the cause of their misery or suggest| against them it was decided to fas- annie Sp Note ea hexane THE DAILY WORKER FIGHTS: FOR THE ORGANIZATION OF THE UNORGANIZED FOR THE 40-HOUR WEEK FOR A LABOR PARTY Vol. IV. No. 76. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: In New York, by matt, $8.00 per year, Outside New York, by mail, $6.00 per year, NEW YORK’S LABOR DAILY HE DAILY WORKER. Entered as second-class matter at the Post Office at New York, N. Y., under the act ef March 3, 1879. NEW YORK, TUESDAY, APRIL 12, 1927 - Published Datly except Sunday by THE DAILY WORKER PUBISHING CO., 33 First Street, New York, N. ¥. FINAL CITY EDITION Price 3 Cents POLICE ESTABLISH MARTIAL LAW IN FUR DISTRICT Current Events By T. J. O’FLAHERTY.. THe death sentence has been duly} passed on Sacco and Vanzetti and { those two working class leaders are | brought several more steps nearer | the gallows. Despite the almost uni- | versal belief among individuals even | in capitalist circles that still retain a vestige of a social conscience, that those two workers are innocent of the crime of which they were convicted by a prejudiced jury, Judge Thayer finished his part of the gruesome conspiracy, It is now the working class of the United States and of the world arrayed against the judicial hangmen of this country in the strug- gle over two proletarian lives, * * HOUSANDS and hundreds of thou- sands of workers into whose con- |, sciousness the first rays of class feel- ing have not yet penetrated display an appalling callousness to the fate of Sacco and Vanzetti. Their minds | have been prejudiced against them by | capitalist propaganda agencies for| several years. Peel ene cr is assumed by many people that the long period that elapsed be- | tween, the arrest of Sacco and Van-| zetti and the date on which the death | sentence was pronounced, is proof | that they were given every possible | opportunity by the legal machinery of the state of Massachusetts to prove their innocence. Nothing could be farther from the truth. What the two doomed men sought was a new trial, defended by competent and hon- est counsel and in an atmosphere. free from the class hatred that was in- jected into the first farcical trial by | Judge Thayer, This right was denied | them. | The tremendous wave of until they are free. allowed to fritter itself away will open the prison doors and There is no time to lose. these lives are. tend to destroy. The International Labor gram. nits See inte great majority of the people still have a childlike confidence in| iheCaintes“ of ent 4efal” thachinery. Even where class is not arrayed | against class it is undoubtedly true! that judges are sometimes open to| influence in deciding poiits of law. | Citizens who have been burnt know this. All who have had experiencé with capitalist political organizations take no stock in the fiction of legal | rectitude. The legal system was es- tablished to bolster up the economic system which is based on the exploi- tation of wage labor. Those who ap-| pear in court as the enemies of that economic system are considered guil- ty until they are proven innocent and not the other way around. * * * Te the case of Tom Mooney as one horrible example! Even presi- | dent Wilson’s investigator had to come to the conclusion that Mooney was the victim of a frameup. But the murderous capitalist crew that held and still hold California in their | grip ignored all evidence and the| pleas of prominent citizens who could | not by any stretch of the imagination | be considered radical. Mooney was) saved from the death chair by the} solidarity of the workingclass. But! is still behind the gray walls of San Quentin, The employers could not forgive him for his efforts to organ- ize the workers into militant trade | unions. That is the crime of Sacco and Vanzetti. ‘ tives, liberal organizations, w movement possible. American masses must move campaign. | be denied. A National Conference to The full bench of the supreme court of Massachusetts handed down a decision sustaining the action of Judge Webster Thayer in denying a new trial to Nicolo Sacco and Bar- tolomeo Vanzetti. Shut al oS ee | With cy raarage a he ra 4 lends which has all along been really r the city of Boston, the headquart- ja political battle, The authorities of ers of the interests that want to| Massachusetts, in league with the railroad Sacco and Vanzetti to death | federal authorities, had determined there are thousands of willing work-|to “get” Sacco and Vanzetti for their ers walking the streets seeking work. | activities as revolutionary workers. They grumble and declare there is Because those activities did not pro- something, wrong but if you mention yide a legal basis for prosecution a‘.solution that has been cursed by ten a crime upon the intended vic- the elergy, they show signs of terror|tims. They were charged with mur- or exhibit a strong inclination to slice der, The prosecution was so con- your anatomy with a jack-knife. If| scious of the weakness of its frame- they have the price of a newspaper | ups that while it indicted Sacco and they will glance over the headlines |Vanzetti for murder, it tried them which tell of the imposition of the! for their revolutionary opinions and death sentence on two fellow-workers | activities. and then turn to the sporting pages.| The press was flooded with “anti- They do not realize that those who|red” propaganda against them. The want to inject an electric current in-|stage of the trial was set against a to Sacco and Vanzetti are responsible |now existent danger of a revolution- for their lack of empleyment. ary coup. The jury was pumped full * * ® of “patriotic” insanity. After it was : ‘ convinced that Sacco and Vanzetti HIS state of affairs should not were “enemies of the U. 8. govern- breed pessimism, It should only ment,” the jury brought in a verdict generate a determination to work of guilty of murder against the de- harder at Se task rd prhis Ay fendants. The frame-up was so out- message of a new order of society 2 the befuddled workers. Their in-|teepont, oui sat te ait: | stinets are good. In the shop the |tain their cloak of respectability only most ill-informed workers believe in}hy demanding a new and a “fair”! sticking together against the boss. rial f ‘anzetti. The exception is looked on with scorn, bac eaflage cea je But lema’ But against this healthy instinct is| fairness fu bee prt pho aero arrayed the mighty influence of the not induce capitalist Massachusetts capitalist press, the schools and the|to release its victims. | Webster pulpit. Those agencies are busy | Thayer was never judge in this case, preaching the gospel of obedience |put hangman. The supreme court of and meekness to the workers. The vorking class political parties, etc. Properly organized this conference can ele te syn- thesis of the mass protest, able to.apply the full millions of workers, farmers and all other liberty-loving groups. It will make out of mass protest the most powerful Movement Massachusetts was never a_ legal (Continued on Page Two) body in this case, but executor, Organize All Support for Sacco and Vanzetti by a National Conference protest against the legalized murder of Sacco and Vanzetti must not be allowed to subside The nationwide resentment which the determination to execute these two innocent workers to glut the class blood- lust of Massachusetts capitalism has created must’ not be in scattered and futile denun- ciation of capitalism in the abstract or criticism, no matter how keen, of the persons responsible. “very ounce of energy that is now devoted to well-meant but more or less unorganized efforts in behalf of Sacco and Vanzetti must be organized into one irresistible drive which bring Sacco and Vanzetti back to the working class and the labor movement. American capitalism’s judicial and punitive machinery works swiftly when the rulers will it so. It takes more time for the labor movement to gnobilize. There must also be a common program—no effort. must be wasted because of lack of a common program—no effort must be wasted because of lack of a common directing center. Saving the lives of Sacco and Vanzetti is a huge task but it can and will be done.. The issue moreover is something far and greater than the lives of two workers—precious as It is the American working class that has been on trial these seven long years and it is the spirit of defiance and the will of the workers for struggle, crystallized in the per- sons of Sacco and Vanzetti, that the rulers of America in- , Defense has a practical pro- It proposes that a national conference representative of all elements willing to unite to demand and force freedom, for Sacco and Vanzetti be called. At such a conference dele- gates would come from unions, fraternal societies, co-opera- ure of is what is needed. The in the same direction, deter- mined and disciplined, concentrated in their millions upon one objective—wresting Sacco and Vanzetti clutches of the capitalist executioners. This national conference can work out the details of the In the meantime let the agitation centering around the case take the form of preparing the masses and their organizations for a national assembly which will be so huge, determined and representative that the ruling class | must recognize it as the expression of millions who will not from the save Sacco and Vanzetti! Organize to open the prison doors! WORKERS MUST SAVE SAGCO AND VANZETTI, SAYS WORKERS PARTY By C. E. C., Workers (Communist) Party. Sacco-Vanzetti case was never a legal but always a political case. Legally Sacco and Vanzetti are inno- cent of the crime charged against them. They could not bé convicted. Politically they are “guilty” of hav-, ing fought for the workers against capitalism. For this crime capitalist Massachusetts decided to murder them. As an obedient hangman of capitalist Massachusetts Webster Thayer decreed the murder. And as an efficient tool of capitalist Massa- chusetts the supreme court of that state now approved of this decree. Save Sacco, Vanzetti. Workingmen and workingwomen: Sacco and Vanzetti are to be mur- dered because they are of us and for us. We cannot permit this. It is an act of class war of the capitalist class against the working class. The courts of Massachusetts acted in the name of capitalism against our com- rades, Sacco and Vanzetti, We workers must act unitedly for our comrades. Our solidarity with our politically persecuted comrades, Sac- co and Vanzetti, must be expressed in a united and irresistible demand: “Freedom For Sacco and Vanzetti!” Capitalist Massachusetts has used its legal machinery against our com- rades, Sacco and Vanzetti, as a poli- tical weapon to condemn them, Mass Movement. We workers must use our political will, transformed into a united mass movement, as the only power left to get the legal freedom of Sacco and Vanzetti. Sacco and Vanzetti are innocent! Their execution is murder! We demand freedom for Sacco and Vanzetti! Central Executive Committee, Workers (Communist) Party of America, “500,000 in N.Y, Court is’ Attacked by! Harvard Professor BOSTON, April 11.—The immediate appointment of a commission to examine and review all acts and pro- ceedings of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts against Nicola Sacco and Bartholomeo Vanzetti, under sentence to die. in the electric chair during the week of July 10, was de- manded in a vesolution presented to) the legislature bg Roland D. Saw-| yer, congregational minister. | Nation*Wide Protest | Meanwhile, with huge mass meet- ings. and protegt demonstrations an- nounced in large cities thruout the United States, members of the Sacco- Vanzetti Defense Committee, repre- sentatives of trade unions, and humanitarians convinced of the inno- cence of the two Italian workers, are conferring to determine means of freeing them. Fight For New Trial Some of the present legal possi- bilities are: (1) appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States; (2) Ap- peal to Gov. Fuller of Massachusetts, | and (3) the impeachment of Judge Thayer, on grounds that he showed intense prejudice during the trial and subsequent hearings for appeal. Plans are also announced for the distribution of millions of leaflets in hundreds of cities; for huge protest meetings in the large industrial cen- | (Continued on Page Two) ~ Back Vanzetti and “Sacco Protest New York workers will join in a mass protest against the threatened execution of Sacco and Vanzetti this Saturday at 1 o’clock in Union Square. | Represent Half Million Workers. | A large number of the most im-| portant trade unions in this city, | speaking for more than 500,000 work- | ers are now actively represented in| {the Saceo-Vanzetti Emergency Com- | | mittee, which is arranging the huge} protest on Saturday. | The intense resentment against the | decision @f Massachusetts Superior Court in refusing to grant a ne’ trial to the two framed-up Italian) radicals will be expressed at this mass | | demonstration. The committee exe | pects the demonstration to be at- | tended by many thousands. | Campaign Gains Momentum. | Realizing that only the powerful | force of the combined protests of the | | workers throughout the country will | | sueceed in freeing the two persecuted | | men, a relentless campaign of mass | demonstrations, the distribution of! | leaflets calling attention to the braz- }en class injustice of the case, and | other means calculated to bring pres- |sure on the legal authorities in Massachusetts, is being commenced | at once, | Many Speakers. At the demonstration on Saturday, which wi!l be followed by many others on successive days thruout the city, | a large group of speakers will call} for huge national protests thruout the United States in an effort to free Saeco and Vanzetti, who are now | facing death in the electric chair. i Labor Active In Protest. | The Sacco-Vanzetti Emergency | Committee, of which Elizabeth Gur- \ley Flynn is secretary and Robert W. | |Dunn treasurer, annnounced that addi- | tional speakers will be: announced | shortly. Some of the labor organizations | who have joined in arranging Satur- | day’s demonstration are the Joint Board of the I. L. G. W. U., Joint} Board of the furriers’ union, Shoe | Workers’ Protective .Union, Window Cleaners Union, Architectural, Bronze and Iron Workers’ Union, Amalga- | mated Food Workers’ Union, | Active support to the campaign to | free the two workers is also being | given by Il Martello, Italian weekly and the Anti-Fascisti Alliance of America. eee tee | Soldier’s Body Found in River. The body of a man apparently 45 years of age dressed in army uniform was found yesterday outside the basin at pier A. Chevrons indicated the soldier was a corporal, 4 Ben Gold, I. Shapiro, S, Mencher and eight other members of the New |York Joint Board of the Furriers’} Union are in jail today at Mineola, Long Island. It was Judge Smith of Nassau County who sent them there yester- day; but it is William Green, Mat- thew Woll, Edward F. McGrady, Hugh Frayne of the A. F. of L. ma- |chine who have plotted fer the past six months to get them behind prison bars. Prosecutor Praises Machine. The proof of this frame-up was un- |mistakable in the court proceedings at Mineola yesterday. In the pres- ence of the prospective jurors, be- fore the full courtroom, the district attorney, Elvin Edwards, demanded that the judge withdraw bail from the 11 workers who were to be placed on trial; in his fervid appeal to the court he stated that there is a fight going on between the American Fed- eration of Labor and the Joint Board \“whom these people represent,” and “the Joint Board is using methods of terrorism which ‘the American Fed- eration of Labor is trying to do away with.” Argument Irrelevant. This had absolutely no connection | with the Mineola case, which grew | out of the strike of last year before the present struggle within the union had begun in its present form. It followed the announcement of two of the Joint -Board attorneys—Charles Weeks, former district attorney, and | | George Levy—that they were ready with their case in behalf of Ben Gold and I. Shapiro. This address to the judge also fol- lowed the plea of Henry A, Udohart, who. is. to..degend workers, asking for a postponement of his case until Wednesday because he was not fully prepared. Withdrew “Bail. In svite of the fact that the case of Gold and Shapiro was feady for the trial, which had been set for this morning, Judge Smith withdrew bail (Continued on Page Five) U.S, SENDS NOTE DEMANDING CASH FROM NEW CHINA Powers Plan Annexa- tion, Says Millard BULLETIN, LONDON, April 11.—Russians ar- |rested in the recent Chinese raids upon the Soviet embassy at Peking have been released, according to a dispatch from Peking tonight to the Daily News. Patt as SHANGHAI, April 11.—Radio dis- patches received here declare that 150 Nationalist sympathizers have been executed by the Shantungese military authorities. ae ae U. 8. Closer To War. WASHINGTON, April 11.—With “| the presentation of a stern note on the Nanking “outrages” to the Nationalist government today, the United States moved closer than ever to open war on China. Threatening to “take appropriate | measures” unless the imperialist de- mands are promptly met, the note, issued simultaneously with the Brit- ish, French and Italian notes, calls for the punishment of the commanders of troops responsible for the “outrages,” apologies by Chiang Kai-shek and “complete reparations for personal in- juries and material damages done.” Send Chiang Copy. In an effort to precipitate a split within the Kuomintang the powers have despatched a copy of the note to Chiang Kai-shek as well as to Eugene Chen, Nationalist foreign minister. Would Bombard Cities. The British foreign office demanded an even sterner note, it is reported, and only the reluctance of American finance capital prevented the admin- istration from joining Great Britain in a war-like ultimatum to the Nation- alist government. The British foreign office proposed to threaten China with a blockade, with the shelling of sea- coast cities and similar methods of “reprisal.” The occupation of the whole Yangtze Valley is reported to (Continued on Page Two) a the. gight..athor.,. STATE QUIZ INTO [Ben Gold and Left TAMMANY CONDONES. INDUSTRIAL — SACCO-VANZETTI | Wing Fur Workers © INSURANCE SWINDLE ON WORKERS TRIAL DEMANDED In Jail at Mineola (Corruption of Senators and Assemblymen Comes To Light in Insurance Expose “BIG FOUR” ROB MILLIONS. Today’s is the second article of a series which The DAILY WORKER is printing, exposing the fraud of industrial (weekly payment) life insurance. Yesterday's article stressed the faet | that last year the “Big Four,” i. e., the Metropolitan, Prudential, John Hancock and Colonial Life Insurance Companies collected 100 million dollars in premiums and paid only 22 million dollars in death claims, losses, etc. What happened to the other 78 mil- \lion dollars? Of all policies which terminated last year only one in a hundred was an endowment policy. 75° of all terminated policies are lapsed for non-payment of premiums. What happens to the tens of millions of dollars which these octopus “mutual” corporations make on forfeitures? There are 40 million indus. trial policyholders in the United States and Canada. SSRs | By CHARLES YALE HARRISON. | Business was good with the “Big Four” last year. New business put on the books amounted to about two billion six hun- | dred million dollars. Lapses (which do not include death claims |or matured endowments) came to one billion three hundred mil- ‘lion dollars. These lapsed weekly payment policies are a dead |loss to the seven million erstwhile insurers. Giving the insur- |ance companies the benefit of every doubt, they pocketed fifty million dollars on this little deal alone. The Growth of’a Swindle 1925 “(Continued on Page Two) 3 BILLIoNn 20 BILLION The “Big Four” business in force has doubled itself a little more than | six times since 1905. Their assets have pyramided 14 times in the same period. The N. Y, state legislature has permitted this fraud. Demand an | investigation! Striking Plumbers MINERS UNION TO ‘Helpers Ask Bosses MAKE TEST CASE | : | To Meet Committee OF FOUR ARRESTS | ? | — Twenty ti lumbe: f Brook- 4 = ‘ hi eatblotg a total te case kao Pickets Jailed by Coal 300° workmen, have signified their} Company Police |willingness to grant the striking) ae, |plumbers demands of $14 a day and| PITTSBURG, Pa., April 11.—A test ja forty-hour week, officials of Local] case will be made of the arrest of |No, 1, U, S. Plumbers of Brooklyn,} foyr pickets of the United Mine {announced at the strikers headquar-| Workers of America, by police of the |ters in Lenruth Hall, Waverly and | Pittsburg Coal Company, attempting |Myrtle Avenues, Brooklyn, yesterday. |t) operate non-union during the pre- The plumbers’ helpers of Brooklyn, | sent jockout of union miners. The great Crescent mine of the {who have been on strike since April | Pittsburg Coal Co., at Daisytown Pa, 11, have sent a letter to the Master |Plumbers’ Association requesting|.44 the largest mine of the Vesta | Coal Co., subsidiary of the Jones & that they meet a committee of the workers who _— organized in the | Laughlin Steel Corporation, in the American Association of Plumbers |same town, are still trying to break Helpers. They have also issued a/iy. union, {leaflet hed the members of the plumb- Four pickets were on the public |ers’ union stating their demands and road, leading to the properties of the asking their assistance be getting | mines engaged in the lock-out, and them into the plumbers’ union. _The | while peacefully attempting to per- letter to the bosses sent last night,| 1.40 strike-breakers not to go to | work, were arrested by armed com- | follows: “April 11, 1927. ii x hay any police, and accused of being: a “Master Plumbers’ Association, ae “ f . “8 Nevins St,, k |“Brooklyn, N. Y. “Gentlemen: “On April 5th we sent you a letter | with our demands and a request that you meet a committee of our organ- ization representing the journeymen plumbers’ helpers. You have not an- |swered this letter. | “The letter contained the ing demands: “1, Recognition of our union. $9.00 per day. “3, 40 hours per week. “4. Double pay for overtime. “We wish to inform you that there is no organization but ours that represents the journeymen helpers in your employ, Irrespective of any jagreement which may presumedly | represent us or may be signed in our behalf we are determined to fight for} our demands, “We again request that you meet a committee of our organization representing your employes to dis- cuss these matters, H “Very truly yours, 1 “C. C. MILLER, “President. ank Dobbins, in charge of the union forces in the Canonsburg dis- trict, provided bail for the four picks ets under est and they will be ar. raigned before a justice of the peace in Washington county, * * * WINDBER, Pa.—More than 500 miners of the Berwind-White Coal Company gathered at the German Hall this city on April 8th to consid- er the question of a raise in wages, pay for dead work and a fair weight for coal produced. The miners of Berwind-White Co, producing anthracite coal, numbering about 4,000, received a heavy cut in wages February 15. committee of the discontented miners (Continued on Page Two) follow- Reorganize Downtown L. L. D. A meeting to reorganize the down- town branch of. the International |Labor Defense will be held at the Ukrainian Labor Hall, 17 East Third St., Tuesday, April 12, eight p, |All workers living downtown \urged to be present. A united front .