The Daily Worker Newspaper, May 27, 1927, Page 6

; i { y i Page Six THE DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, FRIDAY, MAY 27, 1927 | | Professional Patriots | This series continues to explain the activities of the 25-odd so-called patriotic organizations functioning in the United States at the present time. The previous four instalments listed the names of the various groups together with some of their typical financial supporters—notorious union-smashing corporations and “conservative” business men. The material for “Professional Patriots” was gathered by Sidney Howard, co-author with Robert Dunn of “The Labor Spy” and John} Hearley. | Consumers Pay. Mr. Hichborn calls attention to the fact that all these | contributions are sd on in charges to consumers. | As for the American Legion we certain evidence on the character of its backers in a letter written on the letterhead of Swift and Company, December 26, 1919, and addressed to certain corporations: “At a meeting held on December 28, 1919, presided over by Mr, Thomas E. Wilson, here were present repre- sentatives of the different stock yard interests and it was voted that they contribute $10,000 towards a cam- paign for funds for the American Legion. A national drive is being made for the Legion and the amount asked from Illinois 100,000, Mr. James B. Forgan, chairman of the Fi ional Bank, being treasurer of | the fund for Illinoi . We are all interested in the Legion, the results it will obtain, and the ultimate effect in helping to offset radicalism. It is important that we assist this worthy work and at the meeting 1 was asked by the chairman to write to the different stock yard interes for their contribution. In pro- rating the amount, it was suggested that we use an arbitrary percentage as a basis and the amount you are asked to contribute is $100.” In much the same manner the new American Citizen- ship Foundation is supported by substantial Chicago capitalists (see page 159). Taking the whole group of patriotic societies, both the national and local, the general and the employers’, it is clear that they are supported mainly by business interests. The connections of their directing committee members, shown in the list on page 22, makes that evident. In addition, there are of course many mem- bers paying small amounts who genuinely believe in the disinterestedness of the organization. Of all the organizations the National Security League has the widest basis of support and is less identified with big business interests than in its early years, Its pro- gram is genuine, though of course reactionary, in its insistence on things as they are. Of course it should be clear that support by interests fearful of change does not mean that they themselves have actively promoted the organizations. Rather the state of fear has produted a situation which could be capitalized to advantage by either skillful promoters or by intense enthusiasts. The officers who run the or- ganizations are clearly one of two types—either promoters out for a good job which gives them also the gratification of public attention—and a salary— or sincere enthusiasts thoroughly alarmed at the men- ace of radical ideas to property interests and what they conceive to be our “form of government.” Financial Appeals. Despite the fact that most of the income of these professionally patriotic bodies comes from business men, corporations, and wealthy givers in fairly large amounts, public appeals for membership and funds are made by most of them. What proportion is so raised by cir- culars and leaflets is impossible to estimate, but the character of the literature of appeal throws light on the type of patriotism they are most eager to serve. And it shows what they think will bring in the money. The National Security League, which appeals widely for dollar memberships (and over) heads its appeal: “For an AMERICAN AMERICA and law and order,” or, “For a better, safer and more prosperous America.” It pledges that the money will be used to increase “respect for constitutional government and in opposing socialism, communism, and Bolshevism.” In one letter it asks: “Are you willing to help match, for AMERICAN | PROPAGANDA, what the Communists are spending for | anti-American propaganda?”, asserting that “if the Bol- | sheviki are spending over $90,000 a month in England, | it can be safely assumed that they are spending over a $1,000,000 a year here.” Another Security League appeal offers members 2 chance to save America’s soul. It reads: | “Help save America! America is in danger of losing | her soul. The National Security League offers you the | means of putting forth your individual force to help save it. Will you do this by giving,” etc. e A Good Salesman. | In the spring of 1926, Major General R. L, Bullard, | President of the National Security League, was asking every man who served in the military and naval forces | of the United States during the World War, to become | it a member because “revolutionary radicalism, having so | much money, is so boastful of its aims on our side, as | well as on the other side of the world.” » .The Major General points out that the chief purpose of his League is “resistance of revolutionary radicalism” | and tells how the League “has been in the past six months | especially effective in resisting the efforts of pacifists and religious extremists to throw military training out of the schools and colleges.” In a letter mailed about the same time to Reserve | Officers, he reports that “hundreds of officers of the | Army, Navy, and the National Guard have joined us. | . . . If these men, realizing the need of our work, can afford from their meager income, to join with us, we believe that you as a citizen and a Reserve Officer, will! be glad to help our work in a similar way.” The same appeal to fear of the reds is voiced by the American Defense Society. It argues that: “The efforts and dollars of loyal citizens must be matched with the forces of the Reds and the large sum» at their disposal.” To encourage giving, the leaflet predicts imminent rev- olution, saying: “The radicals have not yet declared open warfare, Government officials state that their information is thar the revolution has been planned to follow the Presi- dential election. This winter (1920) will be the decisive | time for the success or defeat of the Reds,” etc. “Make your chceck payable to Robert Appleton, Treas.” Heroic Work. | An appeal to business men telling them frankly what the Society claimed to do in the prosecution of Commv- nists for their political opinions is contained in the fol- lowing paragraphs addressed on the letterhead of the American Defense Society, April 9, 1924: “It is not too much to say that the Prosecuting At- torneys were greatly assisted in their successful conduct of the trial of Foster and Ruthenberg, leaders of the Communist Party, by the American Defense Society. We have a letter to this effect from the Prosecuting At- torneys. | (To be continued.) British Workers Realize They Must Fight | MAY DAY DAWNS IN RED CAPITAL Government's “No-Strike” Bill OF SOVIET UNION By J. LOUIS ENGDAHL. (Special to The DAILY WORKER) MOSCOW, U.S.S.R., May 1. (By Mail)—May Day | dawns in Moscow! We catch the first gleam of red as | our train reaches the outermost cottage in the suburbs. | Then entering the city, the seat of power of the world social revolution, the growing sprinkling of scarlet gradually becomes a veritable sea of crimson—the revo- lutionary crimson of International May Day. No build- ing anywhere, large or small, without its revolutionary banner. Ten o'clock last night we left Ozery, textile center, |on the southern brink of Moscow Province. By midnight we had reached Kolomna, where we had | to change trains, Ozery'being on a branch line. Since | we had left Kolomna in the afternoon, the raflroad | stations had been decorated with Red Flags and a mass | of evergreens. - » ARE vou 7 QUITE SURE PMA Gon BE THE CORPSE , GNINoR ? f i i | = ; The station was crowded. Tomorrow would be May ——— | Day. | No one cared to sleep. Everyone sat about, \ —————4 drinking tea, discussing. Comrade Gerish and I joined — I in. ' — ——— The express came thru for Odessa, and then our ex- (= = | press for Moscow arrived from the opposite direction at —— 1) | 1:20 o’clock to the second. It was nearly five o’clock jand breaking daylight as our train came to a stop in the Kasan Station in Kalantchevskaya Place, Moscow. | Here the trains came in from Kasan and the Urals. On the opposite side of the square stands the Octover ; Station, formerly the Nicholas Station. Once named | for a czar, it now recalls the October (Our time, Nov. ji, 1917) Revolution. Its trains depart for Leningrad, Reval and Helsingfors, over what is said to be the best | tailroad in the Soviet Union. In the same square is the Yaroslav Station, next to | the October Station, from which trains depart for | Yaroslav and Archangel in North Russia. Thus, toward three points of the compass, trains from | this square depart. Over the entrance to each station | is a huge emblem of the Soviet Union, with a con- spicuous hammer and sickle. But on this day they were also brilliant with crimson bunting and banners, und in the square itself there was a huge Tribune | (speaking platform), also draped in red. | Chamberlain (From Lansbury’s Weekly) Trade Unions Schaefer’s “Twelve” and the Freiheit Singing Society By DAVID SAPIRO {on the part of the guardsmen. There| A Gala Day. It was unfortunate that the first! are very effective contrapuntal devel-| _The streets cars were not running today. So we de- performance of Schaefer's “Twelve” | opments in some parts of the chorus,| cided to walk to our hotel. Crossing the square and in Madison Square Garden on April| especially the, passage “Oh, Mother going up Myasnitskaya Street, we came face to face 2nd, was given under such unfavor- in Heaven, the Bolsheviks are turning with a huge building beautifully decorated. It was the able conditions, and those who heard| the world upside down.” Schaefer| General Post Office. The largest banner carried th it could not get a fair impression of | takes full advantage of this powerful | Slogan “Long Live the First of May!” : this remarkable work. The bad acou- | passage in Blok’s poem, and the cho- | Others carried the slogans as follows: “Long Live stics of the vast auditorium of the; rus repeats it over and over, in fine| the Communist International—The Leader of the World Garden, the lateness of the hour when | contrapuntal style, till the listener is | Revolution!” “The Military Strength of the Union of the “Twelve” was sung, the tired-| impressed with the idea that the “Bol- | Soviet Socialist Republics Is the Guarantee For Our ness of the chorus, orchestra and/ sheviks are turning the world upside| Successful Socialist Construction!” “We will Strength- audience, all contributed to a poor| down.” That is the spirit of revolu-| ¢n the Union, of Soviet Socialist Republics—the Base rendition and reception of this work,| tion, turning the old order upside, of the World Proletarian Revolution!” There were which, under more favorable condi-| down, and on top of that, creating a} others, But this will serve to give a sense of satisfac- tions, would have aroused the audi-| new and better world, | tion to workers in America who know the General Post ence to great enthusiasm. | * * * | Office Buildings (The Federal Buildings) in the United The “Twelve” will be performed! It would be a fine thing to| States that house the federal courts, as the scenes of again on Saturday evening, May 28th, have this particular passage of the| the most vicious prosecutions of revolutionary workers. in Carnegie Hall, on the occasion of | “Twelve” sung at all mass-meetings,| That satisfaction came to me. the fourth anniversary of the Frei-|for it has the real revolutionary| From this point on, building after building vied with heit Singing Society. Then it will| spirit, and might help in arousing the | cach other in the beauty of the decorations. Busts of be heard under the most favorable| masses to “turn the world upside) Lenin, some small, but many very large, were seen conditions. The hall is ideally suited| down.” The world is in need of BAR deine) in the windows. Others contained pictures for musical performance, and the con-| In another part of the work Schaefer | of the various Soviet Leaders, Ryckof, Bucharin, Stalin, cert will start early so that the cho-| makes fine use of a beautiful melody| Kalinin and others. rus and orchestra will be fresh for | in the Russian Folk-Song style, with a | Djerzhinsky Square. its partrneney: | very interesting orchestral accom-| Especially beautiful were the buildings housing the * $ paniment. | Moscow Union of Consumers’ Societies and the People’s The poem by Alexander Blok, gives | bd bd * Commissariat for Transportation that we passed. Also us an episode of the Bolshevik Revo-| The march of the guardsmen is|the Custom House. Many places had huge electric lution of twelve Red guardsmen} expressed by very grim music. It decorations that would be illuminated at night. marching through the streets and! is not stirring martial music, like, Then we came into Djerzhinsky Square, formerly the bullying the bourgeoisie in the first|some of our cheap-military marches.| Lubyanka Square, opposite the Vladimir Gate in the|” days of the Bolshevist triumph of| There is no element of triumphant | Kitai Gorod Wall. In the center of the Square, namec 1917. It is an extremely vivid pic-| exultation expressed in it. In the| after one of the most courageous fighters of the Rus- ture, full of bold and even crudry march of revolution there are serious,| sian Bolshevik Revolution, is a beautiful fountain, the realism. It gives one an unforget-| grim, even unpleasant duties to per-| work of Vitali (1835). But today it is not gushing able picture of those early days of| form. That is what Schaefer tried to| water. Today it has sprouted a huge cluster of beauti- that tremendous upheaval of 1917. It|express in his music. |ful Red Flags. On the northern side of the square seems to me that Schaefer has| The work as a whole is character-| stands the gorgeously decorated building occupied by caught the spirit of the poem, with| ized by realistic melodies and harmo-| the United States Political Department (The G. P. U.) all its stark realism, in his musical | nies, strong rhythms and colorful or- formerly the “Cheka,” headed by Djerzhinsky while he | A lot of old hokum is rehashed. |} seems that as soon as he hit Soviet setting. All the discorda::t clements of such an episode are well reflected in the music. There are moments of the necessary harshness of a revo- lution, as expressed by Blok. There are also moments of great beauty of |melody and harmony, reflecting mo- mentary romantic and tender episodes | chestration. {thing he has done so far. It is worthy of, being produced by the revolutionary character would prob- ably prevent its performance by them. So it remains for our working class chorus, The Freiheit Singing Society, to perform it. Debunking a “Times” Inventor Since American industrialists ted to do a good business with Sov Russia, the lies about the revolution which used to appear regularly. in the American capitalist press were con- | siderably reduced in number. Sunday’s New York Times, how- ever, shows that we may at any time @xpect bunk about the Soviet Union to be ladled out among the news thrs's fit to print. A cable from Berlin transmits the profound observations of a Mr. Her- man Norden, “explorer, traveller ard writer” during’ a brief visit to Baku and Tiflis. Mr. Norden presents a dark, if not very orginal, picture, It territory he was trailed by the Red police. In Tiflis two men, who said they were reporters, interviewed him. Later he discovered that they were the “Chiefs of the Soviet Cheka.” It happens to be that the Cheka has been abolished, and the Gay Pay Uoo (State Political Department) put in its place, but why shculd a little fact like that bother an ex- plorer, traveller and writer? It also happens to be that the chiefs of the Gay Pay Uoo are in Moscow and not in Tiflis; Mr. Norden should worry about such little matters. Genuine Reporters. T have just returned from an ex-. tended visit to the Soviet Union, dur- ing which I visited Baku and Tiflis twice. I was also interviewed by two reporters, probably the same young men who came to see Mr. Nor- den. I found on investigation that they really were reporters; there are really reporters in the Soviet Union. Isn't that strange? A Tabloid Imagination. However, he should not be under- estimated. He has the imagination of a tabloid editor, or of Mr. Joynson Hicks himself. He saw people being arrested in the streets, and he knows that these people are.shot and “pierc- ing screams rend the air.” During the month I spent in the Caucasus I neither saw nor heard anything of the kind, though there is nothing the matter with my eyes and ears, But then I am not an explorer, etc. Mr. Norden discovered some other Bolshevik atrocities. There are no white collars in Tiflis “because of | the Soviet policy to reduce launder- ing!” The Caucasian costume, with its soft collared shirt, is centuries old, and was worn by the most dash- ing officers of the Czar’s army. No doubt in those dear, old days, which Kerensky is now lamenting in the Times, Mr. Norden was telling the world how “picturesque” they are. As a matter of fact, they are—and much more comfortable than white collars at that. During his Tiflis explorations Mr. Norden found no vestanrants. He ascribes this to the Soviet decree that everybody must eat in public kitchens. There happens to be no such decree on the Soviet statute books; no doubt that decree is the missing document for which Joynson Hicks is looking. Anybody who is not interested in lying about Soviet Russia (at three cents a word), I would suggest that there are at least two good restaurants on almost every block of the Prospect Rusta- velli, the main street of Tiflis; and a number of good ones in all parts of the city. The Georgians are cele- brated for their cooking and for their wine and cheese, Why does the Times call Mr. Nor- den an “explorer” anway? I should say the correct term is iit a But its! | come swinging around the corner. of great harshness of sound, which | Friends of Music or any other of our! is a true translation in musical terms| best professional choruses. I consider it the finest) was alive. Cavalry and infantry detachments of the “G. P. U.” The horses are especially spirited, so early in the morning. They are off to every section of the city, to direct the task of maintaining order thruout this day, when hundreds of thotsands will be in the streets—FOR MAY DAY! From here a street called the Bolshaya Lubyanka leads northward. At the corner of the Kusnetzky Most, rises the huge building of the People’s Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (Narkomindel) of the Soviet Union. Between the two wings of this construction stands a monument (executed in 1924 by the sculptor Katz) to the memory of Vorovsky, the ambassador of the Soviet Union who was assassinated in Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1923. In front of this building a garden has replaced the church which was demolished in 1924. Today also, everywhere, May Day flags, bunting, decorations of all kinds. Monument to Karl Marx. Then we come on into Sverdlov Square, formerly Teatralnaya, one of the handsomest and largest squares of Moscow. In summer portraits of the revolutionary leaders are reproduced in grass mosaic on an elevated flower bed in front of the Bolshoi Theater, now gaily decorated with red flags and streamers. In the south- ern half of the square we find Vitali’s Fountain, erected in 1885, in front of which, in the middle of the square lies the foundation stone of a monument to Karl Marx, made of Finnish granite. Then we find ourselves in the Tverskya, perhaps the liveliest street in Moscow. This thorofare starts from Revolution Square where, during the February revolu- tion, 1917, the troops sent against the, population took sides with them and thereby ensured the victory of the revolution in Moscow. On the facade of the Second House of Moscow Soviets (Formerly the Town Duma) there is a relief showing a Revolutionary, sweeping on- ward, with Rosa Luxemberg’s saying: “The Revolution is a storm which blows away anything that stands in its way.” . Scene of Battle. Prominent again, in May Day attire, is the build- ing of the Soviet of the Town and Government of Moscow in Soviet Square, formerly Skobelev Square. Until the February Revolution this build- ing was the palace of the Governor General of Moscow. Since 1917 it has been the seat of the Moscow Soviet. At the outbreak of the Bolshevik Revolution (October, Russian time, 1917), there was five days hard fighting for the Soviet Building, where the revolutionary staff had their headquarters. All the side streets leading to the South, as well as the Tverskaya, were occupied by the counter-revolutionaries; communication with the owing to the incessant shooting from the side streets; it was only after the arrival of the Soviet artillery on that the Staff was set free. Opposite to the in the Dresden Hotel was the editorial A COUNTER-REVOLUTIONARY INTERPRETATION OF MARXISM. A History of Socialist Thought. By Harry W. Laidler, Ph, D. T. Y. Crowell & Co. $3.50. Apart from about 30 pages of counter-revolution and a dozen-odd pages of muddied Marxism, this is an excellent volume to have around. In its re- maining 640 pages it gives clear summaries of the ideas of the leading Com- munistic and socialistic thinkers of-all time. Particularly valuable is the way these ideas are treated—not as isolated systems dragged down from the skies, but as natural growths from the industrial and political development af each period. Marxian socialism is dealt with as only a person can deal with it who has taken his attitude and most of his information from minor, secondary, and liberal sources, Disregarding Marx’s deliberately anti-religious bent, the materialist concept of history is sweetened (following Seligman) into the “economic interpretation of history.” In discussing the Marxian theory of value, “labor” is constantly confused with labor-power, following an early pamphlet, and ignoring both the monumental analysis contained in Capital and Engels’ epigram that labor is no more labor-power than the ability to digest is digestion. Engels’ preface to Marx’s Class Struggles in France is again trotted out to prove that these two gigantic collaborators rejected in later life their advocacy of armed uprising to overthrow the capitalist class —although the emasculation of Engels’ text by its German social-democratic editors has repeatedly been exposed by the Marx-Engels Institute in Moscow. * * * So tremendous an episode as the Russian Revolution is lumped with the amiable searchings of Sydney Webb and the latest vagaries of Ramsay Mac- Donald as “post-war socialist developments.” The three chapters which give the history, theory, and results of the Soviet upheaval are splendidly clear, accurate, and freighted with telling quotations by Communist leaders from Lenin down. It.is in the succeeding chapter on the socialist criticism of Communism that the author’s objectively counter-revolutionary slant appears. It may be necessary, for an impartial all-around statement of the case, to pile up the arguments of Bertrand Russell,-Norman Angell, Kautsky, and Hillquit against Bolshevism. But how, if one is to be impartial, can one declare that the Socialists have gone so far as to “prove” their theses (p. 545), while the Communists have only “sought to prove” theirs (p. 490)? Before and after these ticklish spots the book is good. The utopians, from the prophet Amos to Robert Owen, are described with sympathetic in- sight ‘and against a well-knit economic background. Other socialist schools, such as Fabianism, Lassalleanism, the revisionists, syndicalism, and guild socialism are given in satisfying detail. To complete the survey, serviceable sections are devoted to consumers’ co-operation, Christian Socialism, “social- ism of the chair,” and state socialism. As a handy reference to the various schools of revolutionary and near-revolutionary thought there is no better single volume in existence. —SOLON DE LEON, THE SCIENCE OF RE-EDUCATION. Your Nervous Child, by Dr. Erwin Wexberg. Translated by Walter Beran Wolfe, M.D. A. & C. Boni. $1.75. This enlightening ‘book by Dr, Wexberg makes abundantly clear how vast a responsibility rests on parents and on teachers for the happy guidance of children into a maturity unburdened by neurotic malady. It is no longer permissible to believe in Heredity as a dark fate beyond human control. The heredity-mongers in science are either caste-conscious professors who are opposed to real democracy (because they fear the rise te power and prestige of the workers) or indoor experts who are out of touch with the social forces that shape human nature, ignorant of behavior as determined by the interplay of realistic forces in society. Nor is it permissible any longer to worship Environment as the illim- itable creator of good and evil behavior patterns. The sanest view—the most scientific, too—beholds in cultivated human nature a vital interplay of childhood predisposition and social forces. * * * Even acknowledging that childhood predisposition is a function of the glandular situation, we are still in a position to mould the plastic nature of the child, to inculcate habits, instil attitudes, evoke moods, in accordance with various psycho-sociological goals. Human nature is malleable. The greatest hope of the education of the race lies in. the potentialities of human nature for re-education. The feeling of inferiority, so natural in childhood (the period of help- lessness) must be counteracted by counsels of encouragement, parent and teacher intelligently and humbly conspiring to welcome the growing child as a full-fledged personality, a human equal! * * * Nervous children (so-called) are merely those children whose natural feeling of inferiority has been reaffirmed and painfully fixated by parents and teachers and elders-in-general who somehow have managed to prevent the child from developing independence. The bullying father, the over-in- dulgent mother, the authoritative pedagogue, the egocentric elder, the whole tribe of meddlers and intruders have robbed the growing child of self-con- fidence. This Adlerian theme is full of good sense and enormously significant as psychology and psychiatry. We need to re-educate the parents and the teachers so that they in turn may know how to help the younger generation attain to courage, confidence and pride of personality. This splendid primer in Individual Psychology, made eminently readable by the free-flowing and sprightly translation of Dr. Wolfe, is a good intro- duction to the whole field of educational psychiatry now coming into its own in our institutions of learning. The new medicine has become a study in re-education, the most promis- ing approach to human nature in its tangled variety and irrationality. —S. DANIEL HOUSE. RATHER THIN STUFF. Bread and Fire, a novel by Charles Rumford Walker. Houghton Miflin Com- pany. $2.50. Starting with a resolution to be “fair” to labor the author of Bread and Fire degenerates his novel into an absurd lampoon on workers and workers’ organizations generally. “ Tt is pure Bolshevism!’ I shouted.” “, ,. members of the Workers Party discussed with prophetic enthu- siasm the state of natural communism.” f Bread and Fire is peppered with dialogue similar to the excerpts above/’ and tells in a stale manner the story of steel and its victims. When , Walker talks technically of steel, the giant blast furnaces and the grim le gle that goes on in steel towns, he is interesting; when he undertakes to,wwrite of the labor movement he is silly. é * * * Mr. Walker's curiosity led him to work as a skilled worker in steel and copper mills, What he saw so intrigued him that following his he joined the staff of The Atlantic Monthly, that virile organ of k Boston. Paice. Came | fi Bread and Fire is the result of his industrial slumming. It is vivid in’ rare spots and rests securely upon a firm foundation of cliches: Apart technical descriptions of steel-making it has nothing to say and says it x There is nothing in the story to interest the student of modern ind trial America that is worth the three hours which the present wasted on it. * A —CHARLES YALE HARRISON. THE CLOWNS OF THE COURT OF BUSINESS. The Story of a Wonderman, by Ring Lardner. Scribners & Sons, This is an example of what the Sunday supplement yahoo readers laugh at. It purports to be a satire on the success autobiographies of the day,— “a kind of review of all the asininities of the day.” The attempt is a dismal flo} 7 it the first: place, pein dg eee in ye pathy Rita the sac of success to whack them even an occas: Lardner syndieatéd column is amusing, « bookful proves tiresome His slap- needs sai ‘At best the bcok might be useful as a gift to an uncritical convalescent recovering from a minor operation. It won’t make him Ree rah erg ‘ f meno | | { } | }