The Daily Worker Newspaper, September 3, 1927, Page 5

THe New Macazin Section of The DAILY WORKER SATURDAY, SEPT. 3, 1927 This Magazine Section iat acteesho ttl Bvery Satu rare in DAILY ‘The Passing of Labor Dz Day F all the names in which’ there is no meaning Labor Day stands out as the most prominent. The real Labor Day is the first of May when the class conscious, militant workers of all lands gather to demonstrate, to take stock of their defeats and victories in the past, and pledge themselves-to prosecute the struggle for working class emancipation with greater vigor in the future. The rallying day of .international labor— the first of May—as well as the Labor Day of. class collaboration, had its genesis in the United States, but the American labor bureaucracy have spurned the first like an unwanted child and left it on the: political doorstep. The first of May. brings out the police . with their clubs and their riot guns. The official Labor Day brings out the capital- ist politicians, the labor fakers and the capi- talists, who enjoy the day scratching each others’ backs. 23.8 Even a few years back, Labor Day had some proletarian character. It was custom- ary for the union that was engaged in a strike or that was most recently on strike to be given the position of honor in the parade. There are no longer any parades. The labor leaders adVise the rank and file to go to some shady glen for the day or take their families to the seaside: It is much easier on the labor fakers and less costly. Bringing great masses of workers together to demon- strate, gives them a consciousness of power. Here is danger for the minority that governs and oppresses the masses by the aid of guns, clubs and reactionary labor bureaucrats. The idea of Labor Day was first proposed in the New York Central Labor Union, in May 1882. Two years later the first Monday of every September was declared Labor Day by the American Federation of Labor in convention assembled. The labor leaders of those days were not yet safely tucked away in the pockets of the capitalists. Those at the top were conservative and many of them reactionary, but they were obliged to fight the capitalists on the industrial field and the latter did not yet know how to pull their fangs. Of course the economic position of the American capitalists was far from being as sound as it is today. They could not af- ford to bribe the top strata of American labor as they have been in recent years. ‘In ‘those days even Sam Gompers shook his fists at the capitalists. Indeed, Sam’ was -always able to shake his fists and wag his tongue against the “bad” employers, but that is about as far as he eger went, He was a first-class trained ram of capitalism and nobody was better able to lead the sheep to the industrial shambles than the first: presi- dent of the American Federation of Labor. In 1886 we find Gompers speaking from the same platform with Henry George, the great single taxer who was candidate for mayor of New York. The huge parade that was held on Labor Day of that year had vi- tality in it. There were injunctions then as now and the labor leaders instructed their followers to violate the injunctions. About this time the great eight-hour-day movement was launched and the A. F. of L: made preparations for the calling of a na- (Continued -on Page Two) Negro Looks “WORKER — A ALEX BITTELM N, Editor Drawn by ELLIS. on in Boston . By WM. L. PATTERSON OSTGN with its narrow, crooked streets, its low, unpretentious buildings, Boston with its many graveyards, thi@resting places of its revolutionary dead, the greatest spots of interest for those in whom all revolutionary spirit has long since died; Boston the high temple of culture, the abiding place of wisdom and fountain of knowledge had: worked itself into a state of semi-hysteria. Tense and ex- pectant, its people walk their city’s pavement will- ingly, and yet it may be unconsciously, submissive to a dictatorship of the police, their appointed serv- ants—the guardians of law, the controllers of order, who are; themselves, however, above the law, and who have never reasoned that their conduct should be most orderly. “Boston is waiting for a lynching to take place. The illustrious Governor of Massachusetts has decreed it. Desperately he has striven to place the Atamp of respectability upon this criminal act. Citi- Just So Reds are not made by oratars on soapboxes, But by fat sleek gentlemen Who sit on interlocking directorates And figure thru the chewed ends Of many fat sleek cigars 4 How to-wring more honest pennies |. From the sweating carcasses Of lazy, discontented working: stiffs. —-H. G,. WEISS. zens even more illustrious than the illustrious Gov- ernor—-those who can show to you the tombstones marking the resting place of dead forebears who were present on that now famous tea party of 1776, have said, “Yes;-Boston has known every event of the social elite, and though in America, we cannot set a precedent in this, we shall no longer hold our- selves above thé glorious Southland. We, too. shall have our lynching.” They have religiously followed the precedents established by the courageous South. The newspapers have announced it for days ahead. Boston thinks of nothing else, talks of nothing else. Boston has been preparing seven years for this event. Thousands of people have, duting those long years, and years before, come to regard lynching as obsolete, archaic, and the desire to participate in one is evidence of an atavistic psychosis. They have come to believe this so thoroughly, so sincerely, that some have travelled thousands of miles just to make an effort to peaceably persuade Massachusetts to defer this Roman holiday indefinitely, to grand these seven years’ dead men a new trial. Som@. who could not come to Boston, voiced their protest against the promised orgy throughout the avail- able press, and by direct communication with the authorities of Massachusetts. Some of those who have come are satisfied of the futility of their ef- forts even before the task is essayed. Others hold tenaciously to the last fleeting shreds of a slowly dissolving hope. that possibly something may be done. For them» the age of miracles is not dead. These speak in a now half disillusioned way of (Continued on Page Two)