The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 2, 1928, Page 6

ratnisimnencrana ieke iv k } ‘hy Page Six THE PATILY WORKER, NEW YORK, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1928 THE DAILY WORKER| Published by the NATIONAL DAILY WORKER PUBLISHING ASS'N, Inc. Daily, Except Sunday 83 Ficst Street, New York, N. Y. Cable Address: SUBSCRIPTION RATES By Mail (in New York only): By Mail (outside of New York): $8.00 per year $4.50 six months $6.00 per year $3.50 six months $2.50 three months. $2.00 three months. Phone, Orchard 1680 “Daiwork” Address and mail out checks to THE DAILY WORKER, 33 First Street, New York, N. Y- ..ROBERT MINOR WM, F. Entered as second-class mail at the post-office at New York, N. ¥. under the act of March 3, 1879. The Anti-Strike Plan~“One of the Federation’s Greatest | Difficulties Is Control of Its Own People” The discussion in the press which follows the announcement that the American Bar Association and the officialdom of the American Federation of Labor have agreed upon a “formula” for making arbitration agreements between capitalists and workers legal by giving them legislative standing and making them en- forceable by the courts, can lead to but one conclusion—that this proposal is nothing else than a section of the British Trade Union Act, modified to suit American capitalist requirements. The proposal calls for nothing less than the governmentaliza- tion of the unions. It means to extend the Watson-Parker rail- way labor bill to cover all industry—but with the additional vicious provision that the decisions of arbitration boards are legal rulings | and enforceable by courts and police just as injunctions now are. | The experience of the labor movement with arbitration is | that workers always get the worst of it. There is therefore no| reason for capitalists to evade the findings of these bodies and} consequently it follows that the phrase “enforceable by the courts” applies only to workers and their organizations. That the courts and their power of enforcement are the center | of the whole scheme is obvious from the statement made by ex- | Governor Whitman, former president of the American Bar Asso- | ciation who appointed the sub-committee which is now working with the A. F. of L. committee, and which is reported in the New York Times for February 1 as follows: “The plans, which are of course immature as yet, seem, so far, to be rounding into shape nicely. “T have heard some objections, but nothing insurmountable as yet. I do not believe that the courts will object to the plan which provides for the enforcement of the voluntary agreements by them. .. .” (Our emphasis.) But the purpose of this anti-strike proposal (we shall see a jittle later that it is something more even than a measure against strikes) also in conformity with the purposes of the British Trade Union Act, must be separated from the methods of enforcement favored by its sponsors and indicated in Whitman’s statement. Essentially the proposal is to preserve in perpetuity the pres- ent reactionary leadership of the labor movement—to put the gov- ernment more openly and effectively than ever behind the Greens, Wolls and Lewises and against the working class—organized and unorganized. The ruling class sees the danger to its agents-in the growing gap between them and the rank and file, it senses that the spirit of revolt which is manifest in the ranks of the coal miners presages the rise of a mass movement in this and other basic in- dustries that the labor agents of imperialism cannot stem without more assistance. The New York Times quotes, in the same story in which Whitman’s views are given, an attorney “who did not wish his name mentioned at this stage of development of the plan.” He said: “The only way, in my opinion, to make such agreements en- forceable is for the American Federation of Labor to insist that, upon a member’s failure to conform to such a contract, he must no longer remain a member of the Federation. The plan does not carry the idea of outside force being used . . . and it should even give the Federaticn a better control over its members. One of the Federation’s greatest difficulties is control of its own people.” (Our emphasis.) Nothing could be clearer than this. The betrayals carried out by the official labor leadership have made their role as bosses’ agents plain to hundreds of thousands of workers. These “‘peo- ple” can not be controlled effectively much longer. As a matter of fact, as in the coal mining industry, it was the miners who re- fused to surrender—not President Lewis. Had the operators not desired to smash the union completely in decisive sections of the industry they would have accepted the Lewis proposal for sepa- rate district agreements with speed-up provisions and Lewis him- self would have tried to break the strikes which would have broken out. The official misleaders have not been able to crush the will of the workers to fight. This is what is meant by such statements as “the Federation’s greatest difficulty is control of its own people.” Nor does this exhaust the sinister purposes of the “formula” of the bar association. Most important of all is its obvious theoretical base—the theory that the labor movement in the United States is the American Federation of Labor as it is today and that, after such militant mass unions as those of the miners and needle trades workers have been smashed, reactionary rem- nants covered by the mantle of government may be allowed to re- main tame, hand-fed, servile, but effective instruments of im- perialist reaction, allowed to bear the title of the American Trade Union Movement. Imperialism in its present period tends inevitably to give a legal status to that section of the labor movement which accepts and carries out its instructions. < The legalization of reaction in the labor movement both as to policy and tactics, including expulsions of workers who will not submit, is inherent in the “formula” of the bar association proposal, What of the 85 to 90 per cent of the working class now un- organized? What of the millions of workers in basic industries whom the A. F. of L. leaders have refused to organize? This “formula’’ would force them to acknowledge the yellow- dog contract, to join company unions, or to allow their lives, lib- erties and living standards to be molded by a labor officialdom whose acceptance of this “formula” shows them panting to grasp the manacles and whip of imperialism’s slave-drivers. This formula is designed to give protection to the Wall Street unionism of Woll, Green and Lewis. It has as its main purpose the prevention of the rise of a powerful labor movement. It is intended to make the existing unions legal instruments DUNNE | of Wall Street government, It is intended to strangle rank and file rebellion against be- trayal. Most of all, it is part of Wall Street government’s war pro- gram intended to harness the unions which are left, and thru them “TEAM WORK” aed re By Fred Ellis “Team work on the part of employers and employes is a very desirable thing, but before it can be a practical reality there must be a will to work together and a frank recognition of and respect for each other’s rights."—-WM. GREEN. Mr. Woll at His Worst Lenin Pageant Editor The DAILY WORKER: M. J. Olgin’s article on the pageant and ballet at the Lenin Memorial Meeting was a well-deserved tribute to an event whose significance has not as yet been sufficiently appreci- ated by those for whom it should be most significant: the revolutionary workers of this country. The pageant and ballet should, it seems to me, be looked upon as an event of the first importance to the revolutionary move- ment, since it’ was’ the first mass cultural expression of the American workers, created from within out of our own materials and with our own imagination and power, as a tribute to the greatest leader of the prole- ‘arian revolution, Vladimir Ilyiteh Lenin, and to the workers’ and peas- ants’ republic that he helped to found. We have had Lenin Memorial meet- ings in the past; we will have many in the future, meetings for which, { hope, Madison Square Garden will be found too inadequate. But . it ought to be recorded that at the Lenin Memorial meeting of January 21, 1928, American workers for the rst time achieved a unified artistic expression of their collectivist class spirit. Comrade Olgin, however, in describ- ing the emotions aroused by the page- ant and ballet neglected to point out the part played by the individuals who conceived and directed the event. A mass expression, whether cultural like the pageant and ballet, or polit- ical like the Soviet state, requires conscious direction by a few experts imbued with the mass spirit. And just as out of our own ranks we were able to bring forth the raw material capable of being molded into mass artists, the actors and dancers of the pageant and ballet, so we were able to produce out of our own ranks the individual artists who created the spectacle and molded it into shape. And I think we cannot praise too much the work of Comrade Adolf Wolff, who conceived the pageant and wrote the libretto, and Comrade Edith Segal, who conceived and directed the ballet. The ballet especially was a revelation, The event had its defects, but they were all healthy defects resulting from unripeness, haste, lack of facil- ities. In them are the seeds of growth and betterment. With the pageant and ballet at Madison Square Garden, the American workingclass has entered the path of real work- ingelass culture that will ultimately overthrow the stagnant and decadent culture of capitalism. —A. B. MAGIL, New York City. By JAY LOVESTONE. A deadly blow .is. being planned against the American working class by Mr. Woll, corporation lawyer, who has worked himself into the position of being a, member of the} Executive Council of the American, Federation of Labor. We are referring to the announce- ment-of the American Bar Association which consists of the highest-priced lawyers defending the biggest finan- cial and industrial. interests of the country. This organization is one of the most: notorious labor-hating organizations’in the country. The American Bar Association has for some time been working on a plan to mobilize more efficiently and ex- tensively the government apparatus on the side of the employers in the class struggle. These solons of fi- nance and industry have worked out a plan to suit their class interests and purposes. Workers Will Fight. We are well on the road to a con- dition in which the workers will be compelled. to fight for their basic, their most. _ elementary. _ demands. These servants of the ruling class of this country very well foresaw the deep-going economic recession now with us and becoming more acute. They decided to prepare for the fight already beginning. Of course, they enlisted in their ranks the labor lieutenants of American imperialism now drawing from ten to twenty-five thousand dollars and over a year as so-called leaders of labor. Naturally, Mr. Woll, who is the blackest agent of the exploiting class in the ranks of labor, was put on the committee known as the Committee on Com- merce of the American Bar Associ- ation. This subcommittee was charged with the task of working out a plan to prevent strikes. Certainly, this is an appropriate name for dealing with labor problems, particularly for a committee of which Mr. Woll is a member. Mr. Woll has experience as a commercial agent in the commodity known as labor power. He has been selling out the workers for a long time. This committee has now worked out a plan which is sup- posed to be fool proof in the way of preventing strikes. “Voluntary” Compulsion. Mr. Woll knows that not even the most conservative American workers are ready to endorse compulsory ar- bitration. His friend, Lewis, knew Jas well when he was compelled to i Against this new form of betrayal and suppression our class must fight with all its might. In every union, in every workers’ fraternal society, in every co-operative, in the factories among the unorganized workers, this scheme must be exposed for what it is —a program of slavery. Mass meetings, resolutions, every form of protest must be organized. This campaign to make the labor movement part of the impe- rialist machine, to drive out of the labor movement and outlaw all workers who resist, to condemn the unorganized workers to new suppressions and more intensive exploitation will be defeated by the masses whom it is designed to‘enslave. Call to account before the working class those labor officials who put forward a proposal for the surrender of workers under as a worker and for the interest of the guise of “peace.” “Peace in industry” can be:; only. by a working class which has fought thru, to victory.-Any- other-peace is a peace of death. & ; camouflage his betrayal of the an- thracite miners who were not ready to accept voluntary or any other ar- bitration. While denouncing. arbitra- tion Mr. Lewis and his clique, wreck- ‘ing the United Mine Workers, sold out the hard-coal diggers and put over an arbitration agreement on them. The American Bar Association, of which such notorious capitalist agents ‘as Chas. E. Hughes and Silas H. Strawn, the Chicago banker, are the leaders, have tnerefore worked out a plan whereby its provisions are | based on “voluntary” arbitration. The | objective is to settle all difterences by negotiation and arbitration and that the findings of such negotiations and arbitration should then nave legai standing and be enforcable by the government. ‘This is an extension of the Watson-Parker law on the rail- ways to the rest of the industries. Mr. Woll is for the plan. He is one of the fathers of the plan. Mr. Green is coming down to speak for it. “Fact Finders” to Fool Workers. The workers will not be fooled by this voluntary “arbitration” move. | krovisions have been made for a ‘fact-finding council to be known as |the National Industrial Council. This will consist presumably of experts who have been trained and reared on the payroll of the biggest employers. Probably some “reliable” labor lead- ers will be placed on the Fact-Find- ing Council also. Thus the employ- ers will be represented twice. But this is not enough. We may presume that representatives of the “public” will be placed on such council and ar- bitration committee. Thus the em- ployers will be represented three times. The workers will be left out in the cold. The workers should not be misled by the plan. The purpose is “to pro- mote good will between those invest- ing capital, those participating in management, and those who render service in industry and to facilitate the moving of commerce without wasteful interruption of industry.” Great stress is laid on the fact that this is not compulsory arbitration. Let us see! In order that a strike should be really successful it must deal heavy blows to capitalist profits. In order to be successful, therefore, the strike must have real support and must be sudden. The longer the delays in negotiations, thru manouvring as to arbitrations and “public fact-finding tribunals”, the less the effectiveness of the strike and the more the em- ployers are given a chance to prepare either by a temporary increase in production or in storing up goods in some way or other. Thus this plan robs the strike as a weapon of the workers of one of its most basic and important features—suddenness and timeliness. Destroys Right to Strike. This plan, as supported by Woll and | Green, is an out-and-out surrender of the right to strike. It is a mortal ,blow to trade unionism and must be {denounced and opposed by every ‘workingman who has the slightest concern for the interest of himself his class as a whole, We are not surprised to hear Mr. Strawn, whom even Coolidge could not choose finally to have partici because of his being soaked in it, say that: “I appreciate very much the helpful spirit manifested by the American Federation of Labor and I sincerely hope and trust that the proposed meeting will result in revealing to the joint committee information which will enable the committee to ef- fectuate the plan.” Likewise Mr. Chas. S. Whitman, formerly strike-breaking Governor of New York State, and at one time pres- ident of the same American Bar As- sociation, has declared: “Perhaps nothing on the horizon of Federal legislation offers greater promise than the conferences between the associacion representatives in dis- cussions of a subcommittee of the Committee on Commerce of this as- sociation and a committee appointed by the Executive Council of the Amer- ican Federation of Labor and headed by one of its vice-presidents.” Here we have it. We are properly told that nothing on the horizon oi federal legislation has appeared as important as this. This proposal oi the American Bar Association, en- dorsed by the trade union bureau- cracy, is the most menacing move that has been made in a long while against the American working class. It is a black climax to a long series of sordid deeds and deals. It pro- poses the complete, national legaliza- tion of company unionism. It pro- poses an emphatic incorporation into the basic laws of the country, openly of course by this time, of the denial of the right to strike. It is the most gigantic and cosily sell-out in the history of the American labor move- ment which is unfortunately already too rich in betrayals. Every workingman must wake up to the danger. This proposed law is the most direct and brazen move yet made for the complete excinction for the total annihilation of the labor movement even in its present-day most conservative form. On the basis of this law, Mr. Green and Mr. Woll will become managers at best of semi-company unions; the right to strike will be banished; no picketing will be permitted. Special committees of “fact-find- ers”, loaded with representatives of the employing class, will make the decisions. These decisions will be law. These findings will be the final word and order and will be backed by capitalist machine guns even much more thoroly than they have been to date. The findings will be blessed with the sanction of the Executive Council of the American Federation of Labor. Very likely such decisions when they are issued will be protected by a union label especially prepared and autographed by Woll and Green. The Crisis Is Here and Now. This move of the American Bar Association and the American Feder- ation of Labor leadershin is clear proof of the crisis in the trade unions. It is a danger signal of tremendous importance which must be heeded by every workingman and working- woman of the country. It calls for militant, determined action. This move must be paralyzed at the outset. ‘Workers should . vigorously denounce it and adopt resolutions in their unions and expose it as a dis- J obless;( GetsLife Gustin N, Furdyk, 38, a World War veteran, faces a life sentence in Sing Sing prison if he is convicted of hav- ing attempted to steal food and cigars from a restaurant at 288 Second St. Furdyk, a laborer, has no home. He was cooking eggs over the res~ taurant kitchen stove when discov- ered by police. He has already been convicted on three petty burglary charges. If ‘he is convicted it will be his fourth of- fence. His case is being pointed to as a further example of the severity of the unemployment crisis. $e and fundamental interests and rights of the working masses, We will not be victims of. the bun- combs of “voluntary arbitration.” Arbitration between the workers and the employers is always a fraud. The workers must fight to win as much as they can. The workers must get as much as they can as part of their training for getting the whole thing, which is theirs. Every workingman and workingwoman who has one cor- puscle of red blood in him or her must be aroused by this menace. Every member of a trade union and, every still-unorganized worker must join hands to beat down this hydra of reaction, fathered and supported by Green, Woll and their clique serv- ing Wall Street. There was a time when some, char- itably, said that Green, Woll and Com- pany were the left wing of Wall Street. Today even the most conservative would say this is absolutely wrong. Green, Woll and Company are today the right wing, the extreme right wing, of Wall Street. There are not many employers in the country deal- ing with unionized labor who would dare to put forward such a scheme, There are not many of these who would dare propose it unless they had the unlimited and unstinted sup- port of such notorious labor fakirs as Green, Woll and their close allies in advance, Accept the Challenge! The workers must not turn back at this challenge. This challenge of reaction must be accepted. It must be met with an iron hand. The Greens and the Wolls must be driven out of the labor movement, must be driven to cover, and come out completely in the open as employees of the biggest bankers and manufacturers, as agents of the wirst open-shoppers. The working masses must put a to their destructive, hellish activities’ in the labor movement. There is no placé in the labor movement for such a scheme of union wreckage. There should be no place in the trade union movement for such infamous union wreckers, ‘ Only a good house-cleaning of the labor lieutenants of Wall Street and its Bar Association can save’ the American labor movement. We are not heading for a crisis in the trade unions. The crisis is already here. We are in the throes of it. The Wat- son-Parker law is being proposed for all industries, i The militant workers must show their mettle. The Communists must show they are worthy of leadership. We must smash this vicious con- spiracy to exterminate the trade _ the working class, to injerialism’s war chariot. _ |in the Teapot Dome Oil investigation. ' aN