The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 10, 1928, Page 6

a j ; i r. Page Six THE DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 1928 THE DAILY W ORKER HANDS OFF THE DAILY WORKER! aca § Published by the NATIONAL DAILY WORKER PUBLISHING ASS'N, Ine. | Daily, Except Sunday 88 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 $8.50 six months $2.50 three months. $2.00 three months. | ~~"Addrear and mail out checks to Ad THE DAILY WORKER, 33 First Street, New York, N. Phone, Orchard 1680 | “Daiwork” m2: Editor Assiatant Editor. second-class mail at the pos the act of Marc Business Failures and the Working Class The weekly supplement of the survey of current business re- leased for February 6, by the department of commerce and plotted for the month of December, 1927, reveals some very interesting | and important facts relative to the effects of the decline in in-| dustry. | The chart shows that business failures for all classes of es- | tablishments totaled about 1,500 for the month. This figure takes on great significance since it approximates the total busi- | ness failures for 1915 and 1922—when the results of the pre-war and post-war depressions were showing themselves in this manner. Trading and manufacturing show almost the same number | of failures and the same general curve. As the month of Decem- ber closed the number of failures tended to increase. While it is true that the number of failures was increased | among the smaller establishments by the increase of trustifica- tion resulting in the squeezing out of the small fry (mergers in industry and the extension of the chain store system in distribu- tion, etc.) it is impossible to deny that the decided general re- cession in business denoted by a chart shows the same level so far as the number of failures are concerned as that prevailing in the two periods when business generally reached the lowest depth in 20 years—1914-15 and 1920-21. Translated into terms of the class struggle these figures mean increasing unemployment, wage-cuts and a general assault upon the working conditions and living standards of the working class. The figures quoted above smash the illusion of American prosperity and confound the labor officialdom that has based its policy of surrender to capitalism upon the permanent prosperity “myth.” 4,000,000 jobless workers likewise give the lie to these | misleaders. | Statistically cold as these figures are they yet are a signal | for the working class to organize for great struggles against the} open shop, wage cuts and unemployment. | Practical working class organizational measures have already been taken in New York, Cleveland and other cities through the creation of Councils of Unemployed, in order to make mass de- mands for relief and to spur the unions to action in demanding that the unemployed workers receive compensation during their period of enforced idleness. No cheap panaceas, no illusory ges- tures of the politicians trying to capitalize the misery of the men, women and children of the working class, such as the proposals ef the Tammanyite Wall Street aspirant for the presidency, Al nith, will suffice. These workers contributed to the prosperity the capitalist exploiters and those who made millions off their ploitation should be forced to disgorge some of their profits in er that adequate union wages may be paid the millions of orkers now on the breadlines and tramping through the country in search of means of subsistence. As in all recent struggles of labor, the Workers (Communist) Party is taking the lead in the creation of Councils of Unemployed, and it is one of the major tasks of the Party in every locality to aggressively work for the building of such organizations. Carrying On Communist Work Among Women By OLGA GOLD. At the last National Convention of the Workers (Communist) Party which was held in New York City in September, connected with women’s work discus- sed the achievements in this field as well as the mistakes and shortcom-‘ ings. However, there is still lack of) adequate interest and attention from the Workers Party as a whole, to this | important phase of activity. There! ure still many comrades who have a skeptical attitude towards the organi- zation of women, or who do not give it proper evaluation. This is especi- ally true of sections in small towns which are isolated from large cities and where the active part of women in the daily struggles of the working class is not witnessed. The ideological difficulties are a great hindrance to vur development of this activity. Now more than ever before with the sharpening of the class struggle, we must intensify and increase our wom- en’s work. We must real'ze the im- portant part that women play in the most important campaigns we are car-, tying on at present, such as the bit- ter fight against injunctions, the struggle against discrimination against foreign-born, and especially for the fight for the organization of has achieved comparatively more jthan any one other district in this | branch of work. But our forces were Ree pepeny concentrated or directed. ; j,,| Not sufficient attention was given 1927, comrades directly | ¢, the most important work of all, the work of women’s industry. Wo- men’s work in general requires per- haps more than any of our daily ac- tivities, concentration, patience and energy. The comrades in charge of women’s work in industry were surrounded by other activities and did not contri- bute sufficient attention to their func- tion and the chief son for that was no guidance or direction from the center. Considering our strength we made a pretty good achievement in the work among housewives, known as the “Working Women’s Councils.” These played a considerable part in the relief work in the various strikes, such as the Passaic, furriers, paper- box, ete. ‘They also took an active t and led campaigns for more ana schools, for bet.er housing tox working people and for lower renis. Some of these campaigns have an in portant immediate political signifi ance, for example, on the housing question. They organized large com tees, or rather demonstrations tc t Mayor Walker at The DAILY WORKER is under indictment in the federal court. involve thousands of dollars in fines and five years apiece in federal penitentiaries. ® Corwin tne so pepe Cs S William F. Dunne, Alexander Bittelmanvand Bert Miller face charges that —_——+ Both Miners and Needle Trades Workers Are Facing the Same Enemy By ROSE WORTIS. Two unions are today engaged in a bitter struggle, the outcome of which will have a far-reaching effect on the future of the American trade union movement—the miners and the needle trade workers. To the casual observer it would appear that these two struggles are of an entirely dif- ferent characier. The needle trade workers are apparently engaged in an internal conflict, while the miners are fighting the bosses. Those, however, who have followed the struggles otf both the miners and the needle trade workers, know that the crisis now facing them can be traced to one and the same cause, namely, the coward- ice and treachery of the official lead- ers of these unions. The Struggle in the Needle Trades One year ago, after the Furriers’ and Cloak & Dressmakers’ Unions of New York under left wing leadership carried thru successful strikes in their respective industries, resulting in the establishment of the 40-hour week, inereases in wages and other impor- (ant gains, the right wing bureaucrats of the International Unions, fearing these accomplishments of the left wing administrations would greatly enhance their prestige among the workers, and so constitute a serious menace to right wing control, launched an attack on the New York organizations. They expelled the Joint Boards, representing more.than 70 per cent of the New York mem- bership and precipitated the present civil war which has gone on unabated for the past 14 months. Aid of Bosses. Having no support from the work- ers, the bureauerais invited the aid of the bosses in their efforts to wrest the unions from the control of the left wing administrations, which had the enthusiastic support of the great s of the workers. The bosses eadily enlisted in the crusade against the left wing, seeing an opportunity to weaken the organizations thru in- vernal strife and win back the con- sessions they had been forced to grant n the recent militant strikes. Before ong the workers realized that the struggle against the bureaucracy was >: merely for the right to democratic dministration of their unions, but a struggle for the preservation of their unions and union conditions, in which they would have to encounter the most determined opposition of the combined forces of the union bureaucrats, the bosses and the state authorities. The months that followed are a record of the most shameful provocation and treachery ever practised by so-called union leaders against workers. Gave Up Workers’ Gains. In order to force their domination | the | on the needle trade unions, bureaucrats had not hesitated to work in fullest cooperation with the bosses. They gave up the most important: gains of the workers in order to get the assistance of the bosses in their attempt to force the cloak, dress- makers and furriers at the point of a gun to join their dual unions. The 40-hour week has been abolished, wages have been reduced, and piece work, the speed-up system and gen- eral sweat-shop conditions have been re-established in the industry. The bureaucrats of the needle trades, who had at one time pro- fessed at radical views, had gone over completely. to the camp of the bosses and have in conjunction with the as- sociations taken out the most sweep- ing injunctions, agitated for and caused the wholesale arrest and im- prisonment of workers who insisted on their right to strike and picket. The ruinous war that has been on in the needle trades for the past year practically destroyed the unions and has brought conditions of abject slavery in its wake for the workers. No Struggle Possible. Even the most backward workers realize to-day that so long as the re- actionary.. bureaucrats, will have a vestige of power in the industry, no effective. s.ruggle against the bosses is possible. The workers have come to realize en masse that they can make no distinction between the bosses and the bureaucrats, that both have but one object, which is to force the yoke of slavery on the workers and use them as tools for their per- sonal aggrandizement. The internal struggle of the needle trade workers is now recognized by: all class-con- scious workers as a struggle against the bosses and their labor lieu‘enants, the officials of the International. The needle trade workers, who had tasted EEE medied as quickly as possible. The organization must be greatly widen- d. It must find ways and means how o adapt itself so as to approach the great mass of working class women, the unorganized, and also to a certain extent in the campaign for building a Labor Party. It should be noted that in eleven important manufactur- ing industries women predominate. We will not elaborate on the conditions prevailing in Init goods, hosiery, yaper box, candy, textile, biscuit and other industries in which women form a majority of the workers. They are known to be among the industries in ‘which most wretched conditions and most miserable exploitation prevail. Analyze Work. We must, however, analyze the| wk of the party among women gen-| ly, especially in the past two| . Quite good work was done} our Boston comrades, known as; ‘by and for the City Halli. You can well understand what a re- ception these working women received by our strike-breaking, anti-labo: governmental administration. In th next political campaign these womer will remember by their experience that the democrats and republicar are entirely too busy to pay atten tion to their needs. In other word they will be completely digillusione from the poisonous capitalist propa ganda about our impartial govern ment which is supposed to be “elected people.” Success in Work. The women’s councils made a fai: success in their work regarding th entire women’s conditions but they have been working on a too narrow ‘The following immediate tasks are uired, if we expect real effective lk: among women. Regular nation- funetioning full-time machinery, which will help establish functioning vict machineries, whieh will be to meet the great problems 0: masses of women in industry. The great majority of women work- ys do not understand that they must orm a united front with the men orkers. They have not advanced rough, to accept and understanc iis important fundamental need. . hosses are fully conscious of th: dupes and fools they can make of omen in the labor struggle. They, he bosses, apply all sorts of vicious vopaganda in order to create poi- onous illusions in the minds of wo- forts given in many large factories. In order to reach these women, our plans must be very carefully laid out and we must have a knowledge of their psychology. Our tactics must be worked out in great detail for general methods cannot be applied, but each situation must be separately. met with. It is of urgent importance to publish a women’s paper on a’ na- tional scaie, at least on a semi-mon h- ly basis, which must be made inter- esting to the broad mass of average working women (by mapping out some plan this paper can be support- ed to a large extent by individuals who would not support any other en- terprise.). Open forums, lectures, mass meet- ings must. be utilized at least once in a while. They must pertain to the special problems of interest to women. My intensive work carried out by as | “the New England Mothers League, basis. They attract into their ranks also some work among various na-|the vanguard of the working class tional women’s organizations in De-| and very close sympathizers. It con- troit. sists also primarily of one national The New York district, an example|ity, mainly Jewish working clas for other districts on women’s work,| women. ren. They teach them to accept a/the Party as a whole along syste- orm of class collaboration, or entire} matic lines with full reorganization mnorance of class consciousness.|of the work realized, we can reach hey delude them with false pretend | the broad masses of the American d privileges grafted on the basis 01] working women, and align them for ¥ \ } the benefits achieved thru organiza- tion, stand ready to continue the struggle until the union is freed from the control of the bosses. Altho the circumstances in the miners’ struggle are somewhat dif- ferent, the plight in which the work- ers find themselves at present can be traced directly to the same source as \that of the needle trade workers. The Struggle of the Miners. The United Mine Workers but a short’ time ago was one of the most ,powerful and militant unions. The militancy of the rank and file of the miners did not chime in with the plans of the Lewises or the Greens. It interfered with their policies of class collaboration. It fos- tered a spirit of hatred toward the coal barons. Therefore the Lewis jmachine in a systematic manner un- dertook the struggle against the mili- tant workers of the union. Simultaneous with the waged against the workers in his union, Lewis adopted an ever more compromising policy toward the bosses. Time and again the Lewis administration betrayed the workers in the unorganized fields. After the latter had responded to strike calls, Lewis made setilements in the union jfields leaving the workers in the un- organized fields to return to the mines beaten, demoralized and at the mercy of the bosseg. Officials Responsible. It was these treacheries of the union officials that made possible the jattack of the bosses on the mine workers. For 10 months thousands jof workers have been on strike, fight- jing most heroically against an or- ganized regime of terror in.the coal 'fields in spite of the demoralizing in- |fluence of the Lewis machine that made every attempt to stifle the re- ‘volt of the workers; fighting injunc- tions; fighting the coal and iron police; fighting persecutions; suffer- |ing evictions from their homes during the bitter winter months; suffering cold and hunger. While the workers are fighting so heroically against all odds for the preservation of their union,. the Lewises, the Greens and the Wolls have not only failed to mobilize the labor movement in support of the miners, but have even officially out- lawed relief work fer the striking miners for many months, contenting themselves with sending appeals to President Coolidge, the representa- tive of Wall Street, to intervene in the strike. Challenge to All Labor. The strike of the mine workers is a challenge not only to the Miners’ Union, but to the entire trade union movement of this country. The open shop interests have chosen the ‘Miners’ Union as their first target for ‘attack because it represented the best and most militant of the American trade unions. They knew that a de- feat of the miners will pave the way for an attack on the other unions and will spell the annihilation of trade unionism in this country. What has the officials of the Amer- ican Federation of Labor, the Greens, Matthew Wolls, the Lewises, who are drawing their high salaries all along while the miners are literally dying of starvation, done to meet the crisis now facing the labor movement? What have they done to mobilize the hundreds of thousands of workers to save their unions from destruction? While the miners were on strike This situation must be re-| sex, as extra amusements and com-lan effective role in the class struggle. facing the most brutal combination of struggle, forces, while the injunction epidemic was spreading to every industry paralyzing every strike, while the bosses "were making tremendous cuts in wages attacking one union after another, the officials of the A. F. ot L. sat in high councils, deliberating on plans to destroy the needle trade unions, who under left wing leader- ship had been the only ones to take up the challenge of the bosses and had gained improvements in the con- ditions of the workers thru the strike weapon. All the financial and mora) resources of the Federation (as Presi- dent Green had stated some time ago) will be mobilized not to fight the coal barons, the textile kings and other exploiters of labor, but to carry on the holy war against what he termed “the Communist menace.” Aid of Lewis. As far back as 1925, when Sigman, the reactionary president of the I. L. G. W. U., expelled 35,000 members, the Lewis administration came to his assistance by giving him a loan oi $75,000. To-day the bureaucrats are united in the effort to subjugate the workers to ‘the bosses and ‘conver their organizations into “company unions.” The latest statement of Matthew Woil on the question of anti-strike legislation, where he openly endorse: the proposal of the Bar Association to ‘introduce legislation that will do away with strikes, exposes the Mat- thew Wolls, the Lewises and the Greens as the open agents of the bosses and proves conclusively that only thru the defeat of these repre- sentatives of the bosses in the labor movement can the workers hope to successfully build organizations that will fight for the improvement of their conditions. : The struggle of the needle trade workers, the struggle of the miners, the struggle of all other workers, or- ganized as well as unorganized, has become a struggle on two fronts,— the labor bureaucrats and the bosses, both of whom are united in their ef- forts to keep the workers in sub- mission. The heroic struggle of the miners in face of hunger, oppressien and brutality, the determined strug- ale of the needle trade workers, the spirit of revolt against the treacher- ies of the officialdom in the other unions, is proof that the workers of ‘his country are alive to the present langer. REBELS A Political Fable By FRED J. FLATMAN. Qe upon a time a small commun- ity in one of the southern states, which for obvious reasons must re- main unmentioned, decided after it had received a visit from an interna- tionally known evangelist—whose name must also remain unknown to history—that it would undertake and administer its public life without du- plicity of any description. For the first time in its history, the news- papers really published news, told no lies, either in its news columns or advertisements. Stock salesmen and real estate agents were compelled to strike camp and migrate to Florida. Prices were plainly marked in store windows. In fact all went as merry as the proverbial marriage bells until the next election came around. It was the speeches of the candi- dates that was responsible for the community deciding that it would be far better to return to the old-fash- ioned style of living. The republican candidate had de- livered himself as follows: “Fellow citizens, it is with enor- mous amount of pleasure that I take my place upon this platform and see before me such a large number of horny-handed sons of toil, for it is to them that I am going to make my appeal for support today, and con- forming to our mutual determination to eliminate all subterfuge. From Head Down, “The fundamental principle of Americanism as we all see it, whether we be advocates of republicanism, democratism or progressivism, or for that matter any other ‘ism’ worthy of your support as Americans, is that the workers must be skinned. Now then the party whose standard I am holding aloft during this election con- siders that the skinning process should take place downwards. That is to say, from the head downwards. We submit that it can be removed more easily that way.” The democratic candidate flatly de- nied this. In part he asserted: “The republican candidate is very badly informed, fellow citizens. Tha skinning process of course is abso- lutely necessary for the maintenanc? of our glorious Amercan ideals and modern civilization, but after con- siderable experimental and research work that the democratic party has undertaken, at by no means small ex- pense, we feel that we can logically demonstrate that our great institu- tions, that are admired and emulated through the world, can be far better maintained and their influence mora widely diffused by skinning the work- ers from their feet upwards.” The progressive candidate smilingly rebuked his opponents by asserting: Should Be Chloroformed. | “That while he was very, very sorry |to be compelled to admit in behalf Jot the progressive party, to which he owed allegiance, that it was still | necessary for the workers to be skin- ined, his party claimed that as the ‘skinning process was so painful, the workers should be chloroformed while ‘hat actual operation was taking place.” The audiences remained mute during ‘hese appeals, for they felt that the speeches were merely the newer ren- ditions consequent upon the recent re- orientation. The last candidate to take the platform declared that he repre- sented the Workers Party and that “Speaking for them, he wanted to assure the electorate that the skin- ning process of the workers was not by any means necessary, and that it took place simply because the work- ers accepted it as the basis upon which society was constructed. He got no further. The citizens were convinced that he had broken the pact to which they were all a party and he was driven from the town and latest advices are that the com- munity has returned to its former code of morals (?) and Americanism. Under the pressure of the attack from the bosses and the treachery of the bureaucrats, the workers are turning to the left wing and the pro- »ressives for guidance in their strug- gles. The time is fast approaching when the rank and file, under mili« ‘ant leadership, will wrest the unions from the control of the bureaucrats ond the bosses, and convert them into ‘ighting weapons for the defense cf workers’ interests, Socrates drank deep of the hemlock cup in ancient Greece, | And the knights took a big chance at Runymede. E Every window of the Bastille was a dead man’s eye E’re Marat strode through the Tribune’s halls. Five innocent men swung from a hempen rope in ’87 And in ’27 two were burned. . .. Centuries of bitter reckoning And scales that never weigh the truth For those Jone souls that risk their little moment of man’s life To make the gesture of dissent. i And a guy says to me the other day: “Now that you’ve a good job, Fergit this radical bunk An’ make yerself some real jack!” But, jeeze, a guys got guts Who stands in the cold and snow. An’ walks in the rain on the picket line, ’Cause maybe the kids aint fed enough An’ may be yet, a man’s a man sometime. . .. -JAMES A, MILLER, on |