The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 15, 1928, Page 1

THE DAILY WORKER FIGHTS: FOR THE ORGANIZATION OF THE UNORGANIZED FOR THE 40-HOUR WEEK FOR A LABOR PARTY Vol. V. No. 38. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: In New York, by mail, $5.00 per year. Outside New York, by mail, $6.00 per year. Entered am eecons-ciunx marier ut kH#e Sone Office at New Nork, N. NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, FEB. 15, 1928 CITY MOVES TO POSTPONE FARE RAISE BY |. RT. Announce “Deal On to Purchase B.-M.T. | Three temporary injunctions were issued yesterday restraining the In- terborough Rapid Transit Company | from introducing a 7 cent fare on its | lines. Any one of these might suf- | fice if allowed to develop and grow} strong. The New York State Transit Com- | mission rejected the plea of the Inter- borough for permission to make the inerease which the Interborough had earlier applied for. | The Interborough filed in the| United States District Court a suit against the city, the Transit Commis- sion, the Manhattan Railway Com- pany and William A. Prendergast ot the metropolitan division of the De- partment of Public Service, in which it seeks relief from the “confisca- tory” restrictions of the contract un- der which it operates the lines, es- pecially the 5 cent fare provision. Untermyer Retracts. And if these three major events were not yet enough for one day, Mr. Untermyer, he of many words, issued several characteristically long state- ments in which he disavowed all the mean things which. it has been sup- posed he has said against, the officers of the I. R, T. | The Interborough was first to rush | into court by filing a lengthy com- | plaint in printed form in the Federal | Court. By bringing suit in the fed- | eral rather than in the state courts the Interborough hopes to secure the advantage over the city. In the complaints attached, the In- terborough prays for relief from the “acts of desperation” by the city, re- ferring to “inflammatory appeals” which it charges city officials and particularly Mr. Untermyer has made against it. “No alternative,” it says, “has been left to the Interborough Company but to place itself within (Continued on Page Five) PENN. TROOPERS DEFEND SCARS PITTSBURGH, Feb. 14.—Five bodies of state troopers armed to the teeth and carrying extra rations of food and ammunition moved in on California early yesterday where union coal diggers have lately been active, mass picketing a mine be- longing to the Pittsburgh Coal Com- pany. - Between midnight and 5 a. m. the cossacks came in trucks and on motorcycles from their barracks at ‘Washingion, Brownsville, Mononga- hela and Belleveron. eee Fail to Break Strike Morale. PITTSBURGH, Feb. 14—The ar- rest of thirty-eight men, women and young girls who picketed the Jones and Laughlin mine at Daisytown last week failed to unfavorably affect the determination of the striking coal diggers to violate the injunctions against mass picketing. The’ thirty-eight were taken before squire Schwards, a Vesta coal com- pany flunkey, who was willing to do his masters a favor, but since the “yellow dogs” were unable to prove that the pickets violated traffic regu- lations or were disturbing the peace, the company squire was compelled to turn them loose. » . *. The Youth Conference for Miners’ Relief will hold a theatre party at the New Playwrights’ Theatre Feb. 22. The play is “Hoboken Blues,” by Michael Gold. WAR DEPT. OPENS CHINA RECRUITING 70, WASHINGTON, Fe Feb. 14.--Another move by the U. |. government against the workers and farmers of China is seen in the instructions is- sued recently by the War Department to resume recruiting for the Chinese infantry service. This announcement coming simultaneously with the set- ting up of a Soviet government by more than a million Kwantung salt- makers, fishermen and peasants, is considered to indicate increased steps by the imperialists to stem the grow- ing tide of revolt thruout the peasant ‘districts. . COYLE TO SPEAK ON USSR. Albert F. Coyle, executive secre- tary, All-American Cooperative Com- ‘mission, will lecture on “Cooperatives in .the Soviet Union and Western Europe,” Friday evening, et Irving ae 15th St. "aad Irving Place, un- ‘der the auspices of the ogre \ One Small Meal a Day Tens of thousands of children of the Pennsylvania, Ohio and Colo- rado miners, who ere striking for a wage which would allow them to live face death from cold and star- vation if the American workers do not send immediate relief. The: lit- tle Pennsylvania miner’s girl shown above is eating her first bite in two days. The children in the “mine fields do not average even one meal a day. Contributions should be sent to the Pennsylvania-Ohio Miners’ Relief Committee, /611 Penn Ave., Pittsburgh, Pa., New York City, Party Instruction All members of the Workers-(Com- munist) Party are instructed by-the district executive committee to report to 108 E. 14th St. at 11 a, m. tomor- row for BEE PS Party work; ‘DAILY' PLACED ON 100 MORE STANDS. Drive for. New Readers| Growing The Daily Worker has been placed on additional 100 newsstands in the metropolitan area in» the: campaign for 10,000 new readers ‘duririg © the’ last week, A. Ravitch,” circulation manager announced last night. This is the latest development. in the campaign which will continue] until the Ruthenberg memorial meet- ing March 4, in conjunction with the national campaign for , 5,000 new members for the Workers (Commu- nist) Party. The Workers Party members thru- out the city are canvassing news- stands in their neighborhoods. and placing the DAILY "WORKER. -in those places where it is not for-sale. Thousands of copies of the paper are being distributed every day by Party units thruout the city.- They are being given out by Party’ com- mittees sin front of many large fac- tories and shops. Engineer to Discuss USSR at Exposition Charles E. Stuart, head of a New York engineering firm acting in the capacity of consultant to the Russian Soviet Government Trusts, will be the speaker this afternoon at the» Rus- sian Cultural Exposition, which is ‘be- ing held under the auspices of -the American Society for Cultural: Rela- tions with U. S, S. R., at 119- West 57th Street. : Stuart’s firm deals with the=re- habilitation of old coal an n mines and the planning of new.mmines in the Soviet Union. Stuart -hag-made | ~ several, trips to Russia since. 1926, and has travelled extensively. h the Cae 10, 000 0 ONI By BILL DUNNE. . The attack of Wall Street: government WORKER thru the indictment and arrest of members staff on the charge of violating the postal laws, is sim purpose, altho differing in method, to progecutions of the labor and revolutionary press izations in the period from 1919 to 1922. (Palmer attack and the Bridgeman raids and prosecutions.) The dramatic character -of the previous attack has. not yet developed in New York but the purpose is clear—to place an‘enormous financial burden. upon the only American ravolu- tionary daily paper and jail. members’ will be unable to live and function for the working class in justrial and political crisis. the rapidly developing ind Five and one-half years of great lulled many workers into a false sense struggle dropped back to a slow tempo prosperity” propaganda, of ‘the ‘capitalist. agents permeated aapsee of the working class” and checked the growth of or- gan mn and consciousness.. Just as in the period bm 1919 to 1988 the drive of tm perialist reaction began with an” the Commi \and revolutionary non-party workers {Pa DAILY WORKER. | X., under the act of March 3, 1879. Published daily except Sunday by The National Daily Worker Publishing Association, Inc., 33 First Street, New York, N. ¥. FINAL [ FINAL CITY | EDITION Price 3 Cents 4,500,000 ESTIMATE OF UNEMPLOYED Open nm Labor Campaign Against Anti-Strike Law BAR PROPOSAL IS SHOWN AS DRIVE AGAINST WORKERS Launch Campaign to! Protest Move | Labor forces which for several weeks have been making preparations for a united campaign of protest against the Woll-Cohen-American| Bar Association anti-strike law, will} tonight get their drive under way at a huge mass meeting at Manhattan Lyceum, 66 E. 4th St. A call to the whole labor movement, with the triple slogan: “Defend your unions,” “Defend your right to strike,” “Defend your right to organize,” has been issued-by the Trade Union Educational League which is in the forefront of the fight to arouse the labor movement to the menace of the proposed -anti-strike bill. ~~ + Foster. Gitlew to Speak. Wm. Z. Foster, national secretary of the league and leader of the fa- mous 1919 steel strike will speak at the meeting. Ben Gitlow, mem-» -ber. of. the Central Executive Com-; mittee of the Workers (Communist) Party-who has on many past occasions risen to defend. the rights of the workers, will also.speak. In°a-statement issued yesterday, Foster characterized this move on the part of the open shoppers in coopera- tion: with: the labor bureaucrats as a challenge to every gain which ‘labor has secured in the last fifty years. If the workers: ‘io not act promptly and in-mass numbers, he said, a law ‘willbe “put; which willbe the first Step in a of driving the workers back into involuntary servi- tude. On their part the forces of the em- ployers speaking through Julius Henry Cohen, ‘chairman of the Bar Association Committee, continue to fire their bombardment of propa- ganda in support of their “formula” Yesterday as a final shot before the opening of the hearing on Thursday the group fired its biggest gun in the form of a statement by Matthew Woll, acting as president of the open- shop National Civic Federation and incidentally vice-president of the American Federation of Labor. Woll Approves. . In this statement Woll announces that the work of the Bar Association Committee is the “first ray, of sun- shine in the fog of legal chaos,” now hanging over the labor. movement. Yet Woll admitsthat the courts have uniformly favored the employes and that at the present moment labor is faced with the denial of every right supposed to have been guaranteed it. He admits further that “if the special committee of the Bar Association is to be successful in its endeavors, that there must be a radical change of attitude on the part of our courts as well as of the law under which in- junctions are at present issued.” This admission that there would have to be a “radical change of at- titude on the part of the courts,” it is pointed out, at once brands the whole move with which Woll is al- Jied, as plainly dishonest. For no one knows. better than Woll himself, that the courts which are under the control of big business, will make no such change, Information secured within the past few days has led to the opinion that the proposal now sponsored by the (Continued on Page Five) tt upon The DAILY in to the raids upon and and organ- of its staff so that it Spas in Se going. industrial, activity, have . of security. The class and the “permanent Sains war Ge gather to First : New York Bread Line in Seven Years! While Governor Smith is conducting a long-drawn out farce ‘ nvestigation,” thousands of starv- ing and homeless unemployed men are forced to wait in endless lines along the Bowery for hot, watery ¢offee and bread which is served with sermons that thank “God” for America’s “prosperity.” Coolidge Got Oil Cash in ’24; Both Old Parties Involved | WASHINGTON, Feb. 14.—Harry Continental Trading Co. operations, and who subsequently fled to Europe to | avoid service of a subpoena, contributed $5,000 to the Coolidge. campaign fund in 1924, after he had gone to¢————_———_— FUR THUGS HELD Europe, Senator Nye (R), chairman of the Senate Public Lands Commit- tee, declared today. A record of the contribution has been found in the report on campaign funds filed by the Coolidge campaign organization with the house of repre- | sentatives, Nye said. Evidence that ‘both the democratic ‘and republican parties were corrupt- ed by money from the same source in the 1920. presidential election cam- paign is another development in the oil slush fund investigation. With agents of the committee tracking down clues involving both of the old party organizations, Senator Nye announced today that investiga- tion would be made of the $600,000 (Continued on Page Two) FORCE GOVERNOR TO ACT ON PALMER By WINIFRED R. MOOERS. (Special to The DAILY WORKER) DENVER, Colo. Feb. 14—A ruling which -may have far-reaching effect. was made in Federal Court here yesterday by Judge Symes, who held that Governor Adams, Adjutant General Newlon and other Colorado state officials must answer. the habeas corpus writ made for the ‘re- lease of Frank Palmer and. three others held in Greeley jail over three weeks without charges. Judge Symes scored the use of troops against the striking miners in the interests of| the coal operators, stating that “I cannot subscribe to the contention that by signing a piece of paper the governor can remove all the rights of citizens. WORKER’S FUNERAL, The funeral of Andrew Poperzer, 49, member of Carpenters’ Union, Local 2090, will be held today at 1:30 L. 1. :Poperzer died last Sunday. p. m, from 23-70 29th St., Astoria, M. Blackmer, oil mah involved in the | FOR GRAND JURY Alex Fried anc and 5 Others Held for Assault Alex Fried, the leader of the right wing in the Furriers’ Union and chief agent of the American Federation of Labor in the carrying out of the lat- ter organizations’ campaign of de- struction against the Joint Board Furriers’ Union was held for the grand jury yesterday by Magistrate John V. Flood in Jefferson Market Court. With him were also held five other hirelings of the right wing “union.” The judge postponed setting the bail for them till today. All six are charged with having attacked, last week, with knives, Max Fineman, a fur worker, who was walking in the fur marxet on Sixth Ave. This is the second time the case, was brought up in this court, due to the fact that Fineman was too injured to appear in court. Heavy bail was set for the release last week of the six, who are: Fried, H. Reiss, I. Moskowitz, Julius Schaeffer, Moe Passman, and Harry Plitt. Fried was appointed by Matthew Woll, A. F. of L. chief, to lead the pogrom against the fur workers’ union in spite of the fact that he is known to the police as having used several aliases while following the burglary profession. He was sen- tenced to serve a six-year term for burglarizing a jewelry store in Bos- ton several years ago. Workers’ School Class In Speech Improvement One of the additions to the cur- riculum of the Workers School this term is the course in “Speech Im- provement” to be given Monday eve- nings from 6.45 to 7.45 p. m., by Bea- WILBUR FIGHTS FOR 4 BILLION — Have i it to Guard U.S. Spoils INDIANAPOLIS, Feb. 14. — The) Coolidge-Ohio gang administration does not intend to surrender its $4,- 000,000,000 naval building prograrn, Navy Secretary Wilbur demonstrated in an address here before the Indiana~ polis Association of Business Men. Wilbur’s address was an appeal to save the navy “from those who are ignorantly attacking this program .to put us in a position where, in a sense, our sailor men will have to fight blind-folded.” It was designed to answer labor and _ progressive groups who have objected to the huge naval program and to counteract the effect of disclosures of the adminis- tration’s imnerialistic intentions. Disaster Utilized. Obviously taking advantage of the public feeling aroused by the S-4 dis- | aster, Wilbur told the employers of | Indianapolis that the ships planned | in the new program could be well called the eyes of the fleet, raEnaare ing scout cruisers, aircraft carriers and submarines. After stating that the United States government is not seeking any competitive armament race with Great Britain, Secretary Wilbur explained in detail how the present program is designed specifically to equal and outdistance the naval strength of Britain. The following quotation from his speech, tho underestimating the com- parative strength of the two fleets, (Continued on Page Two) Pioneers ty’ Gradenis Twenty members of the Young Pioneers will be graduated into the Young Workers (Communist) League at a dance to be held Saturday, Feb. 25, by the downtown section of the League at its headquarters, 60 St. | Marks Place. John Williamson, district organizer | of the League, J. Horowitz, section organizer, and several of the gradu- | trice Becker. ates will speak. DOLLAR DONATIONS WILL SAVE DAILY WORKER Make a Proletarian Reply *‘o the Attack on Our Press: Only from our class of the working class are live and speak and strug; securing the finances we / ald on the Bridgeman convention), so today the new wave of reaction which accompanies the industrial depression, unem- ployment and the drive on the living standards of the working class, is striking straight at The DAILY WORKER—the com- bined symbol, expression and most effective weapon of our period of struggle. The DAILY WORKER not only needs thousands of dol- lars for defense but it also needs still more thousands to keep The forced suspension of The DAILY WORKER would be triumph for reaction. If The DAILY WORKER can be gagged a destroyed there will be high glee and cheerful grins in of the National Civic Federation, the headquarters facturers’ Association, in Wall Street and Wall Street’s White House, in the luxurious haunts of the high-salaried misleaders of labor and in every Place where the enemies of ov class conspire against t WORKER. Give us the money to Send your donations The DAILY WORKER must not be strangled by the hands of our enemies now gripping its throat. built into the collective voice of the millions of American work- ers now menaced by the imperialist war. the Manu- mass support will be l capitalist attack. The need is great and immediate. $10,000 we must have at once. DAILY WORKER and the working class it fights for can af- | ford to pay $10,000 for one perjured witness. But for us $10,000 means the very existence of The DAILY The statement of the Central Executive Committee yes- terday shows the danger to our press clearly. We must and will act together to repel the attack. 10,000 one-dollar donations bring The DAILY WORKER thru this present crisis. Such can support come. Only in the ranks the defenders of The DAILY WORK- gle for our class. Every day of delay in} need makes the burden greater. The enemies of Tre | buy the “munitions” of the class : war. today. It must be saved and open shop drive, Basra and frow workers will a militant proletarian reply to the I | the union headquarters, GENERAL CRISIS DEEPENS WHILE | OFFICIALS STALL i Section of Land Now Affected Two meetings of unemployed | workers will be held today. H. M, | Wicks, of the editorial staff of the DAILY WORKER will address a mass meeting arranged by Section 2, Workers (C sect tsb Party at 1:30 p. m. at 101 W. 27th St. A rally of unemployed hotel and restaurant. workers will be held at 3 p. m. at 133 W. 5ist St. Bascal Cosgrove, secretary of the union will be among the speakers, The New York Council of the Un employed will hold a large mass meeting tomorrow evening at Man- hattan Lyceum, 66 E. 4th St., it was }announced last night. Important questions will be taken up at the meeting, according to John Di Santo, secretary. Establish Centers. The council announced yesterday that it has established centers thru- out the city for unemployed workers jin various trades. The centers thus |far established are furriers 101 W. icy St.; hotel and restaurant work- 133 W. 5ist St.; seamen, 28 South St.; iron workers, 7 E. 15th St.; Painters, 143 E. 103d St. and a general center at the Brooklyn Labor Lyceum, 949 Willoughby St. The Workers International Relief is in charge of all the relief work of the organization, it has been an- nounced. Between four and five millions are now unemployed in the United States. Unemployment which has become the chief national problem in spite of the attempts by Coolidge “prosperity” propagandists to conceal its serious- ness is rapidly developing into a crisis. Edgar Wallace, legislative agent for the American Federation of Labor, which incidentally has done practic- ally nothing to awaken attention to the problem, estimates that 40 per cent of all wage workers in the coun- try are now idle or employed part time. If this figure is correct, over four millions are now without the means of livelihood. Conditions, ac- cording to all estimates, are now par- allel to those which existed in 1920 jand 1921. These conclusions are based on @ study of reports from many states throughout the country. The figures |bear out reports which recently were submitted at a hearing held in New York at which various representatives stated that fully 40 per cent of wage workers in this city are now idle or working part time. | | \ Unemployed Everywhere. Washington reports a _ veritable army of newly unemployed. At the request of Director Stewart of the | U. S. Bureau of Labor statistics, the | police of the District of Columbia have |been ordered to e a count of un- |employed persons, men and women sep: tecent in- r Ss upon 1 ity or- gan 2 precipitated this me s taken to be a move to al temporarily the rising wave of bitterness which the unemployed | workers are displaying at being forced |to starve while scores of large firms are still reporcing the largest divie |dends in their history. A similar move for a “survey” in New York is now under way at the orders of A! Smith. Reports from Atlanta, Georgia, state that the situation there is “dan- gerous.” In a recent announcement the executive board of the Atlanta Federation of Trades stated that the condition is worse than in years, ER found. Money we must have if our fighting paper is to | Many citizens of Atlanta who have lived here for years,” the reporé (Continued on Page Two) Women’s Cotncil Keeps \Up Fight for Children The United Council of Working Class Women is intensifying its ae- tivity in organizing the mothers of Public Schools 19 and 50, Brooklyn, to demand better school conditions for their children while local politicians « are waiting for a decision from the board of education on the postponed \ transfer of the children. The board meets in two weeks. An. other parents’ meeting will at that time be held to hear the results and plan a school strike should the much- contested transfer be effected.