The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 28, 1928, Page 6

Page Six ) THE DAILY WORKER Published by the NATIONAL DAILY WORKER PUBLISHING ASS'N, Ine, Daily, Except Sunday »,, 88 First Street, New York, N. Y. Cable Address: “Daiwork” 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 — ohn TBE A@dresr and mail out checks to THE DAILY WORKER, 33 First Street, New York, N. Y- ES Editor. ....05.5. ee .-ROBERT MINOR ae Assistant Editor. .. WM. F. DUNNE Entered as second-class mail at the post-office at New York, N. ¥., under the act of March 8, 1879. A Different Kind of Crisis There is more unemployment in the United States than at any other time since 1921. A New York capitalist newspaper notes that altho seven per cent more of electric current is used today than at the end of last year, the streets and alleys are swarming with unsold human “current’—the labor power of millions of unemployed. The year 1919 w the highest peak of employment in manu- facture, and 1923 was another peak, not quite so high in em-| ployment but very much higher in production. Since 1923 the number employed has gone almost steadily downward, while the amount of manufactured goods has gone almost steadily upward. | From 1914 to 1926 production in manufacture increased 72 per | | | | éént, while employment increased only 18 per cent. In 1927 pro- duction was 70 per cent greater than in 1914, while the number | of workers employed in 1927 was only 15 per cent greater than | in 1914. | | This indicates the nature of the “new kind of crisis.” It! means, in the first place, a vast army of permanently unemployed, | an army of men and women thrown out of industry by the per-| manent abolition of their jobs, which are taken over by machines | and the speed-up system for those workers who remain with the | machine. A few examples: Since 1923 the petroleum production of this country has increased 84 per cent, but five per cent fewer | men are producing the 84 per cent larger production. The meat slaughtering and packing industry is producing 20 per cent more | meat products than it did in 1923, but has permanently dis- | charged 19 per cent of its workers since 1923. Railroads are} hauling 30 per cent more, but have discharged one per cent of their employes. Bituminous coal miners are digging four per cent | more coal, but there are 15 per cent fewer men digging it. Cotton] textiles, electrical equipment, etc., show the same trend. Capitalist “optimists” point with pretense of confidence to | the large production of automobiles. The Central Committee of the Workers (Communist) Party in its last plenary meeting pointed out that the present big pro- duction of automobiles is a competitive production. Today the auto industry is manufacturing or about to manu- facture at the rate of between 4,500,000 and 5,000,000 cars per year. But there are $1,500,000,000 worth of automobiles in use in this country which are not yet paid for. Those which are to be y thanufactured are not to be sold for cash, but to be sold under tivo conditions: first, that in probably most cases an old car will have to be accepted in part payment for the new; and second, the bulk of the price of the car is to be paid on the instalment plan. There is no sufficient market for the millions of “used” cars. | Vag There is not even a market for the 5,000,000 new cars. For | ' avery car Ford sells, General Motors will have a new car that it cannot sell, and for every new car that is sold, the seller will nave to take in place of it a used car which cannot be sold. While » 5,000,000 purchasers are being sought (many of them must be "members of the upper strata of labor), there is an army rapidly swelling toward a total of 5,000,000 men thrown out of industry and reduced to a purchasing power approximating zero. This is the big contradiction: Capitalism by its very de- velopment ripens the disease which destroys it. “The richest sountry in the world has the longest breadlines.” The difference in this “different kind of crisis” is that it comes under conditions which leave no way out but one. Not the least of these conditions lies in the fact that U. S. capitalism is carrying on in a period when world-capitalism is writhing in its mortal disease—the per- jod of proletarian revolution. ef Leaders of the great finance-capitalist monopoly system which is called “the United States” will try to break their way out by means of the billion dollar navy planned by Coolidge, and a war for the seizure of foreign continents for imperialist ex- _ pansion. Thus the danger of imperialist war is before the work- ers no less than industrial misery and collapse. But the capitalist “way out” is not a way out, but a way deeper into the misery. The only way out in reality is the organization of the work- ing class to play its heroic part in taking over, in alliance with the working farmers, the machinery of production under its own tlass rule in this period of proletarian revolution. The American working class, no matter how backward today > is subject to the same causes which revolutionize a working class; and the American working class will be no less revolutionary than that of any other country. How Al Can Lie! We got a sample of the kind of stuff Al Smith will use in his presidential campaign when he remarked on the radio Sunday night that “the nation has not favored the election of a president of great wealth.” Yes, usually the wealthy owners of the country have hired a » sharper like Al to sit in the presidential chair for them: But men of “great wealth” have always held and controlled the ce of president. The essence of the thing is revealed by the cord that no candidate was ever elected as president of the - gest campaign fund. This is the record as far back as to include Lincoln’s election in 1860; and so far as we know the record of campaign funds is not complete further back. Al Smith is covering up with demagogic sophistry his only pore of being elected, which lies in his being the final choice of ‘all Street, with a campaign fund in proportion. In the same style of demagogy Herbert Hoover, the most outstanding rival for Wall Street’s choice, is trying to make it appear that he is be- ing “fought” by Wall Street. Both are lying in that peculiar yankee way. THE DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 1928 ‘TM WITH YOU BOYS!” James J. Walker, New York’s butterfly mayor, recently returned from the Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Bowery that he was “with them.” ~— By Fred Ellis assured jobless workers on the Red Army Men Join the Party x - J A regiment of the Y. C. L Division received during the period of Novem- ber-December, 1927, 85 applications for Party membership. Most of the applicants are Young Communists and Red Soldiers who have shown themselves as active so- cial workers in the Red Army clubs. Out of 33 comrades admitted as can- didates to the Party 70 per cent are workers, 27 per cent peasants and 3 per cent employees. All who ac- cepted applicants are very popular among the soldiers. The new Party candidates closely follow the trend of the discussion and the work of the XV Party Congress and the life of our Union in general. In joining the Party they declared that they want to defend the unity of its ranks, to fight the Opposition and to participate in the building up of Socialism. Party educational work has begun in January among the new recruits. Apart from that, the candidates are assigned Party tasks meeting with their desires and capacity. About 90 per cent of them perform various Party duties. In assigning Party duties, the nuc- leus takes into strict account not only the strength and capability ‘of the comrades, but also their living condi- tions, as a result of which not a single comrade is over-burdened. That is how we forge sound Bolshevik- Leninists in our day to day practical work in educating our new cadres. The Fourth World Red By A. LOZOVSKY (Continued from Last Issue.) IKE all former Congresses, the Fourth Congress of the Red Inter- national of Labor Unions will devote much attenton to the labor movement in the colonies and sem-colonial re- gions. Seeing that the working class and the trade unions of China have come most to the fore during the last few years, the tasks facing the Chi- nese trade unions, during the revo- lution will be the subject of special consideration. Quite apart from the Chinese trade unions, which bear upon _ their shoulders the great weight of the struggle against the internal and ex- ternal enemies, the trade unions of India, Indonesia, the Philippines, and a whole number of other coyntries play a very prominent part in the fight for national and social emanci- pacion, In its treatment of the Labor movement in the colonies and semi- colonial territories, the prospective Congress will have to undertake a differentiation and specification of the facts submitted to it. Upon the whole, the Fourth Congress of the Red International of Labor Unions will have to reply to a great number of questions, not only as regards the colonies and semi-colonies, but also in respect of the imperialist coun- tries. This refers quite particularly to the colonial countries, however, since there the trade union movement is yet young, so that errors com- mitted are more easily made goou than is the case in countries in which: definite forms of organization and « hard and fast organization and a hard and fast organizatory system have evolved and assumed a perma- nent form. SOE. SPECIAL point on the agenda of the Fouth Congress of the Rea {nternational of Labor Unions is the juestion of the tactics to be ob- served by adherents of the Red In- ternational of Labor Unions in Grea Sritain. For the decision of this question, not only the experience made during the last few years iv. Great Britain, but also the revolu tionary experiences in other countrie: will have to be taken into considera tion, All objective circumstances speak for the fact that Great Britain is likely soon to experience an ag- grava ‘on of social struggles, anc chat despite the energetic attempts on the part of the General Counci. leaders io bring about “industria. peace.” All such struggles, however are doomed to fail, if they are carried on under the guidance of those men who deliberately abandoned their position in May 1926. For this rea son the question as to the taciies ov. the Minority Movement in Great controls only a small percentage of the working class. The task of gain- ing hundreds of thousands of Japan- ese workers for the trade unions is a question of great historical im- portance, and therefore we shall also pay attention to this country, which plays so prominent a part on the shores of the Pacific. es aie § Fetses item of the agenda which ap- pears under the head of “problems of organization,” covers all questions of daily practice in our revolutionary trade union movement. In this re- spect we shall have no further gen- eral principles of organizational de- velopment to work out, since this has already been done by former Con- gresses. At this Congress, however, we shall have to investigate the or- ganizatory condition of our sections, and of the minorities, the reasons of the weakness noticeable in the in- dependent organizations and min- orities, the relations between the minorities and the independent unions, the activity of the existing factory councils and the creation of new councils, the reasons of their possible inactivity, the methods of work among the masses, the position of our finances, the mutual relations and the aid institutions in the‘unions, the question of fighting funds, and other matters. We need self-criticism, severe and pitiless self-criticism. Only thus can we derive useful les- sons from our weaknesses and short- comings. Finally we shall have to treat the very serious question of the Inter- national Propaganda Committees. We already possess some such commit- tees, which do far more work than the respective internationals. What next? Should they be left in this condition or should steps be taken for enlarging their functions, as some comrades suggest? All these ques- Labor Congress tions demand detailed consideration. The organization of all our revolu- tionary forces in a vertical direction is a question of the greatest impor- tance. To content ourselves in this connection with some resolution or other, to repeat what was already said some years ago, ‘would be sense- less. Here, as in regard to the other questions, a very definite expression of opinion on the part of the delega- tions is necessary. Only our collec- tive experiences can help us to make another step forward on the way of a better organization of all revolution- ary forces. Of the other items of the agenda, the winning of the youth, the recruit- ing of the young workers for the trade union movement deserves special attention.. This is a matter of paramount. importance in countries like France or Czchoslovakia. Though there are resolutions to hand in in re- gard to these questions, they will yet THE DARING ENTERPRISE By JAMES P. CANNON. A characteristic of all Leninists everywhere is their incomparable dar- ing. No odds dismay them, no rela- tion of forces dims their faith or halts their struggle. In 1914 when the imperialists beat the drums of war, nearly all the ‘great”’ and influential socialist lead- ers went oyer to their side. The bour- geois statesmen and the socialist lead- ers fused into one stream—a stream which swept the masses to misery and death. Lenin and the ‘Bolsheviks did not go along. In the blackest days of the war they raised the slogan, “Against the Stream!” and projected a victorious proletarian revolution and a new International. The small group who took up that fight have grown into a mighty army. History records their achievements in letters of fire, Lenin’s teachings and daring spirit have spread throughout the world and found adherents in every country. America has its nucleus of revolu- tionaries endeavoring to follow the path of Lenin and to fight with his dauntless spirit. Their number has been small and the odds against them almost inseparable, yet thanks to their audacity and courage they have already done astounding things. They nave united the scattered fractions of cevolutionary workers into a_ single party, fairly homogenous already, and growing stronger in the ideology ¢ Communism, This small party has hallenged all the powerful forces of he mightiest imperialism in the world and become the heart and core jritain, as"to the inethods of captur-|of every struggle against it. Price- ng the masses, and the process to ve observed in instilling our revolu- ionary fighting methods into the snasses, gains quite special im- portance. At the same time I should like to aise the question of’ the immediate tasks facing the revolutionary wing of the Labor movement in Japan. Naturally the situation in Japan is different. In Great Britain the trade union movement can look back on a long history, while in Japan it is still quite young and comprises a far smaller proportion of the working class. In Japan, however, the situa- tion is quite peculiar. We there see a rising wave. The labor movement is extremely split up. There is a serious revolutionary wing, but it , less experience has already been gain- ed. On the field of the fight against intervention and war; for the salva- tion of the unions and the safeguard- ing of labor conditions, for the inter- est of the unemployed, the rights of the foreign born and Negroes, labor defense—look where you will, the American Communists, numbering only a few thousands, are in the van- guard of the struggle. Many of the achievements of the past and more of the undertakings of the future will revolve around and be regulated by the success of what might be called. our central achieve- ment, the mainspring of our machine. That is The DAILY WORKER. The founding of The DAILY WORKER four years ago. on the heels of the big set-back in the trade union and farmer-labor movements, was a daring enterprise indeed. Noth- ing was a greater inspiration and strength to militant workers or a big- ger blow to our enemies. It began “on a shoe string,” and how has it been maintained for four years? How could the few despised and outlawed American Bolsheviks succeed where the “socialists” failed and where the powerful labor bureau- crats do not even try? When we consider what has gone into it—the plans, the hopes, the end- less committee meetings, the volun- tary activities of thousands of over- worked comrades, the unpaid wages of the harried staff, unacknowledged sacrifices of thousands of unknown givers and doers in the ranks, the desperate campaigns and frantic ral- lying cries—-when we consider all this our DAILY WORKER ceases to be an “institution” and becomes a living thing, warm with human toil and sac- rifice and hope. Those who have mg@e and main- tained. The DAILY RKER so fa: JAMES P. CANNON. —the thousands in the ranks as well as the conspicuous few—have been too close to their achievement (and too busy) to fully estimate the mag- nitude of their achievements. It is only now when the American work- ers are standing before a new wave of desperate struggles and a growing radicalization, when the Communist Party faces greater opportunities and responsibilities than ever before, that a full consciousness of the signifi- vance of our daily paper begins to dawn on all of us. The enlarged meeting of our Cen- tral Executive Committee which has just finished its sessions has made a timely analysis of the big changes in the objective situation and has called the party to brace itself for the com- ing struggles. The party will do this. Tt will prove in the impending fights that the preparation work of the past 9 years has not been in vain. The habit of collective work, the disci- pline, the growth of common ideo- logy and the indefatigable propaganda which held the party together under the adverse objective conditions of the past years will come into play now with tenfold greater effort. The varty, following the line laid down hy the C. E. C., will grow in num- hers, strength and influence. The meeting of the C. E. C., which was almost a general party meeting, radi- ated this confidence. : But there is one indispensible pre- requisite. The DAILY WORKER is sain under attack and is in great danger of suspension. Can we enter the new period of struggle and test without our greatest weapon? Such prospect hangs over us like the hadow of calamity. It is necessam now without delay to relegate this »eralyzing fear to the background. Tt is the most burning task of all the varty leaders and of all active and ‘nfluential comrades in the districts ‘0 arouse and mobilize the party members and sympathizers down to the last one for the fight on this front, The DAILY WORKER front. The new offensive of the govern- ment ‘against our “Daily” will then become the signal for a counter-at- tack of such energy and proportions as to put the paper on a sounder basis for the big fights coming, and strengthen the fighting capacity of the militants all along the line. ‘i —JAMES P. CANNON. have to be formulated once again. The question of creating trade union sections will have to be thoroughly considered. This problem has al- ready been discussed with the Young Communist International. The Con- gress will have to pass its final ver- dict on the matter. Very much attention will also have to be paid to the matter of educa- tional work. Though this point is not one of the separate items on the agenda, a special commission will yet be appointed in the section for the discussion of this problem. The discussion in regard to the creation of a trade union cadre must be set on foot. In this respect little has as yet been done. While the bourgeoisie attempts to demoralize the children of the working class by means of its schools, and while the Social Demo- crats and reformists co-operate with the bourgoisie in feeding the children in their schools with reformist wis- dom, we have as yet done very little. The erection of schools in each individual country, the establishment of international schools, of finishing courses, the organization of corre- spondence courses, the provision of the requisite literature, and so on, are all points that will have to be dealt with, while at the same time our trade union press will have to be made the subject of detailed discus- sion. We already possess a very ex- tensive revolutionary trade union press, but it is in need of a thorough reform. And in this connection, as in all others, we shall have to appear at the Congress armed to the teeth. Among the questions to be discussed by the sections and commissions, there is that of emigration and im- migration, a question of which is of quite particular importance for a whole number of countries. It is of particular significance in the case of france, where there are millions of imported workers. True, on this sub- ject, too, a certain resolution is to nand, but we shall have to see how much has been done towards its reali- zation and if little has been done we must know the reason why. Besides all this, the coming Con- sress will have to deal with the work among the women and to ascertain on the strength of experience how much has been done in this respect. ‘t will also be of interest to find out iow large the proportion of women is n our minorities, in the leading or- sans of those minorities, in our inde- vendent unions and their leading or- vans. I am under the impression hat we are advancing far too slowly n this respect. The Congress will save to take the matter in hand most nergetically if we are to abolish con- vervatism and put an end to routine. (Tc Be Continued.) South Has Over Half U.S. Textile Spindles CHARLOTTE, N. C., Feb. 27—The southern states can now say for the first time that they have more than half of the ‘textile spindles in the United Stdtes. This is stated in a re- cent issue of the Southern Textile Bulletin. At the end of 1927 the southern states had 18,740,000 spindles, while northern textile states had only 17,754,000. More mills are constantly m to the south due to the closeness to the source of raw material, to the cheaper labor supply, and other at tractions such as water 0 J } ee