The Daily Worker Newspaper, April 3, 1928, Page 6

wy, semen: Page Six THE DAILY WORKER Published by the NATIONAL DAILY WORKER 5 Daily, Except Sunday $3 First Street, New York, N. Y. PUBLISHING ASS’N, Inc. Phone, Orchard 1680 Cable Address: “Dailwork” SUBSCRIPTION RATES By Mail (in New York only By Mail (outside of New York): $8.00 per year $4.50 six months $6.50 per year $3.50 six months 2.50 three months. $2.00 three months. Address and mail out ohecks to aie seats ROBERT MINOR ..WM. F. DUNNE at New York, N. ¥., 879. Assistant Editor Entered as second-class mail at the post-offi under the act of March 3 The Miners Can Beat Their Enemies The whole course of history for the entire labor movement of the United States will be affected by the national Save-the-Union Conference of the Mine Workers at Pittsburgh. But with the adjournment of the sessions of the Pittsburgh conference, the real fight for the saving of the Union will only begin. The conference is a mobilization, a clarification of pro- gram, a measuring of the forces willing to fight for the Union. The mobilization has successfully begun. The forces repre- sented by the 1,200 delegates constitute the conscious militant elements which could be reached prior to the conference and which were physically able to send representatives. This preliminary mobilization is overwhelmingly successful. The mobilization must now be carried on to a still more ntic scale. The full potential forces of labor in all coal fields must now be mustered while the real fight opens. The mine workers must also measure the forces of the enemy they have to contend with. The membership of the United Mine Workers’ Union will not lack enemies for its fight. Even the blindest worker sees at first glance that the coal operators must be fought and beaten. But the coal operators at most are only a small part of the enemy forces. Any strike could be won on the first day, if the forces of the State (the local and State government and the fed- eral government) were not at the disposal of the coal operators. The coal and iron police in Pennsylvania, and the police forces in! other states, have been the very front line of the coal operators in this fight. The workers must recognize that all of the legis- lative, judicial and police machinery of the state will be used against them, and that they must not for one instant relax their vigilance and their distrust of all government intervention of any sort in this struggle. The forces of government are always on the side of the em- ployers—but in this particular case the highest power of the cap- italist government is especially interested in smashing up all unonism in the coal industr; The. coal industry is logically an iy al part of the colossus of finance-capital, and as yet it is the weakest point in the monopoly structure. The coal industry not kept up with other basic industries in the process of 1opolization as desired by the biggest finance capitalists. The Melion interests, the Steel Trust, the Rockefeller interests, the biggest railroad combines, General Motors and the big banking concerns interlocked with these colossal industrial concerns, want to complete the structure of monopoly by a sweeping trustifica- tion of the remaining coal fields which will eliminate the small operators. But when we speak of the Mellon interests, the Steel Trust, the Rockefeller interests, the railroad combines, General Motors and the biggest banking concerns—these are the government. Coolidge is but a small servant of these interests, and Coolidge | will do their bidding in doing all in his power towards moving every possible government agency against the mine workers. (Still, the mine workers can and must defeat these enemies!) John L. Lewis, usurper of the presidency of the United Mine Workers’ Union, is closely identified with the same group of cap- ital which is especially interested in smashing the Union. That the reactionary officials of the John L. Lewis machine will use every power at their command to break the strike even at the cost of entire destruction of the Union, must be clearly un- derstood by every worker. Lewis is opposed to everything the mine workers stand for. Lewis is even now working with. the scab operators to help bring about the complete monopolization of coal production by a single trust. but the organization of coal mine capital against the mine workers, is Lewis’ object. Lewis’ program takes into consideration first of all the profits of the rich investors, he insists that the Union take rseponsibility for stockholders’ profits before thinking of wages or conditions. Instead of organizing the non-union fields, he “justifies” the reduction of wages in the Union fields to meet the competition of the non-union fields. (Still, the Mine Workers can and must defeat the Lewis machine.) There are many weak or insincere men in every mine field who are not yet quite certain whether they are on the side of the Mine Workers or on the side of their enemies. These will nov have to be fought by the mine workers as enemies, if they remain “uncertain.” “Uncertain” men are Lewis men. (But the mine workers can and will compel all uncertain men to get off the fence and declare themselves for or against the workers.) Against all these enemies the coal mine workers can success- fully carry out their struggle. But they can do it only if they regard the Pittsburgh confer- ence as the beginning of their fight. The miners can win if they fight into every mine field and into every unorganized territory. They can win only if they carry out their program in real action. This program must not be looked upon as a program of the | United Mine Workers’ Union alone. It is a program which affects the entire labor movement. The victory of the Miners will be the victory of the entire working class. The entire working class must help- The Mine Workers are at the beginning of their fight. The entire working class must be mobilized to help them win the great victory which is in sight. 1 RR AA, OMEN Not the organization of labor, | | | | | | | | | THE DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, TU | WEIGHED BY THE UNION AND FOUND WANTING DAY, APRIL 3, 1928 fISHWICK. Labor Defense Conference in San Francisco By WILLIAM SCHNEIDERMAN The California State Conference of the International Labor Defense was attended by 110 delegates represent- ing 65 trade unions and other work- ers organizations, including many I. L. D. branches. The conference was opened by Edgar Owens, state secre- tary. | On a huge poster in the hall was the “Roll-Call” of 10 class-war pris- oners in San Quentin and Folsom penitentiaries, headed by McNamara, Mooney and Billings and ending with the framed-up victims of the recent carpenters’ strike in San Francisco, Pesce and Madsen. Letters of greet- |ing were read at the conference from | McNamara, Corneilson and Pesce. | Cannon Reports. | James P. Cannon, national secre- tary of the I. L. D., reported for the national committee on the defense work being carried on thruout the country. Local reports for San Fran- cisco, Los Angeles, Oakland, San Jose, and other cities of the state were also given. Among the resolutions adopted at the conference, the outstanding one | dealt with the opening of a campaign |to free Mooney from jail. | A state committee of 20 was elected for that purpose, and furthermore to | start a campaign for the repeal of |the criminal syndicalism law, under | which over a 100 workers were jailed in California since its inception. | The state Conference of the I. L. D. was a success, and has done much to build a powerful labor defense movement in California on behalf of Aclass-war prisoners. eae 2 Lenin By GEORGE HALONEN. Lenin as a Marxian and revolution- ist, analyzed cooperation from the standpoint of the class struggle. He | understood that the cooperative move- | ment is a mass movement of the pro- | letariat and petty-bourgeoisie against capitalist expolitation, and therefore |a phase of the class struggle. Lenin j understood that because certain eco- nomic conditions create cooperation, it cannot be independent from these conditions, but must change accord- ing to the changing of conditions. Lenin did not ignore the cooperative question as a minor one. He consid- ered this question from the stand- point of how the cooperative move- ment is able to help the class strug- gle and upon the answer he based his tactics. Lenin fought bitterly against the Narodniki cooperative ideas. He point- ed out that the credit cooperatives would serve only the well-to-do pea- sants and the poorer peasants would be left outside. To help the develop- | ment of big estates is not the bu ness of revolutionists. The revolu- |tionists must help only that which revolution. Lenin pointed out how ridiculous it was to think that the small producers’ cooperatives (artels) would be the means for peaceful revo- lution into socialism without a revo- lution. tion could not be realized in the small villages, but instead it required the expropriation of the bloodsuckers who have monopolized the means of -pro- duetion, “and this requires fight, fight and fight and not meaningless, narrow-minded bourgeois morals.” Consumers Cooperation. The consumers cooperative move- ment Lenin regarded as very impor- tant for the revolutionary movement. One has only to recall the Copen- hagen Congress of the Socialist In- ternational (1910) to see Lenin’s posi- tion on this question. It is very sig- nificant that Lenin, the great revolu- tionist, considered the cooperative question so important, that he was one of the Russian delegates to the sub-commission of the congress which considered the cooperative question. The cooperative movement at that} time was already a big movement and throughout a reformist movement. Lenin, however, did not abandon this movement because it was reformist, | will strengthen the struggle against the exploiters. credit cooperatives as advanced by the! By MEILECH EPSTE! (Editor of the “Freihei The Freiheit has become the mass organ of the Jewish labor movement. Tens of thousands of workers look |up to the Freiheit as their leader. The Freiheit is a fighting paper |not only in moments when the strug- |gle is sharp as during the struggle |of the Joint Boards of the Cloakmak-| jers and Furriers. The Freiheit al- |ways remained a fighting paper. | The Freiheit’s Battles. | In the trade unions and in the | Workmen’s Circles, against Zionism |and against yellow socialism, for the Soviet Union and for Saeco and Van- | zetti, for a Labor Party and for the! |slogans of the Workers Party, for | Jewish mass colonization in the Sov- jiet Union and against the specula- ions of the “Bund’¥in Poland, for he miners and against Wall Street imperialism and against the Jewish | bourgeois philanthropists, the Frei- |heit not only wrote but fought for lor against in accordance with the |Communist line of policy. In its first years of existence the | Freiheit was only a good labor paper jon the fringe of Communism. Now it |finds itself in the midst of the Com- ;munist movement. A sharp and clear |cut line separates us from the petty- ‘bourgeois Jewish world. It is no | wonder that we now hear complaints | from our friendly writers and artists. Their dissatisfaction is‘ a result of our Communist character. It is | difficult for them to adopt them- | selves to the demands of a Communist | | | ; Mass paper. | It would be an exaggeration to ‘say that the Freiheit did not make mistakes in its early days. There were cases, and very important ones, | too, when the Freiheit was politically | weak. Some of the mistakes were un- avoidable. This was partly because it took a long time to build a staff for a Yiddish Communist paper. A member of the Freiheit staff must be a Communist writer. but on the contrary fought bitterly to | poses. The reformists understood bet- Narodniki will not help the cause of|ter than many revolutionists the im- can record fruitful Communist work. |The Freiheit brought the Communist ideal to thousands of workers. The Freiheit was instrumental in turn- ing their Communist sympathies into solid Communist convictions. The prestige of the Party and its ideo- logic leadership is recognized by left wing workers, and in this the Frei heit has a big share. The Freiheit is a Communist pa- per surrounded by many workers’ institutions. Almost all of them were built under the influence of the Frei- heit. Workers’ cooperatives, workers’ clubs, left and progressive Workmen’s Circle branches, singing societies, mandolin orchestras, educational in- jergans of the portance of controlling this big mass movement. No wonder that the co- operative question was one in which the reformists fought the Marxian revolutionists most bitterly. Lenin The socialization of produc-|not only debated with the opportun- ists in the sessions of the commission, but he also submitted his own theses. As these theses very clearly point out Lenin’s conception of cooperation, we publish them here: Theses Proposed by Lenin. “The congress declares: “1, That the proletarian consumers’ cooperatives improve the condition of the working class by reducing the ex- ploitation of all kinds of middlemen, by exerting an influence in the work- ing conditions of the workers engaged in the distribution of products, and by giving better conditions for its own employes. “On the other hand the congress declares: “1, That the betterment achieved thru the help of the coopératives is insignificant so long as the means of production are in the hands of that class whose overthrow is essential for the realization of socialism. “2. That the cooperatives are not immediate struggle against capitalism, and that they with The producers and; win it over for revolutionary pur-|other similar organizations of the jother classes, may develop the illusion that they (these organizations) are |men’s organizations, are woven jaround the Freiheit and the Jewish section of the Workers Party. It was not an accident that the Freiheit cel- ‘cbration just past was arranged by \these grganizations. The Freiheit is their paper and the success of the \affair is their concern. To the call of the Freiheit responded the best and the most active sections of the |Jewish working masses. From the |point of view of activity and influ- jence the value of a Freiheit reader jis worth ten times as much as that lof a Forward reader. This does not mean that the Freiheit has reached the maximum number of readers. Of course not. We must concentrate all means by which the social question can be solved without a class strug- gle and overthrow of the bourgeoisie. “The congress demands the workers of all countries: “a, To join as members in the proletarian cooperatives, help their development and thereby to defend the democratic character of these organ- izations. “b, Thru indefatigable socialist propaganda in the cooperatives to help the workers to better understand the idea of the class struggle and so- cialism. “ce, At the same time to endeavor to bring all the different forms of the labor movement to as complete unity as possible. “The congress also declares that the producers cooperatives benefit the fight of the working class only when they are an integral part of the con- sumers’ cooperatives.” Lenin’s theses were not adopted. However. the fighting attitude of Lenin and the other revolutionist members in the sub-commission com- pelled the reformists to present to the congress a resolution in which the main principles about cooperation as advocated by Lenin were adopted. Lenin considered the cooperative Stressed Cooperatives’ Importance Congress so important that he wrote in the Bolshevist newspaper |«Social Democrat” a special article, “The Cooperative Question in the In- ternational Socialist Congress at Co- penhagen.” In this he points out jthat in the main the cooperative reso- ‘lution adopted contains right inter- | pretations of the principles, but that it is not clear enough because it was a compromise resolution. The article concludes with: “The fight against the reformists is only postponed, and will inevitably be resumed.” hagen After the Revolution. The revolution changed the social {conditions in Russia. The exploiters were overthrown and workers cap- tured the political power. Therefore, the purpose of cooperation changed | accordingly. Lenin’s last article which |was published after his death was |about cooperation. In this he empha- | sized the importance of cooperation. Now the producers’ cooperatives and credit unions in villages are of great jimportance. The consumers’ coopera- \tives have also different purposes {than before the revolution. The class | struggle has attained its highest out- |come, the dictatorship of the prole- ‘tariat. Now is the time to build the jnew society. In this work the co- loperative organizations of the peas- |ants and workers must be brought question as discussed in the Copen- nearer to each other, our efforts to reach the lower layers of the Jewish working masses. The Freiheit is here to stay. This is clear even to our most bitter enemies. ‘The Communist and left wing movement built the Freiheit. A New Outlook. The situation in this respect has changed completely. The workers have renewed their belief in the pow- er of the Communist ideal and the achievements of the revolutionary movement. The Jewish labor move- |ment has a new outlook, its creative forces have found expression. In its first two years the Freiheit suffered from Communist inconsistency. The Jewish Federation of the, so- cialist party was inclined towards a THERE ARE By SCOTT NEARING, (Federated Press). Frank 0, Lowden, presidential as- |pirant, former governor of Illinois and chairman of the national crime | commission, publishes a report in which he scores the failure of Amer- ican courts to apprehend and punish crim’nals. In American. cities the crime rate is very high, while the rate of crime punishment. is low. “Robbery in Buffalo, for example. must. be a particularly lucrative calling. As arrests are made in only 3 per cent of the cases, the number who are finally convicted is neces- sarily so small that the luckless in- dividual who is occasionally caught and convicted must attribute his mis- fortune to an act of God, as he would in case of disastrous storm, ship- wreck or earthquake,” the report says. “One no longer wonders why. so many individuals turn to crime It would appear to be about the saf- est business in which one could en- BANDITS AND BANDITS Work Pays Less. Where burglary and highway rob- bery become relatively safe and lu- crative, men take them up as pro- fessions. No intelligent person would attempt to make his living as a gun- man, if he could make an equally good income with less. inconvenience jin some other calling. At a certain point in the rise of every great empire, banditry has paid better than other forms of business and better than work. From that time, banditry is practised by people \who have initiative, courage and a certain indifference to the opinions lof “respectable” society. Bandits and Soldiers. Business is business. There is no use, being sentimental about it, and certainly there is nothing that the present generation can do by way of moralizing so soon after the termina- tion of the world war and during a period when Nicaraguan patriots are being shot down as a matter of course by professional U. S. soldiers, Men struggle to live. According to Lester F. Ward’s Law of Parsimony they try to live as best they can and with the least expendi- ture of effort. If under given socia! conditions banditry offers a better living than mining or plowing or weaving or blacksmithing, men will practise banditry. With Open Eyes. And why not? Is banditry any more anti-social and parasitic than real estate operations or stock gambling? Or living on interest, rent and dividends? Is it any more ferocious or inhuman than war? We shake hands with brokers, bond- holders and brigadier generals. Why should we draw the line at bandits? They take up their profession with their eyes open. They run the risks incident to their calling. They make handsome returns on comparatively small expenditures of time and smal] outlays of capital. That is, from 2 commercial standpoint, they are highly successful. In the United States they have become so numer- ous and so prosperous that they may well demand a place in the oceup: tional census of 1930. Freiheit Has Become Mass Organ of the Jewish Working Class With all its defects the Freiheit stitutions for adults and children, wo- labor paper with Communist lean- ings. The Jewish section of the Com- munist Party was definitely strug- gling for a Communist “Freiheit.” This resulted in internal differences and struggles. A number of years passed before this process of crys- talization was completed. With the aid of the Central Executive Com- mittee of the Communist Party there was built a consistent unified Jew- ish section of the Workers (Com- munist) Party. This Jewish section proceeded to lay the foundation for the present “Freiheit.”, Results Justify Hardships. In the Jewish labor movement the need for a “Freiheit” was sorely felt. Every live, active force in the labor movement centers itself today around the Communists. The labor bureau- crats have openly allied themselves with the employing class. Every class-conscious worker understands that only over the heads and in spite of the labor lieutenants of capital- ism, the Wolls, the Greens, the Sig- mans, etc., can a militant labor move- ment be built in this country. The Freiheit record of struggle in the interests of the working class has endeared it to thousands of the best fighters in the Jewish labor movement. The road it has yet to travel is a hard one. But she is steeled to meet the struggles ahead. The results of the last six years of the activities of the Freiheit have more than justified the hardships and sacrifice made by thousands of work- ers to build the Freiheit, APOLOGY The article by Wm. Z. Foster, “Background of the Coal Miners’ Struggle,” in Monday’s issue of The DAILY WORKER, was_ reprinted from the April issue of “Labor Unity.” A line of type giving credit {' that publication was omitted by error. emma nipeisaee