The Daily Worker Newspaper, April 27, 1928, Page 6

ices aac ottarsta a TENE THE DAILY WORKER Published by the NATIONAL DAILY WORKER PUBLISHING ASS’N, Iné. Daily, Except Sunday $3 First Street, New York, N. Y. Sable Address SUBSCRIPTION R (in New York only) year $4.50 si work” Mail per By £3.0¢ 1 (outside of New York): year 0 $2.00 th pe and oR, 33 First Street, New York, N. Y. ..ROBERT MINOR | ..WM. F. DUNNE red as second-clasa mail at the post-office at New York, N, ¥. the act of March 3, 1879. A Communist Nominating Convention “The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of existing social conditions. Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win. Workers of all Jands, unite!”—Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto. under Nine years ago the struggle for the revolutionary proletar- ian character of the socialist party of the United States reached the point of ruthless expulsion of the majority of the working class membership by the Hillquit-Berger bureaucracy. In September, 1919, the majority of the socialist party’s former membership founded the two revolutionary parties which later merged into the Communist Party of America and consti- tuted the organized Communist movement. Most of the prole- tarian elements and all of the revolutionary traditions of the socialist movement were incorporated in it. The Communist Party was at.its beginning as much an open party as the socialist party had been, It was taken as a matter of course that this revolutionary political party should be, for the entire working class, more open to the daylight than any other party. But the war-mad.* ruling class could not look with equa- nimity upon a revolutionary political party of the working class in the United States. The government put through one of the most sweeping and ruthless political mass arrests that had ever been known in the United States, thinking thereby to drive the Communist Party out of existence. But Communist Parties don’t drive out of existence. Our Communist Party safeguarded its organization and the stronger elements of its membership by or- ganizing its entire framework upon an operating basis which the police could not destroy. Certainly, for a revolutionary political party it is necessary to be able to do,as this Party did, to function with or without the permission of ‘the ruling class. Memory is short. Upon the fact of the brief and enforced | “underground” existence through which the Communist Party passed from 1920 to 1923, the capitalist press and the yellow social- vaitors falsified all of the history of the labor movement and 1\e persistently characterized the Communist Party as a body g in the dark with purposes kept secret from the masses. ut Communist Parties—-the great International Communist rty—has no secrets from the millions of toilers, The Communist Party is today becoming thoroughly known to the advanced sections of the working class, such as the coal miners, the textile workers and the needle workers, as the foremost leader of all the struggles of the v.% ‘iz. workers that are now going on or that have occurred during the past several years. The announcement yesterday that the Workers (Communist) Party will hold a great national convention in New York City on May 25, is significant of its present role in the struggle of the masses in this country. The Communist Party engages in the political struggle, including participation in the elections. The big national nominating convention dramatizes this fact. The Communist Party is radically different, however, in its manner and purpose of participating in the elections of capitalist “democracy.” For the democratic, the republican and the social- ist parties, which defend and wish to preserve the government of the capitalist class, the elections furnish a stage upon which they can conduct a masked parade and from which they preserve and build up among the masses illusions of “democracy” for all, where only dictatorship by the capitalist class really exists. The Com- Phone, Orchard 1680 | mail out checks to | THE DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, FRIDAY, APRIL 27, 1928 “GENTLEMEN, YOU ARE INVESTIGATED” i but the “investigation” Mine Wome By REBECCA GRECAT. One of the most outstanding fea- tures in the struggle in the bitumin- ous coal fields of Western Pennsyl- vania, Ohio and Illinois, is the rising militancy and rapidly spreading or- ganization of the wives and daugh- ters of the miners throughout the re- gion. The women in the coal mining camps have always enjoyed a well- earned reputation for their activity and fighting spirit in time of strikes. Never before, however, have they thrown themselves with such vigor into the struggle. They have recog- nized that the present fight, in its sharpness and viciousness, in the ob- vious determination of the coal oper- ators to smash the mine workers’ union, in the openly hostile combina- tion of political and industrial forces against them, menaces their homes and threatens their very existence as no previous strike ever has done. ‘making a grand. flourish of mobiliz- $34,000,000 to $59,000,000 to $80,000,- ing all forces for the strike, organ- n Org is with a whitewash hose. fighters. In eastern Ohio, in western Pennsylvania, they had shown their courage, joining with the miners in ized Ladies’ Auxiliaries in various |mass picketing, braving coal and iron sections of the district, especially in |police and state troopers, defying the Allegheny Valley, to raise money |threats of arrest. Amid high en- for food and clothing and help in the |thusiasm, therefore, the conference distribution of relief. As the strug- adopted a resolution calling upon the gle developed, however, the women |wives and daughters of the miners to pecans more militant, and demanded |organize their forces and stand shoul- \mass picketing. Beeoming convinced |der to shoulder with their men in the ithat the disastrous policies of the fight to win the strike and save the Lewis administration were bringing junion, thus taking one of the most ‘starvation to their doors and destroy- jimportant steps to unite all the forces jing the chance for decent home con- lof the miners for the sharp struggle \ditions for themselves and their chil- |which now lies ahead. dren, they endorsed the progressive| Since the slogan was issued by the |movement in the union, and began |April 1st conference to organize the and iron police, as in Meadowlands, are not rare. Not even brutal at- tacks—in Bentleyville, a 62-year-old miner’s wife had her skull cracked with: a tear gas bomb, necessitating six _stitches—can the women be driv- en Off the picket line, where their work is extremely effective. An outstanding instance of-militant action was given in Lansing and St. Clairsville, Ohio, Over 200 women from Lansing joined a march on the Belmont County jail in St. Clairsville, where five leaders of the Save the Union Committee, arrested on a pick- et demonstration in Lansing, were lodged. When they arrived in town, 44 women were arrested and thrown {to raise progressive slogans in the women in the mining camps, there jin jail, but the other women have not ‘auxiliaries. jhas been a rapid increase in the for- | The union officials then tried to |mation of progressive women’s aux- ‘crush these newly developed organ- jiliaries, and.a more active participa- izations. They threatened to expel jtion in direct strike action. |from the auxiliaries and cut off from| In Ilfnois, for the first time since relief all progressive women. They the strike began, auxiliaries are be- idemanded that the auxiliaries refuse ing formed under progressive leader- ‘ceased their picketing. Such is the spirit dominating the wives and moth- jall the bitter hardships of the coal strike. The sharp attacks now being made \by the reactionary strikebreaking of- ‘ers who have unflinchingly endured | Unequalled Sacrifices, In the long year of conflict which came to a close April 1st, the wives lrelief from ‘the Pennsylvania and |Ohio Miners’ Relief Committee. With- in. the auxiliaries themselves, the ship in Staunton, Belleville, and other centers. Indiana progressives have organized their women. In western \ficials of the union against the min- jers who attended the National Save |the Miners’ Union Conference and en- and mothers in the soft coal fields suffered more intensely than in any previous struggle. Evictions, club- bings, terrorization by coal and iron munist Party comes upon this stage in sharp contrast to the| parties of capitalism. The Communist Party declares openly to| the working class and exploited farmers that democracy for these | masses “cAn be attained only by the forcible overthrow of existing | social conditions.” | The contrast between the Communist Party and the socialist party is of particular significance because the latter maintains | a thin pretense that it also represents the working class. While| the thin-blooded preacher who is the nominee for the presidency for the socialist party pipes his pious dread of revolution, the call to the revolutionary path towards liberation is sounded boldly by | *the Communists and’their candidates who will in all probability be William Z. Foster and Ben Gitlow. While the socialist party works with the reactionary bureaucracy to break strikes, the Workers (Communist) Party stands on the picket line. The Communist Party couples its election with the grim real- ities of the struggle of the workers. This election of 1928 is for the Workers (Communist) Party an occasion to redouble its ener- | gies in fighting on the front line with the coal miners, with the textile workers and with the needle trades workers and all workers now engaged in the day-to-day struggle for the right to organize and for the protection of their standards of living. For the 1928 election campaign, the socialist party removes all reference to the class struggle from its constitution. For the me campaign the Workers (Communist) Party issues the call _ vedoubling the fight on the basis of the class struggle of the « svkers for zinal freedom and for their day-to-day demands. | The Communist Party points out the fraudulent character of he capitalist elections, and calls upon the workers to politicalize their struggle which must be developed toward a conscious pro- ‘gram for the taking of political power by the working class in ailiance with the working farmers. The national nominating convention of the Workers (Com- munist) Party will be an event of immense importance to the police and state troopers, hunger and cold—these have been their bitter ex- periences. As a result, thousands of | them have been roused to battle as never before, and have taken a keen- er and more militant interest in the strike and in the union. Moreover, with their increased ac- tivity has come also a better under- standing of the issueg involved in the strike, and a definite alignment with the progressive elements in the union. Today, the active women in the min- ing camps support the attack against the Lewis machine, and are organiz- ing and fighting under the leadership of the Save the Union Committee, Women in Van of Militants. The organization of the women in the soft coal fields began shortly after the lockout on April Ist, 1927. The reactionary officials of the union in District 5, western Pennsylvania, Educational Work in the U.S. S. R. Trade Unions (Continued). (EDITOR’S NOTE: The following is taken from Robert W. Dunn's new book, “Soviet Trade Unions,” pub- lished by the Vanguard Press, New York.) Lae aby kates! For the, more interested workers, training schools are used to teach unionism. Schools for “trade union literacy” have been opened in many factories. Elementary schools of this kind have courses lasting four or five months, with classes once or twice a week, More advaneed courses are given in classes attended by picked “activists” who spend from three workers and farmers. It must be made a vehicle of launching an election campaign which will stir the working class of America to a new and bigger consc:ousness of its historical role. The keynote of the convention will be class struggle. months to two years in schools de- vised to produce efficient union leaders. The railroad men, the coal miners and the textile workers have schools of this kind in operation, ‘wives of the reactionaries started a campaign against the “Hunkies,” as | Pennsylvania, new auxiliaries are be- g established in camps that. had dorse its program, especially in Dis- jtrict 5, have also been directed \they call the foreign-born women, and never dreamed of any kind of wom- against the progressive women, but to grant any rights to the women who jopposed them. Women at Save the Unien Meet. {conference in Pittsburgh of represen- tatives from all centers of the district for the purpose of organizing a Mine Women’s Progressive. Committee. | delegation of miners’ wives was elect- led to attend the National Save the Miners’ Union Conference on April 1st, and urge that immediate steps be taken to rally the women in. the mining camps behind the Save the Union Committee. Their action was successful. The miners who came to the conference understood that the women in the mining camps are a vital factor in the present strike and must be or- ganized. They had already learned that the women in the coal fields are Al his, Ontario, Charleroi. ‘These organ- izations are being formed by miners’ lwives themselves, who have develop- The answer of the women of Dis- ted leadership in the struggle, and are |relief cut off. trict 5 to these threats was to call ajgoing from eamp to camp~to help ‘barracks are threatened. How the |build up progressive women’s groups. ; In Heat of Struggle. | |. With the intensification of the| struggle since April 1st, and espe¢ial-| ly since the strike call of April 16th | issued by the Save the Union Com-} mittee, miners’ wives and daughters} in western Pennsylvania are taking the lead in mass picketing, pulling out scabs, shutting down mines. Noth- ing terrifies them. In Library,’ in Meadowlands, in Fredericktown and other mining towns, coal and iron po- lice and state troopers use tear gas bombs daily to disperse them and make new arrests constantly—but to wherever they held the offices refused ,en’s. organizations—as in Van Voor- have not intimidated them. Already imany have had their supply of milk |for their babies taken away. Whole local unions have had their district Evictions from the {women feel, however, can be seen by the happenings in Avella, Pa., where the wives and daughters of the min- ers whose relief had been cut off since April 1st, marched upon the and-drove him out of town. To counteract the attacks of the re- actionaries,.the progressive women of District. 5 called a second conference in Pittsburgh, The decision was unanimous to fight against attempts to cut-off district relief, to support the Pennsylvania-Ohio Miners” Re- lief’ Committee, now the National Miners’ Relief Committee, to’ organ- no avail. Cases of women pickets beating up state troopers and coal ize marches upon the office of the local Lewis organizer in those centers under the direction of the national, are on the way to becoming union|-year “eourse for advanced — union union. There are also special schools| leaders. A “graduate” school for three| workers from the provinces. in the provinces and the counties for| hundred workers was opened in Mos-| funds for this school are given partly |. cow in the} fall of 1927 with a two members of particular unions whi wine Photo shows the State University in Moscow, for the workers and pei right are two peasant women, typical students of the universities in the, The by the C, C. T. U. and partly by the Lewis-Fagan organizer, beat him up, Mooney, Bonita Cases in May Labor Defender’ fonder,” organ of International La- ber Defender, is just off the press. “Tom Mooney’s Appeal to Labor,” an inter y by James P. Cannon, na- tional ry of the I. L. D., is the leading art } “The Conviction of Sam Bonita” ky | Rose Karsner, is an able analysis of | the class character of the frame-up | against one of the leaders of the | | anthracite miners. The article is il- | lustrated by photographs of the im- | pressive funeral of Alex Campbell, | who toyether with Fete Reilly were | murdered with machine-guns by hired ' assassins of the corrupt Cappelini forces. Over 20,000 workers gathered ! to honor their dead leaders at the funeral in Pittston. T. J. O'Flaherty writes too briefly on the great Save the Union Confer- ence; John Arthur Wilkinson de- | scribes the whiplash of unemployment | on the American workers. Hsu Pei | Tsin writes on “After the Canton Up- | rising.” Michael Gold contributes an elo- | quent May Day greeting, inset in! dramatic photographs of great Amer- ican workingclass demonstrations. “Bielsk Nights,” a story of the ter- rors of Polish fascism by David Bog- en, is a searing description of the tortures inflicted on militant workers ahder the bloody Pilsudski regime. Robert W. Dunn writes on the “who’s who and what’s what” of the | attack on The DAILY WORKER. It is a marvelously effective condensa- tion of the activities of the profes- sional patriots and their attempts to wreck our paper. —Ss. G ec Crew Barely Escapes When Dredge Sinks LONG BRANCH, N. J., April 26.— The crew of the-dredge Progress bare- ly escaped death yesterday when the dredge sank in a heavy sea near here, while in tow from the Delaware break- water to New York. Preparations are being made to refloat the dredge, which is in shallow water. anize Behind Militants where relief has been. withdrawn, to continue mass picketing and stand solidly behind the Save the Union Committee. The movement to organize the women in the mining camps has spread to the non-union fields of western Pennsylvania, where thous- ands of miners struck April 16 ih response to a call of the Save-the- Union Committee. In Millsboro, Fay~- ette County, in Yukon and White Val- ley, Westmoreland County, and cther strike centers, striking miners’ wives join in mass picketing. A women’s strike auxiliary of more than: 190 members has been formed in Export, and other auxiliaries are being planned. ; Thus the activity of the miners’ wives and daughters has preven how powerful a factor the women in the mining camps can become when or- ganized. The progressive miners nov’ understand that the fight against the Lewis machine, to organize the jun- organized miners, restore the union and union conditions in the industry, must have the cooperation of their women-folk.. And the women have demonstrated their readiness to be organized and drawn into the strug gle to hasten victory for the prog- recsive forces and the union, The women in the mining camps have dencnstzated before all of Amer- ican labor that women can be om ganized, that they can fight, that they can be turned into a dynamic foree to build a strong and militant Inhor movement in this country. The woren in the Passaic textile strike, the women in the garment industry, have many times in the past shown how powerful a factor ‘they are in struggles and in organization. Now the women in the soft coal fields have proven their great capacity not ‘merely, for enduring hardships, but for en- gaging in battle, and participating in strike action. Their work must prove an inspiration not only to the miners, must give a new impetus to the move- ment to organize the working wom- en in America. separate national unions that will benefit by the training. _ The technical education of workeva is still more important. We hava dealt with it in our chapter on the production work of the unions. In every factory we find young part- time workers, mainly between the ages of sixteen and eighteen, attend- ing technical schools. In addition to these schools, there are also technical schools for special industries, such as the textile school in Moscow which serves all the factories in a large cotton trust. These schools are ta train young workers to become spe~ cialists and engineers, Support for all these educational “jactivities, as we have mentioned, comes from a number of sources, First, from the industry itself. (To be continued) sue of “The Labor De- but to the entire labor movement, and ~ € ) { \ arene