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

THE DAILY WORKER FIGHTS TO ORGANIZE THE UNORGANIZED FOR THE 40-HOUR WEEK FOR A LABOR PARTY FOR A WORKERS’ AND FARMERS’ GOVERNMENT FINAL CITY EDITION orker 3, 1878, ily 225 NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 15, 1928 "SUBSCRIPTION RATES: im New York, by mail, $5.00 p Outside New York, by mail, $6.00 Published daily except day by The National Daily Worker Publishing Assoctati inc., 26-28 Union 8q., New York, N. ¥. Vol. V., No. 193. COMMUNIST PARTY URGES MINERS TO BUILD NEW UNI WORKERS PARTY GOES ON BALLOT INSOUTHDAKOTA AUGE FURRIERS TRACES LEWIS BETRAYALS. DEMONSTRATION 1 EADING TO ABANDONMENT UNION OFFICIALS © Ford’s Genius MOVE TO DITCH Makes Famine Gradual, Sure DETROIT, Mich., Aug. 14.—Fir- Ticket Now Qualified | in 11 States | Speed Campaign for Signatures a | Soitth Dakota has been added to the number of states on whose of- | . ficial ballots the Workers (Commu- nist) Party ticket will appear in the elections according to a telegram received today by the National Elec- | tion Campaign Committee of the Workers (Communist) Party, 43 | East 125th St., New York City, from Arthur Starr, special organ- | izer in the agricultural regions of | the Northwest. | The necessary mumber of peti- tions has been filed with the sec- retary of state for South Dakota, Starr reports. The working farm- ers of that state, who were fooled by Townley and his fake get-rich- quick oil schemes, are now begin- ning to realize that there is no short-cut to emancipation from the perennial troubles that afflict the farmers. On Ballot in 11 States. The Communist ticket is now on the ballot in 11 states, and organ- | izers are actively engaged making the necessary preparations to qual- ify it in the majority of the other states of the Union. In some states getting the party ticket on the bal- lot is little more than a formality, but in states like New York and Ohio it is a stupendous task to col- | lect the necessary number of sig- | natures. In addition to South Dakota the Communist ticket is on the ballot in the following states: Delaware, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, | West Virginia, Michigan, Arkansas, | Iowa, Kansas and New Mexico. The work of putting the Party ticket on the ballot in Massachu- setts, New Hampshire and Maine is somewhat handicapped because of the energy and finances thrown in- to the New Bedford and Fall River textile struggles. by the Party or- ganization in New England. Alex. Bail, district. organizer, reports, however, that the Communist ticket will be on the baliot in those three states. Progress is being made in collect- but the Party members must show more enthusiasm than hitherto dis- | Continued on Page Three DU PONT “GIVES” Pierre S. Du Pont, multi-million- | aire munitions king, it was learned yesterday, has punctuated his sup- | port of Tammany Al Smith by ay contribution of $50,000 to the gov-| ernor’s campaign fund, the largest contribution yet to be made to the democratic vote-buying chest. No limit will be set to the size) of contributions, John J. Raskob, manager of the Smith campaign and business associate of Du Pont, announced, Other contributors to the fund were John D. Ryan, president of the open-shop Anaconda Copper Company with $10,000, and John T. Smith, counsel for the General Motors Corporation with another $10,000. Bukharin Report in ‘Daily’ Saturday Saturday’s issue of the Daily Worker will contain the full stenographic transcript of the re- port made by Bukharin on behalf of the Executive Committee of the Communist International at the Sixth Congress of the Inter- national now in session at Mos- cow. . This is one of the most im- portant reports that has been made in many years—it is the official statement of the views of the general staff of the greatest revolutionary organization that ever existed. It analyzes and clar- ifies all of the big questions of world politics and class struggle which interest the workers every- where. In Saturday’s Daily Worker you will get it complete in the official text, as just received from Moscow. It will cover two full newspaper pages, and the Daily Worker will be enlarged to 8 pages, this Saturday, in order to publish it without omitting the customary material. ta Augusto C. G. Pinto, militant was arrested for the eleventh time when the police jailed two entire picket lines at the Whitman Mill recently, has been beaten up in the He is shown above with the bandages around “house of correctii his abdomen. It is a common occ: for police or detectives to jump off a chair onto a man’s stomach. New Bedford textile picket, who urence in American class warfare PINTO, PICKET LEADER, TELLS OF HIS TORTURE —e COMPANIES BAR _ RAILWAY STRIKE 70,000 Workers Taking Walkout Vote Until Sept. 2 ing workers whose pay envelopes average fifty cents-a day and -re-hiring them at is the latest wrinkle which Ford efficiency has intrcduced seven dollars and five dollars industry. The new device for driving the CHICAGO, Aug. 14.—Officials of| men 1o the wall has had its initial the Brotherhood of Railway Train-| tryout at the Ford battery depart- men are doing everything in their h he power to avert a walkout of 70,000; ™ent =e 3 workers emploved on roads opera-| merciless speed-up long enough to here survived ting west of Chicago, it was learned today. Even if the vote which is now being taken should favor a strike, a strike will not be called,| officials of the union declared. ene ee 70,000 Voting. | CLEVELAND, Aug. 14 (UP).— A strike vote affecting 70,000 rail- road employes and 98 per cent of, the railroads operating west of Chi-| cago, was being cast today by Western members of the Brother- hood of Railway Trainmen and the |order of Railway Conductors. A call for the vote was issued after attempts to arbitrate demands of the trainmen failed in Chicago last week. The men have asked in- creases of 10 per cent for yardmen and 18 per cent for trainmen and conductors. The railroaders, according to A. F. Whitney, president of the train- | men’s organization, agreed to ac- ‘cept an offer of seven and one-half |per cent, but the settlement was | conditioned upon two of the union groups abolishing certaining work- ing rules. | Abolition of the rules, Whitney By SYLVAN A. POLLACK. | Battered and bruised, A. C. Gon- |zales Pinto, militant picket leader |of the New Bedford textile strikers, |lies at the point of consumption. | Brutally beaten with blackjacks be- NEW LEWIS MOVE Reject Fagan Offer of Conference (Special to the Daily Worker.) PITTSBURGH, Aug. 14.—Open- ing signatures in New York State, | shop coal operators yesterday flatly rejected the offer made to them by Pat Fagan, in control of the reac- ionary Lewis machine in Local 5, |to meet in a conference to discuss wage reductions and what was taken | to mean the basis of a sort of com- | pany union which the Lewis-Fagan $50,000 TO SMITH machine was willing to set up in the district. * * (Special to the Daily Worker) PITTSBURGH, Aug 14.—The flat refusal of all the large coal op- erators to consider the conference invitation sent them by Pat Fagan, Continued on Page Three * cause he acted a8 an inspiration to the rest of the strikers, Pinto was savagely attacked in the House of Correction after he was arrested on August 3.. Since the strike started April 16 he has been jailed 12 times. When visited in his home in the | garret at 829 Water St., Pinto was | still suffering from the unhuman } mill owners’ agents. (of his experiences, Pinto told me | the following: |. “After I was arrested on Aug. 30, I was taken to the the House of | Correction. Placed in a cell with another striker I started to speak to bins in a whisper. The keepers told me to shut up and I did not say any ‘more. Handcuffed. “The next morning I was taken |to court to be arraigned on the ‘charges against me. I was hand- |euffed and compeligi to walk that | way through the streets to the court house. | treatment meted out to him by the| Asked to tell! declared, would have offset the in- |crease agreed upon and would have lowered the standards of pay in com- | parison with those received in other \ sections of the country. ; | The strike vote will be tallied here |and will be announced September 2 Whitney said. NEW UNION CALLS SLOAK WORKERS |Tear Up Boss Union’s Books, Is Slogan Climaxed by the slogan issued to the masses of workers in the cloak and dress manufacturing industry here to “tear up the books of the company union and join the cloak- makers’ union of and for the work- ers,” a call was issued yesterday by the National Organization Commit- fee! themselves safe, now suddenly find themselves at the employinent gate with no chance for a job pay-| ing more than five dollars. Many of the older men are being immediately replaced by others who are scarcely more than boys and ‘are better able to endure the speed- up and willing to take the decrease in pay. There is no question that the “vanishing pay-envelope” stunt, now that it has won its spurs in the battery department, will he gradu- ally extended to other departments of Ford industry. RED WEEK TO AID ELECTION DRIVE |Tag Days Planned for, Aug. 20-26 The week of August 20 to 26, set aside as Red Week, and culminat- ing with the Tag Days of Saturday | land Sunday, August 25 and 26, will | find ‘the “election campaign of the) Workers (Communist) Party on its financial feet. Under the slogan, “Strike a blow | for the Party of the Working Class” | HERE TONIGHT Workers to Build Real Union in Industry |To Hold Ballot Secret) into starvation in the automotive Rally in Cooper Union, Other Halls The two-year-old struggle of the fur workers against the union of- ficialdom which betrayed them and destroyed union conditions in the shops will culminate in the great mass meeting tonight at Cooper Union. At that time the workers will be asked to endorse the Inter- national United Front Committee and the campaign recently launched by them for a zeal national organ- ization of fur workers. The meet- ing will be held immediately after work. Great Enthusiasm. In gauging the sentiment of the furriers in the fur market, their de- termination to wipe out the decayed remnants of the right wing skele- ton of an organization and its rec- ord of reaction, is easily seen. Thou- sands are expected to come to the meeting, an announcement having ben made last night by the commit- tee in charge of arrangements that additional halls are being engaged. STATEMENT OF THE WORKERS (COMMUNIST Stressing mainly the importance of quitting work promptly at 5 o'clock, so as to come to the meet- ing on time, a statement, issued yes- terday by the International United Front of the Fur Workers’ Locals in the United States and Canada declares, in part: “At this monster Cooper Union |mass demonstration the representa- tives of nearly every !ocal in the United States and Canada, the rep- resentatives of the Joint Board, of the Progressive Bloc, and of the Greek for workers: will present the” plans for building one powerful in- ternational union. Build a New Union! “Down with the remnants of the OF JACKSONVILLE SCALE Central Committee Exposes Role Played by Socialists in Aiding Lewis Pledges Support to Coal Diggers in Building New Militant Union Condemning the betrayal of the mine workers by the 4 Lewis machine and declaring that this betrayal will go down in the annals of American labor history as one of the most dastardly acts of treachery ever inflicted upon the mass organizations of labor, the Workers (Commu- nist) Party yesterday issued a statement to the miners calling upon them to continue the struggle and give every efforts towards building the new the coal diggers in this historic union, and pledging its support to task. The statement traces the course of the Lewis treachery begin- ning with his first taking power over eight years ago and ending with his final sell-out in the recent abandonment of the Jackson- ville scale and the virtual advice condtions. to the miners to go back to seab The statement follows in full: The strike of the bituminous coal miners has collapsed, The collapse of the 15-months strike in which the rank and file miners and their families put up « he- roic struggle, undergoing tremen- dous hardships and making super- human sacrifices is due to the conscious treachery, incompetency and corrupt practices of John L. Lewis, the president of the United Mine Workers of America, his In- ternational Executive Board and district officials. Pen? ‘The betrayal of the miners who toil in the bowels of the earth, “NO BACKWARD ) PARTY. will go down in the annals of American labor history as one of | the most disastrous acts of treach- | ery ever inflicted upon a large mass organization of labor. By the act of John L. Lewis and his henchmen, the United Mine Work- ers has been wrecked and the rank and file miners who have seen their mighty organization ruinec must begin the arduous task of starting anew to build an organ- ization that will be able to fight | stubbornly to regain all that Ji | L-Lewts has “surrendered etna capitalists. STEP”—A LIE. and aptly illustrated by a picture |decayed and sinking scab agency | With oratorical bombast John , Mr. Lewis cloaks his outrageous | | of a worker eagerly rolling up his sleeves for a crack at an amply pro- portioned capitalist .whose head is a money-bag and whose nose is a dol- lar sign, the District Office of the | Workers (Communist) Party has | printed a colored leaflet to be dis- |tributed by the thousands among |New York workers this week, mo-| | Continued on Page Two MAYOR NOT IN TO “MILL DELEGATES tee which will be distributed among, Murdoch Free to Lead I objected to that kind of! | treatment and told the detective | | that the capitalist class has special laws for the workers. When I said the workers today by the thousands. |It declares in part: “Strike while the iron is hot. Let ll together begin the task of build- ing a union. Every worker in the | FLAY BRUTALITY OF BRONX POLICE. he scowled and that he was “Later I was brought back to the) | House of Correction and placed in; cell 30. This was about nine o’clock | this see angry. |industry must become a member of it was easy sll the union. Every shop in the trade . Again Monday | (Special to The DAILY WORKER) | NEW BEDFORD, Mass., Aug. 14. A committee of 30 striking mem- bers of the New Bedford ‘Textile Workers Unicn, chosen by the thou- | sands of strikers to lodge formal pro- must immediately put itself under test with Mayor Ashley against the the leadership of the National Or-/ vicious police attacks on picket lines ganization Committee, Let the em- | andthe barring of strikers’ children Members of the Retail Grocery, | Fruit and Dairy Clerks’ Union have | sent a letter to Police Commission- | They dragged ie thra the corridor| er Warren protesting against the nq took me down into the basement terrorism of the police attached to linto a special cell called the “hole.” | the 22nd precinct in attack strikers } The men did not speak and neither four men entered. It was so dark that I could not see their faces. to abolish the chaotic condition in the industry, brought about by the Sigman-Schlesinger clique. “A cloakmakers’ union as against a company union! This was the picketing the Bathgate Ave. stores, | qiq I. | slogan launched by the 15,000 cloak and dressmakers gathered at the at night. An hour later a flashlight) ployers feel the united strength of from the city’s public parks, ap- was turned on my darkend cell and+the cloakmakers who are fighting | Peared in the City Hal! yesterday and was told by an official that the mayor had left five minutes ago. | While permission to picket is the |ehief demand of the Textile Mill | Committees’ members, the union | will insist on the right to use the \ public parks as gathering places for the Bronx. | The union charges that the police | were sent out from the 22nd pre-/ men entered the hole. One, of them Stadium. cinct and without provocation beat | Brutally Beaten. | “About three hours later the fout| said: ‘Did you bring the blackjack ?’) h 3 in the B: | the strikers’ children. uge mass meeting in the Bronx) 4 huge wave of mass resentment adi swept over the city when the police 'No time must be lost. You must | arrested Elizabeth Donnelley, T. M. up and arrested many pickets who | and another answered: ‘Yes.’ Then| immediately join the ranks of the |C, children orgahizor, and several were peacefully walking up and) down before the non-union stores. | Paul Flakowitz, Morris Silver and | Abraham Schmetterling were a fined $2 as a result of the arrests; Boris Zibatoff was fined one dol-| they went into action. One man Continued on Page Three CZECH COMPOSER DEAD PRAGUE, Aug. 13.—Leo Janacek, famous Czecho-Slovakian composer, died here today. CHUKHNOVSKY READY Courageous Aviator MOSCOW, Aug. 14 (UP).—Early resumption of the search for Ronald Amundsen and members of the Jost dirigible Italia in the Arctic was an- nounced today by the Soviet Relief Committee. Repairs have been completed to the plane of the Russian aviator Chukhnovsky, which was wrecked on one of his earlier rescue flights and towed back to safety by the icebreaker Krassin. to Leave on Krassin The Krassin was instructed to rush repairs to her prow, damaged recently in the ice, and to pick up Chukhnovsky. The ship then will proceed to search for Amundsen and the party of Renato Alessan- drini; lost when the Italia crashed. . +* * The “Krassin” succeeded in sav- ing most of the lost crew after all the other rescue parties failed, and are now the only ones left in the builders, Your decisive action has children when they tried to sing thrown the camp of betrayers into strike songs in the park last week. a state of paralyzed fear. The con-/ After making the arrests, the po-| vulsive hysterics of the advertising |lice drove out the hundreds of chil- | \that calls itself the International |Joint Council. It is time to build one international union capable of | defending and safeguarding the | workers’ job, the workers’ union | |ronditions and the workers’ rights and freedom. ! “Wednesday is the day of the} first united demonstration of fur- riers under the auspices of the In-| ternational United Front Commit- tee. “Unite your ranks. On to Cooper Union mass meeting. Let no fur-| rier stay away. Respond to the call of your union. A second hall is provided for if necessary. Come on time. “One union is being built. One union for the workers. This is the last death blow to the company union. The greater the response, the sooner the victory. “On to the historic furrier’ dem- onstration. No overtime on Wed- nesday evening. In thousands, on to the demonstration on Wednesday, 6 o'clock, at Cooper Union.” «A utomehile—Symbol of Modern Slavery” The Daily Worker will begin tomorrow a series of unusual ar- ticles on the automobile industry by Ben Lifschit. These articles deal with the development of one of the most irrportant industries in the medern economic world. They picture the enormous conse- quences of the unprecedented growth, the competition and con- flict of large business interests, the enslavement of the workers, the developments which are mak- ing this industry one of the forces driving to imperialist war. L. Lewis, assuming a pose of fighting opposition to the coal op- erators, declared at the begin- ning of the strike to the thou- sands of miners who were pre- pared to fight to the last ditch, that the United Mine Workers of America would never take a back- ward step, that the Jacksonville scale would be maintained. Now that the Jacksonville scale has been abandoned and the bitu- minous miners are facing wage cuts of from $1.50 to $3 a day, LEWIS PLEADS GUILTY. Franker | These are fine words. words were never uttered by a traitor to the working class. By these words, John L. Lewis pleads guilty to selling out the miners. To interpret the above so that every miner who toils in the hot bowels of the earth digging coal, can understand, Lewis admits that he agreed to abandon the miners’ wage of $7.50 per day as a gigantic contribution to the | coal operators. Lewis and his officials, who squandered millions of the miners’ | money during the strike, drawing big salaries, have refused con- act of treachery in the follcwing words, according to the editorial in John L. Lewis’ official joarnal, | the United Mine Workers’ Jours _ | nal: “They have modified their wage policy as their gigantic contribu. tion towards the stabilization of the coal industry. By this saeri- fice they again prove their loy= alty to the public welfare. Ni | let the coal operators and the lic do as much as the miners ha done.” a sistently to give adequ Nevertheless, they fou ficulty in making, at # | of the miners and a contribution to towards the estal industry. A What does this — | mean to the miners?” | destruction of their | means wage cuts, it me ening competition betw | union and non-union fields, | ther reduction in wages, gre: speeding up of the miners, lo hours, also, and the driving o of the coal mines of over one quarter of a million miners. “LOYALTY”—TO WHOM? This was no willing sacrifice | on the part of the miners. These ’ Read this series*of articles on | agent, Schlesinger, in the employ- | ers’ yellow sheet, the ‘Forward; | proclaims to the world their hope-_ less fear of facing the new ies ment. | “Safeguard the foundations of | your union! All must join. All) must help build the organization! | “Let every man or woman en- gaged in manufacturing cloaks and | dresses join our union. Struggle for human working conditions in the factories. “Tear up the books of the com- pany union! Drive their agents out of your shops! Bring shop complains to your own union, 16 W. 21st St. Enroll yourselves as mem- bers of the union. Take out mem- bership books at $3.35, Pay your dues regularly. Help in everything that leads to the erection of a| strong, clean and united Cloakmak- struggle in the Arctic. ers’ Union of and for the workers.” | one of the most important issues before the workers—‘Automo- bile, Symbol of Modern Slavery.” dren gathered there. The committee visiting the mayor Continued on Page Five SOUTHERN MILL REVOLT 150 Unorganized Girls Strike for Pay PETERSBURG, Va. Aug. 14.—j|the regular wage. The workers ac-| One hundred and fifty workers, cepted this cut at the time, being most of them girls, walked out on | unorganized, on the promise that as strike from the Twentieth Century | soon as business goes back to nor- Rayon Textile Company plant here|mal, their wages should be in- demanding higher wages. The strike | creased until it was on a par with) was spontaneous, the workers in the| their regular pay. | plant being unorganized. Now the dull season is complete- The wages of the workers were|ly over, and the firm is doing a greatly slashed by the company|tremendous amount of business. some time ago, when the bosses But it refuses to raise the wages complained that the dull season|of the workers again, as it stipu- made it impossible for them to pay lated when the reduction was made. | conditions of savage exploitation, jungle conditions of competition between the miners, low wages, part-time employment, and _per- manent unemployment for over one-quarter of a million miners, are not the result of conscious public sacrifice on the part of the miners, but the logical out- come of treacherous, corrupt re- actionary and criminal policies of John L. Lewis. The stabilization of the indus- try that will result will be hailed | with glee by the operators who are impatiently waiting to turn the misfortunes of the miners in- to additional fabulous profits, while for the miners it wili mean a nightmare of capitalist fright- fulness, hunger, increased ex- ploitation, industrial despotism, and abject poverty and degreda- tion of the one-quarter of a mil- lion miners and their families who will be driven from the in- dustry. Mr. Lewis states that by this sacrifice they (the miners) again prove their loyalty to the public welfare. Mr. Lewis forgets about the welfare of the miners in his loyalty and subserviency to the public welfare of the capitalists. Mr. Lewis has made the “su- preme sacrifice’ of leading the miners to defeat and the destruc- | tion of their organization in or- der that the capitalists could overcome the crisis in the coal | industry at the expense of the | miners, REFUSED TO ORGANIZE MINERS. The loss of the strike is the climax of the policies pursued by Lewis. unorganized resulted in the pro- duction from the unorganized fields outstripping the fields, At the outbreak of the strike, John L. Lewis resisted, op- posed and refused to support any move for the organization of the unorganized. For years John L. Lewis has been responsible for a fascist pol- icy of terrorism against the rank and file. Whole locals were ex- 2 Failure to organize the | union | | pelled from the organization and | the best, the most militant and | class-censcious fighters of the | miners driven out of the union. Gangsterism dominated the union | with the chief gang-leader being John L. Lewis. Every expression | of opposition was shut up by the use of the black-jack, gun and — | machine-gun, Militant leaders of | the miners were assassinat 44 | This is how Lewis endeavored Icdll_ whatever militancy fested itself in the organizati The fighting calibre of the