The Daily Worker Newspaper, November 12, 1928, Page 6

i policies of f H t : minedly and immediately the slogan of the "ment of the Union of South Africa, came out He said: kA Mr. Tielman Roos is the embodiment. of 100 per cent jingoism, and he is right when he declares that Communism endangers the _ “white standard” ~ Africa. Communism means the liberation of 4 Wage Six Central Organ of the Workers (Communist) Party Published by National Daily Wor Ass’n., Inc., Daily, Except Union Square, New York, Stuyvesant 1696-7-8, Cabl ROBERT MINOR WM. F. DUNNE Editor . Assistant Editor SUBSCRIPTION RATES: By Mail (in New York only): $4.50 six mos. $2.50 three mos. By Mail (outside of New York): $6ayear $3.50 six mos, $2.00 three mos. Address and mail out checks to The Daily Worker, 26-28 Union Square, New York, N. Y. $8 a year The Communists Are for a Black Republic! The whole capitalist press is up in the air. London exposures. Johannesburg expos- ures... Riga exposures... follow each other with dramatic swiftness. The charge is stu- } pendous: | “Moscow wants to create an independent Negro republic in South Africa.” The “charge” is well-founded. We plead guilty. The Communists do want a native Negro republic in South Africa! The slogan to establish a native republic in South Africa is not the invention of the Riga lie-dispens- ers; it is not the product of the lie-factories of the capitalist press in London or Johan- nesburg. The Sixth World Congress of the Commu- nist International took up the Negro ques- tion in all its ramifications. The delibera- tions of the Congress analyzed the situation of the Negroes in the United States of Amer- ica, in the South African Union, in the Negro States of Liberia, Haiti, Santo Domingo, and in the Negro colonies of Central Africa. The Communist International considers the prob- lems of the oppressed Negro race as one of the most significant questions confronting the Communists. The thesis of the Sixth World Congress of the Communist International on the colonial question describes in the following way the conditions of the Negro masses in South Africa: a “In the Union of South Africa the Negro masses—who constitute the majority of the population, but whose land is expropriated by the white colonists and the government and who are deprived of their political rights and of the right to freedom of migration—are subjected to the most inhuman forms of race and class oppression and suffer at one and the same time from precapitalist and Capitalist modes of exploitation and oppression.” The World Congress, of course, did not con- fine itself to an analysis of the situation of the Negro masses, but gave clear-cut instruc- tions to the South African Communists how | to fight for the oppressed Negroes. The first instruction is for an uncompromising struggle for full equality for the Negroes: “The Communist Party, which has already achieved considerable success among the Negro proletariat, must continue, even more ener- getically, the struggle for complete equality for the Negroes, for the abclition of all special measures and laws directed against the Negroes, and for the confiscation of the land of the plantation-owners.” The second instruction given by the World Congress of the Communist International to our South African comrades is for a deter- mined fight for the establishment of an in- dependent Negro republic in Soitth Africa: “The Party should determinedly and imme- “diately put forward the slogan of the creation o\an independent native republic, at the same time: safeguarding the rights of the white minority, and should actually fight for its establishment.” No, it is not the product of the Riga lie- factory but the product of the Leninist the Communist International, when the World Congress instructs the.South African Communists to put forward deter- establishment of an independent Negro re- public. The overwhelming majority of the population of the South African Union con- sists of Negroes. There is a thin layer of white capitalists who exploit and oppress the Negro masses. There is a stratum of white labor aristocracy which shares the profits of exploitation wrung from the Negro toiling masses by their white masters. The slogan of establishment of an inde- pendent Negro republic in South Africa may sound unbelievable to the horror-stricken white capitalists, but certainly it is some- thing natural and self-evident for revolution- ary Marxians who accept the fundamental teachings of Lenin about the relations be- tween white imperialism and the colonial peoples. Mr. Tielman Roos, Minister in the Govern- with a vicious attack against the Commu- nists, declaring that in the next election the ‘issue will be nationalism vs. Communism. “We shall fight to the utmost any attempt to develop natives along lines which will en- danger the white standard of the Union.” of the Union of South the Negro masses of South Africa, means the establishment of a “black standard,” means the end of white exploitation and oppression. But to make the panic of the white capital- ists and plantation-owners complete, we can furnish the additional information that the Communist International put forward the of an st Negro republic not spo! | of age. only for South Africa but for the Solid South of the United States of America as well. The same colonial thesis of the Sixth World Congress of the Communist Interna- tional reads: “In those regions in the South where the Negroes live in compact masses, it is necessary to proclaim the slogan of self-determination for the Negroes. A radical reorganization of the agrarian structure of the Southern States is one of the basic tasks of the revolu- tion. The Negro Communists should make clear to the Negro workers and farmers that only their close union with the white prole- tariat and their common struggle against the American bourgeoisie can gain them freedom from barbaric exploitation, that only a vic- torious proletarian revolution can fully and definitely solve the agrarian and national questions of southern United States in the interests of the oppressed masses of the Negro population of the country.” The Communist International is for the slogan of national self-determination for the Negroes in the South, where the Negro toilers live in compact masses, exploited and oppressed by the white plantation-owners and capitalists. The Workers (Communist) Party of Amer- ica in the election campaign just past came out openly and unreservedly for the right of national self-determination for the Negroes. National self-determination means the right to establish their own Negro State, if they choose to do so. The Communist Party de- clares that it respects the decision of the Negro masses about the form of realization of this self-determination. At the same time it is the duty of the Negro comrades to em- phasize the solidarity of the Negro and white workers and to make clear to the Negro masses that only a victorious proletarian revolution can fully and definitely solve the NTS A JOB? EW YORK, MONDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1928 By Fred Ellis The Real Situation in Russia | By ALBERT RHYS WILLIAMS. 'UNDAMENTAL to any under- standing of the real situation in Russia is the fact that Communist |Party policies are not determined by a few score leaders, but by the hun- |dreds of thousands of the members; national question in the Solid South in favor | that the course of the revolution is | of the oppressed Negro masses. It would be a dangerous illusion to think that the realization of national self-deter- mination for the Negroes can be secured un- der the present relations of power under cap- italism. National self-determination for the Negro race can be realized only in the course of the proletarian revolution. It would be a major mistake to believe that in imperialist America—in the'country of the most power- ful, most centralized and concentrated in- dustries—there can be any other revolution but a proletarian revolution. The Communist Party is the advocate of full racial, social and political equality for the Negro race, and pledges itself to fight for the right of national! self-determination for the Negroes in the South. But the Negro masses must understand that their racial and economic liberation can be achieved only in alliance with the working class—whites and blacks alike—and as a product of the vic- torious proletarian upheaval. |Trying to Resurrect a Dead Horse (Bertram Wolfe) During my recent stay in Denver, Colorado, I had an opportunity to make a first-hand study of the socialist party of Colorado. The words with which I caption this article do not originate with me, but come from the lips of precisely one-third of the membership of the Colorado socialist party and were pronounced at a public “mass” meeting held under | the auspices of that organization. The socialist party of Colorado has a member- ship of three; the youngest of whomis over 60 years The three members are: (1) Channing Sweet, millionaire, father of democratic ex-governor Sweet of Colorado, who, on account of his enormous wealth feels moved to donate exactly $10 a year to the defunct party of which he is a member; (2) George Faulkner, ex-Communist, who left the Work- ers Party in 1924 because he was for La Follette and the Workers Party refused to support La Fol- every member of the socialist party of Colorado, the initials of one of the three has slipped my mind). The eldest of the three is Channing Sweet, whose age must be around 80, and the youngest is Brown, whose age can be conservatively estimated as around 60. When Norman Thomas arrived in Denver and found a little handful of old fogies and respectables calling itself a mass meeting, he was deeply chag- rined. Faulkner, as chairman of the meeting, did not make matters better when he announced, “What we are trying to do here is to resurrect a dead horse.” Norman Thomas confided to a bystander that, “The G. A. R. is a great institution, but you can’t build a socialist local with it.” When Maurer was scheduled to come to Denver, the grand S. P. of Colorado was ignored ir the making of arrangements and Pastor Heist of Grace Church was appealed to to get some sort of a crowd together. Still the alleged mass meeting which took place in Grace Church was distinguished by anything but mass attendance. And Faulkner very bitterly protested that the socialist party of Colorado was being “superseded” by the church or- ganization. The two’ socialist presidential candidates, in their desperation, demanded that some young fellow be dug up, and finally a young fellow was dug up who claimed to be sympathetic with the socialist party and’ ready to join. This accession of 25 per cent to | the membership and of so much young blood dis- mayed the youngest member of the socialist party of Colorado and Brown declared in the hearing of the young man, or in such manner that it got to his ears, “I have no use for those new-fangled so- cialists who take up socialism as a fad.” Result: 25 per cent of the membership was scared away and the socialist party remained intact. . I report the above to the Daily Worker merely because it is a symbol of what the socialist party has become and a concrete example of what the New Leader is hailing as the “revival of the socialist party under the stimulus of the presidential cam- paign.” 4 = |controlled by- the rank and file, long |and intensely trained in political thought and action. In them resides |a vast revolutionary intelligence that ke not to be fooled by the resounding phrases of journalists and orators: |a revolutionary will that is not to be |thwarted by the intrigues of politi- \cians or intimidated by bureaucrats. In every struggle they manage to get to the root of the issues, to make their voice articulate and their. will | effective. But in “The Real Situation in Rus- |sia,” not only do the author, Trotz- |ky, and the translator, Max East- sia underground.” Not True. published in the Russian press, par- |ticularly in the Pravda, official or- |gan of the Communist Party with a ing into the farthest steppes and forests of the Soviet lands. The first part of the book was printed jin the Pravda of November 2, 1927. part in the issue of November 17. The Joffe letter, in its original form, let him ask at the public library for Inprecor, and in Inprecor of De- cember 12, 1927, he will find the counter-theses on work in the vil- lage and other opposition documents to the extent of 30,000 words. In them the central committee of the committee and distributed through- out the world. Surely an original | This exiling is depicted in a highly sensational jto Mr. Eastman not only Trotzky but “his friends were viole desert...” Very lurid, but that is not the way it happened to Trotz- ky’s friend, Feodorov (page 204) in whose home I lived in Moscow. As jan active oppositionist he was slated |for exile and the G. P. U. proposed that he join Trotzky at Alma Ata. like the climate. A few days later, and over the telephone, the G. P. U. asked: “How about going to Amer- ica? We can fix up a job for you in the Amtorg there!” Feodorov’s wife was in raptures. But not Feo- dorov. His was a most exacting taste in places of exile, Courteous- ly but firmly he objected, So while the G. P. U. racked its brains in an effort to please their fastidious client, Feodorov went on a visit to Leningrad, then to Zinoviey and Kamenev in exile, some sixty miles from Moscow, carrying rugs and curtains for their barely furnished quarters. Finally after a month of pourparlers a satisfactory place was found for Feodorov—the city of Kharkov with a position as manager of a chemical factory. His departure was celebrated by Some fifty oppo- sitionists in his home, in an evening of fun and fellowship. They joked about the “vacation” the party was _ now giving: them, the first in twenty method of suppressing and outlaw- | manner, and according | ly drag- | ged out of their homes, shipped into | Feodorov protested that he didn’t! | | | | | |man, ignore these facts but the pub- | lishers are moved to announce that | years; they held mock trials, jocu- “all the documents in this book were | larly ordering this cold-hating com- suppressed and outlawed by the/rade to exile in frozen Siberia, that Stalin regime and came out of Rus- | heat-hating | | arty is accused of “cheap sneers,” | eatlige” “kotowing to the kulak” cash and stock celebration of Hoo-|°¢"t Per year on the par value of (rich peasant), “bourgeois lying.” | ver’s election exposes’ the enormous And all this, translated into three | profits lette; (3) Mr. Brown (altho I know the name of |languages, is printed by the central| workers by ordinary wage slavery | | | | American Writer Exposes Eastman’s Lies; Shows Masses Repudiate Trotskyism Albert Rhys Williams, well-known American author who has spent most of his recent years in the villages of the Union of Social- ist Soviet Republics, writes in the current number of The Nation on questions raised by the latest counter-revolutionary book by Leon Trotsky, recently translated and renegade, Max Eastman. sponsored in this country by the Although Williams is not a Communiat—a fact which is“evident in some of his paragraphs—he is nevertheless a which is evident in some of his paragraphs—he is nevertheless a sincere sympathiser with the Russian workers’ revolution, with the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics which it founded and with the Communist Party whose leadership alone made its victory possible. Because the article is a useful, timely and honest refutation of some of the grosser lies of Eastman and Trotsky, some extracts from Wil- liams’ article are reproduced here by courtesy of The Nation. It may be remembered that the Joffe letter, referred to in the article, was printed in full in the Daily Worker after Eastman had tried to palm off a garbled version of it on the public—EDITOR. comrade to blazing Turkestan. There were Russian dishes and steaming samovars, rol- Very luring to the reader, only it |licking stories, folk-songs, and vil- doesn’t happen to be true. Long ago |!age dances till morning. A real old- various sections of the book were |time Russian vecherenka. Eastman’s Distortions. There is nothing of this sort in circulation of over 600,000 penetrat-|the book. For Mr, Eastman has set out by all means to convince the reader that the oppositionists were the victims of unrelieved brutality and trickery and into his elaborate The substance of some of the second |iMttoductions and footnotes he ad- mits only such material as would buttress his arguments. Many of x « ik. the incidents related seem to me a appears in the magazine Bolshevik. | (°° 3 if If the reader wants it in English, | bit distorted, if not apocryphal. How- spinners and weavers here for twen- ever, granting their authenticity, against them can be placed others that would lead the reader to quite a different impression. For instance, why has Mr. East- man not included the authentic inci- dent of November 7, at the textile factory where Trotzky was a great favorite? Suddenly without warning he appeared before the workers | forming in line for the tenth anni- |versary parade. Cheers greeted his |first sentences glorifying the Oc- | tober Revolution. But as he passed | to an attack on the party there were |murmurs of dissent, then protests, jthen shouts: “Stop it!” Trotzky lashed out ferociously, calling them “bureaucrats! bourgeois!” “No, Comrade Trotzky,” they cried hold- ing up their hands, “we’ve been GENERAL MOTORS’ JOY By HARRISON GEORGE. An analysis of the General Motors being wrung out of the plus the most extreme rationaliza- tion and speed-up of production, The present common stock is worth at par $25 a share, of which there are 17,400,000 shares. The regular quarterly dividend on these shares has been $1.25 per share, or #5 a year, which is 20 per cent. This year, besides the above $5 per share paid’ in dividends, the di- rectors announced that on the pre- sent quarter, the stockholders would get an extra dividend of $2.50 a share, making for the year $7.50 dividend on each share of $25 of common stock now held. This raises the profit from 20 to 30 per cent of the par value, $25, on each share. This is prosperity, indeed-—for the stockholders. What the workers get out of this is exactly nothing. They get wages, but this is pure cream— surplus value made by them, but which they do not get. But that is not all. The directors announce that very soon the present $25 shares will be split up into two- and-a-half shares of a par value of $19 each. Now, while this seems quite innocent, since $10 goés into $25 two and a half times, yet what goes along with this announcement looks quite different. For it is stated that hereafter, the new $10 shares will get a dividend regularly of $5 a share per year, or 50 per cent pure profit. This project of paying $5 dividend annually on each $10 share of the new; stock, thus means that the ckholder who now holds shares at $24 each, will be paid $12.50 a year nd instead of §5 as at present,, an increase of profit ratio of 150 | per cent, and, as noted above 50 per | the stock. The “Poor” Capitalists. The “poverty-stricken” — stock- |holder who has nothing to eat but | breiled lobster, chicken and porter- | house steak, the humble (and myth- ical) “widows and orphans” who have, let us say, $25,000 in General Motors stock at par, will be able, by drawing two years of the regular | dividend, to have their original $25,- |000 back, and still have the $25,000 | stock besides, with all its future pro- \fits guaranteed by capitalist rule. Small wonder that capitalists believe \that the system is.the best of all possible systems! Nor is this all. Even under the present dividends, the stockholders are getting only about 60 per cent of the net profits, as the corporation has held to the policy of retaining about 40 per cent as a reserve. So the 30 per cent cash dividends ($7.50) paid out this year to stock- holders, represents only 60 per cent, or the actual net profit of 50 per cent ($12.50) on the capitalization | residing in each $25 share. Why They Celebrate. In announcing that $12.50 regular dividends will, in the future, be paid for each $25 now held, either the corporation intends to hold nothing in reserve of the net profits taken, or intends to make still more pro- fits by increased exploitation of the workers; and it is a glit-edge bet that it will be increased exploita- tion. That is why the General Motors celebrate the election of Hoover, as they know he will use the power of the government to suppress the culated * ‘ty years. We’re Communists and you're splitting the party.” Trotzky persisted, rousing the workers to |rage, and from their hands he es- jeaped only by fleeing in his car. | Everywhere the opposition met a Mike rebuff. A spontaneous rejec- \tion by the very workers who were vat first allured by the seductive promises of the higher wages and |more privileges, held out in the op- (position program. About this side of the conflict Mr. Eastman is eloquently silent. While | dwelling on the “intrigues” and “ruthless strategy” of the party | against the opposition, he sedulous- ly omits the ruthlessness and vio- |lence and provocative tactics em- | ployed by the opposition against oe party. ¢ the oppositionists. were all sweet- |ness and light, harmless as a brood of doves. No hint to the reader \thatt the faction they organized was ‘put on a war footing, with secret |pass-words, and a Red Cross: cap- tained by Joffe; that the opposi- \tionists forcibly seized halls, vio. \lently ejecting the regular party workers; that they repeatedly vio- lated explicit promises given to the |party; that they supplied the bour- ‘geois press with party documents, |and even waged their propaganda _among correspondents of the foreign | capitalist press. Masses Repudiate Opposition. It was by this defiance of all |party discipline and loyalty that the pathy as they firgt enjoyed among pursued by the opposition was lead- ing to the disruption of the party, | and—despite all disclaimers to the (ond party, a threat to the very ex- \istence of the proletarian state. Alarmed at this prospect the mas- ses rallied to the defense of the party and to the support of the jcentral committee. If in the prov- inces it was the agrarian program of the oppositionists that defeated them, in the cities it was primarily their tactics, stirring deep and wide- spread indignation. They were con- demned by the party masses as dangerous, if not destructive, to the revolution. Nothing of this is in the book. The feelings, ideas, and judgment of the party masses are ignored. They are completely left out of the picture, or dragged in now and then to appear shouting hosannas to the opposition. The whole con- troversy is presented as a duel be- tween contending, leaders, with Mr. Eastman striving by all means to glorify the Trotzkyists and to blacken the Stalinists, but in his bitter partisanship he overreaches himself. He leaves the party ac- quiescent in perpetration of a mons- trous crime. Slander Against Russian Party. If this were true, how pitiful ab- ject and contemptible the character of the million revolutionists com- prising the Russian Party, how ut- terly lacking either in will or in in- telligence. For either they have been hoodwinked and tricked by the “demagogism, lying and jesuitry” of Stalin and his henchmen, and were ignorant of the situation; or craven, cowering, and browbeaten, they lack ordinary backbone and courage to rise up in protest against it. The party that wrought the greatest re- volution in history, the party that fought through a decade of war, famine, blockade, now become a crowd of dupes or cowards! Is it possible that anyone believes that this is the real situation in Russia? * “The Real Situation in Russia,” One might think that | |oppositionists alienated such sym-| the workers. In their eyes the course | |contrary—to the formation of a sec- | ‘The Writings* lof Tolstoy and the Bolsheviks (Translated from the “Prayda” by Valentine V. Konin.) By EM. YAROSLAVSKY. (Continued) Of course, Tolstoy knew perfect- \ly well that such was not the case; otherwise he would have never pro- |duced works such as, “Don’t Kill,” jor “Nikolai, the Stick,” or the | “False\ Coupon.” Having taken a | part in public correspondence, he | became acquainted with the life’ of “Chitrovka,” of the artisans and the poor city people. Having aided the famine relief, he witnessed horrible scenes of hunger and village pov- erty. How could he have seen and known all that preach the theory |of non-resistance? How could he carry out his teachings as far as to advise not to defend oneself against a mad dog? “If I admit,” wrote Tolstoy, “that one can lock up a very mad person, then you and |I will also have to be locked up for | Someone else’s sake .. . If the mad }man will kill you and me, and my |daughter and your wife,—what’s so terrible about it? Die—we all must —but do harm—we must not.” Tolstoy looked for some support, —a giant of his classs let loose. Like | many “repenting: nobles,” Tolstoy |idealized the peasantry but it was not. Stenka Razin or Pugatchey |whom he idealized. These people frightened him. He idealized Platon Karataev—the peasant who hadn’t entered the way of the revolutionary struggle. Tolstoy expressed the | weakness, no the strength of the | revolutionary movement. | “Tolstoy’s ideas,” wrote Lenin, “are a mirror of weaknesses and faults of our peasant rebellion; a reflection of the cowardice of a little homely peasant!” | Remarking upon these weak sides | of Tolstoy’s creations and the philo- |sophical political views, we, the |Bolsheviki, have all the less right to silence Tolstoy’s reactionary re- |ligious preachings. In spite of his |pungent attacks upon the ‘Greek Orthodox Church Tolstoy appears jas a missionary of a refined, reli- gious confused craze. Tolstoy ap- pears as an opponent of science. | Religion is his true science. Ac- |cording to Tolstoy, all life is sense- less, with the exception of one, | whose goal is to serve God and his acts. According to him there is jonly “one way not to be mistaken— that is not to take the initiative, but wait for the call of God.” | Against such a philosophy, against such a preaching, we, the Bolshe- viki, have always led and shall al- lways lead a tireless fight, for this philosophy differs in no way from jan ordinary open priesthood. “We do not deny and do not intend to deny Tolstoy’s artistic inherit- jance. We cannot throw overboard all the valuable parts of Tolstoy, |a genuine artist, who has given to us not only incomparable pictures of the Russian life, but the works of the highest type among world literature.” (Lenin). We shall ac- / quaint the working mass with that \merciless criticism of capitalist ex- \ploitation which is displayed in Tol- stoy’s work; we shall acquaint them _with, as Tolstoy expressed, “the |striving to do away with the public |church, the landowners, and their |rule; to annihilate all.old forms and orders of the land rule; to clear the land and create in the place of the |police—class government, a com- mune of free and equal peasants.” We shall show how Tolstoy “re- flected the painful hatred, which matured into a_ striving towards something better, a desire to get rid of the past, the immaturity of his dreams, lack of political discip- \line.” (Lenin.) But, under no cir- |cumstances, may we conceal the ‘fact that with the death of Tolstoy \“the pre-revolutionary Russia with \its lack of.energy and strength, ex- \pressed in the philosophy of a genu- ine artist, had gone towards the past.” (Lenin.) In sending forth into the world the full set of Tolstoy’s works, we are obliged to rember that in these works there “is a big dose of religi- ous opium, poisoning the conscious- ness of the people, separating free- dom from consciousness, hinderirg the reconstruction of socialist society, paralyzing the mass strug- gle against the world of the exploit. ers, deadening the power of class ire, class hatred. No falsehood! We do not need to |conceal our respect to a genuine artist and writer, by silencing the contradictions in his creation, or his superannuated social theories. or his reactionary philosophical political views. We must accept Tol- stoy as he is. We must show him to the masses fearlessly and truth- fully, with all his virtues and all his faults. Tolstoy deserved it, (The End.) Cuban Cigar Workers Demonstrate Against Machine Introduction HAVANA, Cuba, Nov. 11—For the first time in five years Cuban women took part in a labor mani- festation, when more than ten thou- sand cigar and cigarette factory workers paraded before the presi- dential palace today in protest against the introduction into Cuba of cigar-making machines. Several special trains brought workers from nearby towns, Presi- dent Machado informed officials of the National Tobacco Workers’ Fed- eration that he would “study their complaints.” Each | } ] 1 i i exmamamacen