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

aily a Published by National Daily Worker Pub Ass’n., Inc., Daily, Except Sunday, at 2 Union Square, New York, N. Y. Teler 1696-7-8. Cable Address “Da Stuyv ROBERT MINOR..... Editor WM. F. DUNNE.. Assistant Editor The Answer of the Furriers st two years since of the American ocialist assistants It has now been ¢ the reactionary of Federation of Labor, and their boss and police allies, launched a concerted offensive against the left wing Joint Board F rs U oy establishir a dual company union. Thru the economic pressure of the bosses and the helping hand (and fist) of police and thugs they hoped at that time to.destroy the militant workers or- ganization. Instead of being driven out of the industry, the left wing Joint Board conducted a fight so successful that after this bitter period the union succeeded in gaining the allegiance of every important local in the International Fur Workers Union, from which they broke away preparatory to establishing a new in- ternational at the conventior December. While plans were under way for the con- vention and the new union’s simultaneous amalgamation with the new national organi- zation of the cloak and dressmakers, who had gone thru a similar struggle, a new obstacle presented itself which the battling fur work- ers must overcome before their convention delivers the death blow to the degenerated hulk of the A. F. of L. scab union. This event was the announcement of Fur Trimming Manufacturers Association that they would terminate their agreement with the left wing union Jan. 31 and conclude a fake agreement with Matthew Woll’s scab union. When the fight against the left wing be- gan, the left wing succeeded in splitting the ranks of the employers. The big Associated Fur Manufacturers withdrew recognition from the Joint Board while the smaller trim- ming employers organization maintained re- lations with the left wing union. With the large Associated having a fake A. F. of L. agreement which permitted the most inhuman exploitation, while trimming bosses were compelled to live up to their pact despite the Joint Board’s weakened condition, their present action was to be expected. The most important reason for their action, how- ever, was the specter seen by the bosses in a Joint Board that was ready to begin the final drive for complete control of the industry and its consequent wiping out of the scab union. Although its official announcement ‘was made only yesterday, this news was known over two weeks ago, and the expected de- morali: dtion of the furriers’ fight failed to materialize. On the contrary, long before the bosses were ready to admit the fact openly, the workers united behind the Joint Board in a statement announcing the im- * mediate beginnings of mobilization for a general strike in the industry. No one who reexamines the two years of struggle, bitter struggle, against the most Savage and traitorous of enemies can come to the conclusion that lack of recognition by the smaller association means a_ serious setback to the Joint Board. The Joint Board now stands at the end of two years of struggle and cannot be dis- couraged by such tactics. Instead determina- tion is now greater than ever. The A. F. of L. company union is almost completely shat- tered. The United States and Canadian lo- “gi Worker Central Organ of the Workers (Communist) Party SUBSCRIPTION RATES: By Mail (in New York only): $2.50 three mos. $8 a year $4.50 six mos. By Mail (outside of New York): $6 a year $3.50 six mos. $2.00 three mos. Address and mail all checks to The Daily Worker 26-28 Union Square, New York, N. Y. ee | { cals it still controlled two years ago are now waiting to officially affiliate with the new left wing national union. And most important of all—tens of thousands of cloak and dress- makers will also be members of the same amalgamated needle trades union which will conduct the final fight against the weakened foe. going on for a general strike in the industry. The great majority of the fur workers realize that only thru this measure will they regain the union con- ditions they once possessed. In this way, only will they drive from the trade the A. F. L. and socialist thieves who have robbed thousands of families of their means of a livelihood. Only by militant struggle can all the various divisions of bosses in the industry be brotight to time. The mobilization is of “Socialists” in Colombia No matter where the adherents of the policies of the second (socialist) international are found they never miss an opportunity to stab the movement of the working class against imperialism in the back. Whenever workers are struggling against terrific odds, whether it be in a strike in the mines, the textile mills or the garment in- dustry in the United States, a general strike in England, an insurrection in Vienna, or in the lines of the embattled strikers facing the murderous fire of soldiery in Colombia the role of these spurious socialists is always the same—the most depraved allies of the en- emies of the workers. Colombia, where 40,000 workers are on strike against the United Fruit Company, there exists an organization calling itself so- cialist. It is composed, for the most part, of small business men and confused profes- sional hash, salted down and colored over with a “pro-labor” camouflage, including a few right wing labor officials. This strike is led by the Communist Party of Colombia, which there goes under the name “Socialist Revolutionary” because of Colombian criminal syndicalism laws, and this party is not to be confused with the So- cialist Party of Colombia. Qne Communist strike leader. Machecha is known to have been killed in open field fighting which took place when the workers defended themselves against the government troops, and others are among the unknown dead in this struggle. But while this is going on, and thousands of workers under Communist leadership are venturing their lives in the class struggle, the socialist declare thru their organ, the Diario Nacional, that it is the duty of the government to protect foreigners—U. S. capi- talist exploiters—and the socialist central committee has offered to send two delegates into the strike area to urge the workers to give up the struggle and submit to slavery. As the workers of what is now the Soviet Union had their Kerensky, as Germany had its Noske and Scheideman, as the workers of England and the peasants of India had their MacDonald, as the needle trades workers of New York suffer from the Yellow Forwards and its gangsterism, so too, are the workers of Colombia betrayed by the “socialist” party of Colombia. Such parties are anti-working class parties all over the world, : Mine, Mill F eatur es in Labor Unity DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, WEDNE A YEAR AFTER CANTON! SDAY, DECEMBER 12, 1928 By Fred Ellis The Canton Soviet --- One Year Ago By HARRISON GEORGE. | “Land to the peasants! meat to the workmen!” These were the slogans under which, on December 12, 1927, the| workers, peasants and revolutionary | soldiers seized power and set up the) Canton Soviet in Southern China. | Canton, China, seems a long way from America, and when these words | are put into cold type on the printed page, only to the reader whose heart beat in true international solidarity with ‘the revolutionary workers of the world, will they bring a picture | | of the lion-hearted Canton coolies, | | whose heroism wil ring down the. | ages. Rice and April 1927—Reaction. | | April 18, last year, when Chiang! | Kai-shih made his coup d’etat, aided | by Li Chi-sen, his more or less re-| |liable Canton commander, the rail-| | way workers on the road from Hong- kong to Canton had instantly struck | land flown to arms against the re- | action. | It was but a few days later that |the writer got his first views of | Canton, traditional center of Chi- ese liberation movements, home of | Sun Yat. Sen, headquarters of the | nationalist revolution which had swept northward to the Yangtze. | Along the Pearl River. Up the Pearl River, winding its muddy way between flat country-| | sides, where the mud huts of tiny| peasant villages hid from the tor-| rid sun among dejected trees, and | | where the water buffalo, the cara-| | boo, with the coolie, the beast of| | burden of the Far East, toiled laz- | ily among the rice paddies, lies Can- ton, Nearing the city by boat, a halt} is made at the spot where Sun Yat) Sen planned to build a b or that! “Again the Lion-Hearted Chinese Workers Will Fly to Arms Under the Red Flag” shops and factories whose tops show thru the murky haze up rivér. As the city nears one sees the banks lined with sampans, the homes of a great portion of Can- tén’s population. —- Flat-bottomed small boats, half or more covered to tbe used as a house. Unpainted, ugly, inescapably dirty, filled with children of all ages clad in rags or |nothing at all, but all working at} something, some making toys, wood carvings, ivory carving, beads, brass- work, anything. 4 The Flower Girls of Canton. A certain section of the river has hoats a bit more elegant, the homes of the famous “flower girls,” sweet ard wis‘ful-eyed daught.rs ot the or bought by the rich as play- things; “sing-song girls” to decor- ate the banquets of the Chinese bourgeoisie. If you are friendly with & compradore he will make you a present of such kind. The local agents of imperialist concerns are very friendly with compradores. Over the swarms of sampans and the weaving masts of feeight-car- rying junks, all along the river front runs “the Bund,” the chief traffic artery of all Chinese ports. The river here is divided by an island, Shameen, the international settle- ment, with splendid foreign hotels and comfortable houses in pleasant yards, with restful parks and boule- |vards. Over the gate of the park| a sign says that Chinese and dogs are not allowed, unless the Chinese is an ‘“‘amah” or nursemaid to for- | theatre, singing the Internationale in Chinese, with a fervor and spirit that never dies. Workers—White and Yellow— United. But behind them and more pow- erful are the factory workers and the pc .sants. When foreign white | workers came to them last year | bringing the message 6f interna- | tional solidarity, at Changsha in | Central China, 200,000 waited all cay in the cold rain, without shel- ter and almost no clothing, to greet their comrades from America, Eng-| |land and France with wild acclaim |when the white workers shouted | their slogan “Tah tao digo chu yi!” | Down with imperialism! | At Canton, April last year, the | streets ran red with workers’ blood. | In front of the hotel where the pro- | visional committee of the Pan-Pa- |cifie Trade Union Conference was | located, demonstrations were held against “the Bolsheviks.” The fas- |cist Inachinist’s union led parades shouting “Dewn with the Comrmu- nists!” The Undying Spirit. Before our eyes our Chinese com- rades were led bound thru the streets to execution, girls and young men, but with heads up and, if they were not gagged, shouting “Down with Chiang Kai-shih! Long live the Communist International! ‘Down with Kuomintang murderers! Long live the world revolution!” And underneath the staccato shots and crushing reaction boiled the rebel- |were crushed by white terror. The | Canton Soviet was destroyed. | But today, one year later, the re- | action in Canton is so insecure that | machine* gunners guard the street corners, While out in the province | of Kwangtung five districts are still |is a friendly spy for the red armies. | Reactionary troops cannot be trust- ed to fight them. Revolution seethes under the crust of reaction. Reac- tion itself is disintegrating with graft and intrigue. No Nanking | government official trusts another. Every general is a power unto him- |self. The imperialists must keep a | spy to watch every bribed Chinese official, and another spy to watch the first. Under this rotting crust runs the steady and growing stream of revo- lution. Everywhere, strikes and |peasant risings. The Communist | Party, the majority of its members | murdered, rebuilds and grows,’ re- knits its connections. When it ) Speaks the masses answer. The im- | perialists, at whose bidding nearly | 400,000 workers and peasants have been slaughtered, feel insecure de- spite their victory. No End But Victory. The Chinese revolution is far from dead, It arose as a necessary | step of history. And history will again call it forth on a greater scale than »before. And again the lion-hearted coolies will fly to arms under the red flag. Again and again they will fight ‘until victory is achieved with “Land to the peas- ants, rice and meat to the workers!” Realty Hogs Crowding Manhattan’s Workers Worse Than Shanghai. | under Soviet control. Every peasant | Misleaders in the American Labor Unions By WILLIAM Z. FOSTER In jail Boyle was treated like a prince. He had, so it was reported, a private office, a secretary, and business visitors. Often he was al- lowed to slip out at night to visit his home. While in jail he remained business agent of his union. Im- mediately after his being jailed powerful influences, such as high- priced lawyers and conservative la- bor leaders, were set on foot to se- cure his release. Simon O’Donnell went to Washington about it. Gomp- ers wrote to President Wilson and secured a special hearing before the attorney general. A. Mitchell Palmer, the notorious “red” baiter and general reactionary, took up the case and induced President Wilson to pardon Boyle. Upon his release fren jail Boyle was presented with a $4,500 automobile by his admiring friends. Boyle is a pal of Governor Small of Illinois. When in 1922 the latter, , charged with misappropriating state { | funds, was acquitted, Boyle was ac- cused of having bribed the jury. He fled, but turned up six weeks later and was haled before the grand jury. He refused to testify and was given six months for contempt of court. He jumped $2,000 bail and disappeared. Recognized by a wo- man in the millionaire Rainbow Club at Tomahawk, Wis., he was eventu- ally, after many adventures, brought back to Chicago and sent to jail. Whereupon he was promptly par- doned by his friend Governor Small. “Umbrella Mike” then returned tri- iumphantly to ‘Chicago, where, at the head of his union, he still flour- ishes, Like other building trade officials, Boyle controls his union by bribery and force. By judiciously distribut- ing political and industrial favors, placed at his disposal by capitalist politicians and employers, he has built up a solid clique of supporters. If this group cannot control a ma- jority of votes peacefully then “rough-house” methods are used. On April 28, 1924, two men were killed and four were injured in an election fight in Boyle’s union. Boyle returns the employers’ favors by laying all possible obstructions in the way of organizing the 50,000 unorganized Chicago electrical work- ers of the Western Electrical Co., Chicago Telephone Co., and Com- monwealth-Edison Co. Boyle is one of the many actual capitalists among Chicago building trades officials. He is heavily inter- ested in real estate. Hhis real es- tate business is the Boyle & Hen- dricks Co. He is also the head of the Boyle Valve Co. By 1914 -he was known to be worth $350,000, which he amassed in eight years on a union salary of $40 to $50 per week. He is now popularly consid- ered to be worth well on to 1,000,000. Timothy Murphy. “Big Tim” Murphy is one of the most lurid leaders ever produced by the American labor movement. He | represents, par excellence, the gun- | man type of official so preyale=t in Chicago unions. He originated in the “back of the yards” distr’_+. tra- ditional home of Chicago’s toughest | elements. In 1917-18 Murphy was a demo- cratic representative in the Illinois | state legislature. Previously he had | been a Hearst gunman in the so- called newspaper war. In 1919 he got into the labo: movement ac- tively by organizing the Gas Work- ers’ Union. Later he came to or- ganize or otherwise get control of | many other unions, including the Bridge Laborers, Street Cleaners, Street Foremen, Asphalt Layers, Garbage Handlers, Bootblacks, Win- dow Washers, etc. Most of Mur- phy’s unions were of city employes and closely connected up with the big political parties, where Mur- phy’s political affiliations served him well. He soon attached himself to the clique of gangster leaders controlling the building trades unions, and plunged not only into every known form of labor graft | but engaged in othcz forms of crime ae The December a t issue of Labor Unity, organ he Trade Union Educational League, is replete with important articles on the most re- cent events of the organized labor ™ovement.. Amalgamation in the needle trades, to be brought about through simultaneous conventions of the National Organization Commit- tee of the cloak and dressmakers, and the Furriers National Commit- “ tee of the Furriers union is the sub- * ject of the leading article. The con- yentions will take place Dec. 28 and 29 and will effect an amalgamation. Fyents leading up to this result are interestingly told in the article. An article, illustrated by pictures of the coal-cutting and loading ma- chinery that is posing such a prob-, lem for the coal miners, and of the ecmpany money which is substituted oy the coal barons for U. cur- veney in payment of miners’ wages, . 3 written by Freeman Thompson of ‘he National Executive Board of the National Miners Union. In it he ‘ives a review of the situation at present, and especially of the bat- tle in the western districts, where, ns in Wyoming, the new unior has checked the wage cut and is win. | wing larger and larger numbers of | the miners to its banner. ‘The Anthracite. Another mining article, especially sppropriate at this time, is on the n acl und for the many murders ad frame-up court cases which have Yen piace there, It tells of the ‘ f ” Job” acite situation, which gives the s the T the energetic entry ‘of Anthony Mine- rich, representing the National Min- ers Union, into a situation where a local misleader of labor was trying to betray 5,000 miners on strike. Since the article was written, a framed-up charge of dynamiting a| church has Minerie N. Sparks, editor of the Marine Workers Voice, organ of the Ma- rine Workers Progressive League, contributes an ‘authoritative discus. sion of the Vesiris disaster. An article on the call of the Pan. Pacific Trade Union Secretariat for a plenary session in Vladivostok in August, next year, is illustrated with photographs of Filipino labor Jeaders and scenes of the white ter- ror in China, Harrison George, recently re- turned from abroad, has an article on tactics in the anti-imperialist struggle. been placed against On the Strikes. Mike Ross, an authority on the struggle in the carpenters’ union, writes of the latest development, the struggle against President | Hutcheson’s orgy of expulsions. Gertrude Miller writes on the Pat- erson ike. om De Fazio covers the Milltown rubber strike. A beau- tifully illustrated article by Scott Nearing on “The Negro Hunts a occupies the center page carefully annotated and i 2 from of | Unions interprets the present out- | burst of American imperialism, and jpoints to the grave contradictions |that exist within it, showing how |the very capital export, which is \the basis of that imperialism, is wrecking the home market ard the foreign market for U. S, goods, in- creasing the exploitation of labor on the one hand and bringing. a crisis of imperialism on the other hand, which imperialism will try to solve \by war. The cover is by Fred Ellis, Coca-Cola King Wants Pinless Lady to Take Painful Blonde’s Job | HAVANA, Die: fi, ‘The squabble between the imperialist Coca-Cola millionaire, C, P, Whitehead of At- | which furnished Cuban workers with a fair sample of what their exploit-| ers do in their spare time, is near- ing an end, The lady in the case is being sent back lyacht, “Malvern,” while her recent |“daddy” is remaining here to choose a successor who must guarantee not to stick pins in his carcass if he fells aslecr in public after a hard Red International of Laboxinight’s work, | Chiang aKi-shih up north, made the lanta, Georgia, and his little blonde | ° baby ex-chorus girl, Frances Porter, | under torture, politely called “ex- | southern bank, stands an ancien‘ ‘over the rice paddies where the peas- be tor to Palm Beach on Whitehead’s| 27% and the caraboo t.il with a business, as Hongkong prospers only by trade passing to and thru Can- ton. All f.rgotten now, since the} reaction surrendered to imperialism. British, Trade Sick. | But in 1927 the boycott of Hong- kong by Canton, and the great sea- men’s strike, had taken the sap out | of Hongkong, in spite of the omin-| ous grey warships that Jay in its! harbor and the swarms of British troops which filled it with the air | of an armed camp. | Where the boat from Hongkong, | British boats with British officers | and Chinese crew, stop a moment. | you will see a great military camp. A training camp for troops of the! nationalist army. Over in the cen- ter of the camp, surrounded by picked trocjs, were a thousand or so student officers disarmed, cap- tives of the reaction, seized the mo- ment Li Chi-sen in combination with coup d’etat on April 18. Some ‘had already been shot. Others were ‘nation.” Contrasts. Further up the river. on the ar pagoda, a relic of feudalism, looking wooden plow shod with tin; looking over the military camp where snappy-uniformed officers armed with automatic pistols and command-| ing troops of machine gunners give instruetions how to massacre rebel- would put British Hongkong out of | cign children. Slaves to Imperialism. Where the boat lands, Chinese ex- aminers of the customs go thru the baggage. The foreigner expects and gets little attention. The Chinese who come third class locked in cages ast-rn are thoroughly searched for posible “seditious” literature. Ex- tremely deferential Chinese runners from the foreign hotels will take your beggage. For a white man to cerry anything but a gun or a stic) in China is unknown. If you escape the runners a hun- dred rickshaw coolies out on che bund contend with each other to carry you. Big and little, young and old, but all gaunt with habitual starvation, a blue denim trunk leav- ing exposed their bronzed skins, pouring sweat in the hot sun and with hunger-showing ribs rising and falling as they pant, running thru the streets. The Rickshaw Coolie. There are no draft horses in Can- ton, The coolies do the horses’ work. Two years between the rickshaw shafts and the strongest coolie is a wreck. He sleeps in the rickshaw or with other homeless workers stretch- ed out along the sidewalks, or in some hole under a shed. He eats, when he eats, a small bowl of rice and water flavored with slender greens, at the open-air kitchens. The rickshaw coolie is more visi- bly representative of the toilers of the East than any other. In May last year we saw the inspiring sight lion of the masses. On December 12, 1927, after all too short but earnest preparation the workers and peasants, with the aid of mutinous troops, rose once more, seized the city and set up a Soviet | power, At its head was Su Chao- jen, president ‘of the All-China La- bor Federation, a man of quiet pow- ¢. and urli~ited darir=. “Arms! Give Us Arms!” Coolies and peasants were crowd- |ing everywhere demanding arms. | But arms were few and organiza- | ion was not fast enough to meet the return wave of reaction led by U 1%. °s gunborts and foreign forces backing up the reactionary troops of Li Chi-sen, In the strong stone buildings of hanks and others buildings the work- ers and peasants fortified them- selves, never to give up until im- perialist artillery and machine guns had literally destroyed the buildings around ttfem. Died—Bit. Died Fighting. Again and 4n greater streams ran the blood of the workers and peas- ants thru Canton streets. They died, and they died by thousands, but they died fighting like tigers, these brave coolies and peasants of Kwangtung. Chiang Kai-shih broke the already strained relations with the Soviet Union and in Canton the Soviet con- sulate was raided and Vice-Consul Hassisi murdered. Workers, men, women and children were tied to- gether, drenched in oil and set afire. lious peasants and workers from the | of 5,000 rickshaw men in a Hankow! Protest strikes swept all China, but a hh LL LT > “By Federated Press). With one of its boroughs—Man- hattan—more densely populated than Shanghai, China, ar] with 2,- 500,000 persons in its five boroughs living in overcrowded “old law” tene- ment houses, nearly one-half of the land in New York City is still un- built and largely available for dwell- ings, business and industry, accord- ing to the Regional Plan * New York and environs. The worst congestion exists on ? ‘tan’s lower east side, where in one district there are 416,000 per- sons crowded into one squr-e mile, This is at the rate of 650 per acre, although if properly developed the city could house 80 persons to each acre, Millions in Battle of Candy With Fags Candy men have formed a $1,- 000,000 pool to combat the propa- ganda against sweets of a cigaret company that urges “pills” as an antidote to candy craving and fat- ness. This morning there appears in many newspapers an. advertise- ment issued by a second cigaret company that urges everyone to “eat a chocolate and light up and enjoy both; two fine and healthful treats.” The cigarette company which urged people not to eat sweets has _ been boycotted at many New York restaurants that sell candy. as well. He was accused many times of murder, robbery, etc. but be- cause of his powerful political pull he was rarely convicted. He came to be known as Chicago’s most ar- rested man. Hey there x oe 8 Fellow-worker , * * * Take the cotton * * * Out of your ears ‘ * * * And the blinkers * * * Off your eyes * * * Wake up e+ * * The Daily Worker-Freiheit * * * Ball has arrived * * * There’s going to be *_ * * A great time in * * * Madison Square Garden * * * i Saturday night! P. S.—Get your tickets NOW! a