The Daily Worker Newspaper, January 31, 1929, Page 6

Page stx DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, THURSDAY, JANUARY 31, 1929 Daily S05 Worker Central Organ of the Workers (Communist) Party Published by the SUBSCRIPTION RATES: York only): 50 six months onths New York): 0 six months ths $2.00 three i all Address The checks to Union x. and_m Daily We Square, N, ROBERT MINOR .... WM. F. DUNNE Editor ditor The “Hoover Era” of Darkness Teaching children the facts of life in the sphere of sex is-a crime under the laws of capitalism—and it is not hard to understand why. The most hard-boiled “men of the world” who “rise” to positions as federal judges, detectives, court bailiffs, etc., through the usual means in capitalist politics based on organizing the underworld of prostitutes, pimps, pro- fessional gamblers, drug peddlers and gunmen—even these hard-boiled commercializers of human depravity cannot bear to hear the charges spoken in open court against Mrs. Mary Ware Dennett for writing the pamphlet “The Sex Side of Life.” When federal Judge Muskowitz—yes, this blushing in- nocent Muskowitz!—ordered a secret trial for the woman accused of attempting to educate children, he brought to the courtroom with him a Catholic priest, a rabbi and a protestant preacher. These charlatans of organized super- stition sat on the bench to back up the cowardly Muscowitz in one of the vilest pieces of Middle-Age tyranny and ob- seurantism. Unless she herself or her friends, has pull also among the crooked capitalist politicians, this woman will be given a heavy sentence in a federal penitentiary without being permitted even to hear the charges openly brought out in court! The timid little pamphlet she wrote to explain to children the most matter-of-fact principles of biology as ap- plied to human beings is too “obscene and filthy” to be cited even in the indictment! But she can be sent to a long term of penal servitude for it without its being read in court, be- cause a filthy-minded catholic priest, a smirking rabbi and a rotten hypocrite of a protestant peddler of superstition simply say that the crooked, ignorant detectives are right in declaring it is “too awful” to bring out in court. This is not the only indication of a new wave of Middle- Age intellectual reaction is beginning simultaneously with the Hoover administration. Why? Imperialism, the present period of decaying, rotting capitalism, rushing headlong into inevitable world war and equally inevitable proletarian revolution, is compelled to dis- card the accoutrements of “progress” and “freedom,” and takes on, instead, all of the implements of superstition, ar- - bitrary coercion, stultification of science, research and art to a degree even exceeding that of the previous capitalism. Anti-evolution laws, prosecutions for “blasphemy” or for “slandering” religious institutions—these go along with the increase of injunctions against working class organizations, laws against the foreign-born, sharpening “Jim-Crow” per- secution of Negroes, etc. An assistant U. S. attorney expressed the immediate aspect of the prosecution of the woman for educating chil- dren in the facts of life sex, by exclaiming in court: “When the clarion call for war shall sound, God help Amer- ica if we haven't the men to defend her!” This is a reflection of the present rush toward imperial- ist wars of conquest by Wall Street. But it is only one as- pect of the new Obscurantism of imperialism. The “Hoover Era” will rival the Middle Ages in the throttling of intellectual life. The New Offensive On the Textile Workers The hand of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, on which the blood of Sacco and Vanzetti has never dried and never can, has again reached out to clutch the leaders of the American working class and smash the organizations of the workers. This time it is Fred Biedenkapp, national secretary of the Workers International Relief, on which fell the burden of feeding the thousands of. strikers’ families during the great struggle of the textile workers against the New Bed- ford mill bosses last year, who has first fallen victim. With the connivance of the boss “judicial” system in New York State the Commonwealth has seized Biedenkapp for extradition to Massachusetts. Next on the roster of vengeance, according to the specific terms of the extradition warrants of the New York Magis- trate McAdoo, for the bloody Commonwealth of Massachu- setts are Albert Weisbord, secretary-treasurer of the Na- tional Textile Workers Union, the organization which is the great fruit of the strike, and Paul Crouch, secretary of the All-America Anti-Imperialist League, who has once before ‘paid for his loyalty to his class by years spent in peniten- tiaries of American capitalism. Besides these, whom the Commonwealth of Coolidge and Fuller is still unsuccessful in extraditing from New York, loom the cases of 662 workers against whom vengeance is demanded by the mill barons of New England, infuriated by the might of the struggle which the workers of New Bed- ford were able to wage against their despotism, and at the great National Union which grew from these struggles asa permanent threat to the tyranny of the bosses. Since that day when the mill gates were thrown open and the thousands of strikers streamed out to battle for existence with their oppressors, the mill bosses have never ceased to cry, first for the blood of the pickets under the clubs of the police, and now for the lives of the workers to be wasted at the decision of the bosses’ courts in years of im- prisonment. The mill bosses of Massachusetts who staged the Sacco- Vanzetti frame-up and murder are past masters at the art of jailing workers and their leaders. Moreover, they are now alarmed as never before at the growing strength of the organized workers as a result of the throwing off of the crooked trade union agents of the bosses and the establish- ment of the big new union. The bosses mean to strike and strike hard. They are out, if not for blood, for jail serms totalling an appalling number of years. They mean to silence for decades the voice, and to shackle for decades the hands of the militant workers of New England. The workers thruout the United States must be alert to the grave danger in which stand the textile workers who heroically fought through the long New Bedford strike. They must be prepared to rush to the defense of the New Bedford victims against every attempt of the whole apparatus of capitalist justice (boss-owned judges, suborned’ juries, police, stool-pigeons, paid witnesses) to frame them. The -danger is great. A victory for the capitalist through their class courts would be a serious blow to the New, England working class, to the workers of the whole country. __ The class-conscious workers’ organizations must and w:ll give an example of the proletarian fighting capacity that is gaa into the class struggle by the organization of. a boss- Work Amon g Latins in the U.S. By ALBERT MOREAU. The Daily Worker is on the brink of disaster. Without immediate financial help — in amounts two or three times as large as have heen. received in the past two days, the Daily Worker will be compelled to go out of existence. If we receive such help the Daily Worker can overcome the present crisis and will survive as the fighting champi You, the workers ion of our class. for whom the Daily Worker has fought during the five years of its existence, are the only can depend. friends upon whom we Send funds immediately to THE DAILY WORKER, 26-28 Union Square, New York City. At the VI World Congress of the hes Million Immigrants Await Organization | for Anti-Imperialist Struggle Communist International our Party was criticized for failure of work among the Latin-American workers of this country. The American dele- | gation to this congress brought a} recommendation to cooperate with the Mexican Party in order to or- ganize the million and half of Mex- ican workers all along the Mexican border. Organization of 4 Millions. | With the constant influx of Latin- | American workers our Party is con- | « fronted with a series of problems that the organization of 4 millions of Latin-American workers presents. | The CI criticism was well justified. Only recently some of our D. 0.s be-| gan to realize the importance of agi-. tation, propaganda and organiza- tional work among these workers. In spite of the repeated requests made by the Spanish Language Bur- eau, there has been neglect on the | ; part of some of our District Organ- | l\izers to turn to this phase of our) work inasmuch as the population in| their districts comprise from 50 to| 70 per cent of Latin-Americans. It is hoped, however, that right after, the close of the National Convention, the districts will pay more attention to the mobilization of Latin-Amer- ican workers for trade union work, | |and anti-imperialist work with the object of bringing them closer to the Party and ultimately in it. The immigration of Latin-Amer- | jicans in the U. S. is due principally | j to the growing U. S. imperialist | penetration into Latin America, | which expresses itself in mass ex- | propriation of the peasants from |their land and the industrialization | lof the countries involved. Porto| | Rico is a classical example. Porto}! Rico is owned by a few American corporations and the peasants, being expropriated, find themselves either | slaves to the sugar, coffee and to- | baceo plantation owners, or com- | pelled to immigrate to the United | States i in order to avoid actual star- vation. Some of these workers are po- litical refugees who are forced to | run away from the criminal hands | | of the dictatorships set up by Amer- j ican imperialism in Latin America. Mostly Unskilled Worker. Ninety to 95 per cent of these | Latin-Americans are workers. They | constitute to a very large extent, a | mass of unskilled workers and they | are the most exploited, after the Ne- gro. In some instances the Latin- ing plantations and constitute at | present an important factor in this/| industry. We also find them toiling | in railroads, packing houses, tobacco | factories restaurant and hotels, dye | | factories, textile, mining (Colorado). | The Latin-American workers are | being discriminated against as an ‘inferior race.” As in the case with the Negroes, they are being segre- gated in unhealthy headquarters | (Los Angeles, Imperial Valley).} This discrimination makes it more| difficult for them in their daily| search for jobs. They are called} “greasers” and are looked down upon. The Latin-American is legal-| ly known as “white,” and yet a few | | communities insist that Latin-Amer-| ican children shall be enrolled in the | Jim Crow schools. The Latin-Amer- | | ican worker is exploited by ruthless | agents through whom the employers {hire the workers. Their children | have special schools erected for them | so as to segregate them from “white” children. In time of unemployment, these workers are persecuted by the local | authorities while they are welcomed at “season” time. They are arrested | and jailed for vagrancy. The follow- | ing is an excerpt from a letter re- ceived from a correspondent of “Vida Obrera,” the official organ of the Spanish Language Bureau: “The Mexican population is working under conditions of ex- ploitation too terrible to be des- cribed. Just yesterday 40 of them were thrown into the local bastile on vagrancy, fined what they had in their pockets and turned loose. Those who had nothing, were held for ten days or rather, are being held. They will be taken to the edge of town and told to travel.” Mexicans Most Numerous. Compared with other Latin-Amer- |ican immigrants in the United States | the Mexican is the greatest in num- ker. The yearly immigration is about | During the fruit seasons, the Mex-| started with a membership of ten, 58,000, the second in number of the | | ican workers toil in the fields with |has now over 50 members. For the national immigration in this coun-| their wives and children. The aver-| past year this fraction initiated anti- try, the Canadians being the first on| age wage is $8.00 per week. When imperialist work, the formation of a |the list. This is why the Mexican | the season is over, they are com-| Workers Club, an I. L. D. branch | immigration presents a serious prob-| pelled to travel from state to state | \and general ‘educational activities lem for the capitalist class. A bill) is at present under consideration be- | | for the widespread diseases among | fore the House of Representatives, | restricting the immigration, not only | ) anything to better the economic sta- tus of the Latin-American workers in this country, are following the | Policy of their imperialist masters | by serving the interests of the em-| | ployers insofar as the Latin-Amer-| ican worker is concerned. | Agricultural Laborers, In the West and Southwest, where | the greatest majority of Mexican workers are to be found, we find | them working for the fruit growers. | The fruit growers are opposed to) | the immigration law, as the Mexi- leans are the cheapest labor. The |chamber of commerce of the Im- perial Valley of California says, | . “Without the Mexicans in un- | limited numbers, our section, where | cantaloupes are grown, will go | back to the deserts. Take away the Mexicans and you destroy the sugar industries.” | Railroads and other great indus- tries may suffer a serious blow. if unlimited Mexican labor is cut off. In Texas the Mexican workers are | onions by thousands of bushels an- | nually. | they pick cotton. In some communi- | ties of Arkansas and Tennessee the! | Mexican worker has replaced the Negro worker. On the Salt River and Gila River Valleys of Arizona, the Mexicans are predominant. The growers of the Great Western Sugar Co., employ over two thousand to grow 293,000 acres of beets. In Southern California they are indis- pensable for the fruit growing. Also for horticultural work. In Nebraska, 5,000 Mexican work- ers are employed in the beet fields. They are even found in Alaska | where they can salmon. Miserable Working Conditions. Los Angeles is the greatest Mex- | ican centre in the country. With a | population of about 200,000, Mex- ieans children labor is widespread. with their families. This accounts | ther. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa) | American works for lower wages| of the Mexican workers but of all! Fe Railroad employ over 10,000 Mex- |than the Negro. Negro railroad| Latin-American workers. The reac- ican workers. The Denver and Rio | worker, for instance, is being re- | tionary leadership of the A. F. of L.| Grande Western Railroad employ placed by the Mexican at a lower| demanded, in a resolution at its last| about 8,000. The Great Northern | wage than the Negro had formerly | convention in New Orleans, the re-| Railroad, 1,000, the Soutern Pacific, | received. The chaser has been out of the army for six years, But when he | walks through the shop on his first | tour of inspection, it is easy to de- | tect the military bearing of the ex- lieutenant. He swings his head easily from side to side, like an offi- |cer watching for salutes. The square cut of his sober, efficient grey suit \sets off his carriage. And the ichaser knows that the derby hat |mustache better than a soft felt. He saunters out of the office at | 8:80, half an hour before the gangs ‘quit work for the first break, He \remembers the neatly-written slips left on the desk by the day clerk. He knows what jobs must be rushed, and what jobs can be left over. He knows the drivers of the machines. Directly Harry Rivers, the am- bitious wire-winder in the repair shop, was transferred from the day to the night shift, the chaser won his confidence and showed he liked to see ambition in young fellows by discussing production with Harry occasionally; and sometimes he gave \him a cigarette. The paper-lapping machines stand 40 to 50 yards apart. At 8:30 the machine drivers and their metes |suits his sharp eyes and crisp-cut | his house to the cable factory. His| head swings round, first at the machine and the whirring paper, then at the driver and his mate— “Good night.” The driver answers cordially but reverently, “good night.” Then a few more precise steps along the line. The chaser draws his chin in slightly and stares in the general direction of the next machine. He had once reported this man for smoking on the job. But he says “good night” to him. “Good night,” the driver replies. The chaser looks up at the crane- man as the crane crashes along the suspended rails, The craneman | stricting of the Mexican quota. These | over 4,000 in Texas and Louisiana They are engaged in fruit-grow- reactionary officials, who never did! alone. We also find them employed The Chaser: A Story ..... nods his head before he swings the load. The chaser continues his round. He has completed his smile of the evening. He has shown that offi- |cers are gentlemen even in civil life. The rest of the tours are irregular— mechanical inspection defeats its own object. He recalls one of the most interesting evenings of the job—the night he discovered a poker game. ... | The machines had been a full minute late after lunch. He had strolled casually between the cable drums. The charge hand had gone to the toilet. Cigarette smoke mixed with the stink of oil, resin pissin in the pneeneile look toward the office. They see the derby hat Lobbing above the \eable drums. “Hold ’em up—coming!” They look hard at the machines. | As the cable drags slowly through the mandrils they inspect it in- terestedly. Their reputations as |“good workers” are at stake. The chaser reaches the ‘ first machine. His suave face looks like an advertisement: for a dental cream after his walk across the park from |the only raisers of the Bermuda! In Mississippi and Texas, | y Martin Moriarty ‘hand told him later. |by the hundreds by the Pennsylvania Railroad. No single group of workers in the | United States is suffering more seri- ously from the evils of seasonal em- |ployment than does the Mexican | worker. The packing houses in Chicago | have a great number of Latin-Amer- | ican workers. Tampa, Fla., alone jhas over 100,000 Latin-Americans, the majority of whom are Cubans, | employed in the tobacco industry. In New York, and the border line of | New Jersey, there are more than | 250,000 Latin-American workers; | they toil in restaurants, hotels, pack- | ing houses, tobacco factories, dye works, textiles, etc. Their average wage is from,$12.00 to $15.00 per week, T.U.E.L. Should Organize Them. Thie brief outline of the conditions of the Latin-American workers in ) this country should make us realize | the importance of the work that con- | fronts us. The Trade Union Educa- | tional League is the first. organiza- | tion which should initiate a cam- | paign to organize the Latin-Amer- ican workers in their respective unions, taking a leading part in the struggle against the A. F. of L. of- ficialdom which keep them out of {the unions, in the organization of | the unorganized and the. building up | of new unions. Our anti-imperialist propaganda can be successfully carried on among the Latin-American masses, for) every Latin-American worker is an anti-imperialist and the question is to activize him. The publication of Communist lit- erature in Spanish is imperative. The Spanish Language Bureau of the Party constantly receives re- quests for Party literature in Span- ish. The Party should undertake the publication of pamphlets, leaflets, ete., in Spanish with the help of the Bureau. New Fractions Built. Since the publication of “Vida Obrera,” the Party was able to organize Spanish Language Frac- tions in a few districts, such as De- troit, Chicago, San Antonio, Texas. |The New York Fractions, which | among the Latin-American workers. The Spanish Language Bureau of the Party constitutes at present the | basis for organizational work among |the Latin-American masses but the districts are the ones who should undertake the work and change the Bureau into an instrument of propa- ganda to help the districts carry on the work among the Latin-Americar workers, and lead—the chaser could detect cigarette smoke as he detected poison gas in the army. But he coughed as he reached the game, Piles of coin jingled on the con- crete floor, and every player rushed to the nearest machine. The right- |ful machine driver felt saved and virtous. The players were prompt after that, and watchful: | One of the young fellows in the shop was never greeted by the {chaser. Unmarried, he was fiercely resentful at having to work as a driver’s mate at nights when others walked in the park with the girls or listened in on the radio. He had been a prisoner of war, and although he brought the best lunches in the shop, the hollow cheeks of the prison |camp had never filled out. “Who the hell can eat in this place?” he would ask. “He'll lose them _ skirt-chasing ideas when he gets my age, the oldest man in the shop said: “He'll be all right if he don’t get married,” a lead-press man, father of six, said wistfully. The ex-prisoner had an easy job— done by a boy of sixteen on the day shift. He watched the cable curl on the wooden drum, and was supposed to look for defects in the paper. The “Like a bloody slow motion picture,” the mate said. One length of cable often took four hours to run off. The mate liked to read the sports column of the newspaper while he mechanically guided the cable into position on the drum. He was in- terested in the result of the big fight the night the chaser saw him. drum revolved on the axle lazily. | “Put your coat on,” the charge “The chaser, said we want men whv take an in- terest in their work.” « Copyright, 1929, by Internat Publishers Co., Inc. BILL HAYWOOD’, Boo! The Words of the Haymarket Martyrs Whi Influenced Haywood’s Life; Gompers’ Treachery All rights reserved. Republica. tion forbidden except by permission. In previous chapters Haywood told of his boyhood among t, Mormons in Utah; young manhood as miner and cowboy in Nevad hardships with family; miner at Silver City; in the Western Feder tion of Miners; at the W. F. M. convention of 1898; Gompers and h earlier acts concerning the Haymarket martyrs. Haywood repea the words of these workers when on trial which made him a reveal tionist. Now go on reading. * 8 * By WILLIAM D. HAYWOOD. PART XXIII. Gres spoke for eight hours. He arraigned the social system ¢ he proved that violence was constantly and extensively used to ov awe the industrial class, and that legal and political remedy had bi denied them. He said: I believe that the state of caste and classes, the state where one class dominates over and lives upon the labor of another class, and calls this or- der; yes, I believe that this barbaric form of social organization, with its legalized plunder and murder, is doomed to die and make room for a free society, voluntary association for universal brotherhood. You may pronounce sentence upon me, honorable judge, but let the world know that in A. D. 1886, in the State of Illinois, eight men were sentenced to death because they believed in a better future, because they had not lost faith in the ultimate vic- tory of liberty and justice... . These are my ideas; they constitut: a part of myself. I cannot divest myself of them nor would if I could. And if you think that you can crush out these idea: that are gaining ground more and more every day, if you thin! you can crush them out by sending us to the gallows, if you woul once more have people suffer the penalty of death because’ the; have dared to tell the truth, and I defy you to show where wi have told a lie, I say if death is the penalty for proclaiming th: truth, then I will proudly and defiantly pay the costly price. Cal your hangman. Truth, crucified in Socrates, in Christ, in Giordan Bruno, in Huss, in Galileo, still lives. They, and others whos number is legion, have preceded us.on this path; we are ready follow. Michael Schwab said: It is not much that I have to say, and I would say nothing a all, if keeping silent did. not look like a cowardly approval of wha has been done here. To term the proceedings during the tria “justice” would be a sneer. Justice has not been done. More thar this, could not be done. If one class is arrayed against the other it is idle and hypocritical to think about justice... . I have no the slightest idea who threw the bomb on the Haymarket, and have no knowledge of any conspiracy to use violence on that o any other night. * * * Oscar Neebe told of his work among the bakers and brewers Chicago, and the improvements secured in wages and hours of lal by direct action. He had worked for the education of laboring m When he was sentenced to life imprisonment he said: “I am so: I am not to be hung with the rest of the men.” Adolph Fisher said: You ask me why sentence of death should not be passed upor I will only say that I protest against being sentenced t death because I have committed no crime. I was tried in thi: room for murder, and convicted of anarchy. I protest agains’ being sentenced to death because I have not been found guilty o: murder. But however, if I am to die on account of being ar Anarchist, on account of my love for Liberty, Equality and Fra ternity, I will not remonstrate. If death is the penalty for ou love of the freedom of the human race, then I say openly that have forfeited my life. This verdict is a death-blow against fre speech, free press and free thought in this country. Said Louis Lingg: I despise you. I despise your order, your law, your force propped authority. Hang me for it. George Engel told the court: All I have to say in regard to my conviction is that I was no at all surprised. For it has ever been that men who have endeav ored to enlighten their fellow-men have been thrown into priso: or put to death. Samuel Fielden said: The nineteenth century commits the crime of killing its bes friends. It will live to repent it. But as I have said before, i it will do any good I freely give myself up. me. * * In a speech lasting many hours, Albert Parsons said: I am a socialist. I am one of those, although myself a wage slave, who hold that it is wrong, wrong to myself, wrong to m; neighbor, and unjust to my fellow-man, for me, wage slave that am, to make my escape from wage-slavery by becoming a maste and an owner of slaves myself.. , .This is my crime before hig) heaven. This and this alone is my crime.+.. The only sacrec right of property is the natural right of the working man to th: product which is the creation of his labor. These were the principles from which Samuel Gompers had “c fered all his life.” The Knights of Labor was at that time a strong, growing org. ization with nearly eight hundred members. Its rapid growth at t period made it evident to Gompers that the organization of craft uni: that he had started, the A. F. of L., could not meet with success if 1 revolutionary demands of the workers were encouraged. Gorhpers his plea to Governor Oglesby for clemency, had said: If these men are executed, it would simply be an impetus tc this so-called revolutionary movement which no other thing 01 earth can give. These men would, apart from any consideratior of mercy or humanity, be looked upon as martyrs, Thousands an thousands of: labor men all over the world would consider tha‘ these men had been executed because they were standing up fo: free speech and free press. W ask you, sir, to interpose your great power to prevent s dire a calamity.” I remember speaking’ coolly and calmly, and pleaded as strong ly as I could for the exercise of the governor’s clemency, at leas! to grant a reprieve to the men for a confiderable time, so that as opportunity might be had to establish their innocence, if they weal innocent. The qualifying word, “if,’ measures Sam Gompers’ loyalty to { revolutionary working class movement of America. This was writi thirty years after Governor John P. Altgeld in reviewing the ca had said: None of the defendants could be at all connected with the case The jury was picked. Wholesale bribery and intimidation of wit- nesses was resorted to, The defendants were not proven guilty 0: the crime charged under the indictment. The reason and manner of Gompers’ plea on behalf of the m about to die had made the delegates at Salt Lake City realize the w difference between the pure and simple trade union, and the West: Federation of Miners, which had inscribed on its charter: “Labor p duces all Wealth, Wealth belongs to the producers thereof.” *Samuel Gompers: “Seventy Years of Life and Labor.” Vol II, pp. 180-181, Gompers’ warning to the governor had expressed his life-ambiti which was to prevent the growth of the revolutionary working cl: movement. “ * * ° In the next instalment Haywood writes of the betrayal by Ger pers of the American Railway Union strike led by Gene Debs; + Haywood’s return to Silver City and his work in the W. F. of 3