The Daily Worker Newspaper, March 13, 1929, Page 6

—_— ar» teen aot en et tO a eon Page six DAY. DAILY WORKER, N W YORK, WEI Baily 32 Worker Central Organ of the Workers (Communist) Party . New York, | Stuyves: six months onths checks to 28 Union % The Watson Coal Bili Not content with anything less, the coal operators of the entire country are straining every tissue to take absolute control of not only the mining industry as such, but also of the bodies and minds of every miner working at the mines they own. To this end, their agents in Congress are doing their damndest to pass the Wall Street-coal operators-John L, Lewis proposal that is advertised as the Watson Coal Bill. bill means the return of peonage to closer approach to all other industries. It means also, that if Wall Street, the coal operators and John L. Lewis have t The passage of th the coal fields and its heir way with this pet scheme of trus ification and speed-up which they call “rationalization,” you will be lucky to be able to draw your breath, let alone a pay on pay day. To effectively stop these things the workers must or- ganize! Class-conscious industrial unions already formed must be built to giant proportions and, through a national center, fling their economic and political strength in the teeth of their oppressors. The National Miners Union is such a union. Miners must join it and help to fight against the slavery that Lewis is seeking to impose on you for his friends, the coal operators and Wall Street, Fight against the Watson coal bill. It is a bosses’ plan for trustification. ; They call it rationalization but it is the intensified. a ee eee ee The Present Crisis Within the Insh Labor Movemen By JACK CARNEY, |skilled and unskilled, the majority Since the rout of the Irish Labor |of whom are organized in the Work- Party at the last general election, ers Union of Ireland. the Party has gone from bad to| Railroad Bosses Cut Wages. worse, Within the inner councils| Now come the railway directors there were hot discussions. The : division within came out in the open at the recent election of officers for the Irish senate. The Labor| men, due to the policies of the lead- Party put forward a candidate for|ers, Thomas, Cramp & Co., stand vice-chairmanship, an office carry-|helpless. before the attacks of the ing with it a salary of £1,000 per | railway companies, The men grow year, Senators Foran and Duffy,;restive and so the mass meetings both members of the Irish Transport | of the Workers Union of Ireland are and General Workers Union, voted |the largest in the country and its openly against the nominee of the membership increases daily. There Party. Johnson, on his election as |have been up to date over 2500 Irish a senator had announced his resigna-|railway workers dismissed. The tion as secretary. Following the vote | Workers Union of Ireland has of Senators Foran and Duffy, R. J. | brought the fight from the indus- P. Mortished, considered the “fntel- | trial field and now d lectual” head of the Party, satel fea ” tendered | the railways of the country be taken his resignation. over and controlled by a national Previous to this there had been | council composed of representatives on foot in Dublin an alleged “unity” | Of the workers. This move has been movement, which claimed to bring | enthusiastically received by the rail- about the unification of the work-|Wway workers, ers of Ireland into one organization. | British unions are afraid to face this Unions that were Irish and were the |issue before their own membership result of opposition to British unions |@nd so out of these day-to-day joined with the latter in this alleged | Struggles the demand for Trish work- unity move. The new council in|ers in Irish unions grows. Dublin met and at the second meet- | ing the Irish Transport and General | the free state parliament for lower Workers Union withdrew leaving the | taxation, occasioned by the serious situation as it was before the move | depression of Irish agriculture and was made for unity. The new coun-|the competition of British trusts, cil sits but carries no weight with | finds the employers demanding from the workers. it remains silent and at times brings speed-up system also demand reduced wages. |reduced wages. In this struggle the |and dismiss the running staff and| 0. ‘The! British National Union of Railway- | The officials of the| The demand of the opposition in| On important issues|}the government either taxation or| itself before the public by a deputa- tion to poor law authorities appeal- ing for a few more shillings extra relief, while other unions are batt- ling for the development of employ- ment schemes to absorb the grow- ing army of unemployed. Bevin, English Misleader, Jeered. The fight in Ireland, along trade union lines, is one for the organiza- tion of Irish workers into Irish unions. Recently Ernest Bevin visited Dublin. He received such a hostile reception that he retired be- fore the running fire of Irish trade unionists. In Belfast there were more speakers on the platform than there were workers in the audience. The reason for this is not far to seek. The wages of transport work- ers in England are from £1 to 283— less than what they are in Ireland. If the Irish transport workers were organized into the British union a national agreement would find wages reduced from 13 to 9 shillings per day. Where Bevin’s union has gained a foothold, as for instance. in the Dublin tramways, the workers have had to submit to a reduction of five shillings per week. Every worker on the tramways is com- pelled by his employer to belong to Bevin’s union. ‘ The strongest British union in Ireland is the National Union of Railwaymen. It finds itself faced _ with the growing strength of the Workers Union of Ireland. Rationali- zation has reflected itself to a large extent in the railway construction shops of England. Here the rail- way workers work for 20 to 25 shillings per week less than the Trish workers similarly employed, VN result being that members of i ish unions in Ireland ate dis- because members of the same y in England are doing the same ¥ per. The result that fol- is the dismissal of Irish work- rs from the railways of Ireland. Workers’ Union of Ireland has government tries to retrieve its po- |sition by making itself the leader in the fight for lower wages, The rank and file of the trade unions de- mand action. The class collabora- tion policies of the Irish Labor Party and Trade Union Congress are op- posed to any strikes. The represen- |tatives of trade unions against whom | the fight is directed find themselves differing with leaders of the Party who turn more to middleclass sup- port for a coalition to form a gov- ernment. As the fight grows more intense the demands upon the trade union leaders grow more insistent, Hence this split within Irish Labor |Party. Labor Fakers Discredited. The “industrial” leaders of the |Labor Party cannot regain the con- fidence of the rank and file. Their condoning of executions of republic- ans who opposed the British-inspired Free State, the open incitement to direct war upon the rebel forces and the pacts between them and the employers, have made it impos- sible for them ever to regain their control over the working class. Small unions under the domination of former large unions like the Irish Transport and General Workers Union now fight to throw off this control. Each day finds them in- volved in a struggle and each day finds them tuzning to the Workers’ Union of Ireland, which has the largest number of unskilled workers organized in Ireland. During the “stable” years when the country was torn in two with an armed struggle the price paid for the treacherous neutrality of the right wing was a class collaboration agreement. Today the employers feel comparatively secure. But rank and file workers throughout Ire- land are now awakening. The crisis within the Irish Labor Party is proof positive. The Irish Labor Party can never return to anything like its former position. It lies dis- | to bear the brunt of the battle the dismissals were directed ning against the semi eredited and broken, a warning to all those who believe that they can fool all the workers all the time, __. rules of this art, repeated! ly. quoted | MORGAN’S | | Some Experiences of the Armed ! By L. A. Deze the ten years’ existence of the Comintern the class strug- gle has assumed in the various |countries its sharpest form, that of | armed insurrection. We wish mere- ly to recall a few of the most im- | portant episodes of these struggles: | insurrections and Soviet Republics in Munich and Hungary, 1919, oc- |cupation of enterprises and estates in North Italy, 1920, Ruhr strug- gles, 1920 (Kapp-Putsch), March |struggles in Central Germany, 1921, insurrection in Hamburg and Bul- garia, 1923, insurrection in Reval, 1924, July-struggles in Vienna, 1927, struggles in China, 1927-28,| (Shanghai, Canton). | Shortly before the formal estab-| lishment of the Comintern, mighty | armed class struggles took place, | such as the big victorious October insurrection in Russia, 1917, the| civil war in Finland, 1918, the mu- |tiny in the army and the transfor- | mation of the imperialist war into a civil war in Germany and Austria, 191&, the January struggles, 1919, in Beriin. The leaders of social-democracy “repudiate” the armed class strug- |gle. They are advocates of armed| insurrection only in the countries of) proletarian dictatorship (see Kaut-| sky: “The International and Soviet | Russia”), whereas in the capitalist | | countries they are for brutal sup- | pression of the revolutionary mass jmovements (Ebert, Scheidemann, Noske). | Sometimes the Left social-demo- crats pay even lip service to the proletarian revolution. But when it |really comes to the struggle, and especially when the struggle ends | |in defeat for the struggling masses, they declare “that one should not| have taken up arms.” An eloquent example of this was| jgiven in the July days, 1927, when the Austrian Left social-democrats, | who were certainly very “red” shortly before the struggle, con- demned already in July, 1927, the! demolition of the High Court of} Justice by the excited masses as a dastardly action and hastened to! dissociate themselves from the “in- cendiaries.” Class-conscious proletarians, Com- munists, take up a different atti- tude to armed class struggles. They cannot simply “repudiate” such | struggles, because they are unavoid- able historic phenomena which can- not be ordained or forbidden at will. They cannot desert the oppressed masses, who are fighting for their rights at such a critical moment (in contradistinction to the social- | insurrection “REPARATIONS” BANK Class Struggle by Lenin, (See “Revolution andover, it is not a purely French phen-| Counter-Revolution.”) lomenon, but a typical example of | Marx and Lenin On Armed Revolt.|the civil war plans of the bour-| The doctrine of Marx and Engels| geoisie throughout the world. ‘There-| on armed insurrection was further|fore there is every reason to make| developed by Lenin, who was not|a careful study of plan “Z.” | only a great theorist of armed in-| To put it briefly, this plan “ et surrection but.also the leader ani : that in case of serious unrest} organizer of the great October in-|in Paris, when it seems hopeless to} surrection. It is characteristic of|nip the rebellion in the bud, the | Lenin’s genius that he did not give| government troops be for the time his mind only to “high” political| being withdrawn from Paris and and strategical problems, to the| concentrated in Versailles together “aniversal line” of the insurrection, | with the reinforcements drawn from but took @ great interest in the|the various provincial garrisons, in smallest technical details of the, order to reconquer Paris with the| prepafation and carrying out of the | concentrated forces. and was a greater Same Plan in Germany. adept at “this ‘than “anyone elie, Thus, the French General Staff] We merely draw attention to an| wants to repeat today the tactic instruction ¢laborated by him in| applied by Monsieur Thiers in the) October, 1905, “on the tasks of the slaughtering of the Paris Commune. groups of the revolutionary army”)That a similar plan exists for the in which he goes into the tasks, | “defence of Berlin” was admitted in the equipment, the training, ete., of 1926, at the arrest of several lead- the revolutionary “groups of three”|ing German fascists (Col. Luck and and “groups of five,” and also to|others), According to this plan the \the article, “The Moscow Insurrec-|Reichswehr and the fascist leagues tion,” in which he explains in great|were to be removed from insurgent detail, among other matters, the Berlin, to be concentrated in Pots- methods of struggle for the army. |dam for the purpose of reconquer-| Lenin’s numerous articles on this |ing Berlin from outside question are a reliable key to a| What is the meaning of the tar- proper understanding of the exper-|tic that in a civil war the counter- iences of armed class struggles, but|revolutionaries are prepared to they cannot take the place of a/abandon towns and even whole re- careful study of these experiences| gions to the insurgents? This is themselves. It is a regrettable |qdue to the fact that the reaction is, fact that so little is done by the|above all, afraid of direct contact Communist Parties for the investi-|between its soldiers and the insur- gation of the wealth of civil war/gent masses. To quote the German experiences in the last decade. On the other hand, these exper-| pamphlet on the experiences of the iences are busily studied in the/Reichswehr in the Ruhr struggle of camp of the bourgeoisie and utilized |1920, “under the pressure of the for its civil war preparations. There | growing excitement of a hostile MARCH 1 General Loffler, who has written a|do not succeed in preventing the exists an extensive literature, espe- cially in Germany, on _ struggle against “internal unrest.” Every- where detailed regulations are being worked out for the event of “in- ternal unrest.” We would like to mention here only the famous plan “Z,” the plan of the French Gen- eral Staff for the suppression of an eventual insurrection of the Paris population. Although plan “Z” is already “ob- solete” as a sensation, it is. still very much alive because it hangs | continually like a sword over the heads of the French workers. More- working class population, hundreds of thousands strong, ‘the troops |sink as into a morass,” Thus, this tactic is dictated, first and foremost, by concern for the reliability of the soldiers, by fear that the revolutionary “infection” will spread to the cannon fodder at the disposal of the counter-revolu- tion. Within the framework of big concentrated forces, in a war with proper fronts against the strong- holds of rebellion, it is easiest to isolate the soldiers from the revo- lutionary masses. Suppression of an insurrection of democratic leaders, who in such {cases do not want to desert their own bourgeoisie). They cannot dissociate them- selves from such struggles because this would mean cowardly betrayal of the cause of the international proletariat, They declare them- selves for these struggles regard- less of whether they end in victory or defeat, even if serious errors were committed in their leadership. They look upon the positive as well as the negative experiences of these struggles as a source from which lessons can be drawn:for the future inevitable struggles. This was exactly the attitudes of Marx and Engels to armed revolu- tionary struggles. They were not only enthusiastic believers. in such struggles, they also thoroughly in- vestigated the experience of these struggles, (See “Civil War in France,” “The 18th © Brumaire,” “Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Germany.”) At the same time, they did not neglect careful study of the prac- tical questions of the carrying out of an armed insurrection. Theirs is the expression “art of insurrection.” They elaborated the fundamental On to Bigger Harvests in the Soviet Village | tion, |armed forces of the counter-revolu- , 1929 By Paris workers, provided for in plan} *Z,” certainly explains the efforts of the French bourgeoisie to create a thoroughly reliable army (with the help of Paul Boncour and Co.). An army composed of patriotic, de- classed and utterly unconscious} (colored) elements is to defend France against the “internal ene- my.” The cases of fraternization which) took place this January between the French soldiers and the miners in Grand Combe show that the French bourgeoisie needs very much | a reliable army. The government was compelled to substitute the con- | scripted forces, who proved them-} selyes unreliable, by colored troops. The efforts of the bourgeoisie to create cenary cadres on whom it can rely, not only in the case of proletarian insurrections, but also in the labor struggles, as blind tools against the working population, are an international phenomenon. This phenomenon can be very dangerous to the proletariat if it shows itself incapable of enlightening the pro- fessional soldiers, including the col- | ored troops, by suitable methods, | and of shaking their confidence in the bourgeoisie. The highest tactical principle of the counter-revolutionary side con- sists in not letting their forces be defeated singly, but to concentrate them, to form regular fronts against the insurgents, to liquidate one by one the various hotbeds of rebellion. Having “restored order” in one rebel center, it will be possible to proceed against another with concentrated forces. This tactic is, no doubt, the most favorable to the bourgeoisie; it is bound to lead to the suppression of the insurrection if the insurgents concentration of the counter-revolu- tionary forces, in disorganizing them already before their concentration, in neutralizing them or drawing them to the side of the revolution, in disuniting and defeating the al- ready concentrated trocps, | But this presupposes maximum | activity on the part of the insur-| gents, from the beginning. They are lost if they do not assume a relentless offensive. “The defensive | is the death of every armed upris- ing” (Marx). Use of Provincial Garrisons. It is said in plan “Z’” that armed forces are to be ‘drawn from the provincial garrisons to suppress an insurrection in Paris. Certainly, if the insurrection feared by the bour- geoisie is to become a repetition of the Paris Commune in the sense that it will be limited to the capi- tal, that it will be impossible to extend the insurrection to the pro- vinces, the insurrection in Paris will be a failure if the counter-revolu- tion were really successful in em- ploying also the provincial garrisons j for the suppression of the insurrec- But if the insurrection takes place simuftancously in various parts of the country and if the insurgents, first and foremost in the provinces. succeed in getting the best of the ticn in their own regions and then i...mediately make an energetic at- tack on other counter-revolutionary troops, the issue of the struggle will be different. Such a simultaneous insurrection everywhere, when there will be no “Vendees” where the counter-revo- lutionary forces can be concentrated undisturbed, can certainly only be visualized under the leadership of a revolutionary Party, well estab- lished among the masses not only in industrial districts but also in the countryside and among the rank and file of the army, and only if this Party has acquired the art of con- trolling the insurrection. This is the most important lesson ——— Copyright, 1929, by Internationa. Publishers Co., Inc. ILL HAYWOOD’S BOOK All rights rese,ved. Republica- tion forbidden except by permission. The First Preamble of the Industrial Workers of the World; the 1.W.W. and the 1905 Revolution In previous parts, Haywood told of his early life in the Ola West as miner, cowboy and homesteader; of his years as union man in the mines; his election to the head of the Western Federation of Miners; the union’s great strikes in Idaho and Colorado; the movement which culminated in the organization of the I.W.W. (Industrial Workers of the World) at its first convention at Chicago in 1905. He is now speaking of the action of that convention. Now go on reading. * * * By WILLIAM D. HAYWOOD PART 58. FTER considerable debate a constitution was adopted, with the preamble which follows:* “The working class and the employing class have nothing in com- mon. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of working people and the few who make up the employing class have all the good things of life. “Between these two classes a struggle must go on until all the toilers come together on the political as well as on the industrial field. and take and hold that which they produce by their labor, through an economic organization of the working class without affiliation to any political party. “The rapid gathering of wealth and the centering of the management of industries into fewer and few- er hands make the trade unions unable to cope with the ever-growing power of the employing class, because the trade unions foster a state of things which allows one set of workers to be pitted against another set of workers in the same industry,-thereby helping defeat one another in wage wars, The trades unions aid the employing class to mislead the workers into the belief that the working class has interests in common with their employers. “These sad conditions can be changed and the interests of the working class upheld only by an organization formed in such a way that all its members in any one industry, or in all industries, if necessary, cease work whenever a strike or a lockout is on in any department thereof, thus making an injury to one an injury to all.” * * * perine the convention I was a very busy man. I seldom left the chair during the sessions, and after the meetings were over I met with many of the different committees of which I was considered an ex-officio member. Sullivan, president of the Colorado state federa- tion of labor, was on the committee on the preamble. I suggested some of the changes in the preamble that were adopted. It was Coates who proposed the change of the old slogan of the Knights of Labor, “An injury to one is the concern of all,” and made it read, “An injury to one is an injury to all.” In the convention it was the miners’ delegates that decided every important issue. “They had come with the definite purpose of organizing an industrial union. All of these miners’ dele- gates were socialists, but they fully appreciated the need of an economic organization as a foundation, The first of May was adopted as the international holiday of the American working class. The general strike was recommended as the most effective weapon against capitalism. It was decided that only wage workers should be eligible to membership. The universal transfer of membership was adopted; any man coming to America with a paid- up card to any union in his own country was accepted into the I.W.W. The Ameri¢an unions at this time were demanding enormous initiation fees from foreign union men applying for membership. * * ° A RESOLUTION was adopted for a labor press, a literature committee and a lecture bureau. Militarism was condemned, and any one who joined the army, the militia, or the police power was forever denied membership. . This was, of course, at a time when there was no con- scription in America, Ce | - M. SIMONS and a number of other delegates had referred in their speeches to the Russian Revolution of 1905, which was already an inspiration to the labor movement all over the world. Lucy Parsons spoke of the terror felt by the capitalists of Russia at the raising of the red flag in Odessa. Delegate Kiehn of the Longshoremen intro- duced a resolution on Russia: * * * a Ee tat het there is in progress at the present time a mighty struggle of the laboring class of far-off Russia against unbearable outrage, oppression and cruelty, and for more humane conditions for the working class of that country; and “Whereas the outcome of the struggle is of the utmost consequence to the members of the working class of all countries in their struggle for their emancipation; and “Whereas, this convention is assembled for the purpose of organ- izing the working class of America into an organization that will enable them to shake off the yoke of capitalist oppression: now therefore be it “Resolved, that we, the industrial unionists of America in conven- tion assémbled, urge our Russian fellow-workmen on In in their strug- gle, and express our heartfelt sympathy with the victims of outrage, oppression and cruelty, and pledge our mora! support and promise financial assistance as much as lies within our power, to our perse- cuted, struggling and suffering comrades in far-off Russia.” e id ° » yee delegates visited Waldheim cemetery to see the graves of the Chicago martyrs, ‘When the officers of the new organization were elected, I was nominated by Guy Miller for president. Several other delegates spoke in support of the nomination when it was seconded, one of them saying that I was a man who wouldn’t be afraid to go to bull-pen if necessary “And lick the militia!” added Mother Jones. But I had to decline, a: T had just been re-elected secretary-treasurer of the Western Federatior of Miners, and my duties lay with them for the time being. Coates and Sherman were also nominated. Coates declining, Sherman was unanimously elected first—and last—president of the Industrial Work- ers of the World. * This first preamble includes the “political action clause” on whict the fight to make the I/W.W. an anarcho-syndicalist organization soor began, , In the next instalment Haywood writes of jis speech at the 1.W.W. convention; what he thought of its prospects; he organizes the “Bron- cho Busters and Range Riders union of the 1.W.W.” Readers who wish to get a copy of Haywood’s hook in regular book form, may get) of the armed class struggles of the past decade, * ral ‘ one free with each yearly subgeription, renewal or extension to the Daily | Worker, Send it'in now, ¢