The Daily Worker Newspaper, March 26, 1929, Page 6

Page Six NET oor DATLY WORKER, NEW YORK, TUESDAY, MARC Daily $45 Worker Central Organ of the Communist Party of the U. Ss. A Published by the National Da Daily, except Sunday, at 2 Telephone Stuyvesant 1 SUBSCRI By Mail (in New York only): $4.50 six months $2.50 three months By Mail (outside of New York): $6.00 a year $3.50 six months $2.00 three months Address and mail all checks to the Daily 8 Union Square, New York, N New Yor! “DAIWORK, $8.00 a year Worker, xe An Orgy In the Worship of An Imperialist Hero The death of Marshal Foch, the French military butcher supreme, has provided the imperialist world an opportunity to indulge to the extreme in the worship of war. In this American imperialism, especially its press, has eagerly joined, enjoying the continued drunken stupor brought on by excessive heroworship of a war idol who waded deep in the blood and agony of the working class. More than two score coal miners may be slaughtered in Pennsylvania’s underground hell pits. But a column for a day suffices for these. The death of Foch is exploited in pages of publicity for many days. To give the horrible details about the murder of these workers so near at home would arouse labor against the conditions and the social system that spawned this catastrophe. So this news suffers under the capitalist censorship. But the death of Foch is seized upon as an opportunity to spread the propaganda of militarism. Nothing so glorious as the military leader who sends millions of men to be shot to pieces or gassed to death on the battlefields of the capitalist ruling class. In other days it was Marshal Haig, of Great Britain, or Diaz, of Italy. Soon it may be “Black Jack” Pershing, America’s hard- boiled killer, or Von Hindenburg, of Germany. It doesn’t much matter. They are all alike the heroes of capitalism. It is for the working class to remember that it was Mar- shal Foch, of France, who rushed his generals across Europe to take their places in and give every possible assistance to the Polish armies warring against the Soviet Union. The armies of other border states were given similar support, in ad- dition to supplies of munitions and financial aid in the French imperialist effort to destroy the First Workers’ and Peasants’ Republic. Marshal Foch, while the world was still echoing with the roar of propaganda floods against ‘The Hated Huns”, gloried in the advance of the German armies into Soviet Ukraine. The nests of French emigres now safely + protected in France, especially in Paris, yield up the most sincere mourners at the bier of Foch, for the Marshal was a hope of the fallen czarism. Marshal Foch was the champion of French imperialist foreign policies that selected a socialist to rule in Indo-China; that ordered the destruction in blood and terror of Damascus, and waged a war of extermination against the peoples of Syria, in Asia, and Morocco, in Africa; that joined American and British imperialism in wielding the executioner’s ax against the struggle for power of the Chinese worker and peasant masses. The remains of Foch were placed on view all day Sunday under the Triumphal Arch that Napoleon planned to cele- brate his victories. ‘Foch will find a final refuge beside the remains of Napoleon in Les Invalides. Fitting company. It was Napoleon who was depended on by the reaction to destroy the fruits that the proletariat sought to win in the French revolution. Foch and Napoleon were alike the ene- mies, in different periods of French history, of the toiling masses of France and of the world. The antidote, for the militarist poison spread incidental to the death of Foch, is an intensified working class struggle against the war danger under the leadership of our Com- munist Party and the Communist International. Foch, even dead, symbolizes the effort of capitalist rule to maintain its oppression over labor. Fake “Zinoviev Letter” Exposed. After five years, the length of time that has passed from one British parliamentary election to the next, definite facts have been established as to the faking of the so-called “Zinoviev Letter”, that was used by the British government, in 1924, as a subterfuge for breaking off diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union. This fraud is also traced to the emigre Russians, Vladi- mir Orloff and Alexander Gumanski, leaders of the gang of alleged document counterfeiters in Berlin which also manu- factured faked letters designed to incriminate Senator Borah with having received money from the Soviet government as payment for his efforts on behalf of Soviet recognition. The facts brought to light indicate that conservative party forces, then struggling to unseat the Labor Party government, were the direct inspirers of the fraud, plotting to use it as “cam- paign material.” It has been déclared that the faked “Zinoviev Letter” was directly responsible for the defeat of the MacDonald Labor Government by the conservatives five years ago. It is, of course, difficult to establish this fact. There is no doubt, however, that it brought some repercussions, just as the exposure of the fake this year will have some effect on the British parliamentary elections now under way. It is worth while remembering, however, that J. Ram- say MacDonald, the leader of the Labor Party who gave his name to the labor government, has never denounced the faked “Zinoviev Letter.” He did not fight it five years ago asa fake and a forgery, but rather accepted it. Repeated demands on the part of British workers, and even of the British Trade Union Delegation to the Soviet Union, that the “Letter” be denounced, brought no action from MacDonald. It is inevitable that MacDonald should seize upon the latest exposures in an effort to coin this development into “campaign material” for His Majesty’s Labor Party. But 1929 is not 1924. The British working class has passed thru its first “Labor Government,” it has experienced the betrayal by the Labor Party leaders of the coal miners’ strike and the general strike and it has witnessed the increasing develop- ment of class collaboration, on an American Federation of Labor scale, between the heads of the Labor Party and the General Trade Union Council on the one hand, and on the, other the great industrial overlords "and the conservative government. The exposure of the faked “Zinoviev Letter” will un- doubtedly draw the British workers into closer sympathy with the workers and peasants of the Soviet Union. This will not mean increased support of the Labor Party, foremost reformist agent ef British imperialism, but rather a swing in support of the British Communist Party, that wages the’ it in the parliamentary elections under its own standards, he only Party of labor in Great Britain that raises the } of “Class Against Class!” Y “4 i :h | Force By J. R. (Warsaw). The so-called extra-party “Bloc New Polish Con ANOTHER MINER KILLED FOR PROFITS! —Ccurtesy April New Masses. stitution for Collaboration with the Govern- Pilsudski Regime Compelling Sejm to Pass Law for Official Dictatorship ment” (B. B.), the leading exponent of Pilsudsky’s fascist government in the Polish Seym (Parliament), has brought in a bill for the revision of the Polish constitution. | Rew Constitution. The bill, which replaces the 56 ar- ticles of the old constitution by 70 new articles, goes beyond a mere constitutional reform from the for- mal standpoint—it contains a new constitution. The bourgeois demo- cratic and parliamentary constitu- tion passed in March, 1921, is to be | substituted by a new one directed |openly and expressly against par- liamentary and democratic princi- ‘ples. |. In reality bourgeois democracy and parliamentarism have been dead since the coup d’etat in May, 1926, jand this new draft of a constitu- tional revision is merely the formal confirmation of an existing fact. | The bill has been thrown in the! face of the Seym with a dictatorial| gesture. The president of the B. B., Colonel Slavek, Pilsudski’s chief | agent (and like Pilsudski a one-time | “socialist”, quite according to the |pattern of the Polish S. P.), made the following declaration to the rep- resentatives of the press: “Our ex- \tra-party bloc controls over 30 per| cent of the votes in the Seym, in-| stead of the necessary 60 per cent. decrees into force on his own author-)of the fascist Government. ity. A special clause entitles the president to act on his own judg- ment. The president is responsible to no- body. He can appoint as he pleases, give offi posts or remove them same, i for the Seym, ete. The responsibility of the ministers for the actions of the president is considerably lessened. These extreme powers held by the dent (that is, by the fascist overnment) reduce the role played by the Seym to a minimum, the more that the bill includes a provision that he Seym shall work under the est governmental control. eneral suffrage” continues to The fascist government would gain nothing by creating a census Seym, which would probably only give an advantage to the opponents No one, however, is allowed to vote before serious consequences. attaining 24 years of age. This ex-|On the demand of the Marshall of cludes revolutionary youth from the|the Seym, or of one quarter of the poll. number of deputies prescribed by | Soldiers are permitted to vote; the |the constitution, or on the order of| voting age being fixed at 24, this|the minister of justice, the “per-| means that only the officers and non-commissioned officers take part in the elections. Traps for Revolutionaries. The new constitution sets innumer- able traps for the revolutionary dep- uties who succeed in get%ing into the Seym in spite of all these difficult- ies, for the president ‘of the republic ight to decide on the valid. ted elections, And since possible to contest the of any person's elec- ident can declare it to all ahd void. avery Seym deputy must take an oath that he will se:ve solely the rightfulness tion, the pr be British Cocoa Manutacturers Fire 400 Women Workers who is a supporter of the “soci Ramsay MacDonald. The Welfare, Fake. ,/and even then not until the lapse of | By William Siegel BILL _ grow fat, from all these you will receive blessings |the welfare of the whole Polish| State. This is directed especially) against the deputies of the subject! nationalities, and of course against the Communist and revolutionary |peasant deputies, who are counted) among the “elements hostile to the_| ate.” Failure to keep this oath| can involve jured” deputy can be brought be-| fore the tribunal and declared to} have forfeited his seat, In order to be able to clear the} oppositional groups in the Seym out |of the way the more successfully, the bill demands that the submis- sion of a bill must be accompanied by the signatures of one-sixth of the | total deputies, an interpellation by those of one-fifth, and a vote of no} confidence by those of one-fourth, | Meetings Farce. | | The Seym meets once a year for four months. Its chief task is to pass the budget, but the Seym is not} permitted to make any alterations beyond those proposed by the budget | commission. If the Seym has not] settled the budget question within | 21-2 months, the budget is declared | to be accepted. A vote of confidence can be passed | only by the absolute majority of the! constitutional quorum of deputies, | f seven days after its submission (in order to give the government time to exercise p But in spite of this we want to push} LONDON (LRA).—Four hundred our bill through on constitutional more women workers have been dis- lines.” charged by the Quaker firm of Cad- Colonel Slavek does not doubt that |bury" Bros., cocoa manufacturers,, at |the bill will be passed; his sole anx-)Bournville, England. New met&ods and new machinery had alt sible to : |Placed several hundred workers at this plant. iety is whether it will be pi |preserve the external form of th constitutign in the process. Still, there is no need to stand much on| After working 20 years or more, \ceremony with the gentlemen of the |since early girlhood, for this one \Seym. “Nothing will be altered in firm, women over 40 received the this project,” declares Colonel dreaded notices that they were | Slavek. “sacked”—the E ish term for Absolute Dictator. fired. As there are already 30,000 The draft constitution increases |Unemployed in the neighboring city re on the dep-| This pious Quaker firm has car-|yties). Should the vote of no con- ried out many of the same welfare fidence be passed, the president is} schemes so much heralded by certain |entitled cither to accept the resig.| large American firms. Profit shar-|nation of the cabinet or to dissolve ing devices, recreation, educational | the S. classes, private insurance plans| B. ss the Seym, there is the; jagainst sickness and old age are all | Senate, one-third of the members of | |part of the company’s scheme ‘to which are elected by the government “beat the union to it.” Their own |and two-thirds by popular vote (low- company union plan wag known as est age limit: 30 years). In this the workers’ committee. | way a guarantee is provided that the} Fellow-capitalists now hail. the Senate, even more than hitherto, “generosity” of Cadbury’s, because | will be a stronghold of fascist reac- the powers of the President to a of Birmingham, many of the women fantastic extent, and makes him the actual bearer of the fascist dictator- ship. The election of the president, hith- erto carried out by the National Assembly, is now to be decided by plebiscite. But the “sovereign peo- ple” is not allowed to choose its own candidates, but must select one of two candidates, one nominated by the National Assembly, the other by the retiring president, in this man- ne- the opposition is deprived of any possibility of putting up its own candidate. The president is accorded the right of veto. This ‘is a right of particular elasticity. If the presi- dent is so minded, he can postpone the sanctioning of laws passed by the Seym till the next session (that repeated acceptance dependent on a qualified majority. But even when such a qualified majority has been attained, he can still refuse his sanction, and even dissolve the Seym. In this manner the president, or the government, has the power to reject any law of which it disapproves. H The president may declare the Seym to be dissolved as often as he deems it necessary, and is limited only by the grotesque proviso that he nfust not do it more than once “for the same reason.” Full Legislative Power. Most important of all, the presi- dent is invested with full legis- lative powers. He can increase the already existing taxes and other dues by 10 per cent, and can put is, for a year), and can make their) -ling off in trade—or profits—the fainted when the “sacked” notices reached them. |they were thrown on the industrial | scrap heap by the very Quaker) \bosses who had so often boasted of | ‘their benevolent welfare work. That's Gratitude. Cadbury’s have found their repu- tation as benevolent employers a {good business asset. Thousands of jvisitors have been shown over the |Bournsville factory, and have been impressed by the many welfare} schemes initiated by the company. | This impression created in the minds jof “the nublic” has been worth many thousands of dollars’ advertising. |Sales of Cadbury’s cocoa and choco- late have made a fortune for a large |family and for their fellow-inves-| tors. In order to forestall the workers’ |resistance to rationalization and ‘the | \displacement of fellow workers, the |firm requested the company union committee to choose which men and women should be fired. The men’s committee refused, saying the dirty \job-belonged to management to car ouf. The women’s committee “de- | cided with the officials concerned who would have to go.” “The dismissals are necessary,” explain Cadbury Bros, “in order to reduce the staff to an ‘economic level.’” But there has been no fal- firm admits. Since the company’s attempts at “christianity” were like- ly to interfere with profit-making, by. all means let the “christianity” go. The directors of this large concern lare all liberals or tories, except one ¢ . *U. S. prohibition service a small allowance is: paid to each They realized that! discharged worker “to tide him over” ments by the Senate to Seym enact- for a few weeks. The workers point out that such a‘ bonus for a few weeks is of little use when older |women whose work has been highly | specialized in the cocoa factory find themselves up against unemployment in Birmingham. Workers in England have secured |a small measure of social insurance against unemployment. But the workers themselves must contribute a third of the fund. The “dole,” too \small to buy even enough food for) |the unemployed worker, is only a sop thrown out by the British cap- italist government to silence the workers’ demands for more adequate unemployment * insurance under | Portunists, who call for the defense real workers’ government. Won’t Test Holy Jones Law on Ordinary Man John Foldorof probably owes his reedom today to the fact that the wanted some more spectacular case on which to try out the vicious “five and ten” (five years in jail and $10,000 fine) Jones law for violation of the dry act. Felodorof was indicted by a grand jury ten days‘ ago. He pled not guilty. Federal Attorney Ulysses S. Grand 8rd wanted something of a ease befitting his ancestor in the tomb up Riverside Drive and nub- bed Felodorof. He wouldn’t prosec- ute. So the cowrt had to discharge its intended victim, tion and bureaucracy. The amend- ments can be rejected by the Seym only by a three-fourths majority. Discards Parliamentary Mask. The fascist dictatorship has laid /aside its parliamentary mask. This | bureaucratic and anti-parliamentary constitution, directed against the workers, peasants, and oppressed na- | tionalities, is the constitutional sanc- \tioning of the existing fascist rule. The Communist Party of Poland calls upon the working masses to tafe up the struggle. But not in defense of a bourgeois democracy |which does not really exist. The Polish C. P, exposes the hypocrisy | of the social democrats and other op- of “threatened democracy.” The C. P. of Poland combats this constitu- tion bill as it combats the fascist dictatorship, for one cannot be sep- arated from the other. a C. P. of Poland Fights On. The fascist constitution is not only the expression of the ruling fascist dictatorship. It is more than this: it means that the fascist dictatorship has secured its foothold and is pre- paring to deal an even severer blow to the workers’ movement, to the peasants and the oppressed national- ities. Therefore the C. P. of Poland does not regard the fascist constitu- tion as a purely formal alteration. For the Communist Party of Po- land the new fascist constitution bill is the signal for an intensified strug- gle against the fascist dictatorship, for the struggle for the workers’ and peasants’ government, for the dictatorship of the proletariat, es sass BN phil OOPAE f Copyright, 1929, by Internationa Publishers Co., Ime. iv HAYWOOD’S BOOK All rights rese.ved. Republica- tion forbidden except by permissicn, ae Haywood Sleeps Peacefully While the Jury Argues; Lone Man Wants to Hang Him; Acquittal! Fights for Others Haywood has told in previously printed instalments of this story how he lived in the Rocky Mountains as a boy and young man, always a worker; how the miners made him secretary of the Western Federa- tion of Miners; how he fought through the big strike that organization waged; how the I. W. W. was created; and how the mine owners tried to frame him for the murder of a governor. He is now telling of his trial for murder at Boise, and Darrow is making his closing argument for the defense. Read on. * * * By WILLIAM D HAYWOOD. * PART 69, “WHAT is the Constitution for except to let the rich rob the poor?” Wrecked Darrow. He described Supreme Court Justice Goddard as irtiest political skate in Colorado. . . f = i you kill him your act will be applauded by, many; if you should decree Haywood’s death, in the great railroad offices of our great cities men will sing your praises. If you decree his death, amongst the spiders and vultures of Wall Street will go up paeans of praise for those twelve good men and true who killed Bill Haywood. “In almost every bank in the world, where men wish @ get rid of agitators and disturbers, where men put in prison one who fights for the poor and against the accursed system upon which they live and and praise that you have killed him. “But if you free him there are still those who will reverently bow their heads and thank these twelve men for the character they have saved. Out on our broad prairies, where men toil with their hands: out on the broad ocean, where men are sailing the ships: through our mills and factories: down deep under the earth, thousands of men, of women, of children, men who labor, men who suf- fer, women and children weary with care and toil, these men and these swomen and these children will kneel tonight and ask their God to guide your judgment. These men and these women and these little children, the poor and the weak and the suffering of the world, will stretch out their hands to this jury and implore you to save Haywood’s life... .” He had spoken eleven hours. While he spoke he was sometimes intense, his great voice rumbling, his left hand shoved deep in his coat pocket, his right arm uplifted. Again he would take a pleading attitude, his voice would become gentle and very quiet. At times he would approach the jury almost on tiptoe. This speech was, I think, one of Clarence Darrow’s greatest. * * 8 PART of the instructions that were read to the jury by Judge Woods was written by John Murphy in his sick-bed at the hospital. The case went to the jury on the night of June 27. S That night I went to bed at about the usual time, and slept undis- turbed until they aroused me in the morning with the news that the verdict had been brought in. There was no hint as to what the verdict might be. - When I came into the court the room was filled with people. The jury was called and the judge asked if they had come to a verdict. The foreman answered that they had and briefly added, “Not guilty.” There was some gommotion as the jurymen began to step from their places. At the request of Richardson they were called back and polled, each one answering formally as he was called upon, “Not guilty.” I had been surprised as the jury came in at the appearance of a juryman named Gilbert; his face was ashen gray. One of the jurymen, with long whiskers, pulled a small American flag out of his pocket and said, “Haywood, I’d like you to sign your name on this flag.” I laughed and reminded him of the trouble I had already got into in Denver, writing on the flag. But I signed my name and he bot his souvenir. The labor jury’s verdict of “not guilty” had alrealy been announced. I received many congratulations from-friends in the courtroom and from all my lawyers, shook hands with the jurymen, and was invited by the foreman to visit his home before I left town. ‘As I went down the back stairs to the jail, I saw the penitentiary wagon just driving out of the yard. The warden had been waiting for me. The guard unlocked the cell. Moyer and Pettibone had already heard the news; Pettibone shook hands with me, but Moyer did not rise from his seat, although my acquittal had assured the probability of his. He only remarked laconically, “That's good.” I gathered up my books and papers, and went into the night cell to get the rest of my stuff. There were a number of members of the Federation waiting at the back door of the jail, among them Bill Davis and John Harper, who had been manager of the Victor cooperative store. They were warm and spontaneous in their congratulations. Some of them went with me to the house where my wife was living. She and the girls had gone there immediately after the verdict had been announced. I ‘was surrounded by a happy crowd. ‘ ee ae! HAT afternoon I went to the home of the foreman of the jury. He wanted to tell me the story of how the verdict had been reached. He said that there were many ballots cast, the first few being ten for acquittal, one for conviction and one blank. He added that it was he who cast the blank ballot. “I wanted to find out who it was that was voting for conviction,” he said. “In the discussion that followed, I learned that it was Gilbert. From then on the ballots were eleven for acquittal and one for conviction. Gilbert thought I had been won over and it was only a little while before we arrived at a verdict.” It was Gilbert I had seen coming into the courtroom with a gray face. I won- dered whether this Gilbert had made some promise to the prosecution which he found impossible to carry out with the pressure of the other jurymen against him. The foreman had used a clever method, I thought. I tried to express my gratitude, then I went home. , When I got home, several packets of telegrams had arrived. I started the folks to opening and reading them. There were nearly a thousand messages of congratulations from different organizations, members of the Western Federation and other individuals throughout the country, We decided to return to Denver the next night. On the follow- ing morning I took a walk with Darrow, who tried to dissuade me from returning to Denver with my wife and children. He told me that I should go somewhere up, in the mountains for awhile; he seemed to feel that it was important to me to keep out of the public eye for a time, but his arguments had no» weight with me. Darrow had been employed as a lawyer and not as a mentor. I told him that I should probably be called upon to go out to raise funds for the defense of Moyer and Pettibone. pee at HS I WENT to the hospital and brought my mother home, then to the other hospital to see about taking Murphy back to Denver with me, John was in the last stages of consumption, and we knew he would not live long. He was in his room at the hospital. The nun wh answered the door was not the one who-had been with him the previc day, but as I entered I saw two others gliding along the corridor 1i upright coffins. One of these was the sister I had seen the day befo! She went with me to Murphy’s room. He was ready and anxious *% leave that night. I told him I would come for him with a carriage. When I was leaving the nun asked me if I would not like to see the conservatory of music connected with the convent. From the music rooms she took me over to the academy and introduced me to the other nuns, who all congratulated me on my acquittal. The mother superior was away at a convention of mothers. While she was showing me over the building, the little nun told me she had seen MacParland in church, sitting directly below her place in the gallery. She said that she felt like throwing her prayer-book at his old bald head. Then she told me it was she who had turned and waved at me when I was working in my garden in the prison yard. * * * In the next instalment Haywood tells how he refused the advise of Darrow and the jurymen to “be quiet for a while” and plunged into revolutionary activity. World-wide celebrations were held over his release. You can have Bili Haywood’s book free with one yearly sub- scription to the Daily Worker, new or renewal, 1 anes Soe hl i oe