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

DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, MONDAY, MAY 13 Baily Sas Worker Central Organ of the Communist Party of the U. S. A. Published by the Comprodaily Publishing Co., Inc.,. Daily, except Sunday, at 26-28 Union Square, New York City, N. ¥ } Telephone Stuyvesant 1696-7-8 Cable: “DAIWORK.” 1 SUBSCRIPTION RATES: By Mail (in New York only): $8.00 a year $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 Adéress and mail all checks to the Daily Worker, 26-28 Union Squai 5 = New York, N. ¥. Defend the Red Front Fighters! Revolutionary workers the world over will be stirred by the agreed plan of the German social-democrats and fascists to outlaw the Red Front Fighters’ organization in Germany. World protest will result. An effort is to be made to disband this defense organi- zation of militant labor while fascism’s various militarist breeds are to be tolerated, which means encouraged as anti- labor weapons in the hands of the ruling class. This was the program presented by the social-democratic minister of the interior, Carl Severing, in the cabinet of Von Hindenburg, at a conference of the premiers of the various German states. The official statement issued declared that “complete agreement was reached” and would go into effect immediately. The agreement is “complete” only insofar as the ene- mies of the workers are concerned. It collides head-on, how- ever, with the stand of the German working class that voted support. by large majorities in the workshops and factories, to the Communists and against the socialists. The effort to outlaw the “Red Front’, that Severing now seeks to carry out on a national scale, was inaugurated by the social-democratic minister of the interior for Prussia, Albert Grzesinski, who also declared the Red Marines and the Red Youth Front to be illegal. This anti-labor example has already been followed by Saxony and Hamburg. Under cover of the social-democratic mask it wears, the fascist re- action moves against the working class. One. of the few worthwhile pages in the history of the pre-war social-democratic party in Germany was its struggle against the Bismarckian exception laws. | Now it is the socialists who take up the role of Bismarck. They will fail as Bismarck failed. The German social-democrats, smarting under their de- feats in the factories, now fear the Red Front. Fighters’ demonstration planned for Whitsuntide, May 26, at Hamburg. It was later changed to Stuttgart. The latest social-demo- cratic move is an effort to suppress it altogether. These are indications that the May Day struggle in Berlin is only a forerunner of developing interesting events in Germany. Today the Communist group in the Reichstag goes into action demanding the withdrawal of all prohibi- tions against public demonstrations and against the Rote Fahne (Red Flag), the central organ of the German Com- munist Party. The demonstration in Union Square, Saturday, carried out also in other sections of the United States brought these. developments in Germany to the attention of an increasing number of American workers. The struggle grows with the developing resistance offered by the master class, with its social-democratic shock troops, against the growing revolu- tionary temper of the masses. Activity During Negro Week. Intensifying every posstble activity in support of Negro Week, May 10-20, strengthens the working class struggle on all fronts. Emphasis on drawing Negro workers into the new left wing industrial unions, on basing the broad campaign for the organization of the unorganized in the great basic industries on Negro as well as white workers, contributes to the success of the Trade Union Unity Conference to be held at Cleveland, June 1. Stressing the role of the Negro peasantry in the south, the Negro land workers who constitute a large section of the oppressed agrarian population, helps develop the unity and resistance of agricultural discontent. Fighting against lynching, against all forms of persecu- tion developing under the Jim Crowism that exists not only in the South, but throughout the nation, should help develop and strengthen the forces enlisted under the banners of the International Labor Defense that fights these capitalist erimes. : Negro workers and farmers, in the floods and storms that often devastate many sections of the land, are the worst sufferers. Bourgeois aid given white flood and storm victims is withheld from them. The Workers’ International Relief has an opportunity during Negro Week to stress its role as an organization for the relief alike of Negro and white workers, during strikes and in times of disaster. It was appropriate that the opening event of Negro Week should have been devoted to the building of The Negro Cham- pion, the organ of the American Negro Labor Congress. A powerful press is one of the first prerequisites for success- ful agitational and organizational work among the masses. It holds high the standards of every effort. It must get better organized support through the building of many new and strong locals of the A. N. L. C. Negro Week itself, the first organized effort of its kind, grows out of the radicalizing process which is today changing the outlook of the working masses, turning it toward the path of increasingly militant struggle. It should receive the greatest possible support from all workers and poor farmers. It should mark an important milestone on the road uf Ameri- can labor’s progress. © It should see an effective strengthening of the Communist Party, through an increase in membership and activity, en- abling our American section of the Communist International to better fulfill its role as the leader in the emancipation struggle of all oppressed, of all races and nationalities. | struggle. \of class betrayal and treason more |, | brazen and flagrant. Never was the |claim of the A. F. of L. to be the | organization of all the workers more lempty than now. More than ever | | | | j | | | ets tts ita ag ilo Trade By WM. Z. FOSTER. | IL ‘HE Trade Union Unity Convention, to be held in Cleveland, Ohio on June 1 and 2, will be one of the | most important gatherings in the history of the working class in this country. It marks the beginning of a new era in the American labor movement, The convention confronts many vital tasks. It will serve as a cen- tral rallying point for the revolu- | tionary and progressive elements in the working class to fight against | the developing war between the Uni- | ted States and Great Britain, | against the attacks upon the Soviet | Union, and against the intensified | | speed-up set afoot in the industries | by the employers. It will especially | | prove a means to unite the workers | |for struggle against the corrupt A. | F. of L, and 8. P. leadership, tools of American imperialism. It will add | great impetus to the left wing drive |to organize the unorganized. But | the fact that will lend the convention | | the greatest significance historically | is that it will be the starting point | for a new trade union center in the United States. | Basic Industries Unorganized. For forty-eight years the Amer- ican Federation of Labor has laid | claim to being the center of work- ing class resistance against the em- ployers, to being the “bona-fide” la- bor movement. But it has utterly failed to make good this claim... To- day, after all these years of “or- ganizing work,” hardly more than fifteen per cent of the organizable | | workers are within its ranks. And these are mostly skilled workers in the competitive industries. The| | great basic, trustified industries are | almost completely unorganized. | But unmeasurably worse than | its failure to draw the masses of workers into its ranks is the fact | that the A. F. of L. has not func- tioned and does not now serve the purpose of a class union. The rec- ord of its leadership is one long story of treachery to the working |class, a history of treason hardly equalled in any other country in {the world. A Capitalist Prop. But never was the A. F. of L. ‘more bankrupt than it‘is now. Never was its leadership more sub- servient to the capitalist class, more | violently hostile to all programs of Never were its policies |the A. F. of L. has become the un- |ashamed tool of American imperial- ism, It is the instrument of the | capitalists to put over their ration- | alization and war programs among the workers. It is a prop of the capitalist system. For more than a generation, not to go back farther, whenever A. F. of L. unions have been moved to acts of class solidarity and have | waged bitter struggles against the bosses, it has been against the wishes and policies and in the teeth of the sabotage of ‘the reactionary leaders, who have been traditionally | tools of the employers. Since the T. | U.-E. L: came into existence eight and one-half years ago it has been |the leader and organizer of these rank and file revolts. It has become | wildly hated by every crooked labor \leader in the United States. To. Organize Masses. The struggle in the old trade unions, especially those containing the greatest masses of unskilled and semi-skilled workers, . occupied. the major attention and efforts. of the | T. U. E. L. But now the situation | develops so that the T. U. E. L, de- votes its greatest efforts to the | masses outside-the old unions. _ | The vast armies of unorganized workers, especially the unskilled and semi-skilled in the key and basic industries, are. beginning to stir and to resist: under.the. bitter. speed up, widespread unemployment, wage cuts and generally worsening condi- tions confronting them. It is the great task of the T. U. E. L. to |organize these super - exploited | masses and to lead them in strug- | gle. | The A. F. of L. will not defend | the interests of these workers. Its | settled policy is one of betrayal of the semi-skilled and unskilled, of | surrendering them to the employers for intensified exploitation, in re- | turn for fat positions for the leaders and a few crumbs for the skilled workers, Many bitter experiences prove this. Hence it would be worse than folly: to try to draw these masses, now just awakening to the | need for organization and struggle, into the A. F. of L. unions, even if these inert organizations could be sufficiently galvanized into life to “organize” them. New Unions Must Be Built. Manifestly new unions must be formed for these workers; unions built upon an industrial basis, head- ed by militant fighters, and anima- ted by the spirit of the class strug- gle. This is the course being’ fol- lowed. Any other would be a deadly error, Already such fighting indus- trial unions have been established in the mining, textile and needle in- dustries, with more now building in the automobile, shoe and marine transport, and other industries. By the same token that it would be wrong to try to draw these in- dividual workers into the corrupt A. F. of L, wnfoma, so it would be in- correct to try to affiliate them col- nion Unity Convention|CEMEN A New Trade Union Center (This is the first of a series of four articles by William Z. Foster on the Trade Union Unity Convention to be held in Cleve- land June 1 and 2. In these articles Comrade Foster will deal with the factors that make the Trade Union Unity Convention necessary, the organizational and ideological preparations for the convention and its tasks. The other articles will appear in successive issues of the Daily Worker.) a ea ce to the A. F. of L. The A. F. of L.| ican Section of the Red International leadership does not want such revo-| of Labor Unions. lutionary unions and even if it In the past the T. U. E. L., while should in any case accept them it} maintaining its central national or- would only be to destroy them. To| ganization under its proper name, propose the affiliation of the new] has conducted its struggle under industrial unions to the A. F. of L.| other names in-the various indus- would be to invite them to submit] tries; such as the Save-the-Union to the treason and slaughter of ; Committee, Progressive Committee, Green and his associate labor fakers. Amalgamation Committee, ete. It National. Center Necessary. | was T. U. E. L, sections in the Min- Just as it is clear that the newjing, Textile and Needle industries unions must be formed in order to| that led the struggle in these in- organize the unorganized workers,|dustries which led to the formation so it is clear that a national center |of the new unions among these work- must be established to coordinate| ers. But now, coming forward under the new unions, to enable them to| its own name (which will be doubt- make common cause against the| less somewhat changed by the con- bosses and the labor misleaders. To vention), the expanded and reorgan- | task of the Cleveland convention. create such a center will be a basic This center will be the reorganized and expanded T. U. E. L., the Amer- ized T. U. E. L., to which the new unions will be affiliated, will di- rectly lead the struggle in the vari- ous industries. The coming conven- tion marks a new stage in the de- | velopment of the T. U. E. L. Fight in Old Unions. Does the formation of the new |} unions and their concentration into {a national center imply that the T. U. E. L. will give up its work in | the old unions, that the new center | will claim to be the whole labor | movement and will ignore the exist- ing mass trade unions? Does it call for an exodus of the left wingers | from the A. F. of L. unions? By no | means. On the contrary, the T. U. | E. L., with added strength from its new affiliations, will redouble its | work in the old unions. It will strug- gle to revolutionize them, to smash their reactionary leadership, and to bring them into closest cooperation and eventual affiliation with the re- volutionary unions. The reorganized T. U. E. L, will be the national center not only for the new unions but also for the left wing in the old unions. It will be the concentration point and organ- izer for all revolutionary trade union forces both without and within the A. F. of L. Workers! unorganized and organ- ized, send delegates to the National Convention of the T. U. E. L. Build a powerful organization that will defeat the bosses and their agents, the A. F. of L. leaders. Be repre- sented at the Cleveland convention. SINCLAIR GOES TO JAIL By William Gropper New Scottish Miners Union Formed By W. M. HOLMES. LONDON, (By Mail).—At a con- ference in Glasgow recently, the new Scottish Miners’ Union, the “United Mine Workers of_ Scotland” was formed. The conference was most success- ful and enthusiastic. One hundred and twenty-three delegates were present from all counties in the Scot- tish coal field, including delegates from 25 branches of the new union that have already been formed, Alexander Kirk, of West Lothian, a working miner was in the chair. In his opening speech he referred to the complete breakdown of the old county unions in Scotland, the open alliance of the old reformist leaders with the coal owners, their damp- ing down of the minezs’ struggle and their consequent policy of dis- ruption, splits and the expulsion of militants. Kirk castigated in strong | terms the shameful part played by Cook, who, he said, has now com- pletely turned against the rank and | file and joined hands with Mondism. All for One Union, Resolutions on the mining situa- tion (stressing the fact that a period of intensified struggle is opening) and the formation of the One Union for Scotland were agreed to unan- imously. Only one voice was raised against the immediate formation of the new union; and that was the voice of Philip Hodge, the general secretary of the Fife Miners’ Union. Delegate after delegate from Fife, howe: lectively through the new unions rose to explain that Hodge’s vie ¥- point was not that of the Fife mi: ers. The draft rules of the new union were approved with incidental amendments. William Allan (Lan- arkshire), was appointed provisional general secretary and a provisional executive of 14 was appointed. The conference instructed the pro- visional executive to get into touch with the M. F, G. B. and the individ- ual district miners’ union with re- gard to the termination of the dis- trict agreements. Agree on Program. A program of immediate demands was agreed to by the conference. This included the seven-hour day, a national wage agreement, a five-day week and time and a half for over- time, a minimum wage of 12 shil- lings a shift for miners (the present minimum in Scotland is eight shil- lings, four pence), 11 shillings for other underground workers and 10 shillings for surface workers. Child Labor By JACK SCOTT (A ‘l5-year-old member of., the Young Workers League) A million and more curses are borne upon the air The cries of children who have worked from the age of three. And the bodies of those children are terrible to see A million and more prayers go The god of money, Mammon, dren’s “god,” For I see weakened eyes and st: up to “god” who doesn’t care. is more powerful than the. chil- unted bones ; Thear their curses, followed by their groans, But thousands more are silent ; they are under the sod. I walk into a factory, I am choked by the dust and burnt by the heat, Can one work in such a place? Yet children are there. Capitalists, parasites, when their time comes, you beware! For kta their vengeance will be long and sweet. By FEODOR GLADKOV Translated by A. S. Arthur and C. Ashleigh } | All Rights Reserved—International Publishers, N. Y. | Gleb Chumaloy, Communist and Red Army commander, returns to | the great cement works half in ruins. His wife, Dasha, who has | become a self-reliant Party worker, greets him with a new inde- pendence. At the factory committee. time is spent. in endless quarreling. Gleb speaks there on the need for restarting the works. When he re- turns home at night, he fights with Dasha about her sex life while he was away. She insists upon the same freedom as he. He tries to force himself upon her, but she repels his love. In the morning they go to the children’s home where their little daughter, Nurka, stays. cle ae ASHA stood on the steps by the tall vases, waiting for him, breathir deep draughts of air. “What beautiful air, Gleb, like the sea. floor.” She walked on a few steps. She seemed as though she were goir home, as though she were quite at home-here. From the veranda Gleb saw more children down below among tt bushes and the clumps of ill-clad trees of early spring. The childre were straying about like the goats at the factory, fighting with eac | other, crying. Some groups were turning over the soil, digging greedi {and hurriedly like thieves, glancing fearfully behind them. They wou | dig and dig and then turn and tear the booty from each other’s gras: The one who was stronger and cleverer would roll clear of the heap « little bodies and run aside with his loot, gnawing greedily, chewing ar | choking, tearing at it with his hands as well as with his mouth, Near tt | fence some children were swarming over the muck heap. la mae 'LEB clenched his teeth and struck the balustrade with his: fist. “All these poor little wretches will starve to death here, Dasha. Yo | ought all to be shot for this job.” Dasha raised her eyebrows in astonishment, Nurka lives on the secor glanced down ar | laughed. “You mean their scratching in the earth? . . . That’s not so ver terrible. Much worse things happen than that. Had there been no one t look after them they would all have starved like flies. We have tk children’s homes, but we have no food. And if the staff were left fre | to do as they liked they would bite the children’s head off. Though som | of them are fine—real hearts of gold ... trained by us.” “And Nurka—is she in this state too—our Nurka?” Dasha met the white-faced Gleb’s gaze calmly. “In what way is Nurka any better than the others? She has ha her hard times too, If it hadn’t been for the women the children woul | have been eaten alive long ago by lice and disease and finished off b starvation.” “You mean to tell me that Nurka has been saved by a lot of scream ing women and suchlike?” “Yes, Comrade Gleb, Exactly—in that way and no other.” Coming down the mountain they had noticed the children on th veranda, but when they arrived the children and nurses had disappearec Probably they had run off to tell of the arrival of visitors. cAsak, Je ay no sun was shining in the hall, and the air was thick and hot, smellin of sleep. The beds stood in two rows, covered with pink and whit counterpanes, torn and patched. Some of the children were in grey smockr some in rags. Their faces were wan and their eyes sunk deep in blu sockets. The nurses passed through the hall, in and out... There wer little pictures on the walls, the children’s club work. The nurses in passing stopped deferentially. “Good day, Comrade Chumalova. The matron is just coming.” Dasha was not reserved here. This was her household. “Here I am, Nurka.” " A little girl in a smock, small, the smallest of all, was already run ning towards them, jostling the other children, with cries and. laughte: And all the other children pattered after her with their bare feet, and thei eyes like those of little hares. “Aunt Dasha has come! Aunt Dasha has come!” Nurka! There she is, the little devil! Impossible to recognize her a stranger, yet with something familiar about her, She rushed up to her mother, flew to her like a bird, shrieking, laugh ing and dancing all at once. “Mummie! Mummie! My Mummie!” Dasha laughed too, lifting her in her arms and kissing her. Nurka, she cried out: “My Nurochka!. My little girl!”. This was the old Dasha. again; the same as ever, as when she use to wait for him with Nurka when he was coming home from the factory The same tenderness, the same tears in her eyes, the same musical voice with the wistful quaver in it. “Here’s your father, Nurochka; here he is. daddy 2” Lik Do you remember you‘ * * * 'URKA opened her eyes wide, frightened. She tooked at Gleb wit! timid curiosity. He laughed and stretched out his hand, But he felt his throat con tracted, as if it were bound by a string. “Well, kiss me, Nurochka. How big you are! Mummie ... so big!” She shrank back and again looked piercingly at her mother. “It's daddy, Nurochka.” “No, it’s not Daddy. It’s a Red Army soldier.” “But I am Daddy, and a Red Army soldier too!” “No, this Daddy is not Daddy. Daddy looks like Daddy and not lily an uncle!” Dasha’s eyes laughed through her tears. . Gleb’s laugh strangled i) his throat. “Well, all-right. For this first time I’m not your Daddy. But you’r still my little daughter. Let’s be pals. I’m going to bring you som: sugar next time. Even if I have to dig it out of the mountain.. I’ll briny it. But why. is Mummie any better than I am? You're here, and. she’ somewhere else,” “But Mummie is here;.she’s here in the daytime, and when it isn’ daytime. But Daddy isn’t. I don’t know where Daddy is. He is fighting against the bourgeois.” “Aha, you got that off well. Give me a kiss!” The children danced around, staring at Gleb and hungrily waiting for Dasha’s voice and hand. The girls, with their hair cut like boys, kep stretching out their hands towards Dasha, clasping violets. Each wante to be the first to put the flowers into her hands, ~ Gg “Aunt Dasha! ... Aunt Dasha!” iene’ You're as big a * 'OMEWHERE off in one of the rooms the “Children’s International’ was being strummed on a piano and discordant children’s voices wert shouting: “Arise, ye children of the future! Freedom’s youth of all the world!” Dasha laughed and patted the children’s little heads; they were evi- dently accustomed to this caress and were waiting for it as for their ration of food. ‘ “Well, youngsters, what have yoy had to eat and drink? Whose tusw my is full and whose empty? Tell me!” 7 £ And they all shouted their answers in a general uproar. They werd scratching their heads and their armpits. One dirty little. wretch kept hawking and swallowing the mucus; his eyes bulged and he groaned, scratching his filthy chest under his shirt. Gleb went up to him and raised his shirt. Bloody scratches and scabs! But the boy screamed, terrified, and ran to hide behind the beds in the corner, so that only his head and protruding eyes were visible. “Ta, ta, tal There’s a hero for you! Look,at him behind the bar- ricades already!” a And the boy and Dasha and the children all burst out laughing; amd the sun laughed too in at the open windows as large as doors. Dasha walked on with Nurka’s hand in hers, without a single glance at. Gleb; and this hurt him. Dasha and Nurka. were as one—and he. a stranger to them—a stranger.and separate. Dasha, hand in hand with Nurka, was truly a mother, and more so here than at home, And he was alone, here and at home . . . childless. Yes, here too, life had to be conquered. They vjited the different floors and the dining-room, where the dishes were standing and the children sitting round; they went into the steamy kitchen, smelling of food, where were more children, and, then into the bare-looking clubroom, whose walls were covered with mildew and drawings, Here, clustered around a short-haired maiden with a brown birth- mark that covered all one cheek, the children were singing the “Interna- tional” in deafening, discordant voices, i “Arise, ye children’ of the future! \, The builders of a brighter world!” (To Be Continued.) me IE TRE aS A OR NR RD 5. Std Pe ee ee oe ee eee 8 t 8 is a i © 8 © p b c ti