The Daily Worker Newspaper, November 19, 1929, Page 4

Page Four Address and mz Send Resolutions to District Agitprop Department! The discussion on the October Plenum of the Central Committ and of the Plenum of the District Pxecutive Committee, held im- mediately afterward, is now being carried through in all vu of Dis- trict Two. A nuntber of units have already had their discus day, Wednesday and Thursday, November 18, 20 and 2 of Section Two will carry on their discussions. During the of November 18th, Section 1 and 3 will ca through their discussionss. Also some units of Section 5 will have discussions on the Plenun With only rare exceptions, discussions in the units so far endorsing | the Plen have been carried unanimously in all units. The chief dis- | cussion centered upon the tasks of the units, and sections themselv | The results of discussions have proved a stimulant to work. Comrad are asked to send to the District Agiprop Dept. copies ¢ tions they adopt for publication in the Daily Worker. PARTY RECRUITING DRIVE Into the Life of the Masses | ALFRED WAGE ts wee By ECHT. Every party member will hail with sincere bolshevik cheers the party recruiting and Daily Worker building drive. The announcement { of this drive made by the organization department of our Central Com- mittee should electrify every unit of the party. And why? Because this drive constitutes a political and organizational program which will propel the Party and the Daily Worker headlong into the industries; | will mark the beginning of making every mine, mill and shop a Com- munist fortress. The disintegrating factional background of our party still bears down upon us a little, causing many comrades to live only within the | party. Talking about inner-party situations constitute the sum total of their activities. Other comrades carry on wordy battle about social reformist illusions—not among the wor! in the shops to win them for the T. U. U. L. and the party but only within party circles. Com- rades are replete with indications that the masses of workers are in mood for struggle against rationalization and extreme exploitation yet on the job, in their shops, these same comrades are speechles Im- perialist war preparations continue, the danger of an imperialist at- taek against the Soviet Union grows day by day, however there seem to be comrades who do not realize that to fight the war danger and té defend the Soviet Union effectively the party must grow in mem- bers, in influence, establish its leadership among the workers in all basic and war indastries. The drive to win 5,000 new members for the party and 5,000 new readers for the Daily Worker has within it all elements neces: to | dynamite the party out of its present too static existence. It is a drive ‘to drive all of us into tasks that will win a majority of the working class for the party and constitutes an important step forward to make our party a mass party. Those who fail to participate in this drive will be swept aside by an avalanche of fighting proletarians who will replace them within the party. The time for marking time has p: d. It is either forward or backward. Those who fail to march forwa’ face the danger of soon finding themselves in the camp of the enem Throughout the program of the party recruiting and Daily Worker building drive there runs a line which we must call especial attention to. In past drives of this kind (and this has been especially true of Daily Worker building drives) comrades have orientated themselves too much upon skilled workers, sympathizers in the professions, small shop keepers. Here money came easy. Secondly, previous drives sent com- rades into the field in scattered formation, each to do what he could in his own way; each selecting his own prospective party members or Daily Worker readers. This drive throws the party, in organized formation, right in front of mine, mill and shop gates, right into the heart of all industries. It demands that districts of the party, center their attention and mobil- ize party forces in a real communist offensive against the most im- portant industries in the district to win the workers for the party. | This drive demands that each unit of the party approaches the fac- | tories within its jurisdiction in a body and through the distribution of the Daily Worker, leaflets, sale of party literature, holding of regu- lar factory gate meetings, establishes definite and lasting contact with the workers in the factory. The loyal carrying out of the drive program will enrich the party in shop nuclei, will help organize the T. U. U. L., will acquaint the j workers with the lessons of Gastonia and the bosses’ terrorism every- where, will expose the Lovestone and Trotskyist renegades, will liquid- ate reformist illusions, will broaden our Negro, women’s, youth, anti- imperialist, workers’ defense and strike relief work; it will place us | in the front of masses of workers ready to fight against the imperial- | ist war and for the defense of the Soviet Union. Evéry party comrade, party unit, section and district of the party must make the Daily Worker an organic part, an actual participant in the drive and in every task undertaken during the drive. It must be- come your spokesman in every industry, help you to organize and agitate. It constitutes a major instrument to help build a mass party | and must, towards that end, secure a mass circulation. | Do you accept the leadership of the Comintern? Forward then, | ranks solid and vitalized, into the life of the working class masses, with the Comintern Address and the line of our party plenum. | | | Class Struggle in South Rallies Workers Everywhere A cablegram from 20,600 textile | out and the low wage reign, has} workers in Czecho-slovakia and a |SPread over the land. | message from Hernan Laborde, head | The granite workers of West Con- of the Latin-American Red Aid, an- |cord, members of the International | nouncing continued mass support of | L@bor Mfense branch yesterday re- the Gastonia strikers indicated that |Cived the following letter from Mrs. | “the fight to free the seven Southern Alice Carpenter, secretary of ‘the | workers from long prison terms was , Bessemer City ae of ee LL.D. | continuing on an inereased scae_ ‘Dear Comrades o: neat ‘oncord | throughout the world. Branch of the I. L. D.: The cablegram from Czecho-slo- “The monument to our fallen fel- vakia recieved today at the national ,!ow-worker, Ella May, is accepted | office of the International Labor | bY the Bessemer City Branch of the} Defense, declared, “The Union of | International Labor Defense in the | Textile Workers in Czecho-slovakia |Same spirit of working class soli-| numbering more than 20,000 men |darity that prompted its donation. and women, protests against the lIt is a contribution not to Bessemer brutal class verdict pronounced upon | City workers only, but to all work- the leaders of the Gastonia strike. ers. For Ella May, though, we glad- The class verdict in this case is|!¥ Claim her, is now a loss not to a further indication to the hundreds |0U" vicinity alone, but a loss and) of thousands of textile workers in ain to workers generally. She has | America and the world that “free- |become a martyr toward working dom” and “democracy” are merely | class emancipation and rule. The phrases in the United States as in Mill Mothers Song, which she herself all capitalist lands. composed, should be engraved on her | ji ile- tomb, we think. That she is a work- Bees toc to et up tn there ingelass martyr should accompany | struggle until they have wiped out her name. Zila May,’ the date of this bitter verdict of class-justice, her birth—‘Sept. 29, 1900" and the | sending their leaders to living death ate she fell in action, “Sept. 14, in the North Carolina prisons. 1929 on the monument you are | ex ape * sending.” Granite workers of West Concord | ES Oe RR ERETIEA ES 8) have Sand yg hneth eel claim to have discovered the exs never heard o » N. Cy be- fore April when the strike broke out. Yet they volunteered to build a monument, which they have half) completed, for Ella May, working-| class martyr who was shot through the heart September 14, while on her way to a meeting of the Nation- al Textile Workers Union, | ‘The fame of Ella May, whose | historians long ugo evolution of the class a politicn) economists conomic physi T have added the following that classes contribution th Lt) ) that this a it the transition to songs are being sung throughout | of all classes and to the em. | the South, wherever the “stretch: | Marae bios el alcaeg agin tek i | sharply than in other capitalist countries. at 26-28 Cr DAIWOT New York, N re, Central Organ of the Commu “Worker ist Party of the U. 8. A. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: $8.00 a year: ik): $6.00 a year; 0 three months 0 three months $4.50 months: $3.50 six mont GET THEM OUT! Resolution of the November 1929 Plenary Session of the Chicago District Committee ot the C. P. U.S. A. on the Economic and Political Situation and Tasks of the Party The plenum of the Chicago District Committee of the Communist | Party of U. S., approves and endorses the thesis adopted at the last plenum of the Central Committee of the C. P. U. S. A., as containing a correct analysis of the Third Period in the U. S. and a correct applica- tion to the U. S. and to the C. P. U. S. A. of the Tenth Executive Committee of the Communist International Plenum line, the line of the Third Period, the period of the further development of the general crisis of world capitalism, the periéd of the sharpening of the inner and outer contradictions of capitalism, the period of the further radicaliza- tion of the working class and of the new rising tide of revolutionary proletarian movement, the growing danger of war and especially of war against the Soviet Union, as a country of the building of socialism, the revolutionary fatherland of the workers of the world. 2—U. S. CAPITALISM PART OF WORLD CAPITALISM. The march of events in the few weeks since the plenum of the Central Committee has already proven the correctness of the analysis of the economic and political situation presented in the United States. American capitalism is not isolated from the sharply accentuated crisis of world capitalism as the Lovestone theory of exceptionalism pretends. American capitalism is an integral part of the world capitalist system; and having become the world’s economic center of gravity, is not and cannot be exempted from the effects of the recent crisis of world capitalism. On the tontrary, this becomes one of the powerful factors | which accentuates this. general crisis. All of the main features of this crisis are manifesting themselves in the present situation in the United States, and some even more The growth of the pro- ductive forces in disproportion with the market, the rapid growth of trusts and combines, the ever closer linking up of the trusts and com- bines, with the capitalist state and with the trade union bureaucracy, the speed-up and wage cuts in the work shops, the conveyor system, and all other forms of rationalization, the preparation for war, the radicalization of the masses—all these main features of the Third Period are now to be found in the United States. The main contradiction of the Third Period—the contradiction between the productive forces and the market—drives U. S. capitalism into intensified imperialist penetration in its colonies and semi-colonial countries—principally Latin America. The intensified economic and political attack against those countries meets the resistance of the toiling masses, and in their fight against imperialist subjugation the working class of these countries begins to play a leading role (Columbia, Venezuela). The struggle between the U. S. and Great Britain for world hegemony is deepening notwithstanding the efforts of the bour- geois to cover it with phrase-mongering and maneuvers. The visit of MacDonald to the United States was only a hypocriti- cal maneuver designed to delude the masses with pacifist phrases under cover of which the war preparations are being steadily pushed forward; and the barren results of this visit showed the British and American bourgeoisie to be incapable of reaching even a temporary agreement on any important question of Anglo-American rivalry. The rapid growth of the socialist construction in the U.S.S.R., the success of the Five Year Plan of socialist tndustrialization and socialist reconstruction of agriculture, in its first year going beyond the highest previous estimates, which together with the introduction of the uninterrupted working week (with each worker having every fifth day a holiday) makes it possible for the whole plan to be carried through in four years, is an increasingly powerful factor to destroy capitalist stabilization and to revolutionize the international working class. 3.—PRESENT ECONOMIC SITUATION. As regards the present economic situation in the U. S. A., the thesis of the Central Committee correctly stated that we are in “an immediate pre-crisis situation.” The events of the last three weeks have not only confirmed the correctness of this analysis, but have shown the development of the beginning of the economic crisis. The fall in production in the principal industries is now further marked, The sharp decline in steel production (the present consumption of steel represent- ing only about 80 per cent of the productive capacity of the steel industry); the sharp decline in the automobile industry (35 per cent in the last six months), the decline in, the building industry (the total for the last nine months being 11.1 per cent less than in 1928), already give the feature of the beginning economic crisis. The decrease in the crop yield (9 per cent below the harvest of 1928) and the higher money rates are further symptoms of the coming economic crisis. The terrifie crash in stock exchange values (the sweeping away of $25,000,000,000 November 7, 1929) being a manifestation of the de- cline in production of the leading industries at the same time is an additional factor in, the further development of a deep-going economic crisis. One of the immediate causes of this unprecedented crash on the stock exchange was undoubtedly the huge volume of new securities issued during the last period ($2,239,000,000 worth in the last nine months, the new stocks as compared with bonds and notes representing in the third quarter of the year 80 peer cent of all corporate new securities offered as contrasted with 46 per cent in 1928 and 24 per cent in 1927). Nevertheless the barometer of the stock exchange only represented very clearly the coming of the economic crisis. The lying propaganda of the bourgeoisie and of the social reformists to the effect that industry is basically sound and that the crash in the stock exchange is due only to speculstion, represents an attempt to hide from the masses the deep going sature of the cvisis, to restore confidence in ’ the capitalist government, and at the same time to mobilize the small savings of large strata of the population under the slogan of “buy sound stocks” in order to support big capital in the present difficult situation. However, in the special periodicals which are not for the masses, the capitalists more or less openly recognize the beginning of the economic crisis; the Chicago “Journal of Commerce” speaks about “something more than seasonal adjustments influencing busines: New York “Journal of Commerce” states that “business has really passed its high point and is about to start downward for a period of unknown duration;” che “Analist” predicts “more or less serious busi- ness recession during the next year;” and the British financial authority, George Paish, declares that the New York stock market collapse “is a warning that we now are traversing the biggest financial crisis the world has ever seen.” 1. AGRICULTURE. * The inner contradictions of capitalism are aggravated in the agra- rian field by the struggle waged by tru ied capital against the farmers and by the sharp antagonisms developing between the rith and poor farmers and agricultural iaborers. True, the farmers in Illinois are in a somewhat favorable position compared with the farmers far away from the marketing centers and of centers of congested population, which enables them to establish direct marketing relations with the consumers. However, the bitter strike of the dairy farmers around Chicago last winter against Borden’s Milk Corporation and the Mow- man Company, the process of establishing large scale farming by these large corporations means in practice the squeezing out of the poor farmers from their land and of driving them into the ranks of the pro- letariat. The rapid mechanization of agriculture, now taking place is a further factor in causing the “independent” farmer to disappear with increasing rapidity and the number farmers: to increase. The credit system helps to further aggravate the crisis in the agrarian field. This holds true clearly in Indiana, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Southern Illinois. 5.—ECONOMIC CRISIS DEVELOPING. The present economic situation in the United States shows that we are now in the real beginning of an economic crisis which will charac- terize the coming year. The economic is, sharpening all contradic- tions of the present period, will intensify the drive towards a new imperialist war, and also because of the huge market of the Soviet Union, shut to capitalist exploitation, to a war upon the U. S. S. R. This coming economic crisis, the cost of which the bourgeoisie will endeavor to put upon the workers, leads to an increased speed of ration- alization, to wage cuts, mass unemployment, all of which has already begun. This attempt of the bourgeoisie to lay upon the shoulders of the ; working class the terrific economic burden of the crisis is being met by the resistance of the working class. To break this resistance the capitalists, well aware of the coming crisis, have already begun an economic and political offensive on the working class, by wage cuts, mass lay-offs, by attacks on the right of the workers to organize or to defend their organizations, attacks using more and more fascist methods, and an offensive on the Communist Party, the leader of the working class struggles. The most striking example of heroic working- class struggle and the brutal offensive of the bourgeoisie is shown in Gastonia. In the mining industry, the speed-up is proceeding more and more rapidly, masses of workers are being laid off, wage cut follows wage cut. In the State of Indiana agreements as to conditions and wages do not exist. In Illinois, the so-called tonnage rate is continu- ally readjusted to meet the ever increasing rate of production, result- ing from the introduction of machinery, all conditions of protection for the men are being virtually wiped out. A process of laying off old men in industry goes rapidly hand in hand with the general tendency to eliminate a large section of workers from industry. At the present time, a greater volume of coal is being produced in Illionis with a much smaller section of workers employed. According to the official figures on-employment the miners of Illinois average 14 days a month. This includes a section of workers employed every day in the month, bring- ing down the actual working time of every miner to about ten days. With the continued pressure from the unorganized field of Kentucky, West Virginia, ete., preparations are being made by the operators in complete collaboration with the United Mine Workers of America of- ficials to make a positive drive on the existing lowered wage rates and to bring them down to the lever of the unorganized field. Rationalization on one hand, and the beginning of the economic crisis on the other is already bringing great unemployment. In the mining industry, the Barr mine in Cordoville which formerly employed 600, now after the introduction of machinery employs only 200. The Deering-Peabody mine, formerly employed 600, now employs 120; the | Slopout mine in Harrisburg formerly employed 120, now employs 20. | employers in an effort directly to counteract the effect of the leaflets Mass layoffs have already taken place in the Majestic Radio Corpora- tion, the Seaman Body Company, the Harnishfeger, International Har- vester, A. O. Smith, Nash Motors, Florsheim Shoe and other big plants. The speed-up and wage cutting offensive of the employers taking place in the steel industry has resulted in numerous strikes in the industry. In the automobile industry, the speed-up and lowering of wages resulted in strike movements in the Nash plant in Kenosha and the Seaman’s Body plant in Milwaukee. The International Harvester Company has already introduced wage cuts of ten per cent in the Rock Island plant and has extended this cut to the West Pullman plant in Chicago. The construction of a large International Harvester plant in Rock Island and preparations to hire 8000 men in that locality is undoubtedly a step towards the reduction OF BREAD ity of Bread” by Alexander Doran, New York, PRANSLATED FROW THE RUSSIAN printed, by permission, fr weroff, published and copyrighted by Double: (Continued.) Mishka and Trofim walked on a few steps, and paused, never taking their freightened eyes from the mujiks. The mujiks watched them too, irresolute, ready to fall on them. ‘At that moment behind the two boys a thin column of smoke ap- peared in the distance; then a long train was silhousetted against the sunset. There was a brief flash of pistons. “It’s coming!” shouted Pyetra. “It’s coming toward us.” Thrown into fresh perturbation by the sight of the distant train, the mujiks climbed a little hill to meet it, determined to catch hold of the steps, to hang on to the rear buffers—to escape the night in the terrible stillness of the steppe. The soldier felt his wooden leg despairingly. “T can never get on, comrades.” One ofthe women, rejoicing that the soldier would not be able to jump aboard the train, said timidly: “Don’t jump, mujiks, you'll kill yourselves.” No one answered her. Terrified by the thought of remaining alone on the steppe, the woman prayed despairingly to God that the soldier might not jump, that the mujiks might remain there together. The train swung nearer, rounding a curve. The engine toiled dili- gently with its steel elbows, the smokestack panted through its gaping black mouth, delicate white steam rose and melted into the air. Pyetra bent over the old man. “Grandfather, the train is coming. Do you want to get up?” “I'll manage when it gets here. Sidor spoke loudly to the others “Jump-onto different places! Don’t all stay together in a bunch.” Trofim admonished Mishka: “When you catch hold, place yourself, with your head toward the engine, so the wind won’t blow you off.” ~ “And you'll jump on with me?” “T’ll jump wherever there’s a chance. I’m quicker than you.” The train came nearer, slowing its headlong rush as it climbed the hill. The engine snorted, the steep-browed iron horse turned on them the glare of its headlights. A rush of hot steam, released by the machinist, threw the women and the little girl to one side, and flung the old man down the embankment. Mishka heard Trofim’s voice as if in a dream: “Jump!” And again as in a dream, he saw the steps of a green car come rushing toward him, he stretched out his arms to seize them, he shrieked mad “Little uncle!” Before him Trofim’s head flashed by, Trofim’s legs swinging with the rush of the train. When Mishka realized that Trofim had boarded the train, the reserve of peasant strength hidden deep within his small frame, sent him bounding forward like a release spring. Another step flew by—another. People leaned out of the car windows, and every one looked at the little boy in the wide bark sandals running along with the train. They shouted something to him, but just as he was about to seize the steps of the last car, his breath coming painfully through his hot nostrils, some invisible force tore him from the ground, trampled on him, and hurled him down and down into a deep black hole, Slowly, one after another, those whom the train had left behind dragged on—Yermolai, Pyetra, the soldier with the wooden leg, the women and the little girl. Sometimes one fell behind, sometimes. another. They called to each other through the dark anxious night that divided them and plodded on stubbornly, plucking grass and grind- ing it between their teeth. A moment’s rest, then on again, obstinately, doggedly. Again the soldier took up his tale of clear cold water and green gardens. But lulled at last by the long versts he had traveled, the old man lay down submissively at the foot of a hillock, a gray heap in the tall parched grass. For the last time his fading thoughts en- circle the fields of his village, he smells the smell of his native soil, and in a last flicker of love he kisses the soil of the Kirghiz steppe, and murmurs with his old dying lips: “Be thou fruitful, Mother Earth, for the old, for the young, for the peasant’s joy!” The terrible sorrow of the people is here but it will flower into ecstatic joy. From every side, along every road, toilers come stream- ing from village and hamlet, great and small. Each one bears seed, each one casts his seed into the hungry earth. The hungry earth brings forth grain, wearied, she rejoices in the joy of the weary. The young spring shoots spread far and wide, earth clothes herself in a green dress. The old man smiles at the green fields, and the smile dies on his thin blue lips. “Mother Earth, be thou fruitful!” Trains go by, men who have been thrown off the trains pass by on foot, nobody sees the joy on the face of the old man fallen on the long road. Honor to thee, thou nameless one! (To Be Continued.) of wages in the other plants and particularly in the tvo large plants in Chicago. Hi In the packing industry, the introduction of the speed-up is pro- ceeding. The packing workers are victims of the most intense speed- up methods. Marked tendencies for organization have been expressed in the packing industry as a consequence of the intense speed-up. In the building trades, the present crisis is far deeper than the usual seasonal decline. Thousands of workers are now unemployed in the building industry. Recently the employers attacked the skilled section of the building workers, which resulted in a strike of the struc- tural iron workers. In the railroad industry, the same process is taking place and a marked movement can be noted among the railroad workers. All of these factors are further proof of the fact that the coming economic crisis will sharpen all punemanta| contradictions of American capital- ism and the class struggle. . 6.—RADICALIZATION OF THE WORKERS The offensive of the employers is meeting with the determined resistance of the working class. The growing radicalization of workers is expressed in the movement of the miners for the organization of the National Miners’ Union; thousands of miners are joining the new rev- olutionary union, are driving the officials of the U.M.W. of A. from their meetings, burning charters of the U.M.W. of A., and laying a basis for a general struggle against the operators. Partial strikes have also been taking place in the mining industry. In many sections where the Communist Party was never heard of before, strong units of the Party have been established, practically on the initiative of the miners themselves. The units in Eldorado, Illinois, and Bicknell, Indiana, are characteristic examples. In preparation for the Cleveland Convention of the T.U.U.L., hundreds of workers from every industry responded to the call to mass meetings. In Kenosha, Simmons Bed Plant, in the Nash plant, in the Seeman Body Works, strikes have taken place and thousands of workers participated in the factory gate meetings of the Communist Party and T.U.U.L. Among the oil workers in Indiana, a strong movement is developing, indicative of the growing radicalization of the workers there. The response to the activities of the Party and the T.U.U.L. have been openly attacked by the employers. In the Illinois Central shops, a meeting of 30,000 workers was called by the distributed there by the Party. Representatives of the Northwestern car shops have been present in court coming out openly against the activities of the Party and the T.U.U.L. in that shop. Meetings at the factory gates, as well as distribution of literature, have been inter- fered with by the police as well as by the company. The International Harvester workers in ‘two instances defended the speakers of the Com- munist Party and prevented by physical force their arrest by the police. These instances were only symptoms of the coming general attack on all revolutionary working class organizations and on the Communist Party. This attack has come as a result of the radicalization of the workers, our activities in the mines and factories, and the growing readiness and response of the masses to the leadership of the Party and the militant unions, sf é (To be continued) i.