The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 15, 1930, Page 5

as NEW YORK, » SATU IRDAY, , FEBRUARY 15, 1930 apannne = ote JOBLESS NEGRO SEAMEN LOOK 10 COMMUNIST PARTY TO LEAD “GOING TO SPREAD s COMMUNISM TO ALL THE DOCKS” Will Bring It to thel Negroes in South (By a Worker Correspondent) I am a Negro seaman. I just Joined the Young Communist League after reading a Communist leaflet I:picked up on the Clyde Line pier, North River. I want to tell why I joined the Communists and what I| am going to do for the cause I now believe in. A half-hour before the Clyde liner Seminole sailed I was laid off with 14 others. I was a pantryman on that boat. It was a hell hole to work on. They had no system whatever— that is they did not care what hap- pened to the seamen, Whenever the passenger list was less than 150 -~a lot of us were laid off. We never would know until a short time before the ship sailed if we’d have a job or not. We were paid every other trip. The way they treated us when we} tried to get our pay—that was like dogs are treated. You’d have to wait around to get a@ voucher. Then you'd have to wait and wait to get the captain to sign it. Suppose you couldn’t find the captain, Well, the ship would most likely go away—and you’d have to wait till the ship came to port again to get your pay. Why, you’d starve for weeks without a penny, without a place to stay. Then they had a system between the head waiter and the glory-hole steward, and all those bosses— that’s what you might call them. A boy had to gamble to keep his job, and he’d lose every cent all the time. Got to give them tips, too. A regu- lar syndicate to skim the seamen. Those bosses were Negroes, too. Skinning their own Negro bothers. Well, that showed me that the Ne- gro and the white bosses are all to- gether against the Negro and the white workers. Tn Jacksonville the immigration officers would come on the ship and take some poor seaman off and de- port him to Jamaica, or elsewhere. I tell you that was cruel. How did I hear of the Communist Party? I didn’t have no place to go, being unemployed. I was in a poolroom opposite the Clyde Line. I looked down on the floor and there I saw a copy of a paper called the “Liberator,” for Negro workers, it said.’ I read something about Haiti. I got interested, and wanted to learn more about an organization that welcomes Negro as well as white workers. I, found out there was no discrimination, I thought it was wonderful. So I joined. I will do all I can to spread Com- | munism in all the ports and docks I go to, especially to the Ngero} dock workers in Charlesten, Jack- sonville and the rest of the South. —H. V. COMPARE THIS WITH US.SR, Slavery in Fall River Mills (By a Worker Correspondent) FALL RIVER, Mass.—The condi- tions ir, the Fall River mills have gone beyond the endurance point of the workers, The Davis Mill seems to ke the only one with three shifts and even here the workers do not stop to eat lunch but work eight hours straight without ‘stopping. -In the rest of the mills the workers go in right efter six in the morning and stav until 5:30 p. m. The night shift works all the rest of the time. The top w: ages are $17 a week and the average is $12 to $14 for adults, while the young worker 's get less than $10. A girl worker in one of the de- partments never made more than $4.20 a week for 9 hours a day and she has to stand all the time. The mills are overheated and the nir is filled with lint and dust. Be- sides this the light is artificial and the workers in some departments have to work under an awful glare from the blue lights. In the card and weaving roms the wise is so great that it is impos- sfble to talk. There are no safety devises end the workers are getting their hands injured. The foremen ang second hands use a tyranny over the workers like a beast in the jun- gle would vse, Practically every- thing is done by piece work. The werkers are organizing into the National Textile Workers Union, that grew out of the Taxtile Mill Committees, and that wili lead us in the fight that’s coming against speed-up and low wages and unem- ployment. YOUNG TEXTILE WOKKER. ALK to your fellow worker in | your shop about the Daily Work Sell him a copy every for a week. Then ask him to ielome a regular subscriber. | | | | terested in Communism, show them | | bosses. |ers Union. Photo at left, unemployed Neg- ro seamen at Clyde Line pier on North River. Hearing of the militant program of the Commun. ist Party, and that it fights f , scores of them are race equality, joining the Communist Party At right, mass meeting of Fall River textile workers. Read let- ters on this section from unem- ployed and Fall mill workers. Negro seamen from Kiver Worker Correspondent.) (By a Worker Correspondent) ays a week now. If we even dare speak about this the bosses want to th-ow JoinedCommunists|) AVERY ON Because They Fight. 9 Disérihination | SHIP MADE HIM (Bu a Warleen Gor Correspondent ) 1 used to be a seaman, bat was jatd off and could find no work at sea. poe i My latest job was running a hyc ra: 4 ? tie machine in the Paris Hat Works 'JObless Negro Young (Halskin Hat Co.), at 47 West 23th | St. 3 They paid me the wonderful wages) (p, of $18 a week, Mad to work from) [4% 8 a.m. to9 p.m. All the workers! .! been not working for the last | there are young, 11 Spanish girls, SX months. Was an able seaman on | three colored boys. |the Clyde Line for the small sum of I want t t th deearhove $55 a month. Worked on the Chero- want to get the colored boys in-|\46 and the Oneida. | The work is sure hard- They have PIM A lpr all two watches—12 hours a day. Then | ee ers, no mate Naty BL aaa Ma jthey keep you slaving when the e must knock it into their heads | ship ‘comes into port. that there is no discrimination i} I been in the hospital for a couple | |the Communist Party and the Young | | months due to an injury I got when | iar eee ees ey Bi ie | working. on the Furniss-Prince Line, paced the S. S. East Pri so many times by white organiza- ey we an ae on tak. hip for | tions. But we have to show them | the poor wazes of $45 a month, and Pee eg for them by dcing rotten conditions. After making one | mer SHSM | trip I had to go to a hospital. Due I joined because there is no race jig lifting heavy weights I was in- discrimination among the Commu- | jyyed. They had the machinery to nists—its for all the workers, |lift it, but made the men do it in- Once you can get the young Ne- | stead, | gro workers to fighting, they'll fizht ey wouldn't pay for hospital | for the working class cle a oe enses either. Since then I have been able to work. — ie think I have found my way out} ‘of being just a dumb slave by en- BUDD WHEEL is tering the Young Communist Lea- me. | t fights for the Negro, workers, DOWN T0 3 DAYS * for all the workers —W. ” “Charity”—Thro —Throwing Prices Slashed ; Only Workers Out of Half Day’s Worle “Rescue” Mission (By a Worker Correspondent }' DETROIT, Mich—The workers; , PHILADELPHIA, — While the of the Budd Auto Wheel Co. bere} “charity” institutions sof Phitadel- | are facing very bad times. . Condi-|phia as in other cities are doing| tions are gettirg terrible. | their utmost to hide the extent of | I work in Department 1. Just a|unemplcyment, preterdirfe to light- year ago we were getting $3.50 for |" the’ sufferings of the jobless a piece of work, Three months ago {through campaigns for huge relicf they cut prices on cne piece from |funds, the unemployed are thrown $3.50 to $1.75, but this-Monday cut cut of the soup kitchens rur. by the} down on production 14 pieces « cay. | @oney raised in their behalf by the | We work 4 hours a day and 3 “charity” institutions. Thursday, February Ryan, a 20-year-old | worker, who lives at 246 South 9th 7th, Patrick unemployed us ont. I thin’: it is best for the working Street, was thrown out of the so- people to join the Communist Par- | called “Rescue Workers” mission ty. That is the only Party for the bell where he had gone to ask for working class and that is the cnly| something to eat. While the “Rescue Party that can fight the bloody | Workers” are themselves being ex- | Also, join the Auto Work- |posed by rival “charity” rackets as raising funds that go to making; The employed and unemployed | | their leaders rich but not for relief workers must make the Februa Ryan starving and asking for some- demonstration’ the biggest of thing to eat was told, “If you don’t kind under the leadership of the get out of here in a hurry I'll kick 8! Communist Party. you out on the street!” PHILA. WORKER. omer | Sun Oil Workers Will Eee Also. Seaman a’Rebel | No Unemployment in ./a cord, the Soviet textile He is the . Contrast the ile workers’ conc s in Charlotte and fall River, with these in a Sovict mill, as described by worlke spondents. (Photo from film “Fragment of an Empire”; courtesy Amkino). . . worker mill. e is the master | y corre= U.S. S.R. Mills; Letter’ to Gaston Workers A letter from a Charlotte textile worker in Highland Park Mill is printed on this page. Here is a letter from a worker in a huge Soviet mill, to the southern mill workers: PENN WOODMEN SLAVE DAYBREAK TILL DAYBREAK in Camps; Wages _ (By a Worker C ‘orrespondent) CHERRY GROVE, Warren Coun- ty, Pa.—You didn’t hear anything yet from this part of the country so I am writing. The conditions here in the shops is going from bad to worse. Eve day there is more unemplo3 : I’m working in the woods, chem- ical work. We are getting $2.20 for Jargslavl, the factory the Gastonia textile Dear icamtadee We send you gre 2s from our Workers and Farme: Republic. We are now entering into the thirteenth year of worke rule of: one-sixth of the world’s surface, and the sec- ond year of our realization of the Five-Year-Plan of building social- ism, Under the guidance of the Com- munist Party and under the rule of the Soviet Power, we grew in strength. At present many textile ‘Freeze Low factories and other works are con- structed all over the Soviet Union, and we are getting rid of unemploy- ment. At same time themselves \ ountae: the large and her wo: ‘children toa a.cord of wood. A cord of wood is | nurse and she quite sure that eight feet long, four feet high and | her children will be security: four feet long. But we got to cut We, workers of textile industry, |four feet, four inches long and we work seven hours a day. We have| got to pile four feet, four inchs | possibilities to spend our leisure |high and it’s got to be over eight! time (free from work) at the clubs| feet long if we want to get paid for and the red corners. We have still many adult workers who are illite- rate. The revolution gave them a possibility to learn. To be literate is very attractive for them, and they learn to read and write in or- to be capable to take part in political life. Our government gives | large sums for this purpose. You know that for the imperial | government it was better and more profitable to keep workers in a state of ignorance, but now it is quite another thing. In our textile fac- tory there are 13,000 workers. Before the'revolution it belonged | One man could eut one to one- and-one-half cords a day; it takes very hard work to cut two cords a day, working from daybreak to! ‘late in the evening. When we work by the day we get $2.75 a day and bbard, but ye sure slave for that. We got to be at work at 5 a. m., ‘and waiting for the «daybreak on |the snow when it comes to 15 or 20 below zero, instead of waiting in the camp for daybreak. We got to work until dark at evening. | dinary seaman, $40 for an able se “Will Fut All My Guts’ Into the Ley FOR Class Struggle ndent) 19 years Young Com- oung worke Clyde Line Tl hrows Its a PAR an Seamen on Streets | 1 was a me: on the Clyde es | Line, till I wa off. I worked (By a Worker Gorresncadent) jon the Modena, wk, Seminole I am a seaman of the Clyde Line, | 2% Cherokee. I have no job, and I got no home. They paid $45 a month, slave I joined the Young Communist ! wages for what I had to do. Had League after hearing their speaker |to get up 6 a. m. to go to work and their leaflets on the T' work till 10, and get an hou reading , Clyde Line pier on the North River. Some back at 11, after 11 I'm a Negro, 19 years old. work to 2 p. n n off till 4| I was an able seaman on the nd at 4 had to draw stores Clyde liner Mohawk. I was getting only $45 a month. Worked 12 hours yr 4 off till After i hard then, to sleep, only to wake e you go Worked on the Merchant Line, on morn- the Fairfax, before that. That goes om Philadelphia to ksonville,| They paid only $35 for an or- up r ing and the same old slavery again. Trea hink we can better our con- y action. ‘Action is what ns ,man- sa we unemployed need. I was not working, and started I think its a good movement “for to think. When I heard the Cdm-|everyone who works, everyone in munis aker, and read their leaf- the L should stick together to lets, I joined the Young Communist | organize the workers and build up| | League, because I want to learn|the League. jand understand how to fight to| I am going to try my level best | make our conditions better, to make | to do as much as I can for the wot us workers rule—E. P. i ing class, Negro and v and will put all my guts into it. —JI. C. LENIN SAII \I—"The 1 mere fune- tions of distributing a newspaper will help to establish real contacts . It would blow every spark of class struggle and popular indig- vation into general conflagration | NEW ORLEANS ceive ther training.” All of which | means—reach the masses of work- ers in the industries with the Dail Worker. , Ss eee Se eee een ngmen and workingwomen Speed M anne Throws Many on Streets . in it cone ue Spee oe (By @ Worker Correspondent) pe ine Church ene says tant lt, S|: mw 1 ORLEANS; La—A new! better to turn churches either into . ~ : < s : . it » | system of conveyors has been in-| nurseries for children or schools. : + eR, Zz stallol in the New Orleans branch here workers adopted re-|°. 4) , Aries of the American r Refining, utions about taking down all the Rey aa s largest in the world ght hund- chureh bells to deliver them go! ey sorters one UREA works for the more rapid develoP- there, 200 having been thrown. out nent of our industry. For this} : 2 Aygo pave reason our clergymen rage very much, for they see that their income goes away and the christian flock’! | dispers Comrades, if you are interested in anything, that concerns the life in the Soviet Union, write us, and we will answer you. Write also about your life and work. 30 cents to to ma- € average rate i However ow have been in: 3 I S.8.) Our address is as follows: U. : R., Jaroslavl, the factory “Krasny ~ The work are Perekop,” the club of Stalin’s name, | tho milit the third story, the room of worker {je Inox cwner correspondent will soon h a st > on th —A Wi Correspondent, | hands. BRITVIN. —P. C. the Communists because | .. Around it an army of warriors | Gh Y. , would systematically gather avd re- | | When we are in the camps the wind blows the snow on the beds, | |and for this we got to pay $1 a jmonth for rent to the company, ,Coungil of Public Economy. to a manufacturer, Rokzinkin, and} now it is managed by the Supreme Now our comrade director accounts to the Photo shows a scene in the famous Oil workers in Bayonne, N. J., in 1915, when strikers fought the rebellion of the Standard police and troops who attacked them. Photo shows dozens of police attacking one striker, who.is fighting heroically. Note police about to pull draw guns on worker. Other strikers rescued this striker. The Sun Oil workers of Chester, about whom a worker correspondent writes, will also rebel against slave conditions. They, and*the Bay- onne oil workers too, will be led by the Trade Union Unity League. which means $14 te $16 a month for this rotten camp. that we got! forms us about the work done in to freeze in- the factory and about the profit, Tm reading ,the Daily Worker made by it. Much money is spent | and when I'm through with it I give | for the protection of labor and the it to my friends to read it. safety first appliances. Brothers, fellow workers, call the In dangerous places, machines aoa Communist Party and the Trade |jooms are inclosed in order that a Union Unity League to, help you.| worker may not be exposed to an Join the Communist Party. They | accident. will lead us to freedom | Now a few words about religion. —CHEMICAL WOOD WORKER.' In our country it is on its last legs. | workers. In his accounts he in- (By « Worker Correspondent) CHARLOTTE, N. C.—Every worker in the Highland Park Mill No. 1 knows that their living con- consider it their duty to become | an organizer of the National Tex- tile Workers Union. Every worker must bear in mind that this union belongs to them, and not to the bosses, as the union that affili- ates to the A.F.L, does. entirely too low, and their hours too long. The only remedy for | | ditions are very bad, their wares | | if such conditions is through organ- The U.T.W. was here in 1922 ization. | and organized all of the workers In order to organize the work- _ in most of the miils here and just ers in this mill, every worker mast | as they were about to win the strikes, the U.T.W. fakers sold | will fight for them to the bitter | them out and ran off with the mo- | end—and that’s the National Tex- ney, as usual. tile Workérs Union. Now they have the nerve to ay The U.T.W. of. the AF. of L.- to organize the workers in the had a meeting here Sunday, Jan. South again. Of course we know 26. It was announced as an open all about the agreement between mass meeting, and some of the Hoover and Green, for no, increase | workers that attended had heen in wages and no strike. But the members of it for five or ten years | southern workers will not join the | but were refused the floor. to | USDW, They want a union that | speak, a | the chairman, “I will put them out Railroad workers, enginemen, Since the betrayal of the 1922 strike by the Brotherhood misleaders, writes a worker correspondent, the speed-up has become steadily more fierce. He calls on the railroad workers to enlist under the banner of the Trade Union Unity League for a pupal against the rail bosses. “EVERY HIGHLAND PARK MILL WORKER AN ORGANIZER FOR N. ‘T, w.” Is Call of Chariotte Worker; How the U. TW W. R Runs A Meeting -- Workers Are Not A Not Allowed to Have ee Plows Dewey Martin asked for the | Then they put us out and ar- floor for just two minutes and _ rested three. when he arose some mill owner | or banker from the back jumped up and said, “don’t let him speak, he belongs to the N.T.W.U.” About this time some big fat policeman jumped up and said to They were put un- der $100 bond each for “disorder- ly conduct.” The next morning at the trial the state’s witnesses were so rot- ten that the judge had to acquit the three. | if you say so.” | —R.BM., MILL WORKER, ‘COMMUNIST IN ORDER TO FICHT FOR EQUALITY One Reason on W hy Negro Jobless Seaman Joined (By. Worker. Correspondent.) | I am an able seaman, a Negro worker, 18 years old. I have joined the Young Communist League after ‘being out of work for some time. |I joined because I felt I could make better for the working class, for workers. I joined’ in order to fight for equality. ailor on the Clyde Line 2 and Seminole, As I drew down only 12 hours a da hey pay the ordinary s 0 a*month, y work on the Clyde Line took me to ports like New York, Char- leston, S. C., Miami, ‘and Jacksonvil- le. I often thought, when I saw the Negro dock workers there, if they only had some organization to fight for them. Now I know I have found that organization—the Com- fan $55 a poor r being made a slave, forced to sleep in cold quarters on the ship, being kicked by the mates, cursed }at by the bosses, being out of work, | I am now going to do all I can from |now on to make it better for all the | workers, Negro and white, by work- ling hard for the Communist move- ment—J. C. GRACE LINE TRIES TO “GET” SEAMEN | Atiominta Frameup on i NEW ORLE -Antonio Ar- |tiaga and P. Go , members of | t he crew of the Santa Tecia jure being held in New Orleans be- fore the federal authorities on the iframed up charge of “mutiny and ault cn the high seas.” Artiga and Gonoles, firemen, re- jfused to work on their watch while }the Santa Tecia was at Colon, Pan. The chief engineer, enraged at this “insubo ation,” cruelly beat these two men up with the aid of the other officers of the ship, Fearing that Artiga was maimed as a result of his unhaman treat- ment, the engineer claimed that they had attempted to blow up the by letting the boilers run dry. f officer aided in the frame- bringing np an additional rge against the two of “assault- cer on the high seas.” | The’ up by | For eight s the two seamen were shack and chained in a lavatory, t: d and abused by, the ship’s officers. On arrival in Ncw Orleans Artiga 1 Gonvoles were taken off the p by the Department of Justice .| agents Members of th> crew of the S.S. Santa Tecia, also members of the ne Workers League, as soon as ould leave the ship came to the local headquarters of the League and reported the whole affair. Tho local I. L. D. immediately taok the proper to defend these two seamen}; red sworn statements jfrom said members and taking the affidavits to the Mexican Consul, | had the hearing of the case trans- | ferred from the Western rict of |Louisiana to the New Orleans Dis- | steps trict. This in itself is a great help is a successful termination of the case, as otherwise it would have | Leen impossible to have the wit- nesses appear for the seamen. and would have also made it d “cult for the Marine Workers League te keep in touch with the two men. The Marine Workers League, with the aid of the. I. L. D., is always prompt to come to the front in de- fense of seamen who are framed up, and will alv show its pro- letarian soli with fellow work. lers of all nations, regardless of 4, color or nationality. | —SEAMAN, Lay Off Zine Miners— Kill Men by Speed-Up (By a Worker Correspondent) FRANKLIN, N. J.—The zine workers of this part of New Jersey are feeling unemployment pretty se- vere. The miners and the refinery | hands both, They are all unorgan- wed, They snouid organize, under |the Communists. But there are no {Communists here. There's room for such fighters as them. | The speed-up is terrib! | killing us off one by one. The other day, Michael Toth, who worked in the New Jersey Zinc company sheg, was killed when his clothing got tangled in a machine shaft, when he was trying’to replace a wheel belt, That worker was murdered by the zine, bosses. Come out here and organize us zine slaves, miners and men in the plants both. - —ZINC WORKER. , and ig RITE about your conditions _ for the Daily Worker. Become « a Worker Correspondent, ‘