The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 27, 1930, Page 1

Indoor meeting of the Buffalo unemployed demonstration, before the march on the City Hall, Jan. | A large number of Negro workers participated in the demonstration. Mounted police charged the | jobless workers who put up a stubborn resistance. 1 24. D DEMONSTRATIONS ON MARCH | Above shows A. ¥ Is, district organizer of the Communist Party, introducing A. Pearlman, secretary of the Unemployed Council at the mass meeting which preceded the march to the City Hall., compelled the administration to give up. its plan to tecp them waiting until they starved or left town, thus avoid paying them for clearing the s | Ohio Deputies Bomb Mine Strikers With Tear Gas; West Virginia Troopers Threaten to Machine Gun Them; This Is the Capitalist Government’s Reply to Workers Fighting the Wage Cuts and Speed-Up That Throws Millions Out to Starve ¢ tered a! FINAL CITY EDITION N. ¥., under the act of Mar. iss matter at the Vost Office 5 seed at New York, he Comprodaily Publishins <g3%> 4 quare. New York City, Ne Vol. VI, No. 305 SUBSCRIPTION RATE In New York by Outside New York, by mail $6.00" per ye: il, $8.00 per yenr. 12,000 MILWAUK Capitalism’s Answer to i OBLE Ss MEET Unemployment Not less than 17,000,000 workers are unemployed in the various capitalist countries of the world. This means that about 60 or 70 million people, including the fami- lies of the workers unemployed, are in extreme suffering. This phenomenon of unemployment preading rapidly into the far corners of the earth—wherever capitalists hold the machinery of production without which the working class can not live. Even from the historical little island of Mytilene today come reports of unemployed tobacco workers rebelling against their desperate condition and coming into collision with the watchdogs of the capitalists, the police. From Athens, Greece, comes the report of workers capturing a police patrol wagon to release prisoners. From Poland, from Sweden, from all parts of the capitalist world the reports are more or less similar. In Germany there are 3,500,000 unemployed—about one-fourth of all of the workers of Germany. In England nearly 2,000,000, at least, are unemployed, whilst in Italy not less than 800,000 are jobless and in Austria 400,000. A million in La i an- other million in the British dominions, still another million in Japan, go to swell the total. Every effort is being made by capitalist for to minimize the reports of unemployment in the United States. Such figures as are used by capitalist spokesmen are vague, incomplete and purposely con- fused, The A. F. of L., the Socialist Party and the miserable rene- gades from the Communist Party, the followers of Loyestone (whose sole business now is to fight the working class and to fight the Com- munist Party), try strenuously to make the situation look as prom- ising: for-capitalism as possible. On the other hand the estimates by the Communist Party on the extent of unemployment are the most ob- jective figures that have been offered, and these estimates now show about seven millions. With every care to avoid exaggeration, we can say that these figures are well within the limits of reasonable esti- mate on the hasis of facts, gathered from capitalist sources. Even before the present cyclical crisis began (with the stock exchange crash)—even as far back as last April—unemployment in the United States was a serious question for our class. For instance, a school board investigation in Philadelphia showed last April more than 10 per cent unemployed in that city. That investigation showed that heaviest suffering was among the Negro and foreign-born workers who in some districts were 20 per cent unemployed. The report was that more young workers under 21 years of age were unemployed, than over 21; also unemployment was greater among men than among women. On the basis of this report from Philadelphia it would seem that at least 3,000,000 workers were unemployed throughout the country in April, 1929. That wes before the beginning of the present crisis. Since then’the reports of reductions in pay-rolls, corresponding to in- creasing total unemployment or increasing part-time unemployment must lead to the conclusion that unemployment today has reached about 30 per cent for the country as a whole. We mean by this to make allowance not only for the totally unemployed but also for the part-time unemployment. Translating part-time unemployment into teems of full unemployment, there would seem to be indications of the equivalent of 9,000,000 unemployed in the United States today. In actual numbers of totally unemployed, it seems that the estimate of seven millions is quite conservative. The enormous dimensions and continued growth of are one of the most striking evidences of the.inevitably approaching crash of the stabilization of the capitalist system on a world-scale. The dominant finance-capitalistic interests of every capitalist coun- try know fairly well what this means. And because they know that the system of capitalist slavery is approaching the decisive struggle with its hundreds of millions of wage-slave and colonial victims, the capitalist class prepares to fight to the death for the preservation of the wage-slave-imperialist system. . . General Koutiepoff is “lost” in Pavis—“prepare for war against the Union of Socialist, Soviet Republics!” The popes of the czars and landlords of old Russia are not being worshipped by the revolutionary workers’ government—“Christians of the capitalist world,-unite to overthrow the workers’ revolutionary government!” Jewish workers are transforming the dens of supersition into centers of enlightenment, health and happiness, with the encouragement of the workers’ govern- ment—“they are turning our synagogues into stables,” shriek the New York rabbis—“make war on the workers’ revolutionary government!” It is impossible to separate the unemployment situation, anywhere from the island of Mytilene to the city of Detroit, from the drive of the capitalist class now being made against the working class on an international scale as expressed in the war plans of the. imperial- ists now conferring in London—especially the Hoover government’s attempt to lead a-“holy war” to destroy the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics and to open up new realms of slavery for exploitation by the Wall Street fiance-capitalists. The demonstration against unemployment must be lead to the highest possible political level. The demands for relief of unemploy- ment must be coupled with a concrete and determined drive for the organization of the unorganized workers, the building of the new revolutionary unions under the Trade Union Unity League. The millions of workers who will demonstrate in all capitalist countries on March 6 must be made to understan! the imperialist war plans which threaten to drown the whole world in blood as a meafls to preserve the capitalist system of wage slavery—and especially the centering of this drive upon the intended destruction of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics. They must be made to understand that the interest and duty of the working class is to defeat “our own” capi- talist government in that war, to defend the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics at all costs, and to transtorm the imperialist war into class war to free the world of capitalist slavery. Never before has the working class had such imperative need for the rapid building of powerful Communist Parties in every country, In these demonstrations a flood of the best proletarian elements now employed in the workshops and among the unemployed must be drawn into the Communist Party. unemployment Pa eee” sae A League, was sentenced to six months § Months for Refusal fay Sor vagrancy” yesterday. | armament conference opened today , found out that he . When the jud to Salute Flag; Former Ti", ‘Communist, he ordered. bim ri é Soldier Beaten in Jail to salute the flag.’ The six months’ ‘term was his punishment for refus- to * hom the SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 26. Perbert Keister, an exoldics any @ember of the Young Commumipt | ary. while in the EE JOBLESS MARCH; N.Y. DEMON ‘Santo Domingo CHIEF MINSK WORLD FIGHTING DAY ON MARCH 6 AT NEW YORK ~CITY HALL TODAY Call Demonstration for Work or Wages at 12:30 Jobless Increase Mobilize All Workers to Back Demands BULLETIN. MILWAUKEE, Wis., Feb. 26.— Twelve thousand Milwaukee un- employed, a large portion of them Negroes, demonstrated today, and marched through the business dis- trict. When the jobless workers marched past the City Hall, they denounced the “socialist”. fakers, and sent a committee to the City Council. They demanded the city turn over the surplus in the treas- ury, amounting to $16,000,000, for the support of the unem- ployed. Details follow. | { Hundreds of thousands of work- ers in New York City are out of a job and the conditions of the work- in the facto are being worsened every day by the bosses who are taking advantage of the severe economic ¢ which affects every industry. The Trade Union Unity L alling for a dem- onstrati y Hall on Thursday at 12:30 o'clock sharp. The building trades council which up to the present time has denied ,(Continued on Page Two), DEPUTIES GAS “MINE PICKETS Troopers Threaten to Use Machine Guns -POWHATAN, Ohio, Feb. 26.— Deputies huried tear gas bombs.into a column of 300 striking miners picketing the struck mine here yes- terday. The picketing followed an early morning’ mass meeting. In Moundsville today, state troop- ers threatened to use machine guns on the strikers when pickets at- tempted to rush a group of import- ed srikebreakers. Against Murderous Bosses. The Moundsville and Powhatan strikes involve 1,500 miners, They are directed against two mines near Moundsville, and two at Powhatan The strike started January in the Glendale mine of the Paisley inter- ests (the same concern murdered 47 miners in a gas explosion. in its Kinloch mine last April 1) against ers a wage cut, discrimination, and ‘a| ft! number of other grievances. spread to the Alexander mine, then to Paisley mines in Powhatan. It is} led by a rank and file strike com- mittee, formed under co-operation with the National Miners Union There have been many arrests, use of injunctions, and a mobilization of troopers by the bosses. OPEN TOPPLING NAVY RACE MEET | LONDON, Feb. 26.—Leaning on its last, weak leg, the race-for- vasa gesture in order to make the | masses believe that Jt has not com- | pletely collapsed, Japan plunged into their usual se- i (Contirued on Page Lwo) “Rebel” Heads, Betray Masses RABBI DENIES PERSECUTIONS 'Rykov Exposes Anti- Soviet War Threats On Fake Issue | SANTO DOMINGO, Feb. “26.— |The insurrection against the Vas- |quez government, headed by Gen- }eral Jose Estrella, a lawyer, is kowtowing to American imperial- ism, When the 2,000 armed peasants |entered Santo Domingo today, Es- | trella hastened to assure the U. | aT i Minister Curtiss, that he would pro* So viet 8 for Science | tect the property of the American | | corporations, and would see to it that there was no “disorder.” Very little fighting greeted the | |entry of the insurrectionists here, | the government soldiers fraternizing | | with Estrellas troops. Although the | | great bulk of the insurgent army | lis composed of poor peasants, the } !demands put forward by Estrella, jwho said he represented General Urene, are not antagonistic to the | American imperialists who have a death grip on Santo Domingo. | After the “occupation” Estrella | visited United States Minister Cur- | ee eee erase anu [campaign conducted thtoughout the U.S. representative, who Ye really |Wx!d by the bourgeois rabbis and the agent of the National City Bank |Ptiests who for days have been of New Yon foaming at the mouth over “re- | ‘ ported” executions of rabbis in Minsk. Rabbi Menachem Gluskin, Workers’ Republic MINSK, U.S.S.R., Feb. 26.—Six rabbis, headed chief rabbi Menachem Gluskin, appealed to Jews throughout the world today not to support the religious cru- sade being organized by the im- perialist powers against the So- viet Union. ‘Theerabbis denied that any of their colleagues had been executed by the government. This completely exposes the fake ‘Explains Attitude ia NEW YORK, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 1930 | | ‘hour day, and other demands, the release of a number of Commun AGRARIAN CRISIS | Price 3 Cent NEARS; JOBLESS OF GREECE ACT; CLASHES IN WILMINGTON, CHICAGC Unemployed of Greece Seize City Hall, Storm Prison and Free Im prisoned Communists Chicago’s Young Pioneers Demonstrate; Police Guard Bridges; Jobles: Starve in Poland (Wireless By Inprecorr) ATHENS, Greece, Feb. 26.—Serious collisions occurred today on the Greek island of Mytilene, between unemployed workers and police. The unemployed workers organized a dem- onstration before the City Hall, demanding along with their relief from starvation, the seven- IS CATASTROPHIC “Building Boom” of Hoover Collapses everal days ago the misleaders the New York building trades Si of | who made the. above statement, was | unions, affiliated to the A. F. of L., | |reported to be executed. |announced that between 40 to 50 | The six men published a vigorous |per cent of their members are un- of the Jewish people and the Jew religion who are |tacking the Soviets.” | PORTER MEETING | si /Young Workers Resist; Battle Cossacks | BULLETIN. : Fred Edwards, one of the dem- onstrators at the Porter greeting, was so severely beaten up by the police, while they took him away in a taxi, that he was taken to a hospital for an X-ray to deter- mine whether his skull is frac tured. anti-semitism. Gushin, Rabbi Gertz Mazel, Rabbi | Babriel, Rabbi Osher Kersten, Rabbi Mendel and Rabbi Yarkho. MOSCOW, Feb. 26.—In an inter- view today between Ed. L, Keen, vice-president of the United Press | for Europe, who is now in the So- viet Union, and Alexis Rykov, chair- man of Council of Peoples Commis- sars on the religious issue, Keen re- | ports Rykov as saying: “Such rumors (of imprisonment | and persection because of religious | beliefs) either result wilfully or are distortions of actual facts for polit- | ical purposes. “I do not deny that churches have | been closed and diverted to other : tek |purposes, but. such has never hap- Wall Street district. }pened except upon the request of At 9:30 John Porter stepped down | mass meetings in the local commu- from the elevated at Battery Park |nity. In every case when it is pro- |and was immediately cheered and posed to divert the functioning hoisted on the shoulders of two |church to some other purpose, final comrades, The throng then marched | sanetion of the presidium of the | (Continued on Page Two) |Central Executive Committee of the | Sa ae TOS | Soviet Union is required, but when- | |of local authorities. T9GLUB JOBLESS * * * | Vicious police attacks greeted the ‘demonstration of the 400 young and {adult workers that met John Porter | yesterday at Battery Park, when he |was released after over 18 months {of imprisonment by U. S.. military | authorities. Many young workers were severe- | ly beaten by Whalen’s cossacks when they marched through the | (Continued on Page Three) ‘2 - Gangsters Foree THU CONVENTION Teeting to End | | "%o International Ladies Garment | Wo: and their 200 gangsters | assembled in the lower hall at Bryant | | Hall, 42nd St. and Sixth Ave., yes- | DEFENDS U.S.S.R, terday forced the owner to return | . if _ the money and cancel the contract Meeting Sat., Sun., to ‘for the Trade Union Unity League, Mobilize Against War ‘to hold a meeting of unemployed) j workers in an upper hall there yes-/ The convention of the Metropoli- terday. {tan Area Trade Union Unity League ! The I.L.GW. maintains the Bryan‘ | this Saturday and Sunday will mob- Hall room as headquarters for its|jlize thousands of workers to con- underworld gunmen, which it uses/duct the fight against the imperial- ; to make raids on the needle trades jst war and in defense of the first (Continued on Page Two) |Workers’ Republic, the Soviet Union, lin the shops and factories of Great- ‘er New York and New Jersey. The convention will DOPESTERS FIGHT JOBLESS. PHILADELPHIA, Pa. (By Mail). |—The local clergy, upon request of | | toyment | occupied with conferences (Continued on Page wo) work to help relieve 4 iin this city. protest against the action of foreign | employed. rabbis in joining “the worst eneTmes building trades workers throughout h | the unjustifiedly at- | 2,000,000 building trades workers at least 1,000,000 are unemployed, on They defended the Soviet as the | the basis of the A. F. of L. figures. only government openly combatting | What is the outlook in the build- ‘ing trades? The protest was signed by Rabbi |New York fakers published their un- lly bad also. | force, legal and illegal, be held at | used to break up the strike. Irving Plaza, 15th St. and Irving strikers have had against them The imperialist delegates of Great | the Chamber of Commerce, are get-| Place,’ and will start at 2 p. m.,| united front of the Tammany colors he had Britain, United States, Italy and ting their congregations to pray for Saturday. The first day will be | lice, who killed Katovis here; of the | socialist party, whose chieftain, This applies to the United States. Out of the The day after the employment figures, F. W. Dodge Corporation issued a statement de claring that building contracts awarded between February 15 to February 21 in the New York area dropped 19 per cent below the previ- ous week, and showed a decline of 27 per cent below the same period last year. In other parts of the country the building trades situation is extreme- During 1929 there was a drop of 13 per cent in all building work, and in 1930 the drop is even steeper. Where Is That “Building Boom?” The Annalist (Feb. 21, 1930), re- viewing the building situation, points out that the crisis in this field is | worsening and no. improvement in unemployment can be expected in this quarter. They say: “For the total contracts awarded this year to February 14 falls be- hind the corresponding total of 1929 by 21.7 per cent. - The week before that 1t was 21.3 pec ceni; the week before that, 20.9; the week ever the church, for lack of support, | before that 15.8 (note how the drop | ,is not being used, it may be taken |increases each for other needs upon the decision | with 1928 to February 14, this year, week). Compared shows a deficiency of 32.5 per cent. “It is quite true that the number | If the reader wonders why construc- of churches in the Soviet Union has | tion expenditure nearly four months after the president’s conference of Nast November fails to reduce un- (Continued on Page Three.) FOOD CLERKS WIN IN MANY SHOPS Reaction United Front Can’t Stop Them Moh of the Food Clerks’ ek of the strike Industrial Union > arrested a few days ago. The police tried to disperse these unemployed, whereupon a shower of stones back the police. The j ss then stormed the City#Hall, throw- ing out the city officials and occupying the building. Later, a second demonstration stormed the prison, disarmed the guards and po- lice and released the isoners. Many police were injured. In Athens itself, demonstrating workers captured a prison van con- taining Communist workers, drove off the police escort and released the -prisoners. The organ of the Communist Party, “Rizospastis,” is appealing to the workers for mass demonstrations on Feb, 28, which will lead up to the World Unem- | ployed Fighting Day March 6. | * * | Police Attack Wilmington Jobless. | Wilmington, Delawai reports yesterday afternoon stated that a |mass meeting of unemployed was attacked by the police after speak- ers had explained the demands of the ade Union Unity League in its figh ainst unemployment, the report 3 that, the police at- taeked the jobless because they were called hired assassins and murder- ers, and because speakers had ad- vocated racial equality. * i Police Guard Chicago Bridges Against Jobless March. |+ Chicago reports state that police | Wednesday entered a hall on Hal- sted street where an unemployed (Continued on Page Three) MANY BACK USSR DEFENSE MEETING Lawrence B. Cohen, Jr., president of the Harvard Socialist Club, today wired to the Friends of the Soviet nion, 175 Fifth Ave., a statement supporting the mass protest mect- \ing arranged by the organization ,for March 16 in Bri Coliseum, |177th St. and Bronx River. He also asked the Friends of the Soviet Union to send a speaker to address the club on the present agitation against Soviet Russia because of al- leged “religious persecution.” Mr. Cohen’s telegram read: “I heartily support, as do I be- lieve a majority of our membership, the plan for a mass meeting to e) |pose the plans for imperialist war |against the Soviet Union by capi- |talist nations under the guise of | seeking religious freedom for Rus- sian farmers and workers who do /not seem particularly troubled about |the matter. i‘ suters Market, pieketing | speaker for the same topic to speak goes on as vigorously as ever, and|at Harvard under our the strikers are as determined to! Please address Harvard , Soc Here at Millers Market every has been The the po- the win, (Continued on Page Two) the { | Club, 2 Bond St., Cambridge, Ma: The Harvard Socialist Club is affiliated to the Socialist Party. The Friends of the Soviet Union ; announced that it will send a speak- | er to address the club. The Friends of the Soviet Union (Continued on Page Z'wo) J ‘ Could you suggest as t leaders of their union JOBLESS YOUNG WORKERS FIGHT Cleveland, Cincinnati, Councils Growing CLEVELAND, Ohio, Feb. 26.—A thousand workers, mostly young workers, held a demonstration here on Buckeye Road and 89th St., in the steel and metal section. A po- lice “riot squad” was there to break ;up the meeting, | e young wo! ers pressed around the speaker and would not allow her to be arrested. In the steel and metal mills these young workers just suffered a series of wage cuts. Wages are down to $12 a week in these mills, where boys and girls work 12 and 14 hours a day The bosses have fired most of the adult workers and less t a third of the m are working hose left on the job are mostly young work- ers, whom the nk they can force to work wages and with a greater speed-up. And at that these young workers get only part-ti work and know they may | be thrown out enti The burden of supporting the family falling on these young wo , so they starve with the | totally unemployed, only they starve on the job. The young girl workers especially realize that they are being em- ployed now to prepare the working for of the steel and metal mills for war. Particularly is this true in the Grasalli Chemical Works and the American Steel and Wire Co., where right now bullets are being manufactured, A young workers’ demonstration is to be held on the Public Square March 1, after which a meeting will be held to form a Youth Section of the Unemployed Council. Cincinnati Unempioyed Defend Their Counci CINCINNATI, Feb So far, 10 eviction notices against unemployed - workers have come to the attention of the Unemployed Council, but becatise of the activity of the Coume cil not one has yet been carried oute The Council has revealed to the jobless masses that $10,000 was ap- propriated by the City Council “for the unemployed,” but not one cent jof it has been received by the un- employ public work started by the city, wages of 25 and 30 cents an hour are paid, aiding the employers to further cut wages in factories. At a mass meeting in a hall, there suddenly appeared the director of the led “Associated Welfare So- who attacked the Unem- |ployed Council, saying that it “had gone too far, and that Mr. Mitchell is stirring up trouble and under- mining American institutions, and will be officially requested to leave (Continued on Page Three) Write About Your Conditions for The Daily Worker. Become a Worker Correspondent, jp. " See