The Daily Worker Newspaper, September 25, 1930, Page 4

SUBSCRIPTION RATES: By mail everywhere: One year $6; six months $3; two months $1; excepting Boroughs ot Manhattan and Bronx, New York City, and foreign. which are: One yr. $8; six mons, $4.50 Published by the Comprodaily Publishing Co.. Inc., daily, except Sunday, at 26-28 Union Square, New York City, N. Y. Telephone Stuyvesant 169€-7-8. Cable: “DAIWORK." Address and mail al) checks to the Daily Worker 26-28 Union Square New York. N. ¥ Page Four Dail Central Orga Yorker Porty U.S.A. “MORE FIRE ON SOCIALFAS- CISM AND REFORMISM! By The “progre e “Socialist City” of of the economic cr sands of workers. cent in J BILL GEBERT. factories decreased time. Wage-cuts and 1 the day in the facto: lately the Wisconsin Motor C s of the workers 10 per ce t roof co: s cut 20 per 11.6 per linquent tax These few cts show the and t ll as the work Beer Instead of Relief. The capita employment is an paign and u governor of W paign speech for that the opening facing star not last long, Oshkosh and Be when he attack Mr. Kohler co the state of W: Kohler was a c publicans and i er’s prosperity content of the worke posed the establ in case of s opponent in the republican gressive” Phil LaFollette ra of unemployment as the main : tions and went to speak to work- ers at factor, ing that he is in favor of unemployment insurance. To far he promises decrease in t on the farms, rais- ing also the problem of p own public utilities and fight against the and against the state party, the “‘pro- the question constabulary. These, together with the demand of repeal of the prohibition laws, were the i _ of La Follette, candidate for governor the repub- lican primaries. He was supported by the A. F. of L. and Railroad Brotherhood officialdom. A number of resolutions adopted by the trade unions, openly declared their support for La Follette and his e. The resolution of the Green Bay Federated Labor Council of the A. F. of L. states that: “The capitalist class deems it necessary to have under its control an in- solent maglignant state constabulary to use in the class war for profits against the workers for wages.” This resolution was adopted, by the way, following the speech delivered at the meeting of this Labor Council by Senator La Follette. This clearly shows that LaFollette republicans in Wisconsin utilize the discon- tent of the broad masses of workers against the proposed state constabulai Thanks to all these methods of the campaign, La Follette fooled the farmers and workers and petty bour- geoisie, and won a victory over Kohler in the primaries of about 100,000 votes. Communist Tasks. ‘We must openly admit that our Party in Wis- consin did not fully realize the danger of the La Follette demagogy appeals to the workers and farmers and did not expose in every day work the so-called reforms of La Follette and the socialist party, although theoretically ac- knowledging that the social fascists are the main danger. Until recently, there was a feel- ing that we already have enough influence over the masses of workers. The dangerousness of this concentration was clearly illustrated a few Ways before the primaries. In front of the Seaman Body factory in Milwaukee, the Com- munist Party and La Follette speakers held meetings at the same time, which resulted that 25 workers were listening to our speaker while 600 to 700 listened to La Follette’ The so- cialist party speakers, in many cases, spoke to- gether with the republican La Follette on the same patform, dividing time at noon day fac- tory meetings as was the case in front of the International Harvester. The socialist party, recognizing its services to capitalism, in the period of growing discon- tent of the workers and their readiness for issue in the elec- | | } | | | | | ilities for the penly warned the capita t city into the arms of the Com- er had control, not only t nfiscated, but the lives of n would not be worth a copper.” red in a Labor Day edition of the to-do m decl; ements from open shops and from the on Detective Agency, the capitalists rec- nize the services of the socialists as they u as tchers of the work- ing class. It the Milwaukee socialist po- lice that attacked a demonstration of 30,000 workers on March 6th; tens of workers were brutally bi bed, and the 's of the demonstr: Fisher, Fred Bas- sest, Blair and others, were arrested and had been sentenced to three months and one year in jail Bosses for Socialist Sheriff. In recogniz the services of the socialists to the capitalist c , the Milwaukee Journal, a leading capitalist newspaper, is carrying on the most vigorous campaign to elect a social- ist, Benson, as sheriff of Milwaukee County. There is a growth of social fascists and fas- ts in which the socialist party plays a lead- ing role together with the A. F. of L. fascist leaders who jointly with the socialist party h the Milwaukee Leader, the mouthpiece fascism. While the socialists are doing this on one hand, on the other hand they are carrying on a campaign among the workers under the Mar: phraseology, speaking of “class jus- tice, ar,” “disposing of class state,” ete. which has in view only one thing—to win the support of the workers so the social- will be able to play their treacherous role, can be useful to capitalis The whole election campaign in Wisconsin Shows definitely that the capitalists, by dema- gogic promises of reforms through La Follette and the socialist party are attempting to pre- vent the workers from organizing themselves for a struggle for work or wages, social insur- ance, etc. The “progressive” capitalist parties of La Follette and the socialists, are attempt- ing to prevent the workers from entering on their class path of struggle. Responsibility. There is a tremendous responsibility facing | our Party in Wisconsin in view of this situa- tion. In many respects, the situation of Mil- waukee is similar to the situation in Detroit IT am of the opinion that our failure in Detroit elections was the result of our inability to ex- Pose the fake campaign against unemployment of Judge Murphy and our not recognizing this as the main danger confronting the working class. In Milwaukee our fight must be concen- trated on social fascism of the socialist party and the “progressiveness” of the La Follette republicans, and on the A. F. of L. officialdom which supports the “progressive” La Follette in Wisconsin. The recognition of this goes to- gether with our main task, concentration on factories and winning the workers in the fac- tories in the struggle for social insurance, against wage cuts, lay-offs, for shortening of the working hours, increase in wages, building the Trade Union Unity League and organizing the workers for strikes, against wage-cuts, lay- offs, speed-up. To lead the workers in every day struggle in the factories will enable us to carry on sucessfully the struggle against social reformism and social fascism which is raising its ugly head today and the worker are mis- lead as was clearly demonstrated in the elec- tions in Detroit and in the primaries in Wis- consin. The task confronting our Party in Wisconsin is to expose and fight against La Follette re- publicans and their allies, the fascist leadership of the A. F. of L. and their social fascist wing, the Musteites, and the socialist party. These are the main tasks of Wisconsin and by the way, throughout the country. Our election cam- paign in all states, on the basis of the lessons of the elections in Detroit and Wisconsin calls for the most merciless and concrete struggle against the social reformism and social fas- cism which can be carried successfully only by leading the workers in every day struggle in the factories and by organizing them into the Communist Party, and building mass revolu- tionary trade union center, the Trade Union Unity League. Mistakes In Our Trade Union Work By TOM JOHNSON. Without question the weakest sector of our Party work is the trade union field. The to- tally unsatisfactory position of the T. U. U. L. and the revolutionary ions, without one ex- ception, are all too apparent. This has been admitted in countless resolutions and in an equal number of resolutions the basic line for our activity in altering the present very dan- gerous situation has been laid down. The fact remains that despite these directives, the basic correctness of which no one questions, the sit- uation does not improve or improves but very slowly. It is clear that our failure in this most important sphere of work is due primar- ily to our inability to correctly apply the Party line in T. U. work. The line of the Party in trade union work is the organization and independent leader- ship of mass struggles. This is expressed con- eretely in the present situation by the slogan of the T. U. U. L., “Organize and Strike Against Wage Cuts.” This is a slogan, of action to be put into effect now and not in some dim and distant future. The workers re ready and if this slogan is properly ad- vanced and correctly applied to the given sit- uation the workers will respond and will put it into action under our lez tership, What are the chief mistakes which have prevented us from realizing this slogan in practice? The first mistake we have made {n Dis- trict 17, and I think nationally, consists of our too general and agitational approach to the problems of the workers. The masses of workers in any industry are not yet self-sac- 4 revolutionists and on the other hand y are not fools, The workers come into the unions for one reason, and taken by and large, for one reason only, to better their condi- tions and to prevent further attacks on condi- tions by the boss. Unless we can show them a concrete program of struggle leading to that end they will not follow us. It won’t do to talk only in generalities of the struggle against wage-cuts, the fight for work or wages, etc. -What the workers are most interested in is the concrete issues aris- ing in their particular industry and shop. It is with these issues that we must deal first of all. This does not mean that we narrow down the activities of the unions to the prob- lems of the particular shop or even industry. It does mean that we approach the worker with a program for the solution of the im- mediate burning problems which he feels most keenly as he comes in contact with them every day. The starting point for all our union activity must therefore be from the shop and the problems facing the workers there. In the same way when framing demands, we rhust raise concrete definite demands based on the conditions in the particular shop and in- dustry we are dealing with. From these shop demands must flow our broader and more comprehensive demands and slogans. A part of this same general abstract ap- prozch to the question is our failure in many instances to give real independent life and vitality to the various industrial unions and leagues. In my opinion, we talk altogether too much in generalities about the T. U. U. L. and its program of struggle to all workers, and not enough by far about the Miners’ |®Union to miners and the Metal Workers’ In- dustrial League to steel workers, When we CAPITA By JACK HARRIS. It has never been a hard task to get the groups of children, especially in the most prole- tarian sections of the cities, to take part in our sports activities. The problem has been hold- ing them. That is why New York where the first attempt was made to really build a children’s sports movement failed. We had a wrong idea of how to work with children. We tried to build an organization without trying to build a corps of leaders either in the districts or on a national scale. Therefore, when we did get 18 teams to take part in a Basketball Tournament in'New York after it was over we were unable to hold on to them. We held block meets during the summer. In the two cases where we had leaders who took eare of their clubs, the clubs not only took part in our activities but became organizationally bound up with the Junior Section of the LSU. | The second shortcoming in our work was that we had an entirely wrong conecption of the re- lationship between the only workers’ children’s sports movement to the Young Pioneers of America. Our idea was that the individual Pioneers had to act as a leadership in the build- ing of junior sports clubs of the LSU. In practice we found that this theory did not work. Now there has come across the ECYCI resolution on children’s work which it seems to me calls upon us to build a cartel of chil- dren's organizations each taking part in their activity. Our children’s sports movement must be one of the organizations that is part of the mass Young Pioneers of America. If we no longer have to worry about draw- ing the children into the Young Pioneers from the Junior Section, but instead the children’s sports movement is part of the broader Young Pioneers then the question is settled, the ques- 1 tion of building sports clubs with the Finnish children of whom there are about 600 through- out the country. We found that they readily joined the Young Pioneers but then they had too many meetings and dropped out of the Young Pioneers when it interfered with their sports work. But when the sports club to which they belong is part of this broad Young Pioneers of America we will be able to hold on to the children. That is, provided we build up a leadership. We need leaders for our children’s sports clubs. The League must give a part of those whom they give as leaders for the present talk Miners’ Union and miners’ demands to a coal miner he is immediately interested, while general propaganda of the T. U. U. L. leaves him cold. Again this does not mean capitula- tion before the narrow craft interests of any section of the workers, but it does mean get- ting away from abstract propaganda and down to something the most backward worker can understand. This same general abstract approach colors much of our organizational work as well. We must put an end to the theory that we can organize the masses of workers through gen- eral T. U. U. L. mass meetings in halls miles removed from the shops. On the contrary the various unions must learn to concentrate all their activity in and around the shops and mines making up their particular industry. The second mistake consists in our failure to establish in each industry and each shop a clear prospective for our work and a con- crete program of activity which ‘will enable us to achieve that prospective. Our general prospective is one of strike struggles, but this is not enough. To merely shout the slogan of Strike Against Wage Cuts means nothing. To bring this slogan to life we must answer in each industry and in each shop where we are working the questions, when, where and how is this strike to be con- PRE-PLENUM DISCUSSION YOUNG COMMUNIST LEAGUE U.S.A. Building the Children’s Sports Movement LISM BEARS ITS FRUIT Pe Pioneers over to become leaders of the Junior Section clubs of the LSU. With these com- rades to start and with the popularizing the demand for leaders from the LSU clubs them- selves we will be able to get a leadership suf- ficiently large enough to take care*of our chil- dren’s sports movement. At the 4th National Convention we must have the LSU clubs start to follow out that part of the LSU constitution which demands a leader from every club. Our perspective must be to hold a basket- ball tournament in every LSU and Pioneer dis- trict in the country; to hold soccer tourneys amongst the children in those districts where the LSU Soccer Leagues exist; to hold indoor swim meets as was held in New York last year; and especially to hold the street activities and games the children respond to so well and which it is very simple to organize. In each district there must be regular lead- ers’ meetings to discuss the activities of the sports groups. These leaders councils must at the same time have classes on the signifi- cance of the children’s sports movement, how to carry on sports work and how to educate the sports groups politically while carrying on their sports work. Our district leaderships must pay special at- tention to what the bosses are doing with the workers’ children in the field of sports. They must carry on a struggle against the boss-led sports through the issuance of leaflets and open air meetings in front of school playgrounds, etc. We must have our children’s press print a magazine reflecting the life of the vast masses of children in sports as well as the other ac- tivities that our children take part in. It must be one of the methods of showing up that the bosses’ sport for children is really a means of “making the children both fit and willing to fight for their country in time of war” as the late PSAL head in New York admitted. The late Gen. Geo. W. Wingate admitted this to the Board of Trustees which is composed of such big bosses as Rockefeller and Morgan. If our “Young Pioneer” becomes such a paper it will become one of our best organizers of children. We must also utilize the Pioneer Corners and the building up of Workers’ Children’s Sports Correspondence. Our Workers Sports Junior Page must be one of the means of building our junior sports and calling upon the seniors to give leadership to the workers’ children’s sports movement. ducted in this industry, this shop. enough to state in our resolutions that the revolutionary unions can and will be built only It is not through the strike struggle. What is neces- sary is to prepare and carry through these strikes. To talk today of a national strike on a fixed date in any industry is pure nonsense. We are altogether too weak to prepare for and successfully carry through such an action, the organizational base of our unions is too Narrow, our connections with the masses of workers entirely too inadequate. This was proved in the mining industry, where the prospective for a general strike in the indus- try was advanced a year ago, and as the date of the proposed strike dtew closer (Sep- tember of this year) it became clear to every- one that a national strike was out of the ques- tion. Our prospective must be for the develop. ment of strikes embracing whole industries, not from above, but through the carrying through of countless smaller preparatory ac- tions, and broadening these strike actions to include ever wider sections of the workers. This means that our present unplanned method of work, consisting of more or less futile at- tempts to build up small locals and shop com- mittees in the shops or mines nearest at hand without any clear program of action for these ALL MIXED UP. Capitalist “authorities” are having a hard time these days in figuring out what’s what. F’rinstance, those interested in imperialist in- vestments in Latin American, are beginning to wonder if the “law an’ order” in those parte is quite safe for their capital investments. The Central Hanover Bank and Trust Co., which seems to have been caught out in the rain with a lot of South American bonds that are hard to sell, has issued a “statement,” saying that everything is all to the good in Latin American investments, that “most of the countries have adopted modern financial practice and well considered budgetary sys- tems, frequently assisted by American ex- perts.” That, we observe, is just the trouble with Latin America, and our opinion is borne out by the remarks of Max Winkler, who is known as an authority on Latin American invest- ments. He says: “Many of the Latin American nations have doubtless over-borrowed. But what would seem to be more accurate, we have over-lent. We are placing hundreds of mil- lions of dollars in Latin American enter- prises. We have invested huge sums in oil, and in many instances the result was turmoil. We have placed large sums in Latin American bonds, and in some cases the result for the borrower was bondage. We have furnished substuntial amounts to create booms in Latin America, and the re- sult in some cases was boomerangs.” Winkler follows this engaging resume with some concrete instances. He says that in ten years—during which the Wall Street lackey Leguia ruled Peru, its foreign debt rose from $5,000,000 to $112,000,000, while Peruvian rev- enues increased from $30,000,000 to only $50,- 000,000. Then Bolivia, where the “experts” of the Dillon Read bankers of New York were “as- sisting” in the most approved style, Winkler says is—“another country which can hardly consider assuming additional burdens.” It seems that Bolivia, under the “assistance of American experts,” has borrowed some $70,- 000,000, most of it in New York, while its revenues total $15,000,000 a year and it only met the interest on its debt lately by selling the monopoly rights to charge Bolivians five times as much for matches as. necessary, to the Swedish match trust. Some of these days these Bolivian Indians are going to use those Swedish matches to burn up all the fancy “agreements” and “con- tracts,” treaties and constitutions meant to enslave them. Workers! Join the Party of Your Class! Communist Party U. S. A. 43 East 125th Street, New York City. I, the undersigned, want to join the Commu- nist Party. Send me more information. Name ....c0secccces Address ..ccecccesececcmmeces URY-secceece Occupation . teeeeees Age...... Mail this to the Central Office, Communist Party, 43 East 125th St.. New York, N. Y. locals, must give way to a careful plan of campaign for each industry and each local- ity. A plan of campaign which will lead us daily toward definite strike action in definite shops or mines. (To Be Continued.) BY BURUK. | A ~——s By JORGE GETTING WORRIED. Senator Walsh of the Foreign Relations Committee has recently visited Cuba and beat a hasty retreat, emitting great clouds of warn- ings. It seems that the Cuban sugar barrel is about to explode and Walsh is worried lest all there will be left for the American bank- ers will be the bung-hole. He says: “Tf the Cuban question reaches the political crisis that is threatened, the American people (read “bankers”) may prepare themselves for revolutions of the most startling character.” From which we judge that Walsh fears that any Cuban revolt that occurs may not stop at just a change of dictators, as the Cuban workers and peasantry are too hungry and too experienced in political struggle to be kidded along like those of Bolivia. So they make a different kind of revolution, one of those “startling” kind that raise the Hammer and Sickle along with the scalps of all exploiters. k * * * ™~ KEEP YOUR PANTS ON. In these days, when Jimmy Walker and his lady judges are all shedding their pants to “give to the unemployed” while they buy new ones to “stimulate business,” it is sad to note that not all public-spirited citizens are falling in line. For the writer, who got a delayed pay-day in the so far distant past that he has for- gotten what money looks like, not to mention spending any on such superfluous luxuries as pants, it is painful to record the following observations of George A. Renard, secretary and treasurer of the National Association of Purchasing Agents: “The difficulties (for purchasing agents) include the temptation to speculate in raw commodities, to overbuy because of attrac- tively low prices, or to give way to senti- mental appeals to help business by making larger purchases than conditions warrant.” These purchasing agents seem damned cold- blooded about it, don’t they? If things keep up like that, Jimmy Walker will have to give away another pair of his 150 pairs of pants. * * * DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. As an unnoticeable postscript to all his screeching against the Soviet, Mr. Hyde adds in a whisper that—“Of course I do not claim that the Soviet wheat sales alone caused the decline in wheat prices.” He fails to be ex- plicit, however, in saying just what was the other factors, let alone making a fuss about them. But also, Hyde should keep in touch with Mr. Legge of the Farm Board, who in speak- ing to the New York State Grange meciing in Syracuse last week, told the farmers that all their woes were dhe to—“the advance in labor rates,” that is, to “high wages.” Legge proceeded admirably to lie in the accepted Hoover style, saying that—“the aver- age wage earnings today are about two and a quarter times the average of pre-war days.” This, Legge told the farmers, is the source of their troubles. Now, Mr. Hyde says that it’s because the Soviet, which has grain to sell, is simply giving it away just to make the farm- ers broke so they will love the Soviet. That’s remarkable. Actually, even the reformist statisticians say that, in 1914 employers paid 16.8 per cent of their costs to wages, and in’1927 only 17.3 per cent, an “increase” of only one-half of one per cent. Also, that since 1919, wages (money wages, not real wages’ increased only 11.4 per cent, while output increased 46.5 per cent; and as 2.9 per cent fewer workers were em- ployed, the productivity actually increased 53.5 per cent per worker. So, as a matter of fact, compared to what they produced, the American wage workers have had a hell of a wage-cut, if you subtract that 11.4 per cent from the 53.5 per cent. But then, who expects Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, or their boss, Hoover, to tell the truth about anything? To get out from under the fact that Hoover’s “eternal prosperity” was the rankest fairy tale, and that neither poor farmers nor workers can expect anything but misery and starvation under capitalism, they try to set the farmers against the workers on one hand, and on the other to tell them that the Soviet is to blame for the drought and other incidentals. * * * THE ARGENTINE TANGO. While Hoover and Hyde are making whoopee over Soviet sales of wheat as the great price depressant, down in Argentine, where the main enemy at present is Great Britain, the new agents of American imperialism have discovered that British are to blame for the wheat prices there. : The N. Y. Times tells about it without crack- ing a smile, saying that British exporting (from Argentine) firms, buy wheat for future delivery prices, then put “an enormous quan- tity of Argentine grain afloat, consigned un- sold to foreign markets, thus depressing the price ruling in the market on the day they choose for payment.” Not only that, but the British insist on re- ceiving grain in| jute bags made in India, though they cut them open at the ship-side and sell them back to the farmers again, and all this, “in combination with British owned railroads, constitutes an active and formidable barrier to every effort to supply Argentina with grain elevators.” From which we judge that American capital wants to sell some nice new grain elevators to Argentina, * * * HIGH MORTALITY AMONG FAKERS. Woonsocket, R. I. (F.P.).—Hard times are hard on business agents, President James H. Moriarty of the Massachusetts Federation of Labor told Rhode Island Federation delegates in convention at Woonsocket. More business agents have been discharged or defeated for re-election in the past two years than during the past previous 25 years, he said. ——w