The Daily Worker Newspaper, October 9, 1930, Page 4

see nen sraitta Published by the Comprodai 18th Street, New York Address and mail all chee Page Four to oe Daily Worker, 50 ating Co., Inc., daily, Telephone Algonquin Sast 13th Street, New York, Daily, Central bas tecC oy Worker’ Sroniet ves US.A. SUBSCRIPTION RATES? By mail everywhere: One year, $6; six months, $3; two months, $1; excepting Boroughs of Manhattan and Bronx, New_York City. Foreign: One year, $8;, six months, $4.50 A BOLSHEVIK ACHIEVEMENT TO BE CONSOLIDATED AND FOLLOWED UP By RAYMOND BAKER. The Communist Party in District 2 has made a serious achievement in the field of Revolutionary by securing es_to put the in the sales, iviti shop psigna: were not. only conti: ved by increased both in quantity and quality The cam sive and ign for signatures v an exten- ained campaign of individual bol- on that actually reached tens of new workers with Communist character of the agitation, the results ed and the large percentage of members Ived reflects to participate in broad agitation and the pos- s of securing serious results on the paign has revealed many weak- d shortcomings, the failure to draw Party members into the activity, lack of proper organizational coordination, the failure to draw the entire membership into activity, etc. However, the characteristic feature lies in the achievements and the first large scale the readiness of our Party | ] successful agitation by individual canvassing | of workers at their homes. | Each Signer a Poten jal Vote. ient number of mly the first step in nduct of the election cam- ed out by the District Com- out in full by the com- m of the entire Party mem- » and the revolutionary mem- ip of the Party. n is a potential veter and there are thousands of potential members of the Party and revolutionary unions. In the period of the next few weeks each worker who has signed the C ist petition | must be visited at least once. Every effort | | The plans worl | mittee must be c: must be made to get these wo: to Vote Communist, to become active supporters and agitators for the Comm them to read the Party pr bers of tha revolutionary unions y In tue campaign a ious effort must be made to draw the non-Party workers into the election campaign activities. Into the Shops. y shop where Communist and revolu- workers are working shall endorse the ates, vote to march in body jommunist candidates, F upon their at the M ison Square Garden. ll vote a definite sum ign fund to be pre- | at Oct. 21 demonstration, s in the shops shall be drawn into all | activities of the campaign. All shop papers shall feature the election campaign connecting the slogan, demands and the platform of the Communist Party with the concrete problems facing the workers in the shop. PRE-PLENUM DISCUSSION Young Communist League, U.S.A. The Cleveland District Before and After the Plan By BEN INTRATOR (Cleveland). ota SIX, just as other districts, began to carry out the Plan of Action at a time when it was politically and organizationally in- capable to do it. The units on the most part were units on paper which in the case of out of town did fot ectvally meet, with the exception of our unit in Akron. Those of our units which did meet had dead, lifeless meetings, conducted no zetivity whatsoever and functiongd more as so- cial clubs where our membership wou!d come together once a week for an hour or two. As a result of this there was practically no activity in the shops, not a single shop nucleus or shop committee existed and no shop papers issued. The result of this neglect of practical every day work of the Y. C. L. in the shops was that our Y. C. L. became more and more isolated from the young workers, instead of developing and increasing our activities, as this radical- ization of the young workers progressed. On the other hand while the every day work ‘was neglected and not carried out in the shops, we find that the Y. C. L. busied itself primar- ily with demonstrative ‘activity which although very good could not be brought to successful results, due to the preparatory propaganda not being spread in the shops. The Y. C. L. considered demonstrations for demonstrations sake and failed to link up the campaigns but separated them. The activity ceased when the demonstrations ended. The result of this absolutely wrong method | of work resulted in the following example: On March 6th the Y. C. L. succeeded in re- eruiting 200 young wo: into the Y. C. L. With a very few exeeptions (about 6 or 7) none of these applicants were followed up, at- tended to, and those that did attend the Y. C. 1. meetings were lost, due to the lack of ac- tivity, dry meetings, and generally wrong method of work, The district was loose not only in activity, but we find that even in the leadership this vhad a very bad effect. The district depart- ments did not function and some of our most important departments were not in existence such as the T. U. U. L. and anti-militarist devartments. The dues payments were a fraction of what they should be and signatures were written into the books instead of stamps being given. A spirit of being permanently unemployed existed among our comrades and resulted in mental depression and demoralization of our comrades. What Was Done. One of the basic reasons why the plan of action did not fully fulfill its object was be- cause the leadership did not fully realize the political importance of the-plan of action. What steps we took are as follows: 1. Had a thorough discussion in the bureau on the plan of action. 2. Mobilized our leadership to set an exam- ple in the units to carry out the tasks. 3. We fought against any signs of pas- sivity and pessimism on the part of either the leadership and membership. After mobilizing the district leadership it ‘was necessary to at once abolish the organ- izational looseness that prevailed in the dis- trict and steps were taken in that direction. We dissolved some units that did not function and strengthened others. This general tightening up in the League apparatus, although only partially realized, re- sulted in a better spirit to do work and in the time that followed there were signs of in- creased activity, and the membership went about the activity of the League with a much of Action What are some of the things that are im- portant in reviewing the plan of action? 1. It has proven to the satisfaction of the League, in my opinion, the superiority of planned activity over a given period of time to the old method used by us, of sporadic out- bursts of activity a few days before culmina- tion of a certain campaign or demonstration. This sporadic activity resulted in a general impression of the League membership that a certain demonstration or campaign is an end in itself instead of a means towards an end. This always led to an underestimation of the campaign and the necessity to link up a in campaign with all the campaigns of y and League. This attitude must and can be broken by the new method of work adopted by the League. 2. The Plan of Action has gone a long way towards orientating our Y. C. L. to the necessity of changing our League from a nar- row and sectarian organization to a mass or- ganization of young Communists ready at all times to take advantage of the objective situa- | tion and local issues prevailing, to lead the young workers into struggle. This, however, can only be done by consis- tent and sacrificing effort in activity by our League membership. 8. The system of planned activity will also result in a coordination of the activities of both the Party and the Y. C. L. resulting in more and better organizational results than till now. Cur Party will take the responsibility of building the Y. C. L. in the districts, and the League as a school of Communists, will send more and better comrades into the Party ready for the leading cadres of our Party because of their previous training. Csn these results be accomplished? Yes, and in as short time as possible because the immediate future speaks of tremendous mass struggles of the workers against capitalism. Our Party and League must be the leading core in these struggles in order not only to bring them to a satisfactory conclusion but also to increase their membership and_ their mass following in the working class. Westinghouse Cuts Wages, Mellon Profits By GRACE HUTCHINS Firing and wage cuts are the order of the day at the huge Westinghouse Electric and Manufecturing Co. workers near Pittsburgh, as at other plants in this industrial center. Only one-third the former number of workers are now employed. Wages are at least 10 per cent less than former rates. The office force was recently cut down by 10 per cent, and two weeks later the remain- ing office workers were given a 10 per cent wae cut, Women workers, hired at a cut rate of two-thirds of man’s wages, have re- plated men in msny departments. Westing- house plays the old gaine of firing a group of workers when they finish a particular job to rehire scrae a few weeks later at lower wages. “Women come cheaper,” and so girls now work at almcct all processes in the rubber depart- ments of the Westinghouse Air Brake plants. Workers Starve, Boss Profits During the very months of 1980 while work- ers’ wages were cut, the rate of dividend go- ing to capitalist stockholders was increased from $1 a quarter per share to $1.25 a quarter per share—a 25 per cent increase. Dividends distributed in 1929 totalled over $11,000,000. The Mellon family is well represented on the Westinghouse board of directors, while Andrew Mellon himself as U. S. secretary of treasury - PREPARING TO. STRIKE —BY BURCK THE GERMAN REICHSTAG ELECTIONS AND THE TASKS OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF GERMANY cratic workers and young workers{would frighten away the electors. By FRITZ HECKERT (Berlin). When at the end of July last the Bruening Government dissolved the Reichstag because it did not pos- sess a majority for carrying | through its dictatorial taxation | measures, neither it nor anybody in| Germany believed that the elections on September 14 would have such a result. Thé fact that the old bourgeois parties have been almost completely shattered by the election and a new party, the National So- cialist Party has far outstripped all other bourgeois parties, is almost unexampled in the history of Par- liament. The result of the elections denotes more than mere discontent with the policy hitherto pursued in Germany: it indicates the rapid approach of a great revolutionary crisis arising | on the basis of the economic crisis and the Young Plan. The Communist Party has in- creased its vote from 3,260,000 to nearly 4,600,000. That is a gain of more than 1,300,000 votes. At the same time the social democratic party has lost over 600,000 votes while the participation in the elec- tion was 13 per cent higher than at the previous Reichstag election. Reckoning according to seats, the social democracy, in view of the greatly increased participation in the election and the growth in the numbers of electors, ought to have increased its seats from 153 to 181. Instead, however, it has obtained only 143 seats. The loss of 38 seats cannot be designated as a trifling loss or even as a “social democratic victory” as “Le Peuple” and other social democratic organs do. Reckoned according to the in- creased participation in the election the Communist Party would have increased the number of its seats from 54 to 63, but it has actually obtained 76, which means that it has really been able to gather fresh broad masses of the workers round its flag. The votes lost by the so- cial democracy were almost entirely absorbed by the Communists. It is only in a few places that our gains in votes were less than the losses of the social democracy. There can be no doubt whatever that the Com- munist Party has succeeded in deep- ly. penetrating the ranks of the so- cial democratic electors. This is also shown by the continual and in- creasing going over of social demo- paid back to the Westinghouse company nearly to the Communist Party and to the Young Communist League. What makes the vote of the Com-| munist Party so important is the} fac tthat it is almost entirely de-) |rived from the proletarian class whilst the growth in the Hitler par- ty on the other hand mainly repre- sents only a regrouping in the bour-| geois camp. The German national- | ist party lost half of its electors to Hitler, whilst the German People’s Party lost 40 per cent and the State party lost 20 per scent of their sup-| porters to the national socialists. The increased participation of bour- geois elements in the election ac-| cried wholly to the benefit of the national socialists. The national | socialists became the rallying cen- ter of all discontented elements of the bourgeoisie and a portion ofthe workers and employees who have been betrayed by the social fascists and are now misled and confused by the fascists. It thus represents a socially heterogeneous crowd. If one compares the bourgeois votes..with the votes cast for the social democrats and Communists, one does not ‘observe any great change in the total result. As the bourgeois parties and in particular the national socialists conducted their election campaign under the slogan: “Shatter the Marxist camp!” (under which term they mean the social democrats and the Communists) it can be said that this attack has been completely re- pulsed and has ended only with the bankruptcy of the bourgeois par- ties. Of all the bourgeois parties only the Centre is ,able to record any gain. But this gain is only an absolute increase in the vote polled, while relatively considered the Cen- tre has to record ® loss. Only in the Rhenish Westphalian industrial district have the Communists suc- ceeded in winning over a part of the workers who have hitherto sup- ported the Centre Party. The Communist Party gained its election victory under a clear and straightforward slogan: Overthrow of capitalism and fight for a Soviet Germany. This slogan dominated the whole of the election agitation. At no time was there the slightest deviation from the revolutionary line. Our opponents, the bourgeois parties and also the social demo- | proved the crats thought that this emphasis upon our revolutionary principles { In one great room of electrical machinery, The result of the elections has exact contrary and/ thereby demonstrated before the} whole world that the Communists make the greatest progress when! they unflinchingly put forward rev- olutionary demands and aims. The fact that the Communist Party has become the leading party in Berlin, Halle, Dusseldorf-West, and Lower Rhine is of decisive im- portance. In a number of other electoral areas such as Dusseldorf- East, Upper Silesia, Cologne- Aachen we have outstripped the so- cial democratic party. In the big towns on the Rhine and on the Ruhr we have with few exceptions beaten the social democrats. In many of these huge industrial towns the Communist gain amounted to 70 to 100 per cent. Also in many other big towns we have topped the poll, as for instance in Berlin, where the Communist vote increased from 611,317 at the last Reichstag elections to 738,986, whilst the social democratic vote fell from 816,196 to 737,821. The Communist Party topped the poll in all working class districts in Ber- lin, before all in Wedding, Fried- richshain, Neukolln and Zentrum.| Tt was only in the fashionable West End districts that the social demo- crats were able to poll a larger vote! than the Communists. The more bourgeois the district is, the greater the advantage of the social demo- erats. Nothing can show, more plainly, than the election result in Berlin, that the social democracy has ceasetl to be the party of the workers, and that it is rapidly be- coming a bourgeois party. . Its so- cial-fascist ideology is the expre: sion of the change in its class basis. A detailed examination of the election result shows that our party has made the greatest progress in those places in which it prepared and organized the fight of the workers in spite of all resistance and difficulties. This is the case without exception. This fact proves that unhesitating advocacy of our revolutionary principles and our revolutionary tactics guarantees the greatest advance to the Party. The Party must more than ever become the leader of the proletariat? and of the oppressed strata of the population. It must organize the economic struggles of the proletar- iat in the big economic crisis and under the hard blows of the em- ployers’ offensive. In order to ful- fill these tasks better than hitherto, the Party must build up a real or- ganizational apparatus for its trade union work, must create in every factory a firmly organized group of the revolutionary trade union op- position and convert the shop stew- ards and the red factory council into fighting organs of the ‘prole- tarian class. The election struggle has further taught us that the arm of the Party is still too short in order to em- brace all the revolutionary masses and in order to transform the revo- lutionary energy into a powerful striking force against capitalism. The Party must therefore carry out a large-scale recruiting work ‘in order to double its membership. It must devote particular attention to winning young workers and the working women who are acquiring ever increasing importance in the class struggle of the proletariat. It will teach the proletariat which is now threatened by the offensive of the employers and the fascists to set up a broad anti-fascist fighting front on the basis of the united front of all class conscious workers. For this purpose it must especially conduct extensive work among the social democratic and christian workers. More than hitherto it must work in the proletarian mass organizations in order to convert these into powerful weapons in the offensive front of the Communist Party. pete The program of the national and social emancipation of Germany which was enthusiastically sup- ported by all our brother parties abroad played a great role in mob- ilizing the masses in the election campaign. The workers of Ger- many have recognized that the Com- munist Party is the only’ party which knows a way out of the mis- ery of the capitalist crisis and Young Plan slavery, which if fol- lowed without hesitation and vacil- lation will bring to the German proletariat the support of the prole- tariat of other countries. The workers of all countries can draw from the election campaign in Ger- many the lesson that ‘the fight for the Soviet Power arouses the en- thusiasm of the working masses! and tremendously accelerates the Communist advance. furnaces and hot sand mixed together is enough By JORGE Put Walls Around It! | Mayor Murphy and-the Detroit bosses have hit on a happy idea in putting up signs at every entrance to Detroit reading: “Strangers, Keep Out!” Only they’re about a thousand years behind the times, .The feudal barons of the middle ages—and earlier, used to do such bright tricks, and found that without building high walls and a moat arotnd the towns the signs didn’t work. After all it would be suite fitting to show that capitalist “civilization” is reverting to forms harmonious with its barbarous charac- ter if all the cities would build walls around themselves. Of course, in the present case, it is the workers only who are kept out, and thus made into pariahs. But let us hear no more of the “broad social outlook” of capitalism! * + * Mulrooney’s Finest There hasn’t been enough head cracking lately to satisfy the New York cops, so just to keep in trim until the winter bread riots begin Patrolman Calvin Sayers got a Hey- wood Broun bun on Monday night—walked into a house in Brooklyn, shot a 58-year-old widow to death, showing that he knows what Mulrooney meant wheri he made a speech re- cently telling the cops to be kind and courte- ous to the people. Another cop, Julius Herberer, taking the hint from Jimmy Walker that what is wanted right now in New York City is civic righteous- ness to defend our sacred homes from the men- ace of Bolshevism,. went out with his little police car, looted the furniture from two homes and presented it to his lady love, an Irish school teacher, who teaches the kids that they have terrible immorality in the Soviet Union. It seems that this cop, who was setting up a little pedagogic ‘concubine thus on the side, he being married and the father of two kids, is especially distinguished by having a dad who is a justice of the peace and at the same time is drawing salary as chaplain of the Nassau County Jail, being a preacher devoted to showing the lowly the Way of Life. Now we ask everybody to note that the cop who put four bullets through the aged and widowed mother of six children is reported in the N. Y. Times to “have had a good record in the police’ department.” While the cop whose philandering led him into making the mistake of robbing the houses of the rich, be- sides “having served with the navy during the World War,” is noted for “a splendid record as-a detective and was promoted to be a ser- geant two years ago, later acting as lieuten- ant.” It was while he was a sergeant that he lifted the furniture. But when his police car was found full of good liquor after a fire in a rich man’s cellar, he was demoted’ It don’t pay to steal from the rich when you’re their watch- dog. ** * We Shed Tears— Crocodile Tears Ordinarily discussion articles are signed when submitted and this year’s crop runs heav- ily to “shocks,” but we’re going to evade the censor and run something neither signed nor “shocking” except in one way. Someone signing a letter as “A League Member” objects to recent criticisms of D. O’s in this column and, assuring us that it’s no personal matter, passes on to the following: “I am one comrade of many who really knows what our D. O’s have to go through, as I have a brother and a comrade who are both acting D. O’s. My brother, I know, has given up a good trade and many other neces- sities to be active in our movement. My comrade has given up a $45 a week job, a | home, old motheer, etc., to be active as a D. 0.” Now, we are compelled to interject here that we have a better opinion of D. O’s than does the League member who wrote such rot as this. The “Internationale” tells us: “We want no condescending saviors,” though it’s doubtful if “A League Member” ever learned more than the first verse. One grave disease in the revolutionary move- ment is precisely this “social worker” view- point of coming to the movement as from above, to “help and guide the poor downtrod- den workers.” Such petty-bourgeois ideology is enough to turn the stomach of any worker, and we are far from ascribing it to our D. 0's, We sort of get the fecefing that this sort of Tin Jesus idea is part of the reason why the League hasn’t “made the turn”—due to its student non-proletarian composition. We feel sad about the D. O. who gave up “ good trade and many other’ necessities,” though what trade is guaranteed “good” for a worker these days is something we missed. And as for the D. 0. who actually laid down “a $45 a week job, a home and old mother” on the altar of the revolution, we can only burst into tears in sympathy and assure him that we will never deprive him of the pleasure of $2,000,000 federal tax refund in 1929. New machircs, have displaced many workers in Westinghouse plants. One such machine in six parts, called the Aut-ou-Mat, recently in- stalled in the Westinghouse Air Brake Co. at Wilmerding, Pa. does the work of 30 men. “Very costly, it’s true,” explains the young engineer, “but the initial cost, you understand, 4s made up many times over in wages.” high-powered automatic switch’ boxes, one young boy alone tends the entire equipment. “But what’s up-to-date today is obselete to- morrow,” continues the engineer and quotes the example of Inland Steel and Dupont Co. of In- diana Harbor, Ind., where blast furnaces which produced a maximum of 600 tons a day in 1927 now produce 1,000 and more tons a ‘a pa , At the Westinghouse foupdxiag tha bead Of lonty tay to exhaust the workers in a short time. The atmosphere is tight and stifling. In the rub- ber departments girl workers, dressed in over- alls, must stand the smell of heated rubber, “enough to knock you ” Negro, workers are used on the worst jobs ywhere’ the heat is fiercest and the ow of Vetcwaatd is dca further sacrifice, and would he do some more by kindly remitting sums due. the Daily Worker, as we have some people working for : who have been fed up on the joy of sacri- ice. “What I suggeest,” the anonymous League Member goes on, “is that you give these com- rades a little more co-operation instead of criticism.” This is what might be called rich: We send the districts thousands of dollars worth of Daily Workers. They dispose of them for cash, but never dream of paying for them (prob- ably this is a part of their sacrifice for. the working class), and then “A League Member” psc that we should “give them co-opera- ion! And when the Party decides that such van- dalism must be stopped, she (“A League Member” is undoubtedly a she) says that her letter should be printed in the Daily Worker “as criticism to Comrade Jorge for his un- communistie tactics.” Probably it never occurs to some of our readers that Jorge may be expressing the pol- icy of the Seventh Convention of the C. P* U. S. A. and the Central Committee elected by it. Will aries tuene eve dees ane ange: key with ee crocodile? ics ge