The Daily Worker Newspaper, March 14, 1931, Page 4

ay A Spectre in the Legislature ( j \ Page By A NEWSPAPERMAN. (The following story is written by a reporter for a York daily ry who accompanied the hunger marchers to Albany and who was present in the ature when the state troopers attacked the un- employed delegation EN-THIRTY bany. A te corridors. W dents stalk the red and rooms, peering around cor: tinizing strange At doors and entranc uniformed, fur-hatted state troopers. Cheap imitators of their northern prototypes—the Canadian Northw Mounted Police. manner nd gray Dashing outfit! Colt 45 automatics. police “courage.” Suddenly waiting figures are gal- vanized. Heels Orders are whispered. Jaws are stiffened. In dness of police prec. ion a paunchy assemblyman moves here and there. “They are he “Look at ’em!” “There they are!” Up the wide marble te the visitors’ galler e hundred men and women march—silent, mea- sured steps on the wide, white marble steps—men in gray clothes, shabby, “badly dressed,” as one of the Al- bany morning papers said, “in con- trast to the well-dressed shoppers on the main business street.” Yes, they are badly dressed. Some | faces are gray, some pale. Others! irs leading are hard, weather-beaten. Horny / hands—unemployed workers. The hunger marchers! Tramp, tramp, left, right, left, right—up the white marble steps | they go—left, right, left, right—in | rows of four, in firm military forma tion. The hunger marchers! | Around corners, out of adjacent) Offices, pallid, begoggled, frightened faces of clerks and bureaucrats peer. | The hunger marcliers! Left, right, | left, right;.up the white, wide marble | Stairs. | | State troopers stand erect at doors, | itrances. Manicured assemblymen} ed here and there with papers ih their hands, casting sidelong| glances at the marchers as they file nto the doors leading to the visit- ‘ors’ galleries. | Orderly, with fine proletarian -dis- | cipline, they take their places looking | down on the buzzing and scurrying | on the floor of the assembly. They sit immobile, quiet, ominous. Tye} hunger marchers! They are at the end of their long trek northward. A long, spare, condor-like clergy- | man blesses the meditations of the legislators. He speaks in the whin- | ing, singsong voice so typical of the clergy: | “—— and in Thine infinite mercy | give us wisdom in these delibera-/| tions. . . . Amen.” ‘The clerk begins the roll-call. “He re——present here——here —here—" | The names are droned scarcely disturbing the tense silence of the chamber. * From the rear a voice is Héard. It is sharp, loud, clear. The speaker is Jack Johnstone, secretary of the) ‘Trade Union Unity Council. The) speaker does not raise his head. The | droning buzz of the soll-call goes EO “Mr. Speaker—our wives and chil- dren are starving”... Two state troopers leap on John- stone and drag him towards the door. Their fists beat into his face, | their clubs on his head and shoul- ders. . At once the assembly is in an up- roar. In the galleries the hunger | ‘fous cr begin the rumbling, om-| | nous chant: | “We want work or wages—we want | work or wages—we want work or) wages... .” | The chanting grows louder, more | ominous—it swells, roars angrily | with menace, hatred: “We want work or wages—we want work or; wages—we want work or wages...” State troopers leap in the packed THE HOWL OF THE SEA By MICHAEL YOUNG Down to the sea in a reeking tub That the capitalists While the bosses sit | face to face. |face seems to collapse under the | | tion... .” | of you and I'll let you have it.” The | burly worker replies: | shrapnel in me from the last war—/ | his face out of his office and asks in | guns, clubs, fists. lof the Capitol before the serried Down to the sea with rotten grub That gets worse every trip Down to the sea with a dirty mate Who works you night and day And if you miss some time in port He logs you two days pay Way down in the tropic lands Where the heat is worse than bell And the insects eat your face and hands And the stinking stew you smell The men below are damn near dead But the officers joke and smile ‘Why should they bother their head For don’t they eat in style? If the fireman can’t keep up the steam \ Because it’s so damn hot ‘The engineer will shout and scream Till the steam’s up to the dot Down to the sea with curse and growl gallerie “badly s ing at the gray-clad, ressed” demonstrators; Clubs Automatics are drawn. Blows ruck—on both sides. Bedlam! ndemonium! Plashlights boom. ward the arched ceiling. A woman ieks, It is impossible to see what happeni There is an angry roar as worters leap into the fight, defending women the state police. Wax-faced legislators run up the aisle, out of the chamber in. the ety of their offices. Some gather into small knots on the floor and} lcok up into the galleries where the fighting is taking place. “Give it to ’em,” they shout to the police. Above the turmoil singing is heard. | The Internationale! It is weak at first and gains in volume... . } “Arise ye prisoners of starva- tion. . . Boom.‘ Boom. Boom. Flashlights. Smoke. Shouts. Shrieks of the as-| semblymen to the state troopers: “Give it to 'em. Sock ’em.” “, ,. arise ye wretched of the earth...” A trooper leaps on the back of a frail girl, choking her as she goes down. A husky world war veteran, one of the marchers, grabs the} trooper by the scruf of his coat, twirls him around so that they are Crash! the trooper’s and shouting blow. A worker kicks an automatic | out of the hands of an officer. An- other blow. Another state trooper falls between the benches. He is motionless. A woman becomes hy- | sterical, but above her shrieks the | singing is still heard ... | “For justice thunders condemna- | Reserves are sent for, Some state trodpers are carried out. A_ little] New York needle worker leaps at the | faee-of- Captain Keeley. She sends | her nails deep into his face. She pulls down. It is horrible to see Keeley's face. Blood spurts, staining the white walls of the ante-rooms as | he flees for medical help. More reserves arrive. The march- ers fight tenaciously for every step before retreating. There is a hard, military quality about the resistance of the workers. This is explained by the many ex-| servicemen in the ranks. They | know! They remember! But it is | different now. They are fighting for something different now. They re- treat step by step. Workers are hurt --but they give blow for blow and sometimes more. More troopers are taken away, cut, bleeding and torn. Camera Shots. A trooper and six-foot ex-service- man. Face to face. The trooper waves his automatic. “One move out “That's all right, I’ve got seventeen pieces of I can stand another.” The trooper served in the* war also, apparently. He is romantic. He says: “Aw, gee byddy——” “Buddy, me eye," says the hunger marcher.. His fist shoots out, lands on the trooper’s jaw. The trooper caves in, lies still. A green-faced assemblyman sticks a trembling voice: “Is it all over?” Three state troopers being carried to the Capitol medical offices. ‘The measured, slow, organized re- treat of the workers in the face of The slow retreat down the steps ranks of the troopers. Like that Cossack shot in the movie “Potem- kin.” It is all over. For twenty minutes the hunger | marchers, held the assembly. j Hundreds cf heroic actions took} place. What a pity that they can- not be decorated with an American Order of the Red Banner. It was a fine, heroic battle; the forerunner, in a small measure, of the inevitable larger struggle which is now in the making. call a ship and grin Until a red begins to howl “Uf you organize, you'll win” ‘Then the crew can get good grub More men to keep up the steam We'll do away with this old tub And ship on a seaman’s dream Smoke curls to- | who are being clubbed and struck by | That's organized from bow to stern With a crew to stick and fight The capitalists, and make them learn To respect the workers’ right On March 18, 1871,. the workers of Paris rose against their oppressors and took control of the city, which they held for two months. date is therefore honored by the world’s workers as the first attempt to establish the dictatorship, or rule, of the working class. by William Seigel are from an International pamphlet just off the press giving the story of the Commune in a series of excellent pictures.) THE PARIS COMMUNE DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MARCH 14, 1931 Vig! a —Drawings by WILLIAM SEIGEL. ay | ef yf! This (The drawings LITTLE FROG AND HIS BROTHER EDITORIAL NOTE: This story shows conditions in China about 5 years ago, and how the workers in the cities exerted every effort to arouse the backward peasantry who today together with the workers, are carrying through the agrarian revolution and establishing Soviets in central and south China. By OSCAR LEDBERG. (A story of the lives of Chinese rev- olutionary peasants, translated by Seymour Goldberg.) DAY; in the’ afternoon, our “Agit- prop Train” puffed in at the Sen- Ye railroad station, when the scythe- like sun-rays were as though tangled in the telegraphic wires. A familiar picture appeared before my eyes—a filthy station; groups of ragged and hungry soldiers, half-naked; peasants in straw hats and jthe entire pillaged Jand in its natural charm, which both depresses and inspires. Little Li, or “Little Frog,” as we called him, whom the Bureau of the/ Young Pioneers at Hankow had sent | with us for propaganda purposes ‘| among the workers’ children, said to me: “The train will stay here a whole night. I am going to the village and shall return as soon as it is dawn.” I asked him not to be late. A meeting had to be held at the sta- tion tomorrow morning and I wanted Li to speak for the youth, Yesterday, when our Agit-prop Train had stood at the Sian-yan station, the “Little Freg” led me to the club of the railroad workers, which had ‘its quarters in a dark) Where they come from and no mat-| And at that moment we all saw a bamboo barn in the back of the sta- tion buildings... The club had one room and a small courtyard, In the interior there were long benches which were placed along the walls. The entire front wall of the room was hung with pictures of workers who were slain in February, 1923, by the Nationalist officers at the time of the railroad strike. The faces of these martyrs, penetrative, passion- ate, looked down from the soot- covered pictures. In this Pa-theon of the first fight- ers of the workers’ revolution in China “Little Frog” pointed out the picture of his father—a man of about 25 years of age, in the clothes of a machinist, and in a hat with broad brims, lowered on his nape, with a concentrated gaze on his motionless, hardened face. He was killed at the moment when he made an attempt to steam away the locomitive in which the arrested strike leaders were to be carried off. The mur- derer, an army officer, afterwards came to the house of the worker to make a search, He said to “Little “Your father was a bandit. The same fate awaits you if you will go in his footsteps, then there shall be no one to care for the souls of your ancestors.” t At that time “Little Frog” was but 11 years old, but he had sense enough to answer: “I will make all efforts ‘o. fulfill the duty of ‘Thou Shall Honor Thy Father.’” “Little Frog” told me that the chil- ‘tren of the fifty slain workers were ‘tudying in the propaganda school at he San-yan railroad station, which cad been built by the contributions of the Union of Railroad Worr 1 His older brother, Li, had completed the course and was now working on| the railroad. | “We are all Communists. The} | Koumingtan is for merchants and} officers. The Party of Lenin is for} | us,” and he showed me his Young | Workers’ League emblem, which he} had hidden in the folds of his shirt. | The later hours of the day I de- | voted to the preparations of tomor- | |Tow’s meeting. It was necessary to | }inform the peasants of the nearby | | Villages, arrange speakers, issue a leaflet in th train printing shop. | In the cyvening two railroad workerg arrived on a cart and told us that| |in the Ma-chan region the situation | | was an uneasy one—the Red parti- |sans have destroyed the Bureau of | the Opium Trust, and there are ru- | | mors that they are preparing to cut | off the railroads. | At night, when we stood on aside- way, a train of soldiers passed by} near us. The atmosphere was stif- ling, as if before a storm, and I could not fall asleep in the car because of the glowing iron roof which wes heated during the day by the merc» less rays of the sun. ‘The tenseness grew. All this time the telegraph operator in his vacant | room constantly received alarming | dispatches from the line which he} | transmitted to Hankow. On the| station, soldiers in ragged uniforms | hastily gathered their belongings and | headed northward along the railroad tracks. The station was deserted. The resounding steps of the patroling soldiers echoed in the nightly silence like the knelling of a clock which in- dicates the approaching of the in- evitable. | I walked along the graveled rail| tracks and looked upon the stars which shone in the cloudless black sky. Never before did I feel somuch depressed as I felt today. What shall the millions of. poor people do? What shall they do? An unendless row of hundreds of years of slavery and poverty lies like a heavy burden on their bent. backs. | Here, in the north of Huneh and | Honan, they rest their hopes in the | Red partisans. 2 the peasants, | jare against all armies, no matter} ter what's written on their banners. The short-growing Cantoneese, with | the Koumintang star, and the North- | erners, with their bony cheeks, under the five-colored insignia, are equally disliked and hated. Armed with knives and single-bullet rifles, they think that they will be able to defend the outlying districts aobut their vil- lages from the fighting war lords, who have for the past fifteen years | turned these fields into a wailing cemetery. ‘There was a time when these fields were known as the “Flower Center” for their fruitfulness and richness, | Victims of dissension and ignorance, | the peasants not only are not in a/ position to’ defend their homes, but | they are constantly exploited by the various militarists. Now, the local officers are plundering them and maintain an unbalanced fight with ' the Koumintang forces. Tomorrow it will be the Koumintang forces who | will use them against the forces of | tlie local general. “Awaiting the com- ing of their mystic deliberator from the Kuenlen Mountains, the peasants at the same time are blazing the fire against all war lords. As an act of gratitude, the war lords are slaugh- tering the workers and peasants by the thousands before, vacating, and burn their homes and villages. What shall the oppressed people do? Who will teach them to forget the sup- posed deliberator, Kuen-Iun, and look for leadership at the railroad work- ers’ club a tthe Sian-yan station? Early in the morning the peasants from the surrounding villages quickly gathered about our train. We has- tened to go through with the meeting in order to utilize the cooling breeze of the young day. Observing the faces of the listeners at the time of the speeches I noticed nothing ex- cept distrust, fatigue and eagerness. A non-penetrating wall separated us. On one side were we—people from the city where the nobility lives, from where the armies and foreign merchandise comes; on the other side—they, drops in the great ocean of peasant poverty and slavery. An unseen city wall separated us from the constant inflow of peasant bil- lews. Speeches were feeble means with which to fight their fanaticism. group of peasants carrying a stretcher ‘covered with a blue linen cover de- scending from the hill. -They were approaching with slow pace towards our meeting place. They silently put | the stretcher on the ground, and one of them, a half-grayed old man, ascended the bench which we used | as a platform at our meeting. Five peasants, armed with rifles, who came with him, stood close around, leaning on their rifles. Three men raised the stretcher above the heads of the masses. The old man tore off the cover, and, behold! the young PRIEST by Vogel comrade, Li, with a bloody rag on his head, was lying on the stretcher, pale and motionless. His sunken eyes were closed and his jawbones were convlusively pressed together. Enraged and depressed, the old man, with a sharp voice shouting short phrases, called to the masses: “Brothers! we are red partisans of the Ma-chan\unit. The young Com- rade Li came to us last night to tell us about the workers in the cities. ‘When we were about to say our pray- er “The great teacher of the Kuen- lun Mountains,” he saw our instruc- | tor, Hu-an, and said: “This man killed my father four yeasr ago. I took an oath to fulfil the duty of ‘Honor Thy Father., Your teacher,” he said, “brings you teachings not from the Kuen-lun Mountains, but from military generals’ headquarters. He is an officer and his hands are soaked in the blood of our fathers.” Before he had time to finish, Hu-an drew his pistol and. right here in the place of worship he shot him. Then I said to myself: “If this boy was telling the truth, this man deserves to be shot; and if this bay was not, telling the truth, death cannot have any power over our teacher, because he confirms with all the customs and for him rifles and bullets are not frightful. The body of a true red partisan is protected against death. And,I drew my pistol and fired all the bullets of my revolver into his head and chest. He died like a dog! On his chest we found a command from his general staff full of hatred and devilish cunningness towards us. Then we decided to bring here the body of this boy, Li, and ask you: Where shall we draw from the pond of your teachings the knowledge and shrewdness which shall lead us to victory?” | j I noticed that from the first rows of the masses, which stood breath- less and very close like a tightened ring, a young worker pressing‘ for- ward and exclaiming: “In the club of the railroad work- ers, at the Sian-yan station!” ‘Tears were choking him, Restrain- ing: himself and trembling, he again cut through the early morning silence with a sobbing yell: “At the rail workers of Sian-yan,” and threw himself on the stretcher. He was Li's older brother, Next Week “But They Can't Deport Com- munism,” a story from a French worker, recently deported from these United States; Harrison's review of “The Kaiser's Coolies,” Page's story of a Pawtucket girl weaver; and beginning John Peter- son's sea stor, ‘The Holy Bed- bus”; and.a drawing from Mexico by Paul, i” ’ | Chicago,” Young Worker Tells His Story By AL DASCH. QINCE this is the story of an American young worker, this little autobiography will begin in a conventional American story book manner—according to all thi rules laid down by Hoyle, Horatio. Alger and the, teachers of English. It is really the story of how I was drawn into the revolutionary move- ment. John Sargent was born of poor but honest parents and as a child he lived the same sort of life that: the average American youth lives. He went to school; was taught to be patriotic, loyal, to despise foreign- ers and to believe that one day he, too, might be president of his coun- try or at least be another Rocke- feller. Well, the happy day arrived, when John Sargent left school and went out into the wide, wide world, to start the Sargent fortunes. Jobs were not very hard for a young fel- low to get at that time and John had little trouble of any kind get- ting located, as the saying goes. That strong, silent he-man, Cal Coolidge, was president, and Amer- j ica was sitting pretty. So thought. America, Somehow John kept drifting from one job to another and held all kinds of positions, such as errand boy, of- fice boy, shipping clerk and runner. None of them ever paid enough for him to put very much away for a rainy day or for the start of his millions. However, John wasn’t worrying. He was making enough to get along, having a good time, plenty of »arties, dances and nice girls. What more could a chap ask for? He was only a young fellow and opportunity was waiting just around the corner and he'd catch up with it any day now. ‘Two or three years passed by and so did John’s jobs. Now he was | working as a clerk in a Wall Street brokerage house and feeling pretty well contented with life. He was in the financial center of the United States, able to save a sum every week, and in with the wise money. Why, any time now he might get a j tip on the market and become inde- pendent for life! Or he might take @ college president’s advice and marry the boss’s daughter. That silent nincompoop, Coolidge, had given way to the super-engineer, Hoover, the savior of hunger-starved Europe. Everybody he knew had a chicken in their pot and there was soon to be a car in every garage. Everybody he knew was happy and the country was at the height of its prosperity. Enter the villain in . John’s life, or, as they say in Holly- wood, came the dawn, and with it the stock market crash. And, when it was finally checked, John found that his services were no longer required. But, why worry? He had a couple of -hundred bucks in his kick. He'd lob around and take it easy for awhile. Yep! That was the life—one grand vacation and when his money was gone he’d find himself another job. However, this time he would make sure that the position he’d get would have a good future. So John started out to have a good time. He went to four or five shows a week, plenty of parties and dances, and had lots of girls, Having no definite occupation, the movies soon t-> made an indelible impression on John Sappo's mind. “Little Caesar,” Squealer,” and many others of this- type, glorifying the gangster end and gunmen, imbued him with the idea of becoming a smart money|~ man. Yes, sir! That's where the money was. Easy money! Big money! That was the racket! Noth- ing crude for him, like stealing or killing or hi-jacking, but gambling— that was the ticket! So John Sargent became a gam- bling was over before it was started. Al- most as clean as the proverbial|’ whistle, John began to look for a position with a future. Within a month he was looking for a position and never mind the future. But, strange as it seems, he couldn’t even get a job, and John began to worry. Previously, when he had gotten a paper, the sport page was the first stop. But not anymore. The want ad section had preference now. Pictures likej==— “The ‘Kid Brome “Underworld,” “Th and his vacation |.) One day John opened his news- | Paper and—hurrah! Yeah Bo! \.No | ptore ‘worries!—good “Old Tam- | many,” good “Old Jimmy Walker.” He had just known the city would do something for him. Look at what they had done now; opened up a free Témployment agency at, Lafayette St. | Well, it’ Wouldn’t be long before he ‘ould be working again. You could ‘bet: your boots on that. No more | cfii’seling quarters from the old man; Ke'd get a real job now. ~.On to Lafayette St. Johnny, day .after day, week after week, stand in | lire and make a freak and exhibi- tion of yourself, Johnny, Tammany’s going to give you a job. Soft-hearted old.,Tiger; ready to do anything for | the,.workers. Stand in the rain and | snow and. cold, get shoved and pushed | around, wait, wait, keep waiting and |,youl get. a job. And then you'll have your chance to become presi- |@ent.or millionaire. Isn’t that what you weré taught in school? Isn’t | that what’ you believe, John Sar- gent? ‘ : Directly across the street from the | line where he waited John saw daily |.a bunch, of lunatics and crazy reds, | yelling anid shouting their lungs out against the government. Where the |uell did these bozos get their nerve, |talking..against this country? If 4they didn’t. like it, why didn’t they |-60,,back. to. where they came from? | Those dirty foreigners! What dif- ference, John, if your parents and two, of your brothers are themselves foreigners, born in a foreign land. |, What difference if those damned | foreign agitators bear names like |Murphy.“O'Boyle, Lamont, Jessup, Nelson atid’ Brown? One day John Sargent got @ | break. “fe beat the rush of the |.thunderjng herd to the desk, when \.a_dat-bellied clerk called out for a shipping clerk. John was handed a card for a job and wound up some- | Where in an empty lot in the wilds | of Canarsie. Well, tough break, bet- | ter luck next time, must've been-some | mistake, ‘that’s all; and back to the |Iiié went John Sargent, waiting, wafting for a job that did not ex- jist!_ Then truly an amazing thing | heppened. ~ John’s brains started to -werk and-he got wise to himself. Hell! There were no jobs here. The |agency was just a place to keep the workers from squaking. No more }Hesging around there for him, John | Started “to. go home, when something that one of the crazy reds across’ the j Stet said attracted his attention. | Well, might as well listen in. It Was too early to go home, anyway. | So John crossed oyer and what |d@'ya know? This crazy red Bolshe- was ‘talking his language. Gosh! what he was saying was true,. all jright. All about why there was un- employment, how all the workers have but “one common enemy, the bosses, how the workers must or- ‘gahize without regard to race, color and creed. What was that? An- cther meeting at 27 E. Fourth St., right after. this on€? Well, believe hit, hd" be there all right and get Some ntoyerof this straight from the }sttoulder-stuff. And so another com- +rade was born, to take his place sheulder to shoulder with the rising preletariateof the world. ns pire | (=py BILL Grorren,! MOTHER GOOSE:ON THE BREADLINE By HAP. “It’s no use,” said’ Mother’ Goose, 1 “The thing has reached the deadline.” Said Mother Goose: “There’s but abuse, The ill-fed breadline, dread line.” “It’s gas or noose,”: said Mother Goose, “Unless—” She joined the-Red line. ae eee Jack be nimble on“the chain, Henry Ford is after gain. If you're nimble, Slow, you get it in the e et you're a wreck; neck, Jack Sprat can buy no fat . ° . umes” breed Hickety, hickety, my blaek hen, She lays eggs for gentlemen. . Gentlemen they iake her eggs, Poultry faraer starves and begs. ee ee