The Daily Worker Newspaper, March 23, 1931, Page 4

* 13th Street, Y Address and m » Page Four New York il all chec City, N. Y, Telephone Algonquin 79 sto the Daily Worker, 50 Resolution of the Central Committee, March 16, 1981. he deepening crisis, which assumes par- sharpness the South due to the s and drouj with the cons crease in the national oppression ¢ ady wor: ng of thei y raising 1 nt ix Negroes and the ditions, is s tive the development of mass libera gles of the Negro toilers, especially in the S South, side by side with, and as a phase of the gen- eral rise in the struggle in the United States. ‘The bourgeoisie and reformists, as part of their class genera! crisis p efforts to imulate among the white workers while at the same time Negro misles attempting to arouse the nee work gn born st chauvinist one hand, together of the Communist to attain class unity in the growing strug- “on the other hand, are rapidly uncovering nanifestations of white chauvinism in ionary trade unions and other mass and even in the ranks of the The Party, and the Party fractions in mass organizations, have the task of quickly and de- cisively overcoming these chauvinist tendencies, as well as all lack of clarity and all under- estimation of Negro work, in the course of the determined efforts to unite the Negro and n the struggles against the bour- and for equal rights for the has still been insufficiently ly for its tremendous tasks n the October statement prepared ideologi in the field of Negro work. Resolution of ECCI, the following was correctly emphasized: “The Party has not yet succeeded in overcom- ing in its own ranks all underestimation of the struggle for the tight of self-determination and still less succeeded in doing away with all lack of clarity on the Negro question.” This statement still remains in full force, despite certain improvements in our work since the 12th Party plenum. A basis was laid in the discussions at the Plenum for the correction of these shortcomings. But the discussions in the units and the. practices of the Party since the 12th Plenum show that much confusion and underestimation still remain to be overcome. | This has not been met with sufficiently timely or energetic action, or by sufficient self-criti- | cism, especially of the seridus errogs in prac- tical work, by the leading committees of the districts or even the Politburo itself. The chief weaknesses, which must be immediately corrected, lie in the failure to guide and strengthen the Negro departments sufficiently and in the failure to work out a plan of mass | work on the Negro field which alone could fur- nish the foundation for a sharper struggle to clarify the Party and to overcome all confusion and wrong tendencies in our Negro work. (3) In addition to this confusion and under- estimation, and partly as a result, a number of serious errors, and even dangerous opportunist tendencies, have recently shown themselves in Negro work. icy, are greatly increasing their | antagonisms | t the Negroes, | | | strug- | ° | of chauvinism in all In the first plage there are the mistaken con- | ceptons and proposals wth regard to the League of Struggle for Negro Rghts. Some comrades, disregarding the correct policy put forth at the St. Louis convention of the LSNR, and continuing the practices followed with regard to the old ANLC, tended in prac- tice to transfer the leading role of the Party. in the struggle for Negro rights to the LSNR, to look upon the LSNR as a substitute for the Party on the Negro field and to relegate all work among Negroes to Negro comrades and to the LSNR. These tendencies clearly reflect an opportun- ist underestimation of the importance of Negro work and an evasion of the Party's leading tole which could easily become a cover for chauvinist tendencies in the Party and the revo- lutionary mass organizations. They also lead to a failure to bring forward Negro demands in strikes and in unemployment struggles, leaving such demands only to the LSNR. At the same time there developed among cer- tain comrades, partly as a reaction to the wrong tendencies just cited, and partly because of the insufficiently sharp struggle against chauvinist tendencies in the Party and the unions, an op- position to the correct program of the St. Louis convention and, as an outgrowth of this op- position, proposals for the liquidation of the LSNR. The rots of their wrong proposals are “The organization (the LSNR) cannot hope clearly shown by the following quotation: to gain sufficient white non-Party workers to change its Jim Crow character . It is clear that when a white worker is sufficiently developed to not only understand that the struggles of the Negro workers are at the same time the strug- gles of the white workers, but also takes a leading part in the struggles of the Negroes, such a worker is a fit candidate for the Com- munist Party.” Such a conception, while appearing to be “left,” is actually a sectarian conception which attempts to limit the struggle for Negro rights to Negroes and to white members of the Communist Party This conception makes more difficult the strug- gle against the right opportunist tendencies everywhere shown in practice and is itself an opportunist underestimation of the possibility of overcoming the chauvinist tendencies among the white workers in the course of the now sharp- ening class struggles and of drawing the broad masses of workers, Negro and white, into com- mon struggle against the capitalist offensive and for equal rights. Some comrades, also seeing no possibilities of drawing white workers, except Communists, into the struggle for Negro rights, have developed the * festation” at 50 East AIWORK.” Daily. orkeF ict Dory USA 3 emenon worms r By wait everywhere: One year, $6; six months. $3; two months, $1; excepting Boroughs ( of Manhattan and Bronx, New York Ctiy, Foreign; one year, $8: six months, $4,50, = 2 5 On Negro Work is in our 2 sm. While thi: has been strengtk ent months, it has not kept pace the growing efforts of the e white chauvinist antag onisms ag: egroes, and thereby create di sion between the Negro and white worker. fact, the very increase in the Party's activi in Negro work has brought to light many ections of the country energetic and simultar to the need for great widening al struggle to clarify t 2 y in connection with mass struggles against chauvinism and for Negro rights The weaknesses of the Party bourgeoisie to In icientl the Pa without a st eous reactio! in this respect Ret , both white st ing both N toilers into the LSNR. It sk campaign of the Communist Party, and y of the TUUL and the Unemployed but primarily from the viewpoint of gle of the Negroes for national lib- and and white espec Council the st: eration. (6) Especially now, because of the growing persecution of the Negroes and of the increased efforts of the white and Negro bourgeoisie and reformists to turn the white workers against the colored workers, the colored against the foreign born, etc., it is necessary to redouble our eMorts to secure leadership of the growing Negro libera- tion movement, linking it up with the general struggle of the workers against the bourgeois offensive, by carrying through the following | | of self determination). i kupport the | , and | state unity of the “Black Belt,” and the right The Negro Department of the Central Committee and those in the dis- tricts must immediately give attention to the working out of such programs of action as will make the struggle for Negro rights an integral part of the Party's mass activities, In this connection it is necessary to strength- en the Negro departments by adding to them leading cot des with mass experience. The district bureaus must immediately check up on the activities of the district Negro depart- ments and immediately take such steps as are necessary to make it possible for them to broad- en and develop the mass activities of the Party in the Negro field. Simultaneously with these measures and in conjunction with the program of mass activities, decisive steps are to be taken All Quiet on the Western Front— By BURCK News Item:—The Red Cross, claiming that the farmers of Arkansas and Oklahoma don’t need any more relief, will cut off the little they did | give on April first. 6 i have also given rise to opportunist conceptions, Some comrades sharply retreated from all strug- gle against white chauvinism under cover of counter-charges of “black chauvinism,” narrow nationalism,” etc. They drew a line between such a struggle in the Party and that among the masses, one comrade expressing the fear that an “over-emphasis” on “every little mani- of chauvinism in the Party might hamper the recruiting and holding of Negro workers in the Party. Whereas ,in fact, it is just such an opportunist glossing over of chauv- inist. tendencies which would destroy the Ne- groes’ confidence in the Party, At the same time certain other comrades, see- ing these tendencies to retreat, as well as an insufficiently sharp struggle in general against chauvinist tendencies, tended also to make an opportunist separation between the inner-Party | struggle and the mass struggle against chauv- inism, The representatives of the first tendency in substance proposed a liquidation of the inner Party struggle against chauvinist tendencies and @ concentration on the mass struggle fo® equal rights. The representatives of the second tendency argued in substance that, first, all chauvinist | tendencies had to be completely eliminated from the Party before mass work could be under- taken, one comrade stating that now she could not propose a Negro member for the Party be- cause of the existing chauvinist tendencies. These wrong tendencies must be overcome, pri- marily: in the course of the widest mass strug- gles for equal rights, while at the same time making every effort to clarify the Party on the Negro question. . (5) To lay the basis for overcoming the con- fusion, wrong practices and opportunist conce)- tions in Negro work, the Politburo, first, reas- serts the correctness of the line of the St. Louis convention which created the LSNR. The op- portunist deviations in practice from that linc must now be decisively corrected in every dis- trict. The Communist Party, in all cases, is to retain its leading role in the struggle for Negro rights. The LSNR must not become a substi- tute for the Party. Negro work must not be relegated to the LSNR or become the special task of Negro comrades. On the contrary, with the Party taking the leading role in all of its | activities, as well as specifically on the Negro incorrect position that the “Liberator” is not thie | Jeading organ of the struggle for Negro rights, but a “Negro paper” catering only to Negro workers. The tendency to consider the “Daily Worker" as the “white paper” and the “Lib- erator” as the “Negro paper” is a further indi- cation of sectarian tendencies, It must be recog- nized, however, that the weakness of the Daily Worker in carrying forward the struggle for Negro rights is one of the causes of the develop- ment of the wrong tendency. These opportunist tendencies, both right and “left,” must be sharply rejected and quickly overcome both in the theory and practice to Prevent the possibility of a serious set-back in ““ our mass work, through failure of ow ef- nn ttt at ot mene. field, in struggle for Negro rights, the LSNR, in addition to its chief imrhediate task of building the “Liberator,” must become an auxiliary mass organization (groups around the “Liberator,” af- filiated groups supporting the aims of the LSNR, etc.) having the task of aiding the Party in rallying the white and Negro workers in the struggle against segregation, Jim Crowism, lynch- ings, and for equal rights, a In recruiting activities the principal empha- sis shall be placed on drawing the Negro work- ers into the revolutionary TUUL unions and | the Party, and in no case must the LSNR be looked upon, either in theory or practice, as a sort of a separate body for the Negroes, Special efforts, however, must be made to recruit white workers into the LSNR by showing the impos- sibility of the workers making progress in their | struggles so long as the white workers tolerate boss-class terror against the Negroes. ‘The Liberator should remain the organ of the | struggle for Negro rights, exposing all enemies: ae is ‘sirangely, silent,. He acts as an aid in i i a wi | ech lag ame allt a Se measures: (a) In connection with all of the mass actiy- ities of the Party, Negro work must be brought into the foreground. Negro work must include, not only the recruiting of Negro members for the Party much better than in the past, but must be conceived of primarily as the develop- ment of mass struggles for Negro rights. In the work among the unemployed it is necessary to raise sharply and concretely all discrimination against Negroes in the distribution of relief, persecution of Negro unemployed by the police, etc.; in the work at the shops and factories it is necessary to expose all discrimination against Negroes (district work, iowest wages, etc.); and likewise in all other mass activities, These con- crete struggles and demands developed in con- nection with the fight at a given bread-line, flop house, charity institution, factory or mine, or against a particular city administration, must be the starting point in arousing the masses, white and colored, for the still broader fight against lynching, segregation, Jim-Crowism, and for equal rights (in the South for confiscation of the landowners’ land for the Negro tenants; to overcome all remnanta of white chauvinism still remaining in the Party. This shall be done by a wide ideological campaign against white chauvinism and by efforts to clarify the Party on the Negro question in accordance with the several Comintern documents. The struggle against chauvinism must include the most de- cisive disciplinary measures where necessary. (b) The Party press, as well as the papers of sympathetic mass organizations, must give much more attention and aggressive leadership than heretofore to the struggle for Negro rights, to the ideological campajgn against white chauy- inism and to the clarification of the Party and the masses on the Negro question. Wide ex- posures shall be systematically organized of the living and working conditions of the Negroes, the persecution of ‘the Negroes by the white capitalists and landlords (citing specific cases), the chauvinist theories and practices of the white bourgeoisie and reformists, the mislead- ing segregation theories of the petty capitalist Negro leaders, the lessons and experiences in the struggles for Negro rights, etc. These expo- sures shall be planned in such a way as to be- N. W. R. R. Shop Workers Will Vote Communist CHICAGO, March 16.—John M. Collins, so- cialist candidate for mayor of Chicago, is a machinist employed at Chicago shops of the Chicago and North Western Railroad Company. Fred W. Sargent, the road pays him the measly pittance of $75,- 000 per year, is an invited delegate to the so- called progressive political conference being held at Washington, D. C. The foregoing might lead the uninformed to | the belief that Chicago shops is a veritable paradise for workers and that, full political and economic expression is permitted there. The big capitalist dailies have wasted great ‘gobs of paper and printers ink’in an endeavor to con- vinee its readers that such is the ease. But just what are the facts? The bosses. permit Collins to run for mayor bevalse they know the socialist, party long ago ceased to be a party of the working class, whose job as president of | Sargent hobnobs with the La Follettes, Norrises | and Borahs because he recognizes in these gentlemen the best friends of capitalism. He is willing to-counsel with the men devisng plans to stem the tide of revolt which is beginning to sweep the country. The alleged progressives give Sargent a place on the ccmmittee for stabil- ization of, employment, alongside of John L. Fitzpatrick, president of the Chicago Federation of Labor. Struggles are developing among the workers on the Chicago and North Western railroad. The bosses need betrayers like John Collins in times like} these, Collins speaks at several meeting about the city each week and at each of these gatherings he takes as his topic either unemployment or organization of the workers. However, he does not say that the socialist party in its city program is against real relief and unemployment insurance. In the local union to which Collins belongs and in the shops this ogist for the fakers of the Railway Employees department of the American Federation of Labor and upholds their every act of Sect and betrayal. The workers of the C. and N. W. have suf- fered through two long layoffs since the crisis began. The three-day week has been in effect since November 3rd. Under this schedule, which is the Hoover “stagger system” in all its glory, skilled mechanics are paid $19 ‘per week,’ help- ers $13 and unskilled laborers try to exigt on approximately $9 a week. Hundreds of work- ers have been forced to beg crumbs at’ the hands of the North Western bosses who run the “Voluntary Relief’ Committee.” The most Vicious speed-up system ever seen inthe railroad, industry has been introduced by the Chicago and North Western and workers who have the nerve to stop for a breath are haled before the general foreman and master snechanics for discipline. Often the discipline neans dismissal from the service. The “Safety- “rst” campaign is on full swing and an in- jury due to the vicious speed-up may mean the loss of one’s job at any time. Workers are terrorized and often fired for protesting against the rotten conditions under which they have to work. The police are called to arrest unemployed workers who appear at the shop gates with the Daily Worker and other Communist literature. Just recently Otto Nel+ son, @ member of the Unemployed Council, was given ninety days at hard labor by Judge Mc- Carthy (liberal democrat) because he was caught selling the Daily Worker at~the North Western shops, @ John M. Collins, who parades himsglf before the workers as their saviour, away from the ©. and N. W. shops, is nothing short of a faker and a hypocrite! John. Collins is a defender of the A. F. of L. policies and opposed to the class struggle program of the Mutual RR, Ind. C. ee liar 8 come the means of drawing the masses of Negro toilers into the Party’s mass activities and of drawing the masses of white workers into the struggle for Negro rights. ¢el In connection with the efforts of the Central Committee to make a turn in the work of the Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland and Pitts- burgh districts, special attention must be given by the C. C. representatives to the development of Negro work ,especially among the workers in the basic industries in those districts (mining, steel, auto) where tens of thousands of Negro workers are employed and where the issue of Negro rights becomes a burning question, daily affecting all workers. In the programs of action and the plan’of work drawn up in these dis- tricts, Negro work must be specifically and concretely dealt with in connection with the work among the unemployed and the building of the TUUL unions. (d) The Party fraction in the L. S. N. R. shall immediately take such steps as are reces- sary to insure the regular publication of the “Liberator” as a weekly beginning with April 15th. At the same time, and in connection with the launching of the “Liberator” as a weekly, an energetic circulation drive shall be imme- diately planned and carried through with the objective of 10,000 new subscribers for the “Lib- erator” by June 1st, The Party is to be fully mobilized to aid in carrying through the cir- culation drive, primarily in connection with the mass activities of the Party among the unem- ployed and at the shop and factories. L. S. N. R. groups for the support of the “Liberator” should be organized in the shops and neighborhood. Such groups, in addition to their major task of establishing the “Liberator” as a popular, mass organ of the struggle for Negro rights, should aid the Party in rallying the workers, white and colored, for struggle against all forms of persecution, segregation, lynching, Jim-Crowism, etc., but in no case be- coming a substitute for the Party, which at all times must retain its leading role in the struggle for full equality, and in the South, for the right of self determination. (e)' The national and district fraction in the TUUL should immediately bring forth well con- sidered proposals for a widespread strengthen- ing of the Negro work in the TUUL and in all affiliated organizations. The action of the lost Executive Board meeting in creating Negro de- partments in the National Office of the TUUL and in the Miners’, Metal, Marine, and Needle Unions is already a forward step. It is now necessary for the leading fraction to see that real programs of action are developed for the recruiting of Negro workers in all the activities of the unions and for the development of ihe struggle for Negro rights, beginning by raising partial demands in connection with every form of discrimination or persecution in the shops or mines, or among the unemployed. In all. stilike struggles the demands of the Negro workers for complete equality must be brought forward and the white workers, especially, must be taught the necessity of uncompromisingly fighting for these demands as a condition for strike settle- ments, this close linking up of strike demands with those for equal rights being one of the most effective means of undertaking the mass struggle against the chauvinist ideas and prac- tices still existing among many white workers. The chief immediate task of the TUUT on the field of Negro work is the energetic pushing forward of the work already begun by the ap- pointment of a special organizer at the recent Board meeting for the organization of the Agri- cultural Workers’ Union in the “Black Belt” of the South. ‘The Party fraction must keep a close check on the programs of the work there, especially with regard to the working out of a program of partial demands which can be the starting point for the development of broader struggle for the land for the Negro tenants and laborers, the state unity of the “Black Belt” and for the right of self-determination, () The Negro sdepartment of the Central | Committee shall immediately give consideration to all phases of the work (Party, TUUL, Unem- ployed Coufheils, as well as ILD, WIR, and other mass organizations) with the objective of bringing about a decisive turn in the Party's work on the Negro field. The Politburo will make the closest check-up on the work of the department, both of the Central Committee and the districts, and of the leading fractions in all mass organizations to aid them in deveWping By JORGE Capitalism Raffles Off “A Bit of Heaven”—A Baby! Of the “sacred character” of the family we have heard a. lot. And also we have heard of those godless Bolsheviks who “break up the fame ily,” who “tear children away from their mothe ers,” compel them to be shealthy and teache them in their infant years that America is not a free country for the workers. Yes, really! But it remeained for us to read the following astounding letter from a reader in upper Mane hattan, in Washington Heights district. Read it, workers, and don’t be afraid of getting any mad- der than we are! “Up in Washington Heights,” wrote our cor- respondent on Feb. 24, (and we beg pardon for not getting it sooner), “there is a theatre con- secrated to the bourgeoisie of this section, whose ‘heights’ equals only its lowness of ideals, “The theatre has the name of a famous orni- thologist, one of those scientists more interested in birds than in humans. His name was Audu- bon, and in keeping with it, the theatre is giv- ing tickets away to its patrons, entitling them to a prize. “Just guess what this prize is? Not a canary, that costs money. Not a dog, these belong to shows or ‘socialists’ and have steam-heated ken- nels. But they are giving away, raffling off, a live, human baby! “There was a time when we workers were told that the ‘backward’ Chinese fed babies. to the pigs (the babies belonged to the workers of course, and the pigs belonged to the rich) but now in ‘civilized’ America, workers’ babies—who can doubt that it is a worker’s babe!—are given away to some pig bourgeois exploiter! No doubt to be used for some experiments in be haviorism, Freudism or, again, as some priests used to-do in France (and are still doing) rear it carefully so as deflower it when it grows up—if a girl. “And I am sure, when the child becomes ma- ture, when it will find out that society, capitalist society, thought so little of it as a baby that it gave it away in a vulgar vaudeville show for not even the price of admission—the ‘admission being for the trash on the stage) this child will know which was “illegitimate’—he, the child, or the ruling class of this day!—M.” wie aa Always From Below, Brother “In a small town,” writes a worker, “there is @ movement on foot to organize against the high cost of living. This movement has been started by a charitable organization with a membership of about 500, also a synagogue and a Workmen's Circle branch. They are are about to send a committee to a branch of the I. W. O. which is in existence in this town. “I would like to know whether it would be ad- visable for this organization to make a united front on this issue.” This doesn’t exactly come under our juris- diction, formally considered, but since Red | Sparks is supposed to know everything, we'll take | a fly at it. You see, comrade, that the I, W. O. has “ex- isted” in your town, but apparently has been asleep at the switch and now wakes up to find | that somebody else is taking the initiative in | things. It seems to us that local Communists | ought to be aroused from their slumbers and | give you the detailed plan of ‘tactics for taking | the initiative away from the “charitable organ- izatilon and- the synagogue.” That should be — aim No. 1. And why? Because with such pussyfooting leadership restraining the struggle into “respect- able” and polite forms, even granting the “hon- esty” of such leadership, the whole campaign -will be futile. Undoubtedly there is mass sentiment against the outrageous prices gouged out of the workers. And it is this mass discontent which has in one way or another forced the heads of the “char- itable” organization mentioned, to make some- thing that they call a “fight.” Yet it will not be a fight, but a fizzle, without it is' led by those who follow a militant policy. That means those who take the advice of the Communist Party, whether they are Party mem- - bers or not, in the methods of struggle. Undoubtedly something can be won out of such the work and to see that all decisions are ener- getically and thoroughly carried through, League affiliated to the TUUL. ‘The workers are becoming convinced that only the Communist Party can lead them in their struggles against the bosses. Otto H. Wangerin, secretary-treasurer of the National Railroad In- dustrial League and for many years a railroad worker, is the Communist candidate for mayor of Chicago, August Poansjoe and Lydia Ben- nett, are Communist candidates for treasurer and city clerk respectively. Poansjoe is a well- known Negro worker, while Lydia Bennett has been a militant leader of working class women for the past several years. ‘The workers at the North Western shops will fight for better conditions under the leadership of the Communist Party. The shop nucleus of the Communist Party is organizing the workers for the six-hour day, five day week,—with pay for an eight-hour day; for a determined fight against the speed-up and for full compensation for those employed only part time. The shop nucleus calls upon the workers to repudiate the faker Collins and to VOTE COMMUNIST on April 7th, ‘This is the first of a series of articles dealing with conditions in the Chicago shops and round- houses of Chicago and North Western Railroad will appear from time to time until elec- In these articles a detailed exposure of treachery. of socialist candidate Collins, the demogogy of Democrat Cermak and Republican Big Bull. Thompson will appear. —J.B.C. ai Organize Unemployed Councils to Fight for Unemployment Relief. Organize the Employed Workers Into Fighting Unions. Mobilize the Employed and a. struggle, and the most valuable part of the struggle, whether it is won or not—and every effort must be made to win—will be the new’ knowledge of those participating, of the nature of capitalism and their class relations. So something good can come out of a united front, but not with these reformist organizations —from the top—but with the workers affected, united front from below with those who follow. a really \militant policy in the leadership. And by a militaht policy we mean bringing in every man, woman and child in such actions as mass picketing of boycotted stores. But, as we said, the details should be determined with the aid of your local or neighboring Communist shen ization. In short, the ‘united front, yes! from below. But al 3 % Communist Politicans While the whole world, and particularly) the capitalist members of European parliament, have had to acknowledge that Communist “politicians” aren't of the same breed as the “socialists,” yet in one corner of our backyard, under a rotten board, you will find“some I. W. W. leaders squirm- around emitting shrieks against “all” politicians, but devoting 100 per cent of their attacks to. “Communist politicians.” Let us examine some of these “politicians” in in their native haunts. For instance, take the occassion we noted in the N. Y. Times of March 19, telling of the events in the City Legislature of Hamburg, Germany, when the Communist “politicians” paid reverence to the memory of their comrade, murdered by fascists the previous week. The memorial ceremony was held right in the legislative hall, and the Times tells us how: “When the session, opened, the Communist del- egation marched in bearing a large wreath of tulips which was placed reverently on their dead comrade’s desk. They then walked to the right side of the hall and began pummelling three National. Socialists (fascists) who were seated there, “Throwing their victims on the floor they jumped on them and kicked them. Nationalist and Peoples Party members sought to rescue the Hitlerites, but the combined right wing was nce Unemployed for Common Strug- gles Under the Leadership of + the Trade Union Unity League — Lad t eo heaver™ match for the Communist Deputies, most 0! whom were stevedores, longshoremen and coal: te ha het ate, oe