The Daily Worker Newspaper, April 30, 1931, Page 9

IN TWO SECTIONS (SECTION TWO) _» (Section of the Communist International) THE SOVIET UNION DEFEND NEW YORK, THURSDAY, APRIL 30, 1931 End Hunger By Struggle of Workers By VERN SMITH, AY FIRST is International i Day of Demonstrations for Unemployment Relief—all over the world except in the Soviet Union, where alone there is no unemployment. . There have béen neighborhood demonstrations against starvation; there have been city demonstra- tions and hunger marches on City halls; there have been state hun- ger marches; there have been na- tional demonstrations and national conventions and a delegation to Congress demanding unemployment insurance, and there have been al- ready international days of struggle against unemployment and for re- lief and insurance. ¢ * But May First is not just another of these, important as all of them were, May First is something more. May First has a fighting tradition, in spite of the attempts of the AFL in America to ignore it, and in spite of the attempts of the socialist in- ternational and the reformist unions of ‘Europe to devitalize it and turn it into a panic. A Day of Struggie From the day when the Interna- tional Congress of Working Men, meeting in Paris in 1889 made that splendid gesture of solidarity, and demanded that the workers of all the world should demonstrate on the First of May to support the second general strike for the eight-hour day in the Unifed States, and thus established May 1 as International Labor Day—down to today when the workers strike and demonstrate un- der the leadership of the Commu- nist Parties and the militant unions for the right of millions to live. May Day has been something more | than an anniversary in a fight for immediate gains. The very nature of the day, and its history, its united class dem- onstration against the capitalist system as such, whatever immed- iate issue is uppermost, makes it more even than an international day of unemployment demonstra- (Continued On Page Three) Imperialist War and May Day BY ROBERT MINOR AR! Imperialist war is on the order of the day. This, in the sense that every capitalist government in the world, manipulated by the class of finance capital which controls these governments, is shaping every pol- icy in the light of preparations and manetvers for a gigantic world- wide military conflict. The struggle against imperialist war must be a major consideration of the working class in the great May Day demonstrations. through- aut. the world this year. The working class must under- stand, from the clear-headed revo- lutionary point of view, the reasons why imperialist war is an inevit- able step of the capitalist system. Shallow-pated and- dishonest mid- dle-class reformists, “socialists” and otherwise, are lying every day more feverishly to persuade the working class that the capitalist system has ceased to be a war-like system, that the “Angel of Peace” is hovering in the councils of the capitalist im- perialist rulers of the earth. Ef- forts are being made to put the future cannon-fodder into 3 hyp- notice state in which they would be the most easily used for the mass murder that is being rapidly pre- pared. “Disarmament” Conferences. “Disarmament” circuses and “con- ferences for the limitation of ar- maments” are the forerunners of the coming war. Every “disarm- ament” or “limitation” conference is being used by all of these im- perialist governments as a chess- game of maneuvres for alliances, realignments and counter-moves, each capitalist government trying to make the most favorabie ar- rangement for itself in armaments and in partnerships with other im- perialist states, for the bloody struggle that all know is coming. In every “disarmament” or “arms limitation” conference, every cap- italist government maneuvres for the greatest possible ratio of arm- ament for itself and its own ex- pected allies, as against its expect- ed opponents in the coming war. Out of every “disarmament” or “limitation of armaments” confer- ence there comes an increase in the military and naval equipment of the imperialist countries. Some dis- carding of obsolete war equipment, to give place to more modern death machines, is the sop that is thrown out to deceive the masses against whom these plotters are conspir- ing. Speeches for “peace” are crowd- ing the bourgeois forums and the bourgeois press. The “socialist” { | | t bourgeois fiunkeis of capitalist star- | vation “democracy” are making & paying profession of this job of ly- ing to the working class to make the workers believe that capitalism is no longer 4 war-maker—that the 16-inch guns are mereiy flower- pots for bouquets of good will be- tween the capitalist cannibal rulers. ‘The capitalist class and its flunk- jes are feverishly preparing the minds of the masses to be con- fused when war is declared with the meaningless question “who be- gam it?” Surely “our” capitalist nation did not begin it!—for “our” capitalist politicians were striving for “peace”! So they will say. Behind this camouflage feverish- ly proceed the preparations for war. Billion Doilar War Plan In all capitalist nations the war budgets are climbing sky high. The United States Government is ex- pending $1,000,000,000 this year in feverish preparation for the war of imperialist conquest that it plans. The representatives, official and unofficial, of the United States Government are working to get (Continued On Page Four) “The Communists Have Now Taken- Up the Challenge LBERT PARSONS died on the scaf- fold in the establishment of the first May Day. His writings, and those of his wife, still living, and still burning with passion for the labor movement, tell the eloquent story of the unquenchable fire which nothing can destroy—not the capt- talist government, and not the American Federation of Labor. In 1886, Albert Parsons, already con- demned to death, wrote an arttele, “His- tory of the Labor Movement in America.” He says: “The agitation for a reduction of the hours of labor culminated in the strike of 360,000 men on May 1, 1886. In Chicago, the center of the eight-hour movement, over 40,000 workmen went on a strike for the eight-hour day.. On May 3 some of the strikersowere fired on by the police,’ kill- ing one and wounding several. On May 4 working men held aa indignation meeting which was broken up by the police, when a dunamite bomb was thrown, which killed y»? , Says Lucy Parsons seven policemen and wounded many persons,” That was the beginning of May-Day— Albert Parsons was executed. Lucy Parsons, 46 years later, in a letter to the Communist Party in Chicago, says: “They strangled our comrades upon the gallows, but did not kiil the movement for which they died, the emancipation of the working class, for the Communists have taken up the challenge and capitalism is more in danger today than it was 45 years ago. “The Communists have unfurled the banner of revolt and fling tt to the four winds of the earth, upon its folds is in- scribed the rally cry—‘Workers of the World, Unite!’ “Hail to the First of May, the workers’ ‘day. Turn out, workers, march and ‘let the sound of 'your marching feet resound and echo from land to land and across the mighty ocean waves. You are the shock troops of oncoming revolution!” Halt Wage Cut Drive of Bosses By HIS Sun WILLIAM Z. FOSTER. First as- evoiution- ary significance than ever be- fore. With the deepening of the capitalist crisis and the stormy advance of the Soviet Union —the workers are awakening and will make the coming May Day « real occasion for struggie and erai mobilization of its forces. in the United States the rapidly worsening objective situation lays the basis for a real demonstration on May First. Unemployment stili increases, despite the lying officlat reports to the contrary. Mass starva- tion becomes realer than ever with the collapse in scores of cities of the fake charity relief schemes and the throwing of the unemployed entire- ly upon their own resources year May greater r geii- A Wave of Wage Cuts { Moreover, a new wave of wage cuts is being prepared by the cap- italisis, deeper and more sweeping than any that have yet taken place, And everywhere the bosses and their government use more drastic methods of repression against the workers, Altogether it is a situation full of the grest- est possibility of organization and struggie for the masses of work- ers. Realizing this, the Trade Ur Unity League ts organizing its everywhere for maximum p: pation in the May First dem tiomz. Naturally, fits unions are stimulating, through the var branches, the activity of the Trade Union Unity Councils, Unemployed Councils, etc.—are taking part in many united front movements for | general turn out on May Day The center of the May First Struggle must be directed against unemployment and mass starva- tion, But it must also be linked up with the fight for the whote. (Continued On Page Two)