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

Page Four A Company Steel Town on May First By NELL AMTER wn. It is a company tow ‘om others or League has many tion are over the ating and inst ever- chemes ployed Cot when last week a worker from Onl; ted the their home offic 1 k food, as th With a gun in his hand, he y on an open which time drank poison gerously ill in The worker ey to ou! held the police field for hours his wife and is a local hospital is facing a jail sentence on several charges. ‘The company police try to terror- flet. distributors May Day police the air to stop Not sentences of ed with sedition, for 's got The stration ral- lied ov 0 workers to the \open lot : ned quietly, raptly to speakers from “ of-town” and Yo- cal came from the of the indus- sean n their eyes » with babies in ith hungry eyes; Ss, growing determina- 5 workers, carrying on their | seeing his to} shop | - ubsidy of | f the place where| 4, | struggle against hunger, for the right worn-out, t n out of the mills. | After the ting a resolution is} presented condemning the Scottsboro | frame-up. 4 e | handful of | audience he discrimin- | ate here and do not hire many)\a mighty “AYE” goes up from the| crowd, protesting this legal lynching. | The Young Communist Leaguers and | Pioneers burst into s and cheer | of deportation Eut still demonstra- wholehcarted]y dicks and stool- conye he dicks and a friend Oh, yeh hey thought was tough babies. Hadda tell t if they wouldn't me, I'd c y th down . this says he can't in jail, he Out of work, by John Carlton | (A Buick Worker) | domen) . . . well, I told the s—— of a b- — he'd sure sleep there to- We gettem about one a and there's over a million of . they're responsible for un- loyment. Say, what about I thought he could hold his drink better. . Well, stop and see me some day I'm in the interesting work 1 er and all that Well, glad as hell to’sce you And tw ers dre be; more foreign-born work- nning the long journey tio id struggles are growing and broadening. The voices of workers from this little town, with those of workers throughout the world, are growing, growing into protest, into to live . Ever higher are shining the achievements of our fellow-| workers on the other side of the pond... . More and more of us are epplauding the Soviet Union, where hunger has been abolished; where the youth grow up to full manhood and womanhood unstunted by long hours of slaving in dungeons, in es and sweatshops: where work- ers are building “DY NAMITE” Yellow Journalistic Venture Into | Labor History Dynamite, by Louis Adamic, Viking | thi Press; 432 pases. Price, $3.50. | ERN SMITH. a few years after the landed, and confinued from then on. ‘There were hangings and burnings of slaves and freemen; there were re- bellions like ‘Batoh’s and Shay's. The class war inits'miodern form, that is, between proletariat and capitalist, ed violendsyaimost with the , the fitst attempt to or- hts the Baltimore Federcl 2 cf Apr WH, 1800, tells of a hot fight for control of a ship where | scabs were hired and of “several very considerably wounded.” Other records of the time tell of incidental destruction of property during fights between strikers and scabs, police, troops and “citizens.” But Adamic says: “The struggle of the have-nots against the haves in the United States was first referred to as class war in 1826 in New York City by Frances Wright, ‘that bold blasphemer and voluptuous preacher of licentiousness,” as a conservative writer of that day called her; but at that time, and for some while afterward, the war was merely ver- bal.” Then he says that the strikes of the first quarter of the nine- teenth century ‘were “tame, peaceful affairs.” I have quoted you the first sen- tence in the book, and it is not only the first bit of misinformation, but gives the clue to all the many, many more falsehoods that follow. It was more sensational, more dramatic and would make a better selling book to give the “voluptuous preacher of licentiousness” the credit for opening an era of bloodshed than to present the real facts. I take it for granted that Adamic knows them, because the jacket of the book claims he spent “nearly. two years’ concen- trated research) and study” gathering the facts, But. Adamic does not give you the facts unless they happen to fit into his program. His program 4s just to tell the most lurid and “Interesting” story possible. This Adamit characterizes the Molly Maguires as simply “the first racketeers.” ‘In “fact, the Mollies were an Irish/American group using the general tactics of the socialist revolutionaries under the Czar in Russia, Adamic gives you the so-| called “Chicego, Anarchists” as mere experts in e*plesives; whereas in fact were the militant organizers and ir time. He says were leg: possible ar. at to indicat did blow up ex-Governor Steunenberg. He writes the story of the Los Angeles Times explosion as Burns wrote it, but the story of the Mooney-Billings case as the defense presented it before Mooney showed up the A. F. of L. He says that William Z. Foster introduced sabo- tage into America, after having con- tradigted that assertion himself by nS umerous cases of sabotage Foster's time. Adamic gives the Centraiia cace about as it happened, but he considers racke- teering 2nd Al Capone as normal de- velopments of working-class struggle. Adamic winds up by prophesying ten years of unprecendented strikes and violence, led by the Communists. I quote from Page 426: “They wilt be violent strikes, for the Communists believe in violence, in dynamite, sabotage and assassination. They will employ racketeers, as they have already done in garment strikes in New York, to shoot down scab-em- ploying bosses and rival labor lead- ers.” ‘Well, in all this mulligan of truths, half-truths and plain, outright wild- eyed lying, there is just one general line. Whatever is most exciting, sensational, hysterical—most fitted in the competitive sale of books in a period of hard times in the book KILL NEGRO WORKER By ALEXANDER SACKS. Once, in Oklahoma, while working with a section gang, I saw a Negro beaten by the boss for having called him “a bastard of a slave-driver.” The worker wes felled by the blow of a shovel; then the boss leaped at him and swung his fists into his face, ‘The Negro lay motionless. His nos- trils were torn and smeared with tar and dirt, His face was sweaty and his large eyes were turned to the sun in prayerful gaze. Andre, my buddie, knelt beside him. For once he ceased laughing. His lips drooped. His chin began to quiver. Idragged the Negro to a tree, out of the glare of the sun and into the shade. His body was tense and rigid. I took off my shirt and dipped it into the pail of water. Then I washed his wounds, but he lay silent, prostrate, like a fallen horse. The relief-train came to take us back to town, but the “nigger” was not taken back. The boss was adam- ant. I pleaded with him, begged him. Andre wept like a child, then became crazily hysterical—but to no avail. So Andre and I took our rations of ham, bread and water, and returned to the tree. He lay there, silent and gruesome as death. Dusk fell, stars appeared and a night-bird whistled a wistful melody. We kept our vigil. A light breeze blew, and from the sinister darkness of a far away mountain a faint light flickered. Men were laughing, some- where. The leaves rustled, the night- bird ceased its singing and the night was a cavernous black with squeak- | ing, croaking insects. “Andre looked into the staring eyes I feared he might go insane, I begged him to come to my side. He obeyed, and soon we lapsed into the peaceful slumber that follows ex- haustion. We awoke at dawn and felt the moist, delicate dew on our bodies. We ceased our vigil with sleep, and with sleep his life ceased. His eyes still gazed fixedly at the sky, his face was drawn and pallid in its blackness, his hands and feet stretched and submissive, but his heart beat no longer. Life had fled its prison of tortured flesh About a mile away “there was a huge well, surrounded by many reat stones. Gangs working along the line always got their water from it, and the towns of the vicinity drew from ifs source. “We carried our lifeless companion to the weld and washed his long body. We dre: hid him among the roc source of the well, from which towns- people draw and drink lif water, there lics a dead darkey. head and face are beaten. His eyes are full of prayer. Who is he, or what his name, we know not. A Letter From An Ex - Serviceman My attention attracted as I as passing through Indianapolis, diana, enroute to California, by an raordinary display oi miltary t orce around about the state house Being an ex-serviceman, my curi- osity was naturally awakened at the | mobilization of uniformed and armed officers of the law. I stopped to in- vestigate and see what was going on. I learned that a hunger march, starting from industrial points in In- diana, had focused upon the capitol building of Indiana to tion the governor for redress of grievances. I saw the ciy police forre in action purported to be under the leadership of the governor. I saw them disperse the hunger marchers from the cap- itol grounds, under stern orders, backed with the show of huge hol- sters, pistols and ammunition, be- decking the uniforms of officers of the law. I saw the crowds of hun- ger marchers and sympathizers thus dispersed to a less consvicuous and more remote Idcation and the crowd was ih this manner divided. They would have attracted many sympathizers had they been permit- ted to have their speeches on the capitol grounds, and, therefore, the governor took precautions. Five milion of us were drafted and mobilied to go to France to fight, presumably, for a better world. Now, | as an ex-servicemazn, I wish to ap- peal to all other ex-servicemen that this being the sort of world that our sacrifices have brought upon us, it is now high time that we unite with working-class organizations and do our bit in helping to make the world safer for the useful producers, the farmers and workers, I mingled in the crowd and bought from the literature sellers a paper entitled the “Daily Worker,” from which I gained your address, to which business, most likely to make people read “Dynamite” instead of some- thing by Sabatini or Edgar Rice Bur- roughs—that is what Adamic puts in his “history” of class violence in America. Now, perhaps Adamic does not mean any particular harm to the proletariat. I think he does not in- vent outright any of his yarns. It is merely unfortunate for the prole- tariat that usually the most blood- curdling yarns were the product of capitalist journalism and objectively injurious to the workers’ struggle. Adamic probably characterizes him- self correctly in his “Author's Note” in the beginning: “I am not an ac- tive radical, nor a member of any labor union, but my sympathies are with labor; on the other hand, I do not habitually utter the word ‘Cap- italism’ with.a hiss.” To Adamic’s credit be it said that, at every opportunity, he brings in the story of capitalism's normal brutal- ity, of the everydey robbery at the point of production, of the starvation I send you this brief message of a tourist’s and ex-serviceman’s obser- vations on May 4, 1931. and misery, the unemployment, the mi by unguarded machines and industrial disease, of the work- ers. He recites all this as a reason for bomb-throwing. But Adamic isn't going to throw any bombs; we, the Communists, are elected by him for that particular task—and then, if we did, I suppose he would write another saleable book. Meanwhile the Communists, with- out going in at all for assassination and bomb-throwing, will go on or- ganizing the workers and the un- employed for class war, for the even- tual overthrow of capitalism. Yes, if the workers are atiacked, they are no pacifists, they will fight back. In & revolutionary situation, they will even attack. But they will not cblige Adamic with acts of individ- ucl tervo"—whatever the state of the book market : DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MAY 23, 1931 THE WEDGE THAT DOES THE TRICK By PAUL With the Ohio Hunger Marchers By ROSE CLARK On Sunday, May 10, the Ohio Hun- ger Marchers reached Columbus af- ter a 10 days’ strenuous march, The group from Cleveland, Akron, Toledo, Youngstown, etc., came in on High Street and the Cincinnati-Dayton group came in on West Broad Street. The delegates from Cleveland, etc., numbered 150 and reached the Capi- tol steps about 15 minutes before the } delegation coming from the opposite ; direction. Six abreast with the cap- tains at the head of each company the marchers came in keeping time to the beat of th¢ drummer and the song which carried them thru, “Soli- arity.” The Capitol steps were thickly | sacked with workers.and the grounds | around the building. ! ‘The Cincinnati-Dayton Delegation marching six abreast were a few blocks off. Then cheers for the Ohio Hunger Marchers were heard and then a burst from both delegations of “Solidarity” as the two delega- tions merged on the Capitol steps. The 150 Cleveland, etc., delegation had spent the previous night in De- laware in coats at the Sanvation Army Camping grounds. The Cin- cinnati-Dayton Delegation spent the night in London, Ohio, where they were given the fair grounds to sleep in, minus any kind of a bed. Enthusiasm ran high. In spite of the fact that the police arrested two of the Columbus comrades for col- lecting along the line of march as we were entering the State grounds; an appeal for collection was made at the Capitol steps. The response from the workers showed that they were with the hunger marchers in the right for | unemployment insurance, The police did not dare arrest the collectors. A Grilling March ‘The meeting in front of the State house steps lasted about forty-five minutes. The marchers were worn out. But they reluctantly admitted it However a few of those from the} | Cincinnati-Dayton delegation drop- ped from fatigue. They had started from London at 6 am. At that time they were 26 miles from Columbus. The comissary truck broke down. When they got to West Jefferson, which is #3 miles from Columbus, the truck was still in London. In West Jefferson the mayor refused to let the marchers stop long enough to get a drink of water. Outside of West Jefferson the marchers st‘ ped at a farmers house for wate’ They rested there for an hour and the truck was still out of sight. It began to rain and while the rain was just subsiding they began tie mrach into Columbus. All the fapd was on the truck. They had not eaten since 6 in the morning. In spite of the strain, in spite of marching 26 miles with approxi- mately one hour rest and no food, |the delegates came into the State ;house grounds cheering and singing. Those capitalist newspapers which made run of the Hunger March and which scoffed at the marchers would have to us? a lot of, bold type to make the workers of Columbus be- eve that these marchers were not serious! : An appeal wes made to all work- ers present who had cars to take some of the Cincinnati delegation to the Fair grounds. Every delegate was taken. The majority of the de- legates were Negro workers but it made no difference to tnose offer- ing their machines. The rest of the delegation, 159 strong, marched through the work- ing class sections of the city and about a half hour later amidst tre- mendous cheering reached the” fair grounds where the delegates were to sleep and where a mass meeting was jcalled for the evening. After spending the mght on the floor, in all parts on the Collisseum at the Fair grounds, the delegates got up, brushed the straw off their HIS HOLINESS By BURCK By CARL MUNBI, . “And we, the jury, find the de- fendant NOT GUILTY!” While the judge pounded the desk with his fist for quiet, and the prose- cutor went white and fled the court- room and the stool-pigeons in the chambers gave vent to their disap- pointment, the workers of Portland, who had crowded that court-room all day, gave way to their feeling of joy and relief. They clapped, and that clap sounded: like a bolt from the sky. Then they quieted down; the tide had begun to turn. A jury with workers on it had brought in an acquittal of ‘the third defendant in the criminal syndicalist cases of Oregon, John Moore was free! The little knots of workers who had gathered in the streets during the day heard the words. Applause filled the air in the plaza block. Moore was free—the bosses had lost the ground they had gained in the conviction of Boloff. The tide was turning. Papers carried the story THE DEFENDANT IS FOUND ‘NOT GUILTY’ “In the name of the district at- torney’s office, I ask for a conviction; in the name of the people of the state of Oregon, I DEMAND a con= viction.” With these words of the prosecutor and the similar instruc- tions of the judge that John Moore must be found guilty, the jury retired at 10:15 a, m. on a Tuesday morn- ing. The instructions of the court were in direct contrast to the-> cf the judge in the trial of Fred Wal- ker and resembled those of Judge Ekwald in the trial of Ben Boloff. “The jury, mostly workers, who had listened for a week to the frantic flag-waving of the state and its vicious attack upon the defendant and his attorney, went out and delib- erated over five hours and came in with the verdict. They had seen through the maze of boss frame-up and had voted with honest convic- tion. The “demand” of the prosecutor had been met. Word swept like wildfire through the city. Moore was free! The workers of Portland had contributed no small share of the to the workers who were unable to attend. They told them of the move- ment to repeal the vicious law that was undertaken by the International Labor Defense. All pick up heart again, the workers can, they MUST win! The dark hour has flown, The workers are showing the way and Moore's acquittal was the spark that will set them to the fire of greater siruggler defense pressure, but only when they saw how vindictive the boss tools were in this trial did they realize how much hung upon the outcome. Dillard, the prosecutor, had hinted in his closing argument that these “traitorous activities” would be smashed upon a conviction. ‘The tide has begun to turn. It can only be held by renewed vigilance and effort, clothes. Shaved, got their coffee and stew (furnished by the Ohio Penitentiary) and got ready for the two-day conference on Unemploy- ment Insurance. The conference started at 10:30 a. m. Monday. After the report of Comrade Trtva, district secretary ot the T. U. U. L. and a sub-repon by Comrade Marshal on the Agra- rian situation in the state, discus- sion took place from the floor, Every delegate who spoke tojd of the mis- erable conditions in the cities they represented, how the Charities were giving. as little as possible; families on $2 and $3 a week, how the city gives workers jobs and pays them in grocerics instead of cash. Then how the unemployed councils are fighting for immediate relief of fam- ilies. Fighting against evictions. What methods they were using, the results they were getting, etc, Every session of the conference began with the “Marching Because We Are Hungry,” and “solidarity” songs. The day's conference ended with the elections of the various committees. | At 5:30 a committee of three, New- | ton, Miller and Marshall interviewed the Governor to see that our com- mittee would get before the State Legislature. More penitentiary stew and coffee (and by the way it was real jail house coffee) and another session of the Conference, It was decided here to take up the question of transportation with the State and see that they cover’ the expenses. The Uneriployment Insurance Bill | Was gone over and one or two ad- ditions made. Then to bed again. Tomorrow, we march at 9 a.m. to the State Capitol! Miller, Newton, Cowan, N2rshal, Johnson were to be spokesmon. We had no illusions that the Le- |gislature or the Governor were 50 big-hearted that as soon as they saw us marching down they would im- mediately grant our demands. We were all aware of the fact that they csent the very ones who are | starving us, the bosses and bankers | of. Ohio. But when we came marching down to the State House, with workers gathered already waiting, and when the order and discipline cf the work- ers wes shown to them, they did not like it. They Ad{ourn While the committee was “inside, | cheering and speaking went on out- |side for a geod two hours. Then | the delegates came out to make their report. ¥ They had presented the bill for Unemployment Insurance, each of the 5 spokesman had 15 minutes to speak, and when each had spoken, |the chairman of the legislature arose and announced “Gentlemen, | this meeting is adjourned!” Each of the spokesman told the legislature in no uncertain terms what they stood for. This action was the climax of all the experiences of the “kind gentlemen” in all the towns we pas- sed through in Ohio, They adjourn the meeting when it comes time to give workers unemployment insur- ance! But we made them sit up and take notice and even if they tried to be nonchalant about it something will have to be done. The conference continued after the marchers reached the Colliseum marching through a downpouring rain, Soaked through, they sat around the stoves for a while, Every delegate vowed that we would come back again—but thousands strong! We would force the fat bellied cap- italists to recognize the force of the workers. My Bed of Ba A Blacksmith The first part of this story told of the miserable poverty which forced the young boy to start work in the steel factory, and of his first few jobs—Ed. ii rch By JOE POGDORNEY IT was advanced to operate a two ton steam hammer, the job on the dingy seven hundred pound hammer was vacant on appealing in behalf of} my schoo] mate, John got the job.; It was good to have a chum close by. On scorching hot days we'd meet at the water through and drink heartily like two good horses. We'd put our heads down and kicking side- ways laughing and remarking about being ponies. “Let's find a place to rest Joe’ —upon looking around, T suggested behind a big/furnace close ot my hammer, the boss could not see us behind there easily, we nailed up some seats. This was our resting for a year, away from the hot ham- mers and the big white hot piles of finished draw bar yokes. On slack days I'd sneak away from the bosses sight—sit behind the fur- nace for hours, now and then yahk out big husky sandwiches with nice red tomatoes—my mother was good to me now, the pay went all to her. The gas and smoke behind the furn- ace did not seem to annoy me with the rats playing around; filling my belly, I'd doze off in a heavenly sleep, to be awakened by smoke shooting me in the face from cracks in the walls of the furnace. I finally patched them all up with fire clay. A grand lay-off came. After seven months of tramping, summer found me back in the old blacksmith shop as a blacksmith helper, swinging an eight pound sledge hammer for a cursing blacksmith. crankey, One Pounding with a 16 pd. hammer, | day my dream came true—to run the biggest sleam hammer in the place. Orders had begun to come in from-—-war sweept Europe. West- ern Steel Car & Fadry. Co., received a large order for cars from the old Czarist Government. Our forge de- partment was set busy and steam hammers were pounding out buffers for Russian cars. Speedy jerking of levers, and pounding with’ a sixteen pound hommer, to raise the buffer from deep down in the huge die. T would hammer at times until foam oards in Shop would comie“6ut of my motth before the steel would jump up high eyough for the tongs to catch. “Thats a | tough kid"<the big fat bellied straw | boss would say as he and a@ lot of inspectors..would stand around te wetch theprocess. One evening before quitting time the worst came. I was to come back and'dri¥é the hammer nights. “Hell— now I Won't be abie to go out with my boy friends and I only a boy of sixteen.” We worked every night une til about:three a.m. After sheer ex- haustion we'd gather boards and lay ’em close to the furnace. The nights were very cold that winter, with no protection from the outside; the building was old. But we'd doze off for a covple, of hours. Later we worked all night long from six to six. To"this day I wonder why 1 never smashed the helper’s or the hammersmitis hands or their heads whenever. they reached under the hammer to adjust the hot steel, as after midsiglt I could not keep my eyes open, it was horrible agony. 1 slept on the stool and only instince tively at,thesyell of Yo! Yo! I shoved the lever which brought the two ton weight down. “God dam watchem Joe, what de hells a’ midder, shleep!” These words yelled out would wake me up fora while, it would be when- ever Schmidt would jerk his hands the nick-.of.time before the weight came ramming down —to the great laughter of the crew. * The hempers and I rebelled. We were determimed to get at least a few hours::of hay before mornings at all cost. |The hammersmith had to yield. We scattered, some behind piles of logs» in the dark corner of the building piled for construction or repairs. . Behind the big furnace for Stasiek and myself he was tickled at this idea. I liked him very much he kept explaining Socialism. I was no longer wild about Catholicism. ‘The morning the straw boss called our attention to the fact that the hammer did not run all night. “How da_you know this,” I asked. “The power house does not register any stean} Used after three o'clock in the morning,” he answered, Old Schmidt, the faithful lackey, saw to it that ye, worked all night there~ after. Each morning I'd come home eyes red as fire, exhausted, usually throwing myself alongside the kitchen stove for an Hour before gathering enough strength to pull my greasy overalls off*and wash my face. Again we decided to rest before mozning.” After a hot argument with Schmidt we had our way; I fell upon the schemeef letting the hammer tun up and down slightly the steam recording the action’ in the power house that-stood about a hundred yards away. Together with Stasiek we crawled behind our favorite furn- ace. But even here it was cold as this particular furnace when not used during the day, was a cold place te sleap. It felt like a feather bed on thosa tstraight boards. Now and then & rat would scoot past us on his way to his corner, I would giggle think- ing how closely related our doors were. Stasiek would talk about cialism while I'd be fading awag sleep, but also awaking to the that God belonged to the bosses who were strewing workers limbs all ovsr Europe for ‘profits. Bo- into fact WELFARE WORKERS IN PONTIAC, MICH. By E, W. A hundred men, young and old, are working at the Dawson Mill Pond for Pontiac City, * ‘These men work not for wages, but, for their groceries, which can only be had to the extent of $1 per week per’person. Single men get grocer- ies for $1.50 per week and are re- quired to work one day. Married men get as many dollars worth of groceries per week as there are members in their family, These men work from one to three days a week. Butter and fresh fruit and such other articles of “luxury” aré banned from the list of groceries to be had, Also these men and their depen- dents are referred to not as citizens or as people; no, they are referred to as “indigent persons,” .and their work as “indigent labor.” It is a cold, windy and cloudy day. The mack in the bottom of the pond froze sx inches. The men pick it with pick-axes, shovel it ‘into wheel- barrows and push it up the bank, where it is dumped, making a long mound ten feet high. At the foot of the rather steep incline is a short line of men with traces made of half- inch rope and slung over their shoul- ders. As loaded wheel-barrows neat | the incline a man is hitched to the front part of it and thus our load of precious muck is elevated to the top Concrete organizational proposals were made and actual pictures of the starvation of the workers shown. ‘The conference ended at 6 p. m. At seven many of the delegates left in machines and trucks, on the gas furnished by the state government. ‘The following morning the remain- ing delegates were taken home in the ONG trucks at the expense ot the State. The delegates are now home. Workers are still talking about the Hunger March. The Hunger March- ers are not finished. Our fight for immediate relief, for Unemployment Insurance must be intensified and particularly through our day to day activity \ of the mound by two men, one push- ing and one pulling. si A score of men drag, on skids, over rough, hard ground a stump-pulling winch, to be operated by hand, while trucks and tractors and a mechan- ical wineh stand idle! Only running automobiles on the highways and roaring airplanes in the clouds re- mind the workers of Modern Science and the latest inventions and ra~- tionalization of industry. Otherwise they look as if they were subjects of some Pharaoh building a pyramid, or serfs of some medieval despot dig- ging a moat round his castle, Shorty, who wears glasses, refused to work in th afternoon, He worked all morning. He is dust a kid, 16, a midget in comparison with the 6-foot foreman, who ordered him away from the fire and to work. Attempts to chase Shosiy away proved futile He refused to leave the fire, refused to work and rebelled agairst being drivén.““'The midget was stubborn and’ the’ giant angry, insistent, but unsuccessful. Shorty remonstrated: “I don't fee! like working and I don’t have to work; besides, according to law, the ¢ity will have to pay me 50 cents for every hour 1 worked in the morn- ing and take me home in the eve- ning.” A‘ting of men 51 the fire. They looked and listened. This did not go with the foreman. Tt was bad for discipline, The foremen get together and ® course of—action is decided upon, Shorty is Jeft- alone. Glad of win- ning his point, he began to preach “sedition. tq,the men who come to- the fire 06 get warmed up. “Sure, you all don’t have to work. It’s against the law to have men work without paying them in curreney for it. If you" wotrid all stick up for your rights, you'd a'l get paid 50 cents an hour, in “of just working for grocer‘s:, ‘like ‘you do now.” Shorty’s-legture was cut short. A Police patro} wagon with two cops in the front seat_appeared. They stopped their car, had-a few words with thi” supe, thé tféy drove up close to the fire, got”out and said; “What seems to, ke, the trouble, buddy?” Shorty sta .to explain. “You better come with us, and tell it to the clilefs; the “bull” interrupted him. - “The heck, I won't!” defied Shorty. “I.don’t have to, You can’t take me, according to law.” “Aw, ¢éfhé''on,” and two strong hands of this same law clutched Shorty’s diminutive shoulders and first, dragged his squirming, shapeless body, then pushed it into the cab and locked the door. As the police wagon drove away the supe rejoiced silently and -aefew men laughed nois- ily. But_most_of the men just dug and pushed the black, frozen mucky thinking®