The Daily Worker Newspaper, July 22, 1931, Page 4

| i £ 5 eaen wy we COMproaany cupnsAing CO one. Y. Telephone Algonquin 7956-7. Cable: amily except sueaay, at 60 Last “DALW( Daily... Worker: Contrl Ongange the-Cbimumist Porty USA, SO By mati everywhere: One year, SUBSCRIPTION RATE. $6; six months, $2; two months, $1; excepting Boroughs of Manhattan and Bronx. New York Ctly, Foreign: one ‘year, $8+ six months. $4.50, Allentown Lines Up for the Fight Against the U. T. By AMTER 7 Gee eg) Allentown on and m will f lento’ nd at organizer was sent down and they joined the UT.W. For a period there was militant picket- ing, but the U.T.W.— ot. = for that izers are Means conflict, and the / - ing hand in k with want the strikes to peter out and the spirit of the work- d. Have Green and Woll said that t ers to be cru: gether with Norman Thoma is not the time for strikes? Did Green not p: ise Hoover that there be no strikes Therefore, the policy of the leaders of the of L. is to prevent strik id to SELL THEM OUT whi they take ‘This selling-out does not always take place openly. Sometimes, as in Philadelphia in the up-- | holstery workers, the workers are forced by the | A. F. of L. lead (Muste gang) to go back to work at a 14 per cent wage reduction. ith the threat of revocation of their charter if they do not return to work. The charter was then re- voked. At other times, “settlement” and then leave town after selling out the workers, as in the case of the Danville textile workers. This was the action of Gorman, the organizer of the U.T.W. Or as in Marion, | N. C., and Elizabethton, Tenn., where the U.T.W. with Muste organizers, sold out the workers three times. In Allentown, the organizer of the U.T.W., McDonald, is a 74-year-old man, well trained in A. F. of L. methods. Although he rectly opposed the workers, he has done every. thing to make their strike activities impossible. | He agreed with the police to put only 10 men on | the picket line. This means that scabs can enter the mills without trouble. But the workers found their own methods of stopping scabs, and the | number working in the mills is small. The Allentown workers know that Allentown work is being done in Paterson. That is, Paterson workers, without knowing it, have Deen doing work for Allentown bosses. Twice Allen- town workers went to Paterson to see what could be done about it. But nothing could be accom- plished. On Saturday, July 11, forty-five Allen- | town workers went to Paterson to attend the | ting and bring the greetings of soli- darity to the Paterson workers who were or- ganizing for strike. Their spokesman, Marsh, made a militant speech, pointing out the miser- | able conditions under which the Allentown workers work, At this meeting he emphasized that the Allen- town workers, the rank and file, intended to put | forth THEIR OWN demands—8 hour da day week, 25 per cent increase in wages. This showed clearly that the Allentown workers were not sat- isfied with their leadership and intended to fight for their own demands. At the conference held in Paterson on Sunday, July 12, where the Al- lentown and the Pawtucket, R. I, workers were hhusiastically greeted, it was decided that a elegation of Paterson workers should go to Al- lentown in order to propose a UNITED STRUG- GLE of the Paterson and Allentown workers against the miserable conditions and low wages, | together with Central Falls, and Pawtucket, The delegation went to Allentown, and when | they appeared at the meeting of the Shop Chairmen, who constitute the Strike Committee, Mr. McDonald, the 74-year-old fossil of the UTW, tried to prevent the Paterson rank and file committee, representing the United Front General Strike Committee, from speaking. The shop chairmen would not listen to this refusal and the speaker presented the proposals of the Paterson workers. Outside the hall, stood hun- | @reds of workers, who could hear through the open windows. When McDonald attacked the Paterson delegation as Reds and Communists, erles were raised by the workers outside of “Throw him out.” This was a signal and Moser, representative of the Central Trades and Labor the organizers make a | | THROW THEM OUT AND TAKE THE STRIKE | W. Misleaders | Council, left the meeting. | After this meeting, the workers outside the hall | the meeting and went to an- | the meeting was.on, Rev. | Weber, a minister, a socialist, entered the hall, and asked for the floor. This was granted, whereupon he proceeded in the same manner as his The rank file of Allentown elected a big delegation of 175 to go to Paterson to attend the | strike meetir July 17. There they were enthusia: received and called upon the Paterson silk and dye workers not only to go on st . but to forget thé past, when Allen- town continued at work when Paterson was on The Pat m workers recognize in these young Allentown workers the splendid American fighters that they are, and the meeting un wanted a repo: other hi Ww colleague voted GENERAL STRIKE during the | week | At the National Silk Conference held in | son on Sunday, July 19, a national struggle outlined. Paterson, Allentown, Pawtucket, Cen- tral Falls and Putnam were represented. There are silk mills in other sections notably the An- thracite, pt, Pa., which wanted to go out on | strike long ago, but McDonald, the AF. of L. | faker, tal the delegation that went to Allen- | town for help, to go home. The Allentown workers are beginning to under- of the A. F. of L. mea! gation came to Paterson, they went to the Associated Silk Workers, who told them they could do nothing for them. When they went with the Paterson delegation of the General Strike Committee to the membership meeting of the Associated on July 17 and to the U.T.W., and were refused admittance, they learned another lesson that all the workers must learn: not only the A. F. of L., the Associated,, the U.T.W., but the socialists and Musteites want nothing to do with the struggle to improve the | conditions of the workers. Only the fighting united front led by the unions of the Trade Union Unity League, like the National Textile Workers Union, which unites the organized and unorganized workers on a platform of demands and a program of struggle—only such a united front can lead the workers, defeat the bosses and their agents, and win a victory. The Allentown workers must learn the lessons of their expe the UTW leaders are mis- leaders. They sell out the workers openly, or let them wear themselves out and get discouraged, so that they can then i them back to work on the same or worse terms. Only those are real s, who really lead the workers on the pick- , on the battlefield, giving advice and | nd direction. | Allentown work must learn the most | on of all and that is that they | The important le: must have the strike in THEIR OWN HANDS. A leader who balks their decisions, who does not want to unite the struggle of the workers, who wishes to prevent the United Struggie of Alien- town, Paterson, Central Falls, Pawtucket and Putnam, who does nothing for Egypt, and does not try to extend the struggle to other silk cen- ters, is carrying out the general policy of the leaders of the A. F. of L. This policy is to let the workers be beaten in single sections, instead of building up a broad struggle that will lead to victory. | McDonald ee ONDE Socialist Traitors In the . Imperialist War “The President of the Committee on the Con- ctitution, Philip Scheidemann, leader of the majority of the Social Democratic Party, which of late seems to be an obedient government party, at least & miscellaneously serviceable government party. Five years ago this same Hetr Schéidemann waé horrifying blues and blacks by his flippant description of the Kaiser as the crowned dilettante.” (N. Y. Times, Mag 7, 1917) The social fascists betrayed the workers in the last war. The socialists are part and parcel of the imperialist war front against the Soviet Union. Smash the united front of the capital- ists and their tools the socialists. Rouse fellow workers to participate in the mighty demon- stration for the defense of the Soviet Union. This policy of the A. F. L. leaders is in the in- terest of the bosses, who have their chambers of commerce, and manufacturers’ associations, they have the support of Wall Street, and the gov- ernment. Governor Pinchot, who is trying to break the miners strike, with the aid of the United Mine Workers, the coal and tron police and state troopers, is@inding that the miners will NOT accept his intermediation. Pinchot has also tried to break the Allentown strike, with the aid of the UTW officialdom. But this has not succeeded. Allentown work Your UTW leaders are misleaders, working in the interests of the siik manufacturers. THROW THEM OUT, as the workers outside the hall in Allentown said. INTO YOUR OWN HANDS. You are lining up with the rank and file United Front Committee of Paterson and the other textile centers. Make this ONE GENERAL FIGHT of the United Front of the rank and file silk and dye workers against the bosses end their agents in the ranks of the working tlass, the A. F. of L. and Muste leaders. Farmers: Join the Fight Against Imperialist War By H. PURO. EALIZING that they are unable to overcome the world-wide economic crisis by shifting the burden of this crisis to the backs of the workers and poor farmers, the capitalists are coming out more and more openly for a new imperialist war as the only solution for the pre- sent plight of world capitalism. And, what is more signinficant, they are trying to set aside their own differences and prepare a joint attack against the Soviet Union, the only workers’ and farmers’ republic. Hoover’s moratorium is being put forth for the puypose of enabling capitalism to undertake this joint attack. In order to prepare the’ toil- ing masses of workers and farmers to be Slaughtered in the war against the Soviet Union, the capitalist politicians, newspapers and prop- agandists are carrying vicious attacks* against the of the workers and farmers. They are try- ing to make the workers and farmers believe that the Soviet Union is to blame for their mis- erable conditions. For this purpose they make the charges of “Russian dumping.” By this “dumping” charge the capitalists are trying to hide from the toiling masses the fact that the workers and farmers are building socialism in the Soviet Union, for the sole benefit of the toil- ing masses. They want to hide the fact that the workers and the farmers in the Soviet Un- jon are now consuming more goods than ever befo: nd that the sole aim in increasing in- au production and putting agriculture on a elective bas's is continually to raise the living standard of the working m Because by abolishing capita Profiteers, ex- ploiters and landlords and by building socialism 's in the Soviet Union 1 the capitalists country ha become terribly frigh- w.ied. The revolutionary example given by the every Russian toilers {ndicates that as soon as the workers and farmers in the capitalist countries follow this example, the end of capitalism will come. The present economic crisis both in industry and agriculture has caused a great awakening of workers and poor farmers to whom capitalism gives not even the barest chance to live. These masses are becoming more and more rebellious | against capitalism and are looking toward the wiet Union as an example of what they them- selves should do. The capitalists realize this and therefore they yori: overtime to poison the minds of the work- ers and farmers by instituting “dumping” char- ges and trying to make the workers and farm- ers believe that the Soviet Union has caused the unemployment of ten million workers in this country and the miserable condition in which the United States farmers find themselves. By s vicious propaganda the capitalists are: try- not only to prevent the revolutionary ing awakening of the masses, but to prepare them to be drawn into war against the workers’ and poor farmers’ republic. But what reasons have the farmers of this country, who are getting 23 cents a bushel for wheat (when it costs them $1.40 to produce a bushel), to go to war on behalf of American imperialism and against their own’ brothers in the Soviet Union? What reason has the tenant | farmer or the share cropper to go to war for American imperialism against the Soviet Union | when, after he has finished his crop he finds | that he is in debt to the banker and the land- loyd and has nothing, to live on until the next crop? What reason have millions of poor farm- ers in this country to enter such a war when their ani their m ery and their homes | are being foreclosed after years and tens of years of hard toil? “ a pathili. we - Demonstrate on August First. Certainly there can be no reason for the work- ers and farmers of this country t osupport such a rotten system in which exist conditions such as are admitted by one of the leading republican politicians, the former secretary of the republi- can state committee in Kansas, Mr. Steigler, who is quoted by the capitalist press as saying that conditions of the Kansas farmers are such that “Many farmers will not harvest their wheat, others are dumping it on their fields to rot.” Just think of it, when over ten million unem- ployed workers and their families are suffering hunger, the robbers and speculators who are protected by this capitalist system, have put the farmers into such a position that they are com- pelled to leave their wheat to rot on the field! In this situation, Hoover's Federal Farm Board which was established to protect the bankers when wheat was selling for 73 cents a bushel, refuses any aid for the poor farmers. On the contrary, it decid~d to “dump” on the market 200,000,000 bushels of wheat and 1,300,009 bales of cotton, to help the speculators and to ruin millions of poor and tenant farmers. The conditions of the poor farmers in other fields are no better than those of the wheat far- mers. Everywhere they are in the same con- dition of starvation. And still the capitalist government not only refuses to give them even the smalest aid; in addition, it piles up | taxes upon the poor farming population, making them pay for its huge war preparations and on top of that, it gives its services through the sheriffs and the courts for the bankers and rich landlords to collect their debts from the poor farmers, tenants and croppers. The white farmer and tenant is no better off economically thansthe Negro farmer or tenant, although the white farmer has seemingly more political rights, whereas the Negro farmer and tenant have been denied practically all political rights. In the face of these conditions the toiling farm- ers, both white and Negro, must organize them- selves to fight, not only for their immediate economic demands—against taxation of poor farmers, against foreclosures, against evictions, for the cancellation of debts, for the abolition of ground rent and confiscation of land of big landlords, but by making these immediate de- mands ralying points for the millions of toiling farmers for the struggle against capitalist war peraprations against the Soviet Union and for the revolutionary struggle against the capitalist system and for the establishment of a workers’ and farmers’ government. August First is an International Day for the struggle against the war and for the defense of the Soviet Union. Toiling farmers throughout the United States, join in this day to demonstrate against your exploiters and for your demands. Join with the industrial workers to demonstrate against the imperialist war and for the.defense of the work- ers’ and farmérs’ republic, the Soviet Union. Join the fight against the capitalist system and for the establishment of a workers” and farmers’ government. By JIM ALLEN 'HE armed stru; now raging in Tallapoosa County, Alabama—in the heart of the Black Belt—between Negro croppers, tenants and poor farmers and armed posses of deputiés and white landords is a desperate struggle against starva- tion and feudal tyranny. Led by the Croppers Union, the Negro toilers, supported by the poor whites in the section, are defending themselves with breech-loader and shotgun against a raging, terroristic band of 600 white landlords, deputies and business men mo- bilized from Tallapoosa and Lee Counties and armed with machine guns and rifles, While’ only one Negro share-croppes—Ralph Gray—is definitely krown to have been killed and six others wounded, while defending Gray in his cabin against a posse of deputies who had mortally wounded him in an encounter om the road, scores of other croppers lie wounded in re- treats in the backwoods. Of the thirty-two Ne- gro toilers thrown into the Dadeville jail four of those wounded have “disappeared.” According to Police Chief Wilson they have gone “cutting stove wood’—with a lynch mob accompanying them. The lynch mob is on the rampage—ter- rorizing and burning. The Mary Church, in which the Negro toilers held a Scottsboro protest meeting last Wednesday night, was burnt to the ground in broad daylight and the torch has been applied to a number of cropper’s cabins, with the deputies reporting that they did “not know whether they were occupiec or not.” The croppers are putting up a su ‘f fight for their lives. Sheriff J. K. Young wes critically wounded and two other officers were wounded in a gun battle when the Negroes were defending themselves and the mortally wounded Gray from the lynch mob. Three croppers and three Negro women, who were wounded in this battle, were thrown into jail together with the others. An armed lynch mob is surrounding the jail sup- Pposedly to prevent a jail break and repel a ru- mored attack by the croppers, but—more likely— to carry through a wholesale massacre of the prisoners. The lynch mob is scouring the coun- try in search for the organizer of the Croppers Union and others of its leaders, using blood- hounds and they are armed to the teeth. The Negro huts throughout the area are deserted. ‘The skirmishes started Wednesday night when deputies attempted to break up a mass meeting called by the Croppers Union to protest the Scottsboro legal lynching and draw up demands for food from the landowners. Despite the land- lord’s terror another meeting was held at Dades- ville, county seat, on Thursday night, with over 500 croppers attending. The southern newspapers are playing up the struggle as a séruggle between the Negroes and whites. The Birmingham Age-Herald has a scream headlme “Armed Negro Red Threat Heard.” Saturday morning’s Chattanooga Times, under the headline “Alabama Posse Moving To- ward Red Gathering” reports that an army of 600 white mobsmen are moving on another meet- ing of 500 Negro croppers to “settle the racial difficulty.” The struggle of the Negro croppers is for bread’ and against dea.) from starvation. On July 1st all the food allowances granted the croppers by the landowners were cut out. The only means of sustenance for the croppers and tenants was the meagre allowance of fatback, corn and flour— ranging from one dollar's to two dollars’ worth a week for an entire family—advanced by the landowners, By July 1 the crops had been “put by’—planted and plowed—and by cutting off the allowances the landlords served notice on, the croppers—Negro and white alike—that now they had the choice of starving on the land while the crops they put by were maturing, or starving elsewhere. It was en effort by the land- owners to drive the croppers off the land and take their entire crops when harvesting time came. Then they could employ day labor at 50 and 25 cents a day. The croppers have nowhere to turn for food. They haven't got a red cent. The Croppers Union, which first began organ- izing here about two months ago, rapidly grew to take in croppers from practically every farm By BURCK and plantation in Tallapoosa County and some in Lee County. Their prime demands are the con- tiruation of the allowances until harvest and settlement at that time with the landowner. The meetinzs broken up by the deputies and the Jandowners were probably mobilization meetings for mass demonstrations at the county seat for relief and for the continuation of the allowances. This cry for bread is being met with an army of terror. Following the cutting off of the allowances the landlords offered some of the croppers the alter- native of working on their truck patches at 50 and 25 cents a day, or at the saw mills at $1 a day, They put many of “their” croppers to work on the county roads and in the whiteman’s ceme- tery to pay off the landlord’s road and school taxes whith are $5 each. A whi.> worker from Camp Hill writes the fol- lowing t. the SOUTHERN WORKER, just a day before ine fighting began: “The white bosses of this place has got a gang of Negro boys and men working in the white boss cemetery to pay their taxes. They don't have anything to eat and have three bosses over them seeing that they don’t get any rest until 12:30. Then they only give them 30 minutes to try to find some- thing to eat. By a white worker who is looking after the condition of the work class because he knows he will soon be treated the same way. ‘We workers must get together.” Another white tenant farmer from Camp Hill, who together with his family of five lives on $1 @ week which his daughter makes cooking out, writes at the same time: “Wake up Croppers Union, let us get together. While in this section there are but few white croppers and poor farmers, they seem to be tak- ing sides with the Negro croppers. They may yet be heard from at any time, giving their active support to the struggle of the Negro toilers for their lives. The Scottsboro legal lynching plays a promi- nent part in the struggle. The fight of these croppers of Tallapoosa for food becomes imme- diately a fight against the whole system of na- tional oppression against the Negroes in the South. In an area where four Negroes speak- ing together make a “dangerous crowd”, the significance of mass meetings of 500 as a mass defiance of the lynch law system can readily be understood. To the starving croppers of Tallapoosa, Scottsboro had become a symbol of the whole system of oppression and persecu- tion to which they are subjected. The fight for food had broadened out almost automatically into a struggle against white ruling class tyranny This struggle is but the beginning. Similar conditions prevail throughout the Black Belt, where between seven and eight million Negro croppers, tenants and poor farmers form the ma- jority of the population. The meagre advances are being cut off, wages for day labor have fallen as low as 15 cents @ day in some sections of South Carolina. The misery of the mass starva- tion on the farmlands is bringing things to a breaking point. Bigger and bloodier struggles are predicted before the summer is over. For these courageous croppers struggling against starvation and tyranny there must be the broad- est possible support from the masses of Negro and white workers throughout the country. The Tallapoosa croppers have made “Scottsboro” the rallying point for a deeper and more basic struggle against the domination of the white ruling class. 6 FIGHT STEADILY FOR RELIEF! Organize Unemployed Councils to Fight for Unemployment Relief. Organize the Employed Workers Into Fighting Unions. Mobilize the Employed and Unemployed for Common Strug- gles Under the Leadership of the Trade Union Unity League Imported Somebody in St. Louis. sends. us a couple of leaflets published in London, ,England, warnnig all and sundry in the form of a question: “Ik the Jew to Enslave the World?” and another titled: “Prohibition, a Step towards Jewish Communist Revolution.” We are Jewish enough ‘to know the difference between matzoth and pumpernickel, but that’s about all. But the comrades who sent these leaflets in don’t seem to know that in Europe the fascists are in their need to summon every dark and reactionary prejudice to their side against the workers, quite commonly blabbering the nonsense that Communism is a Jewish in- vention, We didn’t pay a great deal of attention to the recent Zionist confab in Europe, but have the impression that the grand shindig that de- veloped there, was between two sections of or- thodox Jewry as to which could be more counter- revolutionary and anti-Communist. On the other hand, there seem to be a lot.of Communists in Central China, where the Chin- ese Red Army is licking the tar out of Chiang Kai-shek’s “picked troops,” although a Chin- ese Jew is something that don’t exist any more than hen’s teeth. But capitalism reauiges the support of every race prejudice and gives us the A. F. of L.’s campaign against “foreigners,” and puts a Doak in the Department of Deportation. eee ae ge “Socialist” Economics When Ramsay MacDonald made a speech te the “seven-power conference,” he gave the cause of the world crisis inthe following terms, ace cording to the N. Y. Journal of July 20: “MacDonald attributed the present crisis to the fall in prices.” Y'see! The cause of limburger cheese is ate tributed to the smell. And this ts “socialist™ economics! More, as the leader of the Second “socialist”? International, which pretends to have. the in- terests cf the masses at heart, simple people might think that MacDonald would welcome a fall in prices, so the poor would buy more and eat better. But it is precisely because the “socialists” are not interested in the poor people eating, but only in capitalists making profits, that Ramsay got off this piece of idiocy, which compares pretty well with Hoover’s explanation’ to the farmers—first, that the Soviet hedging sale of 7,000,000 bushels of wheat on the Chicago mar- ket last year ‘caused such a crisis that the Farm Board had to buy 200,000,000 bushels, and; see- ond, when that failed to work and prices drop. ped down to the present 23 cents a bushel, that the war debt moratorium will “soon” bring, pri- ces up again, a ee & “Let’s Be Pre-historic!” Says Hearst William Randolph Hearst is fanning the flames of patriotism against “perfidious Albion” —whieh reeans England. And it all comes about thusly: In connection with the 200th anniversary of George Washington cutting down. the cherry tree or something next year, and also to help some Republican party politicians who didn’t get elected last election to get some graft in spite of that fact, Congress or something decidsd to celebrate the anniversary of the surrender of Cornwallis to Washington at Yorktown. Money is being squandered like water (not to feed the jobless, oh, dear, no!) but to c.aze a giant pageant, even rebuilding the Yorktown houses to make ’em look like they did when Cornwallis surrendered. And in the pageant, naturally, Cornwallis was billed to appear and hand over his sword to the cherry tree hero. But along comes the State Department and says: “Nix on that stuff! That might offend England!” So they're going to have a turkey dinner without any turkey, that is, the surren- der of Cornwallis must take place without any surrender, “In connection with these plans,” writes a member of the Workers Ex-servicemen’s League, “we recollect that the American Legion has in- vited, through Ambassador Dawes, the Prince of Wales to be guest of honor at the coming Le- on convention next Fall.” And he goes on to explain that the old 1776 paytriotism must in these days be smothered to make way for the paytriotism of all capitalist parasites against the Soviet Union. “The pay-~ triotic orgies (the Yorktown celebration in this case), always the forerunners of attacks on the working class,” as he well puts it, got into a. con- tradiction, ‘The celebration is aimed to stir up paytrictis=e, for American capitalism. But. Peimacts caple talism is just now bending all efforts to get an understanding with England for joint attack on the Soviet Union, and the Yorktown celebration has to be castrated accordingly. As an old Eng- lish poet put it: i “Ah, let not Britons doubt heir social aim, “Whose ardent bosoms catch this ancient fire!” But Hearst wants the old pre-historic pay- triotism; wants America to make war _the Soviet Union, sure! But also on Great Britain. Fight ‘em all, is his slogan. So.he gets sar- castic and asks: “When is the State Department ‘going to abolish the Fourth of July?” He needn’t worry. It is used now to mle speeshes against the “reds,” and remains & = useful for Fish & Co. All paytriotism nov’ on that issue, as the member of the 1 Ex-servicemen’s League relates in calli-- y all worker-veterans to join the Leagus and ¢. onstration on August First against the war prer .- rations. That's a good idea. But. unless the Communist Party in New York really gives some leadership and the Party members in the League ston dedg~ ing the day to day work of the League, the fine response it gets will be wasted. There is too snus paging ih Duck 22 Se Wgportant asks