The Daily Worker Newspaper, August 27, 1931, Page 4

Published by the reet, New Address and mail Page Four Ine. “Worker, 50 Eaet 18th Street, Comprodaily Publishing dally except S York Cit N. ¥ all checks to the I da New York, N. ¥. ¥, at 50 Mast “DAL A Retormist Contesses His ae Against the Negro Masses By CYRIL BRIGGS THE Chicago Defender publishes in its issue of August 22 a confessional address by its pub- lisher, Robert S. Abbott. The address is sup- posed to have been delivered by Mr. Abbott from the porch of his palatial home on South Parkway, Chica; Who comprised his auditors we do not know. We do know that they were not the Negro workers of Chicago, the murder- ous attack on whom by the police at the orders of white and Negro landlords, meeting with re- presentatives of the Chicago Defender and the N. A. A. C. P. his paper brazenly attempted to justify. Mr. Abbott’s address is part of the present frenzied campaign of the Negro reformists to re- establish their traitorous leadership over the Negro workers of Chicago. This campaign is directed at luring these workers away from the mass struggle, lead by the Communist Party and the Unemployed Council, against starvation and evictions, and for immediate unemployment re- lief and unconditional equal rights for the Ne- gro People. It is directed at the magnificent unity of Negro and white workers achieved un- der the leadership of the Unemployed Council and the Communist Party. It aims to again isolate the Negro workers of Chicago and leave them defenseless before the onslaughts of the capitalists. It aims at betraying their fight for existence, their fight against hunger and starv- ation. Mr. Abbott's own paper characterizes his “ad- dress” as “notable and stirring.” It is indeed notable. A notable confession of the criminal betrayal of the struggles of the Negro masses by the Negro petty bourgeois class to which Mr. Abbott belongs. Mr. Abbott admits that the traitorous, reformist, fawning leadership with which the Negro masses have been afflicted for decades “surrendered rights without a struggle. We yiclded our slef-respect at the invitation of flattery. We rubbed out marks of determination and enthroned instead the grin of the inferior grade of man on the brow and named it dip- lomacy. “...We have tried the circuitous paths of fawning. We have waiked with patience all her way. We have endured the harsh language of courthouses organized to scandalize us. Writers depict us in the phrase of ridicule. Editors of great journals deny us the stature of manhood, and preachers, who are sure of us heavenly, doubt that we are one with men below.” He further admits that the Republican party for which his class has always acted as pro- curers to corral and sell for personal gains the | votes of Negroes has betrayed the Negro People “We have been driven from the sanctuary of the political party we sought in gratitude and clung to in hope | “...In all places we meet either scorn or | toleration. The White House, in which we | found life at the point of a pen, rejects us politically and abhors an entire race as per- | sons or citizerf$ or humans. At the South our | hopes are false...” Mr. Abbott admits, though not openly, the role of the Negro reformists as tools and apol- ogists for the very system under which the Ne- gro masses are so frightfully oppressed. He says: “What it (the Negro race) had it lost. What | it sought to maintain was taken away from it by the cruel, brutal, relentless hand of oppres- sion and through the stupid assininity of its | own products entrapped in the machinations of | the damnable schemes of a fraudulent friend- | ship. Its rights are gone. Its opportunities had to go with the loss of rights. Its good name is now mud. Its children are face to face with a bondage harder than death.” Admitting all of this, does Mr. Abbott now call for a vigorous militant struggle for Negro righst; for a struggle against the capitalist op- pressors of the Negro masses? He does not! All that Mr. Abbott does is to admit the treach- ery of his class in the face of the growing real- ization of the Negro masses of that fact! All that he does is to let loose a flood of social de- magogy! He speaks of seeking “peace through strike against every wrong” of resisting “the lying, thieving ambassadors from the throne of Jim Crow as we encounter them.” But Mr. Abbott raises no demand for struggle against lynching, peonage and the starvation deeply the Negro masses. He does not call for struggle against the frightful legal lynching of the nine innocent Scottsboro Negro children Planned by the Alabama bosses. He has no word of condemnation for the massacre of Ne- gro croppers at Camp Hill, Alabama. His own paper sought to justify the massacre of Negro unemployed workers in Chicago on August 3. He has no word of support for the struggle for the land by the Negro toilers of the South or for the right of self determination for the Negro majorities in that section of the country. Negro workers! Do not be deceived by the fake struggle phrases of the reformists! They have betrayed your every struggle in the past! Repudiate the traitors! Rally to the mass fight against hunger and evictions, for unemployment relief, and for unconditional equal rights for the Negro People! Yoreign-Born Workers in the USA (This is the first of a series of articles dealing with the foreign born workers in the United States.—Ed) By PHILIP STERLING IARLY in the present century a little Jewish girl immigrated to this country with her fa- mily. She grew up, became a social worker, and wrote a book called “The Promised Land.” Am- erica, she declared in her book, was the pro- mised land of the immigrant. But America was never anything of the kind. Instead it has always been the land of promises —false promises. Since European nations began to colonize this continent, workers, farmers, peasants, craftsmen have been lured to these shores by the promise of a better, fuller life, with greater freedom, peace, safety. And all through history the mass of immi- grants have found little in the New World save dissapointment, exploitation, hatred, poverty, op- pression. When the British and the Dutch realized that there was money to be made on the new, wild continent called America, they started colonies wherever they could induce people to settle. But the colonists were not the bold spirits the his- tory books tell about who came here for ad- venture and for glory. They were only workers and farmers drivn from their homes by the hunger, poverty, war, and disease which were sweeping overcrowded Europe. With them came, overseers, professional soldiers, all the hard, bestial men who have served the ruling classes of every age for money. All the colonies were settled by commercial companies v had charters from their home governmenis. The financial succes: of these set- tlements depended on t ability to get im- migrants to work for them Shipping compcnies gave free passage to those who wanted to come here. In return for a tor- tuous ride across the Atlantic on which ma cften more than half of the passengers died of hunger and disease. these immigrants agreed to become indentured servants. That is, they signed a contract to work for a period (gener- ally five years) to pay for their passage Sometimes they pany in whose shi worked directly for the com- s they came. Often, however, er sold their contract to in the south and middle it was possible for a plantation flantation-owne: states, In 1672 owner to pay a shipping master $50 for the con- tract which gave him a grown man’s work for five years. Once the indentured servant found himself at work in his new home, however, he realized that he would have been just as well off in his old home. He found himself an actual slave. He could not marry without his master’s permission. If he did so another year was added to the term of his indenture. For every offense, whether he tried to run away or whether he failed to take off his cap in his lord’s presence, days, months, years could be added to the term of the bond-servant’s slavery. In 1610, the governor of one colony estab- | lished a military penal system for indentured servants. The slightest violation of discipline was punished by the most wanton brutality. Although Negro chattel slavery continued to grow at the same time, the use of indentured workers continued long after the United States won its independence from England because the white slaves represented a smaller cash invest- ment. After a century or more, European workers began to learn that going to America only meant exchanging one hell for another and bond- servants became harder to get. Then workers on this side of the Atlantic were bribed to write letters to their relatives and friends at home telling of the glorious oppor- tunities for life and wealth which the New World offered. In addition, there had grown up many settlements in which child labor could be used. To supply this want shipping agents stole, kidnapped and bought boys and girls under 14 years of age and shipped them to the “Promised | Land.” | _ Immigration continued and increased. 1762 to 1804 the number of white immigrant slaves in Pennsylvania grew so large that during the last 19 years of this period they were two- thirds of the total population of the state. Most of them were Germans who had come here to escape the feudal horrors of their own countries ' But while they were being enslaved, abused and oppressed, Benjamin Franklin said about them in a letter to a friend: “Those who come hither are generally the most stupid of their own nation, and as ignor- | ance is often attended with great creduli! when knavery would mislead it, it is almost im- | possible to remove any prejudice they enter- tain | But even as a tradition of enslaving foreign- lwidkers! Join the Baity of. | Your Class! Communist Party U0. 8 A P. O. Box 87 Station D. New York City. Please send me more information on the Oom- munist Party. Name Address CNY scccccccereccscevosseess Btate . Occupation .... born workers was growing up, so there began to grow a spirit of rebellion against the class of masters who looked on the sweat blood and bones of foreign workers merely as the raw materials from which to build personal fortunes. ‘The Boston Chronicle for September 26, 1768, reports: “News came that on August 17 about 200 of the Spaniards and Italians introduced by Dr. Turnbull, and which he was settling at Mus- quito’s, rose and seized a schooner which was employed in carrying provisions to the settle- ment. Thye tried to capture other vessels and get away to Havana but the wind was against them. An ex cS was sent to St. Augustine. Two sloops full of troops were sent to prevent them from getting away from Musquito’s. The troops arriving, the Spaniards took to the bushes. It is apprehended that Dr. Turnbull will have much trouble with the Spaniards he introduced.” (Tomorrow's article will deal with the two main trends in the history of American im- rey program of the capitalists which affects most | From | | Daily, Wo orker’ Party USA. USA By mai: everywhere: One year, of Manhattan and Bronx, SUBSCRIPTION RATES: $6; six months, $3; two months, New York City. Foreign: one year, \\ $1; excepting Boroughs $8; six months, $4.50. DON *T DIE—FIGHT! awa A-ananaae oe WAITING f FOR HOOVER'S By BURCK Unemployment—1930— 1931—1932 In the spring of last year International Pam- phlets published Work or Wages by Grace M. Burnham, fourth in its series of working class pamphlets prepared by Labor Research Associa- tion. “Work or wages’ was the demand in the | spring of 1930 of 7,000,000 unemployed workers who were already feeling the blows of the capi- tallst crisis. It was the demand of all. workers who were alive to the fact that the weary months ahead, with jobs getting scarcer and wage cuts hanging over their heads, would mean starvation, sickness and death to many thou- sands of the unemployed and their wives and children, A year has come and goné, and another year is well under way. All the promises of the capi- talist rulers of the United States and other capi- talist countries, have proven to be empty words. Hoover's “prosperity”, which was always just around the corner, has finally vanished into thin air. Financiers and politicians now admit that the sufferings during the coming winter will be even worse than the workers had to face in 1931’ Unemployment has increased by at least. 3,000,- 000. And at least ten million more workers are on part time. A wide spread wage cutting cam- paign has reduced the great majority of those still employed to actual want. The employing class has not yielded one inch. Not one piece of legislation for unemployment insurance has been passed. Only where the workers have militantly risen in hunger marches and demonstrations have the, frightened legis- lators thrown out a little relief. The Red Cross, is showing its true role as strike-breaker and wage-cutter. When the starving miners of Hen- ryetta, Arkansas, armed themselves and marched on the groceries for food, the Red Cross. was called in to give an ultimatum of $1 per day for contract labor or starvation, The hard facts presented by the Labor Re- search Association in Work or Wages remain as bed were in 1930. Organizing employed and unemployed to fight for unemployment insur- ance end immediate relief, to stop evictions, feed and clothe starving children, provide medical care for the sick, remains the immediate job of the workers in the United States. This little pamphlet, Work or Wages, will give every class- conscious worker the facts on unemployment, facts with which he can arouse his fellow- worker, facts which will show the unemployed that their fate is no accident but inevitable un- der the capitalist system, Every worker who has nét yet bought this pemphlet shquld send 10 cents for a copy to Workers’ Library Publishers, P. O, Box 148, Sta- tion D, New York City. And all unit, section and district literature agents shou!d order copics for sale during the coming fall and winter cam- paigns for social insurance. Evictions Again--But Again “Not a Penny from the Bankers,” Says MacDonald By A. ROTHSTEIN HE report of MacDonald's commission on low- ering the government expenditures is now the topic of the day in ‘England. The commission which was appointed by the “Labor” government for this purpose was pur- posely constructed in such a manner that it could be depended upon. As chairman, Sir George May, the secretary of the Prudential In- surance Company, which is the richest com- pany in England was appointed. The members of the commission were: Ryden, a director of n huge bank, one of the “big five” and also a di- rector of the Cunard Line; Jenickson, the direc- tor of the huge Vickers-Armstrong Metallurgical and Machine Builders Company; Lathos, a di- rector of a large automobile company; Lord Plender, who as “Impartial Arbitrator”, decided that the wages of the coal miners should be cut; Ashley Cooper, also\a director of large stock- companies, and lastly, Pugh, secretary of the Union of Metal Workers, who became famous by breaking the general strike in 1926 and by help- ing to put through a wage reduction of 25 per cent in 1930 for the workers of his union. In such a manner did the construction of the commission completely guarantee, that “the in- terests of the nation” and especially of its “bet- ter part” (that is, of the bourgeoisie) be assured. ‘The commission did not disappoint the hopes that had been placed upon it to take care of the capitalist interests. It made the following pro- posals, which speak for themselves. The com- mission proposed to cut expenditures in the fol- lowing manner: Cut the expenditures for the u22mployed, a) By lowering relief given by 20 per cnt; b) By raising the workers’ and employers’ c-ntribution to the dole fund by 300 million dollars. Cut the expenditures for education; a) Lower the government subsidies to the local education committees; b) Lower the government aid to the institutes of higher education; c) cut the wages of the teachers by 20 per cent. Cut the expenditures for road building by cut~ ting off 35 million dollars from the sum that the government has been giving to the local munici- palities, Cut the wages of the government employees, of the police and armed forces. Cut the expenditures for health by 5 million dollars. . Cut the expenses of the special commission for Empire trade, Cut the amount spent for mechanizing the army's transports. Cut the aid to the civil air-fleet. Altogether the expenses should be cut by the Workers Put Back Furniture By V. ANDREWS HICAGO, Ill—Only a few days after the City Administration made a promise not to evict the unemployed workers, on Autust 17 again five evictions took place on the South Side alone. In all cases the tinemployed workers, led by the members of the Unemployed Council Branch No. 4, successfully put back the furniture of the evicted families. More than half a dozen police squads rushed to the spot blowing their sirens. But the unemployed workers were not scared. They went on with “their business”. ‘The mass of workers gathered about those that were putting back the furniture. As police ran with their sirens shrieking more people were attacked, ‘The unemployed workers were mostly young and went about their work “business-like”, as one observer remarked. Police did not dare to attack them, not even to molest them. After putting back the last evicted family the workers marched in parade to Washington Park where open forum meetings are being held every night. About 6,000 workers gathered in the Park cheered marching workers. The crowd around the open forum soon swelled to about 10,000 or more, Here, like every night, when the name of the Communist Party was mentioned the crowd ap- plauded enthusiastically. The Unemployed Coun- cil also is cheered and applauded. Applications Pilins’ Up. The Unemployed Council Branch No. 4 was growing fast even before the police murder of the three unemployed workers, but after that, after the huge comonstration of 100,000 Negro and white workers marching together, applica- tions for’ the Council are coming by* hundreds. The Branch No. 4 has already more than 3,000 members. It is going to be divided in eight or more branches as applications are still flowing. The workers in the whole city are aroused, they especially are aroused in the South Side. I think it is the first time in history such militancy has been shown by Negro workers; also’ white workers. Conference for the Unemployed. On Sunday, Aug. 23, at 3 pm., in Odd Fel- lows Hall, 3337 So, State St. a conference was held for Unemployment Insurance and Relief, ,also against police terror and evictions, and for Negro rights. A call has been issued by the Un- employed Council, South Side Branch, No, 4, with the following demands: 1) Unemployment Insurance and immediate relief; food, milk, clothing, soup kitchens and va- sum of about 500 million dollars. It is important to point out that the lowering of the expenditures for road-building directly affects the unemployed because tnese subsidies were loudly proclaimed as the greatest means to provide employment. In such manner the whole economy is being carried out at the expense of the unemployed, of the government employees and at the expense of th sums of money which were to be used for edu- cational purposes. The machine for war re- mained untouched, with the exception of the proposal to cut the wages of the police and the soldiers. It is interesting to note, that the government has until recently been spending about 600 mil- lion dollars a year for the unemployed. For war purposes about the same amount is spent, but at the time when proposals to cut the ex- penses for the Unemployed fund to the sum of 300 millicn dollars are made, those for the cut- ting of w°» expenditures call for only a one mil- lion dolle : slice, Can tl > face of the militaristic, imperialist and exploiting government be shown more shamelessly than is shown in these proposals? Do the workers need a better lesson of what their confidence in the Labor Party has brought them? The commission admits quite openly that “if it were possible to have all classes suffer a low- ering in their income, if such is gotten either by work or by investment” then the commission would propose this: It would demand that all employees of the government and the munici- palities, that all who receive pensions, including the aged and widows of soldiers.who fell in the World War be forced to take their part of the deductions. This will naturally give the manufacturers the needed excuse to proceed to new wage-cuts. On account of this, did Pugh declare that he does not agree with the report of the commission and submitted his own proposals. One cannot’ expose oneself so openly. In the beginning MacDonald declared that the would have “to study” the proposals first. Snowden howled in Parliament that there would be a deficit of 600 million dollars. He shouted that steps had to be taken, “which will not be pleasant for certain classes and certain persons”. True, Snowden did not repeat his phrase that he used in regards to the workers in February that they should be ready for “sharp and unpleasant methods”, but all knew whom Snowden meant now. Snowden said: “No single government, especially such a government like ours, which hasn’t a majority in Parliament can take the responsibility on itself and introduce definite proposals about the cutting of the ex- penditures, The responsibility for that, of any single proposal being turned down, will rest. upon the entire parliament.” Snowden emphasized this remark three times during his speech, The correspondent of the “Daily Telegraph” interpreted this speech well. He said: “The condition is such that the govern- is afraid that it will not be able to carry through the lengthy plans without the help of ‘the oppo- sition (that is without the help of the Conserva- tives) because, there is a danger that a part of cant apartments to be opened by the city and administered by the Unemployed Councils. 2)°'The city must pay i2nt, gas and electricity of the unemployed. No more eyictions, 3) A reduction of rents of 50 per cent. No seg- regations. Equal pay for equal” ‘work regardless of race, etc. 4) For solidarity of Negro and white » ‘workers, For social, economic and political equality; against Jim-Crowism and lynching. © 5) Against police terror. 6) To build Unemployed Councils in every part. of the South Side. The “Daily” Increased This section of the Communist Party of U. S. alone is getting now 2,000 of the Daily Worker daily. Also the Liberator increased to 500 week- ly. The membership of the section more than doubly increased in a few weeks. It expected soon to increase both the Daily Worker and the _ Liberator twice if not more . ¢ ‘ MNO a hs ey ar ‘ , [ Recon | By JORGE Nice and Cheering A London dispatch of August 1, tells of the Perfectly lovely things awaiting you when next the capitalists decide that war must settle the questions of which imperialist bandits are to get or keep colonies and markets. It says that “scientists have developed an ex- vlosive, a teaspoon of which, droped over a city would kill a million people.” Capitalism is efficient. It can fix it all up so that a million people can be killed by a tea- spoon of something, but it is “helpless” to get a teaspoon of milk to hundreds of thousands of workers’ kids who are dying by inches in the New York slums, Hurrah for capitalism!... and mass murder! Hurrah for starvation What Happened “Daily Worker—A daily reader of the Daily Worker wants to know what happened. Since about two weeks he is missing in every copy his ‘Red Sparks’ and not a word is ever men- tioned about its disappearance. It was the best, the ablest and most interesting column of all the papers of the United States. Please ex- plain.—A Comrade.” This is only a lonesome sample of a great many inquiries received by the Daily Worker about the sudden disappearance of Red Sparks, our columnist—Jorge—having suddenly been taken ill and forced to quit work. The explana- tion should have been given earlipr, and we ex- pected him to write it, but until now his con- dition did not allow it, although he expected every day to be able the next. Any time it is missing or irregular in the near future, readers will understand that the reason is that Jorge is not yet able to do much.—Editor. Saree aaa You see, comrade readers, life is short and the N. Y. Times is a liar. But notwithstanding my desire to call daily attention to that sfact; we (editorially speaking) have a liver. Along in 1917, Uncle Sam fixed up a Five Year Plan for our liver, and since we got out of Leav- enworth (which is Choctaw for “Liverwurst’ in 1923, the darn thing has never been the same. Doctors shook their heads over it, and finally it was taken out, some ruffles cut off, hemstitched, washed, ironed and returned.to addressee. But A it was never the same old pre-war liver. That might have been all-right. In fact: for months and years we have been going about, working day and night, and nobody to look at us would have suspected that we had a~liver. But there are limits beyond. which the:.best of livers cannot. be driven. It hardly survived Hoover's moratorium. Then came the patriotic feat in which the U. S. Army planes sunk—that is, tried to sink, the old trans- port “Shasta”. The Shasta was supposed to take the place of “an enemy boat approaching our shores”, and about a dozen army bombing planes hopped out from Langley Field to “repel the enemy.” Well, they got lost the first day, and not only failed to find the “enemy” but failed to find their way back home. All the pot-bellied offi- cers on the boat towing the “enemy” swore that such a thing couldn’t happen again. It didn’t, They towed the “enemy ship” up: close an a bright day so that the “expert army aviators couldn't. miss seeing it, and then they; blazed away with bombs (at $500 per bomb, please take note you hungry unemployed). But they couldn’t hit the “enemy” ship, which, if it had been the real thing might have sailed on up the Potomac, right up Pennsylvania ave- nue and captured Hooey Hoover, moratorium and all. They then took advantage of the helpless con- dition of the “enemy”, went aboard and tried to sink it by opening the sea-cocks, but’ failed at that too. Then they stood off and began throw- ing butcher knives at it, but it failed to sink. Finally, they brought from Washington a writ- ten copy of all the promises. and schemes of Hoover, Gifford, Mayor Murphy, Bill .Green, Governor Roosevelt and Henry Ford for “unem- ployed relief” and loaded them on the “Shasta”, That was too much. The old boat groaned in every rivet, shivered from stem to stern, slowly rolled over on her side and then sunk below the waves, And so did our liver! We will have some more to say about these things when we recover sufficiently. Until then, try “self help”’.—Jorge. s 8 Postscript:—All you folks who have found out that Red Sparks has §. A. (No, not sex appeal but Sassy Atmosphere) should be interested to learn that during our illness the Staff Stenogra- pher collected some of the best Sparks we pub- lished in the last month, Ryan Walker has illus- trated them with the Jaughingest drawings you ever saw, and they're soon to be published in pamphlet that will sell at about a nickel, retail. Write to the Workers Library, which will handle your orders.—Jorge. the Labor representatives will ‘revolt’ against the government and vote against its proposals. This concerns the representatives who are directly ‘supported in their election expenses by the work- ing. masses,” The “Daily Telegraph” soothes MacDonald and assures him that the Conservatives will give him their aid and will help him carry through the lengthy plans. The “Morning Post” declares: “Snowden may be sure, that the well-thought out and decisive plans on economy will not meet any opposition | on the part of the Conservatives in Parliament.” Callins, a pillar of the Conservatives, went wild with joy: “It is possible that the country will find itself in such a condition that. a National government will have to be formed of the repre- sentatives of all parties. Personally, I would welcome such a government.” In other words, this means that if a part of the “Labor” fraction will not be bold enough to carry through the “economy” which MacDonald proposes at the expense of the working class then the Liberals and the Conservatives stand ready to take the place of the government, The Lib- erals and the Conseryatives-can be sure, how- ever, that MacDonald will serve ‘Capitallam: as needs be. It is necessary to mention that the greatest part of the commission which MacDonald ep- — pointed to report on cutting the expenditures -consisted of well known partners to all white- guardist conspiracies against the Soviet Union during the past few years. It is a fine collection of the most important pillars of capitalism, whom MacDonald and his Meutenants serve so tetas