The Daily Worker Newspaper, November 25, 1931, Page 4

SE OF Published by the Comprodaity Publishing ( ‘“ @ 2th Bt, New York City, N. ¥. Telephone 2 @ Address and mail all checks to the Daily Worker, 50 Bast 13th Street, New Page Four AL 4-7956. nquin toes RALLY THEWORKING WOMEN TO THE NATIONAL HUNGER MARCH By PAULINE ROGERS the capitalist press, which tries to cover the misery of the workers as much as pos~ sible, cannot hold back all the stories which pour in about the extreme suffering of the unem- ployed and their families, The third winter of the crisis, with its wage-cuts, lay-offs, freezing EN and vation, is already upon us and with it comes more disease, more deaths from starva- tion and exposure, more suicides—more workers wrecked and murdered by the capitalist system While suffering from unemployment is hard it is doubly hard on women and chil- on men, dren. In most cities women cannot even go to flop houses” or municipal lodging houses, they not “bum” meals as men often do, with the a few weeks ago, two little girls in an ash can because they 1ome and no parents. For two weeks d lived and slept in this ash can, going ‘ol every day, before they were finally dis- Mothers and babies have been found in the park in Pittsburgh and in many s after they were evicted from their In the U. S: A., the richest country in ingclass mothers are forced other home: te give bir babies in the parks, where they n: from exposure as happened in Cleve very day we hear count- nildren who have been aban- and women killing them- ren because they can no doned selves longer the pangs of hunger. The medical authorities in Detroit claim that every and 15 minutes a worker dies from star- vation in that city The only way to stop this capitalist murder of our ow-workers is to unite all our forces— nd children—in the fight against jon and for unemployed in- the Unemployed Councils are nizations because they are com- ely of men, They do not as women constitute about one- 12,000,000 unemployed in this coun- wives of unemployed workers must ne burdens of unemployment and that oyed women have special grievances. The d Councils must become fighting or- ganizations women as well as men workers, by drawing the thousands of unemployed women and wives of workers into their ranks, fighting for their special demands Where women have been drawn into unem- ployment activities they have shown much mili- tancy and splendid results. In the largest Un- employed Council in Cleveland (about 1,000 mem- bers) women are among the most active mem- bers, and make up about half of the member- ship. The organizer of this Unemployed Council is a Negro woman, Maggie Jones, who is a mili- tant leader of these unemployed workers in their demonstrations at the charity organizations, eviction cases, etc. After the murder of Jack- son and Rayford, two unemployed workers in Cleveland, a group of women in this council de- cided that they should eeganize a Nurses Corps which would study first aid and work together with the defense corps at demonstrations, meet- ings, etc. This group now consists of 35 women and some men, and they are doing very good work: Similar “first aid” groups of women will be organized in all the Unemployed Councils of Cleveland. ‘The preparations for the National Hunger March to Washington on Dec. 7 should bring the masses of women into the fight for free food and clothing for children, for cash relief and unemployment insurance and into the Un- employed Councils. Every Unemployed Council should organize’ Women’s Committees, should call special women’s meetings, should elect women delegates to the County and the National Hunger March, :should popularize the special women’s demands and around them build a wide moyement arnong the unemployed women. Organize special women's and ¢Mfldren’s hun- ger marches to demand food and clothing for children! Rally working women for the National Hunger March, Dec. 7, to demand unemployment insur- ance and to fight for the special women’s de- mands: Equal Unemployment Insurance for men and women workers. Equal Unemployment Insurance for single and married women. Special free municipal lodging houses for un- employed women. Free food, clothing and medical care for chil- dren of unemployed and part-time workers. Free hospital care for unemployed and preg- nant women. and by No dismissals of married women. Equal pay for equal work. Smash the Terror ot the War Makers and Wage Cutters! By J. W. a * 'O the extent that our Party intensifies its activities, particularly in developing mass movements of struggle, in this period of deepen- ing crisis and w the bourgeois state becomes more aggressive in trying to smash the Party. From all parts of the country comes daily re- ports of arrests, raids and general police terror. The most recent case is the raid on the Party office in Chicago. This was not an isolated at- tempt, although it is the first time since ‘last year that the District Office has been raided. This was preceded by mass arrests and jailing. According to I. L. D. figures, in Chicago alone, during the six weeks prior to the raid there were 294 workers arrested for revolutionary activities, and the judges used to get rid of them by say- ing, “Refer them to the Red Week—Nov. 16th,” so that 123 cases were scheduled to be called on November 16th, In the south side territory, where the P: influence grew tremendously after August 3rd, Captain Stege and Lieutenant Barker, who demolished the Party office a year ago and beat our comrades, and whom the capi- lalist papers call “stern disciplinarians” were placed in charge. There has now been started a npaign of terrorism on the South Side, par- ticularly against Negro workers. To be stopped and searched on the streets is common practice. To see Negro and white workers walking to- gether is sufficient to convict you as a “red.” Another step has now been taken in all parts of the city, but particularly on the South Side, by closing all meeting halls and threatening hall owners who agree to rent to any working class organization. It in this atmosphere that the raid on the Pa es on November 14th took place and 20 comrades were arrested. Preceding that 2 comrades had been taken out of their houses in the middle of the night. All these raids were conducted by the infamous “Red Squad.” The basis of all this was efforts by the local bosses and bankers, the Traylors, Randolphs, Sergents, McCormicks, Hurleys and meat-pack- ing and coal operator bosses to try and stop or cripple the mobilization of the Chicago working class against the imperialist war. It is an at- tempt to smash the defense of the Soviet Union, and was also aimed at crippling the mass mob- ilization for the National Hunger March. The: had seen the dozens of Public Hearings ed by the Uremployed Council in the ten preceding days, workers exposed the char- ity rackets of Cook County, Emmerson Emer- gency Committee, and the United Charities, and voiced their determination not only to fight for immediate relief but unemployment insurance at full wages. They had seen the widespread in- fluence of the Party among the Negro masses— the thing which the bosses are particularly aroused about. A year ago Captain Stege told ©. Hathaway, “lay off these damned niggers and everything will be all right.” They had seen. the overflow November 7th meeting in Chicago ané 45 additional throughout the district, where the struggle against unemployment, wage cuts and war, were the central issues, where the highest enthusiasm was reached when the work- ers declared their determination to defend the Soviet, Union The situation amongst the coal miners of Southern Mlinois was the specific key to the sit- uation. The boyrgeoisie is more alert to this than the Party ifself. The coal miners are be- ginning to move again-—they just went through a district convention of the U. M. W. A. where ‘Walker and Lewis fought for eontrol, but where the miners had their death benefit lowered from $350 to $250 by decision of this “official” packed jeon:sntion. Not word, not to speak of deeds, to {ht against the starvation of thousands of Illinois miners or in preparations for Apri] 1st, when the operators will try to further worsen conditions. The Party has spoken to these miners themselves, The coal operators being alive to this, have returned indictments charging criminal syndi- calism upon an unknown number of Communist leaders and workers. This is why Gebert and Seffern have been rushed to Benton jail in Franklin County, and are held on $5,000 bail each, In the course of all these activities, the Party has been growing. Since August 1st to Novem- ber 1st 900 workers entered our ranks. This also frightens the bourgeoisie and their lackeys, because for months previously our growth has been very slow. Out of the developing mass struggles, our Party must organize the broadest strata of the working class to fight and smash is growing police terror. Already the “Herald iner” any es: “the indictments naming other Com-annists still at large, are an out- g.ceth of cecal strikes ergind Benton... whee Comnvinists are ssid to have taken ad- vartage of ti> unrest to promote their cause.’ die fight aga rst police terror must be carried Livotigh on ¢Ys resis of mass struggles. We must net place ous case on lez:: technical grounds, al'iough we .cust take advantage of every con- stitutional tsophele to supsert our ‘case, show- ing to the wcrsers that the bourgeoisie in their esugle agains: the working class, violates thelr . capitalist law, as they did in connection with the raid'ag of homes and the District Of- { r arresting werkers ani loo‘ing records and vey, withev't even a semblance of ‘warrants, etc. By linking these two meskeds of struggle tcrether, the working class; will easily see the sam of bourseois democracy and the need of Mis pressur. ane struggic xs the only e’t-c ive wey to fight the bosses. Connected with this must go the expesure of thy liberals, who to date ha-en't Jet ous a squeak about these raids and . r, but who within 24 hours after the gubil- caitoe of the W.cltersham Report, issued a state- ment to the effect that the charge of Third Degree methods against the Chicago police made by the Hoover appointed Wickersham Commis- sion was unfounded. Why all this hypocrisy, Mr. Holly, Borders, Fisher, et al.? As we told you at the time of August 3rd, when you refused to even “protest” against the shooting of 3 Negro workers (maybe because they were Negroes), it is easy to speak glib phrases in soft armchairs, but to even transfer this protest into the poli- tical arena—not to speak of engaging in strug- gle—is too difficult and must “await investi- gation.” ‘The workers of Chicago must answer this latest attack, not only by increased mass strug- gles, better methods of work in the shops and among the unemployed, getting away from mere agitation around immediate demands and en- gaging in struggles for these demands, but above all, must answer the boss class and their poli- tical henchmen by 2 mass entry into the Com- munist Party. Thousands of workers follow the Communist Party and participate in its activi- ties, Your place, comrades, is in the ranks of the Communist Party. The most effective means of preventing Traylor, McCormick and Cermak from hindering our activities ig a mass Com- munist Party. Jom: the Unemployed: and Build Block Committees In Your Neighborhoods ¢., daily except Sunday, at 60 Bast Cable vt Dail Central “DAIWORK.” ork, N. Y. orker’ Porty U.S.A. SUBSCRIPTION RATES By mail everywhere: One year, $6; six months, 3%; two months, $1; excepting Boro of Manhatian and Bronx, New York City. Foreign: one year, $8; six months, MORGAN’S WATCHDOG oe News By HARRY GANNES. Iv. “A wagon-load of law,” to the Harlan miners means the deputized company gunmen who rep- resent the mine owners’ rule in this Kentucky coal territory Wearing deputy sheriff stars and iarrying high powered rifles and machine guns, these company gunmen roam the countryside in automobiles. With them goes the authority of the courts, the Sheriff, the Commonwealth attorney—the whole machinery of capitalisi government in the county. A When the Dreiser Committee first met at the Pineville, Ky. Continental Hotel, Judge D. D. (‘Baby”) Jones hied himself post haste to the committee, offering to open his heart to them. His conduct, he said, was above reproach. He wanted nothing more than to reveal it to the world. Then he left. The next day the coal operators rallied him in and, without doubt, told him the error of his way. He was told of the embarrassment he would run up against trying to explain how he jailed hundreds of miners without warrants; or how large an in- terest he and his wife had in exploiting coal miners through owning coal company stock; or why he kept the jury selection wheels in his private office, and effectively kept miners off juries; or why he fined a defense lawyer for “contempt” when the lawyer mentioned the judge’s connection with the coal operators; or why he exiled miners from the county for be- Jonging to the National Miners Union; and lastly why he threatened to wipe out—through the use of terror and the courts the strong organization of the National Miners Union tn Bell County. ‘The result was Judge Jones disappeared, dodg- ing the committee, preparing his sex frame-up against Theodore Dreiser and criminal syndi- calism idictments against the rest of the com- mittee. Sheriff Blair and Prosecuting Attorney Brock took the operators’ cue and did not show up at all’ But the committee went to Sheriff Blair’s office. Only when he was driven into a corner, when refusal to answer questions would inevit- ably show him up, did he grudgingly consent to speak. He “didn’t know’ how many company gun thugs were deputized by him, though he person- ally supervised the job. Reports from the miners indicate there are more than 400 of these author- ized murderers. The law of Kentucky accord- ing to Sheriff Blair, provides that any coal com- pany, if it needs deputy sheriffs, merely forwards the names of its company thugs to the sheriff. He gives them a star. They then have the right Flood the Line of the Hunger March . ., With Literature OOD the line of the Hunger March with lit- erature. Recently we had 2 statement on this. We don’t want to repeat the statement again. We only want you comrades to remember: Masses will march in the hunger march. More masses will line the march. Get our literature to these militant workers and farmers. FLOOD THE LINE OF THE HUNGER MARCH WITH LITERATURE. ‘The following literature should be brought to the foréground: Unemployment Relief and Social Insurance . .02 Secret Hoover-Laval War Pacts, by Earl PROWORE a) vot vce o or) Meares srecteces OL Pight Against Hunger, Statement of the. Communist Party to the Fish Committee .05 » 10 Social Insurance, by Grace M. Burnham .. American Working Women and the Class Struggle Youth in Industry, by Grace Lynch Justice at Work by B. D. Amis Race Hatred on Trial .........5..., .4. Communist Call to the Toiling Farmers . Revolutionary Struggle Against War vs. Pa- cifism, by Alex Bittelman Anti-Soviet Lies and the Five Year Plan, by Max Bedacht ..,.. 10 “Orders should be sent in immediately:to. the ‘Workers Ibrary, Publishers, P, 0.' Box: 148, Sta- tion'D, New ‘York City, Agit-Prop Department, , Central Committee. bai ifs i Item: Matthew Woll calls for arrest of leaders of National H ‘By BURCK ‘unger March, to carry concealed weapons or machine guns, and kill under the guise of “enforcing” the law. In fact, 99 per cent of the deputy sherifi’s in Har- lan and Bell’counties are hired and paid by the coal companies. They get from $2 to $20 for every National Mine Union member they arrest and charge with some “offenses.” This was Sheriff Blair's testimony. He said being a depu- ty sheriff was just a side job for thé torhpany gun thugs “so they can pick up a little change on the side.” How this system works with the miners was told by dozens of witnésses. Suddenly several car loads of “law” in the shape of gunmen armed with machine guns and Brownie automatics, appear on the scene- They surround a miner's shack, ; ush in the door, and yell, “We're looking for booze and red propaganda.” Each group carries a warrant, signed in blank by Judge Jones, The warrant is not shown to the raided miner. But in case of “trouble,” or if a miner is bumped off in the Process, the “due procedure of the law” is complied with by filling out the warrant afterwards to suit the occasion. Sometimes the machine gun tripods are set up a few dozen feet from the ‘ouse. Trunks are broken up. Beds and cupboards are torn apart. Every scrap of paper is scarched, and it the Daily: Worker, or National Miners Union membership cards are found, the occupants of the house are arrested. All arms are taken, though it is legal to possess arms in your home in Kentucky and nearly every resident has a rifle, shotgun or revolver. The coal operators want to disarm the miners so they must face the company machine-gunners empty handed. Sometimes, as in the case of Jim Grace, Debs Moreland, Tom Myerscough and dozens of others the men are loaded in the cars and “taken for a ride.” They are dumped out over the county line, slugged and shot at» In one case they hung @ miner with barbed wire on Ivy Hill. When the miners are takgn in tow, thrown into jail, then Judge Jones and Attorney Brock, for the Commonwealth of Kentucky, do their share. Jones “talks” to the miners. He has his own third degree methods. The procedure is to get the miner to say he will not be active'in the NMU, or if he refuses, offer not to press charges against him if he leaves the county. Blair and Kentucky Miners Learn About “Law” Brock could not report one miner who accepted either of these condtions. The usual answer was: “Go to hell! We will build this union in spite of you and your gun thugs.” Attorney Brock, who says he belonged to the United Mine Workers Union himself many years ago when plenty of money could be obtained by bleeding the miners, has the strongest hatred for the National Miners Union. All the while Brock, in his lawyer-like fashion, tried to hide the open attack on the NMU by a barrage of legal phrases, his young assistant, Jones, was pacing the floor barely able to contain himself. He punctuated the hearing by his explosive interruptions— “God damn it, I'l tell you what I think about you, you bunch of reds. These guys aint got no right to organize!” . Brock said he didn’t think the miners had a right to make speeches against the rich ex- ploiters, if the speeches led to the workers or- ganizing as a class for a change in government. He said he would arrest every man that made such a speech or organized for any such purpose. Brock always keeps in back of his head the idea | that this justifies him in smashing the NMU, the International Labor Defense—even the Civil Liberties Union comes under this cloud: But there was one man, Brock said, he heard make @ speech, he considered seditious, but no one was able to arrest him, “There were three or four thousand of the miners down at the court house one day,” Brock related. “They was talking about the rich Tob- bing the poor, and the miners digging up all the money the bosses had in the banks and the min- ers now starving. That, said Brock, ‘wasn’t true. The money belonged to the coal operators. I would arrest that man.” “Why didn’t you,” someone asked. “Because it would be suicide for any one to go into that crowd of three or four thousand miners and try to arrest their speaker at that time: We got him later.” Brocked sensed the effectiveness of the mass struggle against terror, ‘The “law” of the Harlan coal operators in the fpersons of the 400 company-paid deputy gun- men sheriffs (picking up a little change on the side by killing miners) and of Judge Jones, Sher- aff Blair and Prosecutor Brock felt outraged to have the terror reign torn up and exposed, Notes from the Famine Region of the Northwest By ELLA REEVE BLOOR W Rete farmers of North Dakota and eastern Mon- tana, and their brothers across the border in Canada, are fighting hunger and death in a mil- tant, organized way, ‘The United Farmers League has just finished a complete survey inthis district, and it found thousands of men and women and little children with no food, and their animais dying. Many homs were found where sickness is pe- culiar to famine-ridden countries has already Prostrated the children. Famine, according to the Red Cross, is an “act of god,” and thus we find that organization on the scene. But the Red Cross dropped many off its list who had been getting $7.50°per month. Its retrenching began in the counties of Mountrail, Williams and Burke, where starvation is perhaps greater than in other districts, The militant farmers called mass meetings spontaneously, coming to the United Farmers League and asking for leadership, Committees and spokesmen were elected to place demands before the county commissioners and the Red Cross. ; i Jn Mountrail County, while a mass meeting of the farmers was in progress, the county chair man of the Red Cross arrived, According to her announcement, her purpose in coming to the meeting was “to quiet those Reds,” and not to find out anything about existing conditions. One after another, fathers of children told how, in the face of the most desperate need, the Red Cross persisted in dropping farmers from its relief, mis- erable as this relief was.'So great was the in- dignation and the pressure of this mass meet- ing, that the Red Cross chafrman was forced to incu Boma Saibaba ew save her face. “I had no idea the need was so great,” she murmured. “Come to the office to- morrow and you will get on the list again.” The next day everyone wno had been dropped went to the Red Cross office and was reinstated. Mili- tant mass action had won something, at least. Mowever, the farmers are not satisfied with this paltry dole after years of paying heavy interest to bankers and heavy taxes to the bankers’ gov- ernment. So they visit the county commissioners at their regular meetings, At Stanley, Mountrail County, such a meeting was held at the county court house on October 6. The entire town was full of farmers who packed the court house to overflowing. Their committee went to the room where the county commissioners were meeting and told them “to come into the court room to meet the farmers of Mountrail County.” The commissioners looked scared when they saw the hundreds of hungry farmers assembled. A reso- Jution and a list of demands had been unani- mously adopted by the farmers. (There was one lone exception, a frost-bitten man who was afraid that his taxes “would be raised.” The farmers yelled at him, “What do taxes mean to us? We cannct pey any taxes.”) These demands were presented to the county commissioners who were forced to discuss them with the farmern for hours. Finally, the commissioners pleaded for more time “to consider.” ‘The entire crowd then adjourned to the street, Ke By JORGE ES “Onward Christian Soldiers” The fact that there is a “Polish military ob- server” monkeying around in Manchuria should remind all hands that Poland is a French fort- ress with guns aimed at the Soviet Union. All that has the supreme blessing ot the Pope, who in 1920 sprinkled holy water on the artillery then being used to invade Soviet Ukraine’ The Pope was then archbishop of Poland. Lots of funny things were then pulled off about that time. For example, there is nothing exceptional about the way Valentine Konopinski was syped out of his life’s savings of $2,950, the only thing rare is that he thinks he ought to get it back. Along in those happy days of 1919 to 1921, when the. counter-revolutionary curs of Polang were allowed to steal everything loose in the “holy” causeof shooting Bolsheviki, Poland, was milk ag money out of unsuspecting Poles in Am rica by the trunkful. Incidentally, it did a banking business in those years without pay- ing income tax, and grabbed a sum estimated at $300,000,000 from Polish-Americans foolish enough to give it, Konopinski happened to be one of them, and turned over his cash in American money to the Polish consul to deposit in a supposed “cooper- ative bank” in Poland. He has never yet bee able to figure out how that American money “disappeared.” Poland then was using “marks,* and his $2,950 got changed into marks at about 200 marks to the dollar as we recall, but lafer the “mark” fell to about 1,800,000 to the dollar, The dollars, of course, went into somebody's Pocket, and according to Konopinski, the pockwts were in the priestly gown of one Father Adafh- sky, who, though he started out poor, managed by such means to become today one of the rich- est men of Poland, promoted by the catholie church to the dignity of Bishop and the real boss in that “cooperative bank” which gathered in Konopinski’s kale, There were plenty of others who got the bum’s rush the same, but Konopinski tried to get his back. For carrying a banner saying: “The Polish Consulate cheated me out of my life’s savings,” in front of the consulate, he got arrested. The judge, a good Irish catholic of Tammany stripe, had a talk with the Polish consul and then wrote on a slip of paper, “The Bankers Trust Co, 14 Wail Street,” and told Konopinski to “go there and get your money.” Which was a way of get- ting rid of the old man, because the bankers gave him a cold stare when he asked for his money. Now he’s trying to get pinched again, So he can bring up the case, Anyhow, this is an example of how the Polish church and state united to swindle those who had more money than brains. And it shows what kind of capitalist interests are arming the Christian soldiers being fattened up along the Soviet border for the coming war. Re Ne Make Way for the King! Since some 100,060 American boys left their bones in France to “make the world safe for democracy” the bureaucratic apparatus of Amer- ican capitalism has waxed fat and arrogant. Any snob in a uniform can push civilians off the sidewalk, and does it. The other day we saw a U. 8. Army car, with a couple of officers brazenly and for no reason at all other than to show off, plant their car across a pedestrian street crossing when the light was against them just for the glory of making the people on foot trouble to get around them. | The other day Governor Roosevelt took it into his royal Bengal tiger head to go to a show. When the show was over, his excellency had his way cleared to his car by the Tammany cops, and the N. Y. Post of Nov. 18 tells what hap- pened. “Inspector Cornelius O'Leary was called to Police headquarters today to explain a charge that on his orders a mounted policeman had ridden into a fashionable crowd last night in front of the Imperial Theatre to clear a way for Governor Roosevelt to enter his car.” There was a big fuss because it was “a fash- ionable crowd” and the article further ex- Presses anger because: “Men and women in eve- ning clothes were reported to have been forced back against the closed doors of the theatre and Some were bruised.” When it is NOT a fashionable crowd, but workers, then the Post can afford to be jocular about it and praise the cops for “treating ’em rough. A lot of these “evening dress” gazaboes have had lots of laughs about workers getting slugged by cops, so we feel no sympathy. But a whole mess of folks who have imagined that Cops are created to preserve order and “protect society” will learn, if they haven't, that cops as @ species are about the most anti-social animal extant. They become more so as the bureaucracy of the capitalist. state, in fear of the masses, urges ever more brutality. And on the dawn of revolu- tion the livery of a cop will bring a shower of stones from many a hand which today is raised in respect toward an “officer.” ee and a dentist to be immdiately placed on the county, one for the northern and one for the southern part of the county. (2) ‘Ten carloads of flour to be ordered from the state mill at Grand Forks to be distributed by the United Farmers League Relief Committee. (3) No tax sales, no evictions, (4) The full cooperation of the coun= ty commissioners in getting immediate action on feed loans. Further demands were, the cancel- lation of all farm debts; the vast stores of wheat held by the farm board, and ali war funds to be turned over for the use Of jobless workers and Poor farmers; free feed and free seed. At the beginning of November, Comrades Om- holt, Taylor and Bloor,.of the United Farmers League, held meetings among the farmers of Red River Valley, near Grand Forks, North Dakota. The League is trying not only to force capitalists to give relief, but to get the starving all possible food independently. This valley had a bumper crop of potatoes, for which the farmers are now getting the miserable price of ten cents per bushel, \Whese farmers were only too glad to donate all the potatoes that the United Fa-mers League can arrange to have dug, lended and distributed, The United Farmers League has collected in towns and villares enov r-aney to buy ga e, oil, and foed for men and trucks to go efter the Potatoes, They are now In the valley, giving all their where a mighty mass meeting was held. It was addressed by Comrades Omholt and Bloor for the United Farmers League, and by Comrade Mabel ‘The demands presented to the county commis- stoners were as follows: (1) Two doctors or more ns a saat fi til strength to get as many carloads as possible for their starving neighbors sleeping under the stars, eating what and when they can, and fighting to get the same consideration as the Red Cross from