The Daily Worker Newspaper, May 26, 1932, Page 4

{ Published by the Comp © 18th St, New York C " \Ad@regs and mail all checks to the Dally Worker, 60 East 18th Street, New York, N. Y. Page Four ¥. Telephone ALgonquin 4-7956. eC — Publishing Ce, Inc, daily except Sunday, at 60 East Cable “DAIWORK™ Dail Porty US.A STRIKE STRUGGLES =o mr IN CUBA By WILLIAM SIMONS of Sani et carmen province of Qriente, months strike a) way Co. (an won were cm that of the str last August in that in Santi workers rejected the attempts of the Ci of the strike is a tribute revolutionary leadership of the worki moveinent in Santiago de Cuba, whi of the ferment stirred up by the trike in Havana and the litical strike to organize the mass unorgenized streetcarmen of Santiago (actin information given by tl Workers’ Confederation of Cuba) carmen of both of these cities are en the same Yankee company, the Ha’ Railway Co. This strike has defi that militant action obtains concrete resw TOBACCO WORKERS’ STRIKE IN CUBA CONTINUES. The effectiveness of the strike of the tol workers. of Havana Province, Cuba, can be from the loud threats of the manufactur move their plants to Tampa and Key West, F ida. Fifteen thousand tobacco workers stru in the middle of January against a new wage- cut of 20 per cent. The struggle was begun by the workers. Those in the “La Belinda” fac- tory abandoned the shop as soon as the boss made the announcement of the cut, and then went from shop to shop, calling out the r The reformist leaders of the cigarmakers, in view of the pressure of the masses, had to go along with the strike, but they still follow their old practices. The danger to the strike comes from these leaders, who prevent the establi ment of broad rank and file strike committ and who conduct negotiations with the boss controlled government officials. The Caribbean Sub-Committee of the Latin American Trade Union Confederation and the Trade Union Unity League sent greetings to the strikers (the latt appeared in the Daily Worker). The reformist leaders of the Cigarmakers’ Union did not dare to suppress the cable of the Trade Union Unity League (they printed it in the strike bulletin), although it stated: “Do not trust y ur leaders. ‘Take the strike in your own hands This fear reflects the prestige which the Trade Union Unity League has among the masses of workers of Cuba. The outcome of the strike will depend on the ability of the National Workers’ Confed- eration of Cuba to strengthen the revolutionary Opposition inside of the tobacco workers’ unions, particularly among the cigarmakers. STRIKE AMONG WORKERS IN SUGAR MILL. ‘The campaign of the National Workers’ Con- Cuba in Cuba is 22, for the organization of the beginning to show at 8 p.m., before the second on, 95 workers from the machine ne other department, went on strike rovidencia” in Guines, Ha- nst an average reduction of the demands formulated by members in the mill) were: s every Saturday, sanitary prices in company stores as in clean drinking water, the ‘On Jan tores, t aid and medical service, the val of the Rural Guards from the vicin- the id meetings, right of the workers to ore recognition of the ke did not spread, due to failure of in touch with the other work- the strike. Furthermore, atened to evict from their ailed to return to work. In addi- e union group failed to give direc- ement. The strikers returned to ght, when their shift began. icates that the field is over- nization of the sugar workers, s to the necessity for a wider campaign National Workers’ Confederation of Cuba z the sugar mill and plantation workers. SUPPORT BY THE AMERICAIN WORKING CLASS. rican workers can play an important role nizing and helping the heroic strike s gles of the workers in Cuba and other colo- ies and semi-colonies under American control. t, in spreading the news of these strug- gles in the shops, among unemployed and in the m organizations. Second, by forwarding res- olutions of greeting to the strikers, by forward- ing to the respective consulates protest resolu- tions against the terror used against the work- giving publicity to the strikes and ns in the official organs of the trade of the mass organizations. arnt the mass meetings on the e, on the war in China, etc. to The support of strikes in the colonies should be a part of the daily work of the revolutionary trade unions and of the revolutionary opposi- tions in the American Federation of Labor. The fight for the freedom of working-class prison in the colonies must become an in- separable part of the defense work in the United States. Let us start to give real support to the struggles of our fellow-workers in the colonies! Let us put into practice the “adoption” plan by which the workers of one district “adopt” the revolutionary movement in one of the colonies or semi-colonies of American imperialism. Let each revolutionary trade union, every mass or- ganization take up seriously its duties under the “adoption” plan! The Willie Brown Case--An Attack Against the Entire Working Class By TOM HOLMES IN FRIDAY, MAY 13th, 1932, Dorothy Lutz was sentenced to the electric chai by Judge Harry S. McDevitt, presiding judge of the Quarter Sessions Court, Philadelphia County, The date for execution is to be set by Governor Gifford Pinchot. It is no accident that just as Willie Brown is sentenced to the electric chair about 40 workers are facing jail sentences-for their militant labor activity in Philadelphia. It is no accident that over ninety workers were jailed during the month of April and over 10 brutally beaten. The Willie Brown case is part and parcel of the general attack against the Philadelphia working-class and the working-class of the United States. A little white girl, Dorothy Lutz was murdered in February. Her body was found in a deserted house. All the clues pointed to a white man being the murderer. Yet the police immediately began looking for a Negro. One police official spilled the beans when he said, “WE DON’T KNOW WHO COMMITTED THE CRIME BUT WE FEEL THAT IT WAS A DARK-SKINNED ‘WHITE MAN OR A LIGHT-SKINNED NEGRO.” The police went to the flophouse at 18th and Hamilton Streets and lined up a group of unemployed Negro workers against the wall and questioned them about the murder. They knew of gpurse that none of these men had committed the murder. THAT THE POLICE TRIED TO CREATE SENTIMENT TO SUPPORT THEIR, PROPOSED FRAME-UP OF A NEGRO IS SHOWN NOT ONLY BY THE SENTIMENT OF THE POLIC OFFICIAL BUT BY THE FLOP- HOUSE INCIDENT WHERE THEY GRILLED DOZENS OF NEGRO WORKERS IN ORDER TO WHIP UP A LYNCH SPIRIT. The police found several strands of a white man’s hair on dead Dorothy Lutz. They gave this hair to an expert police chemist to analize. After several weeks time, the police chemist, a man who has taken a chemistry course in college, had years and years of experience in this field, came out with the statement that “I CANNOT ‘TELL WHETHER THIS IS THE HAIR OF A WHITE MAN OR OF A NEGRO. I SHALL HAVE TO GIVE IT TO A BETTER AUTHORITY THAN I FOR ANALIZATION.” At the trial the hair shown as evidence was not long and brown (hair as described by capitalist press) as when it was first given to the police chemist BUT WAS JUST LIKE WILLIE BROWN’S—dark and very curly. The hair was in possession of the police all of the time, IT WAS THE EASIEST THING IN THE WORLD FOR THEM TO SUBSTITUTE ‘THE HAIR OF A NEGRO WHO HAD HAIR LIKE WILLIE BROWN. Willie Brown was taken in the infamous Phila- delphia “cold storage” and the police “worked out” on him 36 hours. He was not given food water, rest, or sleep. He was beaten mer In Ph™adelphia it is the custom of the police to make their victims extend their hands above their heads. As son as they put them down, the police beat them mercilessly with blackjacks. Willie Brown was forced to sign four confes~ sions, all written in police terminology, pages and | pages long whieh took 40 minutes to read. Now by rd Sagat apa Rll fhe bid PW ua woh Willie Brown, | framed up on a charge of murdering little | te, writing, yes, or even dictating, such a sion, THERE IS BUT ONE CONCLUSION: THE CONFESSIONS WERE FORCED FROM WILLIE BROWN. The police at the trial stated “innocently.” Why is it that the police refused to allow the defense attorneys to see the confessions before the trial? The answer is obvious-THE CON- FESSIONS WERE FALSE AND THE POLICE WERE AFRAID OF EXPOSURE. The legal defense was “handled’ by Raymond Pace Alexander, a Republican politician, who claimed the case was a “legal” proposition and not a class case. Mr. Alexander pretends not to see that the Philadelphia ruling class is deadly afraid of the growing unity of the white and Negro workers this city. Mr. Alexander, who is a lawyer for the scab-herding P. R. T. Co., is not interested in fighting the case on a class basis. He knows as well as the class conscious workers do that the on for the Willie Brown frame-up is not only because of the inability of the police to find the real murder but because the growing unity of the unemployed white and Negro workers is forcing concessions from the boss class of Phila- delphia, and the bosses are trying to intimidate the Negro workers through a legal lynching pro- gram from organizing with the white and Negro workers to fight for the right to live. ‘The Willie Brown Case is not the case of a boy being tried for murder but it is the case of unemployed Negro boy being framed on a mur- der and the case being utilized to create lynch spirit against the Negro workers. It is a case being used to divide the white and Negro workers and thus IT IS AN ATTACK UPON THE\EN- TIRE WORKING-CLASS. ‘The working-class of Philadelphia was too slow to enter into the ¢: ‘Their attitude was this at first: “We will wait and see what turns up. We will see whether or not he is really guilty.” ‘They did not realize that this case was an attack upon the entire working-class, Even after the militant section of the working-class entered the case there was no serious atempt to mobilize the membership of the various left-wing organiza~ tions. Even today, many, many left-wing workers are against the defense of Willie Brown claiming that it is not a class case. These comrades are playing into the hands of the bosses, for this is exactly the theory of Raymond Pace Alex- ander and the Negro reformists, the assistant hangmen of the bosses, who are responsible for Willie Brown being sentenced to the chair, that this case is purely a “legal” one. ‘The Willie Brown case is being utilized by the bosses to create terror against the working-class and it wag the preparatory step in a campaign of terror more vicious than the Philadelphia workers have ever faced in the past. ‘The Wilie Brown case is only the Philadelphia link in the nationwide campaign of terror against the Negro masses and the working-clas as a whole. Scottsboro, Crphan Jones, Tom Mooney, Roth and Adams, Edith Berkman, Philadelphia victims of police terror (ineluding Willie Brown) are only the outstanding cases of boss oppression. ‘The boss class is now, more than ever the working-class on a thousand different fronts, end in a hundred ways. In Scottsboro the frame-up was a clumsy one; it fooled nobody— n ie: strikes in Cuba and to organize sup- | BY collecting signatures to put the Party on the ballot in the coming elections and com- ing in contact with thousands of workers, I closely éxamined their reaction to the Commun- ist Party, and also learned their disagreement or their non-understanding of our policy. I will point out a few shortcomings and mis- takes made by our comrades. When doing this Work some comrades go out merely for the sake of obtaining a large sum of signatures. To prove this I will give con- crete examples of how some comrades approach workers: “We are collecting signatures of citizens to place OUR candidates on the balloti n the com- ing election,” etc. Then if the workers still resist, the comrade continues: “Why not give us a chance? We are new yet, and the more candidates we will have the more fun we will have during election time. Come on, be a sport,” etc. After this line of talk, many workers without even reading the petition or without hearing a word of Communism or class struggle, signs the petition. ‘There are even more dangerous things where our Party is discredited. After the above men- tioned talk, the worker sits down to sign the petition, Then he notices the words Commun- ist Party on the petition. He then jumps up and exclaims, “You did not tell me that this is for the Communist Party.” After this in- cident, the comrade tries to explain, but of course the worker will not listen to him any more and he feels that he was fooled by a Com- munist. While going out one night I found that the territory given to me was covered by another committee the night before. This occurrence is not an accident, but it is a lack of cooper- ation between the Section Election Campaign manager and the comrades. In this case a com- rade was sent out to cover one side of a block, she did not collect any signatures in her ter- ritory, therefore, she went over to the other side of the block to cover that too. After coming back to the Section, she did not report it, and @ committee was sent to cover the same block. Coming to the same block, this is what TI found: Proper Approach Brings Results After the proper approach, the worker said, ‘They carried through a more or less subtle frame-up, easy to be seen through if one knows the facts, which fooled a great number of the people. What are the lessons we must draw and what are the immediate tasks of the working-class led by the International Labor Defense—this is a vital question. First we must mobilize our own left-wing members behind this case. If we cannot do this we cannot expect to mobilize the masses. Secondly ‘we must expose, not only by the issuance of a few thousand leaflets but by a systematic cam- paign, Raymond Pace Alexander, and the whole crew of Negro and white reformists, whose legal lynching role the workers must be shown. (The I. L. D. committed the grave error of advertising as a speaker at a Tom Mooney-Willie Brown meetings, Raymond Pace Alexander, lawyer of ‘Willie Brown, This created the illusion in the minds of the workers that we supported the refarmists “Legal” (legal lynching policies of Alexander.) We must expose the police frame-up methods connecting this case up with the gen- eral campaign of boss terror in this country against the-Negro masses especially and also the white workers. We must broaden out our ac- tivities so as to enlighten the workers. We must mobilize thousands of workers around this case. Point out it is a class case of the utmost im- portance and connect it up especially with the Toward Revolutionary Mass Work ( pedis cm ips PTION RATES: Bronx, New York City. {evarywhore:, Ope year, 96; siz months, $2; two months, $1) excepting Boroughs Foreign: one year, $8; six months, $4.5 ——= My Experiences J. WARD (New York) “I am not interested, because you people are only for Soviet Russia.” After explaining to him the conditions of the workers in the U.S.A. and linking it up with the war danger and the life of the workers in the U.S.S.R., and by ex- plaining the election program of the Commun- ist party and showing him that the Commun- ist Party is the only Party that fights for Un- employment Insurance, he signed and promised to vote Communist. In this formerly covered teritory I found that the comrade previously did not approach the workers in the proper manner. She did not link up the war danger with the every day struggle of the workers in the U.S.A. In this same territory I collected 8 signatures, thus proving that with the proper approach we can get the workers to sign the petition and vote for the Communist Party. Another night I came across an unemployed worker who signed the petition and to whom I rive the proposed election campaign program, and told him to read it over and hope that he will vote for the Communist Party in the com- ing election. He said, “Do you think this pro- gram will convince me?” I replied, “I think so.” If you want me too I will come back and have a discussion with you.” When going back to the worker, I found him reading the “Daily Worker.” I learned that the worker after reading our Platform did not understand it. He said, “Your Party in its platform and its organ shows the conditions of the workers in the U.S.A. It then goes on to knock the other capitalist parties and the Socialist party, stating that they are a bunch of grafters and fakers. We know this fight is going on in all the parties, They all promise everything until they are elected. What is the guarantee that after your Party is elected they will not act the same way?” After having a discussion for an hour, I finally convinced him that the Communist Party is a Party of the workers, and after visiting him a few more times, I will try to get him to join the Communist Party. Suggestion for the Election Campaign Pro- gram: As far as the election platform is concerned. It is not clear enough for the workers to un- derstand. If we do want the workers to vote for our candidates, we have to give out a pro- gram in a very simple language and explain to the workers what we mean by a Party of the workers and for the workers. By explaining in the platform that if the Communist Can- didate is elected, he will not change our pro- Unemployment Insur- ance as a-Slogan of Action HE demand for unemployment insurance must be put forward not merely as a propaganda slogan, as has been the case until now, especially in the FIGHT AGAINST HUNGER program (Daily Worker, August 29, 1932), but as one of the central slogans of action. The struggle for social insurance, and especially unemployment insurance at the present time, has the greatest revolutionary significance, and all tendencies to push it into the background should be deceisively com~- batted. In the marches and demonstratons to take place on the opening of Congress, December 7, this demand for unemployment insurance at full wages at the expense of the employers and the government and to be ad- ministered by the workers should receive the chief emphasis as the most effective instru- ment for exposing the charity proposals of the bourgeoisie and the fake insurance pro- posals of the reformists and “progressives.” (From the resolution of the C. C., en Un- employment printed in full in the pamphlet “Towards Revolutionary Mass Work.”) DISCUSSION OF THE 14TH PLENUM in Mass Work gram, but will fight inside of Congréss and the masses will have to support him from the out- side, and that only by this united struggle will we be able to win our demands. Only through issuing such simple literature, . will. the. Com-~. munist Party be able “to ‘mobilize’ millions of workers to carry on a united struggle—Negro and white—against the growing terror of the Tuling class and for the defense of the Chinese workers and for defense of the Soviet Union. Renegades Give Aid toLang,Social Fascist Strike-breaker 'E counter-reyolutionary sheet of the Love- stone renegade outfit of May 2Ist contains a fulsome eulogy of John T. Lang, who was re- moved as premier of New South Wales, Austra- lia, After stating the fact that Lang was re- moyed by the British-appointed state governor, Sir Phillip Game, the Lovestone rag goes on to explain: “The dismissal of the Labor Premier took place on the pretext of a technically uncon- stitutional act on the part of Lang in connec- tion with the recent conflict over finances. The actual reason, of course, is the resistance Lang has been making to the plans of the Australian bourgeoisie té shift the burdens of the crisis more and more on to the shoulders of the working masses of the country.” A more complete distortion of the role of Lang would be hard to imagine. Far from op- posing the efforts of the Australian bourgeoisie to shift the crisis burdens upon the masses, that same Lang has been one of the most valiant servants of Australian capitalism in carrying out its policy against the masses. Lang’s police have beaten, shot, gassed, jailed anq tortured workers from the day he took of- fice, When he became premier there was not one worker in prison for anti-working-class activi- ties in New South Wales. In less than two months there were more than fifty serving long terms—and all for fighting against hunger in unemployment demonstrations to try to force Lang to carry out some of his lying promises made before election. His first legislative act was to impose a shill- ing in the pound tax upon wages (a 5 per cent wage-cut). Lang is a 100 per cent defender of Australian capitalism, which, in pursuit of its own inde- pendent policy, plays off British imperialism against American imperialism. But, at the same time, Lang, like all social fascists, supports the conspiracies of the biggest imperialist powers against the Soviet Union. The official organ of the Lang forces, the “Labo~ Daily,” published in Sydney, is worse than the —rlin “Vorwearts” in slandering the Soviet Union. To claim that Lang was dismissed because of his fight in behalf of the working masses is to deliberately falsify events in Australia. Lang's dismissal was conveniently brought about in an effort to further mislead and be- tray the masses in the cities and on the -land (the gigahtic sheep stations, etc.) who are breaking away from the labor party (social- fascist) and from the “United Australian” tory outfit and moving toward mass struggle against hunger and imperialist war conspiracies. Lang’s dismissal is part of the adroit dema- gogy of the gang of left-social-fascists in New South Wales in preparation for the state elec- tions which are being held in a few days. Praise of that assassin of workers by the Love- stone gang only indicates the depth of depravity eigen me nes ate | sunk. ‘To proiso Leng te praising Poisoning the Masses By HYMAN BARUFKIN POWER ETHICS, by Jack Levin, 174 pp., Alfre® A. Knopf, 62. rae Bue | F the contention, constantly made by the Com- faunists, that capitalism poisons the minds of the masses from the cradle to the grave, needed. any proof, it is offered in abundance in Levin's book on power. Based on the 26-yolume record of the Federal Trade Commission, which has been at work for over three years investigating the propaganda activities of the combined utility trusts, the con~ demnation against their nefarious schemes comes out of the mouths of their own agents and directors. In their testimony before the eom- mission they admitted: ‘That all electric light companies throughout the country are combined in the National Hlee- tric Light Association; gas supplying companies, in the American Gas Association; street railway companies, in the American Street Railway As- sociation; and that all these central bodies are in turn combined in the National Utility Associa tion, The National Utility Association operates a vast publicity bureau which covers every village, town, city and state in the country. To “educate” the public and “mold opinion” this bureau and its subsidiaries openly bribe or employ under vari- ous guises and pretexts, school teachers and principals, professors, heads of colleges and uni- versities and influential members in all civic, political, economic, socal, industrial and finan- cial organizations in this country. The regular propaganda consists partly of paid full-page advertisements in newspapers and magazines, for which the trusts have the privi- lege of writing articles. The articles are signed by famous educators, scientists, industrialists, politicians and financiers. Besides thousands of news stories are prepared and editorials written for the capitalist press and for the corrupt labor press. “Out of 300 newspapers n the Carolinas there is only one that is unfriendly to the utility com- mittee,” testified Samuel E. Boney, the trusts’ publicity director for that region. And George F. Oxley, general publicity director for the Na- tional Electric Light Association, admitted: “There are more newspapers in the country using the material (prepared by the power trust pub- licity bureau) than there are newspapers that are not.” In addition, the publicity bureaus of the trusts prepare sermons for preachers, and tens of thou- sands of speeches which are delivered by the various prominent men and women in their em- ploy. se are later reprinted in the capital- ist and A. F. of L. press. The trusts also write textbooks for schools from the sixth grade up to the universities, and they censor textbooks written by others, through bribing authors and publishers. All this is supplemented by ‘the printing and distributing of books and pamphlets. To give an idea of this activity, Levin says: “Four private utility publications on municipal ownership. and Muscle Shoals were distributed in quantities of 6,116,125 each. The entire list of publications in this instance total over 23,- 000,000 pieces of literature.” The total cost of all this, which Levin fails to give (the National Electric Light Association alone spends about $1,500,000 a year), is charged to “operating expenses,” and the masses pay the cost in their monthly electric bills. Citing this damning record against the utility trust, Levin draws the most naive conclusions, typical of a bourgeois writer. Another bad fea~ ture of the book is that its price is $2. By com- parison with the Labor Fact Book, which Inter- natonal Publishers have made available for 85 cents, a book like Power Ethics should cost con- siderably less than $1. Nevertheless, workers’ libraries should add this book to their stock of reading matter. For work- ers can usg the material to good advantage in showing the masses how capitalism poisons their minds from early childhood. Such an exposure should arouse workers not only to fight the ex- tortionate electric rates of the power corpora- tions, but to organize to overthrow the whole system that makes possible the existence of a private power octopus. “Not a Mass Meeting) . During the Election Campaign Without Communists” THROUGHOUT the Election Campaign every staiement and every proposal of the enemy parties must be quickly answered -in the Party Press and in millions of leaflets. Special care must be taken to guard against and to answer surprise statements, such as forged documents, “bomb plots,” etc. “Not a mass meeting during the election campaign without Communists’—must be our slogan; at all mass meetings arranged by the bour- geois parties the Communists should appear, expose the position of the enemies and make clear the position of the Party—distribute their literature; debates should be organized with the enemy candidates in order to ex- pose their demagogy and to reach the work- ers under their influence with the demands and program of the Communist Party. The Communist Party itself should organize thou- sands of meetings—great, city-wide meetings as heretofore, neighborhood meetings, and especially small meetings in the workers’ homes where our program should be explained and the workers drawn into active participa- tion in our election campaign. Leaflets of many kinds, posters, dealing with the pro- posals of the enemy parties, with the condi- tions of the werkers in tho ve with our demands, eic., si shoud Jarger quantities than ever reco; to be sold at the lowest prices, (From the 14th Plenum resolution printed in full in the pamphlet “Towards Revolution- ‘ery Mass Work.) > -