The Daily Worker Newspaper, August 11, 1932, Page 4

wars HS sri ABR at ee nf DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, THURSDAY, AUGUST 11 » 1932 Daily, Worker Published by the Comprodaily Publishing Co., Inc., dally excxept Sunday, at 50 E. 13th Bt., New York City, N. ¥. Telephone ALgonquin 4-7956. Cable “DAIWORK.” || | yAddress and mall checks to the Daily Worker, 50 E. 18th St, New York, N. ¥. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: By mail, everywhere: One year, $6; six months, $3 Borough of Manhattan and Bronx, New York City six_months, $4.50. The Struggle for Irish Independence * British press reports that Prime Minister MacDonald, former leader of the Second “Socialist” International, is “resting’ ‘in Ireland. It is obvious that Mac Donald’s mission in Ireland is chiefly of a political character. Mac Donald will undoubtedly try to resume the negotiations between the two governments over this burning question of land annuities, which is rendered more pressing by De Valera’s refusal to swear allegiance to the British Crown, and his demand that Northern Ireland be united to Southern Ireland under the “Irish Free State.” But the Irish workers and peasants can expect no solution of their problems from the resumption of these negotiations. These negotiations will not further in the least their fight for national and social emanci- pation from the slavery imposed upon them by British imperialism and its allies, the British bankers and capitalists. | De. Valera has thus far refused to pay the land annuities to which England is “entitled” in virtue of a treaty which “was forced upon Ireland at the point of the British bayonets and only after the country had been ravaged by British troops.” But the government of De Valera is contin g to collect from the impoverished small farmers these hid- eous land annuities and intends to use them to ease its financial posi- tion and to lighten the burden of taxation on the Trish bourgeoisie whose perspective of industrial development is seriously endangered by the severe economic crisis. De Vaiera’s refusal to swear allegiance to the British Crown is in reality only a gesture intended to mislead the masses of Irish toilers | who are lulled into believing that the government of De Valera really | fights for the independence of Ireland. The “Irish Press,” De valera’s | own paper stated that the government’s refusal to swear allegiance is designed to “remove a cause of strife” which means that De Valera is attempting to dampen the aspirations of the masses of toilers for national and social emancipation. But the British government will not relinquish her “right” to the land annuities and to Irish allegiance. Ireland occupies a very important ezical position for England. Lloyd George, with what a bourgeois riter characterizes as the “indiscretion of an opposition leader,” said quite frankiy: “If (during the last war) the coast of Ireland has been in the hands of an independent sovereign state which might have been friendly or t have been hostile, we might have been done in the struggle, and we t going to take that risk in the future.” De Valera cannot be counted upon to fight for an independent and united Ireland under the Irish Free State. That is shown by his ad- vocacy of “some form of asscciation with the British Commonwealth in some circumstances and fc: some reasons, and the recognition of the King as head of the =ssociation.” The Irish masses can achieve a free Ireland and a Workers’ and Peasants’ Republic only (~-ough the leadership of a mass Communist Party allied with the international proletariat and the national revolu- tionary struggles in the colonies. The Revolutionary Workers Groups which are leading the toilérs in the city and country and are fighting against the illusions being spread by the De Valera government must be given support by the workers in the United States, American imperialism in the interest of its struggle against its British rival is trying to pose as being a friend of Irish independence. But American imperialism which crushes Nicaragua and holds under its | iron heel the Latin American peoples, Philippines, Porto Rico, Haiti, etc., is an enemy of the freedom of the colonial oppressed peoples. The Communist Party organizations in the United States must every- where support the struggle of the Irish people against British imperialism and its Irish allies. It must expose ‘the pretension of friendship of ‘American imperialism for the Irish liberation struggle. It must organ- ize the Irish workers and petty bourgeois organizations to give full back- ing to a real revolutionary struggle for Irish emancipation. It must aim to draw the Irish workers in the United States closer to the Communist Part It must protest the brutal policy of oppression pursued by British impeialism against the Irish masses. two months, $1; Foreign: one ys excepting A The Cox Movement and the Musteites | ATHER COX’S Jobless Party will hold its national convention in St Louis on August 17th. The call for this convention, where it is ex- pected Cox will be put forward as presidential candidate, shows that the movement is aimed at mobilizing and organizing large masses of workers | in order to steer them away from a real mass struggle against the cap- italist offensive. Its draft program is the program of a petty bourgeois reactionary movement, striving to create for itself a mass base among the workers by the use of demagogy. It especially plays on the needs of the masses of starving unemployed workers, Not only in its program, but in its forms of organization ft is trying | to pattern the movement after the fascist parties of Mussolini and Hitler. The use of the Blue Shirts by Father Cox for attacking striking workers reveals the reactionary nature of the movement and shows that it is at- tempting to follow in the footsteps of the bloody European fascists, The menace of the Cox movement is to be seen not only in its ability to mislead many honest workers with its sham radical phraseology, but by its activities among the unemployed. In and about Pittsburgh, where the movement received its start, Cox and his clique are receiving the backing of a section of big capital with the object of crushing the revo- lutionary trade union movement and suppressing any revolutionary move- ment which would endanger the war preparations of the master class. ‘The Cox movement. must be fought by all revolutionary workers as a menace to the immediate fight against the capitalist offensive and as an auxilliary fascist force to crush working class activities. The Socialist Party and its ally the Musteites, encouraged the Cox Movement from its very inception. In the February issue of Labor Age the Musteite group even endorsed the Cox march on Washington which ‘was designed to wipe out the influence of the hunger march organized by the Unemployed Councils. The Cox march was eulogized by the Musteites @s a “sincere and militant” movement. The Socialist Party and the Musteites even invited Father Cox to speak at a meeting in Philadel- phia called in support of the LaFollette-Costigan unemployment bill. Since then the Cox movement has exposed its face more openly, but the socialists and Musteites have not fought against it and the lone criticism of the Cox movement that has just appeared in the Musteite organ, The Labor Age, still praises the Cox movement as being progres- sive. It can find fault only because of his alliance with Coin Harvey. Muste says in the August “Labor Age”: “Father Cox’s movement once seemed a promising though confused movement of the unemployed but it has become more and more a movement of Father Cox rather than the unemployed, less and less promising ,more and more confusing. When he allies himself with Coin Harvey, people are bound to conclude that he is not straight forward or else hopelessly unrealistic.” The Musteites try to create the impression that Cox is leading a genuine working class movement which is spoiled by confused aims whereas in reality it is an anti-working class movement operating with demagogic and confusing slogans. Cox and his clique are by no means people attempting to serve the working class but unable to find the correct path. They are direct enemies of the working class movement op- erating consciously to divert it from the revolutionary path. In this attitude of the Socialist Party and the Muste group, we see once again their social fascist face. Militant workers everywhere must not be mislead by the demagogy of Cox. They must fight against him and expose his organization. The exposure of the demagogy of Cox must go hand in hand with the in- tensification of the struggle for immediate relief and unemployment in- surance. By building broad mass Unemployxed Councils, the possibility of the Cox demagogy to deceive the workers will be narrowed. The election campaign must be turned into a real mass struggle for the day to day needs of the masses and in that way reduce the possibility of Cox to mislead the workers. But in order to fight successfully against Father es Ss superative to Deby againglyend defgat tbe Muste group and. the tt er -made safé-for. American “demoo~, “—and I’ve Done My Best to End-the Depression!” By BURCK What Hoover’s “New” Policy in Nicaragua Means in Action By WILLIAM SIMONS 'HE election campaign period re- sounds with “new” policies for old. Democratic candidate, Roose- velt, comes forward as the cham- pion of the under dog, the “forgot- ten man.” But the “new” policy gag is not confined merely to the election périod. Thé Hoover gov- ernment more than a year ago pro- claimed a “new”. policy on, the question of the use of American Marines in the colonies. In April, 1931, the Hoover ad- | ministration, through Secretary of State Stimson, enunciated this “new” policy toward Central Amer- ica and particularly toward Nica- ragua. “No more marines to Nica- ragua and the existing marines in Nicaragua would be withdrawn.” Heralded As Event : This “change” of policy was her- alded at the time by many Latin American papers as a treniendous event. Hoover and Stimson cry “Change.” But there is no change. In June, 1932, American Ambassa- dor Culbertson in Chile demanded. protection from the Chilean gov- ernment for American copper inines | and got it. The demand had be- hind it the threat of Yankee inva- sion. American imperialism stands ready to back up its demands with | its huge navy roaming the Pacific waters. During the mass uprising Armed Forces Enlarged; Slaughter of Peas- | ants and Workers Continue Anti-Imperialist Struggle Must Be Widened racy” by the Nicaraguan govern- ment itself, that instead of the American marines, the Nicaraguan Guardia Nacional does the dirty work, Representative W. A. Ayres of Kansas, who attacked Hoover for abandoning the Coolidge policy that “persons and property of a citizen are a part of the general domain of a nation even when abroad” by denying marine protection to Amer- ican citizens in the interior of Nicaragua, at the same time admit- ted that “IT MAKES NO PAR- TICULAR DIFFERENCE WHETH- ER WE FIGHT THE JUNGLE HOSTILES WITH AMERICAN MARINES OR WITH NICARA- GUAN NATIONAL GUARDSMEN OFFICERED BY OUR MARINE OFFICERS.” We can,go further and say that even if the National Guard were Scottsboro. Enters Swedish Strike Struggle Swedish Like American Socialists Sahotage Fight for Scottsboro Boys By J. LOUIS ENGDAHL. INDUSTRIAL centers of various kinds in Sweden helped spread | the Scottsboro protest in response in El Salvador in December, 1931 | (in Central America, mind you), American cruisers stood by, ready to crush the uprising led by the | Communist Party, if it proved suc- cessful. American imperialism built up .'s colonial empire through force and maintains it by force. Where, then, is the change of policy? True, the number of ma- rines in Nicaragua has been de- creased, but more than 1,000 still remain. But along with this has gone a corresponding growth in the National Guard, officered by American Marines. Under an agreement signed on Dec. 22, 1927, by the American Charge d’Affaires at Managua and the Nicaraguan Minister of Foreign Affairs, the National Guard was to total 1,229 officers and men at a cost of $689,132 a year. A report by Sec- retary Stimson to the Senate For- eign Relations Committee in Feb- ruary, 1931, admits that “The Guardia Nacional was increased by the Nicaraguan government until in October, 1930, it included a to- tal personnel numbering 2,459 (an increase of 100 per cent), officered by 200 marines, both commissioned and enlisted men. The annual cost of the Guardia Nacional grew to a total of $1,116,000.” American Marines are not to go into the in- terior of Nicaragua; this is left to the national guard; but the kill- ing of Nicaraguan workers and peasants continues. “Make U. S. Property Safe.” When is the complete withdrawal of marines to take place? Accord- ing to a statement by Stimson to Secretary of Navy Adams on Jan. 22, 1931, “After the Presidential elections in November, 1932,” and he advised the special training of Nicaraguan officers in order to “turn over the whole Guardia Na- cional to Nicaragua on Jan. 1, 1933.” But this turning over of the Guardia Nacional takes place if “that should then be the decision of this government.” Translated into simple language, this means that American prop- erty, investments and loans be to the tour of the Negro Mother from the United States. Interest in the Scottsboro campaign finds a basis among workers in all indus- tries. It did not matter in Sweden whether it was the great Asea Elec- trical works in Vaesteros; the tex- tile centers of Norrkoping and Bo- roes; the workers of various trades as in the nation’s capitol, Stock- holm or the seamen and harbor workers of Lervik and Soderhamm, ‘There was an equal inierest every- where. It remained for the Social-Demo- kraten, the chief organ of the So- cial-Democratic Party ,to find a basis of cleavage, to find a for- bidden ground in the working class struggle, where the Scottsboro mother, Mrs. Ada Wright, should not set foot. It discovered this for- bidden zone to be Soderhamm, cen~ ter of strike struggles. But great parts of Northern Sweden are pretty well covered with strike struggles, militantly fought against the em- ployers’ imported strike breakers, defended by the police power of the state. y Under Cloak of “No Politics” Like Vandervelde, Blum and oth- er leading social-democrats, their counterparts in Sweden insist that the Scottsboro campaign must be completely isolated from “politics.” Social-Demokraten, of Stockholm, argued that it was doing a disfavor to the Scottsboro mother and her cause to send her to speak in the Soderhamm strike zone. It would be putting thé stamp of “politics” upon her non-political cause. But the Scottsboro mother gave her an- swer by declaring that it was the workers who were carrying on the basic struggle for the release of the Scottsboro boys, and that she had found specially strong support for the Scottsboro cause among striking workers. And she insisted on going to Soderhamm. And in Soderhamm striking workers themselves, thru their own spokesmen, specially greeted the Scottsboro mother and emphatically denounced the traitor role of “Social-Demokraten.” The “pointed .out_that they, the victims of police clubs and bul- lets, could well understand the is- sue involved in the Scottsboro per secution and pledged themselves to help build the struggle until the Scottsboro boys were freed from the clutches of capitalist class jus- tice that reaches out for its vic- tims among workers’ of all races and nationalities. They under- stand clearly that it is not purely a humanitarian issue that grows out of a mistake committed by the capitalist courts that are otherwise “fair anq impartial.” After that the “Social-Demo- kraten” closed its columns to the Scottsboro campaign—the social- democrat in charge of Sweden's government - controlled radio re- fused the Scottsboro mothers the right to broadcast her appeal to the nation. Renegades Ignore Case The Kilblom right wing rene- gades (with whom the American Lovestoneites a re affiliated) who received subsidies for their press from the Ivar Kreuger treasure chests joined the social- democrats in seeking to ignore the Scottsboro campaign which re- ceived considerable publicity in Sweden, as in Norway, from the press generally, including the syn- dicalist daily newspaper published in Stockholm, The response to the Scottsboro appeal can be measured in many ways. In Norrkoping, for instance, there were greater thousands in the Scottsboro demonstration than in last May Day's demonstration, The police of Norrkoping evidently felt the undercurrent of Scottsboro pro- test since they began making ar- rests early of those distributing propaganda for the meeting and a special police stenographer was brought down from Stockholm in order to get a record of everything that was said by the speakers. In fact the Swedish police built their activities more and more after the German model. Support Red Aid Congress It may be said that the tour of the Scotisboro Negro mother in Sweden actually discovered for the Swedish workers not only the ne- cessity but the tremendous possi- bility of building a mass Red Aid Organization, 5) ~Fudhtometind officered by Nicaraguan instead of by American marines, American domination would still continue, unless overthrown by a revolution- ary movement of the masses. With- drawal of the marines would save the Unite dStates money and fur- thermore permits it to “keep face.” Whether marines will be totally withdrawn on Jan. 1, 1933, or not is not yet certain. They will prob- ably not be withdrawn. The Nic- araguan Guardia Nacional is not sufficiently reliable. American ma- rine officials of the National Guard have been killed; desertions from the Guard are frequent. The deep- ening crisis, resulting in greater mass struggles, makes it more diffi- cult to keep the lid on in Nica- Tagua, Need Systematic Campaign. It is important to demand the withdrawal of American marines to carry on a systematic campaign for this demand, but the mere with- drawal of marines can be accom- plished without any benefit to the anti-imperialist struggle in Nica- ragua, if it is replaced by a native National Guard capable of repres- sing the revolutionary movement. Demanding the withdrawal of ma- rines without demanding at the .Same time complete and_ uncondi- tional independence for Nicaragua, without support of a real anti-im- perialist movement in Nicaragua, means to fall in line with the pol- icy of coolie killing Hoover and colonial enslaver Stimson. The struggle of the Army of Lib- eration should be supported by anti-imperialists everywhere, but ousting of the imperialists from Nicaragua, confiscating their banks, Fantations and other enterprises will be carried through by the masses of Nicaraguan workers, peasants, students and intellectu- als under the leadership of the work+ ing class. The development of such an anti-imperialist | movement should ‘be aided in every way by revolutionary workers, by @il anti- imperialists, particularly 'n the United States. ‘The Anti-Imperialist League of the United States has carried on some propaganda on behalf of the struggle of Sandino’s Army of Lib- eration, but this campaign a few years ago was only a campaign to send medical supplies to Sandino’s Army, and not a mass campaign in support of Sandino’s struggle. Strengthen Anti-Imperialist League. An active campaign should be developed in support of the Army of Liberation, and for the develop- ment of a real anti-imperialist movement of workers and peasants. A nation-wide campaign should be carried on in the United States for the withdrawal of American ma- rines from Nicaragua and Haiti as well. The formation of a branch of the Anti-Imperialist League in every important city in the United States will make it possible to carry on an effective campaign, If The District Committees of the Communist Party were alive to their résponsibility to help the col- onial struggles, a great deal could be done. But, as yet, they are not alive to this. They do almost noth- ing about colonial questions. It is elso necessary to draw in for sup- port to the colonial struggle wider elements of workers. farmers, stu- dents and intellectuals. This should and can be done through the strengthening of the existing branches of the Anti-Imperialist League and through the organiza- tion of new branches, beginning fsb. with the district headd{iarter-cities,. IRED PODOLSK The Former Singer Sewing Machine Plant Near Moscow By MYRA PAGE Our Correspondent in the Soviet Union. installment scribed the proceedings at a Trade | (Yesterday's dec- | Union Election mecting of the | Red Pedolsk workers. A full report | was given to the workers of the | accomplishments and shortcomings in production, and today we con- tinue with this Union Election meeting.) © pis ee PART VI. Questions written on countless | slips of paper are passed forward to the platform, carefully collected and tyed, for the factory commit- tee to read and answer. A com- mittee member, from the depart- ment of technical propaganda and workers’ suggestions, challenges, “Do you know that damages and waste in the factory last year amounted to nearly two million | rubles? With this sum, we could | build six houses. And since the November ‘holidays, absences from | work have increased. Is this the way to fulfill our program? Also our union ;mass work needs to be strengthened. We have about sev. en hundred taking part in our club’s cultural activities. That means many departments have only | a few who join in this work.” So criticisms and demands come, hour after hour. The conference continues another evening in or- der that all who want to take part can do so, There are resolutions giving the union’s program for the coming year, and elections of the factory committee, consisting of forty-nine men and women work- ers, eight of whom are freed for their term of office from work at the machine. In Bulkoy's-place is elected a fitter, Peter Sergueff. After a hearty banquet in the new public dining room, all delegates return to the club auditorium to see a play presented by a Moscow : troupe, “Armoured Train.” On the way home we two Amer- | icans agree, that this has been a | real experience in working class { democracy. Certainly far differ- ent from any A. F. of L. anion meeting or convention we'd ever taken part in! In them the fakers had always put the lid on discus- sion, railroaded through their slate, and tried to browbeat or throw out any who dared criticize or bring forward good programs, One of the slogans that ran along the platform had read, “Our Trade Unions are Training Schools in Communism, Yes, where the mass- es can learn through their organ- ized daily experience and collec- A view in the new Podolsk (U. S tive discussions and check-up, how to master all problems of produc- tion and management, promote general welfare, and to live and work by the maxim, “One for all, and all for one.” ONCE SINGER PRODUCTS, NOW SOVIET-MADE We have seen how Soviet workers organized production and workers’ management in the former Singer works, situated at Podolsk, a small industrial city near Mescow. What results have they been able to ob- tain? Has production increased or fallen off? Has quality improved or gone backwards? In other words, is workers’ control as tech- nically efficient as capitalist con- trol? These questions taxe us back to the Red Director's office. Nicholas Varonin, originally a Leningrad machine driller, now responsible manager of this plant, is ready for us—charts, record books and pages of neat figures laid out around him. A WORKER DIRECTOR Incidentally, Varonin: is typical of the new corps of directors and specialists which the working class is developing from its own ranks, Immediately after the revolution, when the old engineers\and tech- nicians were creating havoc with their sabotage, the workers in his Leningrad pipe factory came to- gether to choose from among themselves. men to replace the wreckers, Varonin was one of them. “Here,” his fellows said, “you're literate and not so bad at figures.” So they put him at technical work, How he sweated over his books! What blunders they all i SINGER PRODUCTION FAR SURPASSED BY SOVIET For several hours Varonin dis- cus with us production problems, vances, set-backs, and prospects th that sure p, level-headéd- ness and frank self-criticism that one soon learns are common traits of Russian Bolsheviks. Here there is space to give only the outstande ing landmarks of the long and siill- continuing uphill struggle of the Podolsk workers to develop their plant and master technique. As soon as the workers took over the plant, in 1917, they found shem- selves faced with tremendous diffi- culties. Singer had followed a clever policy of importing over two- thirds of the small parts to the machine, such as needles, shuttles and bobbins, so that only the cas ing of big parts and general asse) | bling had been done at Podolsk, This had kept the plant dependent en American imports, and meant the development of a few Russian Furthermore, carefully developed a ¢ machine, and the necessary machine-producing equip- me@, along patterns kept secret by him; and when his man Dixon had beat his hasty retreat from Podelek at the outbreak of the revolution, he had not forgotten to take the blueprints with him. Ifost of the older engineers and aspartment managers who could have. helped were openly hestile to the workers’ power. “Go ahead,” they sneered, “See what a mess you can make of it.” So the workers had to start al- most from scratch—without blue- prints, small parts, necessary equip- away at the front, busy driving out skilled workers, and most of these ment or raw material, with few the enemy. In the first years, pro- duction slumped almost to zero, machines rusted, grew’ cobwebs. Only part of the plant was used to preduce small tools and other necessary implements. Then, the Soviet. power consolidated,’ the workers could return, laying aside their guns and tackling production problems witih the same dogged determination that they chased out the Whites. Here the results: By 1928 the peak of production under Singer— 409,585 foot-power sewing machines —had been surpassed, every year fewer parts being imported, more being produced on Soviet soil, until this year the factory is ablé to de- clare its complete independence of imports. Meanwhile hours of labor have been reduced from the ten and eleven-hour day under Singer to eight, and then seven, with one .S. R.) foundry, one of the five best equipped in the world, A shock brigade at work on the new conveyors. day rest in every five, working forces increased from 4,000 to 11,000, wages raised by four times, and a complete system of social insurance cogering old age and illness intro= duced, The plant has been ex- panded and old buildings re- equipped until there is only one structure which remains the same size as it was in Singer's time. Be- ginning in 1930, the Podolsk work ers set out to do what Singer had never undertaken—produce indus- trial sewing machines, to equip clothing - factories. And while the Podolski plant has been expanding, what has been happening in the Singer plants in America? The Daily Worker asks that workers send in letters giving information on these plants, and the workers’ conditions, From. a former Singer employee now in the Soviet Union, we hear that the Elizabeth, N. J., plant was reducing its production radically for the last three years, laying off workers last summer and fall at the rate of 200 a week, until about 3,000 were left, and these were getting only 2 or 3 days work a wesk. The un- employed Singer workers and their families were left .without any relief whatever, Meanwhile, inside the plant, the speed-up increases, and one wage cut follows another, until in many departments earn- ings are as low as 80 cents an hour. Men with families to support: are bringing home pay envelopes of $6, $8 and $12. Elizabeth and Podolsk — two worlds. The one, of capitalist rule and ruin; the other, where workers rule and are building a socialist society. Yet the time is not far off when the two worids will be= come one—when American workers _also will put an end to the rule i