The Daily Worker Newspaper, August 29, 1932, Page 4

DALLY WOKKER, NEW YORK, MONDAY, AUGUST 29, 1932 ie rker. Party US.A daily exexept Sunday, at 50 E. 4-7956, Cable “DATWORK.” 13th St., New York, N. ¥. shed by the Comprodaily Publishing New York City, N. ¥. Telephone ALgon and mail checks to the Daily Worker, 50 E. SUBSCRIPTION By mall everywhere: One year, $6; six. months, $3; two months, $1; excepting Borough of! Manhattan and’ Bronx,,New: York’ City. Foreign: one year,’ $85 six months, $4.50. The New Attack on the Railroad Workers RATES: DECEN Y the raidroad interests announced that they will MY cut es again. Last year an agreement was reached a ds and the officials « he that there hould be a cut of 10 per cent to last for one yea The mem- bershi “assured lers 2 old wages red on They were also oh top of all tk they will not only r cent but intimate as 20 or even 25 per cut, is tion in the railroad ustry, the renewed attacks on the living standards of the railroad workers, shows ankruptey and ruinous effect of the policy of coopera- between the railroad lords and the bi ucratic officials ipon the standards. It shows that not only the semi-skilled and unskilled wo s (who have always been betrayed by the reformist trade union leaders) are the losers in this boss-worker partnership, but the hitherto more privi workers’ leged section of the workers as well. A large section of railroad workers who occupied aprivi- leged position are now faced with unemployment and low In the past these privileged workers were content to follow the policy of the bosses and their leaders in not wages. organizing the rest of the railroad workers, who even in the days « r ’ lived on starvation w . They made no efforts to unite with the Negro railroad workers. Now every railroad worker can see that the policy of cl peace with the bosses is dividing the ranks of the railroad workers and serves only the interests of the employers and their a s, the high-salaried railroad union officials. The railroad workers can now see that reliance upon negotiations of their officials, as was the case six months will bring only continued attacks. The game of the offi- ials is quite clear. They will pretend to be against the new wage cut, just as they did last year. But they will do every- hing possible to demoralize the workers and to defeat them. The last time they betrayed the workers through direct negotiations. Now this method will be a little more difficult. Sut they have planned for such emergencies. They have voted for and brought into existence the Watson-Parker Law, which will now be used against the workers. This law, which calls for compulsory arbitration, will give the officials every opportunity to pretend to be against the wage cut. The bosses, in order to rebuild their prestige, will even assist them. They will demand a 25 per cent cut. The officials will then claim victory in bring about a cut of perhaps 10, 15 or 20 per cent, which is in reality what the bosses hope to accomplish at this time. The victory the railroad workers ; want is not only to defeat the new wage cut but to restore = the old 1931 scale. This can be achieved only through a militant mass fight of the railroad workers. Already there are steps being taken to organize the fight. The “Chicago Unity Committee,” the militant railroad workers committee, is organizing the fight against the wage attacks. It has already called a conference at which a pro- gram of action has been mapped out. This includes: 1.—To vote down the new wage cut in all lodges and demand the enforcement of the present agreement to re- store the 1931 wage scale on February Ist. 2.—To place the local lodges on record demanding a rank and file referendum vote on all future agreements covering wages and working conditions, 3.—To go on record against arbitratior. (Watson- Parker Law) and demand direct ‘negotiation by represen- tatives elected by the workers with the management. 4.—To take steps through the organization of unity committees in all local lodges, yards, shops, uniting the unorganized Negro workers, etc., in joint action against the wage cut. At the same time to carry on the fight for relief to the unemployed and against layoffs. ; The railroad workers of the country, by rallying behind this program, can defeat the new attacks. This fight re- J quires that all workers should rally in support of the railroad workers. This requires especially that the revolutionary trade unions, the left wing oppositions in all the A. F. of L. unions, the Trade Union Unity Councils in the various cities shuld come to the support ofthe railroad workers in organ- izing this struggle. The Communist Party and its central organ, the Daily Worker, will give every possible leadership and support to , tailroad labor in this fight, go, . Six New Lenin Pamphlets On the Russian Revolution ‘HE rapid development of the IN The Threatening Ca‘ Russian Revolution of 1917 from | ele How to Fight 1 cma he ‘overthrow of tsardom in Feb- the only way out of economic ruin, wary to the seizure of power by | starvation and chaos resulting he working class in November are | from the rule of the Kerensky gov- he ‘subject of the six pamphlets | ernment and its Menshevik and fh the Little Lenin library now Socialist Revolution supporters, eing prepared by International | The problem of seizing power and jublishers in plenty of time for | maintaining it are discussed in he 15th Anniversary of the Bol- | Will the Bolsheviks Retain State Yevik Revolution. Power? The task of actually or- Letters From Afar, Volume 8 in | ganizing the insurrection of Noy- he Library and the first of the | ember which resulted in the suc- ew pamphlets, contains the let- | cessful Bolshevik Revolution is dis- ws written by Lenin while still cussed by Lenin in On the Eve of 1 Switzerland, on the meaning of | October, a collection of articles and te February Revolution. The Tasks | letters written at the beginning of ! the Proletariat in Our Revolu- October, just a few days before bn lays down the role of the | the insurrection took place, prking class in the further dev- These pamphlets vividly trace lent of the Revolution to a | the development and maturing of tarian revolution. The April | the Revolution and discuss many ice, Which contains Lenin's | problems of greatest importance to hes at this All-Russian Con- | the revolutionary movement in this of the Bolshevik Party, | country. They are all priced at tarly formulates’ the task of | 15 and 20 cents and should re- erthrowing capitalism in Russia | ceive the widest distribution in Bute —" of power by the | connection with the 15th Anniver- cl gexy of the October Revolution, ~ - eee | Mr. } get along very nicely with it. | | WHO IS ROOSEVELT? | William Z. Foster, Communist Candidate for President, Unmasks Wall St. Nominee in Columbus, O. Speech OMRADES and Fellow Workers! Today Mr. Roosevelt, the standard bearer of the Demo- cratic Party for president of the United States, spoke in Columbus. I am going to deal espe- cially with his party at this time. I listened to Mr. Roosevelt's speech: he presents himself literally as a saviour of the country. But let us see what he really has to offer the workers and poor farmers of the United States in this period of unparralled crises and mass starva- tion, BOSS PARTY PLATFOR IDENTICAL First of all, let me say that the policy of Roosevelt's party identical in all essen- tials with that of the Republican Party. The platform of the Republican Party could be adopted by the Democratic Party and they could Or the candidate of the Democratic Party could run on the Re- publican Party ticket; Mr. Hoover could be a member of Mr. Roosevelt's cabinet or vice-versa. ‘These men are representatives of the big cap- italists of this country and both of them serve the capitalist class, The Democratic Party is controlled by such big organizations as the Gen- eral Motors, headed by Raskob, an affiliate of Morgan and Company, and the Republican Par- ty is controlled by similar bankers and big cap- italists and the speech that we listened to here | in Columbus from Mr. Roosevelt was a bid to the capitalists of this country, especially to put the Democratic Party in power because it can serve the capitalists.of this country better than DEMOCRATIC ECHR Hh dw the Republican Party has done. Now, comrades, the Democratic Party: a few words about its role, its tasks in this election, The Democratic Party appears as an opposition party, but its opposition consists in words only. It is a party that serves, or that the capitalists hope will serve to catch the discontented masses, those who are disillusioned with the Hoover regime, those who are looking for some relief and the Democratic Party, with its demagogy, radical phrases and vague promises to the work- ers and poor farmers is exactly designed to ac- complish this task. Mr, Roosevelt appears with @ veneer of liberalism, a veneer of radicalism, but how thin that is has been fully exposed in many instances. ROOSEVELT AND TAMMANY Take the case of Mayor Walker and the other Tammany grafters in New York. What is his attitude towards this situation. Well, he has done nothing to expose the monumental cor- ruption in New York City, but on the contrary, has used this opposition to block the attempt to make a real exposure in New York. How much Mr. Roosevelt is a radical, a progressive, @ liberal, is indicated by the fact that he said recently in one of his speeches that in the pre- sent election campaign he will prove to the people of this country that Mr. Hoover is a radical. Can you imagine such a thing? Mr. Roosevelt is nothing more nor less than a light- ening rod for capitalism to protect it from danger. What does he offer in the present elec- tion? He offers to the workers and poor farm- ers and the starving masses of this country, the opportunity of jumping out of the Hoover fry- ing pan into the Roosevelt fire. Comrades, there is one party in the United States, and one alone, that represents the interests of the working class and that is the Communist Party. (Applause) Let me point out how similar the policies of Mr. Roosevelt and Mr. Hoover aré. On the question of the tariff: Mr. Roosevelt today made a lot of remarks about the high tariff. But, as a matter of fact, in 1928, Al Smith running for president on the Democratic ticket, called for a high tariff policy just the same as the Re- publican Party, and the Democratic platform calls for a high tariff; and in the recent Con- gress the Democratic representatives, under the cover of levying taxes, put tariffs on higher even than the Republicans did. Identical policy on tariffs. On prohibition: For a moment it ap- peared there was a difference between the parties on this question. The Republicans dry, and the Democrats wet, but Mr. Hoover’s speech shows us even this difference is wiped out. . Again identical policy. Mr, Roosevelt today pointed cut that there was virtual bankruptcy in the country, but he simply undertook to blame that upon the Republican Party; that this in some manner was due to the mistakes and ignorance of the Republican Party. HOOVER, ROOSEVELT AND THE CRISIS This is not so. The Republican Party, like every other capitalist institution, contributed towards making this crisis, but if Mr. Roosevelt had ‘been in power, we would have had the crisis just the same. This crisis arises out of the very character of the capitalist system it- self. It arises out of the contradictions of cap- italism, out of the fact, primarily, that the pro- duction runs away beyond the possibilities of the capitalist market to absorb what the workers and farmers produce, and is not due to mistakes of Mr. Hoover (he is stupid enough as far as ____ eee 7 that is concerned), but the real basis is the very nature of the capitalist system itself, and all that Mr. Roosevelt might propose, and all that he has proposed in the past, would not have prevented one iota’ of the present crisis. And I want to point out that during the course of this crisis the policy of Mr. Roosevelt, “savi~g) our” of the country, and that of his Party, has been identical with that of the Republican Par- ty. And what is their basic policy? It is to save big business from bankruptcy. To this end they have given four billion dollars to the Re- construction Finance Corporation. As for the workers—they can starve! That is the policy of the Democratic Party just as much as the Republican Party, and both cooperated in the past Congress, on every legislative hall in every city and state in the U.S. to put that policy into effect. Giving concessions to the capital- ists in the forms of loans and subsidies, and nothing for the workers but “hopes” that good times will come automatically; that is the pol- icy of both of the parties of capitalism. Any quarrels between them have been matters of detail, RELIEF FOR UNEMPLOYED Let us look more closely into this matter. Take the question of unemployed relief. Fifteen million “unemployed in the U, S., ten million part time. What is the policy of the Hoover government? Let them starve! Shove off the responsibility from the Federal government to the communities; stagger system; divide the work so that starvation spreads everywhere; and Mr. Roosevelt is in complete agreement with this policy. The Democrats voted in Congress for it and Mr. Roosevelt has supported it in practice. Take the state of New York. What has it done? Not more than any Republican state in the country, Just a few days ago I spoke in the of Schenectady, and what is the situation there? They have a diet expert in that, city ‘and "he Says the workers can live on nine cents @ day; this in Mr, Roosevelt's state, and this is the man who is coming here, appearing before the workers as offering them some form of relief. Mr. Roosevelt and his party also speak of un- employment insurance. And how do they dis- pose of it? By making some evasive, hypo- critical “proposals” about state insurance. And I may ask this: If the task is for the states to organize unemployment insurance, how about the southern states, all controlled by the Demo- cratic Party? How many have unemployment insurance? Not a damn one of them. Yet, the unemployed in this country have established an institution that is very well-known, a new type of American city. You see it along the railroad tracks, in the garbage dumps, etc. and these all have one name—Hooverville. If Mr. Roosevelt gets the presidency, as he may, all that will be necessary to do in these cities is to change the name to Rooseveltburg. Mr. Roose- velt’s regime would be just as productive of such shameful cities of poverty and misery as that of the Republican Party. There is one Party in America fighting for unemployment relief and insurance, and that is the Commu- ist Party. We demand from the: federal gov- ernment a system of unemployment relief fi- nanced by the government and the’ employers and managed by the workers, The Communist Party does not write a vague platform of un- employment insurance like Roosevelt and his Democratic Party but it fights for it, and it fights Roosevelt just as much as Hoover. (Ap- plause). BOSS CANDIDATES BACK WAGE CUTS On the question of wage cuts. Every worker in this country, industrial workers, workers for the city, etc. have had their wages cut, The Hoover government has the policy of slashing the wages. Mr. Hoover says he is against wage cuts, so does Mr, Green of the American Fed- eration of Labor, But apparently to prove that. they are against wage cuts they cut the wages of every worker in this country. And what about Mr. Roosevelt?. When the government and the employers have cut the wages of the work- ers in this country they had the full support of the A. F. of L.—and of the Socialist Party whenever it has any strength—and Mr. Roose- velt, who appears here in Columbus, who comes before the masses with all these phrases about the “forgotten man,” and what he is going to do for the workers of this country, is just as much a wage cutter as Mr. Hoover is, Let him talk until he is blue in the face about the in- correctness of cutting wages, but he cuts the wages just the same, Lock in New York state and you will find the workers there have had their wages cut as much as in any other state in the union, And what did Mr. Roosevelt or his party against it? Exactly nothing. They have been the willing, eager instruments ‘of the capitalists of this country to slash the wages of the Am- erican working class. A typical situation is to be found here in the southern part of Ohio, Gov. White, a De- mocrat, sent his troops against the coal miners to force them to accept wage cuts and the Re- l publican governor of Illinois is sending his troops against linois miners to force them to accept a wage cut.\ Both parties have, identical Policies. In Pennsylvania, speaking of the Re- publicans, we find the so-called Progressive Re- ;Publicans; Mr. Pinchot, working hand in hand with the coal operators to destroy the strike of the coal miners a year ago, and the Social- ist Party in Milwaukee, the third capitalist par- ty, works like every other capitalist party to ‘cut the wages of the workers. There is one Party in the country fighting against the wage cutting policy of the capitalist government and that i¢ the Communist Party. It goes; out and fights the wage cuts. (Applause), Practically every important strike against wage cuts during. the past two years in» this country has been led either directly by the revolutionary unions or through the minorities in the old unions or- ganized by the Trade Union Unity League: Among the strikes recently led by the revo- lutionary unions were those. of the miners in Pennsylvania and Kentucky, the textile workers in Lawrence, the beet workers in Colorado, This is action against wage cuts, not talk like the fakers of the Roosevelt stamp. POVERTY, RUIN ON FARMS And what does Roosevelt offer the farmers? Today much is said in his speeches and in the platform about the generosity of the Democratic Party towards the farmers, First, what is Hoover’s policy? Under the Republican admin- istration tens of thousands of farmers have been bankrupted, and 150 million acres of land confiscated for non payment of taxes—admit- ted by Republicans themselves, And how about Mr. Roosevelt’s party? In Mississippi, control- Jed by the Demoeratic party, we see the De- mocratic farmers’ policy y Just a few months ago we had the unparalleled exhibition in Mis- sissippi of 40,000 farms sold in one day by auc- tion for non-payment of taxes—seven million acres under a Democratic government auctioned for non-payment of taxes. This is Mr. Roose- velt’s farm policy in fact. There is one Party that stands for the farmers’ interests, and that is the Communist Party. In the forefront of our demands for the farmers stands the de- mand of no forced collection of debts from the farmers thru mortgage charges, taxes or other- wise. The Party of the poor farmets in Am- erica is the Communist Party and thousands of farmers all over this country are waking up to that important fact. “CRIMES AGAINST 13 MILLION NEGROES” Let us take another important issue before the people of America and what Mr. Roosevelt's Position is on this, I refer to the Negro ques- tion. In the United States there are approxi- mately 13 million Negroes, and capitalism in this country is guilty of many crimes, but I doubt if it has to its score any more terrible crime than that committeed against the 13 mil- lion Negroes. - We can search the world and there is not another section of the population in any country that’ suffers such systematic ter- rible oppression, persecution, ostracism and gen- eral suppression as do the 13 million’ Negroes here in the United States. Lynching, jim- crowism, discrimination in every conceivable form, and the Hoover government has toler- ated it—not only that—it has built it up and is responsible for it. What of Mr, Roosevelt? There is no more important situation in the United States than the suppression and repres- sion of all these masses of toilers of the Negro race, What about Mr. Roosevelt party? What does it offer? To get a measure of his party, look to the south, That is the stronghold of Mr. Roosevelt's party, He personally is the dar- ling of the Bourbons, of the lynchers of the jim- crowers of the south, What is his attitude to- wards the Negro masses? It is 100% support of the entire system of repression and exploita- tion of the Negro masses, in its worst forms. Down south, at the present time in Alabama, they are trying to lynch nine Negro boys. They have framed a charge against the Negro boys. ‘They are innocent of that charge. The pur- pose of this attempted legal lynching is to ter- xorize the Negroes of the south, Mr, Roosevelt has never spoken a word against this attempted Jegal lynching. Why? Because he supports it as a basic policy of the Democratic Party, and the Negro masses must understand that funda- mental fact, The whole thing is part of the process of suppressing and persecuting the Ne- gro masses, and everybody who votes for Mr. Roosevelt is voting directly against the Ne- groes in the U. S, Boke , {CONCLUDED TOMORROW) , | “THE STRIKE” STORY OF DREDGING FLEET STRUGGLE—190 By PETER NIKIFOROV Installment 1. ‘HE first half of 1906 in the south of Russia was marked by ‘a mighty wave of strikes. The blow struck at the Tsarist government by the proletariat of St. Petersburg and Moscow at the end of 1905 resounded throughout the land during the whole of 1906. There was nothing but one strike after another in the iron and steel mills in the South and in the Urals; @ powerful movement broke out among the seamen of the Black Sea mercantile marine and in the Black Sea ports; a new wave of | revolution was gathering among the | sailors in the navy, in the Black | Sea and Baltic fleets. The situau- | tion demanded continuous, resolute | work, The Social-Democratic or- | ganizations were trying to mobilize all their forces to bring the grow- ing movement under its influuence and take the leadership into its own hands: 3 I GO TO KERCH, IN CRIMEA The Crimean Committee proposed that I should immediately depart for Kerch to help our organization there. In the situation that had arisen Kerch was of great impor- tance, for it was through the Kerch Straits, and through them alone that a collossal amount of grain was exported from the Rostov, ‘Taganrog and Maryupol ports. The stoppage of sea traffic in the Kerch Straits paralyzed the work of the Azov Sea ports and held up exports, Intensive work had \to be dege among the dredge-workers ana the dockers in the Kerch port. The Kerch organization was Men- shevik throughout and was sup- ported in its work by two small metal works, where fairly strong Menshevik workers’ groups were to be found; the dredge-workers and the dockers had not come under the influence of the Mensheviks. The Social-Revolutionaries and the anarchists were not particularly ! strong and held only a few groups } among the Kerch petty-bourgeois elements. At the decision of the Kerch Committee I was sent to work among the dredge-workers and dockers. I took up the work given me with enthusiasm. Whole days I hung around first the dredge-workers, "then the dock- ers. I saw the life of the latter, listened to their talks, and soon began to understand their troubles, and to pick out those of their com- plaints around which I should be able to agitate them, THE LIFE OF THE DOCKERS ~ All the loading and unloading at the docks was carrieq on in those days by contractors who played in with the port and steam- ship administrations and who are cruelly exploited the disunited mass of dockers- They turned the dockers into drunkards with vodka and then cheated them over their wages. Pay-day among the workers was always a time of strong dis- satisfaction against the contrac- tors, I Jearned all this in detail and remembered it for my future work. I could have become a docker, but I decided to get in with the dredge-workers, The dredgers were being over- hauled, and only a small section of the fleet was in action, cleaning up the Kerch Straits. I fell into talking with the workers and with. their help, as an unemployed work- him along.” : Bespaloy loked at me ungracle ously; he was bent and gloomy, as though carrying a heavy weight. In this respect all the old metal- workers, who had been put through the training of the 14-16 hour day, were very much alike; they: had, as it were, all been cast’in the same mould. BESPALOV IS AN OLD HAND Bespalov set up and repaired.the piping system on the ships, along with his son, Bespalov had worked many years in the fleet, having taken over the work from his father. He was gloomy and silent and obviously drank considerably; he was dogged at his work, his horny hands seized objects like pincers, and fixed them deftly in their proper places; he did his work well, and accurately, I also knew something about pipe=- fitting and consquently turned out to be a handy assistant, which im-* mediately brought the old man round in my favor. I considerd this circumstance of especial im- portance, for the good feeling of> the old worker would be a support in my work, even if he had no desire of interfering in politics. All the unskilled, heavy work fell to my lot; I dragged piping, handed up the heavy gaspipe wrenches, cleared the way for laying the pipes, and so on. GETTING { CONTACTS ' My first days on tie dredger revealed no signs of any sort of group on which I could lay hold for my work. Bespalov was silent and not willing to answer any sort of questions outside his actual work. All t] same I decided to sound out the old man and began a conversation with him abobut the State Duma. “We'll soon have the elections to the Duma, what shall we do about it?” “It's no work for our brains: if you think too much, you'll get left without a head... .” “But why? The papers are writ- ing that the workers will vote, too,” T persisted. “It is\one thing to read what's written, another to act on it. ... .” said he, significantly. Our talk on politics ended there. The wisdom shown by Bespalov when he said that- “by thinking you can lose your head” showed that the old man felt strongly and understood well the :policy of the Tsarist government and that Bes- palov knew more than he was in- clined te tell. | WORK AMONG j THE YOUTH . ‘The old workers on the fleet held themselves aloof from political conversations, and work in this direction was not promising. But talks about wages always met with a lively response from them. As’I became more and more ac- quainted with the set-up of the workers, with their outlook and economic position, I came to the conclusion that the work must be begun with the youth who were not tied down by families. The main workers in the dredging-fleet had worked for several years on end; many of them linked up their whole fate with the work from early years and worked till old age overtook them; many had little He talks with the unemployed. er got myself a job on one of the dredgers—“Victor Shumsky”—as a laborer at 75 kopeks a day. I AM HIRED I was hired by the boatswain, an sailor who had served his time in the Imperial Navy. Because of his enormous’ capacity for work and his endurance, he kept the ship's crew well in hand, was the captain's right hand, and drank to the scup-— pers. When I appeared before him, he looked me over searchingly; my unenviable clothing and my strong phssique satisfied him. yet “What can you do?” “I can do any unskilled work.” “Where did you work ‘at In the depot at, Chelyyabinsk,” I answered, hoping he would not make enquiries about my work there. re “Why were you sacked?” “For drinking,’ said I, embar- Tassed, : “Right, go and work; if I see you drunk, you'll get the sack. Hie, Bespaloy, here's your assstant, take houses and were tied up in domes- tic affairs. The administration had created a complicated gradation of advancement, up. the stairway of which the obedient file of workers climbed. Whole families with their children, brothers, nephews, grew up to this work and lived their narrow lives. The old workers | were particularly severe about any sort of “free-thinking” and kept the youth strictly in hand. The administration of the port and the fleet endeavored to behave towards the mass in a family way, and even invited the more respected workers to give advice on various questions of a technical nature or on the arrangement of the work. It was clear that there could be no ques- tion of starting work among the older workers. The young workers had to be drawn bit by bit away from the influence of the older ones, and brought into the circle of political interests. This is where I began. . (fo. Be. Continued) gigi l I