The Daily Worker Newspaper, October 28, 1932, Page 4

vage Four DAILY, WORKER, NEW YORK, FRIDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1932 Dail Published by the Compredatiy Publishing Co., 33th St., New York City, N. ¥. Telephone ALgonquin 4-7905. Oundle “D: Address and mail je the Dally Worker, 50 B. 10th St, New Kerk, M. x. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: By mati everywhere: One year, $6; six months, $8: Borough of Manhattan and Bronx, New York City. six_month: twe monthe, (1; ancepting ome year, 98; $4.50. Canada, $8 per year: 75 cents The ‘Difference’ Between Roosevelt and Hoover NDREW MELLON, ambassador to Great Britain and one of the billionaire masters of both Hoover and Roosevelt, is surely an authority on the Republican and Democratic Parties. Speaking in Manchester Oct. 21 Mellon told his “nglish audience that: “On most of the majer issued confronting the country the position of the two parties as expressed in their platforms and by their candidates themselves do not differ greatly one from the other.” We repe If anyone knows this, it is Andrew Mellon. Continuing his burst of frankness Mellon disposed of the illusion that billions of d rs, railway and in- dustrial capitalists is a peculiar y polcy He “The Democratic as well as the Republi n leaders of our coun- try have indeed cooperated in the patriotic manner in putting thru the strictly emergency legislation which President Hoover recom- mended to Congress for the purpose of leading the way out of the economic crisis.” nd for the capitalist rs, Mass unemployemnt and Hoover but will be ekually con- re whole burd mers both defend t ican masses. isis on the working of finance-gapital ! Vote ort avit t Party! For the working for Foster Ford against the candidates political party which fights ’ and Farmers’ Government olutionary way out of the crisis e is no other way out. Roosevelt, the Socialists and Injunctions Ree iT is credited “with prohibiting the temporary injunction in labor disputes without a hearing,” in a leaflet issued by the Democratic Campaig}: Committee, which states that “a vote for Roosevelt and Garner means a square deal for labor.” The Democratic Party is trying to create the impres- sion that Roosevelt is against the tyr ical use of the in- junction to break strike: Nothing farther from the truth. The injunction which is a specially vicious weapon in the armory of capitalism to suppress the rights of the work- ers is on the increase. The Democrats stand shoulder to shoulder with the republicans in destroying workers rights an is 'APITALISM has refused to abolish the injunction, but under the pres- sure of the workers it has made sor intended to create the illusion among workers that the injunction evil was being curbed. Among these was a law prohibiting temporary injunctions in labor dis- putes without a hearing. But workers have not been relieved to any ex- tent from the menace of the injunction, An examination of cases where employers demanded temporary injunctions in strikes (there are scores of such cases on record in New York City alone since this legislation was passed) shows the procedure is as follows: The courts give very short notice to the attorneys for strikers—usually two days, allowing them no adequate time to prepare the defense. When an extension is asked the courts refuse. The temporary injunctions stand isualy until the strike is broken or tled. Many of these temporary in- junction hearings take place after the strike is over. During the strike there are wholesale arrests of pickets. They are tried and sentenced for ‘ontempt of court under the provisions of the temporary injunctions. ‘The total numbers of arrests in New York City alone temporary injunctions in the last year run into hundreds. been made in strikes of shoe workers, metal workers, food workers, needle trade workers, building trade workers. A strike in which the injunction weapon is not used by the employers is the rare exception under these They have The experience of literally thousands of workers in New York State of which he is governor, gives the lie to the claims of Roosevelt's spokes- men that he is opposed to the use of temporary injunctions as a method of strike-breaking. He has never released a single w breaking measures nor.has he ever uttered one word of criticism of the tyrannical procedure of the courts. This would interfere with the capital- ist offensive against the workingclass and the solution of the crisis at the expense of the workers—the joint program of the Democrat and Repub- lican parties, of Roosevelt and Hoover. . . . iy the use of injunctions against workers the Socialists too have an “honorable” record. The Socialist trade union chiefs in New York have used injunctions against revolutionary workers. Morris Hillquit applied, together with the dress manufacturers, for an injunction against the needle trades workers in New York in 1926, and used the injunction again in 1927 to beat down the living standards of the workers. The Republican and Democratic parties are suppressing the rights of the workers. From them only greater suppression can be expected, The Socialist Party trails along with the open capitalist parties in helping to put over the capitalist offensive. Only the Communist Party fights aganst the injunction menace, and against the suppression of political rights of the workers. Vote Communist! Vote for Foster and Ford! jailed under these strike- emblems such as the Republican, Democrat, Socialist, but omitted the Communist emblem. So T spoke * to the instructor about the omit- ting of the Communist emblem and he answered if one of you com- rades will bring one down for the machine, we will place it in for them. So what do you have to say about this? A. G. \Letters from Our Readers Editor Daily Worker: Dear Comrade:—I have read the article of “On the Last Lap of the Election Campaign,” by Clarence oes Hathaway. Everything sounded | Note from Comrade Hathaway, good as far as his suggestions are National Election Campaign concerned, and as I understood he | Manager: The emission of the Hammer and Sickle from posters and other election agitational material, is @ grave error, which should im- mediately be rectified. I entirely agree with the suggestion of the comrade. has mentioned that he is still in the market for more suggestions to be made, so I would like to make one or two and find out whether he agrees or approves with my sug- gestion. TI have noticed that on every sign that the Communist Party has out on demonstrations, they always omit the picture of the hammer and sickle, which I think is very important, because I have been asked by many fellow workers | whether the torch is the Commu- | nist emblem, that they shall vote for on election day. Also another suggestion I would On the other suggestions, about the display voting machine, and on covering the meetings of our opponents, I also agree, and ap- peal to our local organizations throughout the country, to put these suggestions into effect. CHILD WORKERS like to make and that is, on Pitkin In 1920 (there are no later fig- Ave. and Bristol St., in Brooklyn, | ures available), 1,060,900 children “here is a very large store that is | 10 to 15 years of age were reported sented by the Republican Party, and there they have a regular vot- mg machine which they instruct housands of people coming to it of how to vote for Boomberg, Repub- lican, and they have in it three as working for pay, or about one in 12 of the chilf® population of those ages. More than a third of these working children were less than 14 years old, Two-thirds were | | | | | | i} | | the ruling class, Vote Communist Against Wage Cuts! By DAN RICO Why Southern Workers Should Vote Communist on Nov. 8 Equal Rights for Negroes and Self-Determination for Black Belt Is One of Key Demands of Platform By MYRA PAGE (The writer of this article is the Daily Worket correspondent in the Soviet Union, She is the author of Gathering Storm,” a recent novel about life in the South). S one born and raised in the South, I know full well the darkness that covers the sun in “sunny Dixie.” In the seacoast town of Virginia, wheye I grew up, both Negro and white workers have suffered heavily because they fell for the bosses’ policy of “divide and rule.” In the shipyard and on the docks, unions were smashed, strik- es lost, and wages slashed, time and again, because labor was di- vided within its own ranks, along lines of color. The American Fed- eration of Labor officials followed “the employers’ policy of Jim-Crow- ing the colored workers, and ad- vising both colored and white a- gainst going out in sympathy strikes, in support of their broth- ers. Also the middle’class of people, the doctors, grocerymen, teachers, and others have suffere@ because of this division in labcy’s ranks. When the workmen’s wages fell, the standard of living of the white collar workers and professionals came down too. WHy T AM A RED What has been happening in my home town has been happening throughout the south. As the old song goes: “The rich grow richer and the poor grow poorer,” because up until now the rich owning class has been able to get away with its policy of “divide and ule.” Wages in the south, for the same work, run from one-third to one-half less than in other parts of the country. This is a direct product of the caste system. Lynchings are on the in- crease. Several millions of young children are wrecking their little bodies in cotton fields and tending | machines when they should be in school... I want to gse and end to these things. Tht 1s why I am a Red. T Gastonia, for the first time, southern labor learned of this one way out of its misery. It was the Communist Party that showed them and inspired them to organ- ize, develop leaders from their ranks, Ever since then, it has held aloft the banner of solidarity and struggle, in *the south, and no amount of terror on the part of no amount of threats of lynchings, of night-rides given its organizers by K.K.K. and “gentlemen” fascist gangs can make it retreat from its position, Its mbers stand by their principles ful rights and MYRA PAGE freedom for the Negro people), giv- ing their life, if necessary, as Ella May Wiggins in Gastonia, and young Harry Sims in Kentucky, to defend them. The Negro masses are generally quicker, I think, to grasp the cor- rectness of the Communist program than most southern whites. How- ever, I know many white southern- ers, who, like myself, are Commun- ists. And the many demonstra- tions and joint actions of white and colored unemployed workers, as in Greenville, Atlanta, St. Louis, as well as in Chicago, Los Angeles and Defroit, the Scottsboro cam- paign, the coming together of the share-croppers in the Black Belt, the growing strike struggles below the Mason and Dixon line, and the spreading of the revolutionary unions in which white and colored stand side by side, all prove that southern white labor also is learn- ing, and pretty fast, that solidarity and sticking together is the one way to win. COMMUNISM MEANS FREEDO! FOR ALL WHO LABOR ‘ In the six election demands of the Communist Party, there is one that has particular significance for the south. That is the fourth de- mand: Equal rights for Negroes and self-determination for the Black Belt. I whole-heartedly support this demand, because I know it means freedom and opportunities for 12 million Negroes—an entire people— and for white workers and small farmers as well. Freeing of the Ne- gro people also means freeing of my white fellows and myself. Real- ization of this Communist plat- form will go far toward ridding the south of its fearful, bitter darkness, and bringing about a happier condition for all. All, ex- cept that small class who have lived at the expense of the masses; and the sooner their day is ended, — ‘The reason I am so sure of the results of such a policy is, first, be- cause long experience has given me an unshakable confidence fn the working masses of both races, and their ability to work out healthy, friendly relations with one another; and also because in the twelve months spent in the Soviet Union, I have seen myself how this prin- ciple of mutual cooperation of toil- ing masses of various races and nationalities, on the basis of full equality, has worked out in prac- tice. EMANCIPATION OF THE NEGRO PEOPLE In old Czarist Russia, there were many peoples oppressed, like the Negro in America, There were the Uzbeks, the Ukrainians, the Geor- gians, the Armenians, the Jews, and many more. These rulers fol- lowed the same policy of “divide and rule.” Russian workers and peasants were told they were “supe- rior” to these other peoples, and one race and nationality was pit- ted against another, the same as in America today, Not only quar- rels but actually armed conflicts took place between different na- tionalities. Georgians fought Ar- menians, Ukrainians fought Great Russians, and so it went. Each mistrusted, blamed, and hated the other for their misery—until the revolutionary workers and their Bolshevik (Communist). Party showed them their real, common enemy, and the road to freedom. FTER the Revolution of 1917, and the establishment of the workers’ and peasants’ government, one of the first steps taken was the issuing of a Declaration of Rights of the Peoples of Russia. It recognized the right to self- government and independence of every former oppressed nationality. Today, the Soviet Union is com- of seven Soviet Republics, bound together in a voluntary un- jon in the common task of build- ing socialism — the Ukrainian, White-Russian, Russian, Transcau- casian, Uzbek, Turkoman, and Tad- Jik. republics.”: Each’ ‘has its own government, school system, and” press in the native language, its national resources and budgets, and its flourishing cultural life. Within each of these republics are smaller, autonomous republics of smaller nationalities, who enjoy full rights to govern themselves and develop their economic and cultural life. Everywhere in the Soviet Union, I found peoples of different nationalities who once had fought bitterly between them- selves, ‘living and working together in harmony. @nly the older gen- erations recall the former hostil- ities. The Quack “Government Ownership” Schemes of S.P. Are Reactionary Measures for Stengthening Rule of Trusts Under Capitalism By WILLIAM Z. FOSTER pecs rt erew yr ne Socialist Party, taking advan- tage of the terrible conditions of the Working class—men, women and children—in the coalfields, is dang- ling before the eyes of the miners the he-wisp of “government own- Sometimes the Socialist Party propagandists call it national- ization. A pamphlet by Powers Hapgood, who deserted the miners in_ their heroic battles of 1927-28 at the height of the struggle to break the strangle- hold of the corrupt John L, Lewis machine has been distributed widely through the coal fields. It is entitled “End Slavery in the Coal Fields!”—a typical piece of Socialist Party dem- agogy. Every miner and every other worker—is in favor of ending slavery —in the coal fields and in other in- dustries. It is upon this revolution- ary desire that the Socialist Party banks for a hearing, and it is the proven militancy of the miners which it tries to capitalize. ‘The pamphlet does not tell the miners that government ownership and control of mines, unless capitalist government has been overthrown and replaced by a Workers and Farmers Government, means not more but less control by workers over their wages and hours. The pamphlet does not tell the miners that powerful groups of coal operators, supported by John L. Lewis and the American Federation of La- bor leaders, are in favor of govern- ment control of the coal mining in- dustry. They want the help of the government in squeezing out the smaller operators. They want the power of the government placed DI- RECTLY behind the coal barons and the miners placed in the position of the postoffice workers and other gov- ernment employees who are not al- lowed to strike, whose wages have been cut and who have been speed- qd up the same as the miners have. The Socialist Party, when it talks of government ownership, pictures the government as something sc” ’- ate and apart from the cApitalist sys- tem, as an agency that has the in- terests of workers at heart and that workers can control. This is not only ridiculous. It is dangerous. The National, state and local governments are agencies of the capitalist class. The only difference under government ownership as in the case of the strike in the Illinois mines, where state troops were called to break the strike, would be that federal troops would have been used also. Hapgood’s pamphlet says: “Be- cause it will not be necessary to make profits, wages can be far higher un- der nationalization.” But industries owned by capitalist government (which is only the executive committee of the big em- ployers and banks) are also run for profits. Government ownership in all capitalist countries is a means of exercising more control over workers and making money for the banks—who are the real rulers whether there is government own- ership or not. The example of the governmnt op- ration of the railroads during the war, when the railway workers got an in- crease in wages, is often cited as proof that government ownership is better for workers. The fact of the matter is that the railway workers were about to strike. The railways were necessary to carry on Wall Street’s war. ‘The Hapgood pamphlet says that under government ownership there will be a six-hour and a five-day week for miners with high wages. There are about 900,000 government employes in the United States. The overwhelming majority of them are poorly paid. All of them who are | not capitalist party politicians have had their wages cut in the last two years. Where working time has been reduced to five days a week wages have been cut accordingly. Not even the publicity agents of the capitalist class have ever dared to point to the wages and working conditions of the great mass of gov- ernment employees as proof of the generosity of capitalist government to workers. It has remained for the Socialist Party to foster this {llusion. In other couniries, like France and Germany, railroads have been owned and operated by the government for years. It was in France that Briand mobilized the railway workers into the army to make them break their own strike. In hoth Germany and France the conditions of the railway workers are no better than those of workers in other industries. These are facts that any worker can look up for himself, The Hapgood pamphlet says: ¥ “Nationalization of coal mines means: Regular work at shorter hours; decent wages; more air pump- Way Out of Crisis Is Thru Workers’ and Farmers’ Gov’t ed into the mines; better and happier homes; the end of preventable acci- dents; curity, health, safety and freedom.’ This reads like the prospectus for a fake gold mine. The Socialist Par- ty is certainly a good booster for capitalism. Government ownership, if it were carried out, means first of all the shutting down of small mines and the freezing out of still more miners from the industry. It means more unemployment. It means wages fixed by government boards under the slogan of compulsory ar- bitration against whose decisions it would be a crime to strike. It means a system of government spying ex- ceeding anything that the-coal oper- ators and John L. Lewis have been able to do. It means the militariza- tion of the mines. Government ownership of the mines under capitalism means still worse discrimination against the large numbers of Negro miners. Even in the United States Army Negroes are Jim Crowed into separate regi- ments, denied promotion and sub- ject to all the tyrannies they suffer in civil life. Under capitalism government own- ership means putting still more of the burden of the crisis on the masses by the direct suppressive action of the government. It means the speed up and exploitation of the miners directly in the interests of the Wall Street capitalists who would lend the government the money to buy the mines. Remember <:iat the Socialist Party says nothing about confiscation of mining properties. It is against con- fiscation. The Socialist Party con- vention held last summer in Mil- waukes: voted against including con- fiscation in its platform. Norman Thomas, its candidate for president, said that “there was a possibility of achieving Socialism in a generation (this will not frighten the capitalist class very much—D.B.) if guided by the desire for an orderly revolution and that the cost of taxation was trivial when compared with the cost of putting into motion confiscation.” This is the Socialist Party policy in a nutshell: Never hurt the dear cape italists. The vote on the confiscae tion resolution was 166 against, 14 for. The Socialist Party brings forward its program of government ownere ship to distract the miners from the daily struggles, to divert their milie tancy into the fruitless channels of lobbying and mere voting during élece tions. Its program of goverument ownership under capitalism i pit forward as if this meant the abolition of capitalism. This is deception of the most treacherous kind. It is only in the Soviet Union, where the working class headed by its Commu- nist Party is at the same time the government that nationalization is in favor of the workers. ‘The Socialist Party is not a revolue tionary party. Its whole program is intended to help the capitalist class maintain power as against the work- ers by making capitalism appear in a more harmless form. The Socialist Party joins with the Republican and Democratic parties, in attacking the Communist Party. It does this because the Communist Party exposes its lies about government own- ership, because it helps the miners in all their struggles, because it helps them organize militant industrial unions like the National Miners Union; because the Communist Par- ty never looks upon the situation of the miners as “hopeless” but says that rank anq file organization and mass struggle. that the united front of all miners against treacherous leaders, the coal operators and capi- talist government is the most effective weapon of the miners. The Socialist Party joins with all the enemies of the working class | against the Communists because they point out to the miners that the only way out of the capitalist ‘crisis is revolutionary struggle for the over- throw of capitalism and the estab- lishmen tof a Workers and Farmers Government. The Socialist Party program of government ownership would serve only to tighten the bonds of capitalist wage slavery upon the miners and the rest of the working class. Miners! Reject the Socialist Party program! Miners! Join the Communist Par- ty! Support the Communist candid- ates—in the elections Vote Com- munist! By MARTIN MORIARITY ‘HICAGO, Ill.—Years of chopping cotton from sun-up to sundown, and then eight weary years in the stockyards of the “emancipated” North, long’ ago convinced Isaiah Joyce that the Negro workers must fight for bread alongside their white brothers. That's why he is a familiar figure at the relief sta- tions, demanding immediate aid for Negro and white families in- stead of the miserable calories of starvation diet begrudged them by Cermak's office boys. That's why he is candidate of the Communist Party ‘for State Senator. JOYCE'S “HOME” You have to be careful of the treacherous, sagging stairway that you climb to get to Joyce’s “home.” And, if it rains, it’s better not to sit down—you'll only have to dodge the rain, under which the roof is slowly perishing. When I arrived Joyce was telling @ comrade of the latest recruits to the Unemployed Council, in which he is active. “Will Powell,” he was saying, “was out of a job for twelve months but the relief station gave him not a thing. Then he came to the Council. We fought his case. Now he gets $5.60 every two weeks and fuel for himself and wife. That’s not much, of course, but it showed Powell something that I learned— you can win nothing unless you tight for it, organized with the rest of the workers, THE CASE OF LAURA SMITH “Then there was Laura Smith. She was a single worker and so she was expected to slink in a corner and die quietly. But the Unemployed Council forced rent al- Jowance and grocery order for her —three every two weeks.” Against Joyce, faithfully defend- ing this capitalist system that be- stows — sometimes —such humane charity on the workers is the Dem- ocratic Congressman, A. J. Savage. Isaiah Joyce, Negro Worker, Militant Candidate in Chicago HEN “William Hushka was murdered in the attack on the bonus army at Washington,” Joyce recalled, “it was Savage who pleaded, with Hushka’s family not to ask the return of the body to Chicago. There might be blood- shed. Savage said—trying to make believe that the comrades of Hushka, not the goyernment which murdered him, would provoke such bloodshed.” “This should be enough to show the veterans just what they can expect from the rule of such dema- gogues. And the veterans, the he- roes of 1917 who are now left to starve with the rest of the jobless, must ditch these fakers by voting for the Communist Party. THE. VETERANS’ BUREAU x “Take the case of an ex-soldier on Culloden St. He has five chil- dren. He was sick for one year and even tried suicide as a way out. I went with one of his family to the Veterans’ Bureau on Wood St. “why did you bring this white family?’ an official snapped at me. “‘How did you get acquainted?” he asked, scandalized at the idea of Negro and white workers fight- ing together. “Is it against the law for a col- ored man to bring a white family to the Veterans’ Bureau? I asked, We're not interested in Jim-Crow- ing, we're interested in relief. “They were furious. ‘The colored must stay away from the white and the white from the colored,’ they said. Still, they increased the gro- cery allowance—when we told them that we were delegated by the Un- employed Council.” ] Voting for Joyce on Novy. 8 will be many of the workers with whom he slaved in the stockyards. That was in the years after 1916, after he fled the 60 cents a day—no poari—paid him as a cotton picker in Mississippi. ion can work out equally’ well in the United States. And I look for- ward to the rich culture and art which the Negro people will con- tribute to our common heritage. ‘Their music and folklore, already developed, show us what we may expect. I look forward to the ful- ler life which the masses of both races will then be able to live. RIGHT OF SELF- DETERMINATION IN THE BLACK BELT ‘What does self-determination for the Black Belt mean? That in that wide stretch of territory curv- ing like a sickle through the south- ern states, where the colored people form the majority of the popula- tion—an enslaved nation of ten million —the elementary right of self-government shall be applied, ‘This Black Belt forms a natural economic and political unit. Old state boundaries (which, in fact, ority of its population desire it, be formed into an independent, self- governing state. Within this territ- ory, the rights of the toiling whites, who form a minority of the pop- ulation, would be fully protected; just as they are, in similar circum- stances, in the Soviet Union. The Democratic and Republican parties oppose it openly, and in practice. They are for status quo in the south, in everything. Their records in office in both state and federal governments demonstrate that they are in favor of the con- tinual enslavement of the Negro people, and likewise of the white masses, HAT of the Socialist Party offi- cials? Their actions prove their acceptance of the Jim-Crow system. By this, they betray the basic interests of Americanabor, 1 know what has worked oat so have no basis) would be set aside and especially the southern section which is the greatest victim of this vicious system. There was a time when the revolutdonary, tals of this Party's leaders drew me toward them—but that was before their deeds, in Milwaukee, in Reading, and in the south, as well as in many strikes, opened my eyes to their unprincipled, weak-kneed character. It has been left to the Commun- ist Party to come forward as the champion of the rights of the Ne- gro people, and self-cetermination for the Black Belt. I am proud that it has nominated an Alabama Negro worker, James W. Ford, whose grandfather was murdered by a lynch mob, as its candidate for Vice-President of the United States. I know that through its stand, the oppressed millions in the Black Belt will be roused to greater struggic. Southern men and women, all who live by their labor, white and colored, show your class spirit by voting under the hammer and sickle. Vote for Foster and if -_-