The Daily Worker Newspaper, January 27, 1934, Page 4

veel ~— Page Four Consolidate Fighting | Forces Against Hunger At Jobless Straggle for Unity for Demand Goes Forward By HERBERT BENJAMIN On Feb. 3rd, 4th and 5 sentatives of the organized of mass unemployment again be assembled in 3 nal gathering in the Capitol of the Wall Street government. This will be the third such gathering to in as many years under leadership. While this gathering 1 different and less spec than the two which preceded Unemployment C no less militant a ever growing bitterness of th ing masses thar e Hunger March of 1931 ant 1 Progress for Unity The delegates to this convention will represent a mature movement. During r since the National Hunger March of December 1932, the movement under the leadership of the Unemployed} Councils has been enlarged not only/ by the addition of more members and units, but what is even more Portant by the afiiliation of m of the independent ar ganizations that were for by_reformist leadership. Thus, the deleg: n from the state of Washington the Unemployed Ci Peoples Counci! Leagues that fo’ self-help program and served as tails to the kites of the Democratic Party politicians of that state. The dele- gations from Oregon and Southern California will likewise represent in addition to Unemployed Councils, also the Unemployed Co-operative} Relief Ass'n. and the Multonomah County Federation (Portland, Ore.) | which includes the Givic Emergency} Federation thi Jnemployed Leag useof that ) Innumer- | able other such groups, in many cases | much larger than the Council or-| ganizations t existed alongside | them, will th resenta- | ion register their} that proved | ineffective and adherence to the program icies of the Un- employed Councils | Veterans of Mass Struggles vance on the part of the unemployed | movement. It marks at the same time the success the unity policy| of the Unemployed Councils. These} organizations will not merely come| @s observers as was the case with| delegations who came to the Mus-| teite Unemployed League convention| of last Jul These delegates will| ‘kers who have already) together with members of the Un-| employed Councils; workers who in the course of their struggles learned | to distinguish between organizations | that merely hold meetings and or-| ganizations that act as an instru- ment for struggle. | There will be present in this con- vention delegates from organizations that were established by Socialists) and Musteites for the purpose of checking the movement of the masses | towards militant mass _ struggle. Thus, the Pittsburgh delegation will include representatives from Unem- Ployed Leagues that have rejected both the open treachery of the So- cialists and the Musteites who sought to sabotage unity by professing to favor it. Unions Also in Fight | Delegates who represent unions and fraternal organizations will like- wise reflect the progress that has been made in the development of a , Ask Funds Be Rushed | } in | Working class organizations to give |to be held in Washington on Feb. 3, | mailing expenses, for the renting of | feeding and housing of all the dele- | gates to the convention, since the government has instituted | not sufficient funds, the convention | will face many serious difficulties, | to This marks a yery significant ad-|cils, Room 437, 90 E. lith St, New | struggle. | Without Decent Food, Clothing and | Convention! | j re Herbert Benjamin National Organizer, Unemployed | Councils | Need Funds at Once for Jobless Meet To Nat'l Committee NEW YORK.—The National Com- mittee of the Unemployed Councils a last minute appeal asks all financial support to the National Convention Against Unemployment 4 and 5. Money must be had for the hall, and for the transportation, Although the National Committee | has in the past appealed to the workers, working class organizations | and to liberals for funds, the re- | sponse has been very slight. | This can put the convention in very serious danger, particularly a system in Washington of register- ing all transients and is forcing them into transient camps. If there are Funds should be rushed at once the National Unemployed Coun- York City. Poems Dae eecen er ORS ieee IR OE united fighting front against hunger. These organizations that heretofore limited themselves to mere moral support of the unemployed movement are now more and more active fighting forces in the common They will be able to re- their unemployed com- mittees have done and are doing to deal with the problems of their un- employed members and to lend thetr forces to the joint struggle of all the workers, The Washington convention willi therefore be a gathering of actual leaders of the battles that are being waged day in ang day out to resist the hunger program of the ruling class. It will provide an opportunity for an exchange of experience in the development of fighting methods. It will serve to make possible the forg- ing of @ fighting program based upon these experiences that can assure the success of the aim which the unem- ployed movement must set itself—to make sure that “Not One Worker is Shelter,” and to force the richest government and ruling class in the world to establish a system of Social and Unemployment Insurance in ac- cordance with the Workers Bill. . Going , to | Russia? e ‘Workers needing full ouifits of horsehide Jeather sheeplined Coats, Windbreakers, Breeches, High Shoes, eto., will recei etal reduction on all their purchases SQUARE DEAL ARMY and NAVY STORE 121 THIRD AVE. (@ doors South of 1th Strees) MIMEOGRAPHS $10.00 Up STENCILS $1.50 Quire-Ink-Paper EMPIRE 799 BROADWAY Room 401, Cor. lith at. FORMERLY WITH UNION SQ. MIMEO, ape- ¢ the AIRY, LARGE Czechoslovak Workers House, Inc. 347 E.72nd St. New York Telephone: RHineiander $007 Russian Art Shop, Inc. 107 EAST 14th ST, N. ¥. G. ~—— LARGE SELECTION —~ Peasant Blouses, Lamps, Shades, Shawis, Candy, Novelties and Toys from the SOVIET UNION 3 our special $1 LBS ASSORTED RUSSIAN CANDY THE APARTMENTS Take Advantage of Lexington Avenve train to White Plains Road. Stop at Allerton Avenue Station. Tel, Estabrook 3-1400—1401 Workers Cooperative Colony 2700-2800 BRONX PARK EASF (OPPOSITE BRONX PARK) naa now REDUCED THE RENT CULTURAL ACTIVITIES Kindergarden; Masses for Adults and Children; Clobs and Other Privileges NO INVESTMENTS REQUIR' _ EVERAL GOOD APARTMENTS & SINGLE ROOMS AVAILABLE Office open daily Friday & Saturday AND SINGLE ROOMB Library; Gymnasium ; the Opportunity, Sam. to 8 pam. 9 sm. $0 5 pum. 18 am. to 8 pam, Sunday a ae ee PHOTOS...of the better kind AT REDUCED PRICES BLUE BIRD STUDIOS 1696 PITKIN AVENUE, Near AMBOY STREET BROOKLYN, N. ¥. ~ Phone DICKENS 2-1096 | for war preparations, | In no instance shall there ®e any contributi Workers’ Delegates New York CWA Jobs, Negroes Were Foreed to Register Only in Harlem NEW YORK.— Negro workers in New York City registering for C.W.A. | jobs can now register where they | live, instead of being jim-crowed and | sent to Harlem to register. This} concession was won by a struggle | led by the League of Struggle for Negro Rights, from the C.W.A. au-/| thorities in New York, following de- | mands made on Colonel DeLameter, | acting C.W.A. administrator, at his office at 111 Bighth Ave., on January | 18th, by a delegation of Negro and white workers. Until now, groes living above 42nd St., have been forced to travel to the Harlem offices to register, hundreds being sent from the Bronx and other sec- tions, Foree Concessions from C.W.A. Tw@ of the other demands of the delegation were granted by DeLa- meter—that workers whose work days fall on holidays or on days when the weather is too bad to work, should either get paid for those days or be given another work day in- stead. The C.W.A. chief told the LS.NR. representatives that work would be given within 20 days of the day lost, due to it falling on a | holiday or bad weather. Herman | MacKawain, President of the Greater | New York Council of the League of | Struggle for Negro Rights, in com- | menting on these victories won by organized militant action, said: “We must make every effort to see that | these gains we have won are kept. Negroes all over the city are urged to register where they live and re-| ports should immediately be sent to | our office at 119 West 135th St., if any attempt is made to revive the policy of discrimination and jim- crowism formerly practiced by the C.W.A. Demand Equal Rights for Negroes The Council of Greater New York | of the League of Struggle for Negro Rights at its second meeting, Jan. 25th, af 119 West 135th St., decided to intensify, as the chief activity, its campaign, in conjunction with the Unemployed Councils and trade | unions, to fight against discrimina- tion in the hiring of Negroes on CWA. and relief projects, and against all practices of job discrim- ination and jim-crowism throughout New York. All jdges, clubs, unions, churches, and fraternal organizations are urged to cooperate in fighting for the following demands: Jobs or adequate relief for the toiling Negro population; no discrimination against Negroes on C.W.A. and relief jobs, and in unemployment relief; no cut- ting off of C.W.A. jobs; immediate appropriation of funds by Congress to_give all registered unemployed C.W.A, jobs; immediate cash relief for all unemployed not on O.W.A. jobs; abolition of jim-crowism in the registering and hiring of Negroes; the immediate hiring of Negroes reg- istered, immediate registering and hiring of those refused registration; the rights of Negroes to all jobs and Professions, skilled, as well as un- skilled; union wages and working conditions for all workers on ©.W.A. and other reef jobs, without dis- | crimination of Negroes; immediate | passage of the Workers Unemploy- ment Insurance Bill by the present Congress; united organization and action of Negro and white workers in the struggle for jobs, relief, and unemployment insurance. Milwaukee Workers. Send Delegates to Jobless Convention MILWAUKEE, Jan. 25—Although several unemployed branches con- trolled by the Socialists have agreed to elect delegates to the Washington Convention Against Unemployment, the City Central Committee of the Socialist Party has prevented such action by defeating the proposition every time it came up. The Relief and Civil Workers’ Pro- tective Unions, unemployed councils and industrial unions in this section are @ending one delegate from Osh- Kosh, two from Racine, one from West Allis, two from Kenosha and to five delegates from Mil- waukee to the Washington conven- tion. It is also hoped to secure dele- gates from two A. F. of L, locals in this city. Preparations are being made for the Wisconsin delegation to canvass all Senators and Congressmen from that state on behalf of the Workers’ oo and Social Insurance Proposed by the National Committee, Unemployed Councils, (For Enactment by the U, S. Congress) ‘Smash Jim-Crow on. all Ne- | HAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, SATURDAY, JANUARY 27, 1994 In Cleveland, 1,500 C.W. A. workers have been put to work at this site for a new airport on Cleveland's lake front, which is within a mile of downtown Cleveland. $250,000 of C.W.A. funds are being spent on the airport work. Roosevelt Stops C WA: Funds, Jobs; Billions Go for War Purposes Unemployed Demand Re-Instatement of Men Fired On November 15, @ sp velt inaugurated the Civil \ A ministration. Roosevelt, in this speech made promises of four million jobs to the unemployed worke: Roosevelt, said, “This particular ef- fort is to put four million people from the list of those unemployed back to work during the winter months, so that we can honestly say as @ nation that this winter is not going to be like last winter or the winter before.” Two million were to be transferred from local relief lists and an additional two million added to relief. Four hundred million dollars was to be set aside for this purpose by the federal government and taken from the Public Works funds of $3,- 300,000,000, The decree putting into effect the OC. W. A, was aimed at covering up the fact that the P. W. A, which supplied the C. W, A. funds, had not decreased unemploymeny. The P, W. A. was inaugurated in July as a} part of the N. R, A, It was to end unemployment, according to Roose- velt, and give millions of jobs. Ac- tually, the P. W. A. gave a billion dollars for direct war preparations, hundreds of millions to the railroads and employers to buy equipment, and did not even check unemployment. The promise of Roosévelt, that the P. W. A. would give six million jobs by Fall was like all Roosevel! promises—seventeen million remained jobless, and the bankers benefited | While the unemployed starved. Roosevelt in November again responsibility of giving real relief and unemployment insurance to the un- employed workers. Then Congress met, and Roosevelt proposed his bankers’ budget — The Reconstruction Finance Corporation is to get four billion dollars “for and banking” in the com- —600 million dollars goes ft and. navy departments, which is added on to the one billion | the “| dollars recently given for the army| and navy under the P. W. A. | And only $350 million to “taper | off” and close up the C. W. A. and | enough additional to give one mil- | lion youths military training in | forced labor C. C. C, camps at $1 | a day wages. A few days later Con- | gressman Britten proposed with Roosevelt’s approval another half bil- lion dollars for naval destroyers, and | investments in the preferred stocks of banks. Billions were proposed for | the bankers and for war at the same time that the C. W. A. funds for jobs were cut off. The war budget of Roosevelt pro- poses to spend one billion dollars a month. The colossal amount given | the bankers and for war in relation | to the measly sum given for relief can be seen when it is recorded that | the C. W. A. has to date actually | Spent only 261 million dollars total, even less than the 400 million ap- | propriated by the federal govern- | ment. The figures of the boss bankers themselyes show that unemployment has not decreased. In July when | the P. W. A. was inaugurated to give six million jobs, employment stood at 70.1 per cent of what it had been jin 1926. In December, after the C. | W. A. was supposed to have given an- | other four million jobs (making a | total of ten million jobs promised by 850 million dollars for the R. F. C./ promised the unemployed four mil-| Roosevelt since July) employment lion jobs. The C. W. A. workers be-! still stood at 70.1 per cent of what gan very soon to see that Roosevelt’s| ib had been in 1926. These are Wall promises were not tvorking out as/ Streets’ figures. the king that can be cashed in the} In July, the month when Roose- bank. Only a half of the promised} velt launched his “recovery” and “re- four million actually received the C.| employment” program of N. R. A. | W. A. jobs. Millions registered and never got beyond the registration offices. Over one half of those receiving ©. W, A. jobs were transferred from relief or work relief lists of the local govern- ments. They were promised trade union rates of wages, and these rates were quickly cut down. Pay checks were withheld some- times for weeks. Many thousands of the ©. W. A. workers are still fighting to get two and three weeks back pay, due them from the federal government, Graft and racketeering permeated the C. W. A. apparatus. While mil- jions of jobless were vainly seeking to get on the C. W. A. payroll, Roose- velt’s democratic machine was being strengthened by the padding of the payrolls with politicians. A. F. L. Officials made hundreds of thousands of dollars from the wages of the ©. W. A. workers, charging as high as $100 a head for C. W. A. jobs. Rela- tives of office holders drew fat C. W. A. salaries. Negroes, foreign born workers, wo~ men and youth were especial suf- ferers, having small chance of get- ting C. W. A. jobs. Especially Ne~ groes were discriminated against. These were the conditions on the O. W. A. jobs which Roosevelt ine augurated in’ order to evade the Resolved, that a system of federal government unemployment tn- surance be immediately established immediately effective, guaranteeing the average wages in the respective | by an Act of Congress and made industries and territories in the United States, The unemployment insurance shall not be less than $10.00 weekly for adult workers, $3.00 for each dependent, to all workers wholly unemployed through no fault of their own, for the entire period of unemployment; and be it further Resolved, that for all workers, no discrimination; that unemployment insurance be paid to every unemployed worker, adult and youth, whether industrial or agricultural, office employees, and all other categories of wage labor, native or foreign-born, citizen or non-citizen, White and Negro, men and women, and without discrimination against race, color, age, or political opinion. No worker shall be deprived of unemployment insurance because of refusal to take the place of sirikers or to work for Jess than union rates of pay; and be it further Resolved, that insurance shall be provided at the expense of the employers and the government; that the full funds for unemployment insurance shall be raised by the government from funds now Set aside in any form whatsoever for this insurance: Resolved, that the unemployment insurance and by taxation upon incomes over $5,000 a year. Jevied upon the workers be it further d shall be administered the amount of payrolls stood at 49.9 | ber cent of what they had been in | 1926. In December, six months later, the amount of payrolls had gone down to 498 of what they had been in | 1926. Roosevelt's “recovery” meant | after six months, wage cuts and further unemployment. The Labor Research Association has just completed its yearly study of unemployment figures. The esti- mate of unemployment made by this yearly study shows that in November 1933, sixteen million workers were totally unemployed in addition to those on temporary relief employment. under the C. W. A. (now to be cut off) who are not included in the fig- ure of 16 million. Roosevelt’s prom- mises to the unemployed have ma- terialized into billions of dollars ap- propriation for the bankers, and re- Hef cuts, increased unemployments and wage cuts for the workers. Now, in order to sidetrack the in- tense mass anger of the workers at this refusal to give jobs or relief, Roosevelt and all of the employers’ politicians are loosening a flood of talk regarding “unemployment in- surance.” There is the Wagner Bill, the Cannon Bill, Lehman’s vague speeches, Frances Perkins’ proposal the New York State A. F. of L, Bill, the Social Security Bill, and many (Continued on Page Five} The Workers Unem ployment Insurance Bill it further Resolved, that social insurance to compensate for loss of wages maternity, ete.; and be it further oe Se ee ee een et eT eae by Sevens i ireee. A. Workers Used for ‘War Preparations i J obless Convention to Launch | Nation -Wide Fight for the Workers Social Insurance Bill | |Fraudulent Bills Aim to | Sidetrack Real | Benefits By I. AMTER The demand for proper government | Brotection against unemployment is! | Stowing rapidly among the masses of | Workers. All the measures thus far | agopted by the government, both fed- | eral, state, county and city, have not | improved the situation of the workers. | | The number of unemployed is gtow- ing, with an increase of nearly 4 per | cent in the past two months. The in- | dustries report no rise in production. | The sieel industry, which put forward | high expectation of January being a | “banner month” admits that there are | no orders, ne government announced a blic works program last June, but |this has been devoted almost ex-| subsidies to the railroads and big | corporations. No more than 100,000 | men are at work on federal public | works, As a bridge to public works, |the government, forced by the | Pressure of the masses of unemployed, | instituted the C. W. A. program, | Although there has been much prop- | aganda about the federal govern- |ment putting more than 4,000,000 to work on these jobs, this is untrue, and the great part of these workers | were merely transferred from county | and city jobs. But the main gain to jthe unemployed is that they have |forced the federal government to; | provide work at CASH wages. To be} | sure these wages have been very low, | |far below the union scale. Union| :| Wages were granted to a small num-| | ber of skilled workers, as a help to the A. F. of L. burocrats to get back |into the ranks the men whom they expelled for unemployment, Abandon C. W. A.; Enlarge C, C. ©. as War Preparation | | Now, more than 200,000 of the C.| |W. A. men nave been ordered fired | at once, as part of Roosevelt's plan of helping the “forgotten man.” The} C. W. A. program is to be scotched | by May 1. with the hope expressed | that at least 2,000,000 will find “nor-/ mal work”—how, Roosevelt does not} say. The remainedr—Roosevelt does not worry about. ‘Three hundred thousand boys are jin the C. C. C. camps—and their | number is to be increased to 1,000,000 {by summer. These camps, according to Assistant Secretary of War Wood- | ring, are nothing but military camps |in preparation for war. The millions of transients are to be forced into | civilian labor camps without pay— jalso under the control of the War | Department. | “The relief situation is worse than it was @ year ago,” declared Bishop Manning in New York City the other day. Relief is being cut down, | Roosevelt advocates cutting it off en- tirely. His remedy is to put the un- |employed into homestead colonies | where they will work in new industries and cultivate gardens. This at a time | of overproduction of industrial prod- ucté and such a “surplus” of agricul- | |tural produce that he orders the destruction of food! This is Roose- velt’s “planned economy!" ‘Thus the whole relief situation is endangered. Millions of workers face stark hunger. No work—no relief— the refusal of the government to pro- vide unemployment insurance. Workers Demand Unemployme! Insurance The movement for unemployment and social insurance ts growing in all sections of the working population. The workers realized that the ir- regular payments of inadequate relief cannot go on any longer. They have witnessed wholesale discrimination, graft and corruption in relief. This is nothing compared to the graft, kick- back and racketeering that are oc- curring in connection with the C. W. A. jobs. Even the federal government has to admit that in the federal ad- ministration itself hundreds of thou- sands of dollars have been misused. Discrimination against the Negro workers in relief and on the C. W. A. jobs has been practiced. Discrimina- tion against foreign-born, single and young workers, who practically re- ceived no relief whatever, except where they put up a stubborn fight. Indifference to the plight of the mil- lions of women workers. Indifference to the ten million children who are starving in this country. ‘The government knows that the movement for unemployment and so- cial insurance is developing in this country! Hence like last year it is Is, | bringing forward proposals to offset the movement for the Workers Un- employment and Social Insurance Bill, the only genuine bill before the work- ers of this country. and controlled by the workers through unemployment insurance com- | miscions composed of rank and file members of workers’ organizations. That unemployment insurance commissions be empowered to establish free employment exchanges for the registration of the workers, the payment of unemploymer$ insurance, the hearing of contested claims for unemploymnt insurangs and appeals from awards made; and be be paid to workers to the amount of not Jess than $10.00 weekly for adult workers, $3.00 for each dependent, through sickness, accident, old age, Resolved, that part-time workers shall receive the difference between their wages and the unemployment insurance benefit. No worker shall be disqualified from receiving unemployment fisurance because he re- fuses to work at wages below what he was formerly receiving or below the prevailing trade union rates in that vicinity, nor shall he or she be disqualified for refusing to work because of strike or unsafe or un- healthful conditions, nor where hours are longer than the usual trade union standards in the particular trade or locality; and be it further Resolved, that an employee shall not be required te accept employ- ment if the establishment where employment is offered is at an un- reasonebie distance from his or her home. clusively to war preparations and | — National Secretary, Unemployed Councils The Workers Bill is perfectly clear. It provides that each and every worker without discrimination shall for the full period of idieness caused by no fault of his or her own, whe- ther for unemployment, part-time, sickness, accident, old age or mater- nity, receive insurance equal to the full average wage of the respective industry in the locality, but at no time shall it be less than $10 a week plus $3 for each dependent. No worker shall be obliged to accept work for which he is not fit, or where a strike is in progress; shafl be he compelled to take work e nor | which is a long distance from his home. The funds shall be raised ex- | clusively through progressive taxa- | tion on all incomes above $5,000, through the use of all war funds, through a capital levy on the wealth | of the multi-ntilionaires and billion- | aires.. The fund shall be controlled | and administered by a commission | elected by workers’ organizations. | This bill is simple, clear and con- cise. Let us explain a bit. The amount of insurance shall be such | that the unemployed may not be| used to lower the condition of the workers in the shops. Therefore, the proposal of the “average wage in the respective industry and locality.” On the other hand, it shall not be al- lowed to descend to an amount that would mean starvation—as some of the codes of the N. I. R. A. do (aundry). Therefore the minimum of $10 a week plus $3 for each de- pendent. For Whole Period of Unemployment Insurance shall continue for the whole period of unemployment. Un- cmployment will remain as long as capitalism exisis. “Five to ten mil- lion will never return to work,” said Roosevelt. Millions work part-time, earning hardly enough to keep body and soul together. Workmen’s com- pensation Jaws contain provisions that make it difficult to secure relief. Old age pensions exist in few states and provide hunger subsistence for the veterans of labor. Provision for maternity does not exist whatever. The demands that the funds be raised exclusively by the employers and the government is based on the fact that the workers are not re- sponsible for unemployment. ‘They want to work, but are denied the right. The capitalists, who have enriched themselves through the ex- ploitation of the labor power of the millions, and the government, which is supposed to consider the welfare of the whole population, shall pro- vide means whereby the masses may live. The proposal that all incomes above $5,000, all war funds and a tax levy on the wealthy shall be used for this purpose ts based on placing the responsibility where it belongs and fromwhich adequate funds may be obtained without any “hardship” on its bearers. Wins. Wide Endorsement The Workers Unemployment and Social Insurance Bill has been en- dorsed by millions of workers and thousands of working class organiza- tions. It has the support of more than 1,400 locals of the A. F. of L., three state federations of labor, numer- ous central labor bodies, independent and T. U. U. L. unions four municipal councils, the masses of workers sup- porting the Unemployed Councils, the Fraternal Federation for Social In- surance, professional groups, ete. To offset this wide sweep of the Workers Bill, various fake unemploy- ment bills have been introduced in the U. 8. congress and State legislatures. In 1933, 29 bills were introduced in the state legislatures.’ A bill was enacted A bill has been introduced in the | i U.S. congress by Representative Can- the following are the pro- all these bills. capabilities. They provide a maxi- mum period of unemployment benefit of 18 weeks (down to 10 weeks in some states), and a minimum insurance benefit of $10 (increased to about $15 in others), and then the unemployed worker has no further claim on. the insurance fund until he can again prove that he has been working 6 months during the previous year. Funds for insurance are to be de- rived from contributions from the workers, the employers, and in some instances from the state. In some bills, provision is made that the cor- porations are exempt from federal taxation for the amount that they pay Demand All War Funds Go to Jobless; Tax On the Rich jinto the unemployment benefit pools (Wagner bill), In the Wisconsin bill, if the employera set up their own in~ surance schemes, they are freed from state control. If they should go bank- rupt or liquidate their business, the worker would be in bad luck. In the other bills the funds are controlled and administered either by the State The “liberals” have their own bill. This bill sponsored by the American Association for Social Security is an- other “model” state bill and prodives that the worker shall receive only 46 per cent of his average wage, but at no time more than $10 a week, for no longer than 26 weeks in a year, This bill, like all the other bills, provides for no insurance in case a worker is discharged for “misconduct,” which means for agitating or for organizing a union; for refusing to break strikes; for going on strike. All the bills in this respect, therefore, are strikebreaking bills. Swope Pian a Swindle Then there is the Swope plan, which was applied in the General Electric plants. According to this plan, the workers and employers pay i a fund, through which the is supposed to be guaranteed $15 a week for the full time of un- employment or part-time. This plan | did not meet: its promises however, for with the discharge of tens of thou- sands of workers in 1930-1, the com- pany soon cut the amount of in- surance to as low as $2 a week and finally discontinued it. Some of the workers had paid into the fund for years, and thus were duped. A. F, of L., 8. P. Split Workers Forces Governor Lehman of New York now proposes a bill of similar character, except that it will be financed only by the individual employers, without the state participating. This puts the workers completely at the mercy of their employers, and represents « strike breaking wage-cutting instru- ment of tremendous power. Governor Lehman is “studying” the bill with leaders of the State Federation of Labor and doubtless will get their ap~ Proval. The Socialist party, which had its own own bill, has forsaken it and gives support to the bills introduced in the state legislatures by the Republicans and Democrats. The A. F, of L lead- ers oppose federal unemployment in- surance on the ground that a federal bill would be declared “unconstitu- tional” by the United States supreme court! The purpose of their stand is to split the forces of the workers in There will be & (Continued on Page Five), Workers to Demand Jobless Insurance at Feb. 5th Meets NEW YORK —February 8 will be a day of gigantic demonstrations throughout the‘eountry, On that day, when the workers’ delegates present the demands of the jobless to the Roosevelt government, workers in every city in the country will dem- onstrate for the passage of the Workers’ Unemployment Insurance Bill. On that day, the workers of every city will demand immediate adequate relief for the unemployed. Those who have been denied relief, and the millions who have registered. and been denied C.W.A. Jobs will de~ mand that the city beable en- ‘They ex- | Bill. Roosevelt to decide it. It is our job to let Roosevelt and the government know that the workers refuse to starve. Plenty of money for war purposes—from the same _ source shall come funds for the unemployed, All local, county councils must get on the job at once. Issue leaflets, ratse the iocal issues, call meetings, mobilize the workers for immediate ' directly or by a commission set up by» $ the state. These bills are nothing but unemployment reserves bills, Can- non’s bill if adopted would not go into operation until 1935. J ow