The Daily Worker Newspaper, April 11, 1934, Page 6

age Six Daily <QWorker FRNTRA, OBGHN COMMUNIST PARTY U.S.A. (SECTION OF COMMUNIST INTEREATIONAD? “America's Onty Working Class Daily Newspaper” FOUNDED 1924 PUBLISHED DAILY, EXCEPT SUNDAY, BY THE COMPRODAILY PUBLISHING CO., ENC., 6 E. 13th Street, New York, N. ¥. Telephone: ALgonquin 4 - Gable Address Washington Bu lath and F & Midwest Buzeay re Nationa) 984, Press Building, D.C. 19l South Wells St., Room 706, Chicago, i. Telephone: Dearborn By Mail except x ear, $6.00; 8 months, 98.50 oa WEDNESDAY, APRIL 11, 1934 { The Cleveland Convention | Guarantees Strengthening Of Mass Work — Right National Convention of the Communist Party, concluded Saturday night in Cleveland, was by far the greatest and most significant in the Party’s history. Gomrade Earl Browder’s report to the convention for the Central Committee, which will appear as a special supplement in next Saturday’s Daily Worker, was a most clear and forceful anaiysis of the problems at present con- feonting the working class movement of our ex- periences and of our tasks. This excellent report im itself would have provided a guarantee for a very fruitful convention. ‘The decisive factor, however, in determining the Outstanding significance of this convention, was the ehanged composition of the delegates and, ahove all, the firm ties which very obviously bound these dele- getes to the masses of the toilers. Taking the re- port of Comrade Browder as the foundation, these delegates brought their experiences from the shops, factories and mines, from the trade unions and the unemployed organizations, from hundreds of strug- gles of the masses for improved conditions, for equality for the Negro people, against fascism and war. It was this reflection of the changed compo- sition of the Party, of the changed relation of the Party to the masses, that furnishes the guarantee that the convention discussion will not remain on paper, but will deeply influence the struggles of the toiling masses during the coming weeks and months. ‘Therein lies the convention's great significance. The convention, with the rich report of Com- rade Browder, with the co-reports of other Central Committee members on special problems, and with the great experiences of the delegates, gained in the fierce class battles of the past year, hammered out the policies, strategy and tactics of the revolutionary working class movement for the next period. T THE same time the new Central Committee, composed of 29 members and six candidates, was charged with the responsibility of more energetically than ever before rallying the Party as a whole for the realization of the convention decisions. To guar- antee the strengthening of Central Committee lead- ership 18 new comrades were drawn into the com- mittee—district and section organizers, trade union leaders, leading comrades in Negro work, workers from the basic industrial centers, etc. The work of winning the masses in the decisive industries—steel, coal, auto, marine, textile, railroad, metal, meat packing, etc.; the strengthening of the revolutionary opposition work in the A. F. of L. unions and the independent unions; the building of the class struggle trade unions of the T, U. U. Li the broadening of revolutionary activities among the unemployed in the struggle for social insurance, for Telief, against forced labor, etc.; the further ex- tension of the Negro liberation struggle; increased attention to the job of winning the young workers and the women; the strengthening the Party’s work among the agricultural laborers and poor farmers— the central tasks in the struggle for the immediate needs of the masses and against fascization and war —will go forward at an increased tempo as a result of the Cleveland convention. 'HE success of the convention, in fact, is itself a refiection of the improved mass work of the Party following the Extraordinary Party Conference in July of last year. The success of the convention, in turn, with the additional new, fresh forces shown to have been reeruited from the basic industries in the past year, is the guarantee for a much more rapid tempo in the realization of the goal set in the Open Letter to the Party members: A mass Party firmly rooted in the basic industries among the most decisive sections of the American working olass, ‘The change in the Party can be seen by the examination of a few of the statistics of the Con- vention: Party membership: 7,545 in 1930; 16,814 in 1933; 24,500 in 1934. Note the relatively increased tempo of growth during the past year as compared to the first three years of the crisis! This, incidentally, is a fitting answer to those who preniaturely sounded the death knell of the Party a year ago, following the frank, penetrating self-criticism of the Open Letter. Convention composition: out of 233 regular dele- gates (the tabulation on the additional 237 fraternal delegates is not completed), 145 were native-born American workers, 86 were foreign-born. There were (included in the above figures) 39 Negro dele- gates and 19 women. Sixty-four per cent of all the delegates were members of trade unions, 98 were from T.U.U.L, unions, 38 from the A. F. of L., amd 18 from inde- pendent unions. Most significant, as showing the change in the Party since the Open Letter, is the industrial com- position of the delegates: steel 17, metal 37, marine 16, railroad 15, mining 17, automobile 8, and textile 9—119 of the delegates directly out of the basic industries of the country! The percentage could have been still higher had it not been for the fact that many workers proposed in the district conven- tions as delegates could not stay away from work for so long a period without losing their jobs. In addition, all other sections of the toiling population were represented, sharecroppers from the South, poor farmers, workers from the less basic industries, unemployed workers, professionals. These figures show that the Party during the past year has definitely embarked on the road charted by the Open Letter. The job now is to drive forward on that road at a greatly increased tempo. * * * Regs convention brought out no signs of self-satis- faction with the beginnings that had been made toward a decisive turn in the Party’s work. On the contrary, the work in the factories, in the trade unions, among the unemployed, in the struggle for Negro rights, in the rural districts, was thoroughly examined with the aim of searching out the mis- takes and shortcomings, with the aim of finding out every fault in our work that hampered or slowed up our struggle to win the majority of the working class for the revolutionary struggle for power under the leadership of the Communist Party. The convention mapped a course for the im~ provement of all phases of our mass work, again stressing the need for the main concentration of our attention, energies and resources on the Chicago, Detroit, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and New York dis- tricts, and on the steel, metal, coal, auto, marine, railroad and textile industries, Particular stress was placed on increased work in the A. F. of L. unions, on the setting up of organ- ized opposition groups there of the militant workers, and on the establishment of independent Commu- nist leadership in the struggle of these workers for the improvement of their conditions and against the strikebreaking policies of the A. F. of L. bureau- cracy. The many problems raised and discussed at the convention will be brought to the Party members and the readers of the Daily Worker in special articles each day. We urge every worker, every comrade to follow these articles closely. Take them up in every Party unit, in every Party committee, in every fraction. Discuss concretely how these decisions can best be carried out, how Party mem- bers can be mobilized, how the masses can be rallied for the line of the Party. The Party discussion is now closed The convention has settled the most basic problems before the Party. Now is the time to con- centrate all energies on the carrying out of all the tasks set by the convention. The convention showed that the Party has moved forward. The report of Comrade Browder, the examination of our experiences by the delegates, and finally the decisions of the convention lay the basis for the overcoming of our weaknesses and shortcomings. Armed with the powerful weapons given us by our Cleveland convention, the whole Party as one united force must now move forward on all fronts, The goal of a revolutionary mass Party of the toiling masses is within our reach! Study and energetically apply the convention decisions! Forward to improved mass work, particularly in the factories and the trade unions! Motor Products Co, | The agreement also provides for de-| considerable applause. But as dis- partment representatives to adjust | cussion developed and workers took all disputes about | the company’s time study men. The | concrete posals | company will undoubtedly try to| a co) Gases Piece rates with| the floor and demanded action on Workers Union, Smith was more Strike Ends; Men Face New Sellouts (Continued from Page 1) had already agreed to raise wages of unskilled from 44 cents an hour minimum to 50 for men, and from 35 to 40 cents for women. Cal Hasty Meeting To put over the new agreement, A. F. of L. leaders and Labor Board members resorted to the maneuver of calling a hasty meeting at 6 o'clock last night, attended by only. around 250 workers. McGrady, using the Roosevelt club, hammered away at the workers. He was supported by William Collins, A. F. of L. or-| ganizer, and Richard L. Byrd, “la- bor” representative on the automo- bile labor board. As a result of ending of the Motor Products strike, 18,000 Hudson work- ers are also returning to work today and tomorrow. Three Hudson plants were shut down yesterday on the pretext that the Motor Products strike had tied up their production, but actually to prevent the Hudson workers from also striking. However, the strike of 800 Detroit, Mich., Stove Co. workers holds solid despite attacks of police armed with clubs and tear gas bombs on strik- ers. The stove workers, who are striking under the leadership of the Mechanics Educational Society, with Militants directing the struggle, are demanding a 20 per cent increase in pay and a 36-hour, 5-day week. Lay Basis for Sellout ‘The agreement made in the Mo- tor Products strike lays the basis for a real seliout by A. F. of L. lead- ers of the main demands of the| strikers, which are not met in the terms of settlement. One of the main points in the | agreement is setting up an arbitra- tion committee which shall decide} all disputes, with the men remaining | convert these department represen-| | tatives into a company union while! j the militant workers are planning | to raise the demand for rank and file elections. Some Motor Products workers also point out that the 10 per cent in- crease will mean nothing in those departments where rates have been cut in the past few weeks. They only restore the old scale. How the agreement will work out in prac- tice is still uncertain, but it is clear that the basic grievances remain unsettled; that everything will be done to prevent future strikes, and that the A. F. of L. leaders will try to play even more open policing roles to keep the workers down. The original demands included 75 | cents an hour minimum for un- skilled and 90 cents for semi-skilled; | and $1.10 for skilled. Smith Rejects United Action Proposals for united action by the | Mechanics Educational Society of | America, the Auto Workers Union | and the A. F. of L, rank and file to win the Motor Products strike and convert the Hudson lay-off into a | strike, were rejected at a mass | meeting in Deutches Haus last night by Matthew Smith, general secre- tary of the M.ES.A., despite strong sentiment of the workers present in favor of the proposals. About 500 strikers, a big propor- tion of the members of the MESA. attended the meeting, which was called by their organization at the initiative of the MES.A. Motor | Products strikers. The proposals for united action were made by J, Wil- son, national organizer of Local 7, MESA. Wilson proposed a mass meeting | to be called at Arena Gardens and organization of mass picketing with rank and file negotiations commit- tee. | When Smith first spoke, he de- nounced the A. F. of L, leaders, and and more compelled to unmask himself. | He declared that not all A. F. of L, officials are betrayers, and that Collins, who has been playing the Jeading role in efforts to sell out the Motor Products strike is OK, but when he went to Washington, he got mixed up with the others, Wilson proposed everybody go on the picket line next morning, but Smith opposed this, saying this would result in a fight among the workers, Typical Demagogy This was typical of the demagogic arguments used by Smith to avoid a real fight against the sellout plans of the A. F. of L. leaders. On the question of the joint meet- |ing in Arena Gardens, Smith said |he would have to take this up with \the MESA. district committee, | which does not meet until Friday. | He also launched into a virulent attack on the Auto Workers Union. |In contrast to the reception he re- ceived earlier in the evening, Smith’s later remarks drew no ap- Pplause, In the midst of the meeting came news of the agreement negotiated by the A. F. of L. leaders and the national automobile labor board, and McGrady, ending the Motor Products strike, Despite Smith’s opposition, the meeting voted to go on the picket lines next morning and explain to the workers what happened at the meeting. While it did not succeed in organizing immediately united action of the A. F. of L., MES.A. | and Auto Workers Union, it marked |an important step forward in the exposure of Smith, who is one of the craftiest misleaders in the American labor movement, having learned from the British Independ- ent Labor Party, of which he was once a member, how to use radical phrases to mask the most treacher- at work while decision is pending.! fired radical phrases which drew|ous and reactionary deeds. ‘ ‘ Students to Strike Aga Bankruptey of | ROOSEVELT’S NEW HIRED MAN |rupt with respect to its for-| DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, WED! DAY, APRIL 11, 1934 inst War Friday at Ll Nazi Germany Points to War Gold Reserve Waning, Schacht Threatens | Full Moratorium BERLIN, April 10. — The| German government has prac- | tically declared itself bank- eign debts, Dr. Hjalmar Schacht, president of the Reichs- bank, told representatives of Ger- many’s private creditors, meeting at Basie, Switzerland, that a complete moratorium on cash payment of debts was to be expected. This situation further accentu-| ates the isolation into which the Nazi policies have driven Germany; but it is also being used as a whip to compel the extension of further oredits to Germany in protection of old debts. KK provides no release, however, from the crushing burden placed by the German ruling class on the masses, and is no fulfillment of} Hitler’s “promise” to shake that burden off. On the contrary, Dr. Schacht insisted Germany wanted to pay, and asked for international assistance to sweat the necessary sums out of the German masses. Germany’s gold reserve has dwindled to $97,265,000, largely through importation of raw ma- terials for war preparations, in the form of metals, chemicals and cot- ton. Germany’s bankrupt position immensely intensifies the danger of an early war, which the biggest German capitalists see as the only means to increase their business, while utilizing the greatly intensi- fied exploitation of workers in war- time to increase their profits, while the aims of the war itself would be to add new territory to the field of German capitalist exploitation. rin bce tas a Cops Help Fascists Attack Workers Join Attack on Chicago Anti-Tashnak Meet (Daily Worker Midwest Bureau) CHICAGO, April 10—Contrary to the statements in the local press, most of the wounded were in the ranks of the attackers when two hundred Armenian workers here de- fended their anti-white guard dem- onstration against the combined onslaught of three hundred Tash- nak (Armenian fascists) members and local police Sunday, in front of the West End Women’s Club at 37 South Ashland Ave. Fifty police, swinging clubs, flanked by the fascists, who openly displayed guns, blackjacks and knives, were beaten off by the work- ers, who then retreated in orderly fashion. Five workers, four of them women, including two who carried babies in their arms, were arrested and held under $2,500 bond each, charged with assault. They will appear in the Felony Court at 26th St. and California Ave., Tuesday, May 8. The Armenian fascists had called the “historical meeting of all lovers of the fatherland,” at the Women’s Club, but were unable to mobilize support from the masses of Armeni- ans here. Those at the meeting were gathered from all sections of this State and Indiana. ‘The workers’ counter-demonstra- tion was called by a United Front Anti-Tashnak Committee. Tashnak is the same Armenian linked with white guard and Nazi organizations and fascist organiza- tions, that recently murdered Arch- bishop Tourain, head of the Arme- nian church, because the prelate carried owt the demands of his church members that he support Soviet Armenia, By Burek WORIRERS FIRED BY 7,453,000 Copies of Stalin’s “Leninism” Bought in 8 Years (Special to the Daily Worker) MOSCOW, April 10 (By Radio) — One of the most widely read books in all history is Joseph Stalin's “Fundamentals of Leninism,” it is revealed on the tenth anniversary of the historic series of lectures by Stalin at Sverdlov University, which were published under that title in 1926. This book, which became one of the main weapons of Marxist-Len- inism education after the death of Lenin, has sold 17,453,000 copies in editions printed in the Soviet Union, in Russian, Ukrainian, Georgian, Uzbek, Armenian, Jewish, Finnish, Tadjik, Greek, Chinese and other languages. Outside the Soviet Union, it has been published im hundreds of thousands of copies in more than 20 Huropean lenguages, besides Japanese, Mongolian, Korean, Ara- bic, Pendjab and other non-Euro- pean languages, making it the most widely read book of modern times. The tenth edition is now being prepared for publication, in a Rus- sian edition of 1,000,000 copies, and 500,000 copies in 20 other languages. Besides the various articles on theoretical questions in this book, the new edition will also include Stalin’s “The International Signifi- cance of the October Revolution.” The whole Soviet press today is de- voting articles to the anniversary of the delivery of these lectures, stressing the tremendous impor- tance of these works of Stalin. New Haven Trades Council Supports Anti-War League Two Anti-War Meetings in New Haven, Friday NEW HAVEN, Conn., April 10.— The New Haven Central Trades Council, city center of the A. F. of L. unions, has voted to recom- mend to all its locals that they hear representatives of the American League Against War and Fascism, and take up the question of affilia- tion to the League, following a meeting with M. Sapir, New Haven secretary of the League. Two anti-war mass meetings will be held in New Haven on Friday, April 13, one at Yale University at 3 p.m., a second one on the Central Green at 5 p.m. Following the sale of the League’s magazine, “Fight,” and a distribu- tion of leaflets in front of the Win- chester Arms Co. plant, the Win- chestef. workers have asked that “Fight” be sold there regularly. The Y.M.C.A. clubs of New Haven have voted to support the League, which has been given a meeting place in the Y.M.C.A. building. 6 N.Y. Young Circle Groups Affiliate To Anti-War Body Biggest Y.M.H.A. Votes to Join Anti-Fascist, Anti-War League NEW YORK.—Six New York cir- cles of the Young Circle League, junior body of the Socialist Work- men’s Circles, have voted to affiliate with the Youth Section of the Amer- ican League Against War and Fas- cism, over the heads of their na- tional leaders, who carry out the Socialist Party’s policy of sabotaging the League’s struggle against war and fascism. The circles which have affiliated are the Cleos, Arcs, Robert Owens, Upton Sinclair, Vanguard and Car- lyle circles. The clubs of the Y. M. H. A. at 92nd St. and Lexington Ave., the largest Y. M H. A. in America, voted to affiliate with the Youth Section of the League at an. anti-war con- ference Sunday night, attended by 394° delegates, representing 1,700 members. The conference set up a continu- ation committee, one member of which has taken a place on the per- manent educational body of the in- stitution, to carry on ati-war work. Nazi-Scottsboro Protest Parade in Baltimore Sunday Preparatory Conference Called for Tonight by the I. L. D. BALTIMORE, April 10.—Protest against the brutal torture of Ernst Thaelmann, German Communist leader, by the Nazi butchers, and of the Scottsboro boys and Angelo Herndon at the hands of their Southern jailers, and the mass fight for their release, will reach a high point this Saturday evening with a mighty torchlight parade and dem- onstration through the streets of Baltimore. The action is being organized by the International Labor Defense, which has invited all organizations and individuals “of all political and social beliefs” to participate. A call sent out by the I. L. D. urges all organizations to set up a parade committee of five to help prepare the demonstration on the broadest united front basis. A special pa- rade conference has been called for this Wednesday evening at 7:30 at 1204 E. Baltimore St., where final plans and future actions will be discussed and decided. Individual workers and sympathizers are urged to form Committees of Action in the shops and neighborhoods. Organ- izations are requested to donate two or more dollars to help finance the preparations for the parade. Meanwhile, meetings are being held throughout the city to mobilize the widest support for the protest action, The Scottsboro Branch of the I. L. D., composed mainly of longshoremen, is holding meetings on the waterfront. The Ruby Bates Branch will hold an open-air meet- ing this Wednesday night at Law- rence and Calhoun Sts., at which Joe Benson, district organizer of the I. L. D., will speak. White Captain Gets 3 Months forSlayingNegro BRUSSELS, (By Mail).—The captain of a Congo river-boat has just been sentenced to three months imprisonment for the murder of a Negro worker. This sentence is tontrasted to another recent one of five years’ impri- sonment imposed on a_ native charged with breaking a window pane and a similar one for “jost- ling a European.” A. M. | Demonsiration ‘Planned from ‘Coast to Coast Mass Meetings Called in Many Colleges by N.S.L., L.LD. NEW YORK.—Mass meet ings against war, and a one- | hour strike against war, at 11 a.m. Friday, April 13, will be carried out by the students of many universities, colleges, and. high schools throughout the coun- | try, the Youth Section of the Amer. ican League Against Fascism an-, nounced yesterday. The one-hour strike is being or- ganized by the National Student League, the League for Industrial Democracy, with the support of the youth section of the League Against War and Fascism, the Young Com- munist League and other youth or- ganizations. Five colleges in California, in- cluding the University of California, the University of Southern Cali- fornia, and the Los Angeles Junior College will carry out the strike on Friday, John Hopkins university, more, will strike. At Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, there wiil be a mass anti-war meeting on April 13, and an anti-war conference on April 14, At Ohio State University, Colum- bus, Ohio, where 7 students were recently expelled for Rgds Seg R. O. T. C. drill, there will a strike on Friday. At Missouri State University, there will be a state-wide anti-war conference, April 14 and 15, the auspices of the Social Problems Club, and supported by the Youth Section of the League Against War and Fascism. This conference will also be called on to take wp the fight for the reinstatement of Bu- gene Ringo, recently expelled for objecting to R.O.T.C. drill. In New York, students of Colum- bia University, City College, Brook- lyn College, Long Island University, New York University, Seth Low College, Clinton High School, Lin- coln High School, will strike at 11 a.m. Friday, and the students of New Lots Evening School, Brook- lyn, will strike during the third and fourth periods at night. At City College, Norman Tallen- tire, Secretary of the New York City Central Committee of the League, will address a mass meeting at 11 a.m. Friday in Great Hall. At Columbia, Professor Margaret Schlauch of the League will address @ mass anti-war meeting in Room 309, Havemeyr Hall, at 8 p. m. to- night. In Clinton High, Bronx, there will be a mass meeting at 2:30 p. m. to- day in the school auditorium in preparation for the strike. In Lincoln High, where a student, conference last week voted strike, the principal decided to stop all classes at the strike period and turn them over to a discussion of the war danger. At New Lots Evening High, where the Sudents’ General Organization voted strike, the principal arranged for a C.W.A. concert during the strike period. The students have been called on to boycott the con- cert, and to rally in a mass anti-war meeting outside the school during the strike period. Dock Strike in Brazil; Railway Strike Broken RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil, April 10—Longshoremen of the Brazilian Lloyd Navigation Company went on. f strike yesterday, demanding higher wages. bs A strike of 22,000 railway workers on the British-owned Leopoldina Railway, who walked out Saturday demanding wage increases, was broken by their reformist leaders, who accepted a promise of President. Vargas that the Ministry of Labor would work out a plant to “meet their demands within reason.” Baki- Convention Wires Its Greetings to Angelo Herndon in Prison By HARRY GANNES ‘RADE union questions were avidly discussed at the Eighth National Convention of the Party, recently concluded in Cleveland, Auto workers, needle workers, miners, seamen, Japanese agricul- tural workers, each in turn kept the close attention of the conven- tion relating the experiences of the Party in their industries in winning the workers for the revolutionary way out, A particularly striking feature is the large number of new, capable leading Negro workers who have come to the forefront. As a unit, the convention called for a relent- less fight on white chauvinism and petty-bourgeois nationalism and re- fo 5 Dealing with the auto strike sit- uation, Comrade John Schmies, dis- trict organizer in Detroit, analyzed the significance of Roosevelt’s vici- ous “settlement” in the threaten- ing general auto strike. “Did they entirely check the strike movement?” queried Schmies. “No. The bourgeoisie was compelled, as a result, chiefly, of the work of the Party, the work of the Auto Work- ers Union, to give increases in wages in many factories, including Ford’s. “However, we must register that we have failed on the whole up to the present to give sufficient leadership to the readiness on the part of the workers, to struggle.” He laid bare the failure in con- centration work, failures to put into action the Open Letter, which were at the foundation of the inability to lead the struggles of the workers when the huge strike clouds were hanging over the auto industry. “We permitted ourselves,” he de- clared, “after first beginning con- centration, to deviate from the cor- rect policy of concentration. We carried it on at best in a superficial and mechanical way. “Our shortcomings stand out the sharper in the face of the experi- ence that we have gained during the threatening general auto strike for building of the Party.” Among the detailed proposals given to the convention by Com- rade Schmies for overcoming the failures in the Detroit district were: The placing in the forefront more sharply the building of the Auto Workers Union; continue united front activities; work within the A. F. of L.; the consolidating and building of nuclei in auto factories; the recruiting of the best and most militant auto workers for the Com- munist Party. For the first time in her life, a white Southern textile woman, del- egate to the convention, stepped before so large an audience to speak and make a motion. That proposal was that the convention send a telegram of revolutionary greetings to Angelo Herndon, Negro class war prisoner, imprisoned in Fulton Tower Prison, Atlanta, Georgia, ser- ving a 20-year sentence for his revo- lutionary activity. The whole convention rose and cheered Comrade Herndon after the reading of the following telegram: “Hundreds of Negro and white delegates, assembled at the Eighth National Convention of the Com- munist Party, U. S. A., send heart- jest revolutionary greetings to our imprisoned young comrade. The convention is preparing for lead- ership of the struggle against hun- ger, fascism and war program of capitalism with the sharpest em- phasis placed on the struggle for Negro liberation. The entire Party pledges a ten-fold increase in mass struggle to gain your release from the Southern lynch prison.” Ben Gold, leader of the Needle Trades Workers Industrial Union, was announced to speak amid a storm of handclapping. “In the final analysis,” stated Comrade Gold, “the determining factor is to what degree, to what extent do the leading comrades make a conscious effort to carry on a consistent and persistent strug- gle for the correct, party line, and with what results?” The Party will have to pay closer attention to the trade union frac- tions, said Comrade Gold. “The sharp criticism of the Seventh Con- vention of our mistakes have helped us very much,” he said. “We suf- fered from the two mistakes of not working within the reformist unions, the right mistake; and the leftist mistake of only calling on the work- ers to leave these unions and join us, Since then we have corrected these mistakes and are making Progress.’ He proposed two methods of rais- ing the political level of the mem- bers in the revolutionary trade unions. They are (1) Open Party meetings, where Party leaders will come to take up trade union prob- lems from time to time, and discuss the role of the Party; (2) A method must be carried out, of leaders com- ing down to open fraction meetings of the Party and non-Party mem- bers, to discuss with them the prob- Jems of their unions and the strug- gles of the entire country. “This means,” he emphasized, “the bring- ing into closer contact the struggles of the union with the revolutionary struggles of our Party and of the whole working class.” A Negro woman delegate from Michigan made a stirring speech on the struggle against white chauvin- ism and petty-bourgeoisie national- aan — “We do not have to look upon the women question as the capital- ists do. We must look to them as fighters, soldiers side by side with the men comrades in the battle for the victory being led by the Com- munist Party.” Comrade Toth, an experienced fighter in building revolutionary op- positions in the A. F. of L. next spoke. He pointed out it was im- portant “to examine and draw the necessary conclusions from the re- cent strike struggles conducted by the rank and file in the A. F. of L. unions over the head of the labor bureaucracy.” “tn most of these strikes,” he said, “especially where we have no organ- ized opposition, we find the mislead- ers in the forefront to betray. This makes it important for us once more to realize the importance of build- ing the opposition inside these local unions.” - Comrade Toth detailed the fac- tors showing the growing radicali- zation of the masses within the A. F. of L., which made it more and more imperative to intensify the building of revolutionary opposition, “There is on the part of certain comrades,” he warned, “against the correct line of the Discuss Factory and Trade Union Work at 8th Convention e Schmies, Gold, Leaders of Opposition Work \in A. F. of L. Speak Party on working in A. F. of L unions. “The success of this work depends on the cooperation and the support given by the central committee, the district and section committees. In the success of this work we will have tens of thousands of workers in the A. F. of L, unions drawn into a revolutionary role, under the leadership of the Communist Party, and we will bring greater masses into conflict against the betraying bureaucrats.” In trade union work the center of attention was drawn to the two dangers: failure to work within the A. F. of L., and against tendencies that might lead toward liquidations of the revolutionary trade unions. Comrade MacKawain, Negro del- egate from the New York District, in his contribution to the discussion, told how the Convention clarified him on some very basic issues, es- pecially the question of the fight against white chauvinism and petty- bourgeois nationalism. “I know that there existed a period of confusion in Harlem. Now I can see it clearly. I have been confused and I am sure that other Negro comrades have been also, “I want to say the Par has to do something against the two dan- gers, white chauvinism, and petty- bourgeois nationalism. Both are dangerous in our organization. ‘They have to be cleaned out and wiped out or we wont have a Soviet America! es RIL / \ i { i