The Daily Worker Newspaper, May 18, 1934, Page 4

Page Four Everett Marine Worker Describes May Day March By a Marine Worker Correspondent EVERETT, Wash the lon; n By the United Comm. of Action vEV\ YORK.—“By deeds we jiation of Western Union ees in the recent use ers’ militancy in New York Quite a few of the employees >| had thought that alt the A. W. U. E. seemed impotent when our interests were at stake, never- it was not a “company These illusions have been swept The aw lowly” messengers, pur- kept even out of the A. were exploited merci- There were Western Union of- Commun messengers com- shirts, ca: mitt mpardonable” crime then on o by organizing an independent flag and on union to fight for the betterment of their conditions. Their appear- flag. Then came banners and pla- cards calling for the support by the workers of the Unemployment In- surance Bill; Down With Fascism; R. A.; Free Tom y more. the code authorities, exposing the vicious exploitation by the com- pany, electrified the workers of the telegraph industry. Down With the Mooney and “fellow mes- s 215 blocks long,| Bouyed on by the band, but the sengers’ strike in Minneapolis and corn in good and under the able guid- e streets and id leadership of the Office Sidewalks effi Everyone in the parade held his head high, showing the world he was proud of the ideals for which the Red Flag stands. Hurrah for May Day! K Union, they rallied hun- dreds of messengers in preparation for a strike. In desperation, the company Played its trump card. The A. W. U. E. lackeys, at the command of aapees the company officials, herded the Docked for Lateness | messengers into the A. W. U. E. & ae | for the same reason. Because Western Union| What should be our lesson? We | must all do our part in arousing Head Hogs the Elevator | our fellow employees from the | lethargy in which they have been By a Telegraph Worker Correspondent | lulled by the poisonous fumes of NEW YORK.—Just a short time company unionism. We must come ago there were perhaps eight of us | to the meetings of our locals and ance in Washington, D. C., before ; DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, FRIDAY, MAY 18, 1934 Calls for Rank and File Struggle for Vacetions With Pay and Other members headed of rank and file ad a leaflet, “Demand the Return of the 10 per cent Wage Cut.” It found ready response in the minds of| its readers. This leaflet was; passed from hand to hand, and its contents from mouth to mouth. | Branch offices buzzed with com-/} ments as to “why shouldn’t we} get it?” Morse operators flashed | it over their keys. Simplex op-| erators repeated it when the| vatchful eyes of the supervisor | was in another direction. Lines- men discussed it in the lonely} stretches of the hinterland. The} demand was slowly taking shape. Several locals passed resolutions demanding an increase in pay. It reached the ears of the company officials. A quick survey indi- cated the rising discontent. It was decided to stem the tide by throwing a cop. The five per cent was decided upon. The company union, A. W. U. E., had nothing to do with it. They were merely | called in to affix their signatures | formally to the announcement. Too long has the company union | ruled the roost at our expense. We must expose it in the light! posed | we realiza Important Demands of the facts. Only in this fashion can we carry on the fight that we so nobly won with the early return of the five per cent. We must and can win vacations with full pay; double time for Sunday; return of all furloughed employees; return of full disability and si ness benefits; stopping of demo-| tions and transfers at the whim of the officials, as well as other im- | portant demands. To further our common fight, | we must have publicity da medium of common expression. The ideal vehicle would be a shop | paper, by and for the telegraph workers. It is the intention of this committee to inaugurate one | as soon as we get your support. If you are at all interested in your job and the working condi- tions surrounding it, if you are at all conscious of the real need of unity through which demands can be won, you will give us your support. We are rank and file employees as yourself. Our jobs are the only source of income. But the “bad” breaks we get so far was because of the lack of any such unity. We appeal to all sincere fellow “faithful” Western ion employes | raise our demands on the floor. | We must. organize discussion | groups in our offices, in our gangs, in the traffic department, wher- ever we may be. Get to know | your fellow employees. The sense | of unity and strength will encour- age us to march forward. The recent return of approxi- | mately five per cent reduction in pay (effective April 16) was, in no doubt, forced through by the | efforts of this committee. Why | this sudden kindness? It cer- | tainly could not have been due |to the zeal of the officialdom of in an elevator, waiting to be taken up to the slave dens, when the elevator starter asked us all to step out and take another car. Behold our surprise when a man walked into the emptied car, and is taken up, while we wait for “the next car.” Several of us were try- ing to get back to work on time, as we are only allowed 15 minutes for a “short,” and the elevator serv- ice is punk enough without being unceremoniously dumped out of elevators to allow a person a private elevator. Because we had to wait for the next elevator, several of us| the A. W. U. E. Did not Messrs. were docked five minutes for re-| Burton and Elsden tell us re- porting back late. peatedly that the best we could The man who happened to take | hope for was possible negotiations the “private” elevator was none| in November? other than our president, Mr. White.| The Committee of Action, com- the He CONDUCTED BY HELEN LUKE OPPORTUNITY TO ESTABLISH) Just a reminder: Anna Schultz is CORRESPONDENCE WITH Serres (May 18) at the le Bronx and Workers’ .Club, SOVIET WOMEN 432 Claremont Parkway, at a meet- Six women workers of the Soviet|ing sponsored by the Women’s Union have sent us letters in @/Councils. This meet is one of the group, in order to begin a corre-| series of meetings being held as spondence with us, their American | part of the campaign in prepara- sisters. Last Wednesday, Iriaida|tion for the Women’s Anti-War Labanova, member of the Central| Congress in Paris, July 30. Executive Committee of the U. S.! We are most anxious to hear S. R., factory worker and social| what plans other organizations are voluntary assistant to the Chair-|making throughout the country to man of the City Council in Kos-| support this immensely important tromski, wrote about her life before | congress. and after the October Revolution, | Pech Ie Rar AON showing that now, so far from being} a > a half-starved, overworked factory) Can You Make "Em slave and abused domestic drudge, | ? as formerly, she now works short | Yourself? hours, enjoys economic independ- | ence and cecurity, lives in good | Patten 1674 is available in sizes quarters, and takes an active and | 14, 16, 18, 20, 32, 34, 36, 38 and 40. responsible part in the administra- | Size 16 takes 3% yards 36-inch fab- tion of the government of the | ric. Illustrated step-by-step sew- Workers’ Republic. ing instructions included. Now, a weaver, Gerasimova, tells about her life before and after the revolution: My life was not any better. I, K. P, Gerasimova, am working at the Krasnovaljhski textile factory, In Yomna, Ivanovo Province, since 1910. As a 15-year-old juvenile I worked nine hours a day. My beg- garly wages did not suffice to pay my distant cousins for food and lodging, paying even at the lowest rate. To this miserable life were added fines and cursing by the Administration. Only after the | October Revolution was I able to breathe freely. I am at present | working as a weaver on an auto- | matic loom. I have passed my technical examination, getting the mark “perfect.” Was eight times given premiums at the factory and nine times at the competi- tions held for the best weaver and assistant of the Province, where I was awarded the third Province premium. I attended a preparatory course for social work in the women’s dele- gates’ course of our factory. I am studying in a Soviet Party school three days out of five, raising my} technical, political and cultural level. I was elected as social voluntary assistant of the Chairman of the Kineshenski District Executive Committee by the workers’ organ- izations of factories. My wish to work in the State apparatus is very great. I am in all ways trying in my spare time from work in the factory and studies, to learn the work of the District Executive Com- mittee and to carry out with honor the tasks entrusted to me. For the short space of two months I| have already handled two matters! | and got to know the work of three! | , departments. Working women who wish to | Send FIFTEEN CENTS (15) in write to any of the six comrades (Coins or stamps (coins preferred) who have written to us may ad- | for this Anne Adams pattern. Write ° iven |Plainiv name, address and_ style fn thelr stories (adding USSR), | Humber, BE SURE TO STATE THE or send their letters to the Daily | SIZE. “Worker to be forwarded in a Address orders to Daily Worker bundle, Additional letters will ap- | Pattern Department, 243 West 17th pear tomorrow. Street, New York City, 4 fy By a Worker Correspondent PORTLAND, Me. — The Dirigo Fish Co., Frank Willard, the Port- land Fish Co., Harris Co., and the Ramsdell Packing Co. practically control the fishing industry of our town. It is actually run by a trust. They usually pay the fishermen 2 to 344c a pound of fish less than in Boston. If a boat loaded with fish docks at the Union Wharf owned. by Mr. Willard and the men have been offered 4c a pound or even 2c, though the price may be much higher, they will not get a cent more for their fish anywhere else. Mr. Willard picks the telephone up and tells the other companies of his offer, and that is that. This has been the practice of the| last 35 years. The companies own the men, body and soul, by extend- ing credit, supplying them with all the outfit they need and charging them plenty of interest. There have been cases where men, after work- ing years for a company, not only lost their boats in the end, but their homes also. The men are not organized. “What can we do?” they say. “What they-give us, we've got to take.” If you speak with Mr.- Frank Willard he’ll inform you that busi- ness is terrible. The boats, he'll complain, are doing nothing. At the same time he takes out five or six boats to fit them out with new Diesel engines, each one costing be- tween $11,000 to $30,000. The Union Wharf, the sardine factory, the storage place and most of the fishing fleet belong to Mr. Willard. He gets paid $1 per day by each boat for wharfing, he also gets paid for the use of the scale and takes 25 per cent of the gross of each catch for the use of the vessel, besides 10 per cent of the gross for the trawl gear. An average crew will in one year pay out 10 times the worth of the gear but it will always belong to! the owners of the boat. A string of gear will last 6 or 7 years but the 10 per cent collection for each trip will never cease until the gear is worn out; and when another one is installed, the collection goes on. every vessel in Casco Bay, by sup- plying the men and the boats with the general outfit. The Ramsdell Packing Co., sends out a careaway to unload the boat.) The careaway is supposed to carry 1,200 bushels, but carries in reality 15-16 hundred, and then Mr. Rams- dell will say there was only 1,100 bushels to each load, and that’s that again, Western Union Committee of Action Organizes Fight on Company Union employees to make any contribu- tions they see fit, to the under- signed Committee in care of this paper. Until your support warrants the establishment of a shop paper, we are utilizing this “Worker Corre-|local press, as in similar cases, never | spondence” page as an interchange of our daily experiences, ters will be turned over to the committee. Signatures will be kept confidential, but anonymous, Let- ters written by sincere workers will be published as space permits. Onward to the realization of a real Independent Telegraph Work- ers Union! UNITED COMM. OF ACTION EDITOR’S NOTE: We have been publishing letters from mes- senger boys and other telegraph employes for a long period of time, and will welcome any ad- ditional correspondents who wish to make use of the Worker Cor- respondence Section. We usually publish these letters on Fridays, and ask that letters reach us by the previous Tuesday. We would appreciate concrete facts on conditions of work, progress in organization, and victories gained through struggle with the employers. We carefully guard the identi of the writer, and no names appear with the let- ters unless we are authorized to publish them. We will be glad to put any employee of the ‘LOAN SHARKS PREY ON ===" PORTLAND FISHERMEN now being organized. NOTE: | We publish letters every Friday | from workers in the transporta- | tion and communications indus- tries—railroad, marine, surface | lines, subway, elevated lines, ex- press companies, truck drivers, taxi drivers, etc—and from tie communications industries — post office, telephone, telegraph, etc. We urge workers from these in- dustries to write us of their con- | ditions of work, and their strug- gles to organize. Please get these letters to us by Tuesday of each week. Penn RR. Workers Pay 25c For One Hour in Flophouse By a Group of Dining Car Cooks and Waiters LONG ISLAND CITY, N. Y— We've got to the point where we have to do something about condi- tions among the Dining Car Cooks and Waiters on the Penn. R. R. We're still dead-heading at night without pay, even though our agreement between the Penn. and the Brotherhood calls for three hours reporting time for dead-head runs. In addition, now they're dead- heading all runs at night instead of having some dead-head runs during the day. In this way they save the wages of the crews because they have to pay for dead-head day runs, When we go out we get a return assignment on paper but it does not mean anything, when we get to out of town points, especially Wash- ington and Pittsburgh. Just as soon as we get in the hands of these agents, these assignments don’t mean a thing. They may hold us over all day without pay and then send us wherever they feel like. In this way they keep us hanging around in suspense on our own time and have saved the expense of a day dead-head run by dead-head- ing us at night. Then no matter how long they hold us over without pay at points, holding us as long as they please, they make us pay 25¢ a night for lodging at the company flop house. The Harris Co. owns one-tenth of These places are terrible. No heat, not sufficient blankets, so that men have dies from sleeping in these quarters and cars. Both Butler and Bell died from sleeping in these places. While we're forced to stay in these quarters, we don’t even get the benefit of a night’s sleep. We must be in quarters at 11:00 o’clock if the train has arrived and some- times they call us for emergency duty as early as one hour after we come in. In this way even though we only slept one hour, the 25 cent charge still remains and is deducted from our wages, ie a Editorial Note: In this case, to win better conditions the Dining Car workers should join the Brotherhood and should make every attempt to bring in every regular, every regular extra and every extra man on line. Once the men are in, they should immedi- ately foree new elections of com- mitteemen and should be careful to nominate their own rank and file men for these offices. In the past, the Penn. has made too many nominations for committee- men with the result that the com- mitteemen didn’t fight. From the first meeting, all rank and file workers who join should fight on the floor for a militant fighting policy for the return of reporting time pay for dead-head runs and for abolition of the 25c sleeping charge, All let-| Shaw & Thompson | Workers Strike By a Worker Correspondent PORTLAND, Me.—It is about 10 days since the men of Shaw & Thompson's Plate Glass Works went out on strike. Their demands are: 40 hours straight and the re- storation of the 1929 scale. The mentioned a word about it, The men worked there for the last five and six and sometimes 10 years. Until 1929 they used to earn between $30 and $40 a week, but that was in the prosperity years. At first a 25 per cent cut was put | into effect, and then more cuts fol- | lowed, until the men were made to work for $12 a week. Burdened with |large families and prices going up, the men, though very conservative, had no choice but strike. They only now begin to realize the unbearable | conditions they are working under in_this sweatshop. Though the code calls for a 40 hour week, the men were obliged to be available in the shop all seven days of the week and some weeks put in as much as 50 and 55 hours, but were told never to punch the cards over 40 hours. That is how Shaw & Thompson made $10,000 profit last year. At Farley's, a similar factory in | Portland, the men were cut to $3 a week, They put up a kick. One of them walked down to the Cham- ber of Commerce and complained to the N.R.A. Board. As soon as that man reached the shop, Mr. Farley informed him that he knew all about his visit to the Chamber of Commerce and warned him to give it up, but the men stuck together and won. They are getting now be- tween $20 and $25 and work only five days a week. The workers of Shaw & Thomp- son will surely win their fight if they'll only stick together. The next thing to do is: those men of the two shops that went. through the same experience should get to- gether and form a union which will protect their rights and fight their battles, Gov't Railroad Pays $14.85 Per Week in Alaska By a Worker Correspondent NENANA, Alaska—The govern- ment-owned and operated Alaska railroad, wherein they put to work | on the road an extra surfacing gang | of men, paid wages of 49!3¢ an hour for a 30-hour week. It was possible for a man to earn $14.85 per week if he worked a full week. weather permitting. They charged each man $10.60 per week for board, | leaving his net weekly earnings | $4.35. They were obliged to board in the boarding car. The rate of board charged them was as high as it was during the construction period of the road in war-time when the price of every- thing was sky-high. Blt the men at that time would draw down a monthly pay-check of from $120 | to $180 a month, I can assure that there was none of that surfacing crew singing the praises of Presi- dent Roosevelt and his “New Deal.” They were cursing the necessity that obliged them to accept such a beg- garly pittance. It would scarcely pay for the shoes and clothes that they wore out on the job, to say | nothing about supplying them with |} enough to live on during the long Alaskan winter; but hunger's power is strong. The dictatorship of the prole- tariat must be a State that em- bodies a new kind of democracy, for the proletarians and the dis- possessed; and a new kind of dictatorship, against the bour- geoisie—Lenin. Ryan Gets Attempt By a Worker Correspondent NEW YORK.—TI am sending the enclosed clippings to you in the hope that you will explain the ap- parent contradictions involved. I am a comparatively new reader of your fine fighting newspaper and wish to express here my deep ad- miration for the uncompromising struggle you are leading in the cause of the working class of the world. As a marine worker, I feel that without your leadership we would be moving blindly and haltingly, not knowing our enemies and un- aware of our strength. And yet I fear that in this attack on the leaders of the I.L.A. you are un- knowingly assisting in disrupting the unity of the strikers and con- fusing the issues. Conceding the correctness of your opposition to Ryan as a leader, you must agree that in a strike, as in a war, or a game, the idea is to win. A Com- munist is a realist above all else, and therein lies his strength and the ultimate triumph of his ideas. And so I ask the Daily Worker to amplify with convincing proof, the charges against Ryan and other officials in this strike and to pub- lish these proofs, together with a specific and detailed line of action for the rank and file to follow in order to win the strike and to de- pose their false leaders——or else, to support with all the power and prestige it commands, the leaders in charge of the strike, in spite of their political hypocrisy and petty grafting. When the rank and file workers are sufficiently enlightened and guided by the Daily Worker, so that. they can see and follow the cor- rect line, they will win their strikes and the misleaders (if they are misleaders) will be exposed when Gangsters To “Picket” Dock In To Force Longshoremen Into I. L. A. they attempt to block the clear-cut will of the rank and file. J. J. EDITORIAL NOTE: In reply to the letter of J. J., regarding a write-up in the Daily Worker of May 14th, concerning the strike ef the longshoremen on the Clyde Mailory line, J. J. contrasts the Daily Worker with the New York Times’ write-up. J. J. writes that he finds a contradiction regard- ing “pickets” on the docks. This apparent contradiction exists mainly because J. J. is not well informed of the situation on the piers, and also because the difference between the two papers is that one writes the truth, while the other distorts it in order to support the bosses against the workers. In the first place, this strike is not a strike where the workers agreed to strike, but it was forced on the longshoremen when 25 gangsters and delegates of the LL.A. stood in front of the piers and through terror forced the workers out on strike! The “strike” is a gesture on the part of Ryan to force the coastwise lines to recognize the LL.A., thereby forcing the men tp join THIS UNION, to pay dues to HIS RACKETS and to lay a basis for preventing action on the part of the workers to resist the slave code of the shipowners, who are now attempting to force these codes through. Although the strike has been on for six days, THERE HAS BEEN NO PICKET LINE—in- stead the leeches of the LL.A. have sent a whole gang of drunken gangsters into the strike, who are terrorizing the workers and who are preventing them from taking steps to picket the piers. Every longshoreman on strike knows that the only “pickets” on the piers are delegates of the LL.A. and the police—both have been constantly forcing the strik- ers across the street into a park- ing space. Perhaps THIS is the kind of picket line referred to in the “Times,” because this “picket” works 25 hours a day to protect the scabs and to prevent the workers from picketing the piers. Most of the coastwise men know that in 1932 Ryan also pulled off a phony strike, which resulted in the men going back to work under the same conditions they were striking against. Ryan collected THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS IN DUES and then deserted the men, leaving them disorganized and at the mercy of the shipowners. THE LONGSHOREMEN HAVE NOT FORGOTTEN THAT! Take a look at the demands raised by Ryan. He demands: (1) Recognition of the LL.A.; (2) A reduction of the working week from 48 hours to 44—the real needs of the workers are forgot- ten, such as higher wages, better working conditions, against the speed-up and for Unemployment Insurance. Ryan raises his de- mands to confuse the longshore- men and not to win concessions from the shipowners—why? Be- cause if these demands are granted, the shipowners will not be forced to better conditions, be- cause recognition of the ILA. MEANS DUES TO RYAN, while a reduction in the working week means nothing, since the men do not average 15 HOURS PER WEEK in most cases; and since over 60 per cent ARE UNEM- PLOYED! That is why in line with it's policy, the Daily Worker ruthlessly exposes these misleaders and cafis upon the longshoremen to rally around the militant Marine Work- ers Industrial Union, which says that in this strike only the unity f of the workers, under rank and fiie leadership, that raises the demands of the workers and is willing to fight for them, can win the strike. The union proposes the follow- ing line of action: (1) a mass picket line to keep scabs off the decks; (2) a rank and file strike committee ELECTED from the ranks of the strikers, who will negotiate directly with the ship- owners; and proposes that the strike be turned into a strike for the DEMANDS OF THE WORK- ERS, which are: (1) 85 cents an hour, $1.20 over-time, the present deepwater wage; (2) regular shape-up times; (3) a rotary system of hiring, controlled by elected committees of the work- ers; (4) RECOGNITION OF A UNION OF THE WORKERS’ OWN CHOICE. In your last paragraph you place i —perhaps he No, J. L. The government has placed Ryan on the National Labor Board because he endorses the N.R.A. and the slave-codes of the shipowners. He is also a member of the United States War Board—a part of the government owned and controlled by the ship- owners—an out and out enemy of the workers; and as such we must mobilize the workers to clean their ranks of these rats. And then the unity of the work- ing-class will be established, under the leadership of the Communist Party and the Marine Workers Industrial Union and T.U.U.L. which will lead the whole Amer- ican working-class out of the dark sea of misery, starvation and war, into the calm sea of a workers’ and farmers’ government in America, f PARTY LIFE | | Resolution to Increase Sales Is Not Being | Carried Out; Work Must Be Speeded Up | In District No. 8, Chicago, a res- | jolution was unanimously adopted which points out the importance “To increase the mass sale of our literature and establish system- atic and improved sales of our literature in our mass organiza- tions. Special attention to make literature part of our daily work | in penetrating the shops and trade unions. To increase the sales of our theoretical literature— | Communist, C. I. and Inprecorr, | as well as the Party Organizer, inside the Party.” | Having adopted this resolution | LETTERS FROM | | OUR READERS L. 8. N, R. CARD BRINGS QUICK RESULTS Brooklyn, N. Y. | Editor: | I wish to relate to the readers of | the “Daily,” a little incident that is of importance. Some other com-} rades and I, members of the Party,| have started to organize an L. S. |N. R. branch in Bath Beach. We have approached a Negro member of the I. L. D. and when he heard of our plans, he offered us his home for our meetings. At the first meet- ing that took place, en Friday, April 20, after we had explained what this organization stands for and what it is doing, we made an appeal for membership and 11 Negro workers filled application cards and joined the L. S. N. R. At the next meeting only 3 or 4 of them showed up, but we had some new- comers, who joined up after we have repeated the explanation of what the L. S. N.R. is. We have decided in the future, to sent out post cards to the members before every meeting. The mother of a negro family, who had been running to the relief buro for weeks and months and couldn’t obtain any results, receiving our card, decided to go down to the relief buro with the card. When she got there she talked to them differently than she} used to. “Look here, Mister,” she said to one of the attendants, show- ing him our card with L. S. N. R. on it, “I belong to this organiza-| |tion,” she said proudly and in a high voice, “you wouldn't feed me on promises any more. I want my food and rent right now.” Can you imagine her astonish-| meni, when a few minutes later she) was given a rent check and two food checks? A. F. SUGGESTION FOR SELLING “DAILY” Minneapolis, Minn. It is a great pride to see how the May Day demonstrations “took” over the U.S. and the world. Our parade here was praised by almost every one who saw it. I want to show everyone who sells the Daily Worker that there is more of a fer- tile field now than ever before. Some people are slightly prejudiced yet, but they are easy to get if one ap- plies the right method. The Daily) Worker, after being read, should be taken to apartment houses. Select a name on a mail box which has the most names. Write on the top of your paper Mr. so-and-so. Then come back to these people later and note the results. I sold 15 copies in 15 minutes by this method. Others can do the same. I only wish I had more time to agitate and help your paper, but I do what I can. I think all readers should praise Dr, Luttinger for his kind contri- butions to the Daily Worker. This should not be over-looked. Your paper is getting better day by day. I hope the utmost success to you. E. E. P. erious Effort Can Triple For 40-Hour Work Literature Sales in Chicago unanimously, one would think that there would be a marked improve- ment since the convention. But this is not the case. We still persist in voting on resolutions with no seri- ous intention of carrying them out. For the month of April we find some of the basic sections in the city of Chicago hardly sold any literature. Section No. 2 which is one of the sections in the heart of the Negro | territory and concentrating on the | stockyards, sold 1 Party Organizer and 35 small pamphlets during the entire month of April. Can this section give leadership to 40,000 stockyards workers? Even the sec- tion leadership does not bother to read our literature. Another section is Section No. 10 which is concentrating on the West- ern Electric. This section sold 1 Party Organizer, 1 Communist In- ternational, 11 Inprecorrs and 25 small propaganda pamphlets. Section 11 concentrating also on the stockyards sold during the en- tire month of April 2 Communists, 14 Party Organizers and 95 pam- phlets, In fact, none of the Chicago sec- tions are actually orientated to- wards mass sale of our literature. Why is it that Chicago is so far behind in their literature sales— compared to New York and other leading districts? Is it because our membership does not want to sell the literature or that the workers in Chicago do not want to read the literature? Certainly not. But the difficulty lies in the fact that the sale of literature is looked upon as a separate function apart from all other work and not as part of all of our activities. The sale of literature is not looked upon as revolutionary work, but as something unimportant. With this outlook it is no wonder that when a meeting of literature agents is called out of 12 sections one agent shows up to the meeting. One section organizer expressed himself that it is unconstitutional to elect literature agents in the units. Can Section No. 2 explain why they don’t sell more than 1 Party Organizer for an entire month? Throughout the district in the mass organizations all kinds of ex- cuses are given. The T.U.U.L. can only sell literature concerning the trade unions; the I.W.O, has no book case, All kinds of excuses are given for not carrying the resolu- tion adopted at the District Con- vention, into life. There is no question that if the Party section leadership and the leading fractions take the resolu- tion seriously that Chicago will not only double, but triple the sale of literature. Let us organize the sale of lit- erature in all of our mass organiza- tions where we have contact. Let us go into new organizations. Thou- sands of pamphlets can be sold throughout the city in the parks and open air meetings as well as indoor meetings, union locals, etc. Let us go to the masses and not sit back and wait for them. Let us carry our resolution into life. Join the Communist Party 35 E. 12th STREET, N. Y. C. Please send me more informa- tion on the Communist Party. Name ...eeseeereeeeee Street City ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS Demand for Medical Students in Russia N. ¥. U.—The second Five Year Plan calls for a fourfold increase in the number of medical workers by 1937. This is due to the extensive plan for public health which the government is determined to carry out; also to the rapid increase of the porw ation. The population of the Soviet Union was 160.500,000 in 1930. By the end of 1933 the pop- uation had increased to 168,000,000. The increase in the population and in the cultural life which grows by leaps and bounds has thus created an unprecedented need for medical workers. Quite a contrast to con- ditions in capitalistic countries where we are told that there are too many physicians and too many dentists! Dora N., Ann Arbor, Mich, — Spring fever is not a mere joke. A sufficient amount of evidence has been accumulated which shows that what we usually call spring fever is really due to a deficiency of cal- cium (lime) and that instead of making fun of the average young person who feels “lazy” and is easily tired and liable to various infections, in the early part of May, he or she should be treated with irradiated codliver oil or sunshine, either natural or artificial. The sulphur in molasses which your grandmother insists on giving you is a’ time- honored remedy; but hardly in agreement with modern medical science. During the winter months, the store of lime in the body which has been accumulated in the body during the summer, becomes ex- hausted and it is this relative defi- By PAUL LUTTINGER, M.D. —-————————_ toms popularly known as “spring fever.” We would, therefore, ad- vise you to either take some cod- liver oil or go out in the open and allow the sunshine to give you & good tan. You will find that your “Jaziness” and your indefinite aches and “longings” wil disappear under the beneficial effect of the sun's healing rays. ee ea? . Discoverer of Hayfever—Test for Raw and Cooked Eggs P. W. B., Washington, D. C. — Charles Blackley, an Englishman, was the first to discover that hay- fever was caused by the pollen of certain grasses. An easy way te tell a boiled egg from a raw one is to spin it: A raw egg can hardly be made to twirl; while a cookec egg will turn easily when submittec to the spinning test. Possibility of Fatherhood after Sterilization Martin G., Cleveland, Ohio—TI sterilization has taken place by cutting both seminal ducts, ther is no practical possibility of becom ing a father in the future. Once; person has become sterile by vasec tomy, he will always rem7in sterile If the ducts are merely ligated, (tied there is a chance of begetting chil dren. The chance is a slim one but it is theoretically possibl When the seminal ducts are merel tied, however, one can never sure of being absolutely steril There is always a possibility the the ligature might become loose 1 which case the spermatozoa frot ciency in lime which gives the symp- a) the testicles will find their way ou ome en