The Daily Worker Newspaper, July 19, 1934, Page 4

i i ; | ; } i { | i Strike History of General Power Ot the Rank and File Reactionary Leaders of A. F. of L. Couldn’t Stem the Tide By HARRY RAYMOND #YJILL they vote to go o nm gen- eral strike?” Mic Casey reactionary sident of the San Francisco Teamsters Union, was asked as he left a meeting of the Labor Council's Strategy Committee on July 13, after the rank and file of h nion had voted to strike and was already on strike in sym- pathy with the maritime workers. “Not if we can help it,” Casey replied But Casey couldn't Vandeleur, president Council, couldn't help it either. San Francisco Labor, the rank and file of over a hundred unions. was moving forward to the general strike. Up in the office of Mayor Rossi a meeting was being held. Seated in front of the Mayor were Police Chief Quinn, who is personally re- sponsible for the cold blooded mur- help it. D. of the Labor der of two striking workers; mem- bers of the police and fire commis- sions, the Mayor's personal ad- visors and a United States regular army colonel in civilian clothes. At that moment Archbishop Ed- ward J. Hanna, chairman of Pres- ident Roosevelt's Strike Mediation Board, was preparing a radio ad- dress to be delivered at 9 p.m., urging the workers not to strike. | General Johnson—Strikebreaker | At that moment General Hugh | Johnson, Roosevelt's» N. R. A. chieftain, was in Omaha ranting against the strike and awaiting an | army airplane to take him to the Pacific Coast strike area. At that moment an extra edition of the San Francisco Examiner with | @ screaming head liné—‘BIG rushed off the presses. But all the N. R. A. mediators | and all the state troops and the top léaders of the A. F. of L. could | not carry out the pious wish of the | owners of ships and factories. The second great general strike | in the history of American labor was in the making. On Monday, July 16, at 8 am., the general walkout was an accom- plished fact. The wheels of in-| dustry, with labor’s brakes drawn tight, came to a sudden stop. | When Mooney Walked | Along the streets of San Fran- cisco where Tom Mooney and J.| B. McNamara, pioneers of labor on | the West Coast, once walked, com- | pléte paralysis overtook industrial | traffic. Truck movements in all the | five counties stopped as patrols of pickets moved in San Francisco, | Oakland and adjacent territories. Farm Group Pledges Aid to Coast Strikers United Farmers League Sends Its Greetings to Frisco Workers (Daily Worker Midwest Bureau) CHICAGO, July 18—Support for the strikers of the West Coast was pledged today by leaders of the toiling farmers of America. The statement, issued by the United Farmers League, greeted the em- battled workers and promised the full co-operation of the militant farmers in the fight. The statement reads: To Workers on Strike on the Pacific Coast. Dear Brothers: Your magnificent determina- tion and struggle against the at- tempts of the bosses, bankers, and the New Dealers to lower your living standards is a living in- spiration to impoverished farm- esr throughout the country. Same Bosses—Same Misery Our first national convention, held in Minneapolis in June de- cided that solidarity of the farm- | ers with the city workers shall be, in the future, as it has been in the past, one of the corner- stones of our struggles and or- | ganization. Locals of the United Farmers | League on the West Coast have already shown this solidarity by | joint picketing with the striking | longshoremen and by the collec- tion of food supplies for their struggles. In order that our pledge of soli- darity shall be made more con- crete we are urging an intensifi- cation of these efforts to aid you in your struggles throughout our | entire organization. We stand ready to lend what additional aid we can to you. The United Farmers League, ALFRED TIALA, Pres. HENRY PURO, Sec’y. VIENNA POLICE KILL 3 apeiron TERROR IN PITTSBURGH Unemployed worker being forced to run the gauntlet of armed deputies who ASCIST mob violence, deliberately in- cited and organized by the police and the San Francisco ship ow sweeping through the streets of ’Frisco.: Workers are being beaten. nist headquarters are raided by hoodlums and thugs. Brutality, lynch spirit, vicious reaction openly worker who dares to speak against against the exploitation of the capitalist plunderers. Now it is the Communists who are the target of the Fascist gangs in 'Frisco. But how long will heads as well as Communist? It is only willful blindness that the working class of America, as well as in ’Frisco, | now faces the menace of mob secret police, provocateurs, the monopoly capital rulers. There is sadist glee in the way the capitalist | press and the entire capitalist governmental ma- | chine spreads the spirit of murder and violence against the Communists in strike. the mobilizes against every it be before Socialist workers and Socialist Party meetings will feel the assaults of the ruling class thugs and police? Does the ruling class terror not menace Socialist workers as well as Communist? not the ruling class brutality strike at Socialist and gang brutality— all the typical savagery of fascism unleashed by There is the unmistakeable overtone of carried out an fascism in all ners, now is Commu- | and smashed coarse and the ruling class, Does eviction in a working class section of the steel city, It is against just such terror that the Com- munist Party wges a united front of all workers. this activity of the elements of “law and order.” Does not all this menace the Socialist Party as well as the Communist? Then how is it possible for the Socialist Party Executive Committee to maintain the repeated proposals of the Communist Party | Central Committee offertng United Front action? Must it happen that Sociafist and Communist workers face what happened in Ger/.any, where a divided working class had to retreat before the fury of fascist violence? Must it happen that Socialist workers will stand idly by while their class brothers face the clubs, blackjacks and machine guns of the ruling class? And then themselves be beaten and attacked? Everything that is honest and revolutionary in the working class cries out against such a thing. | It is impossible, incredible, that Socialist work- ers will not heed the call of their fellow-workers | in the Communist Party for united action. its silence on f The Communist Party proposes a united front cannot see that | violence, thugs, Thonias, San Francisco mittee? against all fascist terror. communications to the National Executive Com- mittee of the Socialist Party Why is there no answer? be a united working class to face the terrorism of the capitalist class? ahd brutality faces the Socialist Party members. Solidarity with the Communists is a burning need. Why the silencs of the Socialist Executive Com- It has sent repeated led by Norman ‘Why cannot there The menace of murder YCL Urges All NEW YORK.—The national com- mittee of the Young Communist | League issued the following state- Worki n 2 Youth | Vacationers, Prisoners, To Aid Pacific Coast Strike |class struggle, that only by follow ing the policies of the Communist: can the workers beat back the at- \ | All Hail Heroism of the West Coast Strikers LOS ANGELES, July 18—Bring- ing with them $16 for the striking seamen and longshoremen, a group It was labor's day on the streets! VIENNA, July 15.— Police| Frisco working men and women | killed three and wounded several | had stopped all traffic on these | when they raided a Socialist and cisco general strike situation: same streets a few days before to Communist memorial meeting here carry their dead to the cemetery. The bodies of Nicolas Bordoise, a | union cook, and Howard 8. Sperry, | today. back by policemen, were followed by tens of thousands up Market St. —and not a truck, or automobile, or street car dared interfere with Fighting took place at Karven- a longshoreman, both shot in the | leutgeben, near Vienna also. winning the three basic demands | working class in behalf of the strik-| of the marine workers would be ment yesterday on the San Fran- Young workers! The National Committee, Young . Communist League, U. S. A., calls support of the upon all the toiling youth of this ae country, the young workers, stu- shop mates. dents and farm youth, to support _|in every way possible the heroic {general strike of the San Francisco tacks of the employers. | of workers vacationing in Yosemite | Valley made a special trip to Los You who toil in| Angeles this week. The money was mine, mill and factory. Rally to the| turned over to the Workers’ Inter- San Francisco national Relief for use in the strike. Hold meetings of your|They call on other workers in Send teelgrams to! Yosemite, whether on vacation or Roosevelt and the Governor California demanding the with-|kind of solidarity with the strikers. drawal of all armed troops. In your| peaks? ate A. F, of L, locals adopt resolutions| of| working there to express the same LOS ANGELES, July 18—A | True placed Corruption of Old Halls By MARGUERITE YOUNG | (Daily Worker Washington Bureau) | HE big guns of shipowner | propaganda are trained} | today against worker control of hiring halls, the central is-| ! sue in the great general strike | |on the Pacific Coast. The | cold facts about what occurs | When this demand is enforced are | available. They were established a | couple of months ago in Baltimore, | where seamen set up their own em- | ployment agency and controlled 85| per cent of the shipping jobs along | that port's 16-mile waterfront. _Most of the fink halls and ship- | Ping sharks closed up shop, and | those that remained open were de- | Serted. | Blacklists came to be only a bit- | ter memory. | | Discrimination against Negroes | | ond other oppressed races was ruled | out. Wages and work conditions so im- Proved that one striking crew re- | fused to go back to a “Jousy scow” | even after being offered more pay. And (Secretary of Labor Frances | Perkins and President Joseph P, Ryan-of the International Long- shoremen’s Association, please note!) the “merit system” disap- peared, but ship's engineers con-| fessed that to obtain efficient crews | they had to go to the worker-con- | | trolled hiring hall. Finally, true democracy replaced the corruption | | Of old, so that not one single case | of discrimination could be produced,.| Graft Eliminated These are some of the things I} found out about worker control of | marine hiring halls when I saw the | seamen’s agency in operation, de- spite the bitterest Opposition of | shipowners, during last May. Daily for two weeks I watched the Cen- tralized Shipping Bureau, as the agency was called, distribute jobs free of charge, free of graft, in Bal- timore. For seamen of every trade union affiliation I heatd the story of this job agency's efficiency and of the tremendous benefits it | brought to the waterfront. Seamen coming from and going to ports} scattered from coast to coast told this story. How they must have laughed When they réad what Secretary Perkins said last week! She de- clared there was “no precedent” for | joint control of hiring halls by workers, owners and government | representatives. Asked to comment upon the “precedent” for full worker control established in Balti- more, Miss Perkins, instead of an- swering, prattled about the evils (even she admitted them) of boss- controlled hiring halls, such as “the appéarance of — er — er crimps.” Finally, in reply to more question- ing, she came out with her reac- tion to worker control. Only it | wasn’t her reaction; it was Presi- dent Ryan's. She said, “I have it Democracy { Re-? the great solemn procession. Here again the spirit of Tom Moonéy, the imprisoned leader of the working class, was present. The spirit of Mooney stirred in the breasts of the thousands of marching men and women. Following the caskets of the murdeted workers walked a little aged woman, supported on the arm of a big red-faced man, It was Mary Mooney, mother of Tom, with her son John at her elbow! What Tom Mooney has fought for | has come to pass—solidarity of the working class in a general strike movement. Enter the Betrayers But things do not travel smoothly in general strike movements. The workers are being harassed on all | sides. They are being attacked from without by the troops, the police, | fascist vigilante committees, Mayor | Rossi's committee of 500 and the | N. R. A. officialdom. Within their | own ranks thé workers have the A. F. of L. top leaders to combat. The enemies from within col- | lJaborating with the enemies out- | side the labor movement have rail- roaded through a despicable resolu- tion agreeing to arbitrate all de- mands under the direction of the | N.R. A. | This is the very point that the| mass of the strikers voted against. | Harry Bridges, rank and file leader | of the longshoremen, denounced | the move as a rank betrayal. To submit to government-con- | trolled arbitration would be to | submit to the shipowners. | eral strike is now the order of tantamount to defeat. | But while the reactionary lead- | ers of the N. R. A. try to defeat {the aims of the strike with sly |maneuvers, the rank and file still have the weapon in their hands that can bring victory. The general | strike is in effect. It can be con-| ; tinued and spread over the heads of the betrayers the same as it| was started against their wishes. Rank and File Has Final Word | The rank and file must have the | final word. The rank and file, the | ; Communists and militants in the strike are not against negotiating with the shipowners. They are, | however, against arbitration which | | will defeat the strike the same as | it did the strikes in Minneapolis | and Detroit. | Tt was in the militant spirit of | Tom Mooney, McNamara and} Schmidt that the workers responded | to the general strike call. It was| in the spirit of these martyrs of | labor that the rank and file of | the unions overrode the reactionary | leaders from J. P. Ryan to Michael | Casey and defeated the first moves | to break the strike through arbitra- | tion. Continuing in this spirit, sweep- ing aside the labor misleaders, the West Coast workers through their | own committees can conclude a | victorious negotiation, But victory will only come while the workers are out on the streets. Spreading of the gen- | | | workers in all industries. ing maritime workers. The outcome of the general strike in San Francisco will directly affect the working and living conditions of every young worker. For three months the maritime workers on the West Coast have been on strike, militantly fighting for recognition of their unions, for higher wages and shorte: hours, and for workers’ control of biring. They have been |met with the most brutai terror on the part of the employe:s and the government. Armed thugs, National Guardsmen, and thousands of police have attempted to drown their struggle in blood. But despite the huge figures of killed and wounded the workers have kept their ranks solidly united. The attempts of the A. F. of L. leaders and the N.R.A. Labor Board to betray the strike by forcing ar- bitration on the workers, have also been defeated. To every attempt made to stab the strike in the back, the workers have replied with a broadening of the strike front, with the preparations for the general strike. The victory of the maritime work- ers Will give new life and spirit to the struggles of the young and aduli: It will mean a most decisive blow against the growth of company unions which are being foisted on ihe workers by the large corporations |with the cooperation of the N.R.A. It will mean a decisive blow against the A. F. of L. burocrats who try to keep the workers back from mili- tant action. It will teach the whole of William Green against the gen- eral strike. Collect funds and ship same to the maritime workers. Students! Protest the use of armed troops. Hold meetings of students. Raise finances, Refuse to be used as special deputies or as scabs in strikes of workers. National Guardsmen! Refuse to be used against your own class brothers. Your enemies are not the workers, but the rich bosses who rob you and your folks. Get the men in your company together and protest against the use of Guards- men in workers’ struggles. Our fight is your fight. Young farmers! Hold meetings of farm youth. Support in every way the San Francisco workers. Do not be used as scabs or militiamen | against striking workers, Socialist Youth! Unite with Com- munist youth in one common struggle in support of the general | Strike. Long live the solidarity of the working youth! GIL GREEN, National Committee | Young Communist League, U. S. A. RAPE The U. 8. is surely doing right by the Virgin Islands, which lost their virtue to the U. S. in 1917 for $25,000,000. | Natives are getting “subsistence homesteads” under the New Deal— two-room huts’ instead of the cus- | | supporting the general strike and| strike contribution of $8.24 came to criticizing the strike breaking appeal| the Workers’ International Relief here from a neighborhood group of 24 workers, including several city employes. Only one member-of the group had previously expressed class-conscious solidarity. The con- tribution was virtually spontaneous. pees Pea LOS ANGELES, Calif, July 18.— From a prison camp in the terrible heat of Imperial Valley comes this message of solidarity to the marine | strikers from eight class war pris- oners, jailed after the agricultural strike struggle. It was dated July 8 from Brawley, probably after hav- ing been smuggled out from the camp at Superstition Mountain at the other end of the valley: Dear Comrades: In this desert prison camp, news of outside events comes to us delayed several days. We have just learned of the frightful police attack of last Thursday against the San Fran- cisco longshoremen and the sub- sequent calling out of the National Guardsmen. We can’t do much to help these comrades, but we want you to stop sending us prison relief, money, cigarettes, etc., and give it all to the marine strikers. With all our hearts we wish we could do more. (Signed): STANLEY HANCOCK, F. C. MARIAS, JUAN OLIVAS, A. SALOZANO, Y. P. NIETO, MIQUEL N. GUTIERREZ, JR., on such excellent authority as Mr. Ryan that sometimes worker con- trol doés allow corruption and crimps to creep in.” Then the general strike broke. The capitalist press, which had avoided reference to the hiring hall issue aS much as possible, now pounced upon it, explaining that worker control was something | “new,” something “untried,” some- thing which Wall Street banker Eugene Meyer’s Washington Post, on July 17, declared, “may, in ex- tortionate hands, leave the em- ployer completely at the mercy of his men.” The Post frankly advo- cated that the government take charge of hiring halls, asserting, “A proper and natural function of the state is organization of ‘the labor market.” Smell the fascism! The simple truth is that shipown- ers dread to give up control of hir- ing halls even more than to rec- ognize unions because control of hiring is the time-honored mech- anism by which they have car- ried out their anti-union policy. “For years seamen have been the prey of all sorts of parasites—boot- leggers, merchants, tailors, prosti- tutes, barbers and whatnots, who board the ships the moment they dock,” Harry Alexander, former I.W.W., who became chairman of the Baltimore seamen’s job agency committee and later joined the Ma- rine Workers Industrial Union, told me, “But of all the vultures, the shipping agent is the most ruthless. He doesn’t have to board the ship because he knows that without > Daily Worker Washington Cor- respondent, will have to go to the shipping sh: for a job. hipowners gave these shipping agents power to dictate who gets what job for the very simple reason that the agents are willing tools of the bosses. It is they who enforce the blacklist. They follow it reli- giously, discraminating against all men marked for militancy, some- times for union activity, sometimes for simply voicing an individual protest against intolerable condi- tions, “The crimps get a fat rake-off from the shipowners, but naturally that doesn’t satisfy them, so they take more out of the seamen, with the approval of the bosses. Most of the finks have rooming houses where they charge the seamen first class prices for third class service, such as three to five dollars a week to sleep three to six in a room. “Many of them take an outright tribute for a job. When the seaman doesn’t have to slip the shark money, he has to buy the shipping agent’s rotten gin or his lousy food —at prices including the graft against which the seaman dare not complain because it means his job.” Baltimore had its full quota of such shipping agents until last Jan- uary. There was “Standard Oil Pete,” who ran +a restaurant, bar and lodging house, and recruited for that anti-union giant corpora- tion. The Young Men's Christian Association's “Anchorage” Mission House did its share of shipping, particularly by providing crews to scab, and sometimes made this a requirement of the seaman’s receiv- ing unemployment relief, which was being paid for by the federal gov- ernment. There were dozens of smaller agents. In January, Baltimore seamen, united in a powerful campaign for unemployment relief, won worker control of the distribution of fed- eral relief. Their drive for this through relentless exposure of grafting Y.M.C.A. control and thru complete worker organization on the waterfront was victorious. Very soon after this they set up the Centralized Shipping Bureau. In mass meeting they elected a committee of ten seamen off the floor—seamen belonging to the M.W.1I.U., the Interiational Sea- men’s Union (A. F. of L.), the Wob- blies, and the unorganized. This committee was placed in charge of the Centralized Shipping Bureau. It opened in a seamen’s recreation hall which was provided by the government and run by the sea- men’s relief organization on the waterfront. Any seaman “on the beach” could register at the Centralized Shipping Bureau. He must register for a specific job however, and must show discharges establishing his previous performance of that job. He re- ceived a registration number ac- cording to the order in which he régistered. This figure was marked in the Bureau records and on the registration cards. When ships came in, they called the Centralized Shipping Bureau and listed jobs open in their crews. The Bureau listed these jobs on a bulletin board and, after waiting for the seamen to gather in the hall, called off the jobs and the low numbers reg- istered for them. The seaman with ae low-number registration got the job. No Discrimination This, the rotary system, automati- cally ruled out discrimination. The blacklist no longer existed. The low number got the job whether its holder had participated in union or ‘Hiring Halls, Central Issue In Coast Strike, Graft-Free, “Daily” Correspondent Found { | if Workers’ Control of Hails Eliminated Black white, Negro, Hawaiian, Porto Rican or a member of any other minority racial group. The Centralized Shipping Bureau held regular meetings, where rules and regulations were adopted, petty grievances threshed out, and the whole operation of the project sub- jected to criticism and comment by all the men registered. It was an immediate success. During the first week of operation 85 men shipped out, Seamen rallied to it as one man. Ahd at the same time they began to fight more unitedly for improvement of conditions on their ships. Assured that they would get a@ job when their number came up, these oilers, firemen, cooks, coa! passers, bargemen and lightermer refused to accept low wages anc unsanitary conditions without + protest. Job actions and strikes in- creased—and were increasingly vic- torious. Soon the shipowners, realizing what a powerful weapon they were being deprived of, began a con- certed campaign to smash the Cen- tralized Shipping Bureau. Stand- ard Oil boycotted the Centralized Shipping Bureau from the begin- ning, packing men in buses from New York to ship out of Baltimore, and finally spending thousands to ship from an island ninety miles away instead of from the port of Baltimore. The seamen, almost to a man, replied by boycotting the fink agencies. Shippers who could not afford Standard Oil's expensive methods of opposition had to take their crews through the Centralized Shipping Bureau. Finally the ship- owners decided to try other meth- ods. They got help from the Fed- eral government and from some ‘ A. F. of L. officials, Rank and File Support Officers of the I.S.U., who never had expressed approval of the Cen- tralized Shipping Bureau, now raised false charges of “discrimina- tion” against it. A committee of seamen elected in a Centralized Shipping Bureau meeting went to Johnny Bley, secretary of the 18.U, local, and confronted him. He ad- mitted that the LS.U. officialdom was acting as “runner” for Stand- | ard Oil and said there were “ru- mors” that the Bureau wouldn't give I,S.U, men the same chance that it gave M.W.1.U. members, “You started those rumors!” one of the seamen told Bley, “and you can have your book back “And mine,” said another of the Centralized Shipping Bureau dele- gation. “And mine,” said a third. All three of them happened to | be members of the I.S.U., and had seen how democratically the Cen- tralized Shipping Bureau operated!, Finally, the shipowners appealec * to State and Federal governmen Officials to withdraw relief to smast worker-control of this in order (so they thought) to scatter the sea- men and break up the Centralized Shipping Bureau. Later, Federal officials in Washington informed me that worker-control of relief was being withdrawn, following bitter protests against it by A. F. of L. officials and shipowners, who came to Washington personally to tell the government what to do. ‘These government sources told me that all of the complainers said that “the worst thing” about the Balti- more situation was the Centralized Shipping Bureau. That’s what they were after. After a long, heroic struggle, the Baltimore seamen did lose worker- control of relief. And the shipown- ers again are boycotting the Cen- tralized Shipping Bureau. Three hundred seamen in Balti- more are still registered today in the Centralized Shipping Bureau, however, and are redoubling their drive to force the shipowners to hire through the worker-controlled hall. In recent weeks strikes have occurred—on the demand of recog: nition of the Centralized Shippin Bureau. In one of these, that the S.S. West. Eldara, IL.A. long! shoremen dropped their hooks an knocked off in sympathy, President Ox of the IL.A. local next day or- dered the men back to work. Many refused to go. Although the Jong- shoremen had not participated in the Centralized Shipping Bureau, they knew the significance of worker-control of hiring halls and were willing to fight for it. Today there is a strong sentiment among them for a strike in support of the Pacific Coast and for worker-con- To return to work without the day. working class that only militant tomary one-room hovels, BENITO GUTIERREZ. worker control of hiring the seaman | strike activity, whether he was! trol of their own hiring hall, Cy P. Role in Picecs Sialic (Continued from Page separated from the working class, from the labor move- ment, of which it is part, whose very flesh and blood they are. HERE Does the Threat of Starvation Come From? “Starvation!” “Hunger!” “Scarcity!” shrieks the capitalist press throughout the United States against the San Francisco general strike. For over four years starvation has been rampant throughout i\e country. Hundreds of workers have died of hunger. Millions of unemployed face hunger every day. But when the workers go on strike to end hunger, to demand a millions who are hungry, are striving to increase wages ) to justify the most vicious terror against the strikers; now, to force union recognition, and the rights of the working class. . . * Js THE General Strike Against the Govern- ment? General Johnson and the editorials in the capi- talist press declare that the general strike, with Com- munist instigation, is directed against the govern- ment. What is the truth about this matter? The fact of the matter is that the whole force of the govern- ment, courts, mayor, governor, militia, army, navy, specially armed gangs of thugs, are directed against the general strike and the workers. The workers are greater distribution of food and clothing to increase | their wages, to end shameless labor conditions, then the bosses cry hunger. When Roosevelt destroys crops, when he starves workers, that is not “hunger” or “destruction.” Only when the workers, with their most militant leader- ship, the Communists, demand that the Rockefellers, Roosevelts, Mellons, the swinish multimillionaire ship- owners and capitalists in San Francisco, pay their workers more wages, that the shri¢k of “starvation” goes out over the land. The Communists are striving to end hunger for the fighting against the employers, demanding of them certain simple, elementary things. The Communist Party always points out to the workers that the gov- ernment is the instrument of oppression of the rich, of the exploiters, of the bankers and industrialists, but the Communist Party also knows that the work- ers in San Francisco are not and cannot now over- throw this government. The Communist Party, at the proper time, when it has convinced the majority of the workers throughout the United States that this government of capitalist oppression should be replaced by a workers’ government, will know how to go about achieving this end. But the issue in San Francisco is not insurrection or revolution. This cry is raised, the cry that the Communists want to overturn the government, in order to deny the workers their demands; to separate the workers from their most trusted, their most reliable, their most unflinching leadership, the Communists. The Communists never conceal their aims, and when the direct aim is replacing the murder govern- ment of the Morgans, the Rockefellers, the Fords, and the rest of those who have fattened on the sweat and blood of the workers, the Communists will pronounce that fact to the entire working class, who will be the ones to set up the new government that will end all oppression, . * * IAN the General Strike Be Won? U Every opportunity is favorable for the winning of the aims of the general strike. The greatest danger lies in the betrayirny leadership, the Vandeleurs and the Greens, of whom General Johnson recently told the bosses: “Gentlemen! These are your best and most faithful friends.” The strike\ can be won if the rank and file, who sacrificed so much to come out, who felt that they were coming out to add strength to their brothers on the docks and on the ships, will grasp control out of the hands of the bureaucrats, form broad rank and file committees to do all negotiating: if they stick solid until the bosses give in to the just demands of the workers. How can workers throughout the U. S. help the San Francisco workers win the strike? In every local union, the first order of business | fascist gangs and fascist attacks, should be expression of solidarity with the strike. Pro- tests should bé sent to Vandeleur, to Green, declaring that no arbitration should be accepted without first granting the main demands—union recognition, control of the hiring halls, increased wages. Protests should be sent to Green and Vandeleur for their strikebreak- ing deeds. Demands should be made that Green and the A. F. of L. General Council should immedi- ately call on workers throughout the country to help the strike in the form of relief, mass meetings, dem- onstrations, protests to the government against the terror. aoe + Protests should be sent to Governor Mirriam of California, to Mayor Rossi of ‘Frisco, against the bru- tal attack on the Communists and on other militant leaders in the strike. Mass meetings in support of the strike should be called, Wires of sympathy should be sent to the strikers from every workers’ organization in the country. Wires should be sent to the strike committee protesting against any arbitration without at first the guarantée of the main demands of the striking longshoremen. Every encouragement should be sent to the San Francisco workers to let them know the entire Ameri- can working class is behind them in the struggle for their demands. Protests should be sent to the capitalist press for their lies against the strikers, for their provocations against the Communists; against their instigation of fg THE Frisco General Strike a Local Issue? No. The capitalist press is making it clear that the San Francisco strike affects the entire working class, Behind the San Francisco bosses, every bosses’ associa- tion in the country is lining up. In Wall Street mil- lions have been collected to defeat the strike. Every force of the government And the bosses is being used against the strikers—Roosevelt’s N.R.A. administrators, General Johnson, Senator Wagner, the Green leader- ship in the A. F. of L., militia and the U. S. army are ready to act against the strikers. A victory in San Francisco, on hiring halls, union recognition, wages, will be a victory for every worker in the country. It will advance the cause of labor while winning the de- mands of the San Francisco dockers, Because the Communists point out these facts, they are beaten. | Because the Communists call for the solidarity of all / workers, they are slugged and arrested: y The role of the Communists is now becoming clear to many thousands of workers, and the capitalists who want to preserve the prestige and position of the bu- reaucratic labor leaders, on whom they count to be- tray the workers, are opening up the most vicious ter= ror campaign against the Communists. Workers, to defend your right to strike, to defend your own interests, to defend your union, you must de- fend the Communists, the most tried, and trusted, the most advanced, the most capable, the most reliable section of the working class. s '