The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 2, 1935, Page 4

Page 4 DAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 19 STEEL LOCALS MEET TOMORROW TO MAP FIGHT AGAINST BOSSES CONFERENCE WILL Coast Workers ACT TO BUILD A. F. OF L. UNION U.M.W.A. and Aluminum Locals Send Delegates To Plan Joint Action Against Com- pany Union, for Higher Pay By Tom Keenan PITTSBURGH, Pa., Feb. af Labor national executive written, has been forced to t 1—The American Federation council, in session as this is ake up the issue of a real or- ganizing drive in the steel industry only through the pres- sure of the rank and file membership of the Amalgamated | Calif, and for financial aid for the Association. Mike Tighe, President’ of the Amalgamated Association of Iron, Steel and Tin Workers and Company, and back of them Wm Green, have been defeated in their attempts to stifle the organization of the steel workers, who have awakened to the realization that only through the strength of their organization, ready to strike and fight until demands are won. can they ever better their conditions. The important steel workers’ con- ference of Feb. 3, to which the rank and file miners of the U. M.| W. of A. have been invited. has been strenuously opposed by Tighe, who has tried every means to pre- vent the A. A. lodges from attend- | ing. In this, Tighe has used the same maneuvers which the steel bosses | He has tried to raise the | employ. “Red scare” to split the workers, shouting “Red” and “Communist” at every A. A. member who shows determination to fight for his de- mands. Here he shows himself to be in the same class as the vi- cious “Duquesne Times” which calls all rank and file union leaders “Communists” and demands that they be hung from the nearest vacant tree. But his splitting tactics have been in vain. The steel workers, recog- Mize that ever sincere fighter against the bo: is called Com- munist, and that Communists are Sincere fighters for the workers’ de- mands. In statements to the capitalist papers, Tighe has tried to “out- law” the Feb. 3 conference. He has sent letters to every lodge threatening to revoke their charters if they send delegates. To make of the Amalgamated a rank and file controlled union is the reason the Feb. 3 conference is called. That is why Tighe is so bitterly opposed to the meeting. He has charged that the rank and file want to build another union than the A. A, but he knows this is a lie. The rank and file only wants to make the A. A. a real, fighting union which can win. ‘The rank and file A. A. members, although ooorly organized, came near to launching a strike which could have won the union's de- mands last summer. Only the in- tervention of Wm. Green, to pro- pose one of President Roosevelt's “impartial” boards, halted the strike. The comparatively new lodges of the A. A., ready to fight, were the ones which took yp the issue of striking at the last And months ago Tighe already fore- cast his intention to throttle these, the majority of the lodges, by re- fusing them seats at the coming convention in April. The steel workers can depend upon it, that Tighe, and Bill Green, and the other A. F. of L. mislead- ers are trying to hatch up some plan whereby they can prevent an organization drive for building the A. A. as a rank-and-file-controlled union. They will try to work things so that the control of all policies and actions of the Amalgamated are under their thumbs. But the steel workers can defeat them in their goal by bringing the organization drive under the con- trol of an elected committee from the ranks. Rank and file leaders, Who understand the conditions in the mills, should be set up as an organization committee at the Feb. 3 conference, who would direct all the activities and control all the funds of the organization drive, Only such a committee could see to it that all the steel workers are Tecruited in the drive, employed and unemployed alike, whether the worker can nay two dollars, or a nickel, or nothing—so long as they are willing to fight. , When these see the union really controlled by the members, ready to fight for their economic de- mands and accept all who will join in the fight—then they will not be found holding back from joining. In Aliquippa, in Duquesne, two of the strongest lodges of the Amalgamated, the workers organized on this basis. Here the workers are ready for act: An organization drive. conducted along the above lines, will soon es- tablish equally strong lodges in _\eyery other mill. Then the steel workers, acting together. can pre- sent their demands to all the em- Ployers: $1 an hour minimum; the -hour dav, five-day week: recog- Mition of the A. A.; equal rights Negro workers; abolishment of North-South wage differentials; en- actment cf the Workers Unemploy- ment Insurance Bill (H. R. 2827) by Congress. And if the bosses re- \ fuse—shut down every mill in a _\ general steel strike until they are _\ grented. | "The Feb. 3 conference is the first stop! A minimum of ten yearly subs makes you eligible for one of nine {Daily Worker prizes—a free vaca- ‘on in a workers’ camp. Write to convention. | 1.L. D. Enters Fight to Free 7 Mill Hands CHALLENGING the framed-up conviction and sentencing of seven textile workers of Burlington, N. C., in December on a charge of “dyna- | miting,” the International Labor | Defense, through its acting National Secretary, Anna Damon, yesterday announced plans to enter the case, | appeal the conviction and expose the machinations of the frame-up. A thorough investigation on the ground, conducted by attorneys sent down by the International Labor Defense reveals “one of the newest frame-ups in many years,” the I. L. D. stated. Steps already have been begun to bring the case before the Supreme Court of North Caro- lina by March. The seven defendants in this case are all mill workers. Four of them are members of the United Textile Workers Union. Given Long Terms They were sentenced to terms | varying from ten to two years. The defendants are John Anderson, Florence Blaylock, Howard Over- man, J. P. Hoggard, J. F. Harraway, Tom Canipe and Avery Kimry. They are charged with dynamiting the E. M. Holt Plaid Mill in Burlington during the textile strike in Septem- ber, 1934, They were sentenced on December 4 in the Superior Court of Alamance County, by a hand- picked jury from which all union members and union sympathizers were systematically excluded. The International Labor Deftnse is basing its appeal on the grounds of a conviction obtained against the weight of evidence, the introduction }0f faked “confessions,” and open | prejudice on the part of the judge: “Behind this’ frame-up,” the I. L. D. said, in announcing its entry into the case, “is the burning question {of the right of workers in the South to organize into unions. The basis of the State’s case is planted dyna- mite, perjured evidence, intimida- | tion, bribery—and a vicious hatred jon the part of the mill owners for the unions and those who join them.” During lunch-time speak to your shopmates about organizing for better conditions; pass around your copy of the Daily Worker. Ask them to buy it regularly. Tro tzky’s 4 ba frantic anti-Soviet campaign undertaken by the capitalist and also to a considerable degree by the reformist press of all shades with the aim of concealing from their readers the truth about the das- tardly murder of Comrade Kirov, the brilliant fighter of the prole- tarian revolution, has already ut- terly collapsed. Facts speak so clearly and convincingly that the whole chorus of slanderers is unable to shout them down. These facts show that the Denikin press in a number of countries (Yugoslavia, U. 8. A, etc.) boast about being im- | plicated in wrecking activity and terrorist murders on the territory of the Soviet Union and against Soviet officials in capitalist coun- tries, and that some of these papers directly singled out Comrade Kirov as the next victim of their crim- inal conspiracies. The actual facts, the admission of the members of the Leningrad Centre at the preliminary investiga- tion and in court, leave no doubt that the murder of Comrade Kirov Was pelitically and organizationally prepared and perpetrated by the de- generate dregs of the Trotzkyite- Zinoviev bloc with the aim of carry- ing out the program of this bloc and overthrowing the Soviet power. The facts show that the so-called Moscow Centre, which consisted of the former leaders of the Zinoviev- anti-Soviet group, knew of the ter- roristic sentiments of the members of this group, fired these sentiments, and is responsible—first of all, in the persons of Zinoviey, Evdokmoy, Gertik, and Kamenev—for the ter- rorist acts grganized by the Lenin- grad Centre. Finally, the Latvian Consul in Leningrad who recently made a trip to Helsingfors for some reason or other, hastened to announce to the representatives of the Finnish press that he had never seen the mur- derer of Comrade Kirov, had not given him money and had had no intention of putting him in contact with Trotzky. In such cases the Russians say, “The cap on the thief is burning” (by his fear, a guilty person is bound to expose himself), In any case, the personality of the mysterious diplomatic gentleman, whom the in- dictment for obvious reasons indi- cated with as‘=risks, is also quite plain. Thus, the organizers of the anti- (Soviet campaign, including the members of the General Council of ‘On Trial Ask Labor’s Aid “We, 18 victims of the anti-labor criminal syndicalism law appeal for your support,” the 18 Sacramento criminal syndicalism defendants de- clare in a joint appeal to all work- ers and their organizations and to | all friends of labor for united ac- tion to beat back the attacks of California reactionaries on the rights of the working class. The appeal urges the broadest support for the united front defense con- ference to be held Sunday, Feb. 10, | at 2 p.m, in Carpenter Hall, 112 | Valencia Street, San Francisco, | defense. The appeal, signed by all 18 defendants, says in part: To ALL Persons and Organiza- tions who are for Labor’s Civil Rights and are opposed to the Criminal Syndicalism Laws: “We, 18 men and women now on trial for Criminal Syndicalism in | Sacramento, face 6 to 84 years im- prisonment each for our labor ac- tivities, a total of 1512 prison years. “Our arrests last July 20th, imme- diately followed the San Francisco General Strike and were part of the lawless vigilante raiding on Work- ers’ headquarters and homes throughout the State. Most of us have been prominent in agricultural strikes—strikes which gave ex- ploited field and cannery workers 25 to 100 per cent wage increases. We have helped organize agricul- tural workers, the unemployed, farmers, students, professional and white collar workers. “We have already spent 6 months in jail. “The chief tool behind the prose- cution is former District Attorney McAllister, whom the people repu- diated in the last election. The State, disregarding this repudiation by the people, is spending thou- sands of dollars in order to hire McAllister and his two deputies, Buckler and Johnson, as special prosecutors. “The line-up of forces in the trial explains all. It is finance-cap- ital versus labor. The prosecution is backed by the Chambers of Com- merce, the banks, the Power Trust, the Industrial Association, the As- sociated Farmers, Inc. Big. Busi- ness, the American Legion. The de- fense is organized labor and all the issues of humanity for which it stands, and all those who stand for repeal of the criminal Syndi- calism Law. “The issues involved are of ut- most importance to all who must earn their livelihood. They are lJabor’s hard-won rights to organize into the union of one’s choice, to strike and to picket; they are the elementary rights of free speech, press, and assembly; and even in- volve freedom of conscience and thought. “At a mass meeting held in San Francisco on December 21st, under the joint auspices of the Interna- tional Labor Defense, the Epic League of San Francisco, the Dem- ocratic Open Forum, the A. F. of L. Rank and File Committee, and the Conference for Labor's Civil Rights, a call was issued for a conference to set up such a united front. We endorsed this action. The Con- ference date is: Sunday, February Trade Unions, have been defeated by the facts along the whole line. The fact that both the fascists and the reformist leaders have defended and still defend the Denikinites and the Zinoviev-Trotzkyite gang of ter- rorists with equal zeal and identical arguments, is in itself a further plain proof of the community of nections of all the anti-Soviet groups on whom the sentence of the proletarian court fell pitilessly, Trotzky the Inventor And so the slanderers, deprived of any possibility of opposing in- | disputably proved facts, are trying to make play with “psychological considerations.” Trotzky himself READY TO FIGHT AGAT Locals of A. A. Issue Call For February 3 Conference PITTSBURGH, Pa., Feb. 1.—The call of the Amalgamated As- sociation of Iron, Steel and Tin Workers. (A. F. L.) lodges, for min- ing locals to participate in the Feb, 3 joint conference of steel, alumi- num and mining local unions, follows. The cail is signed by William Spang, Pittsburgh District president of the A. A. To all local unions of the United Mine Workers of America. Brothers—Greetings: The Amalgamated Association of Iron Steel and Tin Workers, in Joint conference Dec. 30, held in the international headquarters and attended by the international officers and 180 delegates representing the lodges of five districts, decided to invite the local unions of the United Mine Workers of America to be present at a national con- ference of the lodges of the Amalgamated Association to be held Sunday, Feb. 3, at 1 p. m. in the Elks Hall, corner of Seventh and Duquesne Way, Pittsburgh, Pa. It is our desire to have the repre- sentatives of the local unions of the United Mine Workers participate with us in a joint meeting to work out ways and means of achieving our common demands. “Steel workers and their families during strike of 1933. Writings Linked to this country, a closer cooperation 10, 2 p. m, Carpenter Hall, 112 Valencia Street. “We appeal to you to be repre- sented there with two delegates. “Won't you also send a donation to help finance the defense. “We must win the Sacramento cases and achieve a fighting front for workers’ civil rights. “With warmest fraternal greet- ings, “Donald Bigham, Fred Kirkwood, Albert Hougardy, Luther Mincy, Norman Mini, Jack Warnick. John Fisher, Fred Huffine, Jack Crane, A. J. Ford, Pat Chambers, Mike Plesh, Lee Hung, Harry Collentz, Nora Conklin, Loraine Norman, Caroline Decker, Martin Wilson.” Police Whip Negro In Birmingham Jail BIRMINGHAM, Ala., Feb. 1.—Syl- vester Holmes, a Negro worker, was whipped on his bare back in police headquarters here by three officers who attempted to force him to make a confession of having robbed a grocery store. Holmes’ back still shows signs of the beating. patriots during the imperialist war, “changed their opinion” when it came to a struggle against the workers’ government, and organ- ized and provoked armed risings against the Soviets, took part in the war of intervention against the country of the proletarian dictator- ship. It would also not be difficult for Trotsky’s advocates in the Inde- pendent Labour Party to under- stand that Trotsky, who strongly opposed the Bolshevik slogan of the defeat of the bourgeois fatherland, is now the most fervent defeatist in respect to the country of the dictatorship of the proletariat. was primarily the inventor of these “psychological” tricks. And Trot- zky, you are asked to understand, “during the forty years of his revo- lutionary (!) activity, has always as a Marxist (!) repudiated, from the point of view of the interests of the workers’ movement, the use of any measure of individual terror even against Czarism and not only against the workers’ government,” and he “does not see any reason to change his opinion now.” And the editor of the British “New Lead- er’ pretends to take this “argument” seriously. “Trotzky,” writes the organ of the Independent Labour Party in the is- sue of Jan. 4, 1935, “has denied any contact with a foreign consul in Russia, and states that as a Marxist he has always ‘condemned the use of individual terrorist methods.’ The history of Zinoviev, Kameney and their colleagues would indicate a similar attitude on their part.” The would-be naive leading ar- ticle of the “New Leader” pretends that it does not notice that when Trotsky telks about his “Marxism” he merely repeats the method of the Latvian Consul who attempts to wriggle cut by the claim that as a “loyal diplomatic agent” he is not supposed to take part in the work of a terrorist gang. Memory Clouded Evidently, although the writer of the leading article appeals to his- tory, his memory is greatly clouded owing to his desire to help Trotsky and his colleagues to cover the traces of their crime against the Soviet Union and the toiling masses of the whole world. Otherwise, for example, he might have remem- bered that the Mensheviks who re- Pudiated civil war in the struggle aims, the internal and political con- There is nothing astonishing in this, of course, because in both }cases Menshevism and its Troiskyite fraction defended and still defend the interests of the bourgeoisie against the proletarian revolution. There is nothing astonishing in the fact that the Trotskyite-Zinoviev bloc which began with the shame- Jess distortion of Marxism-Lenin- ism stooped so low that it does not hesitate at the use of any meth- ,ods of struggle against the country which is the living embodiment of the teachings of Marx and Lenin. , In order to realize how deep are the moral and political contacts be- tween the foul murderers of Com- rade Kirov and cynical self-styled “Marxist” Trotsky, we do not even require to remember everything written during the last few years by this “has been” who has been cast out by history into the filthy back- yards of the bourgeois parties. It is sufficient to compare two “human documents” of this kind: Trotsky’s article “Two Outlooks for the Soviet Union,” published in the “Neue Weltbuhne” at the end of 1933 (at , the very time when the under- ground - Zinoviev-Trotskyite groups ,in the Soviet Union began to be- come more active), and the testi- -mony of Nikolaev as given in the indictment on the murder of Com- rade Kirov; » “We could not expect a change in - Party leadership by the methods of jimner Party democracy,” said Niko- ilaevy. “We realised that this path {was entirely out of the question.” Whose words is Nikolaev repeat- jing, almost literally? The words of the leaders of the Zinoviev- Trotsky bloc. What had Trotsky prompted to his fellow-thinkers “We feel that in the present important labor developments in miners is immediately necessary, and we urge every local union to elect one or more delegates to this conference.” Fraternally yours, (Signed) WILLIAM SPANG, Chairman, District One, A. A. of I. S. and T. W. between the steel workers and the Welfare Board Hires Prison Labor in South LOUISVILLE, Ky., Feb, 1—The Executive Council of the Kentucky Federation of Labor has sent a pro- test to Governor Ruby Laffoon against the proposed contract be- tween the Huffins Shirt Company | of Nashville, Tenn., and the Ken-; tucky Board of Welfare. The con-! tract if effective will mean that} 1,000 Kentucky convicts will be put to work in prison shirt shops, and would prove an effective weapon for increasing unemployment and driving the wages of shirt workers to still lower levels. It is considered that N.R.A. labels will be placed on the shirts as the contract was submitted to the re- cently established Prison Labor Au- | thority. This condition exists de- spite the Hawes-Cooper Act which prohibits such practice, but is never enforced. New York shirt manu- facturers, operating plants in Ten- nessee, declared that if the contract goes through its plants in New York will close. this question? “Tf it is true that the bureaucrats hold the entire power and the ap- proaches to it in their hands,” wrote Trotsky, “and this is the ac- tual state of affairs, then a ques- tion of no small importance arises —how to bring about the reorgan- ization of the, Soviet Government. And can this task be solved by peaceful methods? ... No normal ‘constitutional’ methods remain for removing the ruling clique.” A Question of Method From these equally characteristic standpoints, what conclusions are drawn by each of them, by Nikolaev and Trotsky, on the question of the methods of struggle against the Soviet Power? Nikolaev’s conclusion: ‘‘Hence there remained only one path—the path of te:roristic acts.” Tretsky’s conclusion: “The bu- reaucrats can only be compelled to give the power into the hands cf the proletarian vanguard by force.” The wiseacres from the “New Leader” may say: “There is a politi- cal difference between the points of view of Trotsky and Nikolaev. It is true that both of them were ene- mies of the C.P.S.U. and the Soviet Power. Hach of them could not see any other method of overthrowing this power except by force. But Nik- olaev speaks definitely of terroristic acts, while Trotsky uses a more gen- eral formula—“overthrow by force.” “Internal Forces” These wiseacres, however, will have to consider which forces inside and outside the USSR. Trotsky was reckoning on to carry out his plan of overthrowing the Soviet Power, and in particular how he educated these “internal forces,” and for what purpose he tried to mobilize them. First of all, what do both of them say about the external forces which in their opinion will “liberate the country from the Stalinite bureauc- racy.” They are both unanimous on this question—they base their hopes on military intervention. In the article quoted, Trotsky more openly develops his formula on the “Clemenceau method,” a formula which he let slip even at the time when he was trying to build up an anti-Soviet opposition in the Bol- shevik party, and the meaning of which was that the defeat of the Soviet Union would open the path against Czarism and were ardent!from abroad a year previously on'to power for the Zinoviev-Trotsky Birthday Ball For President Hears Protest EASTON, Pa., Feb. 1—An unex- pected note of reality struck through the ballyhoo connected with the President’s birthday ball given here for the benefit of the Warm Springs Foundation when the dancing was suddenly halted and a resolution read demanding that President Roosevelt free Tom Mooney. The ball was arranged by labor unions here and attended largely by the membership of the unions. The resolution was unanimously passed: The resolution said, in full: “To President Roosevelt: Whereas on the occasion of the birthday of President Franklin Delano Roose- velt on Jan. 30, 1935, we members of labor unions and other organiza- tions in the city of Easton have participated in a birthday ball to aid victims of infantile paralysis; and, whereas, a few days ago ‘marked the end of a period of eighteen years and six months of imprisonment for Tom Mooney; and, whereas, Tom Mooney was imprisoned as a result of a convic- tion that was secured through per- jured testimony; and, whereas, we fully appreciate and sympathize with the spirit that prompted the President to lend his birthday to the cause of the victims of infan- tile paralysis; nevertheless, be it resolved, that we respectfully re- quest .on this occasion that the President use his good offices to in- tervene and put an end to the un- just imprisonment of Tom Mooney.” Connecticut Mill Hands Form Mass Picket Line STAFFORD SPRINGS, Conn, Feb. 1—A large picket line ap- peared yesterday at the Cyril John- son Woolen Mills here, on strike since Jan. 13, as the company made its first attempt to reopen with Scabs. Despite the bitter cold, the workers patroled the factory srounds all day. The company which normally employs 200 claims about 90 scabs were obtained. opposition, just as the defeat of bourgeois France opened the paih to power for Clemanceau. Trotsky no longer thinks it necessary to use a historic “symbol.” He sets out his calculations on intervention in a simpler fashion: “The relationship of forces inside the Soviet Union will be firmly established in case of some big his- toric trial which might be a war, In any case it is clear that by in- ternal forces alone, in view of the further decline of the world prole- tarian movement and the spread of fascist rule, the Soviet power will not be able to hold out long.” There is no need to prove that on this question as well—reliance on true disciple of the leaders of the Trotskyite - Zinoviev bloc. The brother of the murderer makes the following statement in his testi- mony: “Leonid also said to me that it is only possible to overthrow the So- viet Power by an attack of foreign capitalist states on it, and if he were abroad he would do everything in his power to help any capitalist gov- ernment which attacked the Soviet Union in order to overthrow the Soviet Power.” Violent Methods of Struggle Let vs examine the violent meth- ods of struggle inside the Soviet Union on which Trotsky and Niko- laev put their stake. “If the prole- tariat gets active, the Stalinite ap- paratus will hang in the air. If this apparatus tries to resist, then not so much measures of civil war as police measures will be used against it. In eny case, the matter in question is not so much a revolt against the dictatozship of the proletariat as of removing an abscess.” Trotzky’s reservation about the “activity of the proletariat” will naturally not deceive anyone. It is the same “activity” which Nikolaev had in view when he murdered Com- rade Kirof, “When I shot at Kirov, my cal- culetion was as follows: Our shot will be the signal for an explosion, actions within the country against the CPSU and the Soviet Power.” These “calculations” of Nikolaev are the natural fruit of the disgust- ing, base, and at the same time helpless end toothless hatred which Trotzky inflames from the lurking Place abroad in the hope that his directives would be seized on by those who are apostates like him- self but who are able, by cunning ~— \FIGHT SHARPENED AGAINST COMPANY UNIONS Betrayal; “To Hell Board. By JAMES EGAN Since the betrayal of the proposed strike action of last June the steel workers have been given proposals, counter proposals, labor board hear- ings, court proceedings, statements by Roosevelt, by the Iron and Steel Institute, Green and by Mike Tighe. A multitude of confusing, delaying and demagogic maneuvers. provid- ing a smoke screen to blind and confuse the steal workers angry and demanding action. From this maze of confusion the steel workers are now moving clearer and clearer. They now understand more clearly what Green, Roose- velt and Tighe did to them at the June convention when under the il- }lusions of the New Deal and a faith {in Roosevelt, the delegates accepted Green’s proposal for an “impartial” board of three. First. The Roosevelt-Tighe-Green proposal for an impartial board of three has achieved its real purpose, namely, to avert a strike in steel last. summer. Second. It has given the steel cor- poratiins time and opportunity to strengthen the company unions. The companies favoring those in the company unions in giving better jobs and steadier employment and discriminating against Amalgamated men. Third. This policy of arbitration and class peace has led to decline; in the active membership in the A.A. Fourth. Thousands of A. A. men have been discharged and their cases presented to this impartial board of three, but today, seven months after its appointment, not one man has been reinstated by the board. The company always states “these men are not discharged, they will be placed on the job when produc- tion picks up. (In Warren, Ohio, there are 12 such men who were discharged when only three open hearths were operating. now there are seven furnaces working but the 12 still remain idle, and the com- pany works its short force 8 hours on and 8 hours off. Each man works 16 out of 24 hours, but the 12 dis- criminated men get nothing from the “impartial” Labor Board.) Fifth, In dozens of mills the work- ers have met every requirement of the board, including elections, etc., but no place in this country has the arbitration of this “impartial board of three” resulted in a signed agree- ment with the A. A., better wages or better conditions. The Iron and Steel Institute and President Roosevelt now become apprehensive of the situation in steel. Why? Is it because the im- partial board is not fulfilling its role? No. Roosevelt and the Iron and Steel Institute are perfectly satisfied with the work of the board. On the surface of things avery Motive Behind Murder of Kiroe and hypocritical trickery to creep into and maintain themselves in the Soviet apparatus and even the Bolshevik Party. To what “police” measures does Trotzky call the fragments of the politically and morally defeated op- positional bloc who are becoming more and more convinced every day of their hopless isolation from the masses, who are driven to frenzy and despair more and more by every victory of socialist construction, by every new manifestation of the love of the masses for the Bolshevik Party and its leader Stalin, who are more and more being convinced of the complete hopelessness of the embitious intrigues of the Zinovievs and Kamenevs? Used Police Measures The things which the leaders of the Trotzky-Zinoviev bloc on the territory of the U.S.S.R. could feed the terroristic sentiments of the miserable remnants of their sup- porters are vile rumors, malicious hissing and slanderous hints. But Trotzky, the “superman,” who uses the “freedom” of the bourgeois press for anti-Soviet work, could openly shout his political directives, He gave the signal to “remove the abscess.” Nikolaev had no’ other lancet except a revolver to reach the leader of the Soviet and the world proletariat. The Nikolaevs threw themselves into the chase of the leaders of the proletarian dic- tatorship whom they most hated, hunted them, carried out che polit- ical directives to “remove the ab- scess . . . by police measures.” Comrade Kirov lies with a head shot through with a treacherous bullet, and Trotzky takes up the pose of a neutral observer, as if to say: I am not concerned in this-I am a Marxist! But this lying pose will not, of course, deceive anyone. It will not deceive the toilers of the whole IN STEEL Men Beginning To Realize Consequences of Jure with Federal Labor >” Is Their Watchword thing is quiet in steel. But why does Roosevelt personally intervene in steel and meet with Green, Tighe and the Iron and Steel Institute, and propose a six months’ truce for steel and more promises of “recog- nition.” The answer is that the steel workers in the mills now see through the labor boards and are saying quite openly “to hell wih the labor boards.” Aliquippa, the outstanding example of a company-controlled, thug-dominated, town has fallen be- fore steel workers determined to ore ganize. It is now a union town. The workers reason: “The coal miners didn't wait for the labor boards to give them recognition, they struck for it and got it. Why should we wait for something that we'll never get waiting?” Duquesne recently unanimously rejected an arbitration plan pro- posed by Tighe. Strike sentiment and the rank and file movement is growing. The rank and file of the A. A. since the organization drive of 1933 hes always been militant and against Tighe's leadership. But not until recently did it begin to con- solidate this broad rank and file movement with a clear program and capable leadership. At the A. A. con- ventions of last summer the loosely formed and unclear rank and file proved easy prey to the demagogy of Roosevelt and Green. Not so to- day when even district presidents and many lodge officials are actively supporting and leading the rank and file with a militant program of ac- tion. Roosevelt, Green, Tighe and the Iron and Steel Institute decided something must be done to check the leftward swing of the steel workers, to bolster up their rapidly, fading illusions in the N.R.A. and labor boards, and to hold back the inevitable strike. They meet in con- ferences in Washington, issue vague statements intended to convey that recognition would be given. “The only point of difference is ‘ority or majority rule,” says Green. What does this mean? It means in the main another ma- neuver aim“ to delay the action which the steel workers are prepar- ing. The discussion around minority and maiority rule is a maneuver by which Tighe and Green hope to cover up the fact that the kind of recognition they would seek to nego tiate with the U. S, Steel Corpora- tion is the same kind of “recogni- tion” that Lewis negotiated for the miners in the captive fields. All the miners in the Western Penna. fields went on strike in 1933, The coal fields have recently been “divided” into commercial and cap- tive mines. The commercial mines are those mines that produce for the general market. The captive mines are the mines owned by the steel corporations and produce only for their mills, The miners, by the strength of their strike, forced the }commercial operators: of the com- mercial mines to sign an agreement recognizing the U.M.W.A., the pit committees and checkweighmen, The steel corporations in the. cap- tive mines would not sign the agree ment. Lewis then made the famous agreement with the captive mine operators “that the steel corpora- tions recognize John L. Lewis (and why not, he is their employee, any- how) as the president of the UM, W.A.” They did not recognize the or- ganization, they recognized only the individual J. L, Lewis. This left the basis for the company to build the company unions in the captive mines under the name of the Work- men’s Brotherhood, etc., and used this agreement with individuals and their company unions to smash the real union of the workers. Understanding this development in the mine fields, it becomes clear that this is the basis of the kind of “recognition” that Green and Tishe speak of in the secret truce negotias tions in Washington. The outcome of the minority-ma- jority dispute means nothing to the steel workers. Even should the ma- jority rule b2 applied, a captive mine agreement would be tacked on, i.e, recognition of the “officials of the A, A.” and not the organization it- self, And the stecl workers would gain nothing, Such is the basis of the ‘truce’ arrangements, and Roose- velt-Green-Tighe and the Iron and Steel Institute will only play this trump card in the face of an im- mediate mass strike in steel. The steel workers must be prepared to meet such a maneuver in the near future and understand how to dee feat it, and rallying the steel work- ers behind a clear slogan of resog- nition of the A. A. and our local mill and department committees, and the abolition of the company union, Minority and majerity in eloce tions—these are terms injected by lawyers and labor boards interprot- ing Section 7A and eagerly picked up by Green and Tighe to dansle before the steel workers to keep them from decisive action. To the steel workers the issue must be clear and simple. No coms world who replied with unparalleled tage and sorrow to the murder of the brilliant fighter of the prole- tarian revolution, this pose of Trot- zky will not embarrass the agents of the international gendarmerie who, when giving money in the fu- ture to terrorists and wreckers egainst the Soviet Union, will not forget to proffer their services also for the establishment of contacts with Trotzky who is living “in some unknown place” in the beautiful capitalist world pany union—our own union, the A. A., in the control of the rank and file. To hell with the !ubor boards, We'll gain our demands by cur or- ganized strength, All eyes turn cm the Daily Worker if you spread it wide open when readirg in the subway, on street cars and busses, Buy an extra copy to leave on your seat. All eyes turn om the Daily | |