The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 6, 1935, Page 2

Barricades Set Up by 125 At Bureau (Continued from Page 1) had previously been handiezpped in placing their relief demands be- cause of language difficulties. Police Threaten Leader At this point police were mobil- ized in a vain effort to biudgeor the workers into submission. Polic: attempted to enter through the win- dows and transoms but were pushed back by the resolute workers. In retaliation, the police hurled epi- thets through the transom and threatened to “get” Jerome Ben-~ ton, organiser of the Lower West Side Unemployment Councils, who led the workers. The workers attempted to use the telephone, but were denied the use of an outside wire by the switch- board operator. Undaunted, the workers took up a collection, penny by penny, and delegated two work- érs to transmit telegraph messages to Corsi and Mayor LaGuardia. Three members of the Workers Unemployed Union, one a member of the City Central Committee, were present. During the meeting, he Was asked to speak. He declared that in the present time, any div- ision in the ranks of the unem- ployed was nothing short of crim- inal. Taking up the cry for unity, the assembled jobless urged imme- diate steps to cement a united front between the Unemployment Coun- cils and the Workers Unemployed Union. He evaded this, however At four o'clock the assemblage again sent a committee past the police who barred the already barri- caded entrance, and placed their demands again. Again they were met with a flat refusal. Mounting a desk, Jerome Benton addressed the workers. “All the things that you have been saying about the relief administration are true,” he said. “We are still met with the same cold-blooded refusal; we are still met by the police when we raise the very necessary de- mands that are a matter of life and death to us. These attacks upon our very lives must be met with the organized might of the unem- ployed.” Me called upon them to mobilize for the ci vide demon- strations which will be held at every relief bureau in the city next Mon- day. The hungry little army filed out —past the waiting police, who this time did not dare attack—outside where another group of support- img workers cheered at seeing their comrades-in-hunger. Seok Rigid fia | ou Immigration (Continued from Page 1) Mary procedure as a ser evil,” declaring that if summary arrests were not made legal, they would be carried out illegally anyhow as under Palmer and Doak, because of the growing insistence of the big | corporations for more drastic action against militant workers. “It would be better to be ar- rested without a warrant legally, than to be arrested without a warrant illegally,” this self-admit- ted puppet of the big corporations told the delegation, The delegation elected by repre- sentatives of 285 organizations who attended the recent Conference for “the Protection of Foreign Born in New York City, consisted of Dwight Morgan, Wagenknecht of the Com- mittee to Aid the Victims of Ger- man Fascism; Carl Houptman of the American Union Against Reac- tion, Max Bloom of the Interna- tional Labor Defense, David Levin- son, attorney for the Committee for Protection of Foreign Born who de- | fended Oscar Mannisto in the Fed- eral District Court, Stella Pannu- | nen of the Finnish Workers Federa- tion, E. Brandstetter, representing the Workmen’s Sick and Death Ben- efit, and Mrs. Carlson. Court Signs ' Dock Writ (Continued en Page 1) from further wage cuts and firing of union men, was brought forward ~ 4n order to confuse the workers and prevent a solid response to a strike call. The Communist Parity hai pointed out during the week since the strike Monday, that the post- ponement of action, while showing fear of the organized action of the workers, was a maneuver to give shipping companies and Mayor La » Guardia more time to prepare a Strikebreaking machinery. Ryan’s Statement Joseph Ryan, president of the IL. A. and Michael Cashal, vice. ” president I. B. of T., in a statement during the week had paved the way * for the issuing of such a decision, | by declaring that the workers would e be satisfied with it. i the situation in the event the in- 2 junction is signed would be if it = carried the right to appeal and a > stay pending the determination of | the appeal.” Following the signing of the in- junction. Edward C. Maguire, at- torney for the unions, declared: “The grant of the stay prevents the abuses in the way of wage cuts followed the publication of the opinion, from continuing, while the case is being reviewed in the higher court. As long as the unions are not left in the position where they can be broken down while the case is being reviewed, I think they will be content to await a decision of @ higher court.” He served notice that an appeal Will be filed this month. He did not explain in what form tions if their hands are tied by an injunction (PEPER WE OTN TEU HEC E RESP ERE DN ERS E AoE ROR ERE & \ “The only thing that might save | and discharges of union men which | the union will enforce union condi- | tial Teoht Sequoia Chesapeake Bay, Maryland ver sinoe owing farmers Yarn strikes are merely symptons of genefhl condition dath eritions and the founding of our republic, prospereue, the real Dacklog of cur national stability. The Homestead Ast, maintained throughout our Bistory, wisely made the creation of independent farm owners a Mational policy. Only when his soonomic existence deflation, has the farmer show resentecnt. onic on Fever in bistory bas the undermined, bave so mary farne: simple. An ounce of over for as two cunees in 1986. Now Zealand are again relatively prosperous. 0, at: . 8 Plans for pegging prices ty leans England's agricultural corrected this by doubling the price of gold in their currenoie due to th Bas boon threatened, ‘i eiiods of eng) position of the farmer beet their hones. deeply gold today can de exchanged the world ndenoies Dave Auetralia ‘and fact that we, 4 inning te persist in following Montagu Norman's Treasury to keep the dollar high, to fareers erely repeat in disguise the Fare Board experiment which ended in failure. Within the last week the Treasury rise from 64 to 72. This change of 18-1/2 equivalent to redueing by thirty billions the nume national wealth, Attempts by governaent Lo Groups against such deflationary oba: freeing the farmer, 20 price stabilising moi If we as « nation fail in of the dollar, and persist in trying resous Treasury, ths government! will inev: follewsd by involuntary in: Ft Our Committee has just completed eity unter dofietion serious Gisintegration that we foresee with: THE QUICKEST, RURETT AnD SAPRT WAY TO Conditions there, typifying » general eonditi permitted the gold value of the dollar to percent in @ur measure of value is dollars rep: ans to silenc # orucial hour to correct the abnormal value operations at the expense of the itably be destroyed in a debacle exceedingly 4iffioult to control. and of RFC in following the habit-bound administration has again undermined position of grave danger. 4 study of @ typioal Amertoan industrial seh in the next six sonths wi Ame” mowey 18 BY THLECKIAE Ot CABLE Notice this confidential telegram DIRECT to the Presidential Yacht, Sequoia—the Committee for the Nation doesn’t bother with secretaries and knows where to reach the President. The demand for cutting the dollar loose from gold was executed by Roosevelt in almost the same words in which it was expressed here, when he amnounced his gold-buying program within 74 hours after receiving this telegram! Hitler Admirer Leader In ‘Nation Committee’ (Continued from Page 1) Swope, of General Motors. Indus- trialist Swope is the leading advo- cate of applying a modification of Mussolini’s brand of Fascism in the United States. “Why is it that your father and other Committee for the Nation leaders launched their inflation program, as a ‘moagtary reform’ measure to ‘rebuild purchasing power,’ without saying anything publicly about the fact that they wanted it, as they said in secret conferences, to help protect prop- erty rights?” I asked young Van- derlip in an interview. I wanted | his explanation of why this “mone- tary reform” movement was | launched ostensibly on behalf of smaller business men and “farm- |ers” when in fact it had been ori- | ginated by big-shot capitalists who were nervously talking about the threat of “Bolshevism” and the necessity of their “doing some- thing” about the farm strikes, un- employed marches and mortgage moratorium movements which they considered threatening to the ruler- ship of the top financiers. “When Did You Hear That?” “That's only partially fair,” an- swered Vanderlin. “Property rights were not being @ttacked sufficiently |at that time for this to be upper- |most in the minds of those in the conferences. I attended most of my father's conferences, and I don't think there was any unanimity on | the question.” “I didn’t say there was. But some of them were certainly thinking along that line. Didn’t vour father and others meet in your Hotel Pierre apartment and listen nerv- ously to Henry Pove’s declaration, las long as February 1, 1933, that America was ‘just six months away from Bolshevism’ unless something were done to prevent it?” shocked. “Who could have been there that could have repeated such a conversation. How could such a | conversation come to your ears!” | Banker Vanderlip, said his son, resigned from the Committee for the Nation soon after it launched its first bruadside. However, he didn’t announce it, nor have his friends take his name off their liter- ature. In fact, “This resignation doesn't mean the Committee for the Nation fellows don’t still come to father for advice . . . they still are associated socially, and talk things over.” | Why Six Classes of Members? “Why does the Committee have six classes of membership, ending some material to some classes of its own membership and keeping if from others?” “Two reasons,” said young Van- derlip. “If various kinds of mem- bers get different material, they | think the more they pay the more | they get, and besides, different kinds f members can use different kinds of material. If you want to reach ‘Journal’ readers through one mem- ber, you don’t send him ‘Times’ pub- licity stuff—you sugar-coat the pill | so as to tell people what they want to hear.” I asked him to explain the seem- ing paradox that this Commiitee. led by industrialists, bankers and big-farmer spokesmen who are in- timately involved in the anti-labo anti-poor farmer Netional Associ tion of Manufacturers-Chamber of | Commerce drive against labor, dare |to ask labor and poor farmers to refrain from striking, to “cooperate” with them. I was thinking especial- ly of the speeches Committee mem- bers have made since the San Fran- | cisco general strike, speeches urging | working people to protect the prop- jerty rights of their exploiters, Frazier on Radio Early in August, for example, Frederic H. Frazier, chairman of General Baking Oo., and treasurer of the Committee, urged a nation- wide radio audience: “Let us not endanger recovery by fighting among ourselves. It is true that many strikes in the past have been justified. . . . But many strikes to- day are not. + Some are fomented ( ES by migratory birds of trouble who are being paid to undermine and Gestroy American institutions. . . « Some American workers may be misled in their attempts to better themselves in these critical times. But the vast majority will be always on the side of America... . Intelli- gent workers will fight to keep America the home of brave men who have the courage to take risks, who create opportunities and em- ployment in their struggle for profits . American workers cooperating with American capital...” “Anything that holds up a fac- tory, such as a strike, just holds down purchasing power and wages,” Said young Vanderlip. “You know that the truth is strikes are the only weapon workers have to increase their wages and purchasing power—don’t you?” “Yes,” he agreed. But then he begged off, “but many recent strikes were not for wages but for recog- nition of unions or something.” Vanderlip and Coughlin I asked him what his fatuer's relation is to the Rev. Charles E. Coughlin, since Coughlin is promot ing a program similar to Vander- lip’s, thoiqh elaborately adorned with radical-sounding demagogy. He wouldn’t go into that. However. he volunteered brightly that they had dinner with Coughlin a few eve- nings previously. Nor could he say Positively whether or not Emmet T. Curran, who is trying to mobilize veterans for the same program and who said he has “communicated” with Vanderlip, told the truth. Young Vanderlip “didn’t think” so. What, then, did the two Vander- lips learn about Hitler's fascism in their studies? “I suppose father hasn’t formu- lated an opinion—but I can say that the Hitler government has been responsible for more good than bad.” “Good in what respects?” “Well, he’s brought an improve- ment in the state of living of many People.” “Not in that of the workers, or | of the unemployed in concentration camps—their standards have been reduced, and they are the great ma- jority.” “Mussolini a Force for Good” “Of course,” Mr. Vanderlip re- plied casually, itler hasn’t helped the whole working class in Ger- many. But he has given the people self-respect!” “I see. And I suppose your father thinks even more of Mussolini?” “Unquestionably Mussolini's been @ greater force for good.” “Your father thinks Mussolini has done well for the people of Italy?” I was thinking of Mussolini’s castor-oil terror brigades, the mur- der of Matteotti, the crumpled trade unions, the statistically demon- strated lower living standards of the Italians. “Why, yes!” Young Vanderlip ex- claimed. “Are there many who deny that Mussolini has been a greater force for good? Why, I’m amazed to hear it!” These clear indications of banker Vanderlip’s fascist temper heighten the fascist portent of the big drive to inflation. It is ever the way of the development of full fascist dic- tatorship to show first, unparalled efforts by the financiers to retrict living standard and civil rights by indirection and, later, the attempt to erase mass opposition by direct mili- tary force. Inflation is one of the methods of reducing the people’s living stan- dards by raising the prices of the necessities of life. The main bene- ficiaries from it are the capitalists and speculators of agriculture, in- dustrtry and finance. It does not even solve their problem, but rather aggravates it. Want More Inflation This is demonstrated by the very fact that, after shoving the United States off the gold standard, reduc- ing the gold content of the dollar from 100 to about 60 cents worth of the metal, and other inflationary steps, the resulting speculative boomlet is over, and the Committee BAILY WORKER, NEW YORK, W Maloy Killing Brings Talk | Of Gang War CHICAGO, Ill, Feb. 5. — While police reported that no progress was made in finding the murderers of Thomas E. Maloy, czar of the Chi- cago Moving Pieture Operators Union, murdered by gunmen yes- terday, indications today point to revival of gang warfare between gangster officials in other unions |here. Police are seeking Edward (Red) Donovan, head of the team- sters’ union. Revival of old gang | warfare between racketeer union officials, it is feared by union work- ers, will bring great harm to or- | Sanized labor. Maloy's 20 year reign in the union was marked by slayings of leaders | of every rebel movement against his | dictatorship in the union, or such as brought in court proceedings to force an accounting of the union's funds. for the Nation are back at the| needle for more. Now they want to set up a Central Bank without the currency-issuing restrictions which | exist at least psychologically for the | Federal Reserve. They want to re-| | monetize silver. (The U. 8, Treas- | ury disclosed that Father Cough- lin’s radio league had silver hoid- ings from which they would get di- | rect speculative gains from this), | They want the new Central Bank to issue “legal tender notes” to retire the United States. obligations as they fall due. This is a much more | recklessly inflationary program than | the previous steps. | The Roosevelt government this | week sent Congress a bill to begin |to execute this program. With characteristic demagogy the govern- | ment put it forward as a measure | to “stregnthen” the Federal Reserve. But even the government-influenced | Associated Press described it as a move toward a Central Bank such ‘ Vanderlip wants. Seek Veterans’ Backing Another strong fascist threat in all this is that it offers the possi- bility to the financiers of bribing a few of the middle-class, veterans |and little business men to rivet them | under the influence of leaders who will later serve them up to the forces of open fascist dictatorship. There are indications that the financiers have thought of this: groups backed by such financiers as Vanderlip and Morgan partner convention” offering to pay the soldiers’ bonus—in currency—but only as a part of the entire new Central Bank inflation program by | having the Central Bank issue new |currency to pay the bonus these financiers could have around $2,- | 000,000,000 worth of inflation at one op. This would be gypping the veterans in the process of bribing them, for it would give them money of less buying power than their ad- | justed services call for. But by | paying them cash, it would renew | the confidence of many in their | yveactionary leadership. These re- |actionary leaders of the American | Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars and Disabled American Veterans | have been listed already by Senator |Thomas as approving of this ichemes! Big Farmers, Too The reactionary leaders of “agri- | culture,” the heads of the old big- |farmers’ “cooperatives,” are in on | this scheme too. They would benefit from it—but not the majority of the farm population, the tenant, sharecropper and agricultural la- | borers. And the Committee for the | Nation has been aware of this for a long time. Months ago it sent out an ele- gantly printed argument for “sav- ing capitalism” by building up farmers (a section of them) to be friendly to capitalism. In arguing |for this, the Committee recalled how the kulaks resisted the vic- torious Russian Workers’ and work- ing farmers’ revolution. Clese to Roosevelt How closely President Roosevelt \is working with this Committee for | the Nation crowd is strikingly illus- trated in letters sent out from the latter’s swank headquarters at 205 East 42nd Street. On last September 5, they sent a selected group a communication warning that “there is danger that the masses will take things into their own hands,” and urging “im- mediately broadening the oppor- tunity for profits” to offset the peril. In this document, Committee Chairman James H. Rand, a known intimate of Roosevelt, boldly stated: “When we first began educating the country to accept the policy of revaluation . . . we were told that ‘no leader can go too far ahead of his followers; the country must be educated; don’t let up.’ Recently the message came indirectly to us again: ‘The need for monetary ed- ucation is still very great.’” This direct implication that the government was willing to go ahead but waiting for the propaganda work to be done on the inflationary program was followed by a request that its recipients see that attached propaganda literature “reach 100,- | 000 of the nation’s leaders.” Soon after this, the committee sent out a letter saying they had word “direct from the White House” that President Roosevelt had read one of their publications “with much interest.” And within just about a month after the first Sept. 5 communica- tion, President Roosevelt reaf- firmed his determination to “re- store prices” some more! Then the committee wrote all its members and supporters: “If the President can be supported so that he can carry through . . . business will be- come increasingly profitable!” Then came the “monetary con- vention”—and now, the President's Administration proposal for legisla- tion. This is one of the ways fascism— like war—is being made in America. Tomorrow—The conclusion of the series on Wall Street’s fascist conspiracy. Stotesbury’s step-son, J. H. R. Crom- | well, recently joined in a “monetary | DNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1935 The Specter of Gold Decision If the Gold Clause Wins, More Millions Will Lose Their Jobs By Harry Gannes The spectre of gold hangs threat- eningly over the whole economic structure of the country. Every. | bank, every stock and commodity exchange in the couritry is prepar- ing as if for a mighty storm. Talk |of panic freely reigns in the biggest | financial institutions of the country |and in Congress, Any day now the nine old Su- preme Court justices, grown white | and grey in the services of the big- gest trusts in the country, are ex- pected to hand down a decision, the effect of which may rock the coun- try like the stock market crash of 1928. These gentlemen are dealing with the fundamental of fundamentals of the capitalist legal rules of pri- vate property—the function of gold in exchange and sale of goods. In order to understand the basic issues involved, it will be necessary to trim away a lot of the techni- calities and legal rubbish that is usually thrown around these cases. Grab for Gold The whole matter arises out of the economic crisis that has en- gulfed American capitalism for nearly six years. The breakdown of the industry and trade of the coun- try brought about the closing of the banks, Hoarding of money took place. All of the “normal” laws of the exchange of goods broke down. In the period of such crises there is always a rush for gold. Dur- ing periods of the usual functioning of capitalism, gold hardly ever enters into day to day consideration. As Karl Marx put it: When things go smoothly, the capitalists declare only factories, and the like are wealth. When the crisis hits them, they ery, only gold is wealth. But with everybody grabbing for gold during a crisis, the banks are |drained, the government gold re- | serves dwindle, There is not enough | gold to go around. Gold becomes a |fetter to the capitalist governments in their effort to smash their way mite the financial blockade, they go off the gold standard—that is, they begin to issue paper money without gold backing, or with reduced gold backing. Now specifically in the United States this has created a serious problem for the capitalists. The Roosevelt_government concentrated in the Federal Treasury all the gold in the country in order to help the big trusts and the bankrupt | banks, Roosevelt Inflation Policy When Roosevelt took office, the | Whole banking system was closed |down. Roosevelt then pursued a | policy of inflation, that is of print- |ing government bonds and money | without gold becking, in order to |hand money to the capitalists to |get them out of their tight hole. Later he concentrated the coun- try’s qold reserves in the govern- ment coffers to use them in the in- terest of the capitalist class. Still later he cut down the gold-content of the dollar. Before the present crisis the American dollar was worth 25.8 grains of gold nine-tenths pure. Roosevelt cut this down to 15 5-21 grains of gold. The effect of this was to raise prices. Since there was less gold in a@ paper dollar, more dollars were demanded for the same article. For the bosses, this raised profits, be- cause with rising prices the value of his stocks and bonds went up. For the workers, it cut his living stand- ard, because he had to pay more | dollars for food, rent, and clothing. But in this whole process there was one big hitch. And that is the subject of discussion in the Su- preme Court. It is the ghost that hovers over the whole economic and financial structure of American capitalism today. It reaches to the fundamental roots of capitalism. A new contradiction arose that is Plaguing capitalism and is fraught with dangerous consequences for ;the working class, whichever way it is decided by the Supreme Court. Contracts for Gold In floating bonds, in making con- tracts, the capitalists are old ex- perienced, wily pirates. They re- member capitalism has a long his- tory of crisis. Especially in the out of the crisis. In order to dyna- | WALL STREET GIRDING FOR EXPECTED PANIC; WORKING CLASS WILL LOSE OUT EITHER WAY ®— Gold! Yellow, glittering, pre- cious gold! Thus much of this will make biack, white, foul, fair; Wrong, right, base, noble; ok, young; coward, valiant... . Wilt knit and break religions; Diess the accurs’d; Make the hoar leprosy ador’d; place thieves, And give them title, knee, and approbation, With senators on the bench, . . —SHAKESPEARE United States, they remember the post-Civil War inflationary periods, and greenback periods. So when a bond issue was floated of say $20,000,000, the purchasers de- manded guaranteed payment of principal and interest in the future in gold. The purpose of this was to avoid losses in the event the gov- ernment decided to cheapen the paper dollar. In other words, they insisted on being paid in dollars of 26.8 grains of gold. That is known as the gold clause in contracts. There are today in the United States over $100,000,000- 000 in contracts, stocks, bonds and government securities containing the gold clause contract, Now these bonds and stocks were issued be- tween 1919 and 1929—that ‘is, when the dollar contained the 25.8 grains of gold. The holders of these bonds (or at least in five instances) have now appealed to the United States Su- preme Court. They demand that their contracts be paid in gold or gold equivalent. This would mean they would get $160,000,000,000 in the present paper dollar, which contains only 15 5-21 grains of gold, in order to make up for inflation. Two Questions Briefly, the Supreme Court must answer the following two questions: 1) Will they sustain the validity of the gold clause?; or 2) Will they uphold the Roosevelt government's monetary policy and declare that the gold contract is void, in the full | meaning of its terms, and that the bond holders should be satisfied by being paid in paper dollars of to- day’s gold value? The answer, of course, is not so easy or so simple. To simply up-| hold the gold clause in contracts, would create an immediate panic, first, because there is no gold for general circulation available with which to pay these contracts. Sec- ond, it would topple over the whole monetary legislation of the Roose- velt government. Yet to wipe out the gold clause, would tend to yank from capitalism its historical, fun- damental basis of money and ex- change, its prime measure of wealth. What the Supreme Court has be- fore it is to work up some solution | of this problem without, at the same time, fundamentally calling into question the gold foundation of cap- italism. It must still provide the Roosevelt regime with every meas- ure necessary to try to save cap-| italism from the crisis at the ex- pense of the working class. They have to do more. They not only have to deal with the imme- diate issues of capitalism, or with the immediate interests of a certain | section of capitalism, but they have to take a long range view, in the interest of the dominant financiers. Probably Two Opinions What will their decision be? And what will be the effect of the va- rious possible forms this decision may take? It is already indicated in the news that the old corpora- tion lawyers in the black robes of Supreme Court justices are not having an easy time of this basic question for capitalism. They have postponed and again postponed their decision. But we do know now that there will most likely be two opinions. One will be written by Chief Justice Hughes, who speaks pretty much for the immediate needs of the Roosevelt regime. The other will be written by Justice Van Devanter, who is mainly concerned with emphasizing the fundamental laws of capitalism regardless of crisis, While there appears to be a con- tradiction here, in reality there is not. It is actually a division of labor. One will be serying the im- mediate interests of capitalism, in crisis, easing the path for Roose- | and underlining the basic, hoary | | voided or pushed into a back seat, \if Roosevelt Is Upheld More Inflation Will Follow | Van Kleeck Gives Views On Insurance: ’ (Continued from Page 1) Lodge, at which 450 were present, * and adopted and endorsed the Lun- deen Unemployment and Social In- surance Bill, H.R. 2627.” The tran- sients of Washington, he stated, * rules of capitalist robbery. It is true | the immediate practical effect of | whichever opinion gets a majority | vote will be different. And that is the question that will be known only when four or more of the other judges vote for either Hughes’ or Van Devanter’s way of expressing the decision. | Panic Should the gold clause be upheld without any frills, the result will be immediate panic. But the Roose- velt government is ready to pass | legislation immediately to fix the matter up, and to adjust its usual policy of inflation, of robbing the toilers to attempt to pull capitalism out of the crisis. If the Roosevelt legislation is | upheld, it will facilitate further in- | flation. The most likely outcome is an attempt to reconcile the contradic- tions, first, by upholding the Roose- velt regime’s legislation which has been so beneficial to Wall Street, and second, to maintain the gold clause with modifications. This would be done by pointing out the emergency situations; hold- ing out the hope of “recovery” of capitalism, with the re-emergence of the validity of gold clause con- tracts at some future date. Those sections of finance capital who stand to gain by a clear af- firmation of the gold clause deci- sion, and those who fear rapid in- flation, frankly welcome a panic. For example, @ leading article in the Wall Street sheet, “The Annal- ist,” of Jan. 26, says: However, to dwell on the as- sumption for a moment, a panic might not be so bad a thing as it has been painted by the Attorney General. They are awful to con- template if they lie ahead, but no one staggers at the thought of one which has passed, and it is char- acteristic of all panics that they do pass, The country ought to know for it has had to put up with five of them in the last four years, Some say the period has been one of continuows panic,” New Mass Unemployment What difference does it make to these gentlemen if several million workers lose their jobs? They be- lieve that they, the big capitalists, knowing in advance the decision, will be able to weather the storm at the cost of the smaller capital- ists, and most particularly at the expenses of the poorer sections of the population. No matter what their decision will be, it will be ex- ploited by the big Wall Street banks and stock speculators for their own interest at the cost of the masses. In the event the gold clause is | | with Roosevelt's legislation ‘upheld, what then will be the effect on the workers? The Roosevelt regime will use it to the full for demagogic purposes, to show the “new era” in the legis- v‘ion. It will have a weapon to Speed up inflation, to go ahead with its ever-increasing fascist measures, with the dictatorial concentration of power in the hands of the executive, with its fake social in- surance schemes, This case in the U. 8S. Supreme Court serves above all to bring to the workers the fact that despite all ballyhoo and demagoguery, the crisis of capitalism in every phase continues and creates new, funda- mental contradictions for the system of plunder of the toiling masses. No court decision can cure or help to solve this crisis, It is only a matter of adjusting the rules to help this or that capitalist group as agayst the other. For the great masses of impoverished workers, poor and middle farmers, and the middle class, the burdens of the crisis will mount every day. The toiling masses are beginning to see through the New Deal, are more and more entering into strike struggles against the N.R.A. They are more and more beginning to | realize that only by struggle on the basis of the united front of the working class can they beat back the new attacks of the Roosevelt re- gime. They are beginning to real- ize that ultimately only by over- throwing capitalism and establish- ing workers’ rule can they save velt. The other will be stressing themselves from panic, hunger, war and fascism. New Soviet Election Law Is Result Of Triumph of Collectivization (Special to the Daily Worker) MOSCOW, Feb. 5 (By Cable).— Indicating how the decision of the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party to alter the con- stitutior of the U. 8. S. R, to give the peasants equal representation with the workers in the Soviets sig- nified a broadening of the essential democracy of the proletarian dicta- torship, an editorial in Izvestia, So- viet government organ, declares in part: “The pitiful adherents of bour- geois democracy, the petty bour- geois, democrats of all shades, in- cluding Social Democracy, based themselves and continue to base themselves, in all their activity, upon a fiction of democracy ‘above classes.’ In reality, they support the masked form of capitalist dictator- ship. These adherents of a bour- geois democracy ‘above classes’ al- ways lump together the naked form of bourgeois dictatorship—its fascist form—on the one hand, and the dictatorship of the proletariat on the other. Higher Type “In polemizing against Kautsky, Lenin had already put forward with bourgeois democracy which is the| great insistence the thesis that the Soviet State, the dictatorship of the proletariat, is at the same time a higher type of democracy, democ- racy for the overwhelming majority of the people, democracy for the toilers. The program of the Party written by Lenin states: “‘Any restriction ef freedom whatsoever is necessary exclu- sively as a temporary measure in the fight against the attempts of the exploiters to defend or restore their privileges. According to the extent to which the objective pos- sibility of the exploitation of man by man disappears, the necessity of these temporary measures will disappear, and the Party will strive to diminish, and then fully abolish them,’ “This line of Leninist principle the Party has undeviatingly carried out, suppressing the exploiters and all their agents of various calibres, of various shades. Vast Changes “Since the time of intervention in 1919, vast changes have taken place in the economic basis of the country itself, and in the correlation of fun- damental social forces. Our Soviet Constitution reflected this, preserv- ing some advantages for the indus- trial proletariat in comparison with the more scattered masses in the Villages. The Party must explain the ‘temporary character of these advantages, which is historically linked with the difficulties of So- cialist organization of the villages.’ “Now when the chief difficulties of this type have been overcome, the question regarding the constitu- tional ‘advantages’ also has changed. The Central Committee of the Party, headed by Stalin, is fulfilling the many gigantic tasks left for the Party by Lenin, one of which, an exceptionally important task, is fulfilled in this proposal to make appropriate changes in the Soviet Constitution, “This is another development of the highest form of democracy. This is a further strengthening of the dictatorship of the proleta- nat, This is a further step to- “realize that this is the only bill which will take them out of the , flop-houses and breadlines.” In dis- cussing the Roosevelt Administra. tion’s Wagner-Lewis Bill, he said that it “does not attempt to help , the unemployed who today have no honest prospect of employment under present economic conditions.” Robert Miffian Sentman, archi- tect and national president of the Architects and Engineers, Chem- ists and Technicians, reported to the committee, “as a result of awakened collective consciousness and of subsequent collective study and investigation, the national con- . vention of the federation, in Chi- | cago, December, 1934, unanimously « endorsed the Workers’ Bill.” He added, “just as emphatically as we oppose the Administration's inade- quate program of four billion dol- lars for public works and its so- called benefits in terms of. work relief as a miserable pittance of $50 or less per person a month—just as emphatically do we oppose any form of so-called unemployment insurance, as typified by the Wag- ner-Lewis Bill, which fails to pro- vide adequate relief immediately for + all workers at present unemployed for as long as they shall continue to remain unemployed through no , fault of their own.” Urges Profit Tax Discussing “sources of funds,” . Miss Van Kleeck said, “It is basic in the Workers’ Bill that the sources , of funds come from general tax- ation and from income taxes and taxes on inheritance and gifts... . It is a sound principle to undertake this redistribution of the national income in a period of crisis to meet mass unemployment by tax on Profits and higher incomes. “Other proposals, which call for the withholding of part of the wages of workers and a tax on pay- rolls, which is inevitably passed on to the consumer tend merely to re- arrange workers’ income, decreasing current earnings in the interest of building up reserve funds against future unemployment. These funds enter into channels of investment, which really constitute increase in the debt burden of American in- dustry and still further throw out of gear the purchasing power of the people in relation to productive capacity.” Air Alliances Against Nazis (Continued from Page 1) ficial sources in Germany.- No statement has yet been issued by the Fascist government, thougn one is promised as soon as the Nazi government has “digested” the proposals. One report says that Hitler in- formed the British ambassador Phipps that Germany might accept, in principle, the British-French proposal for mutual aevial defense, The proposals were welcome here, it was said, because they embody recognition of Germany’s air fleet. Germany is denied a military air force under the Versailles treaty. But the British-French agreement recognizes Germany’s right to an air force by envisaging its inclusion in the proposal for a treaty under which Germany, Britain, France and Belgium would pledge them- selves to aid each other with planes in the event of war. Paris newspapers are exultant over the British-French agreement, hinting that if France were at- tacked, the promised aid of the British air force necessarily would include the British army and navy. The French press considered the agreement so favorable to it that they expressed doubt whether Ger- many would accept. They said that Fascist Germany would be forced to find an indirect way to refuse it because direct rejection would leave the Nazi Reich in the position of re- _ fusing to cooperate in an effort to consolidate “peace.” The Belgian cabinet met today and approved in principle the French-British agreement. - Some of the German officials, in an interview with the Associated Press, declared that the London proposals were “old stuff.” They — said that there is no chance of Ger- many’s accepting it in its present form. London official sources declared that the British government would not support the French proposals for an Eastern Locarno pact for | mutual assistance of the Eastem European countries. The Hastern Locarno pact is backed by the Soviet Union, which has already made agreements with France for the — maintenance of existing borders, and for the securing of peace of the | Eastern European countries. War Department Allots Funds for New York WASHINGTON, Feb. 5 (U.P). — , The War Department yesterday — approved allotments for mainten- _ ance work on river and harbor proj- ti ects as follows: Twenty thousand dollars for i peteenence. of the Hudson River, ‘Six thousand five hundred dol lars for the Harlem River, N. Y, Ford To Speak on Negro j Question i wards the development of previ- ously eat mass creative- ness. It increases the responsi- bility of the Communists, to at- tract new millions into active construction.” James Ford, member of the Cen-. tral Committee of the Communist Party, will speak on “The Negro Question as a National Question in’ the United States,” at Irving Plaza Hall, at 8:30 p.m, - ea