How Do the Cutters Stand?
Wipe Hooliganism Out of the Movement!
The Hillman Reckerman Union minimum wage, and their disposition is in general less revolutionary than that of of the tailors But their discontenti has been continually growing under the intolerable regime of the local, and with a correct policy the Left wing could establish In the militant, Number 29, in his artiBy ALBERT ORLAND directions. While the Beckerman forces a good base there.
cle on the last convention of the in have been split, the administration of local Etut the zig zag tactics of the Toronto, comrade Schneider wrote about irresponsibility of the officials, the tramp is forced to divide power with the Hill and previously the that have the fight between the Beckerman and the ling upon the elementary rights of the man forces in the local, These combined followed like a weathercock the official Hillman cliques and the compromise reached membership, the espionage system and the forces have already shown their strength winds of the Communist International have by them at that convention to divide the economic terror have destroyed the activity in the local by a recent victory over the had their disastrous results here as everyspoils in the New York organization and and broken the resistance of the rank and membership in doubling the amount od where else. The swift alterations between continue to keep the members in submis file of the membership. These are the membership dues in the local. In what the united fronts at all costs and the holiersion To have a better understanding of results of the machinations of the grip the membership will soon find itaelt than thou attitudes of the third period the situation in the New York Organization officialdom in the strongest local in New is not difficult to imagine.
apostles have so confused the rank and file and the importance of the Toronto convenYork.
These are the net results of the Tor that no organized Left wing movement is tion it is necessary to have some knowledge The Cutters local has faithfully per onto Convention for the Hillman leadership. to be found in the The existence of the character and functions of the Cut formed its service as an instrument in The New York market is nearing the final of a Left wing there is not at all desired ters Union, Local Big Four. For Hillman hands to force efficiency union stage of being completely efficiency union. by the official Communist Party, and any in the fights between the cliques in the ism on the tailors. It now comes next in ized for the benefit of Hillman higher attempt to organize a Left wing in the New York Amalgamated oganization in the order to be whipped into line with the union strategy. As to the clothing work is met with fierce oppostion last few years this local has played an rest of the clothing workers. The cutters ers their history is still to be written. by the Stalinists.
important part and on the developments will not escape the fate prescribed for them Where is the Left Wing in the Local?
According the third period policy in the Cutters Local depends much of the by Hillman and the clothing boases.
To fix the blame for not having activization of the membership of the old future of the Amalgamated in New York. What did the Toronto convention ac strong Left wing group in the cutters unions is branded as reformism. ParticiLocal has always been considered the complish for Hillman and what will be its union entirely on the politiciany of the pation in these is considered a sort of strongest post of the in New York, results for the cutters? This convention third period. as comrade Schneider does necessary evil and permitted only with Due to the specific conditions under which completed a chapter in the history of Hill in the case of the other locals would not the object of exposing the reactionary offithe cutters work, they have been a sort man efficiency unionizing of the New be entirely correct, neither would it be just. cialdom and recruiting members for the of aristocratic caste in the ranks of the York market. this chapter, the cutters In the specific conditions of the cutters revolutionary union under the leadership of clothing workers, particularly in New York, local had written not a few important union the absence of an outspoken Left the This policy is of course unlike the clothing workers here.
pages and its future can already be fore wing group in the present period of gener based on the theory that the workers in Working directly for the manufactur cast.
al reaction is hardly surprising. Unlike the reactionary unions have already been ers in separate cutting rooms, isolated from The cutters local is already being the other branches of the the cut radicalized and are ready on short notice the tailors who make up the garments placed under Hillman control. The local tera local still enjoys some union condi of the agents to leave the old in the shops of the contractors the cutters officials are gradually submitting to his tions, like the week work system and the unions and join the revolutionary ones.
have occupied a position more advantageAll that is necessary is just to stage a few ous than that of the rest of the workers exposures of social fascists there at their in the industry. The cutters have consemeetings. No pressure, however, should be quently been easily influenced by the craft used on the officials to show in concrete Ideology of the leadership of the old United cases of struggle just where they stand on Garment Workers as well as of tile present Those who imagine that the Stalinists lence. They do not seem to know that questions affecting the interests of the work leadership The cutters union has have given up their tactics of violent phys during the history of the struggle between ers for fear that this may create Illusions maintained its local autonomy under the ical attacks upon ideological opponents with Bolsheviks, and Narodniki in czarist among the workers that the old unions Ite affiliation with the New York in the working class, like the disruption Russla, a struggle that reached the bittercan be reformed. Here is how this policy Joint Board has been almost on the lines of public meetings, are laboring under a est points at times, there was never a sinis expressed in the Daily Worker, August of a fraternal organization and its co opermisapprehension. The only change in the gle, solitary Instance of one of the groups 19th editorial: ation of a voluntary character.
tactics has been that the Daily Worker is in the revolutionary movement organizing It is not our duty to desert the The peculiar position of the Cutters more careful than it was about boasting Local has been responsible to a large dea gang for the deliberate purpose of diaof and leave the members of these union the of the bureaucratic gangsterism. In reality, under gree for the demoralization and the sufrupting the meeting of another group.
leadership of the ferings of the thousands of clothing workhowever, it continues in just as dastardly Teckling, questioning and similar means bosses agents to be utilize against the interests of the workers. On the contrary erg in New York. Holding the key posia manner as when it was first begun by of discussion were frequent occurences, but revolutionary workers must carry on thei: tion to the New York organization, Local the Lovestone faction against the meetings never the fanatical hoodlumery that is the activities within the of not with has been the decisive factor in the of the Left Opposition. The most recent crowning contribution of Stalinism to the the Lovestonian conception of forcing the struggles between the union and the boss case in point is the disruption of the New revolutionary movement.
leaders to fight, but with the revolutionary es and also a strategic post for all political York street meeting at University As comrade Trotsky has so poignantly conception of winning the leadership of machinations of the cliques and factions in Place and 14th Street, a couple of Wedexpressed it, the Stalinists try to make up these workers for the building of revoluthe union. In the years when the nesdays ago for their impotence in the face of the tionary trade unions which alone can sucwas a militant union, the cutters local was The has been holding its meetthe vanguard of the clothing workers and cessfully fight for the economic demands bourgeois state by physical domineering ing on that corner for sometime, every over and attacks upon nort Stalinist groups of the workers.
contributed the greater share to the imWednesday night. Recently, some Party This policy is a complete refutation of provement of their conditions in the shops in the movement; they substitute for an and the building of the union.
members have been instructed to cultivate the Leninist conception of working within appeal to the workers brains. a club on the Today the Cutters Union, while it the habit of attending these meetings not the old unions. To believe that the workworkers heads. These methods disgrace ers will get radicalized under the influence has maintained many of the gains of the for the purpose of discussing respective the movement as a whole. We branded of a few speeches exposing the reactionary previous period so far as conditions go, points of view, but of deliberately provok them Vitriolically when Lewis Sigman. leadership and not by organized pressure is looked upon the bulwark of reaction ing battles. Two weeks ago, this contempt Hillman and Co. introduced them in the on this leadership to show their color in in the This reputation of Local ible procedure reached its peak. Surround trade unions. We have no less condem action condemns the work in the unions is due to the role it has played in recent ing the meeting at which a handful of nation for them when they are introduced to futility. The result of such a policy years in Hillman campaign of efficiency was present, some 150 to 200 Party in the name of a Stalinist neo Communism. can only be the isolation of the revolution.
unionizing the New York Clothing market. members worked up to a pitch of incitement ary element from the bulk of the memberLocal has been the chief instrument that ended with a physical assault upon the The workers everywhere will be alding ship still under the influence of the reacin Hillman hands for breaking the resist members who were greatly outthe cause it labor by shouting their hos tionary leadership and the strengthening ance of the tailors against standards of numbered. As usual, the Stalinists were tility to these reactionary methods against of the later position in the unions.
production, the introduction of piecework equipped with blackjacks and similar peradversaries in the movement. The workThe reactionary officials, relieved the and finally the crushing of the Left wing.
er in the official Party, in whom the revolusuasive instruments. In spite of the odds, pressure of an organized opposition, have Each victory over the tailors in New the courageously and successfully tionary spirit has not been extinguished a free hand to carry on their work of beYork was achieved by the help of the Cut routed the hoodlums even before the police by the senseless marionettes who occupy trayal and can only be thankful for such a ters corrupt officials who in addition to policy came on the scene. Needless to say that the high poste, will do an incalculable sertthe strategic position they have occupied the meeting was then dispersed.
vice to the Communist movement too by In reciprocation for this policy, which in the organization have also, through their nding up ing voice in otest is a real service rendered them by the connections with the strong arm guard, Some time later, at 10th Street and against these degrading tactics. He will Left wing, they are obligingly taking care.
been best qualified for that job.
2nd Avenue, where a Party meeting was find a ready echo from the hearts, if not ful pains to relieve the third period Who does not remember the infamous in process, Herbert Mahler, a local the lips, of hundreds of others.
Left wingers of the effects of the necessary Beckerman campaign of forcing piece work member, started to ask Engdahl, the Party evil of the participation at union meeton the tailors and his blackjacking of the speaker who had just mentioned the Party ings entirely, by either expelling them or Left wing? And Beckerman as the evil fight for free speech, why the Party sought gradually doing away with union meetings, link between the cutters union and the to prevent the Wobblies from speaking free.
ALL INVITED thereby also gaving the reactionary unions New York organization has contributed ly. gang of Party members immediately to the and themselves from exposure. That this most to wrecking the morale and the solidset upon Mahler and his companiona. Bulls. FORMAL OPENING always means strengthening the revoluarity and making the job of betrayal of the tionary unions is hard to say but it should tailors so much easier for themselves. In and cops came on the scene in a moment, of two regular study classes: mean that to right thinking Communists and one of the former was kicked while the above mentioned campaign of Hillman «History of the American anyway. However, the immediate effect of and Beckerman against the tailors, the cutbeating a prostate with his fist.
the new policy is this amazing reciprocity Mahler. Kolescar and a few other Labor Movement. ters stood aloof, thereby sanctioning all the between the reactionaries and the third were then aregted!
disgraceful acts of their officials.
In the patrol wagon, by JAMES CANNON period revolutionists which, though not But in all the bargains between HillMahler was unmercifully slugged by the «Marxian Economics pre arranged or even intended, is nevertheman and his agents, the Cutters union dicks so that he bled profusely. Kolescar, less logical and unavoidable under the apofficials, the membership of the local has a slight worker, had two of his teeth knockby ALBERT WEISBORD plication of the new policy.
been the loser. The privileges of the cuted out. Both he and Mahle are being held at Stuyvesant Casino, 9th St. and 2nd Ave.
It remains entirely for the Left Comters have been gradually lost, their confor trial now on charges of felonious on Tuesday, October 7, 1980, p munist Opposition to undertake the reditions worsened, and due to the general assault.
building of the Left wing movement in the disruption of the organization in as well as in the other unions So much for the upshot of this sample New York, they are today as helpless as At the formal opening of the two classwhere the Left wing has been wrecked.
of Stalinist gangsterism!
the rest of the workers in the industry.
es, to which all friends are invited, comThe rank and file of the membership will Significantly enough, the Stalinists who The speed up in the shops, the temporary rades Cannon and Weisbord will outline respond a call to action by a responsible Job system which serves as a means of organized and led the rioting were almost and introduce their courses. Workers, wishand constructive Left wing organization.
supplying cheap and efficient labor to the exclusively young comrades in the moveing to join either or both of the classes (Coming articles by comrade Orland bosses and keeping the workers divided, ment, with perhaps a year or six months can do so at this meeting.
will deal with the concrete conditions of have demoralized the membership and of membership They have apparently the cutters at present, and with other secthrown hundreds of them into the streets. been taught by the Party leadership that Auspices: New York Branch tlong of the men garment industry, and The intolerable regime in the local, the Bolshevism is synonymous with. vio Communist League of America (Opposition) the problems of the Left wing. Ed.