MAY 18, 1940 SOCIALIST APPEAL. LABOR WITH WHITE SKIN CANNOT EMANCIPATE ITSELF WHERES LABOR WITH BLACK SKIN IS BRANDED. KARL MARX Back 30 Hour Plan The Negro Question Toledo CIO Council Flint Auto Unions Drivers Union THE RUSSELL FIGHT STUDY ON LIBERALS Launches Red Purge Story of Fight Now in Pamphlet re (Continued from Page 1)
negotiations indicate that little By WALTER ROURKE in Sioux City, LaGuardia atRobert Birchman (Continued from Page 1)
progress has been made.
The appointment of Bertrand tempts to smash the TWU and trials and defend Leon Trotsky General Motors has shown little West Indian Negroes Jobs in and philosopher, to the faculty of more than shocking to work defence of an individual or even plete emasculation of labor unor no inclination to make any concessions whatever to the UAW Our readers will be glad to know that they can Canal Zone Defended by the City College of New York hasers; they have shown the neces a group. Its mission was the as ons. On the other side of the CIO. President Knudsen, accord now obtain all information and background maMinneapolis Labor geois press for many weeks. Ruspolicy against the bosses and would either condemn Trotsky actionary attacks were made stated that he will grant no wage General Drivers Union Local 544, in a pamphlet And the Fourth International as against all who opposed the increases, that he will not recog published by the Northwest Organizer Behind sell wrote books in which he ex their government.
MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. The attempt of Wile that did not please the bourgeois knights fighting for academic reveal them as the true representa duced a resolution which would though he felt that the corpora ion began in 1938 and has aroused national interby CARL SHEA American Legion type of Amernize the shop steward system, the 544 Suit.
pressed opinions of sex relations And these liberals these white group of traitors and assassins or icanism. One delegate intro and has generally behaved as The fink suit against this militant Drivers Unliam Green to gain labor endorsement for his morallatsBecause of his ideas freedom Russell himself have atives of the only progressive have required every delegate to move to bar West Indians from jobs as skilled about free love, the family and they shown their readiness to join force in society the revolution Signe a pledged stating that he was tion was in a position to tell the est in the labor movement. The flagrant, open set back when the Minneapolis Central Labor Un protest from religious and other against the bosses and thereby Bertrand Russell was asked to neither a Communist or a Nazi. union to go to hell.
ion voted to disregard any distinction as to race reactionary sections of New York the cause of reaction?
Or do they lend his support to the British The official vote of expulsion Sidney Hillman and Phillip ion, the methods used by the bosses to break this and citizenship of workers in the Panama zone, society.
continue to humble themselves in committee for the Defense of ment with the vote standing 52 over the union end of the nego backbone of the Minneapolis movement, are clearand simply approved that efforts be made to assure that every worker received union wages, protest to the school board which No, these liberal professors pre not at all anxious to become in for, 37 against. Five CIO locals tiations; from all reports they are ly shown in the pamphlet.
purely on the defensive and Mur The history of the union itself, since its rebirth appointed Russell. As a result a fer to exercise on a comparably volved in this progressive force. have already concurred in the ac ray is beginning to spread the in 1933 34, the organizational and economic gains William Green is asking all AFL bodies to support a congressional amendment to appropriation Kay, a Brooklyn taxpayer; she rather than to challenge directly 7th, 1937, Charles Sumner, secrelaw suit was started by Mrs. Jean safe issue like the Russell case In a letter to Trotsky on May tion of the central body.
His Own Medicine opinion that the union will have to the workers of the city in that period, the bills for the Canal Zone, which amendments contested the legality of the ap the real reactionary force in our tary of the British Committee Ironically enough, Osthimer is de sive up demands for the shop workings of the gigantic bookkeeping system used by Local 544, are all written into pamphwould minate West Indian Negroes from pointment on the grounds that society. capitalism, imperialist for an inquiry into the Moscow a delegate representing a white stewards system.
let in detail collar workers union (Local 29, skilled occupations. Mr. Green doesn mind the Russell was not a citizen of the war and the governments, demo trials writes as follows: Militants Propose Strategy Negroes working at unskilled jobs.
The United States and that he would cratic or dictatorial. They prefer First, with regard to the in from which, little Negotiations have begun at the the Northwe written by Miles Dunne, editor of Organizer and secretary treasurer have an immoral intluence on the to ask favors of the boss class tellectuals, Bertrand Russell is over a year ago several Trotsky beginning of the slack season in of the Teamsters Joint Council, parent body of ites were expelled for being an the industry when the company Local 514, is a splendid analysis of the rise of the Questions Use of Term Negro City College Judge McGeehan cades and throw their lot in with tellectual we have on the Com. Roosevelt, at the instigation can afford a struggle with the un national labor movement since 1933. Miles Dunne Editor: question very much the correctness of your made a decision cancelling the ap the working class. The govern mittee, but in joining it he of Osthimer and other stalinists ion much better than during the shows clearly the connection between the rising pointment because The contenment campaign directed against made it quite clear that he was in the union. Now the official par tall upswing. This fact recog working class, the gains forced out of the emcolumn heading. The Negro Question.
The word Negro is a legitimate one and found that Mr. Russell has taught in ganizations receives scant atten. nor money. condition of thimer is behind the eight ball of the union, as was shown at against organized labor by the boss class and the tion of the petitioner (Mrs. Kay) the very existence of workers or prepared to give neither time since has been red hand poor o. nized by the militant membership ploying class, and the present frantic drive in the dictionary (80 is the word slave. And his books immoral and salacious tion from our professors and their which we were rather rudely This was thrown in his face meeting of the GM sub council of government.
the Greenwich Villager, the successful singer, etc. doctrines is amply sustained by friends. They are too busy safely reminded when we asked him if last night by Joseph Ditzel, pres the UAW CIO in Detroit last One of the major issues raised by the finks atmay be very proud of it. Even while they lick the the books conceded to be the defending the academic freedom he would sit on the Commis ident of the Chevrolet local. Os week, where a motion was passed torneys in the trial was the disbursement of funds boots of the white bourgeoisie, they trade on their writings of Bertrand Russell. of Bertrand Russell, while the sion. solidarity with their race. And the race men There is no doubt but that this power of the working class, which Russell apparently was too speech, that during the Chevrolet postponed until the production union was a huge iron safe from which the offioften take a strong and almost masochistic de decision is a blow at academic is the foundation of academic busy elaborating his advanced strike he had visited the home of pick up, and at that time to begin cials dipped at will, have been ably refuted by light in speaking of the Negro.
YET they all know that a great portion of the posed by all interested in main being eaten away before their questions to put either time or who was opposed to the ex steward system, wage increases, herself, outlining in detail the process of keeping freedom and that it must be op freedom as of all our liberties, is opinions on fundamental social Ditzel nearly every night. Dit a real fight not only for the shop one chapter, written by the union bookkeeper colored working class resent the word second only Laining what democratic rights very eyes if they would only money in investigating the great but a lot of Communists came to etc. but also for the 30 hour of the intricacies of that system were amazed at Not from any inferiority we still possess.
to the word bogace newspapers continually open them.
complex, as the The Call (Mr. Norman Thomas against the only progressive force my house during the strike, after week at 40 hours pay.
suggest, but rather because of their genuine mili BUT THE LIBERALS CAN paper) of April 13th declares that in society.
they had been run off the picket the painstaking details when they read this sectancy and their still inarticulate class conscious LEAD THAT FIGHT. Professor Russell deserves line, begging me to let them tion. Every three months, in addition to the reguCompany Provokes Men ness.
lar audit by the auditor from the International But the liberals who protest so the unhesitant support of the ONLY THE WORKERS march. The Stalinists, Ditzel The GM Corporation, weil Brotherhood of Teamsters, the union hires a pubColored people would rather be called such. vehemently against this reaction progressive forces in American WILL BRING FREEDOM continued, said they wanted to be aware of its temporary advan lic certified accountant firm to go over the books.
They are not seeking to escape their color. they ary example of captialist demo life. Now, as was stated above. The case of Bertrand Russell able to claim some credit for wintage, has been provoking dozens Ward Clarke, who is the accountant regularly are not Greenwich Villagers. but to escape its cracy really accompanying indignities. And to call them col ture. Bertrand Russell, their is an important cause, worthy of another illustration of how they freedom of speech, m for it for these provocations, speed. ups, before the Central Labor Union that 5414 books sorry ored people as they wish, instead of Negroes is standard bearer in the fight for the support of the workers. But choose to see the trees rather everyone, even Communists. The the taking away of rest periods are te best set of books have ever seen.
not catering to prejudice, etc. but just the oppo freedom, is the sorriest site, and is in fact, gettng off the high horse of a lot not even having the courago on a personal plane as The Call such figures as Judge McGeehan themselves, not for anyone else, rank and file action in plant after its books to the enemies of labor is ably traced.
kind of condescension to issue a fighting statement. He does when it says that Russell is and the woods are the democrat especially not for the Trotsky plant. These widely separated ac From the very beginning, Local 544 has insisted It is only when you are already familiar with a preferred to leave all of this to personally deserving of the sup ic or dictatorial oppression of the ites.
colored man that you speak about the Negro. the Civil Liberties Union and took port of progressive forces. Some entire working class by the pow But the purge of the Stalinists negotiations by the corporation committee, and that the books and financial reDon forget that when we take the Appeal to his whipping docilely in the hope perspicacious people braver Balderful state machine the cap every tea bezbor min tanto every the Pool Of the irresponsibility of ports are open to any member of the union, at or in their homes, we show them page first back to him if he submitted sell because we disagree with his to fight the violent and decisive progressive, every war opposiany time. But the five members of the union and your column. And their eyes fall on The quietly.
philosophy. This is stupid and we battles against this reactionary tionist and feverene nemohu kontaktinue, the union leadership thus are and have been avowed organizers for the these provocations con who brought the suit have unsavory records. They Negro Question. It make me feel like a social Professor Speer of can only shrug our shoulders. It class, they are always prepared worker will feel the Tron Heeloo far has found no answer except Associated Independent Unions, Local a child worker or something.
astounded. Dr. Bons of Colum is true that we oppose his philo to give neither time nor money. the war lords. The real workers to advise the membership to use of the boss organization which is now known as peal to white people alone, just as the phrase mittee for Cultural Freedom peti shortly in our press. However, with other matters or have an side with the tipuri cu clements. trust in the top committee. No peatedly to draw members away from Local 544 The title sounds like something meant to ap bla, deeply shocked the Com sophy which will be dealt with are too old and too preoccupied fighters will be crushed side by caution, Peer vant problem is loved most by the masters. tions Mayor LaGuardia to urge although Russell philosophy is other Russell case to pock at. And without these real elements, comprehensive or serious solution into their fink curl organization. Even while they well as about them. We are talking to perhaps ston; sixty Northwestern Univer defend his right to express him with the boss class or at best are classes, the American labor move the membership problems of in ly broke the rules and had to be disciplined. One the most revolutionary group in the United sity faculty members pledge the self against still more reactionary impartial.
States. It is not a question what to do with sum of five dollars apiece to fightphilosophies.
The decisive blows in defense grotesque thing, devoid of all de nological displacement, has been men are financing the suit against the union.
them or even entirely a question of what they this serious menace to academic But we defend this right be of academic freedom as well as mocracy and all militancy.
are to do. They have no question. They have no freedom. We might ask of the cause academic freedom is in liberty and progress in general Workers of America! Stand the GM Bargaining Committee with the following words and they set the tone heard from Hillman or Murray or Miles Dunne ends his preface very fittingly choice but to struggle. They are already angry. Committee for Cultural Freedom volved and not the freedom of a will have to be dealt by the work against the purge of radicals They merely lack the platon box to hold and if they were at all disturbed by man who is deserving of supers. The uninspiring figure of a and militants in the labor move The fight for the 30 hour week of the entire booklet.
put to work the steam of their wrath. They lack LaGuardia attempt to destroy port. On the contrary, Russell Russell, afraid to open his mouth, ment! Stand against the weakwith the 40 hour pay is only be Labor has no champion but Labor. No one can kneed leaders who capitulate so ginning. It is yet to be seen what defend labor but labor. The interests of a labor the socialist revolution. They lack so far the the Transport Workers Union record as a fighter for democratic can never be the leader in the leadership. And believe me, it will be a great few weeks ago. rights has hardly earned him the fight for academie freedom. This cravenly before the pressure of the effect will be of an avalanche union in a hamlet and in a metropolis are pre of demands from local unions ev cisely and exactly the same. Labor must fight leadership, great in more than just theory, that But the past year has seen defense of which The Call speaks. worthy and important struggle the war mongers! Stand against can guide the unleashed fury of the colored race. other shocking events. The Rus. It is difficult to find in the as part of the struggle for all erywhere that the leadership ser for its rights with understanding, with clarity, So please put me down for one, who would sell case is just one more incident, period of the last few years a democratic rights can and will plete democracy in the union! iously take up this slogan.
with honesty. But labor must fight.
rather hear about the Revolt of the Black Man and a minor one at that, in the greater injustice done to a single be led by a militant, revolution Stand for the mighty force of Any attempt to pass off a We heartily recommend that they send immedior the Colored Peoples Struggle or any other organized campaign to prepare man, a more reactionary blow atary working class which by organized labor which constipoor agreement on the mem ately and get this very worthwhile pamphlet.
such thing rather than the Negro Question. the country for war. The attempts the progressive force in society. dauntlessly throwing its force tutes your only weapon for debership, which many believe They can obtain copies of Behind the 544 Suit Titles in a mass paper are rather important. to force the unemployed into the he revolutionary working class against those of its class enemy feating those who would despoil that Reuther, Thomas and Co.
by sending Bc to the Northwest Organizer, 257 Buffalo, New York carmy and navy, the WPA prose than was carried through at the car inspire and gain the support and exploit you in peacetime Plymouth Ave. Minneapolis. The sale of the Lets hear from other readers cutions in Minneapolis, the frame Moscow frame up trials. The of all the oppressed strata of and send you to your deaths may attempt to do, will very pamphlet has exceeded all expectations and it is the way does about this.
up of the Teamster Union officials Commission to investigate these society.
in time of war!
probably meet a stern rebuff. well to get your order in early.
they feel The Struggle for a Proletarian Party honors and the decisive influence went to the leaders who had pro talents entirely to the party. After thinking it over for a day fessional occupations outside the party and who, for the most part, or so he rejected the proposal. The reason he gave was somewhat lived typical petty bourgeois lives which were far removed from astounding se entirely to a cause which might not be victorious He said he was not zully convinced of the wisdom of the lives of the workers they were presumably leading. devoting When we organized the Communist Party in this country in his lifetime! Naturally, could not give him any guarantees.
By JAMES CANNON 1919, under the inspiration of the Russian revolution, we put a After my return from California in the sumrcer of 1937, when National Secretary, stop to all this nonsense. We had the opinion that leadership of the revolutionary movement was a serious matter, profession we were proceeding to form our party again after our expulsion from the again raised with Burnham the question of his in itself, and the highest and most honorable of all professions taking the post of National Secretary. Again recelved a negative (This is the fifth of a series of articles by Comrade a very good job and it is especially gratifying to know that he We deemed it unworthy of the dignity of a revolutionary leader Cannon, to acquaint our readers with the party estimate of follows so closely and is able to speak in terms that indicate reply. In the pre convention discussion which preceded our foundato waste his time on some piddling occupation in the bourgeois tion convention in Chicago a little more than two years ago the dispute which arose in the party, was debated in a seven he is developing very swiftly. will send you a copy of his reworld and wrong for the party to permit it. We decreed that no months discussion, and was settled by a decisive majority at marks, most of which believe are quite valid. think that his one could be a member of the Central Committee of the party Burnham began to develop his revisionist theory on the Russian question. In addition he began to raise the organization question the Third National Convention, April 9. estimation of the effects of my candidacy and its relation to the unless he was a full time professional party worker, or willing to in a manner that suggested a difference with us that was sometasks of the union in the election is not very well thought out, become such at the call of the party. think we had the right idea but one could not expect this of him, having had little or no in 1919. It is all the more right at the present hour of the historic thing far more profound than disagreement over this or that detail of our current work. In reality, his criticisms were directed not The Case of Burnham experience in the mass movement.
clock when the organization of the proletarian party on the highest so much at the party regime as at the organization conceptions In the manner of all unreconstructed petty bourgeois, for whom This letter strikingly illustrates the friendly attitude of the possible basis of efficiency is the supreme problem of the revolution and traditions of Bolshevism.
personal considerations, and especially personal grievances, real proletarian elements toward Burnham and the hopes entertained By and large there is no excuse for any exception to this rule or imaginary, weigh heavier than the problems of the party and for his future development. At the same time it puts the finger unless the party itself, for reasons of its own, finds it advisable He began to express a great deal of concern over democracy the class, our oppositionists industriously circulate the accusa very deftly on his weak spot. no experience in the mass moveafter the revolution, somewhat in the manner of those democrats to have a prominent leader in this or that position outside the who identify Stalinism with Bolshevism. We were greatly distion that we have been persecuting Burnham. It is told around ment. which, unfortunately, Burnham made no effort to remedy party to serve party ends. Naturally there are and have been and and which undoubtedly contributed very heavily toward his failure that Cannon especially, who is the embodiment of all things evil will be cases where the personal responsibilities of the individual turbed by these manifestations. They seemed to indicate quite in the party, cannot tolerate any smart people in the leaderto assimilate himself into our movement. This letter shows that cannot be provided for by the party, and he may have to seek an clearly that Burnham was moving not toward us, but in an oppoDunne was willing to learn from the intellectual. Too bad site direction. Comrade Shachtman and I, who were working very ship and wanted to drive Burnham out of the party. There is external occupation for economic reasons. That is the case right no doubt that this cry gained some sympathy from the humaninever occurred to Burnham that he might learn something from closely together at that time, had jointly elaborated the organizanow with a great many party comrades who ought by right to be tarians in the party and netted some votes for the opposition.
the leader of workers. Had he but known it, there was much devoting their entire time to the party. But such situations have tional resolution against the resolution of Burnham. He and had several personal conversations about these alarming symptoms Others, unappreciated aspirants for leadership, saw in the per he might have learned.
to be regarded as temporary expedients, to be cut short when the financial resources of the party improve.
of Burnham defection from the line of our movement. Wo had secuted Burnham a symbol of their own heartbreaking tragedy.
Comrade Dunne might have added another and even equally followed a deliberate course of minimizing personal friction. This All the insulted and injured rallied to his defense with instinctive serious weakness in Burnham position: his lack of experience It is only natural that a man of the outstanding talents and was not so easy in view of the haughty and provocative attitude solidarity.
in the party. One cannot learn all that needs to be known about equipment of Burnham should play a leading role in the party.
of Burnham, but we did succeed in keeping personal antagonisms Nevertheless, this grievance is entirely imaginary. Burnham a party and its inner life and functioning on weekly visits to the This was universally recognized. At the same time, it seems to me, never encountered any personal hostility from the proletarian down to a minimum. In one conversation which we had with Burnmeetings of the Political Committee; and one cannot be a serious it placed upon Burnham the obligation to put himself completely wing of the party. On the contrary, as the record amply demonleader of the party in his spare time. The pre war Social Democham during this period, he made it quite clear that his appreat the service of the party and make party work his profession.
nensions were directed at our orthodox Bolshevism on the orgaracy was a sprawling, slow moving reformist organization which In the early days of our acquaintance him took it for all kinds of liberties that were denied to others. His qualities and proceeded on the theory that it had unlimited time to advance to granted that he had this end in view. Far from barring this road nization question, or at any rate at our interpretation of it. He expressed the opinion that we, as leaders of a future Soviet, would abilities were appreciated in the highest degree and every step socialism at a snail pace in a completely normal evolutionary to him, personally made numerous attempts to open it. first that he made in our direction, that is, toward Bolshevism and process, uninterrupted by wars and revolutions. The leadership broached the question to him in the summer of 1935. Even then he too ruthless in our suppression of opposition.
complete integration into the party, was welcomed and enthe main corresponded to the character of the party. Lawyers, was highly critical of the administrative inefficiency of the Trot: However, he was by no means sure of himself on these points.
couraged. Far from trying to drive Burnham out, extraordinary doctors, teachers, preachers, writers, professors people of this skyists; he even propounded the theory that this was an inherent He was obviously going through a difficult period of skepticism efforts were made to draw him more completely into the party kind who lived their real lives in another world and gave an eveweakness of Trotskyism. He was inclined to the opinion that our and internal conflict which was undoubtedly aggravated, if not life. At the same time, the more experienced and discerning com ning, or at most two evenings, a week of their time to the socialist regime. which was then embodied by Shachtman and Cannon inspired, by a hopeless contradiction between his personal life rades understood very well that he was standing in an untenable movement for the good of their souls they were the outstanding. was so pre occupled with political ideas and with the convic and his position as a party leader. However, it appeared to us position; that sooner or later he would have to make up his mind leaders of the pre war socialist party.
tion that they would prevail in spite of everything, the or that his Souvarinist views olshevism and Stalinism were to come all the way with us or go back to the bourgeois world. They decided things. They laid down the law. They were the ganizational and administrative machinery for realizing the ideas not by any means fully formed. His revisionist views on the RusThe unavoidable decision, when it finally came, was of his own speakers on ceremonial occasions; they posed for their photographs was not given sufficient attention. That was before Burnham sian question had not yet led to counter revolutionary conclumaking and gave interviews to the newspapers. Between them and the discovered that Cannon has no political ideas and no interest in sions with regard to defensism or defeatism. We hoped that he In looking through my personal files the other day ran across proletarian Jimmy Higgins in the ranks there was an enormous them. would survive his personal crisis and find his way to Bolshevism.
a letter from Comrade Dunne, addressed to me in California, gull. As for the party functionaries, the people who devoted all proposed to him at that time, in the most friendly spirit, To facilitate that, as said before, we did everything to maintain November 21st, 1936. This letter is convincing evidence of good their time to the daily work and routine of the party, they were that he help us remedy the undoubted weakness. proposed confriendly personal relations, without making any concessions whatwill toward Burnham. Vincent wrote: have recelved from Com simply regarded as flunkeys to be loaded with the disagreeable cretely that he make an end of the two or a nickel business of in ever in principle, either on the Russian question or the organizarade Burnham quite a long letter of very good criticism about tasks, poorly paid and blamed if anything went wrong. prejudice structing college students who have no intention of connecting tion question.
The Organizer and the election campaign. think that Jim does was cultivated against the professional party workers. The real themselves with the labor movement, and devote his energies and (Continued Next Week)