SOCIALIST APPEAL JUNE 29, 1940 STALINIST Would Revolution Let the Enemy Invade Stalinists Confess the Attempt To Assassinate Leon Trotsky An Anti Labor Bill stupid level of a Nazi campaign against the Jews.
SOCIALIST APPEAL The House is turning what ought to be the serious study of some real problems into a dangerous and Volt IV, No: 26 emotional hunt for an allen scapegoat.
Saturday, June 29, 1940 PubMehed Weekly by the But all this was said before the present war SOCIALIST APPEAL PUBLISHING ASS at 116 University Plach, New York, NY.
drive. These same people Congressmen Coffee, Telephone: Algonquin 8647 Celler, Geyer, etc. voted for the very same bill Saturday night!
Editorial Board: Two conclusions are forcibly driven home: FELIX MORROW ALBERT GOLDMAN The alien bugaboo is the most useful disGeneral Manager: guise which the reactionaries now have for GEORGE CLARKE adopting measures against the labor movement; this terrible danger is hardly as yet recognized Subacriptions: 00 per year: 00 for alx months.
Foreign. 00 per year, 50 for six months. Bundle by the trade unions, as witnessed by the fact that orders: cents per copy in the United States; cents few of them were even aware what was being per copy in all foreign countries. Single coples: cents. adopted in the Smith bill under the guise of anti alien legislation.
Reentered 23 second class matter December to the post om, at New York, under the Yesterday liberals have joined the unholy alliance for national unity, and there is not a single Congressmen in Washington who can be now called a friend of the labor moveFight with the Socialist Workers ment.
Party for: JOB AND DECENT LIVING FOR CVERY SHELDON WORKER HARTE OPEN THE IDLE FACTORIES. OPERATE WPA Purge THEM UNDER WORKERS CONTROL TWENTY. BILLION DOLLAR FEDERAL PUBLIC WORKS AND HOUSING PROGRAM The government is proceeding against all mili4. THIRTY THIRTY 30. WEEKLY MINIMUM tants in the labor movement, not only under the WAGE 30 HOUR WEEKLY MAXIMUM FOR anti alien formula, also under the guise of ALL WORKERS ON ALL JOBS attacking Communists and Fascists. Witness the Bir 30 WEEKLY OLD AGE AND DISABILITY provision in the new Relief Appropriations Act PENSION which bars Communists and Fascists from emEXPROPRIATE THE SEXTY FAMILIES.
ployment on WPA.
ALL WAR FUNDS TO THE UNEMPLOYED.
Already, in setting in motion the machinery PEOPLE REFERENDUM ON ANY AND ALL WARS.
for purging those he considers to come under the NO SÉCRET DIPLOMACY.
law, Colonel Somervell, head of the WPA in New York, anounced that a person does not 20. AN INDEPENDENT LABOR PARTY, have to be a member of the Communist party to 11. WORKERS DEFENSE GUARDS AGAINST be ineligible for WPA employment. He said he (Continued from Page 1) ros lead his men in; then for some with the VIGILANTE AND FASCIST ATTACKS. regarded Trotskyists as Communists within the shown the statement above sum minutes came the rat tat tat of Yesterday Serrano, learning that 12. FULL SOCIAL, POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC EQUALITY FOR THE NEGRO PEOPLE.
meaning of the law, and indicated that other marized, which they had made the machine guns and the noise Martinez had named him as having ordered the uniforms, with Splinter groups would be subject to similar the previous day, and they ratio of the pistol shots.
drew his dental of that point and interpretation. New York Times, June 23. Foreigner In Charge said he wanted the uniforms for Assailant Confesses Then the two autos of the a raid on the headquarters of AlFurthermore, the affidavit which must now The fourth confession was ob Trotsky household came out the mazan, reactionary presidential be signed by all WPA workers rules out of tained from Nestor Sanchez Her door, one of them stopping and candidate.
WPA employment all workers who advocate or nandez, who was arrested when an unknown person, with a mark, Stalinists Cannot Escape belong to any organization that advocates the in David Serrano home, in a dez: Tell Alfaro (Siquetros) to Even without the demonstrated overthrow of the government. Under this pro note to Serrano from David Al come with us.
complicity of Serrano, a prominvision anybody, even a milk and water socialist, faro Siqueiros. The note has ask An extremely interesting de ent figure whom the Communist Legislation for the fingerprinting and registra can be thrown off WPA because he wants to ed Serrano to tell Hernandez to claration was made to the po party cannot possibly disown tion of aliens was given final approval by both change the government. It is the identical formu ing.
take Siquieros place at a meet lice by David Serrano, promin with any plausibility, the Stalinhouses of Congress Saturday night. That would la which was used during the last war time perent Communist party leader, ists will find it impossible to limit Police then found a valise of who in Spain went under the responsibility for the crime to have been bad enough. But the legislation thus od to prosecute labor leaders under the criminal Hernandez containing one of the name of Miguel Julio Justo.
seven or eight scapegoats. Seradopted is actually the notorious Smith Omnibus syndicalism lays.
police uniforms used in the as When arrested, Serrano denied rano speaks of a investigaPili. whose most vicious features apply to citianlatmy of stalpigeons is being asked for sult and a revolver taken from that he had anything to do with tion which for some time pointed police guard. Whereupon Her the assassination attempt or th to Siqueiros and his associates as viens and non citizens alike. The bill is so reac by Cok Somervell: expect, he said, at least nandez made a clean breast of it. he had instructed anybody to get issue of the Stalinist organ LA the criminals; but the very last tionary that it was never conceded a chance of 50, 000 Fetters from persons reporting WPA empassage until Roosevelt provided a disguise for ployees ás Communists. All of these letters, queiros and Serrano. He dentea declared Serrano, he himselt was Voz de Mexico, to appear before it by requesting legislation against the aliens. it signed by responsible intlividuals, will be given party, but shared its attitude that party who had been carrying outros as innocent! The attempt to membership in the Communist one of those in the Communist the police anounced the solution Instead of giving you our description of the careful attention.
bill, we shall quote a few of the remarks made Many workers were not particularly excited tionary. In April, he said, he had had happened in the attack on clear the partys skirts of Loren met Siqueiros who offered him an Trotsky. zo, because he was once expelled about this provision because they thought it important role in the attempt. it was in 1930. is ludicrous beby Congressmen in the House debate, June 29, 1939, when the bill was originally presented.
would only apply to agents of Stalin and Hitler. since Siqueiros knew him as one Scapegoats Named cause he has been closely associThey will now discover that its real aim is di extremely daring in the Spanish Serrano then proceeded to char ated with the here in the MR. COFFEE OF WASHINGTON. Criminal synbattles.
acterize Alfaro Siqueiros as an intervening years. And so on. The dicalism laws cursed the statute books of many states rected against all militant workers.
undesirable person who is con stalinists will not get out of this.
The Attack for some years during and following the World War. casual reading of a typical such law would incline At eleven o clock on the night stated that he believes thetram. Stalinist Assassination Record As for Serrano theoretical the unwary to the conclusion that such a bill is inof May 23 he met Siqueiros, Pu faro, together with his brother nocuous and not inimical to the civil liberties of jol and others, and together they and their friends Luis or Leopoldo argument, that Stalinism does residents of our country. Actually, the phrase overwent to a house where individuals Arenal and Antonio Pujol, are im not employ the weapon of assasthrow the Government by force and violence was soon arrived with valises contain plicated in the attempt on Trots sination, that is likely to be ing the police uniforms and a ky. The Communist party, he proved beyond doubt in a Swiss construed by innumerable judges as an indictment of labor leaders who were prosecuting a strike against an employer for the elimination of grievances. Thus Commenting on the trial of Christian Front Elven a uniform and a revolver. picious of them. He did not know court and corroborated by the labor leaders and unions were perscouted and prose ists, we predicted in our issue of June 8: As the avoid fingerprints. Siqueiros Gomez Lorenzo, Said Serrano, but Rassinated Ignace Reiss, a GPU They all had rubber gloves to about the complicity of Rosendo French police that Stalin GPU cuted by reason of their strike and picketing activities by means of a distorted interpretation of the course of the whole trial nears its conclusion it donned the uniform of an army in any event the latter has been foreign agent who had broken above quoted phrase.
becomes evident that the whole case is being con major, Pujol one of a Neutenant expelled from the Communist with Stalin and declared for the MR. CELLER OF NEW YORK: The bill is no verted into a farce. For, we pointed out, the of police, and Pujol carried the party, As for his wife, Julia, Serrano kidnapped August Klement, secbroad and indefinite that threatens freedom of mask of defending the United States against the joined by two of the others in a imagines that she is implicated retary of the Fourth Internation: speech and freedom of the press on all matters af reds is the primary defense upon which new automobile waiting outside. but he has not seen her for five killed him. They killed Trotsky fecting the Army and the Navy. am quite convinced fascist defendants rely and is conceded be a Hernandez was handed a packet or six months.
that the recent manifesto of the Methodist Church former secretary, Erwin Wolt, in virtue by the prosecution as well as the defense! 250 pesos, as his pay for purttelcontaining, he found afterward, concerning pacifism would come within that ban, and Flaws In His Story Barcelona in September of 1937, 11 distributed would bring down on its authors severe As a result, nine of the thirteen defendants pation. An the others that he saw At the time of the above decla as they had already done to Moupunishment.
have been acquitted of the charge of conspiracy got the same amount. ration, it appears that Serrano lin, leader of the Spanish Fourth had not been told that his party Internationalists. Every section pronouncement against the use of troops in a to overthrow the government, ten have been acstrike might likewise get one into serious difficulties.
ed by Camacho, who reported him as having assigned Martinez chist, syndicalist, left and right plea for fewer airplanes could be construed, under quitted of the second count in the indictment, Julia information that things to get police uniforms or that wing socialist has testified to the bill we are discussing, as advice to disobey some accusing them of conspiracy to steal government were Army regulation.
property the ammunition and guns they stole household Siqueiros e told his ing to get his daughter Sovietina ist Spain. To answer the concrete MR. GEYER OF CALIFORNIA: Let us recognize from armories and the jury could not agree on stop they were first to seize the the day before the attack; or that evidence now adduced in Mexico this bill for what it is, an attempt to put to an end the others.
police guard. Siqueiros kept look his present wife, Agueda, had told with the general assertion that this trend toward real democracy. It is an attempt to break the labor movement that is just now gaining And this was the trial which, the Social Demo hour, from other directions four of frequent visits of Alfaro Siqu the Stalinists never assassinate foureiros to see Serrano.
anybody is going to convince excratic New Leader, the Jewish Daily Forward rying machine gun. There were ly under instructions so fast in membership. Hitler rose to power on other groups appeared, each carThus, while Serrano, obvious actly nobody!
Just this type of law.
and others of similar stripe told us, was to be at least 25 men. The four other higher up in the Stalinist ap oners continue today and therefrom The interrogations of the pristhe death blow against the Christian Front!
Even the reactionary New York Herald Tribgroups, said Hernandez, were led paratus, is laying the crime at after. But already the complete Once again the workers can see the lesson by foreigners.
Bine could not stomach this bill when was origclear: fascism cannot and will not be fought by at the head of all and they pro the next few days the ComAlfaro Siqueiros placed himself a few others, it is likely that in picture is clear: a carefully. orinally introduced. On July 31, 1939, the Tribune this democratic government; woe to the work ceeded to the realichomes, Hier himice to the scapegoats who Trotsky. The attempt was unganized, well financed attempt by munist party will add Serrano the Stalinist apparatus to murder said editorially: ers if they depend on the government to stop the the police were fascists. Only the working class, by its own inde nandez was put in charge of will be sacrificed for the crime, doubtedly under the general di By channeling popular disturbance over Communwhile the Stalinist apparatus rection of the GPU foreign secIst and Nazi Fascist activities into a flag waving campendent methods, carried out against the protec keeping guard over them.
paign against the alien, a measure Hko the Smith bilt tion afforded the fascists by the government, can he saw the outer door to to them as mere individuals tion, but with the direct aid of simply reduces the whole movement to the base and smash the fascist gangsters.
Trotsky house open and Siquei who did it without connection the Communist party of Mexico.
By ALBERT GOLDMAN There is always one question sure to be thrown at me whenever and wherever speak on the war ques.
tion. Naturally during the main speech or lecture explain that in a war between imperialist countries our party urges the workers to continue the class struggle even to the point of revolution regardless of the effect that the struggle of the workers might have on the military front. And also explain that this policy applies as well in a war between the democratic imperialist countries and Hitler Germany Wouldn you. 50 the question runs by this tactic, permit Hitler armies to conquer the democracies? While the workers would be struggling against the capitalists wouldn Hitler armies march in and take over everything?
Invariably the questioner is troubled. He is perfectly willing to fight for the workers to take governmental power into their hands, but he is afraid that to do so in the midst of war would play into the hands of the fascists. must admit that my answer based on socialist fundamentals does not always or very frequently convince the questioner. My answer is generally as follows: Revolutionary workers, as a matter of principle, cannot and must not support their own government in an imperialist war. It continuing the class struggle at home with the possible effect of a defeat at the front is an evil, then supporting an imperialist government with a victory at the front is a greater evil and we are compelled to choose the lesser of the two evils.
Then proceed to explain that a successful attack on the enemy at home is so all important that the workers must take the risk of having the foreign enemy take advantage of the confusion and weakening of the mintary front which must inevitably come as a result of a revolutionary struggle. If the revolution should be successful then the workers, after a short period of disorganization, can better defend themselves against a foreign army.
Another argument that advance is that even if our democratic imperialist government should defeat the fascist countries, fascism would result if the workers failed to take power into their own hands.
France Fate Underlines Our Answer!
The surrender of the French army furnishes revolutionary Marxists with a very telling practical argument. Here was army touted by every expert as the finest army in the world. The Germans could easily defeat the Polish army but wait until Hitler comes up against the French army. So the experts expressed their wishful thinking.
But the French army did no better than the Forleek or Norwegian army against the mechanized Neither the French nor the Polish bourgeois governments could furnish adequate leadership for the defense of France and Poland.
This does not mean that the Hitler government is unbeatable by any other capitalist government. Given a sufficient period of preparation the United States with an industry more powerful than Germany could in all probability be victorious over Hitler.
But It could do so only if it adopts the same fascist regime that Germany has. It could do so only by suppressing On the other right the workers enjoy at present.
hand a working class regime has forces at its disposal that no capitalist government can possibly muster.
It would muster the burning enthusiasm of the masses who, conscious that they are fighting for their own interests, would be capable of devotion and sacrifice that they would not possibly exert when in the army of a capitalist government.
And what is of the greatest importance, a workers government could appeal with tremendous effect to the soldiers and workers of the enemy army.
It is very significant that the English and French imperialist governments very soon after the war gave up the idea of appealing to the German people over the head of the Hitler government. They soon adopted the line of blaming the German people as well as the German government.
No wonder! Why should the German workers listen to the French and British imperialists? What can the German workers expect from the British imperialists?
An appeal from a French or British Soviet government, on the other hand, would inevitably have a tren dous effect upon the German masses. They would know that to defeat Hitler would not mean their enslavement by the French or British imperialists but a union with their French and British brothers.
The lesson of the conquest of France by Hitler is clear and should be taken to heart by every worker.
The French armies were not defeated because the workers disorganized it by revolution. They were defeated because there was no revolution.
If there is any way to defeat Hitler and Hitlerism it is through a workers government fighting for a socialist world.
the Christian Front. President Roosevelt is more popular in Wall Street today than at any other time since he took office as the Chief Executive of the nation. The new state of affairs is best exemplified by a telephone conversation yesterday between the head of a large investment firm and a broker friend. They were discussing the President latest speech, and the broker expressed a dislike for his stand. hot argument ensued, and the banker became so incensed that he broke off business relations with the broker.
And when Wall Street banker tosses potential profits around that way over criticism of Mr. Roosevelt it may be taken for granted that times have changed. Ralph Hendershot, Financial Editor, New York WORLD TELEGRAM, June 12, 1940.
Speakers: Honor the Memory of Robert Sheldon Harte Secretary of Leon Trotsky Murdered by Stalin G.
The Truth About the Attempted Assassination JAMES CANNON of Leon Trotsky FARRELL DOBBS National Secretary, Tues. July 2, 30 IRVING PLAZA Irving Place 15th Street New York, Auspices: Local New York Speakers have just returned from a visit to Leon Trotsky Trade Union Secretary,