Liberty in Kentucky-Try and Find It
Sandberg, Sam
Liberty in Kentucky—Try and Find It A Short Visit of a Student Delegation Bears Out Worst Reports of Violence and Class Rule By Sam Sandberg I WOULD have preferred a longer stay in Bell and...
...Then came L followed by Gruliow and finally Greenberg...
...In Parliamentary representation, we still remain a mere group impotent against whatever designs for reducing the standards of working-class life the MacDonald Government—which in its essential policy Is entirely under the control of the reactionary conservative majority which is predominant in this Parliament — may choose to enforce upon the nation...
...They offered to let us speak on the courthouse steps (with a view, as we then suspected and later learned, of arresting us for criminal syndicalism, regardless of what we said...
...And if, as a means of such challenges we can awaken in the minds and hearts of workers everywhere the necessity for a united front for solidarity, then our trip and all such trips will not have been In vain...
...Even in such constituencies, the bye-' election vote for the MacDonald candidates has shown a great weakening from what it was when reaction swept the country six months ago...
...and, after what has happened, who can wonder...
...MacDonaM's Steady Loos One swallow, or course, does not make a summer...
...Coy followed...
...You nearly killed me back there...
...Despite ominous warnings from newspapermen, despite stories of violence, I was unconvinced...
...It had never been one of our safe constituencies...
...Exhibition of Americanism Near the top of Big Black Mountain and within 50 feet of the Virginia line, we stopped...
...One was stationed to stop traffic behind us and a third watched our car...
...In entering via the window the chief's bulk got stuck half way...
...We moved around the corner...
...THE turn of the tide Is now becoming quite unmistakable...
...We later found out they had been ordered to stay behind and not to follow for half an hour...
...A Challenge to Capitalism An hour later the newspapermen caught up with us in a little town In Virginia...
...and as an Indication of the mood in which the question is being handled, I cannot do better than quote to you Maxton's state* meat of the I. L. P. point of view, He says: "The I. L. P.'s quarrel with the Labor Party la not primarily one about standing orders or discipline in the House of Commons...
...Finally, with the admonishment that "we'll string you if you ever come back," we crossed the state line into Virginia...
...I oould not possibly imagine or picture mob violence against a peacefully inclined and unarmed group of sociological students...
...A crowd gathered about quickly...
...Entrance Into Kentucky We left Corbin, Ky...
...All the signs and tokens of renewed life and confidence are evident and in growing force...
...British Labor's Rank and File Takes Hold By Fred Henderson LONDON...
...We are once more on the march, and with a confidence that grows stronger from week to week...
...Personally, I do not think that the occasion for such fear any longer exists...
...We showed that they had something to bide and that their blatant ravings on patriotism, Bolshevism, Communism and atheism were simply red herrings to confuse the public...
...Nobody, for that matter, Imagines that, after the lesson we have learned, any aspirant to leadership revealing even ah incipient tendency to MacDonald ism would have the smallest chance of becoming Labor Prime Minister...
...Impotent, that is to say, to prevent reaction from having its way...
...I would have preferred being allowed to investigate, «¦ a student, the living conditions Of the miners...
...Koch was placed in Herndon J. Evans' car...
...For which, indeed, if the affective leadership ware not forth* coming, the rank and file would make new effective leaderships of their own...
...Near a V-shaped bend in the road, we were met by the Harlan County mob arriving tardily to welcome us...
...We were forced to lie on our stomachs and each of us was flogged with a new limb and by a different person...
...After the experience of the past two years, the definite Socialist fores within the Labor Party, while recognizing that its effective work must be in and through the general working-class movement, was bound to Insist, as a condition of Its continued affiliation, that it should have full freedom for its Socialist work of criticism and education within the Party...
...It hi imperative that, having got rid of our incumbus, we should unite OUT own ranks—as all the evidence shows they are being unit* ed amongst the rank and nls throughout the country — for the task of regaining power for those clear and definite Socialist pun poses from which IfacDonald diverted the Labor Government...
...We focused national attention upon a intolerable state of affairs and proved conclusively that civil liberties mean nothing to the exploiters, to the ruling class and to their miserable and cowardly tools...
...A box of relief tied to the running board held the door shut...
...and the Mult of the Wakefield bye-electlon has given renewed spirit and Confidence to the whole movement...
...The outcome completely disillusioned me...
...Chief of Police Pearl Osborne's car forced ours to the curb, and the chief jumped out and demanded to know what we were doing there...
...What do you think of God Almighty...
...They did not seem to know what to do about it...
...Now that Macdonald has gone over with this policy to the capitalist parties, and the Labor Party, lias, by bitter experience, seen the folly of It, t h a n would seem to be no reason for any continued breach between the L L. P. and the Labor Baity on this issue...
...Across the Harlan County Hue, Dr...
...Isaac Greenberg, president of the student council, and myself...
...The lt.ll.-f "Distributed" A mad dash through Bell County began...
...At this point, Koch was shifted back to our car, being placed in the improvised rumble -1-Vseat, and the motorcade proceeded quickly picking up breakneck speed...
...Such movements Of recovery cannot be expected to be sudden and sweeping...
...Nobody now Imagines that the general Parliamentary group will ever again give that license of condonement to the .possible vagaries of any future Labor Prime Minister...
...The school system, the distribution of relief, the company towns —all these things interested me...
...We have made the first recapture of one of our lost Parliamentary seats...
...As I pointed out last month, the Easter decision of the L L. P. against disaffiliation from the Labor Party is a most significant factor In this connection...
...Koch was first...
...and the I. L. P., in Insisting, as a condition of its continued affiliation, upon effective safeguards for its freedom of action If such conditions should arise, undoubtedly voices a fear which Is still widespread amongst the rank and file...
...We drove to Knoxvliie, Tenn., where we got in touch with attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union and then proceeded back to Commonwealth College...
...Our group Included Lucien Koch, director of CommonWealth College...
...They would never have worried about discipline In the House of Commons If the late Labor Government had been try* ins...
...After we were back in the car, two of the mob began to pummel and punch Koch and Coy...
...and that from now on the record will be a record of recovering our looses and reestablishing the power which the last Labor Government destroyed by their suplneness against the two years' betrayal of our purposes into which they permitted MacDonald to lead them...
...Stacy, to take the wheel and drive us out...
...to create a Socialist system of society...
...The party has got clear of MacDonaldlsm, and has put its house In order against any recurrence of tbe disease which proved so nearly fatal to us...
...instructor in current history, who traces his ancestry to pioneer days...
...Between these demands, hurried conferences were held by the officials and dignitaries...
...but taken In connection with the heavy fall In the support given to the MacDonald Government at every other bye-election which has taken place since the beginning of this year, it undoubtedly indicates the flow of a returning tide and not merely a local and isolated freak of public opinion...
...Then one was stationed at the state line to stop all traffic "even if Hoover comes along...
...but they have their dramatic moments...
...For the first few months after the General Election, our little group which had survived the debacle and struggled back Into Parliament, gave the Impression of being rather cowed and depressed by a sense of impotence and overwhelming loss...
...It was not an unqualified decision...
...It was the failure of the general Parliamentary party to apply that check of criticism and revolt to Mac Donald's misleadershlp that made most of our troubles for us...
...We were to see more of him...
...First was the "distribution" of part of our relief supplies along the public highway by the drivers...
...Harold Coy...
...Preceded by a Harlan County car and followed by a car from Pineville, we speeded through Harlan County and up the side of Big Black Mountain, highest peak in Kentucky...
...Pictures were taken of the bruises and welts on Coy's back...
...Leo Gruliow, newspaperman...
...Our car, in which we were prisoners, was going so fast that we nearly crashed into one of the Harlan cars...
...Chief Osborne demanded a peace bond...
...and it Is a recovery based upon a very clear determination that no Individual leader or group of leaders shall ever again have the opportunity of repeating the performance...
...I would like to have seen the mines, to have talked to the owners and operators...
...Stacy got It across to Fleenor that everything was O. K. and that he was doing as ordered...
...but we held it in the last Parliament, though only by a minority vote in a three-cornered fight, when Liberals and Conservatives each put up separate candidates and split the capitalist vote in audi a way that though we won the seat the aggregate capitalist vote would have had us beaten if it had been united...
...We refused...
...Chief Osborne told us were going right through to the Tennessee line and after some discussion offered to permit us to go to Harlan instead...
...With difficulty Dr...
...That has now disappeared entirely...
...Liberty in Kentucky—Try and Find It A Short Visit of a Student Delegation Bears Out Worst Reports of Violence and Class Rule By Sam Sandberg I WOULD have preferred a longer stay in Bell and Harlan Oountle* We went there to' distribute relief, to teat our constitutional rights and to talk to people about conditions...
...The vigilantes conferred for a few moments...
...Subsequent developments seemed to show that our early morning arrival had found plans for our reception uncompleted...
...the most significant evidence of revival since the General Election...
...No More MacDosialdism And while the recovery is thus manifest in tbe trend of public opinion, the Internal difficulties in our own organization are also shaping more favorably...
...the first time we have ever gained the seat by a clear and absolute majority...
...Despite the fact tthat our mission was a peaceful and lawful one, despite the fact that no one was obliged to talk to us who did not want to, our relief car was Immediately commandeered by duly constituted officials and we were turned over to a self-constituted mob of business men and mine thugs who beat us and ejected us from the state...
...Mayor Brooks told us to get out or be would have our car driven out...
...Bo* tween vicious blows and outbursts of superb profanity, one of them fired questions: 'What do you think of the American flag...
...The old fighting vigor and spirit of confident attack Is again manifest in our Parliamentary work...
...But you never can quite tell...
...For It Is in the rank and file, and not In Parliamentary taadorshlps, that the life and strength of OUT cause, and the decision of Its purposes, have their source and inspiration...
...We were then taken out one at a time and whipped...
...We were told we were blocking traffic...
...We entered Bell County quietly...
...their Inspiring incidents Which reveal the progress that is being made, and enable us to measure something of the extent to which possession of our lost ground is being re-established Since I wrote my last letter we have all been rejoicing over such • signal incident...
...He pushed the box aside, and with the aid of a member of the mob forcibly pulled Koch from the driver's seat and commanded one of his henchmen, vhom we later found out to be a Dr...
...There was not a sign of trouble...
...This man we later identified through a newspaper picture as Deputy Sheriff Lee Fleenor, under murder indictment in the killing of two miners at a relief kitchen...
...and the recovery of the British IJabour Party after the destruction of its Parliamentary struggle at the last General Election Is encouragingly manifest all over the country...
...After our car, in response to shouted demands, had turned back on the road to Cumberland Gap to proceed to Harlan County Instead, it was stopped by one of the Harlan mob, who drew a gun and shouted: "You're under arrest for reckless driving...
...Before the violence was over, members of the mob had seized and were readying a bundle of our Bills of Rights and our statement I of peaceful intentions which we had left at the office of the Governor of Kentucky...
...This is the constituency we have now recaptured...
...You will understand how greatly it has heartened us...
...We explained again that our intentions were peaceable...
...and our win is all the more significant because it is a win on a straight fight...
...But none of these things were we permitted to look into...
...We explained our peaceful and lawful intentions and our plan to stay temporarily in Pineville, and it ended up by our parking behind his car at the curb opposite the courthouse...
...Came Too Early Then ensued scenes of official inadequacy and impotence impossible to believe...
...They forced him to discard his coat, chained his wrist and beat him with a long untrimmed branch of a tree...
...With complete certainty you may take It that the worst is over...
...As soon as we passed the Pinevllle city limits, however, things began to happen...
...And there should bo no real difficulty In fixing up an entirely amicabli arrangement With the I. l. P. The committees of the Labor Party and of the I. l. P. are now la conference together with a view to settling this matter of the conditions attaching to I. l. p. affiliation...
...but not impotent in fighting spirit...
...they are a challenge te the ruling class—a demonstration of class solidarity of dass-eonsdous students to workers...
...In the light of my present knowledge, I am convinced that the majority of Kentucklans even do not realise the state of lawlessness which exists in Bell and Harlan Counties...
...We're going to PineviUe," Kocb replied as spokesman for the group...
...They have, for the most part, been constituencies in which class Privilege is entrenched, where Labor, in its most victorious days, b»s made little or no Impression on the well-to-do electorate...
...Mayor Brooks, Herndon J. Evans, editor of the Pineville Sun, Chief Osborne and other leading citizens of Pineville were in the crowd...
...The quarrel between the I. l . p. and the late Labor Government was due to the fact that, by their actions, speeches, and attitudes, the members of the Government were creating the Idea In the public mind that the capitalist system must be pre* served at all costs...
...Sunday morning, April 10, for Pinevllle in Bell County...
...AH this, of course, is not to say that our difficulties are over...
...The amazing and astonishing part of the entire proceedings which followed our entry was not the beating we received, but the participation in our illegal ejection of the constituted authorities of both counties...
...Our trip had demonstrated the vlclousness which the class struggle will assume as capitalism slow, ly expires...
...and the growing sense that the country Is responding to It has given our men an outlook and a demeanor that was lacking when the new Parliament first assembled...
...The dignitaries were determined not to allow us to remain...
...We were not the first to receive such treatment and undoubtedly we shall not be the last These Invasions are not a challenge te Kentucky...
...Finally Chief Osborne attempted to climb through the window of our car to take the wheel away from Koch...
...When, however, a vacancy occurred in the Wakefield division, Labor had its first real bye-election chance...
...The recovery Is essentially the recovery of the rank-andfile...
...But he clambered out and then, drawing his knife, he slashed away at the ropes that bound the box to the door...
...but from which the millions of the rank and file were never diverted, and to which they stand true, today, waiting for effective leader* ship...
...Stacy, having relieved himself of dire and profane threats, relinquished the wheel to our recent acquaintance, Deputy Sheriff Fleenor...
...The second was the disappearance of a group of newspapermen who had been trailing us from Frankfort, Ky...
...The MacDonald Government has bad extraordinary luck since the General Election in the fact that •uoh Parliamentary vacancies as have occurred—there have been about a dozen of them—have been In constituencies that gave Labour no real chance of testing the general public opinion' of the country...
...Two things of pointed interest occurred during our wild drive across the two counties...
...In that respect there Is an enormous improvement now manifest inside the House of Commons...
Vol. 13 • June 1932 • No. 23
