Use the Nation's Wealth For Its Producers
Maurer, James H.
Use the Nation's Wealth For Its Producers Address of Acceptance by the Socialist Party Candidate for Vice-Pjresident Over National Radio Hook-Up By James H. Maurer (Social**. CsmiMsi*...
...For more than a century we were told that our salvation depended upon a high tariff...
...Leadership Lacking In 1924 over 300,000 "rotes" were organized and thus automatically became "obercros," or laborers, a higher social class...
...Theirs la the system where it is unlawful for a worker to drink beer, but considered smart when a capitalist drinks high-priced liquors...
...Unlike most of the Latin nations, Chile's population is not a mixed Indian race...
...Man filled his own stomach from his own land, clothed and housed himself with his own products and had a surplus left besides...
...and again they may be just mouthing phrases, as does Hitler, with which to capture the support of the cruelly suppressed masses...
...The political flunkies of the owning class may or may not know, and some of the dissatisfied ones who may know believe that there Is a short cut out...
...There are three definite race strains that have not mixed very much, the Castlllan Spanish, the Araucanlan Indians and the Hermans...
...We must build on the solid rock of scientific Socialism...
...The truth is, their howl about school taxes is mostly camouflage...
...Are the workers who created this wealth 26 times ss well off, or 25 times more secure against poverty and want as were our ancestors a century and a half agoT Needless for me to tell you that we are not even as well off or.ss secure against poverty and want as the early settlers of the ox-cart period were...
...Time will tell...
...But by consulting the income tax returns we know that only about 3,000,000 out of our 120,000,000 .population bad annual incomes of $3,000 and over, and among this group were 20,000 with incomes of $50,000 and over, 1,357 with Incomes of over a quarter of a million, and 500 with incomes of a million and over, and 10 with average Incomes of $8,900,000 each...
...taxes must come down they say...
...Hence, the -Indian strain In Chile does not consist of beaten, cowed and almost inarticulate peasants, as is the case in Central America, Bolivia, Peru and all other Latin couafxles where the population is overwhelmingly Indian...
...Then anl not until then will there be pen...
...It has been represented in the Chamber of Deputies off and on since 1894...
...maybe so, and maybe It is just another military revolt, so ' typical of Latin America, in which one set of grafters la ousted to make way at the trough for the feet of another set of grafters...
...Millions are spent annually by merchants In advertising to encourage the people to spend, while bankers spend millions more advising the people not to spend but to give it to them, the bankers, that they will keep It, and sometimes they do...
...Others advocate a new party with catchy reform platform that to the average mind sounds radical, but care is always taken not to make It sound radical enough to knock the parasites from labor's backs or to stop the robbery of labor...
...e, good will and happiness on earth...
...Join the Socialist Party The various representatives of our governments In the United States, local, state and federal, loyal as they are.to the system of private ownership of tbe means by which we live, many evidently do not know and those who may know are too cowardly to admit they do know, that this country is no longer an ox-cart country, that things have changed daring the past hundred and fifty yean, when the combined wealth of the nation was only 1600,000,000, 'and that now we have one family living in Pennsylvania reputed to be worth between 18,000,000,000 and $10,000,000,000, and a national wealth of $875,000,000,000...
...For many years the ruling class ruled with an Iron hand, as did Porflrio Diss in Mexico, seeking to curry favor with American and British investors by keeping the workers virtually enslaved...
...While this great wealth was created collectively it surely does not require %nuch of a scholar to see who it was created for...
...The present depression is being used as an excuse by these capitalist pirates to cripple our pub...
...Any system that piles up mountains of wealth and {hen compels those who created the wealth to suffer privation, to beg, steal or starve is not only morally criminal, but actually stupid...
...Confused and Inchoate as they were, they were easily broken up and suppressed by the Ibanez reactionaries...
...The Araucanians are Indians of tbe highest type of intelligence and energy, descendants of the fierce warriors who fought off the invasions of Almagro, chlaf lieutenant if Pizarro, the only Indians who were able successfully to stand off the Spanish...
...And now comes our turn in the forward march to a higher and better civilization, the emancipation of all wealth producers, which means the birth of the cooperative commonwealth...
...It has been In turn a pure-and-slmple trade union movement, affiliated with the Pan American Federation of Labor, a Socialist party, a Communist party, an I. W. W. movement, and a mixture of all of them...
...It is true, however, that there Is and has long been a genuine revolutionary movement in that distant country...
...In their mad greed for personal gain they have denuded our forests, polluted our streams, arrogated unto themselves our mineral deposits and the exclusive right to the use of our rivers, streams and water power...
...Those who produce nothing own everything and those who produce everything own nothing...
...Hoover's Explanation The parasites that absorb the lion's share of the nation's Income naturally own the lion's share of the national wealth...
...From the very inception of the government of the United States and its sub-divisions it became a battle-ground of two conflicting forces, individualism and collectivism...
...In their confusion, however, they adopted as their battle-cries, "Viva el Lenin," "Viva el Troteky," "Long live our Comrades, Sacco and Vanzettl...
...I need but point to the old Russian Czar's government that was content to ride along in old tenth century custom,- and the hundreds of thousands of martyrs who suffered and died in Siberia or in vile disease breeding dungeons, while many hundreds of thousands more were ridden down, crushed, beaten and murdered for no other reason than they dared think and reason about religious, political and industrial freedom, a higher and happier civilization...
...With their blood-soaked dollars they have smuggled their vicious lies Into our schools, colleges and universities and through these cringing satellites they have warped peoples' Intellects, filled them with superstition, fear and false beliefs, and call It Christianity...
...They have debauched our courts, corrupted our legislatures, muzzled the clergy and subsidised the press...
...Even the two billion doV lar mustard plaster dole only seemed to draw more red lines In certain ledgers and make mors Reds...
...it has taken the form of a well-organized and disciplined Socialist Labor Party, and at other times It has been a great mass of confused radical and revolutionary elements...
...It has been confused, it has been muddled, it lost much of its effectiveness by reason of its confusion and lack of unity, but it has made itself felt, ''and it is not at all Impossible that ambitious politicians have flattered and catered to that revolutionary movement in order to get into office...
...Others complain that there is too much government In business, that big business should be left alone...
...And to heap insult upon injury those pirates, through their kept press, endowed colleges and their political retainers have been busy psychologizing the public to bow, crawl, cringe and inspect those who rob them, and I am sorry to say that a great many poor souls with warped intellects do, and this is their rugged individualism...
...If this annual Income of $90,-000,000,000 in 1930 had been equally distributed to the head of each family of say only four to a family, each family would have bad an income of 99,000, and the national wealth of 9S7S.000.000,-000 divided la a similar maimer would mean that each family would be the possessor of 112,000 worth of property...
...Who Gets the Lion's Share The wealth of this nation has increase 26 times as fast ss our population...
...their reign of labor exploitation and stock robbery may last a little while longer...
...Theirs is the system of hypocrisy where murder, robbery, suicide, prostitution, deceit and crime stalk hand In hand over the land...
...We hear a great deal these days about' the collapse of capb tallsm...
...Join with the political party of your class, the Socialist Party...
...It is a fact worth noting, however, that back of the revolt is a long and exciting history, often glorious and always tragic, of a working class struggling to be free of capitalist oppression in Its worst form...
...Meanwhile, the "rotos," the "little men In brown," the "iil-smell-Ing" proletariat, were becoming restive...
...of the great strikes and the massacre of • workers and the torture of their leaders...
...of the political career of Don Arturo Alessandrl, elected President as the Friend of the Rotos, who was later deposed and .exiled to Juan Fernandez—Robinson Crusoe's Isle— by the militarists under Carlos Ibanez...
...Their remedies usually are, elect the best or good men, the lesser of two evils...
...it may be that they merely took the nearest stick with which to beat their enemies...
...robbed them of the fruits of their toil and farms, and call It business...
...and the Germans, centering around the beautiful city of Valdivla, have made their characteristic contribution to an alert, wideawake people...
...The Racial Composition The Chilean revolutionary movement has always been definitely proletarian, but It seems to have suffered from lack of informed leadership that would give it a definite character...
...During the hand-craft and oxcart period only three per cent of the population lived in cities and towns, 97 per cent lived upon the soil...
...President Hoover thinks the depression is in the main due to hoarding...
...who gets the lion's share of this wonderful income, not the workers who created It, no, by hook or crook, mostly by crook, through our so-called cherished institutions . Of Rent, Interest and Profit it was absorbed by less than 3,000,000 parasites, leaving the balance of our population of 117,000,000 absolutely at the mercy of their individualistic and capitalistic disease germs far more destructive to the human family than any other known pestilence that the human family has ever been afflicted with...
...Now aa a matter of fact, tax bills have gradually bees transferred as far as possible by their political government to the small home owners...
...The individualists ' sought personal aggrandizement through private property at the expense of the public good, while the collec-ttyists aimed at the greatest good to the greatest number...
...Compare this period of crude primitive production and distribution with our marvelous modern machine age of production and distribution,, While our methods of producing and distributing the necessaries and comforts of life have multiplied many fold since the band-craft and ox-cart period, the workers now In so far as being possessors of real wealth and security against poverty and want are not as secure or as well off as were the toilers during the hand-craft and ox-cart period...
...In my opinion capitalism has gotten beyond the collapsing stage, to me capitalism looks like a wreck...
...Robbery Made Legal Thus, any institution in which money could be made was to be privately owned, while anything that was all out-go and no Income was left to the government...
...Do so and we shall march In one solid phalanx roughshod over our robber enemies on to victory and tbe cooperative commonwealth...
...We shall not turn our backs to the enemy, but meet them face to face...
...Use the Nation's Wealth For Its Producers Address of Acceptance by the Socialist Party Candidate for Vice-Pjresident Over National Radio Hook-Up By James H. Maurer (Social...
...Every stride forward toward a higher and more humane civilization was vigorously, yes murderously opposed by the ruling parasitic class...
...No, comrades, none of that reform dope for us...
...They were well led, and they held vast and effective demonstrations...
...The Workers in Turbulent Chile Character of Present "Socialist" Revolt is Undefined By William M. Feigenbaum npHE revolt in Chile is widely X advertised as a Socialist revolution...
...It was among them that the revolutionary movement sprang up...
...Our weapons will be ballots...
...There la also a strong Irish and English strain, as evidenced by the fact that the Chilean national hero is General Bernardo O'Hlggins, and that there are such common names in Valparaiso and Santiago aa Livingstone and Lynch...
...It may be that they are genuine Socialists, as are the leaders of the Spanish revolution...
...The freedom of the colored man from chattel slavery was met with all the opposition that the slave owning class and their retainers of the north as well as the south could nfusten This struggle also had its- mar* tyrs, Wendell Phillips, Eliza Love-Joy, John Brown and thousands of others that suffered imprisonment and death for the preservation of the Union and the emancipation of the colored man...
...It may be that the Davila junta recognizes the facts and Is genuinely determined to work with the masses...
...As mentioned before the capitalist system is a wreck...
...And In this struggle between the Individualist and collectlvist the Individualist has won, with the seat of the government in Wall Street and its loud speaker In Washington...
...Its beneficiaries, retainers and professional apologists are at their wits' ends in trying tc» salvage something out of the wreck...
...They glorify the killing of human beings and violation of law and call H patriotism if the crimes are committed in their Interest...
...Their weapons may be injunctions, clubs, prisons and bullets...
...Their system of individualism must make way for collectivism...
...A thousand excuses and explanations have been given by our so-called statesmen, capitalists, editors and big businessmen as to the causes for the industrial depression, but not one has had the courage or intelligence to tell the truth about it...
...We, the pioneers in the Social-(Ommsms •¦r*i« rtf«> 1st movement here in the United States, struggling to bring about the great change from Individual ownership of the means by which we live at the expense of the public good, over to collective ownership for the greatest good for the greatest number, also like all other forward and humanitarian movements that preceded us, we too have our martyrs, our beloved 'dene Debs, Mooney and Billings, Sacco and Vaasetti, and thousands of others who have suffered persecution, prosecution, imprisonment and death and for no other reason than because they dare think and hope for industrial freedom, the right to life, liberty and happiness...
...The Spanish strain in Chile Ts almost pure Castillan...
...Our annual national Income is $90,000,000,000 and national wealth is $379,000,000,000...
...With little contact with any other movement, except for financial aid from the well-Informed Argentine Socialist party, It grew up almost as a weed...
...In other words be given a free hand to do as It pleases, just as If big business does not do as It pleases...
...There is no space here to give details of the substantial though occasional political successes of the movement, and of the ousting of elected representatives...
...They have used the government's military power to protect their strike breakers and proclaim to the world that their strike breakers are 100 per cent American heroes, and must be protected in their Inalienable right to life, liberty and their right to work and brand strikers as criminals who must be either clubbed, in-junctioned, deported or shot into submission and most every part of their government stands ready to obey such orders and they call it law and order...
...In our own country, with all our boasted democracy we are little or no different...
...This epoch Is no different from those that have preceded it in so far as the ruling class is concerned...
...Al Cap ens a Piker Jesse James, the outlaw of a half century ago, Al Capone and his gang of present day law violators, racketeers, thieves and murderers were pikers when compared with the so-called eminent* ly rsapsctatlas, stock, bond and combined manipulators who by hook or crook, legally or otheai wise, confiscated and took unto themselves for their own personal aggrandizement the lion's »>^n of the nation's earning power and accumulated Wealth...
...CsmiMsi* far Vk-e-Prcrident) ONE hundred and fifty years ago, when this republic came into existence, we had a population of 4,000,000, an annual income approximating ?400,000,000 and a national wealth of $500,000,-000...
...It Is enough to report that the country, with Its* highly Industrialized working class,* has been In a continual state of turmoil and that the master class, serving British and American copper and nitrate Interests, has been peculiarly vicious in its suppression of the masses...
...They fleeced the farmers coming and going in selling and buying...
...It seems that there was no one great leader like tbe Spanish Pablo Iglealas to lead them .and organize them Into a substantial, well-Informed, disciplined national labor and political movement...
...It no longer functions...
...They have legalised stock robbery and the exploitation of labor...
...They reward mental and physical prostitution with glory and riches, while honesty, and virtue receives its reward in poverty, and call this immorality...
...Ox carta, stage coaches and canal boats were the means of transportation...
...Surely not for the remaining 117,000,000 of our population who created it and whose annual incomes shrank from less than $3,000 to nothing...
...lie school system, by crying for economy...
...The Workers' Turn Has Come And so runs the history of every other civilized nation on earth...
...Their real interest in public schools is to keen the workers in ignorance, so thai...
...National affairs were complicated by the terrible "War of the Pacific" with Peru half a century ago that left its scars in the Tacna-Arlca brawl until very recently...
...Come, fellow workers of the world, no matter what your color, creed or nationality may be, forget petty differences, but remember that you are a worker, no matter whether you render mental or physical service, you are a worker, and as such belong to the working class...
...The task before us is the reconstruction of society, and this job permits of no short cuts to success...
...Others accuse the workers with being reckless spenders, and that had' the workers only hoarded their earnings when they were employed instead of spending it, that now everything would be lovely...
...In this grand forward march of ours, we Socialists naturally expect to be met with tremendous opposition from not only the robber class but the Ignorant whose minds have been poisoned...
...And in the face of this situation we have public officials, editors, clergymen and others who wonder why there are billionaires, and paupers, and why an Industrial depression...
...While our population has increased thirty fold, the annual income has Increased 198 times and the national wealth is nearly 770 times as great aa it was a century and a half ago...
...The movement in that country dates back to 1887...
...The population in 1990 was about 120,000,000 with an annual income of about 990,000,000,000 and a national wealth of approximately 9375,000,009,000...
...A National Turmoil Chile Is a long, narrow strip of country, Immensely attractive to Investors because of the abundance of copper and of tbe great nitrate deposits in the arid Tacna-Arlca regions...
...Now we are told that the high tariff is the one factor more responsible than any other for the industrial depression...
...Much has happened since then...
Vol. 13 • June 1932 • No. 24
