TIMELY TOPICS
THOMAS, NORMAN
By Norman Thomas TIMELY TOPICS Los Angeles, Oct. 28rd. < The Right to Strike IT can be set down as uncontrovertible that tbe * industries where fairly good codes have been set up for...
...Tuesdays at 8.80: "Social Deinocrucy and Bolshevism," Halm Kantorovltrh...
...6, Baltimore...
...There are no charges for Mrs...
...YPSL Executive Committee Makes Plans for the Future HPHK quarterly meeting of the * national executive committee of the Young People's Socialist League of America was beld in Pittsburgh, October 21-22...
...1st, 2nd, Cleveland...
...6th, when a limited number of new scholarships will be granted to Socialists and union members...
...The average California cotton grower is no John D. Rockefeller...
...Principles of Socialism," August Tyler, Mondays and Wednesdays at 8.30...
...It must be remembered that on rainy days or days when the pickers are on the move they earn nothing...
...Mailly's visit...
...Parker T. Moon of Columbia, on* of the best-known historians In America, on' "Nationalism since the WSfjS, War...
...THOMAS and I want to express our appro-ciation of the marvelous hospitality of the many comrades and friends in San Francisco and Los Angeles and their environs and in Stockton, Fresno and Bakersfield...
...It is an inherent tendency in our capitalist society to reduce labor to the status of serfs...
...Most of the strikers know little enough about poli...
...PARTY RUNS SECOND IN ARIZONA 11/11II official returns of the recent special election in from all but 40 precincts, the position of the Socialists as second party in Arizona is secure...
...The size of the audience* bears witness to the interest in the Socialist message whether it is delivered under party auspices or is forums...
...Thursdays at 7: "Radicals In Amerlteaa Thought and Literature," Walter R, Peck, Thursdays at 8.30...
...Moon will ¦njj how, under (he post-war rndlllnns sort of nationalism developed tats fascism...
...The biggest of the strikers' camps at Corcoran— more than 8,000 men, women and children—is or* derly and well run...
...Last week Prof...
...Even if the codes were more satisfactory than they are, and better enforced than they will be, to surrender the right to strike is for workers to accept the position of cows, contended cows, perhaps, because of a little more grass, but still milked by someone else...
...I The Pittsburgh YPSL...
...The vote was 21,137 for Mrs...
...3rd, 4th, Pittsburg...
...5th, perhaps Altoona...
...cans who seem surprisingly cheerful despite deaths of children from malnutrition...
...The committee voted a moving resolution on the death of the late beloved Comrade Hillquit, which read in part: "Rarely does nature pour such bounty on mankind as to give more than one Hillquit to a generation Our loss is irreparable...
...Thanks to my good Comrade, A. A, Clark, I covered a lot of the cotton territory, heard some of the testimony before the Governor's Fast Finding Commission from men of different points of view, Snd visited the strikers' camps...
...and in 1016 the Socialists secured 5.5 per cent of the total...
...Seventeen other workers are held in jail on charges of riot—perhaps, suggests Wirin, to protect them from violence...
...The party's percentage of total votes increased from 47.2 to 48 per cent, a magnificent showing, considering the terrific drive of the Fascist "National Front...
...Mailly's Tour Proves Highly Successful THAT there is an increasing number of Socialists nnd members of the organized labor movement who recognize the need of developing new trained writers, speakers and organizers for their work, is shown by the response coming from many places to the call to save the People's House and Rand School...
...Mailly, as her time is donated, and travel is by auto...
...Sunday evening, Octol r 122, at the Socialist Center, 1862 | Center Ave...
...The Socialists increased their representation in the Council of 125 members from 63 to 64...
...Mailly has as companion Mrs...
...The Land of Cotton IT is a grim coincidence that the farmers' strike * was called at a time when here in California the cotton farmers are waging a bitter war against the striking cotton pickers, a war which has already been characterized by armed attack upon unarmed pickets and the murder of three of them...
...body, including the more thoughtful of the strikers, is that this strike of the cotton pickers is a strike of the slaves who are worse off against other slaves scarcely better off...
...30th...
...Class Struggles In Amrrlcsn History," William E. Bolin, Tuesdays and Thursdays at 7; "The Social Approach to Ll.erature,'1 Alter E. Flsrlioir...
...A Personal Word jt/IKS...
...The Farmers KIOW industrial workers * ™ who recognize these facts cannot deny to farmers the right to strike even though a food shortage in our cities, greater than it already is, would be a grievous thing...
...ar-I ranged a banquet and dinner f r I the "f.E.C...
...European Socialism Today," Siegfried Llpsch Is, Thursdays at 8.30...
...Second class mail privileges have just been secured for this six-months-old ' paper...
...if it were not for the mutual support between bourgeois parties there would have been 70 Socialists in the new Council, NEW RAND SCHOOL TERM The second Rand School term will open Nov...
...Not only is this shown by the letters of good will and donations, but also in the attendance at the meetings for August Claessens, Bertha I...
...The Mailly-Weiss route as now arranged is as below...
...Mrs...
...Two Kinds of Slaves /^NE thing that is generally agreed upon by every...
...Th« Hand School is becoming more and mors the school of Socialist Party nirmberi...
...They lend money to the farmer at 6%% under rigid rules as to how he will use it and then they buy his cotton...
...They follow the crops around...
...The meetings already addressed by August Claessens and George H. Goebel at Trenton last Sunday night, 22nd, on "The NRA and You," held, at the Labor Lyceum of that city, and Dr...
...The largest previous vote ever polled by the party was 3,174 in 1016...
...he committee memberj, besides Chairman McDowell, are: Austin Adams of Pennsylvania, John Domurad of Massachusetts, Aaron Levenstein of New York, Bob t Parker of Ohio, Paul Rasmussen of Illinois, Hy...
...Anna Weiss, wellknown in the educational work of the Workmen's Circles...
...Most of the farmers are fin;.need by corporations allied with the ginning companies...
...So the wees after the rampi.lgn will be the limp for these ttudrnta to return and for other pnrty members to register Tor courses...
...The NEC issued a manifesto calling for anti-war and anti-Fas-cist demonstrations on Armistice Day, November 11th...
...In the 1033 special election over 17 per cent of the citizens voted Socialist...
...The rmnpulgn will end Nov...
...All this in a program which called for the starving of the strikers and their families, and for the lynching of all "outside agitators...
...Cotton growers, so-called ranchers, were armed...
...From points of view which 1 do not need to explain here, there are some disadvantages to the workers themselves in Communist leadership and Communist tactics, but if the Comma, nists do the job, and regular labor organizations do not, and if their demands are intelligent and (veil presented, as these demands have been thus far, there is nothing, as the Socialists of the San Joaquim Valley feel, but to give the strike all possible support...
...I hope to see the gallant garment strike here is Los Angeles, but am writing before I have spoken to the strikers...
...Mailly and others and also by-vie increasing requests for similar meetings elsewhere by Women's Committees, Workmen's Circles, party branches, labor and worker's educational groups...
...Sunday afternoon the entire committee attended the memorial meeting to Morris Hillquit at which Aaron Levenstein of New York paid tribute to the dead leader in behalf of the YPSL...
...Their home is a battered old car...
...be presented, and a campaign to increase the circulation and influence of the league monthly, the Challenge, were outlined by National Chairman Arthur McDowell...
...New Caarsss...
...Today most of the crop was sold under contract price considerably under the present market price for cotton...
...McDowell, Winston Dancis and Noah Walters, members of the National Executive Committee, also spoke...
...His horns is not much better than a shack...
...Not, 27 lo Dec...
...His profit?, whilt some years fairly good, are uncertain...
...Church, East Orange, one of the greatest speakers the party has recruited in many years, at Fairvlew, in Ilergen County, Mondny night, the 23rd, at Eldorado Hall, were remarkably successful...
...Mondny evening...
...In the presidential election of 1032 Comrade Thomas polled a trifle over 2 per cent of the total vote...
...The Right to Strike IT can be set down as uncontrovertible that tbe * industries where fairly good codes have been set up for workers have been industries where the work-ers have had the courage and strength either to strike or to threaten successful strike...
...In the evening a farewell dinner was given in honor of the committee by local YPSL's, at which representatives of the Socialist Party and Workmen's Circle brought greetings...
...Next week Prof...
...In the cotton fields, according to their own testimony, at present prices they make $1.20 a day at most I heard some of the testimony of farssan who claim that pickers can make 11.80 and over but some of these farmers let the cat out of the bag by testifying that that is only when husband and wife and tbe children work, "out of school hours, of couise, and of the right age," some of the fans, ers added...
...Few of them have decent tents and few cotton farmers provide them with any sort of shelter...
...Cities or towns desiring to be included should immediately write or telegraph the Rand School, 7 E. 15th St., N. Y. City...
...ZURICH VICTORY GROWS Witfi more detailed information at hand, the victory of the Socialists in the recent elections in Zurich, Switzerland, assumes even greater proportions than first reports indicated...
...Greenway, Democrat...
...David SiivlllS Miiiifv discussed Imperialistic Nationalism...
...Their leaders are Communists who seem to bt doing a good job...
...Recently they have got food relief from the federal and state govern* ments, much to the disgust of their enemies...
...Sheanin of California, John Strobel of Wisconsin, Noah Walter of New York, Milton Weisberg of Pennsylvania, and' : Winston Dancis, National Sec'y...
...The work of the league departments (educational, industrial and student) was carefully reviewed, and further instrictions on the November anti-war and anti-fascist meetings were issued to the 200 local units of the league...
...tics...
...Men and women of almost all nationalities, with Mexicans the most numerous, live an utterly migratory life in this state and some of its neighbors...
...The total working class vote was 41,600 to*87,40O for all bourgeois parties, Including the Fascists...
...They are easily fooled and all too willing to treat Mexi* cans the way they treated Negroes...
...It ] was agreed, according to the ] union's report, that the workers who participated in the strike, were ' to be threatened and-terrorized into returning to work, that those who refused were to be driven wholesale out of the cotton area...
...Striking Cotton Pickers Murdered j Deliberate cold-blooded murder is the description given by Attorney ! A. L. Wirin of the Civil Libetries I Union after a four-days' investi-' gation of the shootings in the San , Joaquin Valley, Cal., during the cotton pickers' strike...
...The Communists fell from 4,200 to 3,700 votes, or from 6.7 per cent to 4.8 per cent of the total...
...A new plan for district organization of the league wil...
...5,126 for Sumpter, Socialist, and 3,643 for Wilkinson, Republican...
...Ranchers, anticipating trouble, organized vigilante groups, "committees of protection," which had for their object the breaking of the threatened strike...
...Meanwhile, the tour of Bertha H. Mailly is proving most successful and useful, as aside altogether from raising funds it has stim-" ulated interest and membership in the Rand School Correspondence Courses in the cities visited, Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo, Toronto and Detroit have already had such meetings, with everywhere appreciation of Mrs...
...It is made up mostly of Mexi...
...During the first term there have been some empty seats because many stu<>nls have been on the sonp-hox...
...By Norman Thomas TIMELY TOPICS Los Angeles, Oct...
...Comrades who have been loo busy In the campaign to attend classes and lectures will nnd many new courses...
...The Farmers' Holiday Association in outlining its demands and its program shows that it is conscious of the needs of city workers and the unemployed...
...The percentage of total votes is Xen more impressive...
...Louis Waldman, chairman of the Socialist Party of New York, also greeted the Young Socialist Movement of America...
...If the farmers cannot get enough by the subsidy for artificial scarcity provided in the Agricultural Adjustment Act they are justified in trying more direct action...
...From what I heard, it is representatives of these companies who were active in fixing the 60 cents per hundred rate for cotton picking against which the pickers are striking, and then stirred up the farmers to get out their guns...
...Their shelters, however, ingenious, are very poor and their camp will be a lake if and when the rains come...
...All but the strongest of them sell almost their whole crop before it ii picked...
...To deprive workers of this weapon is to surrender the field to the chiselers of whom President Roosevelt and General Johnson complains...
...Two Mexican strikers were shot and killed I at Pixley and one at Arvin, a score i have been injured, many seriously, j Violence was carefully planned before the strike was called, according to Attorney Wirin...
...All workers will sympathize with the desire of farmers for prices to give them a decent living...
...the breach created by his death can never be closed...
...To win the prices it seeks by the-method of strike the workers will have to do what has not been done in agricultural history and they will need an extraordinary spirit and organization...
...Some of these cotton farmers have come from the Old South...
...Frank Kingdom, of the Calvary M.E...
...For farmers there can be no solution which leaves untouched the problem of landlordism and tenant farming, taxation, marketing, or a better use of land...
...The miserable condition of these cotton pickers in the midst of the beauty and fertility of California is an outstanding indictment of our capitalist civilization...
...As the area of the city has been enlarged since the last municipal elections, a proper comparison is with the national elections of two years ago rather than the last municipal poll...
...The more I see of the agricultural problem the more .fully I am persuaded that for agriculture as for other industries there is no satisfactory solution within the capitalist framework and that even ameliorative measures must be judged on the basis of the forces they set in motion towards that solution...
...We can hope to fill the gap only by the solid ranks of millions of workers organized in a mighty army, marching on the road to Socialism to the co-operative commonwealth of which Morris Hillquit was the Architect...
...October 28th, 29th, 80th, Chicago or vicinity...
...Here are a few: "The Iloosevelt Program," Algernon Lee and Nathan Fine, Mondays and Wednesdays at 7| "This Dictatorship Business," llendrlk Wlllem Van Loon, Mondays at'8.30...
...Thousands of farmers sink what little capital "they have, are foreclosed, and then move on...
...will come Prof...
...The Socialists are seen to have increased by 18,000 votes, and despite a -heavy increase in the total, due to a feverish get-out-the-vote scare to "save" the city from Socialism...
...Pat Chambers, an organizer in Tulare County, where two men were murdered, is charged with violation of the criminal syndicalism law and held for $10,000 bail...
Vol. 16 • October 1933 • No. 18
