Socialist Party Calls Uppon Voters To Build a City for the Workers
Socialist Party Calls Upon Voters To Build a City for the Workers I'T'HE Socialist Party enters the m New York municipal campaign of 1933 witk a strong city ticket consisting of Charles Solomon...
...Upon motion of Matthews, in an eloquent and graceful little speech, the nomination was made unanimous...
...Our schools are overcrowded, under-manned, and mismanaged Many are firetraps...
...Fusion, composed of discordant elements with no social program to make the city government the - servant of the people, will not do...
...For the past 23 years Solomon's life has been dedicated to the Socialist and labor cause...
...The slimy trail of corruption led straight to City Hall and Mayor Walker was forced to resign under fire...
...Charles Solomon was secretary to Socialist Congressman Meyer London, and before that was executive secretary for the Socialist aldermanic delegation in New York City...
...Prompt government action to take advantage of federal funds made available by tks National Industrial Recovery Aet...
...After Matthews moved that Solomon's domination be made unanimous/ the delegates and visitors wildly cheered, sang the "International," "Banker and Boss" and "The Red Flag," and settled down to listen to a characteristic fighting speech by their candidate...
...FRANK R. CROSSWAITH CRANK R. CROSSWAITH, one r of the most eloquent speakers for Socialism and the cause of the worker in America, symbolizes the (Continued em Pi-f | Ten...
...payment in cash of all relief: representation of tke unemployed on relief administration bureaus...
...It was a dedication not only of Solomon but of every delegate present...
...This is Socialism...
...The platform, upon which tke catnpaign will he waged, adopted after a long and thoughtful session, follows: "THE Socialist Party presents to the voters of New York, in this campaign, a program for the rebuilding of the city in the interests of the working and jobless masses of the people...
...Socialist Party Calls Upon Voters To Build a City for the Workers I'T'HE Socialist Party enters the m New York municipal campaign of 1933 witk a strong city ticket consisting of Charles Solomon for Mayor, Harry W. Laidler for Controller and Frank R. Crosswaith for President of the Board of Alderman, nominated a- an enthusiastic session of the City Convention Wednesday night, and with a united, determined and lighting party membership prepared to wage the greatest campaign in the party's history...
...There was a contest for only one nomination, that for Mayor...
...Solomon, formerly an office worker and newspaperman, is now a lawyer, specializing in labor cases on the side of the workers...
...Then only will it be possible to abolish greed and exploitation, poverty and insecurity...
...For Controller: Harry W. Laidler...
...Laidler studied at Wesleyan University after a brilliant career as a Socialist "boy orator" in the West...
...Tammany then gave the city ! John P. O'Brien, no less servile to the crooked political machine and special privilege...
...The Slimy Trail The city government is in the hands of a corrupt and incompetent political machine...
...The convention was stirred again and asain by the nominating and seconding speeches of various delegates, and especially by a deeply moving address by Solomon, in which the- popula...
...Aaron Levenstein named former Judge Jacob Panken, and Ivan V. Lorand named Matthews...
...but the workers of his district reelected Solomon at a special election over the "fuaton" nominee of the combined Republican and Democratic parties...
...Our slums are among the worst in the world...
...To save the city from its betrayers and to rebuild it in the interest of the workers we must have a political party of the masses in city, state and nation—courageous, militant, and with an adequate program to combat the corruption and reaction of both Tammany and the Republican party: a political party dedicated to the abolition of the profit system, and the establishment of a planned and cooperative social order in which industry, commerce and finance shall be owned and operated by society...
...The Socialist Party favors: 1. Increased appropriations: for unemployment relief sufficient to provide tke basic necessaries of life—food, clothing and skelter— to tke unemployed, married or single, regardless or color, race or .creed, religious, political or otker affiliation...
...He is 43 years old, a native of New York, and a former Socialist Assembly, man...
...The roll-call gave Solomon 101 votes to 14 for Matthews, and six not voting...
...Louis Waldman named Solomon...
...4. The establishment of additional statu and city public employment offices in cooperation witk a federal system under etriet civil service, adequately financed and (Continued on Page Twelve) Strong Ticket Named by Party AT the most stirring and enthu*'* siastic session of the New York City convention, held Wednesday night, the Socialist Party named what is considered one of the strongest city tickets in its history...
...Immediate steps, however, can and should be taken to relieve the tragic situation of the unemployed...
...2. Prompt and adequate antieviction legislation...
...Five comrades were named, and two accepted, Solomon and J. B. Matthews...
...Chairman Simon Berlin called the convention to order Wednesday night with a brief statement ridiculing a story in a local Yiddish sheet that the party was to split on the Mayoralty nomination...
...For President of the Board of Aldermen: "''rank R. Crosswaith...
...Then he called for nominations...
...This dictatorship threatens the end of the 5-cent fare...
...Its backbone is the discredited 9 Republican party of Hoover, Melt Ion, Mills and Tammany's ally, the s Koenig machine...
...1 Fusion and Confusion f Fusion is without a plan to wipe " out slums, to solve the transit t! problem, to end the gouging of the »j public by the utilities, to free the I city from the dictatorship of the I bankers, or to promote the geni eral welfare...
...On Saturday the platform (printed in part in another column of this page) was adopted, and nothing was left but the naming of the ticket...
...and other seconders of Solomon were Theodore Shapiro, Algernon Lee, Samuel Orr and David M. Corey, while Herman Wascow seconded the nomination of Panken...
...They and the district leaders had filled their tin boxes with millions of dollars while the city was brought to the verge of bankruptcy...
...The legislative investigation forced by Socialists and others proved to the hilt the chsrges made by the Socialist Party that the city government under Tammany rule reeked with graft and corruption...
...His university gave him an honorary degree last month...
...He took his degree there in 1907, receiving Phi Beta Kappa, membership in the scholarship honorary fraternity...
...Henry Fruchter named Laidler, and the nomination was made unanimously, while Shapiro named Crosswaith, a nomination seconded by Louis Sadoff and adopted by acclaim...
...I The rebuilding of our city calls > for vigorous action in regard to , the pressing and vital problems af» fecting the every-day lives of the i people...
...The convention had completed all its work except the nominations by Saturday, after meeting at Intervals from February 26th...
...HARRY W. LAIDLER fJARRY WELLINGTON LAIDLER is a native of Brooklyn, an economist of note, an author of widely read books on economics and Socialism, a brilliant lecturer, a world traveler and co-director with Norman Thomas of the League for Industrial Democracy...
...Julius Gerber reported he had Panken's declination, and after some discussion Friedman withdrew Blanshard's name...
...and beloved Socialist orator pledged himself to dedicate his all to the campaign, to the party and to the cause to which he has already given a lifetime of service...
...Samuel A. DeWitt named Edward F. Cassidy...
...Cassidy withdrew his own name and seconded the nomination of Solomon...
...He is married and has two sons...
...Samuel H. Friedman named Paul I Han shard...
...The remainder of the convention's business was completed in short order...
...He was in 1931 president of the National Bureau of Economic Research, and last year became chair* man of the Board of Directors...
...Now he is Socialism's and labor's candidate for Mayor...
...In the richest city in the world, a million men and women are jobless and are facing starvation...
...He was again ousted, but took his seat when reelected once again...
...Public officials were shown to be faithless to their trust, obedient to big business and in alliance with the underworld...
...N. Y. Nominees Devoted Lives to Cause CHARLES SOLOMON ?HARLES SOLOMON, candidate ^* for Mayor, is one of the most talented and best-loved of the .Socialists in this country...
...no eviction of tke unemployed...
...8. Tke immediate launching of public works on an extensive ecale by city and state government: Payment of union wages on relief work...
...Fusion, which seeks r public office principally on the is-' sue of corruption and extravagance, i supports the present economic sysi tern, the breeder of corruption...
...The excuse given for the ouster was a "patriotic" one...
...Re-elected with four comrades in 1919, he was one of the victims of the notorious ouster of 1920, when Thaddeus C. ¦ Sweet, then Speaker of the Assembly but avid to be governor, united with the Associated Manufacturers of New York to expel the Socialist legislators—the only ones who had been serving the toiling masses and farmers of the state...
...In college he was noted as a debater, and while, a student was one of the charter members of the Intercollegiate Socialist Society, now the L.I.D., being elected member of its first executive committte, where he served under Jack London, who was president...
...It can be totally eliminated only by a system of planned production and distribution for social use...
...His wife, Agnes A. Laidler, is likewise an active Socialist...
...Hundreds of thousands of school chUdi'tn suffer frcm malnutrition...
...Government has been reduced to a racket...
...He was elected to the Assembly from the Brownsville section of Brooklyn in 1918, serving with brilliance...
...Thousands of others slave in tenement sweat-shops for miserable payThousands of children are either injured or killed every year in our streets, their only playgrounds...
...Two million of our people are crowded in tenements unfit for human habitation...
...The more outstanding f among these are: I 1 Unemployment and Unemployi ment Relief ¦ Unemployment is a product of capitalism with its private ownership and irresponsible direction of industry...
...Laidler and Crosswaith were not present to accept in person...
...The rollcall was then taken...
...from Columbia with a remarkable work on "Boycotts and the Labor Struggle" (1912), and threw himself into Socialist work...
...Norman Thomas had written that while he was absolutely unable to run, he would throw himself into the campaign with all his energy...
...He is known as a brilliant orator, a great debater and a talented wriWr...
...Laidler worked for four years as a newspaper man, became a lawyer, received his Ph.D...
...The O'Brien administration has supinely submitted to a banker dictatorship, which, while extorting millions of dollars in excess interest, charges from the city, has crippled our schools, hospitals and playgrounds, cruelly slashed the pensions of the aged and widows, and brought untold suffering to the jobless and their families...
...He is married and has four daughters...
...Back of Fusion, 9 as with Tammany, are the bankf ers, the utility barons and the big l landlords, the economic source of political corruption...
...tke establishment of municipal commissaries for tke sale at cost of tke necessaries of life...
...The ticket follows: For Mayor: Charles Solomon...
...He is associated with Louis P, Goldberg...
Vol. 16 • July 1933 • No. 5
