Letters to the Editor:
Letters to the Editor: Honest Fight for Democracy Needed Editor of The Sew Leader: I have just finished reading the 15th anniversary number of The New Leader. I wish to congratulate you upon...
...trick, the work turned out by non-Stalinist supervision makes the Moscow boys look silly...
...And he did these things without running any risk other than a heightened pulse, because he did them in his day-dreams and nightdreams...
...thing trade unions and Social Democrats have always stressed...
...Some weeks- ago we went to eight pages...
...Today, when you receive the paper, go out and gather just three subs...
...Many of his breed go a little further...
...We want no cash contribution...
...WE WANT SUBS...
...PROSPERITY NOTE /_ENERAL ELECTRIC, one of our most powerful American dynasties, has come through trials and tribulations with t Tf C0'0r*" ,ts annual report for 1937 shows a net income of 45 per cent more than the previous year...
...Either you want a growing energetic New Leader, and are willing to do some work for it— Or you'll sit back and let the paper collapse...
...I wish to congratulate you upon its excellence...
...We don't think it's fair to sit back, receive a fighting newspaper crammed full of the real news, written by the most experienced, informed national and international correspondents the labor press in this country has ever known, and do nothing about supporting the editors and the busines manager in a desperate struggle to keep the paper going in its present size and at its present standards...
...We know a lot of people who'll be overjoyed at the news of The New Leader's having to curtail its activities...
...in your neighborhood, among your shopmates...
...Thus more and more does high Catholic opinion in this country support armed force in Austria and Spain and plead for its special type of fascist dictatorship...
...WHERE THE NEWS ENDS ; $v EUGENE LYONS" /CHARLES YALE HAEBISON...
...And in turn we are ready to send you FOR EVERY THREE MEW YEARLY SUBSCRIPTIONS YOU SEND IN: "DYNAMITE...
...Never thereafter will you look at certain of your comrades—and into the looking-glass—without seeing a few flashes of that brave, romantic figure, P. Herbert Simpson...
...Sow this Dollfuss fascism crushed Austrian trade unions, cooperatives, educational societies and the Social Democratic Party of the workers by military force and ruled Austria through the totalitarian Fatherland Front...
...We Don't Think It's Fair Of You to Let Us Down We don't think it's fair...
...MOSCOW CARROUSEL," by EUGENE LYONS—the Adventures of a United Press correspondent 1st Mb* land of purges and bloody "treason trials...
...The cliquecontrolled Project Union does not represent the workers on the job...
...WJiile the latest trial was under way, the Moscow Pravda fell back upon the English humorous magazine, Punch, for sustaining proof of Christian Rakovsky's duplicity while Ambatsadov to the Court of St...
...Harrison has contributed to current literature that tragie figure, the "vicarious revolutionist...
...We care not what kind of dictatorship he likes or dislikes, if he supports any kind he is an enemy of democracy and the working class...
...House of Commons, Ottowa, Canada...
...May it grow in power, and may its influence increase as long as it adheres to its present policy, is the fervent wish of ANGUS MacINNIS, Member of the National Council of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation...
...THE HULL PROPOSAL CjECRETARY of State Hull's proposal to nine European nations and the nations of the Western Hemisphere for international action to admit refugees from the nations ruled by brutal dictatorships was mainly aimed as a slap in the face of Hitler, but it was also a moral blow struck at all dictatorships...
...keep religious issues and prejudices out of the Labor movement...
...This week Cardinal lnnitzer of Austria wrote fiari Organizer Joseph Buerckel that the referendum on April 10 would bring a new period of Na?i-Catholic cooperation...
...Jerome Davis, and others eagerly in search of justification for the purges...
...Twenty years later, Si Pedro Simpson, his audacity and strategy saved Madrid and Barcelona on the same day—being in two or three places at one* is the least of his feats...
...Pravda printed the first vera* ef a piece of doggerel in Punch as proof of the "undoubted psnjdj1" of Rakovsky while in London...
...its breadth of vision appeals to me...
...They are becoming imperial politicians, although their program would enslave the workers of their own faith as well as others...
...In their minds they are the executioners, supermen, above petty bourgeois prejudices against mast murder and torture which bother weaker awn...
...I shall not comment on the brand of humor represented by the poetry...
...They write letters to the papers, anonymously, condemning the yellow-livered social-democrats and liberals who can't take it and who bellyache about a little blood-letting by the G.P.U...
...May The New Leaden gain many more readers...
...At that time we appealed to all our readers to help us put across The New Leader...
...who is bast known for his novelV.«Oanerals Die in Bed," will he even better known before W I hope, for his latest hook, "Meet Me on the Barricades...
...That ia one of the primary reasons why, if capitalism cannot supply jobs, government agencies should and also why the greater capitalists and bankers should be taxed to pay the bill...
...That's frank enough...
...His glothes vas einst in Russlsnd Gestohlen von his back...
...The choice is yours—we're doing what we can at this end...
...maintain hie morale, discipline and self-respect," and avoid degenerating into, a receiver of charity...
...Here locally on the job the ' workers are gaining courage and daring to point a finger at the dirty practices5 resorted to by the Stalinite bureaucrats...
...It is significant that practically all worthwhile publications have been edited by anti-Gaypayooists while the Stalinists with the first pick of the writers can't meet their "deadlines...
...trerrre, he confides only to his bridge-playing wife and a few sassy fellow-musicians...
...This is the correct" course to pursue...
...I ' » • » npHOSE of us who detected a Punch-and-Judy quality in ths Moscow show trials, it turns out, were closer to the facts than we supposed...
...His revolutionary heroism doesn't go beyond wild fantasy in the suburban trains or while blowing his oboe...
...They even write signed articles pointing eat1 that killing is an old Russian custom (like blini and borscht, for instance) and there's no need getting all het about the purges...
...Talk about "wrecking...
...The Stalinists have brought the organization into such disrepute that their dues collector has to spend two-thirds of the "working" day in pleading with the writers to "cough up" the dough...
...f * TTHESE Piotrs and Pedros are legion nowadays...
...Pravda did not quote the second verse, perhaps hsrsnsn it wools' have tnade some of its friends, particularly the aged Wsbb csnplc equally guilty with Rakovsky of the Trotskyist duplicity unwittingly attested by a poet who thought Trotsky was still chief boss in Moscow in 1924...
...They find it right—more than right, really exhilarating— to wipe out Old Bolsheviks by the score and the hundred in Russia, or Jive those pesky anarcho-syndicalists on the Loyalist side a strong dose of G.P.U...
...Nonchalantly flicking the ash off their cigarets (though in real life they neither smoke nor drink), and draining a beaker of vodka, they asy, "Let the mad dogs die...
...steel strike...
...Communism and fascism approve armed insurrection to overthrow democracy...
...I By a process of artificial selection, the dictatorships will sink to a low level of culture, mediocre examples of what happens when brains are at a discount in any nation...
...We cannot expect to be taken seriously by thoughtful people if we in one breath praise democracy and democratic institutions and in the next breath glorify the crimes of a certain kind of dictatorship...
...In real life he hasn't the gumption to distribute leaflets...
...I wish you many anniversaries...
...Other millionaire atoxena_ are likely to be found living outside the state, a* capitalism knows no frontiers...
...Cardinal Hayes even declares that he prays for victory for the fascist bomber I In Austria high church dignitaries instruct the faithful to vote for the Pagan Nazi dictatorship, also established by armed force...
...It is now likely that the Spanish Loyalist* will be defeated and in that case Chamberlain's policy will also "fulfill expectations" of three noted gunmen...
...Only a vigorous opposition within the union can revive it...
...in Moscow or Spain...
...The verse, presented a^nJemMgM all seriousness as an indication of Rakovsky's Trotskyiat connections, was-published by Punch in November, line, and rag Ms* follows.: ~ »F1 RAKOVSKY'S BARTY Rakovsky gif a barty, I tells you it vas vine, To geep de sever.t birtsday Of de Sovietverein...
...i - By its actions responsible- members of the hierarchy are contributing much to fostering an anti-clerical movement in this country...
...The Cardinal signed this letter with the Na?i salute, "Heil Hitler...
...medicine...
...The spotlight of world publicity on the Moscow frame-ups is driving them to cover...
...Organs that are not afraid to speak up for democracy...
...the "squawks...
...HUMAN WASTAGE OF CAPITALISM rtEPlJTY Administrator Aubrey Williams of the WPA writes P^ in the New York Times Magazine of unemployment and changing industrial technology, pointing out that only by continuous work "can a man preserve and improve his skill...
...lames...
...Our friends wont like to read that unless we get immediate aid well be forced to cut down to six pages and even less, and to drop some of the features which now help make The New Leader the leading fighting publication for true democracy in this country...
...They doift * hesitate to liquidate thousands, millions, for the cause—vicariously, of course, by approving the liquidations carried through by others...
...So don't be fooled by...
...The decay of capitalism with its consequent idleness for millions of workers has this tendency of producing a mass of workers who lose hope, who sink into depths of despair and eventually become accustomed to the life of vagabonds...
...Unless sober second thought induces them to abandon their present course, the fight for democratic liberty will be muddled by church politics which every sincere fighter for democracy, whether he be Jew or Gentile, Catholic or Protestant, desires to avoid...
...The abilities of capable nonStalinists are abused abominably...
...Men with a dozen years' experience on metropolitan newspapers are sent out to dig up irrelevant information while Stalinite nincompoops are assigned to tasks requiring ten times their abilities...
...Not an altogether pleasurable shock, either, because there is some portion of Comrade Simpson in the most level-headed and open, eyed among us...
...I look forward to the coming of The New Leader every week...
...Needless to say, the non-Stalinite who does the work gets no promotion...
...W. P. A. Projects Union Branch of C. P. Editor of The New Leader: Just a brief note to you to show you that your efforts to speak in behalf of the workers on the Federal Writers' Project are appreciated...
...On the other hand the refugee nations will be enriched by taking over the ripe cultural heritage of the enslaved countries...
...Non-Stalinist supervisors edit successful and well-written books on the basis of which the Stalinite overlords get higher ratings and more pay...
...Will the clerical politicians call a halt before it is too late...
...And you can get them this week-end...
...The New Leader then said that the committee was a stooge of the^steeP interests...
...Catholic workers have struck against Catholic bosses, Protestant workers against Protestant bosses, Jewish workers against Jewish bosses and all workers against the same exploiter whatever his faith may be...
...CITIZENS" HELP "CITIZENS" REMEMBER the full-page advertisements of the Citizens' Committee of Johnstown, Pa., last summer which announced the holy intentions of that committee in the C.I.O...
...In any anthology of humor, this poem might reasonably be dedicated to Heywood Broun, Dr...
...In between he accomplished other deeds of revolutionary daring, hob-nobbed with Lenin, Roosevelt, Browder aria other giants, placed himself always where the danger was greatest and iconoclastic boldness the only passport...
...On the other hand when priest, preacher or rabbi aids dictators, he turns politician and we treat him as such...
...Simpson is an extreme case...
...his views, vague but always ex...
...They actually attend mass meetings and shout hoarsely in support of Stalinist he-man stuff...
...AMERICAN CLERICAL REACTION (SN...
...De growds mit scarlet padges Vlocked rount de samovar To trink to Gomrade Trotsky Long life alt reigning Tsar...
...When he approves fascist dictators and dictatorship he should not be permitted to plead that he opposes Communist dictatorship...
...The last two lines hold the deadly evdience...
...We got some response, but it was far from what should have come through...
...It's just the cackling of Stalinite hens who've laid a beautiful egg for all the world to see...
...It is even willing to strike a bargain with Pagan fascism in Austria 1 Its maneuvers fartilM that of the Communist Party which wants a dictatorship of its own but cries out against any other form of dictatorship...
...America,*' the leading Catholic weekly, issue of March 26, pn the, other hand, protests against Hitler's destruction "of the Austrian Christian State . . . the Doll fuss State," not because it is opposed to fascism but because the Doll fuss regime rested "on a corporative basis under strong authoritarian leadership," at fascism satisfactory to "America" because it was Catholic...
...Here it is: Rakovsky gif a barty Herr Zidney V'ebb vas dore...
...Its honesty and fearlessness and...
...The Stalinites are whistling to keep up their courage...
...Auch minor-brophet H. G. Veils (A Vabian vorher...
...The President added refugees from Russia, Spain, and Italy...
...A FASCIST QUARTET press dispatch from Berlin, referring to Premier Chamberlain's statement of foreign policy in the British Parliament last week, declares that it "merely fulfilled German expectations...
...But in his dream life he identifies himself *]• ways with the Leftest, the most ruthless, the most fashionablyrevolutionary...
...Both are also apologetic of Franco's bombing of defenseless men, women, and children...
...The honest supervisor is met with an unofficial sit-down strike on the part of Stalinists assigned him...
...Yet, despite every underhanded CP...
...Don't be misled by the "indignant protests" of Stalinite stooges against the exposure of their tactics in The NewsLeader...
...You're either in one group or the other—and we hope you're in the first...
...But read "Meet Me on the Barricades" for further detail...
...It now appears that R. K. Melton and E. T Weir, neither one a citizen of Johnstown, helped finance the citizen...
...It also satisfied Franco and Mussolini, thus bringing approval from three dictators...
...There is no sorrow in that temple of the mighty where everybody is soaked but the rich...
...Cardinals O'Connell and Hayes support die fascist Christian" General Franco who resorted tx> armed insurrection to destroy the democratic government of Spain...
...Perhaps it's the sort of thing makes Englishmen laugh...
...gansa, one* P. Herbert Simpson, with s shock of recognition...
...No on* who has had the slightest intimacy with the labor and radical movements eaa fail to confront the pathetic hero of this extra...
...A musician by profession, leading a colorless suburban existence outwardly, he is a flaming revolutionary in his imagination...
...I recommend the book—to quote my own review of it in another publication—"as an effective mental purgative far intellectuals suffering political dyspepsia and ideological constipation...
...The Simpson of Harrison's book stemmed the tide of saunter, revolution, almost single-handed, in the heroic days of Petragnhl in IrP17...
...It is not an easy task to keep a labor paper going as I happen to know from actual experience...
...committee...
...A consistent policy of this sort by the anti-fascist nations wiH deprive the terrorist nations of noted men in politics, economics, education, journalism, art, science and music, leaving to them tile human dregs of sycophants, sadists, criminal adventurers, and abysmal brutes in general...
...But that the official organ of a greet government should quote this humor as s satkiUS piece of evidence against poor Rakovsky is no laughing matter—certainly not te Rakovsky and the other condemned on such proofs...
...They cannot play the Communist game of approving democracy at home and dictatorship abroad without creating resentment and counteraction...
...Organs that show their belief in democracy by exposing the shams of dictatorship regardless of what they may call themselves...
...All the copy, all the appeals and full page spreads asking you for help that we could get up would boil down to this...
...in your office—anywhere that intelligent people meet and discuss the momentous events now shaking the world...
...by LOUIS ADAMIC—stories behind American Labor strilogies...
...Und Oheim Arthur H enter son He vore his oldest Brack...
...PROJECTS WORKER...
...Yet the United States and Canada need papers like The New Leader...
...He was then Piotr Simpson...
Vol. 21 • April 1938 • No. 14
