Where the News Ends
CHAMBEKLIN, WILLIAM HENRY
Where the News Ends By WILLIAM HENRY CHAMBEKLIN. Phobias About "Russophobia" WHEN a Communist or fellow-traveler it getting the wont of «n argument hia first impulse is to scream "Esseist" st hi*...
...But they robbed the common laborers in the Hod Carriers' Union of the integrity and reputation of the organi-sstion which they had built up for their protection...
...The hashi for satisfaction is, however, a-vary narrow an*, th* situation within these unions haa been common knowledge for many years...
...Isn't it discouraging that that man is indicted in 194S, the jury returns a conviction, but there is no move to drive the crooks from the ranka of labor...
...Lenin in Lift-Wing Communism and lnfantils Sickness...
...for great sacrifices—if this is necessary—for all possible ruses, deceits, illegal methods, omissions and con-ceslments of the truth...
...This shocked many people at the time...
...abuse for argument...
...Th* fact that it took ao long to jail' two notorious criminals is shameful...
...This is to Shout "Russophobe," "snti Russian...
...A man cannot Serve two masters...
...No peace will grow from the soil of appeasement...
...He read a strong condemnation of the conduct of Russisn troops in suppressing Polish insurrections in 18*0 and 1863 and added: "This waa not written by a chauvinistic Pole...
...And to the name of Tolstoy one msy sdd those of Hereon, Kropotkin, Belinsky, Mikhailovsky, Plefchanov...
...The reason why the Federation officials taks no sction hs well understood...
...For the Record • "A Communist must be prepared for everything...
...Suppose that a liberal minded Engnahman or Frenchman, after visiting tbe United States before the Civil Wsr, had noted the existence of human slavery as a blot on the ideals of the young republic...
...Soncfo Simpficifos Deportment "The Soviets base their prosecution (of German war criminals) on th* Hague and Geneva conventions, which protect civilian populations and the property of occupied countries...
...However, now and then a sincere but confused voice is rsised, suggesting that criticisms of Soviet actions snd policies are mistaken and out of place, even if they are founded in fart, that such criticisms will "sow suspicion" among the Allies, pave the way of war bet ween America and Russia, etc...
...This is s gullible outsider taking the invocation seriously...
...If I remember accurately, he called the Constitution a league with death and a covenant with hell...
...The idea that criticism of Soviet action ar refusal to recommend unconaitionsl eempHsaee with Stalin'» win on every disputed point is aaalvalont to a desire to go to wer with Kasels is SpplSSimsnt in its saost ohvioas sad «tuest form...
...But the plsin fact is that unless the conventions snd the Executive Council of the Federation take sction, no effective action will be taken...
...An Editor fol— Racketeering in the Unions JOSEPH S. FAY was vice-president of the Inter, national Operating Engineers' Union» James Boye WSS ?i«e president of the International Hod Car...
...They wore triad before the criminal branch of the New York State Supreme Court and convicted of conspiring to •xtort 1703,000 from contractors working son the New York ? ityDelaware water project They were sen...
...Unless orgsnised labor can find a way to clean house, ths unions will not get th* msximum public support that they deserve...
...1 am not interested in the standard grsmophon* record falsifications of Communists and fellow-travelers...
...Theae men are among the greatest glories of Russisn thought, of Russisn humsnistic culture...
...District Atloc, ney Hog an denounced the two man as "ruthless and ? rasping thieves...
...He said: "This cannot be...
...Occasionally they may even subject 8talin and hia American fifth column to some ever-so-mild chiding, just to prove their independence...
...And the mushheads are also, in most esses, beyond Intel-Metusi redemption...
...But to scent "Russophobia" in every criticism of sets and policies for which the enormous majority of the Russisn people bear no responsibility is to fall into absurd contradictions...
...One wonders whst would hsve been the effect if some of the hundreds of thousands of members of the "civilian populations" of Poland, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, subjected to deportation and loss of all their property by the arbitrary action of th* nkvd, had appealed to the Hague and Geneva conventions for protection...
...AH of them were outspoken in their denunciations of wrong and injustice in Russia, not, certainly, because they hated their country, but because they wanted to make it better...
...It is true that William Gr**n denounced Fay...
...And th* revelations during the trial prove that sending those two crooks to jau has' by no means armad La* sort of skulduggery for which they wog* convicted Th* bonds of great construction concoiaa which had hem mulcted of hundreds of thousands of dollars could be persuaded to testify only with the greatest difficulty...
...But In retrospect we do not think badly of Americans who overstepped the bounds of polite phraseology on behalf of human liberty...
...We have had trouble with Fay before, and he promised he wouldn't do thi* sort of thing...
...The organisation is set up ss s true federstion...
...There is only one more ironically amusing spectacle than a lawless dictatorship solemnly invoking international law...
...Furthermore, unless unions are progressive, democratic, snd honest, we can expect the enactment of legislation to regulate th* unions...
...And Americana who wish to see friendly relation* between the United States snd the Soviet Union on the only possible long-term basis, a basis of equality snd mutusl respect for the pledged word, will be well advised to banish the expressions, Russophobe, anti-Russian, pro-Russian, Russophile, from their thinking and regard every piece of news or interpretation concerned with the Soviet Union solely on the baaia of it* truth...
...Ob viossly relatione between the U si tad States and the Soviet Union will he better if aa honestly democratic regime Is set ap m a genuinely inde pendent I'oland They will be Worse if S puppet regis**, installed by farce and fraud, tyrannizes over the Polish people...
...It wss written by one of Russia's, and ths world's greatest, authors, Leo Tolstoy...
...There is also a subtler method of substituting...
...Phobias About "Russophobia" WHEN a Communist or fellow-traveler it getting the wont of «n argument hia first impulse is to scream "Esseist" st hi* opponent...
...whtn a criticism of some Sot ist policy or action ia voiced, even though the criticism is buttressed with evidence calculated] to convince the most sceptical mind, ' even if it is based on Soviet official statements...
...Stalin at the Fourteenth Communist Party Congress in 1926...
...This waa only one of many of Tolstoy's scathing denunciations of iniquitous acts of the Tsarist regime, at home and abroad...
...From European history we know thst every time thst tresties hsve been signed, envisaging a new arrangement of forces for new wars, those tresties hsvs been called treaties of peace...
...It was precisely Fay and Bov* and their partners in crime who defeated that move...
...The chief crime of which these man warn guilty was one which wss not set down in any indictment...
...Tbe local unions are helpless in the hands of dictatorial executives...
...Two of them did, in fact, manage to remain outside the jurisdiction of the court...
...Tbe reason is not far to seek...
...It is stse abaardlty...
...Turn for a moment from Russia to the United States...
...Th* public will naturally take satisfac...
...Was Tolstoy, one of the most indigenous of Russisn geniuses, therefore s "Russophobe" ? To ssk the question is to expose its essentisl silliness...
...What is needed is thoroughgoing exposure and widespread denunciation of this reign of terror, in Congress, in protest meetings, leading up to strong diplomatic action by our Government...
...Each one controls its own policies, elects its own officers...
...Their record is "studded with violence, law-breaking, unscrupulous and unmoral conduct aince 1916...
...These voices deserve an snswer...
...They robbed the construction company and the City of New York of some hundreds of thousands of dollars...
...Ugly things thst they would not hesitate to call by ugly names if they occurred anywhere else, slave labor on a gigantic scale, executions without trial, annexations in defiance of explicit tresty sMIsjitloUS, the manipulation of yapps* regimes, are either not mentioned or euphemistically disposed of ss "security measures," prompted and largely excused by the supposed nefarious designs of Ruaaia'a neighbors...
...This will have to be stopped...
...Did he show himself a bad American...
...More than, four years ago David Dubinsky introduced st the New Orleans convention of the AFL a motion to give the Executive Council adequate power...
...Its member unions retain their autonomy...
...teneod to priaon for lei m* of from sight and one-half to ftfteen yean...
...Abraham Lincoln condemned in the atrongest terms the war against Mexico in 1816...
...riers, Building and Common Laborer's Union...
...This phobia about "anti-Russianiam" is especially congenial to a class of persons whom Max Eastman hss described ss mrtthhaada...
...They would quite sincerely repudiate the charge of being sympathetic with Communism...
...Their blackest crime was against the trade union movement When this is taken into account, their sentence seems far too light a punishment All that the courts can do is to deal out punishment In a few flagrant cases...
...Thus *nds one of the most disgraceful racketeering ease* in American trade union history...
...Could such a critic have been fairly charged with inciting his conn fry te go to war with the United States f It is in s policy of unlimited sppossestent that the greatest ultimate danger of war between tbo United State, sad the Soviet Union may he foaad...
...Labor leadera expect a postwar drive of reactionary employer* against onions...
...But it waa not stopped...
...They feared reprisals...
...What state of mind could fairly be described ss "anti-Russian" ? I would say that this epithet could reasonably be applied to anyone who adopted toward Russians the attitude of Naiis toward Jews, of some reactionary racist Americans toward Negroes or Japanese, of Kiplingesque British imperialists toward "natives...
...Jake, for instance, the question of Poland...
...tion in the fact that two auch criminals can b* reached by the criminal law and affectively dealt with...
...But they have been so long accustomed to maintaining a double standard of morals, an extremely mild one for the Soviet Union, a harsh and exacting one for the rest of ths world, that they have become constitutionally incapable of feeling strong indignation about anything thst happens in Stalin's realm...
...The District Attorney had good reason to ask...
...But the way toward the establishment of sn independent Polsnd is certainly not to condone through silence the Soviet reign of terror in that unhappy country...
...The fiery abolitionist orator, Wendell Phillips, used some very strong language about the American Constitution, because It legalised slavery...
...They ars secular Holy Rollers, completely impervious to sny considerations of logic, truth nnd justice...
...Thi* remain* th* only line of action which promises relief...
...I recently attended a forum where a Pole wss presenting his country's case against the decisions of the Munich spelled Yalta...
...Any cur* for the disease of racketeering in th* trad* unions must be applied from within...
Vol. 28 • April 1945 • No. 15
