The Crisis in the New York Painters Union
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WOIKHK* OF T H E THE WORLD, VMTE MILITANT 3) Weekly Organ of the Communist League of America ^ VOLLME V II, NO. 39 [WHOLE NO. 233] NEW YORK, SATURDAY, JULY 21, 1934 PRICE 2 CENTS COPS FIRE ON UNARMED PICKETS A .F.L. Misleaders Betray M ilitant Pickets Tide of Strikes 33 Shot ln Minneapolis Close Alabama Sweeps Over the As Strikers Stop All Frisco General Strike Textile Industry Entire Nation So powerful is the sweep of the BULLETIN Commercial Vehicles CAPITALISTS JUBILANT; strike tide that it has inundated As we go to press news has ar Terror Used the very heart of the Bourbon rived that National Guardsmen South. 20,000 new fists were have been mobilized to smash the UNIONS MEET TO CONSIDER LONGSHOREMEN STILL OUT clenched in the statewide textile longshoremen’s strike In Portland, by Bosses to strike that has brought every loom Oregon which has been in pro San Francisco, July 19.—Never have labor fakers so clearly “headed to a standstill in Alabama. gress since May 9th. The labor CALL FOR GENERAL STRIKE The haven of lynchers and the a strike in order to behead it” as have the reactionaries of the Labor unions in this eity are taking a home of the attempted legal murder vote tonight on the proposition Council led the general strike to disintegration. Minneapolis, July 20. (By wire).—Thirty-three pickets were shot Crush Strike of the Scottsboro Boys for the first for a general strike. with sawed-off shotguns by police who, at the same moment, in two Bitterly opposed to the strike, only to be over-ridden by the over time in years fdlt the might of or * * * different places, began firing volleys of slugs into groups of pickets. With the general strike at its whelming majority of the local unions, Vandeleur, Kidwell, Casey, and ganized and aroused labor when the SEATLE, Wash., July 20.— crisis, and the’ reactionary bureau their clique rode along just long enough to find the first opportunity to United Textile Workers issued their The authorities apparently had planned the double provocation as Armed with long range tear gas the opportunity for bringing in the National Guard, for within a few cracy carrying the bosses’ colors break the strike. call for a general strike of all cot guns, Seattle police attacked in to thd ranks o f labor, the bosses After two days during which tile strike was completely victorious, ton workers. striking longshoremen In an effort minutes of the shootings the first truckload of machine gunners arrived unleashed a new strikebreaking w ith the bosses on the run. w ith no sign o f any weakening o f labor’s Bosses Fear to Open M ills to smash picket lines. Many were on the blood-splotched sidewalks, established m ilitary lines, and cleared weapon: a whirlwind series of injured by gas. the district. ranks, Vandeleur’s gang suddenly sprang a resolution for arbitration on Militant action in Huntsville raids on Communist and other • * * Within twenty minutes of the shootings the rest of the battalion the general strike committee, Tuesday, simultaneously with the begin where a strong group of strikers workingclass centres, workers’ Baltimore, Md.—Taking their cue of guardsmen, held in readiness at the armory here since the strike ning of raids by troops, police and vigilantes, who began weeding out closed down six plants that contin meetings, picket groups and soup from M inneapolis, 574, 1000 mem lines. Thirty-five squads of “vigi m ilitant workers from picket groups, soup lines and other places, and ued operations and threats to de bers of the Tdamsters, Chauffeurs lantes”, dressed as workers, backed jailing them. feat similar moves has caused the and Helpers Union went on strike bosses to re fra in so fa r from any np by the National Guard' and the A Phony Vote fo llo w in g the bosses ’refusal to rec Olsen Threatens M artial Law police, began an unprecedented attempts to open their mills. The resolution introduced by Vandeleur was claimed to have been ognize the union. Picket lines w ill BULLETIN reign of terror on the night of July The Alabama strikers ard point be augmented by 800 more d rivers 17, which is still going on. passed by the narrow vote of 207 to 180, but the vote was by a show of ing the way to American labor in One dead and fifty wounded is the to ll taken so fa r by the who are expected out in a. day or murderous authorities of Muinea; olis. hands, which Kidwell counted, and the demand by Harry Bridges and being the first to initiate the battle so. Over three hundred militant for the thirty-hour week. Among others for a roll call was denied by Vandeleur. Bridges later accused * * * Governor Olson backed up the onslaught by the local police with workers and strikers wdre arrested Kidwell of miscounting, and declared many unauthorized individuals their other demands are: a twelve an announcemoit that he Is prepared to declare martial law. and held on high bail, and a half New York, N. Y.—At a member dollar weekly minimum wage, eli As we go to press no word h a ; yet come from the vast ffgU n-i.ig dozen wokers’ headquarters were voted. Kidwell’s only answer was a formal denial. ship meeting of the Knit Goods mination of the “stretch-out” sys o f a ll trade union members of Minneapolis. sacked and destroyed, including ’ The resolution is directed against tem, reinstatement of workers fired Workers Union branch of the I.L. those of the Communist Party, the the longshoremen and the tCn strik G.W.U., 18,000 workers ra tifie d a for union activities and collective started on Monday, were widening the area enclosed by m ilitary lines. I. W. W. and the Marine Workers Green & Co. ing marine unions. Time after bargaining. strike proposal and prepared to Industrial Union. time, by democratic votes, the NRA has already issued state take immediate action to enforce Thirty-five hundred additional National Guardsmen were ordered here at once by Adjutant General E. A. Walsh. Whild the local authorities pre waterfront unions have voted ments denouncing the strikers in three demands: for the closed shop, tended that this work was done by against arbitration of the hiring the first opening wedge of the boss a thirty hour week, and a thirty Farmer-Labor Governor Olson is, according to the law, supreme “lawless vigilantes”, and most of Knife Coast halls control, and in addition, the es’ b attle to defeat the workers’ a t per cent wage increase. 2,000 mem commander of the National Guard. The Adjutant General’s authority to the capitalist press reported' accord longshoremen have repeatedly voted tempt to win tolerable living con bers of the San Francisco branch order the additional guardsmen mu.-1 have been previously arranged for ingly, some even attempting to say to refuse arbitration of the other ditions for themselves and their of the I.L.G.W.U. have joined the general strike there. with the Governor, which means that the whole manoeuvre was pre that workers made the raids, two Labor Unions issues unless the bosses agree to fam ilies. arranged. also arbitrate their differences with * * * * • » or three liberal reporters let the One attack took place on Third Street and Sixth Avenue North, In real story through. Contradictions Shrewdly timed to coincide with the othdr marine unions. In direct The w alkout o f the 20,000 te x tile Philadelphia, Pa.—Five thousand front of the Slocum Bergen Groceiy Company, from which convoys' of piled 'up, as the same issue of a the boss terror against the left contravention of the democratic de operatives in Alabama becomes a members of the Longshoremens Un newspaper carried both the fake wing, and the reactionary drive cisions of the striking unions, the signal now for labor in the entire ion here declared themselves in police cars were preparing to move a merchandise truck. The police and true story. within the union ranks, William resolutions would have President cotton and silk fabric industry to readiness to walk out in support of were under orders from Chief o tf Roosevelt call on the waterfront Police Michael Johannes to shoot A special dispatch to the New Green, president of the A. F. of L., galvanize their forces and to make the general strike in San Francisco. Strike Headquarters in Command workers and bosses to subm it a ll their way through picket lines and York Times of July 17 is typical of stabbed the coast workers in the good proposals adopted by the The union is awaiting instructions of District issues to the National Longshore were armed with the murderous the lying stories carried by the back with the most damaging anti- United Textile Workers, the Hos from the ’Frisco strike committee. * * * The strikers picked up their labor statement of Green’s shame man’s Board. iery Workers in convention a few sawed-off shot-gun, favorite deadly capitalist press: wounded and took them to the hos ful career. This statement was is A few hours after the “adoption” months back and the National Com Helena, Mont.—Attempts by the weapon of American gangsters. The San Francisco Chronicle pital previously set up in strike sued from Chicago, with Green en of the resolution, the National mittee of the American Federation bosses to put scabs to w ork met As the scab truck began to move, asserts that the “vigilantes” who route to the Wisconsin Federation Longshoremen’s Board issued a of Silk workers to call a general with firm resistance on the part of swaddled around by police cars, a headquarters, to prevent maltreat raided the radicals’ readquarters of Labor, on Wednesday, July 18, seven-point program for the arbi strike for the thirty honr week.