Canada and British Commonweal

EDITORIAL PAGE.

TOM McEWEN, Editor — HAL GRIFFIN, Associete Editor — RITA WHYTE, Business Manager.
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; MOSCOW
TT is said the Russians havé used atomic

Power to move mountains and change

the course of mighty rivers. In these

- olumns‘I invariably stick to what 1
have seen, not what I have heard. There-
fore I haven’t seen any mountains being
Moved as yet, but I have seen one mag-
Nificent mountain made by the Russians,
and on top of it a vast amphitheatre,
the Kirov Stadium, with seating capacity
for 100,000 spectators. \

This job was done in the normal day-
0-day reconstruction of Leningrad. The
Kirov Stadium was’ completed in 1950.
Aere are many sports stadiums in So-
Viet cities, but few on the gigantic scale
f the Kirov Stadium. While repairing
and rebuilding from the living ashes of
its. broken city, Leningrad also built
this mighty stadium for the promotion of
Sport, that greatest of all links in the
Chain of international peace and good-
will. :
How was it done? Well; Soviet; engim-
ers first decided that a mountain was
Necessary in the flat marsh lands of the

‘Surrounding areas. Hence, with the aid
of powerful hydraulic suction equipment,
a mountain was built with earth and silt
_ Tecovered from the Gulf of Finland; a
Mountain about half the area of Grouse
Mountain and vossibly a little better
than half the elevation! ee
. Then a series of macadamized spiral
highways leading to the top, with a
dozen or more outdoor pavilion restaur
ants, garden landscapes and large hotels.
And atop the mighty crater of the
Kiroy Stadium,.a three-car broadwalk
_ which would undoubtedly provide stand-
ing room for another fifty or sixty thous-
and sport lovers. ;
And down on the flatlands along the
Gulf, beautiful garden ablaze with the
Varied colors of begonia beds, dahlias,
‘Yoses, evergreens — acres of gardens

dotted here and there with restaurants, —

training parks, rest rooms — all the
essentials of a vast rendezvous of sport,
Sraced with the artistic sculpture and art
Of Soviet science and craftsmanship.

As a Canadian I felt very proud when,
as a result of the British Empire Games,
We Vancouverites secured a long-needed

’ stadium. In our new Exhibition build:
‘ings we also feel a surge of deep price
in the artistic design and murals dedi-
cated to Canadian labor and culture. It
‘is not to decry these of our own achieve
ments in the world of sports, but only
to aid readers in grasping the magnitude
of this mountain built by Soviet work-

ers with its mighty Kirov Stadium on top,

»

that I say our Vancouver: stadium and ~

Toronto’s Maple Leaf Gardens could both
be placed in the centre of the Kirov
Stadium — with plenty of room to spare:
* Just a few short weeks ago Lord Aber-
_ dare, writing in the London Post, stated
that sportsmen and artists were the
 §reatest of today’s international ambas-

sadors for peace and goodwill between |

all peoples and nations. iy Baye
This mountain fairyland, built by

Leningrad workers eight short years
after their city was laid in .ruins by the
“Nazi barbarians, is a wonderful tribute

_ to that sporting ideal expressed by one
of England’s awakened nobility.

The Kirov Stadium has already been
the centre of great international events
in the world of sport.. Without presum-
ing to pose as a prophet, I would ven-
ture the opinion that the day 1s not far
‘distant when this mountain built by

Soviet workers and its great Kirov Stad-
ium, overlooking the placid waters of
the Gulf of Finland, and garlanded with
acres of flowers, will rumb:

 *,

le with the ©
‘peace-laden cheers of a world Olympic. —

x —————

————_—_

“Sir, the. West German Freedom Committee to liberate Eastern
Europe is here.”

- Recognize China now!

N the five years since its found-
I ing, the People’s Republic of
China has become a symbol of
the profound changes that have
‘taken place in the relations be-
tween Asia and the rest of the
world. Bee

For over a century, from the
days of the Opium War, China
was the classic example of west-
ern imperialist exploitation of an
Asian country. Greedy foreign —
monopolists aided by a handful.
of Chinese traitors battened onto
her, sucking her dry and prevent
ing her developing her own re
“sources for her people.

Overnight that was changed—
the people of China “‘stood up.

Under the leadership of the first —

government that represented their
interests, they have made China
a beacon of Asian progress.
Climaxing the
changes of the past five ‘years is
the adoption of the new constitu:
tion of the People’s Republic —
the constitution that will guide
800 million people along the path.
to socialism.
Of course, ,
Lunacy, Inc. which is centred in

_ Nehru’s wise warning

wat do the people of India, who
will bere to lite with imperial-
ism’s newest creation, say about it?

Premier Nehru gives a timely answer. —

The Southeast Asia Treaty Or-
~ ganisation is, he says, a source of

danger to peace. — pie ?
. The SEATO plan follows closely
the pattern of the North Atlantic
Treaty Organisation. First a “men-
ace’ is conceived and then a measure
‘of ‘‘defense’’ is contrived.

In each example the “menace” is
that of supposedly aggressive Com-

munist intentions.
being accepted, the sequel becomes the
construction of a vast and constant-

monumental —

that branch of 2

The supposition -

4

Washington refuses to understand

that the clock of history won't

run backward — and continues

to hold up the hands of the. aged

and feeble Chiang Kai-shek.

But a largé and growing body
in this country and in West Eur-
ope recognizes the utter stupidity
of this course of action. The
words of Clement Attlee on the
danger that the Kuomintang
clique on Formosa pose to peace
underline this opinion.

To our shame, the sole con
tribution of the Canadian gov-
ernment to. this discussion has
been its assurances that its posi
tion does not deviate from that
of the US.

Such gratuitous insults to the
Chinese do not serve the interests .
of Canada,. Our position as a
Pacific power demands that -we
open normal diplomatic and trad-
ing relations with the largest of
our neighbors on the rim of the
great ocean. core
~The campaign of the BC.
Peace Council for the immediate
recognition of China will there-
fore command the support of all

thinking people in this province.

#7
~

ly expanding military organisation
and commitment to an interminable’

program of armament. :

Having saddled the Western world
with such a burden, Anglo-Ameri-

_ can imperialism now offers the Asiatic —
- peoples a similar incubus. India’s

spokesman is clear-sighted enough to

advise them to have none of it.

The question for Asia’s peoples is
to find means of peaceful living to-
gether, advancing prosperity and
civilisation. fae

A panoply of American admirals
and generals and a load of atomi¢
weapons is not the means. Its only
advocates are U.S. stooges.
warning is well timed.

Nehru’s .

Hal —
Grittin

WE buried Jim Phillison last Monday

in the gravelly, week-grown ceme-
tery on the outskirts of Nanaimo. There,
among the crowded graves of the pion- —
eers, we placed the man who maintained
to the end of his 73 years the proud labor
tradition they founded.

Some of the graves, newer then and
better kept, were already there when
Jim Phillison first came to Nanaimo
from his native Tyneside. The names on ©
the weathered headstones carved long
ago by Alex Henderson are those of
pioneer families, Tibbett and Turner,
Carroll and McGregor, among them some
who made the six-month voyage from -
England around Cape Horn in 1854.

Jim Phillison did not come.to Nanaimo
until half a century later, but none de-
serves more to be numbered among the
builders of his city and his country.

He came by way of Calgary, where he
drove a horse-scraper levelling what is
now that city’s main street. He worked
on construction gangs pushing the Cana-
dian Northern through to the coast. And
in Nanaimo he went. to work as a coal
miner, for Nanaimo was founded on coal
and around coal all its history has. been
made.

As $ many of the pioneers did, Jim
Phillison brought with him the heritage —
of his English working class. tradition.
In the Nanaimo mines he found the same
exploitation, the same dangerous condi-
tions, the same bitter struggle of the

miners to organize. He joined the Unit-

ed Mine Workers of America and he
became a member of the old Socialist
Party of Canada. ; . ’
Among the first of the Socialist lead-
ers he met was “Old Bill” Bennett, when ~
the great pioneer labor journalist
went to Nanaimo in 1907 to campaign
for Jim Hawthornthwaite, the Socialist
candidate in the provincial election of
that year. The people of Nanaimo elect-
ed Hawthornthwaite as later they elected

other Socialist spokesmen to Victoria in

unbroken succession until Liberal gerry-
manders smothered their militant voice.
In all those elections Jim Phillison play-
ed his part. i eee
{path tee at nt :
He ‘was one of the miners who stood
out against all the force the Tory gov-
ernment of Sir Richard McBride could
bring against them in the great Nanaimo
strike of 1912-14. Behind McBride stood

the mine owners, the Dunsmuir family—

pioneers of a different breed — and the
Mackenzie and Mann interests, to which

the Punsmuirs sold out in 1911. Neither .
- scabs nor hunger nor the artillery of the

militia could defeat the miners and when

they ended their strike in 1914 they had

written a glorious page in history.
But not all got back to work. The

blacklist pursued some of them for years ©

and one was Jim Phillison.

- He became a vainter, a fisherman and
finally a coal trimmer on the waterfront
—the only part of the industry where the

3 blacklist could not touch him.

From the day he joined the old Social-
ist party he had sold its papers. And for
40-odd years he continued to sell labor
papers, from the B.C. Federationist to
the Pacific Tribune. To most people in
Nanaimo he was “Old Jim,” the Tribune
man. To “Old’ Jim” himself it was a

- self-imposed duty that he placed above

all others, bringing the truth of his
convictions to his subscribers.

Today, the coal mines are closed down
because it is cheaper to import U.S. coal
than to install machinery to work the
harder seams. But the miliant tradition
of Nanaimo lives on and will yet be a
force in realizing the aims to which Jim
Phillison devoted his life.

‘PACIFIC TRIBUNE — OCTOBER 8, 1954 — PAGE 5