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he People's Advocate oe
: JAPANESE GOODS
0 | Western Canada’s Leading Progressive Newspaper ee reer
ital FULL No. 155 <== Published Weekly VANCOUVER, B.C., FRIDAY, DECEMBER 31, 1937 Single Copies: 5 Cents VOL. III, No. 51

PRO
4 US Gov’t

Will Sift
| Charges

| Fishermen Protest To
= Gov't Over Poaching
_| Of Japanese In Coast
nai Waters

"| RUIN INDUSTRY

- By SYDNEY BLOOMFIELD.

ty WASHINGTON, DC, Dec.
“ 29.—For a number of years
entire fleets of Japanese fish-

-§ ing and canning ships have
'— been operating up and down
the Pacific coast and they
have especially concéntrated
'@in the Alaskan waters de-
s@ stroying the American fishing
( industry, which brings an annual

business of over $75,000,000 and
erm which gives employment to more
than 30,000 workers.
i Especially are the fishermen’s
je trade unions aroused since Japan
| is using the most ruthless methods
— of piracy, completely emptying
[> waters of salmon. American fisher-
) men are restricted in their fishing
i | in their own waters by the US
| | Bureau of Fisheries which en-
l | forces closed salmon periods upon
=) them in order to afford the proper
c escapement of the salmon so as
to build up the salmon runs.
. American fishermen are indig—
hant at such restrictions when the
@ Japanese are doing a lot of sur-
face fishing, thus interrupting the
| normal course of salmon migration
| to their spawning grounds and
® lessening the supply almost to the
point of complete depletion.
US fishermen scouted from an
airplane over one Japanese boat
} and in a signed affidavit stated
that there were at least 20,000
® freshly caught salmon on deck.
So intense is the feeling that in
@ resolution sent to President
Roosevelt, Secretary of State Hull,
and the Alaskan delegate to Con-
gress, the Copper River and
Prince William Sound Fishermen’s
Union went on record as “opposed
te any operation in extra-territorial
waters of Alaska, by Japanese or
other foreign nationals or corpora-

> tions .. that the President of
'the United States, and the Con-
| gress of the US... take whatever

steps necessary, even to the ex-
> tent of ... complete embargo upon
"the importation of fishing products
|of any type, or other commodities
for any country which violates or
-nulliies the fishing conservation
laws of the US recruiting in the
depletion of a valuable natural
resource, destroying the American

(Coneinued on Page Five)
See “FISHERIES”

) Fall Kills
Wells Miner

Second Brother To Die
In Gold Mine Accidents
In BC During Past Three

Years

|
(Special Correspondence) |

WELLS, BC, Dec. 29—A broken-
(hearted father is taking the body of
his 33-year-old son, Jack Gillies— |
second of his sons to die in BC gold

mine accidents in three years — to
Vancouver for burial in the family
plot

Gillies met his death the first day
he started work at Cariboo Gold
'Quartz Mine when a fall of rock
crushed him. His father works in
the same mine.

Since the recent strike and sub-
‘stitution by the company of a boss-
controlled union in place of the legi-
timate Mine, Mill and Smelter
) Workers, experienced men have
jbeen replaced by young workers
ifrom the dried-out prairies know-!
me little of trade unionism and
nothing; of mining, A growing |
|death toll can be expected ed
/such conditions.

| Establishment of a genuine union !
/ iO ensure safety, decent wages and j
conditions, is needed in this com-
/pany-controllied town.

PANESE

JAP
GOODS

. » MADE IN JAPAN

By buying articles from Japan
you are making it possible for
Japan to continue this war against
unarmed women, children and old
men.

The Japanese military - finance
clique depends almost entirely on
foreign trade for the conduct of its
war on the Chinese people. By
its equally cruel exploitation of
Japanese industrial workers and
peasants (who have the lowest in-
dustrial standard of living in the
world) it is able to dump more than
28 percent of Japanese produce in
the British Empire.

The innocent -locking Japanese-
made articles (light bulbs, toys,
matches, celluloid combs), that are
displayed in our stores, must be
boycotted to save the peace of the

JAPANESE

“Fight Against Despotism, Oppression”

world.

DO YOUR PART!

Watch for Changed Labels
Enquire Before Buying

potism and oppression.” This

Seamen Hit
Condit ions

Seek Utilization Of Fav-
orable Clauses Of New
Act To Organize British
Columbia.

Seamen working the coast of
British Columbia are having a
tough time this winter, according
to reports obtained this week at
the Inland Boatmen’s union head-

, quarters, Hastings street.

Average wage is $50 per month,
less compensation, for these sea-
men whose work is never done,
who are always on call and to
whom overtime wages are never
paid. Canadian coastwise seamen
pack their own blankets.

One man, producing his own log
book, showed a total of 248 work
hours paid at an average of 15
cents. Fixing and breaking log
booms, standing watch, turn at the
wheel, cleaning, painting and all

the innumerable daily tasks which
must be done. According to the
articles a seamen iS Supposed to
have Sundays off, but not on BC
boats while there is paint to wash.
This seaman stated he felt his
position keenly when tied up next
to American tughboats.
“Those boys are always talking

union business to Canadians, prob- ,
ably because they know the lousy |

conditions under which we work,”
he said.

Average wage for inland boat-
men on the other side of the line
is $80 per month of 26 days, with
7 days off in 31 and 6 days in 30,
the PA learned, one American tow
boat crew drawing $100 cheques
for November because of over-time
for that month.

Unionized American boats are
not limited to 2 buckets for a crew
of 8 to wash, bathe and scour paint
as -are our boats, this seaman
Stated.

Shipping Federation Hit

Jim Maskell, business agent of
the Inland Boatmen’s union and a

(Continued on page 5)
See “SHAMBEN”

GOODS

President Cardenas Calls
For Front Against Fascism

By ALFRED MILLER (Federated Press)

MEXICO CITY, DF. (FP)—In a history-
nation, President Lazaro Cardenas called for
ary Party (PNR) into “the party of the wor

making manifesto addressed to the Mexican
the transformation of the National Revolution-
kers, peasants and soldiers to fight against des-=

is regarded as establishing the basis for the immediate forma-

tion of a popular front in Mexico.
The far-reaching move was ini-4
©tiated at a PNR national executive

committee meeting recently. Car-
denas, various members of his cab-
inet, governors, senators and depu-
ties participated.

In his manifesto, Cardenas de-
clares: “From the first day of its
existence on, the National Revolu-
tionary party has well understood
the historical interests it represent-
ed. It recognized the mission -it
was to perform throughout the
years in exercising revolutionary
POWET.

“Today we are facing a very
much changed situation. The need
has arisen to analyze the nature
of this mission as well as the struc-
ture of the party to bring it into
harmony with the development of
our reforms and with the great
goal of the Mexican revolution.”

Up until now the PNR had its
membership and financial strong-
hold among government employes
who automatically became mem-
bers of the party and made com-
pulsory contributions amounting to
a week’s wages per year. Orders
have now been given by the pres-
ident to all government depart-
ments to cease taking compulsory
“dues” and to consider only those
as members who pay voluntarily.

The manifesto appeals to the
workers to “transform the PNR
into a party of all the workers in
which justice and the opinion of
the majority are the fundamental
principles.” It appeals to the
peasants “of the entire country to
join the ranks of our political or-
ganization,”

Cardenas opens wide the doors
of the party to women “to elim-
inate, forever, the traditional in-
justice of relegating them to in-
ferior positions.” He asks white
collar workers to join “to defend
the weaker parts of society against
despotic and fascist aggression.”

Youth, “as representatives of the
greatest enthusiasm and unselfish-
ness,” are called on to join the
party. Armed forces of the country
are asked to join and strengthen
the party, “not as a special group,
but as citizens with collective dis-
cipling.”

The manifesto is causing great
enthusiasm in all labor and pro-
gressive circles here: Teaders feel
that the same response will come
from the countryside and that the
base has been laid for an invincible
people’s front against aggression

and fascism in Mexico.

Communists
To Convene

Vital Problems Will Be
Discussed By Provincial
Convention In Vancou-
ver Jan. 15-16.

Not long ago screaming headlines
and interminable articles in the
daily press recorded the Hotel Van_
couver convention of Ganada’s big
businessmen.

Next month, however, when a con-
vention of a very different kind is
held in the city, there will be no
glare of publicity in the daily press.
The hundred-odd delegates to the
convention of the British Columbia
district of the Communist Party of
Canada on January 15-16 will not
Stay in luxurious hotels. Nor will
they meet in the Hotel Vancouver,
but in the Ukrainian Labor Temple.

They will discuss Many Similar
things, it is true, but from an en-
tirely different angle, the angle of
the working people of this province
Struggling to obtain higher wages
and better conditions from the same
big businessmen who met not long
ago to formulate their reactionary
policies for maintaining and extend-
ing their exploitation of workers
and natural resources alike.

There will be no platitudinous
speeches designed for publication
and to misléad the public as there
were at the convention of big busi-
ness. And the sessions will be at
tended by men and women earnest-
ly seeking to present a solution to
stave problems, not by a handful
of individuals wishing they were
elsewhere.

Delegates to this provincial con-
vention of the Communist party will
be trade unionists—hard-rock min-
ers from the Cariboo and coal min-
ers from Nanaimo, seamen and rail-
Waymen, engineers and lumber-
workers. There will be fruit grow-
ers from the Okanagan and farm-
ers from the Fraser Valley, repre—
sentatives of employed and unem-
ployed alike. And their objective

(Continued on page 5)
See “COMMUNISTS”

Canadian War Shipments
To Japan Arouse Storm

Of Protest Fro

<
Famous Ejighth Route
Army Striking At Rear
Of Japanese Forces In

North

NEED MEDICAL AID

US Writer Tells Plight
Of Wounded Thousands
Of Shansi Provincial

Army Troops

By AGNES SMEDLEY

TATYUAN, Shansi, Dec. 29.
—We met them first at the
small town of Fengliantao,
just across the Yellow river
trom Tungkwan, the gateway
to Shensi province.

Before us, along the mudbanks
of the Yellow river, lay the hud-
dled bodies of wounded soldiers.
Some lay prostrate, groaning in
suffering, and when we halted by
their sides they pointed to wounds
—not just one, but often many.
Others not so badly wounded sat
in rows. To the right and to the
left of us they lay until our pas-
Sage was a route bordered by suf-
fering. We stepped over feet
bound in bandages black with dirt
and blood. Some of the men were
on the verge of death from gang-
rene.

We passed further along the
line into the streets of the small
town. We made our way through
the ranks of hundreds of wounded
who limped along, each step a
torture, some of them doubled
over in their efforts to still their
suffering. Often the streets were
blocked with the wounded and on all
Sides were bandaged heads, arms,
legs, faces.

Peasant carts came trumbling
along filled with the wounded, and
they lifted their ashy faces to those
who were going to the front from
which they had just come. Many
of the men had no winter over-
coats, and none seemed to have
blankets, The men lying along
the banks of the river lay on the
mud with nothing under them.

No Medical Aid

‘We talked with the wounded.
They were from four to five hun-
dred in this town that night. They
had been wounded around the
Pinghsinkwan, on the Great Wail,
around the third week of Septem-
ber, though they did not know the
date, and dates perhaps meant
nothing to them. They had been

(Coneinued on Page Five)
See “CHINA”

Consulate

Picketed

Seattle WCF Councilman
Leads Delegation In Pro-
test of Japanese Aggres-
sion of China.

SEATTLE, Wash. Dec, 29.—
(Special)—More than 100 members
of labor unions, Workers’ Alliance
and liberal organizations, led by
the powerful Washington Common-
wealth Federation, state-wide poli-
tical group, picketed the Japanese
consulate in the heart of Seattle’s
financial district this week. Ban-
ners carried by pickets protested
the sinking of the US gunboat
Panay and three steamers in the
Yangtze River a few days before;
decried the Japanese war clique’s
invasion of China and called for a
boycott of Japanese-made goods
“until Japan gets out of China.”

Led by City Councilman Hugh
DeLacy, WCF president, the group
picketed for an hour while hun-
dreds gathered to applaud and
reach eagerly for “boycott Japan”
buttons which were distributed.
Afterwards, DeLacy
mittee of five called on Acting
Gonsul M. Ishide.

“This wanton bombing is a
threat to world peace,” Delacy
told him.

and a com-|

%

4

Malcolm Ross

i—o—

Ross New
Secretary
Of League

Calder Will Make
Dominion Tour To
Protest Padlock Law
In Quebec

TORONTO, Ont., Dec. 29.— An-
nounced this week by A. A. Mac-
Leod, national chairman, Canadian
League for Peace and Democracy,
is the appointment of Malcolm
Mackenzie Ross, well-known in
Canadian literary and academic
circles, as national fSeneral secre-
tary of the league.

Ross, a native of Fredericton,
NB, and graduate of the Univer-
sity of New Brunswick, has re-
cently returned from China, where
he was assistant professor of Eng-
lish literature at Lingnan Univer-
sity, Canton. Previously he was
head of the English department of
the University of New Brunswiclx
Sumamer school and worled as
Staff reporter on the Fredericton
Daily Mail and Saint John Tele-
Sraph-Journal.

In making the announcement
MacLeod explained that an addi-
tion to the executive Staff was
made necessary by the rapidly
broadening objective of the league.
The league plans to send a peti-
tion of one million Signatures to
Premier Maurice Duplessis of
Quebec urging repeal of the pad-
lock law, and in carrying out the
campaign the league is sponsoring

Of rt men

m Labor

Peace, Democracy Body
Urges Gov’t To Enforce
Amendment To Customs

Act

————

BOYCOTT STRONG

Freighter Which Loaded
Supplies At Royal City
To Run Blockade Said
Missing

TORONTO, Ont., Dec. 29.—
Unashamed announcements
that Canada will soon ship
to Japan enough raw material
to continue the war in China,
evoked a storm of protest
here, many trade unions hav-
ing already lodged protests
with the Canadian govern-
ment demanding that Canada
refuse to sell Japan aluminum,
nickel and scrap iron to mas-
sacre the Chinese people.

The following telegram to Pre-
Iier MacKenzie King was sent by
A. A. Mcieod, chairman, Canadian
League for Peace and Democracy:

“On behalf of 300,000 Canadians
we strongly urge you to apply the
amendment to the Customs Act
passed at last session of parlia-
ment, giving government power to
withhold war materials from ag-
gressor states. Nothing could be
more fitting at this Christmas
season than that Canada should
make it known to the world that
we as a nation are not prepared
to assist Japan in her brutal ag-
gression against the Chinese Re-
public.”

(Special Correspondence)

nese are deadly serious in their boy-
cott of everything Japanese; in this
they are backed up by this com-
munity.

Labels on Ghristmas goods are
examined closely by many buyers
before purchase. When a2 movie
short of Madame Chiang Kai-Shek,
wife of the Chinese general, was
flashed on the screen of a local
theatre last week, urging support
of the boycott, the audience re-
sponded with loud applause.

Visiting city novelty stores in
search of noise-making devices for
their New Year’s dance in China-
town, members of the Young Com-
munist League reported to the PA
that many Japanese goods were be-
ing offered at next to nothing, so
§reat were unsold stocks.

A big box of cleverly made novel-
ties was purchased, all with the
Made in Czechoslovakia label, for
distribution at this well organized

a coast-to-coast tour in Pebruary
of R. L. Calder, KG, who has been
leading the fight against the pad-
lock law in the Province of Que-
bec.

In mobilizing Canadian “action
against Japanese aggression in
China, the league has adopted a
three-point Program, ai  citizen’s
boycott of Japanese foods, a peti-
tion for federal embargo on ship-
ment of war materials to Japan,
and a nationwide appeal for medi-
cal aid to China. Dr. H CG. Tao,
formerly Dean of Southeastern
University, Nanking, China, will
make a speaking tour of twenty-
six Canadian cities under league
auspices early in January.

Nanaimo Miner
Killed In Slide

NANAIMO, BC, Dec. 29. — T. A.
Sainsbury, 40, a miner employed in
the Northfield mine was killed by a
fall of coal today, Wednesday. Mates
of Sainsbury dug him out of the
slide and applied artificial respira-
| tion, but he did not respond.
| Survived by his wife, three sons
|) and a daughter here, and by his
| parents, six brothers and two sis-
| ters in Wales, Sainsbury was a na-
tive of Merthyr, Wales.

affair at 37 Pender Street, Decem-
ber 31. °

In this particular five-and-ten
store, ¥CL, members were shown
newspaper reports by a Salesgirl
which stated that no more Japanese
Foods would be bought by the firm
for which she worked.

HONG KONG, China, Dec. 29. —
Fears for the Safety of the Chinese
freighter Haida, three weeks over-
due from Seattle with a cargo of
5,000 tons of sulphur in an attempt
to run the blockade, are expressed
by agents of the steamer in en-
quiries made to officials this week.
week.

The sulphur, ingredient of gun-
powder needed by the Chinese, was
loaded in New Westminster in Sep-
tember when press reporters inelud-—
ing one from the PA learned from
K. G. Yang, Cantonese in charge of
the shipment, the destination was
Shanghai, although the utmost sec-
recy was maintained as to time of
sailing, personnel of the crew and
Owners of the ship.

Sailing from Seattle after bunker-
ing at Comox, considerable interest
was aroused alongs the BC coast
over the ship with its Norse captain
and Chinese crew,

TRAIL, BG, Dee. 29.—Trail Chi-«

E OF JAPAN SPY ACTIVITIES ORDERED —

Boycott Japanese Goods

Chinese Children Are Killed Daily By Japanese Bombs!

These Bombs are provided by:

i—TOYS YOU BUY
2—SILK YOU BUY
: 3—NOVELTIES YOU BUY

lah Lloasd sega a