Page Two THH PEHEOPLE’S ADVOCATE September 23, 1938 THE PEOPLE’S ADVOCATE Published Weekly by the Proletarian Publishing Association, Room 10, 163 West Hastings Street, Vancouver, B.C. Phone Trinity 2019. One Year ._-.._..$1.80 Three Months... $ .50 Half Year... --51.00 Single Copy———-.._$ .05 Make All Cheques Payable to: The People’s Advocate Vancouver, B.C., Friday, September 23, 1938 Chamberlain’s Infamous Betrayal (Continued from page 1) and his associates look to fascism to preserve their class privileges. The preservation of fas- cism already established, therefore, is the cor- ner stone of Chamberlain’s foreign policy, and that is why he ranged himself with Hitler to prevent the latter’s defeat and to destroy Czechoslovakia. e VERY diplomatic victory of fascism, every extension of its influence, every ac- quisition of territory, every capitulation by the democratic powers, strengthens the com- boned fascist states and leads to the point where they hope to be strong enough to launch a war against world democracy, first against the Soviet Union, then France and England. With Czechoslovakia destroyed as a coun- try, its wealth and industries gobbled up by Germany, and its people conscripted into the Wazi armies, a great ally of democracy will be lost and the way to European and world con- quest made easier for the wolves of interna- tional fascism. A continuation of the firm stand of May 21 could, as it did then, prevent the outbreak of war and bring the aggression of the fascist states to an end. Eiven if in the halting of fascist aggression entailed fighting, the fighting would be of such short duration that it would not amount to much more than police suppression of bandits, for the combined power of the demo- eratic states would overwhelm the fascists, whereas the policy of “appeasement,” far from saving life, has led to more than two years of slaughter of men, women and children in Spain and China, and will, unless ended, cul- minate in a world war of unprecedented mag- nitude and horror. @ O THE disgraceful and criminal actions of Chamberlain the Canadian government was both accessory and accomplice. During the machinations of Chamberlain to betray Czechoslovakia and hand it over to Hitler Mackenzie King maintained silence. But when the criminal work was done he quickly endorsed it and declared his solidarity with Chamberlain and Hitler. Wor is this the first offence of Mackenzie King and his pliant government against de- mocracy. Not only does King aid the pro- fascist foreign policy of Chamberlain by an embargo against loyalist Spain and by aiding Japan with war materials; he aids in creat- ing conditions favorable to the development of fascism in Canada. His refusal to disallow Quebec’s Padlock Law; his refusal to curb or even investigate activities of Nazi and fascist organizations in Canada which are directed, controlled and financed from Berlin and Rome, and now his participation in the de- struction of Czechoslovakia, brands him as a treaty breaker and one who has brought shame to Canada. Hitler and international fascism, aided and abetted by pro-fascists in democratic coun- tries, have scored a stupendous victory; de- mocracy has suffered a humiliating defeat. There is no use in denying this obvious fact; it must be faced. But if the peace-desiring people of the world will learn from the bitter experience, there is still time to save eiviliza- tion from fascism and devastating world war. Despite the machinations of treasonable pro- fascists in democratic countries, there are enough of the population who, if united for peace, can compel the King government to change its course and drive the Chamber- lains out of office with the curses of outraged and betrayed people abroad and at home ring- ing in their ears; united they can yet halt the march of fascism and bring peace to a troubled world. Building Circulation NTERNATIONAL events of the past two 4 weeks have served to emphasize that the building of a mass circulation for the Clarion Weekly and, in British Columbia, for the People’s Advocate, as Canada’s foremost champions of democracy, is the primary task of every individual concerned in building a democratic front against fascism in Canada. Tith the exception of a few liberal news- papers, the whole of the Canadian press is involved in a conspiracy of distortion to pre- sent Chamberlain’s infamous betrayal of Czechoslovakia as a wise policy to preserve peace. Only the labor press has stripped the hy- pocrisy from Chamberlain’s schemes and re- vealed their true menacing import. But the circulation of the labor press is still too re- stricted and the truth is still not reaching thousands who must ultimately pay the price of Chamberlain’s betrayal unless the drive to war is halted. In the current press drive we urge sup- porters to remember that, necessary as im- mediate money to finance publication is, only increased circulation can enable the labor newspapers to play their role effectively in building the democratic front. Investigate The Shameful Situation At Blubber Bay A Statement by Fergus McKean, Provincial Secretary of the Communist Party HE BRUTAL and apparently unpremedi- tated attack of BC provincial police, as- sisted by strike-breakers, on the Blubber Bay strikers last Saturday has aroused the indig- nation of labor throughout British Columbia. Aye, and not only of labor, but of every fair- minded citizen familiar with the facts. This, the second police-provoked attack, is the culmination of a long series of acts of terrorism and provocation flagrantly carried through by company officials and provincial police against the courageous struggle of the employees of the Pacific Lime Company’s Blubber Bay plant to maintain their union and reinstate their discriminated members. Wholesale eviction of strikers from their homes, homes they had occupied for nearly thirty years; seizure of personal property of those evicted; arrest of labor MiLA’s who in- tervened on their behalf; arrest and vicious prison sentences against strikers attacked by police and convicted on the flimsy evidence of company officials and provincial police — these are the shameful facts. If every Iabor legislation, supposedly enacted to guarantee the right of workmen to organize, was tested and found wanting, the Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act of the Pattullo government has certain- ly been proved worse than worthless by the workers of Blubber Bay. After six months of negotiations conducted through the cumbersome apparatus of the labor department; after participating in four conciliation proceedings and finally accepting an arbitration award which called for rein- statement of discriminated employees, the workmen of Blubber Bay are now being in- timidated, gassed, clubbed and jailed. Why? Because they dared to take strike action to en- force an award handed down by the arbitra- tion board established by the provincial gov- ernment itself Because they took strike action to reinstate employees dismissed from their jobs, because they joined a union. . ND yet the Industrial Conciliation and Ar- \ bitration Act in its muddled and ambigious text provides for a fine of $500 against any employer who dismisses his employees for joining a union. But this clause of the Act was not invoked. In spite of widespread dis- crimination in many industries it never has been invoked, and unless a powerful organized labor movement is developed in BC there is little likelihood it ever will be. Affidavits in the hands of the union attor- ney, John Stanton, prove that all through the strike provincial police have violated regula- tions affecting public officials by aiding the company in their strike-breaking efforts. Po- lice launches have been used to transport public officials, policemen have forcibly smashed in the doors of strikers’ homes and, finally, provincial policemen have openly at- tempted to hire strikebreakers at Gibson’s Landing to go to work for the Pacific Lime Company at Blubber Bay. Yet when these affidavits are presented to the attorney-general’s department with the demand that an investigation into police ir- resularities at Blubber Bay be launched, Pre- mier Pattullo states: “Affidavits of complaint have been sent to the attorney-general and perused by his department. There is nothing in them to justify the appointment of a com- mission.” Then, in an attempt to justify the brutal terrorism to break the strike, he adds: “I am of the opinion that there are some very sub- versive elements at work and it is not pro- posed to countenance their activities.” Always, when organized workers are cal- lously attacked by government forces in order to crush them, the ery of “subversive ele- ments at work” is raised to hoodwink the public. The workers of BC have not forgot- ten police brutality at Anyox, Corbin and more recently the events of June 19. The Pat- tullo government by its actions has clearly shown itself to be a government dominated by reactionary big business interests of this province. It is significant that in every at- tempt to obtain union recognition in the basic industries of lumbering, metal mining and fishing BC police have been thrown into the scales on the side of the employers to defeat labor. ; © HE flagrant denial by the Pattullo govern- ment of the elementary sgovernment- recosnized right of BC labor to organize closely resembles the rabid, pro-fascist, anti- democratie actions of the notorious Duplessis regime in Quebec. Police terrorism is rampant at Blubber Bay. Forty-six men and women have been arrested in order to demoralize the ranks of the strik- ers. Twenty have been convicted. Strike leaders have been brutally beat up in prison cells by provincial police. A halt must be called! The unholy alliance of the Pattulle gov- ernment, the provincial police and the Pa- cific Lime Company must be dissolved. The valiant efforts of the workers of Blubber Bay to maintain their union, and not only their.union, but the right to organize, must not be permitted to be crushed by police terrorism. Hitler tactics must not be tolerated here. Organized labor in BC must rally as one man to the support of the Blubber Bay workmen. Everyone who believes in civil liberties must add his voice in protest. Demand from Victoria a full enquiry into the actions of the provincial police. Build a powerful defense movement in aid of those arrested. Rush material aid and pledges of support to the Blubber Bay workers. The right to organize must be maintained. The outcome of the struggle at Blubber Bay will affect the whole future development of organized labor in BC. But organized labor and the people of BC must act — NOW! Meat Packers Expected To Reap Huge Profits By New Ruling.... NFORCEMENT of provincial beef grading regulations has again been postponed as a re- sult of pressure from consumers, retailers, and stockmen. While agreeing to the addition of two further grades to the four already stipulated in the original regulations, the Dominion government wishes to have the four lower grades, below the well-known “red” and “blue,” known by trade names instead of A, B, C and D, as re- quested by the special committee appointed by interested parties to define the lower grades. Trade names, it was felt, mean nothing to the average buyer. “Standard,’ for instance, in one store may be much higher than “standard” in another, whereas A, B, C and D grades are much easier for the consumer to look for. The government has not yet agreed to this type of grading, but the committee intends to hold out for its demands. Members of the committee state they are not satisfied witn the present system of inspection. Even professional meat men, they charge, are unable to distinguish between cow and heifer beef after it has been dressed. Further investigation into the beef regulations has brought sev- q@. But they counted without the organ- ized resistance of BC housewives. Kay Gregory upon inspection, but there is no tirely. Small retailers, unable to afford plant necessary for pro- cessing, would be forced out of pusiness. Already such packers as Swifts, Burns, Pacific Meat, are putting out far more canned meat than hitherto, preparing the consumer for the market which they hoped would come their way when the beef regulations were enforced. Officials of the Meat Cutters and Packers Union charge that Burns is already supplying hun- dreds of tons of frozen meat to the Japanese army. Wad the beef regulations been enforced, it is possible that still larger supplies of “processed’’ meat would have found their way to Japan, or to any country eral more interesting factors to light. As pointed out previously, the regulations as they stood, would have excluded from the local meat markets some 200,000 milk cows in the Fraser Valley. The government tcok the stand that having supplied milk, cows jad then served their purpose in life and could only be used for “processing.” Officials numbled something about cows with milk fever, tu- berculosis, etc., and declared that all cows Should be excluded from the fresh meat market. Tt has been proven that infect— ed cows are immediately banned reason why healthy cows cannor be sold for average consumption. The large packing concerns, however, hoped to be able to put through the regulations enabling them to buy all this type of lower meat from the farmers at 2 ridiculously low price on the ex- cuse that it would not comply with regulations, and therefore was no use except for “process- ines Large packers could then fiood the markets with canned goods at fairly high prices, realizing enormous profits at the expens— of consumers, who would have no ether alternative but to buy canned meat cer go without en- needing war supplies. Fortunately, due to the efforts of the British Columbia House- wives’ League, consumers and retailers have been made aware of the danger behind the regu- lations, a danger which threatens to create monopolies in cattle raising and meat packing in- dustries in B.C. This danger still threatens, and will not be averted until the dominion government has ap- proved the recommendation from: the BC committee that the regu- lations must provide six grades to be known as “Red, Blue, A, B, C. D,’ and that cow and heifer beef must be marked accordingly- = SHORT JABS A Weekly Commentary By Ol’ Bill Twelve or fourteen years azo Beasley was gen- eral manager of the Union Steamship Company Z and Capt. Troupe held the same No Flowers position on the CPR Goast Sery- Please’ ice. An airplane accident dumped Beasley into English Bay and he passed out of the lives of Coast seamen. Walking along Cordova on the afternoon of the accident I met up with a sailorman friend. I asked him if he had heard of, and what he thought about, Beasley’s untimely demise. “Yes,” he replied, “I’m sorry.” “Go on,” i urged, ‘what else?” “Sorry Cap- tain Troupe wasn’t with him,” he came back. That honest obituary comment, truly expressive of class feeling and utterly without taint of Hhy- pocrisy, came into my mind when I read a few days ago that the reactionary blackles Pete Thompson, ~ editor of Labor Truth, alleged labor paper, had been bumped off by a street-car.. Sorrow welled up in my heart to think that Chamberlain, Hitler, Musso- lini and Tom Mectnnes were not with him when he was mowed down under the wheels of the BC Col- lectric juggernaut The Sun, in announcing the death of this scoudrelly pro-fascist, stated that the had done much to better the conditions of labor during the last twenty years. This statement is as false and misleading as the name of the raz he published to fieht the labor movement, Labor Truth Like a leech, Thompson fastened himself on to a section of the trade union movement, the ACC ofL when he hit Yancouver. He got the endorsement of that body for his alleged labor paper, but as soon as the ACC of L workers found out what the contents of his paper were they disowned it and threw Thompson out on his ear. He reappeared then in his true colors, as a pro-fascist operating from the Same cesspool as that other fascist for hire, Tom Meitinnes. Thompson was not a labor editor as claimed by the Sun. He was a hireling who sold his puny, questionable talents to the monopolistic interests of BC. His paper was a slander sheet, the object of which was to disrupt the labor movement of this country. It was supported entirely by the boss log- gers and the Shipping Federation who circulated it among their employees free of charge. Unread, it found its way to the toilets. Its standing as a labor paper may be judged by the fact that Blaylock makes no objection to its dissemination among the smelter men and miners of Trail and Kimberley by Trotskyite disruptionists. A truly noble band— Thompson, McInnes, the Trotskyites, Blaylock, the Boss Loggers and the Shipping Federation! The Sun always announces traffic fatalities with @ number indicating the total deaths of the year to date. In Thompson’s case the number is 23, the skiddoo number. If it had been selected it could not have been more fitting or appropriate. We offer out sympathy—tempered with tude—to the motorman. erati- While the heiress to Countess the five-and-ten Wool- Nitwitz-Furbelow 07') millions is blow- cs ing these millions in the purchase of high-soundin§& titles like Princess Maidvani and Countess NitwitzFurbelow, the Wool- worth company is playing a leading part in the ef forts of the moneygrubbers te smash the organized labor movement in America A. few days ago a carload of “hot” cargo loaded by Woolworth’s left their warehouse in “Frisco. At every warehouse where it was spotted for unloading the union workers refused to handle it. They were locked out by the bosses whose plans are to smash the union. : @Qne hundred and twenty-five warehouses! Over eighteen hundred and fifty workers to be condemned to starvation wages and slave conditions so that a degenerate moron can gad around Europe buying up the titles of equally dezenerate moron members of the decadent aristocracy. Is it capitalist system or capitalist lack of system? Beatty's A Real = Canada’s railroad mess Railroad Solution have always the same ob- ject in view—making the railroad workers and the people of Canada pay all the financial losses. To him two railroads in Canada are “a supreme folly.” Last week he announced that a wage-cut was due on the Ganadian railroads when the wage question is settled in the US. There are other methods of solving our railroad problems which Beatty does not speak of. Here is one of them which we wish to bring to his notice. It is an extract from an interview Myra Page had with President Cardenas of Mexico about a month ago. Said Cardenas: “The government, four months ago, gave the na- tional railway system over to the railway workers union on condition that the workers’ administration undertake to run the roads at a profit, using part of the profits to extend our railway system and also te pay off the large national debt incurred earlier by the railroads. In other words, the Federal govern- ment would discontinue its subsidizing of its rail- roads... Today after four short months of workers’ administration, the railroads haye become a source of revenue to the government instead of what they were formerly, a drain on public funds. Also under more efficient management the railroads are begin- ning to pay off the national railway debt” How about trying it in Canada? solutions Lo A political crisis was on in India. The Deadly Indian people were demanding self Parallel determination for themselves; the right to sunder the ties that kept them in bondage to the British Empire. The British imperialists an- swered with bullets and bombs. A war situation was developing that must involye the entire world. Stalin looking on from Moscow was alarmed. He eould not adopt the non-intervention policy as prac- tised in Spain. He came to the conclusion he must send a non-official mediator, his friend Bumbleman, to settle matters. He would also send a couple of hundred “observers” to report on the barroom fights taking place between the Hindus and Moslems. No sooner said than done. He had not been invited to do anything of the kind, but that was OK. Hello! I am all tangled up since the CP picnic. Tve got my wires crossed. It was not Stalin who sent the uninvited mediators and the 200 spies to India, but Chamberlain who sent them to Czecho- slovakia. But the Indian people are demanding the right of self-determination in their own country, and if Stalin did butt in, what would Chamber- jain and the British people say about it? There would be this difference, however: the Indian people have a right to selfdetermination in their own country. The Sudeten Germans have no right to self-determination in the Czech country, and Stalin would not intervene to sell the Indians as Chamber- lain did to sell the Czechs. 2 aa oo