February 16, 1940

THE ADVOCATE

Page Five

ANOTHER

iy

; HE recent visit of Sir Walter Citrine and other British Labor party leaders to oe
“throws into sharp relief their role as instigators of war against the Soviet Union throug ;
Finland and the Scandinavian countries. True to their counter-revolutionary traditions fe)
‘918-1919, the leaders of the Labor party are publicly associating with the most reactionary
slements of the British capitalist class in support of General Mannerheim’s White Guard re-

=: rs . : eens = (ue d
ntly there was established in London a new organization known as the ‘Finlan

Le fOr af committee sit Labor Party Chairman Mrs. Barbara Gould and Trades Union

$ Congress Chairman Holmes. President of the organization is Lord Plymouth, former chair-

dman of the notorious non-intervention committee which prevented Republican Spain from
N-eceiving assistance against the Mannerheim of Spain—General Franco. i
' Executive chairman of the ‘Finland Fund’ is Lord Phillimore. During the Spanish war,
‘Tord Phillimore was chairman of the organization known as ‘The Friends of National Spain,

bf him:

3 “For some years he has
Of: played an important part be-
|} hind the scenes in right-wing
{ politics.”

His importance may be judged
by the fact that he has secured
the open support of two outstand-
ing Labor party leaders for his
{ pro-Mannerheim committee,

: Ss
OUGHOUT Britain Labor
party branches, trade unions
and cooperatives are passing re-
solutions of protest against the
 » open assistance tendered by
{Labor leaders to the war plans
of the anti-Soviet intervention-
ists. Dozens of leading . Labor
Darty members have resigned to
join the Communist party. Major
Slement <Atlee’s public white-
washing of Chamberlain over the
dismissal of MHore-Belisha was

foundly denounced at Labor ral--

lies and conferences. His ‘politi-

cal truce’ with the national gov-
j2tnoment is being attacked on all
sides.

By an overwhelming vote, the
University Labor Federation went
on record as supporting the So-
viets and the new Finnish gov-
ernment and opposing the imper-
jialist war plans of Chamberlain
and Atlee. When their national
leader, Walter Greenwood, re
signed rather than oppose the
Labor leaders, they elected D. N.
Pritt, KC, fighting Labor back
bencher in the House of Com-
mons, in his place. :

A ferment unequalled in the
history of the Labor party is
Sweeping through the rank and
file. Militancy has reached heights
-undreamed of in the first year
of the last war. The British Com-
munist party is growing rapidly
in size and in influence.

Labor leaders are well aware of
all these facts. They faced simi-
lar, if less widespread. opposition
to their war policies in 1914-18,
and are past masters of the art
of concealing their real program
behind a smokescreen of ‘social-
ist’ phrases.

While giving every support to
the Mannerheim forces, while
continuing a vicious campaign of
lies and slander against the So-
viet Union, while secretly plot-
ting to disorganize and weaken
British labor in preparation for
open intervention, they hypocri-
tically deny their real intentions.
Many trade unionists are naive
snough to accept these denials at
| their face value. They argue that
no matter how bitterly the Labor
bureaucracy hates the Soviets, it
would not dare openly support a
new intervention against the land
of socialism,

e

Goce sentiments are only nat-
SO ural. It is difficult for a so-
cialist or trade unionist to believe
‘that the leaders of his own party
are capable of lies and hypocri-
cies of which even Chamberlain
might feel ashamed. For such
‘tender-minded individuals a study
of the activities of the British
government in organizing anti-
Soviet intervention during the
years immediately following the
October Revolution is recom-
mended. i
_ One of the most interesting
books dealing with this period is
Between Two Wars, by Vigi-
lantes ‘4K. Zilliacus). Among
other matters, the author con-
trasts the role of the Labor lead-
ers in the last imperialist war
and the war of intervention with
their role in betraying Spain to
Hitler, Mussolini and Franco.

From his analysis, it becomes
clear that Britain was able to or-
ganize and lead the anti-Soviet
intervention only through the as-
sistance of the leaders of the Bri-
tish Labor party. And when the
British workers finally did call
a halt to the undeclared war
against Russia, it was against the
stubborn opposition of their ‘so-
cialist’ leadership.

During the fateful years 1917-
18, the Labor party leadership en-
countered tremendous difficulties
in retaining working class sup-
port for the British government.
Large and enthusiastic peace
meetings were held. The shop
stewards’ Movement was sweep-
ing England and Scotland. The
anti-war section of the Labor
party was growing in strength
and becoming more outspoken.
Even the Labor party manifesto
of Jan., 1918, which said in part:

“The great speech made by
Lloyd George on Jan. 5 is by
far the most important which
any statesman has made dur-
ing the war. It reveals a gov-
ernment and a people seeking
no selfish or predatory aims of
any kind, pursuing with one
unchanging mind, one un-
changing: purpose: to secure
justice for others so that we

may thereby secure for. our-
selves a lasting peace,”
was received coldly and even
with open hostility by large sec-
tions of workers, who saw in it
one more attempt =to tighten the
bonds which tied them to the
war machine.

The British Labor leaders thus
faced a delicate situation when
they were called upon by their
government to assist in keeping
Russia lined up with the Allies,
and to win working class support
away from the Russian Revolu-
tion, thus sweeping away obsta-
cles to British intervention
against the Soviet. In all fair-
ness it must be stated that they
did ‘their best to carry out these
objectives. But after four years
of war and betrayal the spirit of
th workers was such that their
best was not enough.

e

IR GEORGE BUCHANAN was

British ambassador in Petro-

grad. On March 15, 1917, he tel-
egraphed:

“Open opposition is likely to
develop very shortly between
the parties of the social revolu-
tion (Bolsheviks) and the
Duma (Herensky regime, an
amalgamation of socialists and
open capitalist parties, W-:T.L.).
The latter is for war, and
should it prevail quickly, Rus-
sia will be rendered stronger
than the past. Peace at any price
is the object of the former
party, and military disaster
would follow its advent to
power. s

“Could English Labor lead-
ers send a telegram to Duma
labor leaders (Kerensky and
Chkeidze) expressing their con-
fidence that they will support
free peoples fighting German
despotism . . . the telegram
might also. refer to the unity of
all classes in Britain, and espe-
cially to what the working
classes are doing.”

A telegram was accordingly
drafted by Arthur © Henderson,
representative of Labor in the

formed by British fascists and reactionaries to assist Franco. .In Oct. 1938 the Observer said

British war’ cabinet, and sent off
to the Labor leaders of the

Duma. As this spontaneous mes-
sage from the British workers
did not have its desired effect,
British and French labor delega-
tions were sent to ‘reason’ with
the Russian workers. But this
did not answer either, for as Sir
George Buchanan wired on May
30, 1917:

“They are now attacking our
Labor leaders as being paid
emissaries of the government
and not real representatives of
British labor. It is difficult to
lnow what to do with people
who stick to their pre-conceived
ideas and will not listen to rea-
son.”

With victory of the October Re-
volution, the  interventionists
went over to open invasion of
Russia. The British workers ex-
pressed strong sympathy for the
new socialist state. Publication
by the Bolsheviks of the secret
treaties revealing the real aims
of the ‘war for democracy’ and
their call for international work-
ing class action to stop the war,
found a ready response in the
ranks of British labor. The task
of the Labor party leadership be-
came more difficult. Only through
a steady flood of patriotic ap-
peals and anti-Bolshevik propa-
ganda were they able to maintain
a semblance of support for the
war.

e

Fo a time they deluded the
workers with the plea that in-
tervention was for the purpose of
restoring ‘democracy’ in Russia.
But in the spring of 1919, the
Miners’ Federation tabled a reso-
lution demanding an end to inter-
vention and summonsing of a
special conference to organize re-
sistance to intervention. At the
Labor party conference in June
there was discussion on the need
for direct action to stop the war
on Russia. Labor leaders fought
valiantly against such proposals.
William Brace described it as a

BIG BUSINESS ON
CANADA’S WAR BOARDS

In Canada, as in Britain, various ‘economic control boards’
have been set up since the war began. The three chief Cana-
dian ones are: The Foreign Exchange Control Board, the War
Supply Board and the Wartime Prices and Trade Board. So
far as the powers given these bodies under the authorizing
orders-in-council go, they may take almost any conceivable

action to control the economic life of the country—set prices,
forbid businesses to operate, control security transactions,

award contracts for war mater-
jals and supplies (or withhold
them) and act as agent for the

British and French governments
with regard to the goods which
they wish to purchase in Canada.
It is obvious, then, that the opera-
tions of these boards are of great
importance to everyone in Cana-
da—businessman, investor, work-
er and consumer.

In Canada, because parliament
has not been in session, we prob-
ably know considerably less
about the operations of our con-
trols than the British do about
theirs, for there has been some
very lively criticism in the British
House regarding all these mat-
ters,

Here we read in the press the
Mames of the persons who make
up the boards and some very
general information from time to
time about their operations—as
that “steps have been taken” to
assure that there will be a plen-
tiful supply of sugar, or wool or
coal or some other necessity.
With regard to contracts for war
supplies, we have had, since the
end of November, a weekly press
summary of contracts awarded of
over $5,000 and ministerial radio
speeches have given us some
round figures—as that the War
Supply Board has spent to date
about $100 millions and that Brit-

ish expenditures in Canada in the
first year ef the war are likely
to total between $4,000,000,000 and
$5,000,0000,000.
@
A: this is very useful. The
economist seizes on it as giv-

ing some indication of the likely
effect of the war on ‘Canadian
economy’ and it helps him in his
calculations of ‘how much of the
national income will have to go
for war purposes.” And we people
who are called upon to pay with
our taxes and our subscriptions
to war loans and in a higher cost
of living, are glad to get the in-
formation. But we still wonder
about these mysterious men in
Ottawa to whom we have delegat-
ed grave responsibilities.

in Britain they have been won-
dering, too. The London Econ-
omist, weekly financial journal,
has’ this to say in its issue of
Dec. 9:

“One thing stands out very
clearly. With a very few excep-
tions each controller has been
selected from the trade he con-
trols. Thus, under the cover of
wartime needs, the principle of
self government in industry has
been given an official blessing.
This is, in effect, merely the

(Continued on Page 6)
See WAR BOARDS

Miteh and Drew

{Apologies to James Whitcombe Riley’s ‘Max and Jim’)

Mitch and Drew
Is each other’s
(Somewhat new)
Little brothers.

Their friends say

They don’t know which is
Little Drew and

Which one Mitch is.

We get weary
Guessing who is

Mitch, and wondering
Which one Drew is.

But we know

They is each other’s
Loving, loyal

Little brothers.

—Merry Andrew.

PAGE FROM HISTORY

By WILLIAM LAWSON

The writer of this pertinent
article, William Lawson, is a
prominent Communist is east-
ern Canada, was recenily
elected ito Toronto school
board despite a vicious anti-
labor campaign. Formerly
editor of the defunct New
Frontier, he headed the com-
mittee which compiled the
pamphlet, Finland and_ ithe
Soviet Union.

‘slippery slope;’ J. R. Clynes

stated that the conference was
“threatening a blow at demo-

- cracy” and Sir James Sexton said

he did not believe in letting mad
dogs loose. This drew the fol-
lowing retort from a rank and
file delegate:

“It is strange that the execu-
tive committee of the Labor
party should have taken up ex-
actly the position of every ex-
ploiter and capitalist and politi-
cian in this country at the pre-
sent time.”

Even Herbert Morrison was
forced to declare:

“He wanted to know what
the party had done in the mat-
ter of the war on the socialist
republic of Russia. . . . They
had dene so much that the mat-
ter was not worth a single re-
ference in the report which
was under discussion. This re-
port was an insult to the en-
ergy, intelligence and the vigor :
of the Labor movement of the
country.”

The conference, by 1,983,000
votes to 935,000, passed a resolu-
tion demanding an immediate
end to intervention. Rank-and-
file support for the Soviet Union
had at last broken through the
treachery of their leadership.

N THE autumn of 1919, Glasgow
Trade council proposed a 24-
hour general strike and there
were big demonstrations in Lon-
don. On May 10, 1920, dockers
engaged in loading the freighter,
‘Joly George,’ with munitions for
Poland, then engaged in war
against the Soviets, struck with
Support of their union. A week
later the Dockers union put a
ban on loading of any munitions
for use against Russia,

But in June, a resolution to the
Labor party conference request-
ing a national conference “for a
general strike which will put an
end once and for all to the open
and covert participation-of the
British government in attacks on
the Soviet Republic” was reject-
ed by the Labor party executive.

Then came the defeat of the
Poles and the Red army march
on Warsaw. The British govern-
ment sent a note threatening the
Soviet Union with war. The fleet
was ordered to stand by in the
Baltic. British. troops broke a
strike of dockers at Danzig
against landing of munitions for
the Poles. Indignation of the
British workers reached tremen-
dous heights. Revolutionary ac-
tion was threatened. The Labor
leaders were finally forced to
take steps. On Aug. 9, the Labor
Party leadership warned the gov-
ernment that ‘the whole indus-
trial power of the organized
workers will be used to defeat
this war.” The moment the gov-
ernment realized that the Labor
leaders were no longer able to
keep their membership in check,
they backed down. There was no
War and the intervention was
ended,

e

Tee last war ended, against
| the wishes of the imperialist
governments, because of the re-
volutionary uprising of the work-
ers of Russia, Finland, Hungary,
Germany and the other capital-
ist states. The capitalist inter-
vention against the Soviets was
also ended by the mass action of
the working class. If the leaders
of the British Labor party and
the European § social-democrats
had taken firm action the inter-
vention would have been stopped
in the first few months and the
world would have been spared in-
finite suffering.

But these lackeys of the British
capitalist class did not lift a fin-
ger to fight against intervention
until the pressure of the rank-
and-file threatened to dislodge
them from office. Then, and only
then, did they move to stop the
undeclared war against the so-
cialist state.

It would be the height of folly
to expect any different procedure
from the Labor party leadership
today. Citrine, Atlee, Bevin,
Hicks and their colleagues have
their feet well planted on the
road to anti-Soviet intervention.
Only the militant action of the
rank and file of the labor move-
ment, inspired and led by the
Communist party, will prevent
the British people from being
drawn in their wake into an
anti-Soviet war.

Opposition to the Labor party
leadership is growing rapidly
throughout Britain. For the sake
of the workers of every country,
it is to be hoped that it succeeds
in destroying the influence of
these traitors before it is too
late.

SHORT
JABS

by OF Bill

People who ‘indulge’ in picture shows
> will have the opportunity, in the immedi-
The Wind. ate future, of comparing two outstanding
productions. One of them is outstanding for its rottenness; its white
chauvinist, anti-negro treatment of life at one period of American his-
tory; for the poor quality of the acting.
It is outstanding for the ballyhoo which is designed to sell it for the
first year at double prices. If it succeeds in this increased price program

Gone With

‘it will be the ballyhoo that will sell it, for advance notices from compe-

tent critics inform us that the acting, except for that of the English star,
is below par—rotten, in fact.

It will lack the spectacular appeal of that other chauvinistic pro-
duction of a generation ago, The Birth of a Nation, which made a for-
tune for D. W. Griffith. What it falls short of in that respect, however,
will be compensated for in the fuller display of racial animus and smug
assumption of intellectual superiority on the part of the white para-
sites over the negro workers,

This is the much-touted Gone With the Wind. Don’t waste any
money on it! Let it flop!

G The other picture strikes a different note.
rapes ; aes
Of W hi It will need no ballyhoo, because it is a

rath. Slice of real life of a vast section of the
democracy of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. It is The Grapes of Wrath,
the film version of the most talked about book to issue from an Ameri-
can publishing house in many years.

Advance notices inform us that Nunally Johnson, who converted the
book into a film, has succeeded in embodying the full message of Stein-
beck, indicting the robber barons who rule California, that land of bilk
and money — bilk for the transient farm workers and money for the
Associated Farmers of California, Inc.

One critic, David Platt, hails it as “unquestionably the greatest film
Hollywood every produced.” It is also practically the first film made in
Hollywood from a well-known book which can be identified by people
who have read the book itself in the original.

Not only is the Associated Farmers of California indicted in this
play, but all of capitalist America. The Same critic says: ‘“Red-baiting
is properly exposed for what it is, a threat to gag the first man who
raises his voice against the vested interests. Ruthless terror, parading
as the law, is stripped of its mask, and emerges, the naked, barbaric
soul of the landowners.” Here are Pictured the concentration camps of

Demofascist America, as bad or worse than those of Nazi Germany or
‘Democratie’ France,

The thugs of the Associated Farmers of California, using their every-
day weapons, the gun and the Pick-handle, will attempt to prevent it
from being shown in’ California and other parts of the States as they
endeavored to smother the book in their bonfires,

It is being acclaimed by the American workers who will make it a
financial success, much greater than Gone With the Wind.

Associated Farmers Of Mice And Men, too, will be on the
O f Cc li £ Fe screen here one of these days. Before

alirornia. these two pictures get to Vancouver, it
might be a good idea to let some of our local ‘colyumists’ know just
what the Associated Farmers of California is, just a little atmosphere
in preparation for the Pictures, as it were.

The LaFollette Civil Liberties Committee has dug up data about
that labor-hating organization which shows how much sympathy and
support the AFC, Inc. is entitled to from workers and farmers. (This
AFC, Inc., by the way, is one of the organizations which for years have
been trying to deport Harry Bridges.)

There is a Scotch firm with headquarters in Britain which operates
in the shipping industry. They have docks and warehouses all over
the world and belong to the Shipping Federation here in Vancouver. If
you are a longshoreman and have worked on Vancouver’s docks you
will know that it helped to smash every longshoremen’s union here,
The name is Balfour, Guthrie, and company. Well, Balfour, Guthrie

is one of the big contributors to the exchequer of the Associated Farm-
ers of California.

Besides its ordinary contributions, Balfour, Guthrie supplied the
funds to buy tear gas, machine guns and spiked clubs for Chicago thugs,
imported to beat up and murder the striking agricultural workers about
whom Steinbeck writes in Grapes of Wrath. Some farmers, eh!

If you listen to the Lone Ranger on the radio, the announcer will
inform you that that program is sponsored by California Borax, the
company that exploits the alkali deposits of Death Valley. Well,
California Borax is another farmer that makes large contributions to
the war chest of AFC, Inc.

LaFollette’s committee also dug up the names of some other farmers
who willingly put up their ante to beat down the living standard of the
Joads and smash every effort of the transient farm laborers of Cali-
fornia to organize into unions for their own. protection.

Here are some who made donations ot the funds of the Los Angeles
branch of that ruthless gang of ‘rugged individualists’—funds which are
used to bribe district attorneys and police and to hire scabs and provide
their strikebreaking equipment: Harry Chandler, industrial heir of
General Harrison Grey Otis, owner of the scabbiest newspaper in
America, the Los Angeles Times. He came across with $2000. The
Crown-Willamette Paper company, a Zellerbach outfit, was good for
$1000. The president of the Industrial Association of San Francisco,
a labor-hating mob of ’Frisco bosses, was also good for one grand.
Calafornya, here I come! . 4

Others who, I am sure, must be real dirt farmers, were Bullock’s
Department Store, $500; Edison Securities, $1000; Times-Mirror Pub-
lishing company, $500; Southern California Gas company, $300; and
Southern Californians, Inc. (a grafting gang of ‘better citizens among
whom are listed such farmers as Standard, Union and Shell oil com-
panies), $3.300.

This should help Province and News-Heralda scribes to understand
the play if they ever see Grapes of Wrath.

And Some Gone With the Wind will undoubtedly get
C 1 dP 1 the razzberry from the best elements

olore eopie. among the colored people. This is al-
ready indicated in the action of Henry Armstrong in refusing to fight
for the middle-weight championship against Garcia, under the negro-
hating Hollywood branch of the American Legion, because if placed a
ban on colored fighters in its Hollywood Stadium. Armstrong’s refusal
compelled them to lift the bars and put an end to Jim Crowism in that
place anyway.

The public statement also, of Paul Robeson, one of the world’s
greatest singers, that he refused to participate in the Hoover campaign
to help Mannerheim through the so-called Finnish ‘civilian’ relief, is
another sign that the negroes are on the watch. Robeson knows who
are the negroes’ friends. :

It is deplorable, however, that Joe Louis, if press reports are true,
is to fight in the Madison Square Gardens in March for Hoover’s fund.
Apparently he does not know that he is fighting against the only civ-
ilized country in the world where there is no race discrimination, the
Soviet Union, ‘

It is a pity Henry Armstrong does not weigh 200 pounds; he would
be able to teach Louis something, physically and mentally.

ATTENTION!

The Meeting Scheduled to be Held
Sunday, Feb. 18, at Orange Hall,

(Gore at Hastings) , has been post-
poned until SUNDAY, FEB. 25.

—— Speaker to be Announced ——