=
te i
Peace
———
i

Around the
Slipways

By Charles Saunders

AN ARTICLE by W. A. Tutte, newly elected executive
» secretary of the Vancouver Labor Council, published

tions and purposes of a trade union. I do not believe
y trade unionists of today will agree with this profound
ysis. :
taliis to be hoped that the Congress News did not carry
fei article with amy intention of making it a guide for local
#2 unions. Lutte stated that labor unions are not reform
*#nizations but are in fact established by wage earners for
clearly defined purpose and one equally well defined
fl as follows: @
“taiLabor union purpose is: The securing of immediate
“jsrial personal and collective benefits for all members of
§upion and for members of other unions thereto affiliated
ugh some central body.” The aim: “Extension of the
mtages of our form of unionism to unorganized workers.”
/rogressive labor unionists have long recognized that the
ipl tions of unions are constantly changing with the chang-
erelationships of workers to management, and thereby of
‘:punions to management.
Ss > :
VO officials of the Steel Workers Organizing Committee,
authors of a book entitled, “The Dynamics of Industrial
@iocracy which, by .the way, every progressive trade
“tHinist Should have in his library, state as follows:
“) Workers organize into labor unions not alone for eco-
ic motives but also for equally compelling psychological
social ones, so that they can participate in making the
M@sions that vitally affect them in their work and com-
aty life.’ So that when Mr. Tutte tries to draw a rigid
between labor unionists as a body for specific purposes,
the working class as a section of the general public, he

¥4e unions into being and apparently cannot see that trade
“}ins are essentially the organized weapon of the working
3.

functions of trade unions are much broader than those
mated by W. A. Tutte, whose Gomperish ideas belong
_ the narrowest of the craft unions, something long left
nd in the advance of indusirial unionism. The program
adustrial unions can never be confined within narrow
ets which in the past served the purpose of those whose
y2 concern was to maintain an aristocracy of labor and

‘nore the needs of the working class as a whole.
r)

TUTLE’S analysis there is absolutely no consideration
of tremendous changes being wrought today in labor-
lagement relationship. Participation of workers in man-
nent, through labor-management committees brought
it by the exigencies of war, has opened up a whole
N° field in industrial relationships.

i@As the aforementioned CIO leaders put it: “The partici-
ef OD Of Organized workers in management provides an out-
for creative desires as it is essentially a creative and co-
tative undertaking.” :

{ne of the compelling motives for union membership is
desire of the workers to give their personalities dignity
‘their lives meaning. And although it may be true that
tection of a worker’s job, raising his wages, bettering his
king conditions largely satisfies economic and social
aves for union membership, only when union-management
lions become essentially constructive will workers find
/Satisfaction for their inherent creative desires.
Cooperation of labor and management in war industries
Abe United States and in Great Britain have been a means
#enormously stepping up the production in these indus-

24
d

Unfortunately labor-management committees have not
m developed as yet to this extent in Western Canada, al-

been operating with great success. Trade union leaders
| Unionists in general must recognize, as do thei brothers
the United States and Great Britain, the enormous pos-
4) Uties open to them and, as progressive leaders of the or-
ized workers, move forward to extend and broaden the
ctions of the trade union movement rather than to keep
Jonfined within such narrow limits prescribed in Tutte’s
(cle. History marches on and leaves behind those who
i the changes that it brings.

e IN REVIEW -

SLAVS TO ARMS !—Resolutions and addresses at the Second
All-Slavonic Conference, Moscow, 1942.—Foreign Languages
Publishing House, Moscow.—30 cents, postage 5c extra.

WHEN the Communist Party of the Soviet Union pub-
lished slogans to be used in the commemoration of the
25th anniversary of the October Revolution, there were people

whose comments showed that

they imagined Russian com-

munists had gone ‘racist.’ The slogan that caused the comment
was one which read: “Oppressed brother Slavs, Rise up in
the sacred peoples’ war against the Hitler imperialists—the
mortal enemies.of Slavdom. Long live the fighting unity of

the Slav people.”

Had these doubting Thomases
known anything of the thousand-
year-old struggle going on inces-
Santly between the Germans and
the Slavs, with the Germans al-
Ways the aggressors, they might
have understood the reason of the
slogan. They would recognize that
it is a legitimate slogan in the}
struggle against Hitler fascism and
is no more ‘racist’ than the struggle
to survive of a great people, a peo-
ple occupying in their own right
ten countries with long historic
traditions behind them: Great Rus-
sia, the Ukraine, Byelorussia,
Poland, Bohemia, Moravia, Slo-
venia, Serbia, Croatia and SBul-
Garia; several smaller countries,
Bessarabia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, |
Montenegro, Albania, covering
about half the land surface of
Europe. Added to these is no small
part of the populations of several
other countries, including Hitler’s
Aryan stronghold itself, Germany.

The book under review, Slavs To
Arms! is at the same time, a shrill
trumpet blast calling the Slav peo-
ple to battle and a resonant procla-
mation to the whole world that the
Slavs refuse to be exterminated,
even to make ‘lebensraum’ for Hit-
ler’s poor Wazis.

The Second All-Slavonic Confer-
ence was held last April in Mos-
cow. its purpose, in the words of
the main resolution, was, “The,
welding together of the Slavonic
people in the struggle against Hit |
ler Germany and her vassals.” The
chairman, Lt-Gen. Alexander Gun-
daroy of the Red Army, in his
opening speech, justified the hold—
ing of such a conference by one
quotation from the mouth of the
megalomaniac Hitler, even if a
thousand years of history had not
already done so.

In this quotation, Hitler says,
“All means must be employed to
bring about a German conquest of
the world. If we want to set up
our Great German Reich, we must
first of al] oust and exterminate
the Slavonic peoples — the Rus-
Sians, Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Bul-
gars, Ukrainians, Byelorussians.
There is no reason why this should
not be done.”

Hitler may not yet know it, but
there is one reason why it will
not be done—the Slav people.

Among the Slavs who spoke at
the conference and whose speeches
are recorded in Slavs To Arms!
were Dmitri Shostakovich, Soviet
composer who wrote a great sym-
phony under the guns of the Nazi
vandals; Stella Blagoyeva, bio-
grapher of Dmitroff; Nikola Derz-
havin, member of the Soviet
Academy of Science; Prof. Nejedly
of Prague University and member
of ‘the Czecho-Slovak Academy of
Science; Wanda Wasilevska, Polish
writer; Prof. Maslaric, Serbian
patriot, whose speech should be
listed among the world’s great ora-
tions; Alexander Korniechuk,
Ukrainian writer and member of
the Ukrainian Academy of Scien-
ces. This writer’s name has re-
ceived some prominence in the
world’s press during the past week
for denouncing those who would
break the unity of the Slav people
over the question of Polish fron-

tiers. For there are Slavs, just as
there are Anglo-Saxons, who fail

to see the need for undivided effort
if the Nazi beast is to be destroyed.

For a thousand years German in-
filtration into Slay lands has pro-
ceeded apace. Their military forces
Were defeated by the Slavs, Rus-
Sians, Poles, Bohemians, in such
battles as Lake Iimen and Grune-
wald and their progress stopped in
that direction. Where military
force failed, they came in immi-
grant civilian hordes, setting up
towns and cities and establishing
What they called “German order.”

They held themselves to be of a
nobler clay than the people among
whom they settled. In their towns
they lived as merchants, traders
and craftsmen and made the
country around subject to them.
They were ‘civilizing’ the Slavs by
bringing “German order’ to them
just as Hitler is by bringing his
New order’ to them today.

The German intruders refused to
submit to the laws of these hos-
pitable countries but lived as for-
eigners who were not assimilable,
under the ‘Magdeburg law.’ Thus
German criminals whose crimes
were committed in Russia, Poland,
Bohemia or any other Slay coun-
try had to be tried by German
judges using a code of law which
had its origin in the capital city
of Prussian Saxony, Magdeburg.

This “civilizing’ by German order
was being carried out while the
little German cabbage-junker no-
bility were cutting each other's
throats in continuous wars like the
Thirty Years War which kept their
people impoverished and uncul-
tured. And of the Slav people who
were supposed to benefit from this
brand of “civilization,” Bohemia
had established at Prague, the first
university in Europe north of Paris
and the Poles the second one at
Cracow in Poland.

And while, in Bohemia, John
Ziska and the Taborites were es-
tablishing the basis for modern
democracy, German mercenaries in
the pay of the “Emperor,” the King
of France and the Pope, were de-
stroying the last vestiges of the
democracy of the Italian Repub-
lies.

Prussian junkerdom succeeded
so well in bringing its “German or-
der” into the Slav peoples’ lives
that all potential and cultural de-
velopment was. smothered. Even
their native tongue was denied
them in some places.

One result was to allow reaction
to take the saddle in all the Slav
lands. The Russian Tsar became
the gendarme of Europe. Armies of
Russians and South Slavs were
used to smash the revolutionary
movements of 1848-51, particularly
in Buda-Pesth and Vienna where
Ban Jellacie and his Croatian le-
gions drowned in blood the rising
of the bourgeoisie and the workers
of these towns.

A hundred years ago there was a
Pan-Slay movement. It had the
blessing of the Tsar. It was reac-
tionary.

Today there is a different Slav
people, one with different ideals
from the Pan-Slavs of a century
ago. Under the leadership of the
Soviet Union, the repressed nation-
al aspirations of all the Slavs are
finding new channels for expres-

sion. “Freedom of All Slavs from
Nazi Domination!”

When Frederick the Great said:
“Russia is the most dangerous of
all the possible or potential enemies
of Prussia,” he spoke of his Prus-
sia, the Prussia of the jackboot
and the schoolmaster drill sergeant,
not the Prussia of the simple, hos-
Ppitable German Michael] and his
hausfrau but the Prussia of the
arrogant brute who has been pro-
duced by ‘German order’ and
raised a stage higher in infamy
by Hitler’s ‘new order.’ :

And while this order is being
placed in its proper perspective
by history, the unselfish bravery
of the Russian people has lifted
the whole race to a higher pin-
nacle of nobility by the manner
in which they are carrying out
the task which history has called
upon them to fulfill.

High notes of the Gonference
were touched by Ukrainian Alex-
ander Korniechuk when he de-
elared: “It is easier to tear a
Ukrainian’s heart out than to make
him into a slave,” and again, when
he called upon the UWkrainians to
“Let the roads of the Ukraine be-
come roads of death for the Ger-
man highwaymen.’”

Of the Slavs in exile One contri-
bution cannot be passed over, Nik-
ola Tesla, the 86-year-old Yugoslav
inventor died in the U.S a few
weeks ago. He was one of the
world’s greatest electrical experts,
if mot the greatest. On his death
little mention was made of his
scientific accomplishments and
nothing whatever of his political
opinions. The letter of greeting he
sent to the Second All-Slav Gon-
ference may explain why.

“I have unbounded admiration
for the Russians, primarily be-
cause they are the most enlightened
people in the world, contributing to
all departments of human know-
ledge, more than all other na-
tions combined. They will quickly.
annihilate the German usurpers
and their companions-in-crime.

“The WNazis battle under com-
pulsion, the Russians for their
holy, beloved, limitless Russia. In
this struggle the practical genius
of Stalin will be the decisive fac-
tor. Long live Russia and her
great: inspiring leader, Stalin!”

—wW. Bennett.

CANADA IN THE COMING
OFFENSIVE —By Tim Buck —
10 cents—Dominion Communist-
Labor Total War Committee.
Tim Buck has spoken again. This

little pamphlet tells the Canadian

people who do not already know, _

just what is the communist atti-
tude to the war and the part they.
are playing and must play in it.

“This war for us in Canada,” says
Buck, “is a war for the survival
of Canada as a nation, free to
determine its own destiny, through
the exercise of the will of the ma-
jority of its people.

“The everyday task of the work
ing class movement in Canada to-
day is to help strengthen and ex
tend national unity for the win-
ing of the war.

“We can leave to the post-war
world the choice of the exact path
which Canada will take.”

That is the keynote of the book—
that is the program of the com-
munists, the fulminations of Hon.
St. Laurent notwithstanding.

Buck deals with Labor’s contri-
bution to total war in the realistic
programs of the trade union con-
8resses and the production achieve-
ments of Canadian workers, with
the magnificent part played by:
Canada’s “forgotten man” the far-
mer in providing the foodstuffs for
total war effort.

Every Canadian should have this
book.

pet