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THE PEOPLE

Published every Wednesday by The People Publishing Co., Room 104, Shelly Building,
119 West Pender Street, Vancouver, B.C. Telephone: MArine 6929.

EDITOR ee Har GrRierin
MANAGING JEDITOR, =e — At Parnim
Busrmness MANAGER ...-.......... Minerva Coorrr

Six Months—$1.00 One Year—$2.00
Printed at Brosdway Printers Limited, 151 Bart 8th Arenuo, Vancouver, B.0.

The Comintern Decision

HE action of the Executive Committee of the Commu-
nist International in proposing its dissolution is a de-
cision of the first importance. In the first place it knocks
the last pretentious props from under the Berlin-Rome-Tokyo
“crusaders” whose murderous war of aggression is professedly
aimed at “saving the world from Bolshevism.” Herr Dr. Goeb-
bels is already screaming that it is another “communist
swindle to fool the gullible democracies.” Naturally the full
import of this historical decision will make the going much
harder for the Nazi poison-vendor and his satellites abroad.

In proposing the Commintern dissolution, the ECCI recom-
mends three main tasks for the world Communist movement:
in the countries of the Allied Nations, to give the uttermost
and unqualified support to the war governments of their
country for the smashing of German fascism and its axis satel-
lites; and to take the last arguments away from those elements
who use the communist-bogey as a cloak for obstructing total
war against Hitlerism:; in the Fascist states and those countries
under the murder regime of the Nazi brigands, to organize
sabotage of war industry, resistance, obstruction ... every-
thing thai will tear down the Nazi structure from within and
aid in speedy defeat of the Hitler gangsters; in all of the Allied
nations, to work for greater national unity and solidarity in
order that a maximum national determination will be achieved,
for the complete annihilation of the Axis forces. It is little
wonder that the Goebbels’ propaganda machine is screaming
with chagrin. Its “best seller” has been unceremoniously
kicked into the garbage can of history.

S

5 Bie voluntary disbanding of the Communist International
as a world communist organization, is not, as some are
attempting to interpret it, a sign of weakness, international
working class disintegration, or “betrayal” of the revolutionary
aims of Marxian socialism, as a handful of Trotskyists aver.
On the contrary, it is an indication of the recognized growing
strength of the various sections of the Comintern; a strength
that is already manifested in most of the Allied nations by the
active participation of the Communists in the war effort of
their respective countries against Hitler fascism.

Even in the case of Canada, where the Communist Party
of Canada has been banned since 1940, the ability and deter-
mination of the Communists to work for total war, in spite of
repressive decrees, can be no longer questioned. In many
cases the proposals of the ECCI to its sections is but the
formalization of what has already taken place. Both the Com-
munist Pariy of Canada and that of the USA severed their
organic connections with the Comintern in 1940. That, of
course, did not stop the issolationist Munich agents and the
pro-Hitler Fifth Column elements from joining in the Goeb-
bels’ Anti-Comintern chorus. It is doubiful if even the recent
decision of the ECCI will stop them. What it will do, how-
ever, is smoke them out in the open, and make it much more
difficult for them to carry on their pro-Hitler propaganda
under the pretext of “combatting communism.”

e

S HAS been said, insofar as the Communists in Canada
are concerned, the decision merely formalizes what was
already in effect, since the CP of Canada severed organic
eonnections with the Comintern in 1940, the same year that
it was banned by order-in-council as an illegal organization.
Since then many prominent communist and anti-fascist
workers have sought through the medium of the Communist-
Labor Total War Committee to make their fullest contribution
to Canada’s war effort, by striving for national unity, all-out
war production, and total mobilization of Canada’s manpower
and resources. In spite of the restrictions of the ban, the
Communists have loyally supported every effort that would
strengthen Canada’s war effort. They have also urged that
through the medium of their party, were the ban removed,
a still greater contribution could be made. The recommenda-
tions of the ECCI are aimed towards just such an objective.
There are many who cannot or will not see the full import
of the ECCI decisions in this light. The Hon. Louis St. Laur-
ent, Minister of Justice in the war-government cf Canada is
one. With the Isolationist and Munich factions, he chooses
to distort the significance of the ECCI proposals. For him dis-
affiliation mean disbanding. For the Communists it means
the removal of every restriction that harms national unity and
total war against a world menace to democracy and civiliza-
tion.

Similkameen Joins

The March Of Events

By B. M. W.
N THE short space of three years the provincial riding of
Similkameen has seen an awakening in labor conscious-

ness. Up until 1941 the only trade union at the south end
of the Okanagan Valley was the old and strong railwaymen’s
union, for Penticton is a divisional point. In the whole of
Similkameen there was only a handful of men claiming union
membership, and these mostly Latest and most significant is
isolated members of projection- the organization of workers at
ist or other urban unions. The Granby Consolidated at Allenby
result was low wages, no com- and Copper Mountain.
pensation protection and poor e
working conditions As recently
as four years ago the whole out-
put of Copper Mountain was go-
ing to Japan—even while the
miners were holding meetings of
protest and boycott against Jap-
anese goods.

HE result of these develop-
ments is a new consciousness

throughout all sections in this
riding. Organization of fruit
workers, at first resented by har-
assed growers, has resulted in a
Princeton, Allenby and Hedley, new understanding of problems of
all mining centers, were in the their own industry and of the fact
grip of a fear-complex born of that in the final analysis the
company control and the recent needs of one are the needs of all.
depression. Orchard workers in Much of the opposition to the
the Okanagan were receiving as use of Japanese labor, at present
low as 25 centa for men and i5 in question, is due to a fear of
cents for boys for thinning and post-war exploitation of local
irrigating, and in some cases for workers by possible low wage
picking. Farmers were receiving standards of the Japanese, and
a criminally low price for their it is beginning to be realized that
crops. a fair basic wage rate would re-
At the same time, school in- move this hazard.
vestigators revealed a deplorable Many of the largest acreages
record of malnutrition. are owned by those who came
e here originally as “remittance
TARTING from the Relief men” or with incomes from over-
Workers organization in Pen- seas. Wow that such funds are in-
ticton in 1939 which gave local accessible and they are thrown
municipalities many a headache Upon their own resources a new
(70 percent of relief recipients @ppreciation of the position of
being taxpayers) and exposed those who must sell their labor
several abuses of public monies, to live is slowly being absorbed,
the bus drivers in the riding were 4nd with it the realization that
organized next. if a decent standard for their
Early In 1942, a visit from employees is incompatible with
Ruth Turner of Vancouver returns sufficient to guarantee to
stimulated packing house em- his family the same standards,
ployees, who had started a form then it is up to the primary pro-
of organization the previous fall, ducers to bestir themselves to or-
to enquire into a CCL affilia- ganize to bring pressure on the
tion, and out of this grew the government for a system that
Fruit and Vegetable Workers _ Will assure to everyone the es-
Union which now has locals sentials of life which are well
from Osoyoos to Kelowna, with within reach of all
others in prospect, and includes All in all, Similkameen riding
the cannery workers of Cana-
dian Canners Western Limited.

€C/VWEESE

time!

DZ PT.

Edam
Rum CRPDDAR
BEL PARE

Domtric wan TINE

LIEDER KRANS

"10 LIKE TWO POUNDS OF AMERICAN SWISS) ~
CHEESE FOR A SWISS STEAK ~WITHOUT. STEAK"

: To Moscow

is catching up with the march of ~

Mission

HE film, “Mission to;
built around the bog ©

same name by Joseph BE
former US ambassador t ©
viet Union, must be good |
by the gang of ‘“antis”
vociferously denouncing
distortion of history.”

The most prominent |
them have been lined up
anti-Soviet campsign du
last fifteen years. They #-
ed in the press, almost —
exception, as “historians ©
tellectuals”; Max Eastm:
fessor Dewey, Professor
Edmund Wilson, Suzanne |
latte and. other reaction
ealled “liberals.” |

It is quite natural to fi
defenders of Trotsky an
skyism in the anti-Soyic |
now. That is where they
belonged; the senile, alleg
osopher no less than the 1
Eastman, the so-called *
critic’ Wilson equally ¥
capitalist apologist ec
professor, Hook. Nor is ft
to see the barnstorming +
ist, Dorothy Thompson,
of her windy tirade aga
ler, tailing along beh
fang of pro-American he
Hitler.

Distortion?

“ ISSION TO MOSCO
cording to these mig
tellects, is “a distortion:
tory.” The historians amor
should be good judges of diz
a task at which they are
sionals. Distorting history
job at which they make th
ing. The more they fals
tory, the more honor and
accrue to them from tke
ers to whom they prostitu
intellects.
Could history: be more
ed than in the following
ment in a 2000-word lette
times the length of this c
to the New York Time:
Dewey and Suzanne LaF
“One would never suspect
Was Stalin who enabled 5B
attack Poland and Cham
who came to Poland’s def
That assertion is not o
tortion, it is plain, unva
lying. Anyone whose mem
good enough to remembe
more than 24 hours can &
lie to that kind of histo
all remember the antics
“appeasers” in handing tt
Opean democracies over te
and the sabotage of ever
of Stalin and the Soviet
ment to organize the anti
forces for their own pro
Let Dewey ask Eduard E
Dewey, and his Trotsky
lowing are not pro-An
they are pro-Hitler. And “
to Moscow” will undoubt
a picture worth seeing.

IWA Note

ET Hal Pritchett on th
yesterday. Just baci

the QCI. What the hell
timberbeasts do to our -ci
when they get them out
timber? He looked like
baseman for the House 0!
ball team. The whiskers
fine but Pritchett look
hell (pulchritudinally spez
Anyway, he did a good
the Islands and the treatr
received from the boys U
would be easier to take #
stomach -sickening blat
Locke, the boss loggers’ li