open seems to be quite a flur-
é ry in political circles these
days about whether we know
what other people are talking
about even when they use the
same words as we do. The one-
-and-only GBS made his little con-
tribution a few days ago when he
asserted that if everybody put the
same meaning to the words EnEY.
spoke or wrote,
a. lot of our
troubles would
- be solved, or
words to that
effect.
This is the
utopianism in
Shaw—of which
there is quite a
streak— coming
out, and ts due
largely to his ‘
failure to recognize fully the
class character of the society in
which he lives. . :
Columnists and editorial writ-
ers have followed, or preceeded,
him in the same vein, none of
_ them touching remotely on why
the same words have different
meanings in different mouths.
The Saxon serf was confused
because the pigs he fattened so
laboriously became pork when
they reached the table of his
_ Norman conqueror, just as the ox
became beef, the sheep mutton

and the deer venison. He did all

the work of raising them, «the

HEN the
¥ eighth annual convention of
the CCL begin to filter back in-

to the locals of its affiliated
unions and out into the world
of labor generally, these will be
regarded as sorry substitutes for
labor unity in the fight for peace,
democratic lib-

2 erties and econ-
- omic advance-
_ ment.
For those CCL
affiliates already ~

reports of the

il SS

Short Jabs

AA

baron had nothing to do but eat
them.

These twé classes spoke differ-
ent languages, so they had differ-
ent names for the same things, and
though the languages merged to
become the highly efficient mod-
ern English we (some of us),
speak today, the classes did not
merge. The words have become
common to all classes but the
meanings attached to them de-
pend upon the class that uses
them. The Benchers of the Law
Society, for example, denounce
dictatorship as tyranny byt prac-
tice it as the acme of. liberty
against any would -
whose politics they don’t like.

A good sample of this differ-
ence in the meaning of words in
the mouths of different classes
comes to us from South Africa.
The fascist, (not near-fascist),
government in power there has
passed an ordnance which it
hopes will secure complete separ-
ation of the Colored People and
the Whites. This separation it
calls “apartheid.” It is just plain
Jim Crowism.

The Colored People’s National
Union organized a national week,
of prayer in the Cape as a pro-
test against this action of the
government and to focus public
opinion on “apartheid”? measures
in the Peninsula.

.A local rag newspaper, the
Vaderland Bulletin, answered the
Colored: people with this blast:
“Tf this isn’t prostituting prayer,

_ture of a trade union convention.)

And even these were not destined
to be debated without a full
measure of red-baiting. ‘hose
who proposed to back up a CCL
“demana” for price adjustments
were sneered at as only “Dr.”
‘Conroy .can sneer, as ‘drrespons-
ible Reds.” How the boys of St.
James and Bay Streets must have
ehuckled. They were getting a
million dolars worth of war
propaganda gratis.

C.: .
The treatment of the suspended
Mine-Mill union by the Mesher-

- Conroy-Millard gauleiters provid-

-excommunica-
tion such as
United Electric, these reports
will be a reminder of the con-
vention’ week’s rough outline of
a new Marshali Plan ‘labor
front’ for Canada, with the
‘osher - Conroy - Millard triumph-
wirate vying with each other for
the role of a “labor” gauleiter.
In a solid week’s orgy of red-
baiting, which even the coming
_ Chamber of Commerce convention
» will be unable to match, CCL-CCF
_- leaders Mosher-Conroy-Millard ex-
celled all past performances in
_ this Hitlerite art, and won them-
selves the unrestrained plaudits
of the monopoly press..
Such mundane matters as
prices, housing, wages, economic
seourity, etc., were relegated to
the closing hours of this carica-

ed many salutory lessons for
observant workers. While the
CCF-CCL . social democrats rail
against Communists and what

they are pleased to call\“com-

munist-controlled unions” for the
lack of democratic procedure (a
bon mot they copied from the
propagandists of the Canadian
Manufacturers’ Association), they
gave a classical example of their
brand of “democracy” in dis-
posing of the Mine-Mill éssue.
Only prosecutor Conroy was as-
signed the right to speak for
the CCL suspension action, and
only. Mine-Mill president John
Clark, accorded the status of a
convention “guest,” was permitted
to reply!

John Clark made full amends
for any errors made by his grand
old union of fighting men and
women, but that wasn’t enough
for the new Leys of the CCL.

osttbtvssedl ian

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we eee eee

sees

BC.

be lawyer
N

then we don’t know what is. It is

- sacrilege!” x

@ ;

To imagine that these two class-
es, the millions of down-trodden
Negroes fighting to maintain their
status as human beings and the
small sjambok-wielding minority,
can compose their differences by
giving the same meanings to
words, is the lowest sink of uto-~
pianism.

To come nearer home. If you
buy a lot from the city, you will
get an “indefeasible” title to it.
The dictionary says an indefeas-
ible title is one *that cannot be
made void. :

That is probably the meaning
you will accept when you get
the title.

But where did the City get the
title in the first place? It took
it from some poor believer that
words mean what they say. He
was probably proud of his “inde-
feasible” title and considered it

to be just that. But he failed to _
“ pay his taxes so the City took his

lot (pardon, not his lot, the lot),
in spite of his indefeasible title.
And it will do the same for you
if you fail to ante-up to the tax

collector three years in a row...

Your meaning and the City’s
meaning are entirely different—
end that difference will remain
so long as there are classes, each
of which must give its own mean-

ing to the words it uses no mat- .

ter what meaning the other class
or classes attach to them.

Their pretext for suspending
Mine-Mill was ‘shattered .. . and
their real purpose “exposed eae
to smash every union that re-
fuses to fit itself into the cast-
iron mould Oe a ‘CCL-CCE
“political arm.’

A “show of hands” determined
the vote in support of the CCL
executive attack against Mine-
Mill. A democratic roll-call
vote would have resulted in a
defeat for the CCL union-
wreckers — even with their
credential-collecting hobby initi-
ated by Mosher’s CBRE to
“pack” the convention in case

of “an emergency.” /

*)

The “foreign policy” resolution
from the eighth convention of the
CCL is the most shameful docu-
ment ever to emanate from any

body. of labor anywhere. It is a

warmongering document, calcu-
lated to condition the minds of
Canadian workers to
plans and conspiracies of Anglo-
American imperialism — against
the Soviet Union and the New

Democracies of Europe.

While this shameful resolution |
- was. steamrollered through the

convention, it will be rejected by
every self-respecting body
workers in CCL affiliate unions
when it comes up for discussion
—even under threat of excom-
munication by “Dr.” Conroy,

Better than anything else this |
resolution will serve to awaken

the awareness of workers to the
true character and role of social
democracy. in Canada, which
amid the plaudits of the monop-
oly press, seek to destroy the

fighting potential of labor, and

deliver it over, bound and gagged
to the plans of Ma ciitt saad
reaction.

The Marshall tanhes foment

‘war under the pretext of “con-

taining communism.” The CCL
gauleiters follow suit under the
pretext of. “saving the un:ons
from communism. ” “There is a
deadly and sinister similarity! _

the war'

of.

Who ‘twists’ the facts?

RANSPORT Minister Lionel Chevrier made his debut

in the Paris session of the UN Assembly last week.
To say that he cut a sorry figure is to put it mildly.
did however, manage to uphold Canada’s rather dubious
reputation of being one of those “little” or “middle” nations
in the Western Bloc which is always ready to do a bit of
warmongering in the service of Yankee imperialism.

Chevrier “accused the Soviet Union of “twisting facts”
to “make the uythinking believe that only the Soviet Union
is in favor of peace and disarmament, while the rest of the
world favors war.

Chevrier under-rates the intelligence of the Canadian
—and Soviet—people. lt is he and his kind who must “twist”
facts in order to cover, up = their conspiracies | against
peace.

The Soviet representatives are reported to have ob-
served that they could “hardly expect anything else’ from
Chevrier—a remark which speaks volumes for the vole
Canada’s official spokesmen have played in slavish support
of Wall Street provocations against the USSR.

The fact is that not only the Soviet people, but the
common people of the entire ‘world’ ardently desire peace,
and are willing to sacrifice much to attain it. But the war-
mongers in Washington, London, Ottawa and Paris, with
all their satellites in Benelux, Western and other blocs,
bribed with Yankee dollars and punch-drunk with the pos-
sessive power of the a-bomb, “twist the facts’ to promote
war. For them war means more profits!

Peace in North America has become subversive — a
continuation of war in peace time; the “cold war” which the
Chevriers seek to fan into a hot searing flame. If!a Canadian
talks peace today he is suspect’as a “Red”. Peace i is treason
to the financial royalists of Wall Street.

Chevrier sneers at the Soviet proposal for disarmament
and the outlawing of the a-bomb. But he offers tio alter-
native other than sneers and accusaticns. Other Chevriers
sneered at Maxim Litvinov in the League of Nations. when
he advanced disarmament as the road to peace. History
has since—and will again—establish who “twists the facts.”

The imillions that Canada spends today for. “defense”
(read war) would build countless thousands of homes,
schools, hospitals, would open up a new era for Canada’s
common people in peaceful pursuits, and establish a friend-
ship and respect for Canada among the world's ‘peoples
that is being whittled aw ay by the warmongering twisters
from Ottawa. Ae

‘The time is here for the Canadian people to. begin the
building of a strong virile peace moyement that will clip
the wings of Wall Street’ S carrier pibeons in Canada.

is

’
Wy

“Say Joe, how many extra adiiaes do you expect in sibs
montis pay check as a result of Pantey’s red-baiting spree?”

~ Looking Rece.

(From the files of The People’s Advocate, October 21, 1938)

R. W. Beck, public utilities expert, engaged by Victoria City
' Council to investigate light and power utilities in the capital, spent
several months conducting a Survey and finally reported:

“Study of conditions in Victoria discloses that rates are con-
siderably out of line. They are much too high and the BCElectric
is not paying its just proportion of city government costs.

“If there is io be no greater measure of cooperation than has
_ been shown by the company to date in the preparation of this report
‘it would seem that the people of Victoria, in order to obtain just
treatment in the matter of rates and fair contribution to the cost
of gov i ent, will be forced to. wruterte he the operation of their
own u (i Sag eee

‘Council unanimously passed a utilities

bylaw em ee the ci
to control all utilities within its jurisdiction. se med

- PACIFIC TRIBUNE—OCTOBER 22, 198 PAGE Big

He

Noe

After lengthy consideration. of Beck’s report, Victoria City