eign intereference,

Roundup of
world news

* * *

Ketchikan labor unites

KETCHIKAN, Alaska — Fighting
labor unity was revealed here in
a half-page ad in this city’s daily
newspaper calling for repeal of
the Taft-Hartley Act. The adver-
tisement was jointly sponsored
by AFL Central Labor Council
and CIO Industrial Union Counh-
cil.

Pledging unity in the fight “to
repeal the fascist-like Taft-Hart-
ley Act which was written by
the bosses as part of a general
plan to break unions and reduce
the workers to t's position of
slaves,” the statement warned:

“The record of Republican ana
Democratic leaders in Congress
and the administration of Presi-
dent Truman shows that the
workers can no longer depend on
either party to obtain benefits
for the workers.”

Protest fascist releases

ROME—Citywide general strikes
and brief work stoppages have
marked the recent liberation of
former fascist bigwigs from
Italian jails. In a number of
cases, workers’ demonstrations
have forced re-arrest.

The most heated protests were
aroused by the release of Carlo
Emanuele Basile, former fascist
prefect of Genoa whose crimes
against civilia s constitute one
of the bloodiest pages in the
story of Italy’s war liberation.

Basile’s release caused a gen-
eral strike in Genoa and drew
the: threat of a countrywide gen-
eral walkout from Rome _ head-
quarters of the General Confed-
eration of Labor (CGIL). The
CGIL withdrew its threat only
when the government aanounced
that Basile had been arrested
again and would stand re-trial.

The CGIL considered the re-
leases important enough to war-
rant a special executive comnait-
tee session, in which union lead-
ers demanded actioa against
magistrates who “by their fac-
tional spirit render themselves un-
worthy of administering justice.”

Key to end Greek war

LONDON—In a letter to the
London Times, which appeared
recently, Gen. Markos, Greek
guerrilla leader, said he would
issue a “cease fire” order if full
coalition government, including
the Communist dominated EAM,
is set up in Greece.

Markos stipulated that the
broadened government, which he
proposed should replace the new
Liberal-Populist coalition umder
Premier Themistocles Sophoulis,
must proclaim the amnesty of-
fered by the present government.

The guerrilla leader also asked

that free elections, without for-
be granted.

Hoodwinking the UN

CAPETOWN—A_ booklet justi-
fying South -Africa’s treatment
ef its 8 million native popula-
tion is being flown to New York
to be presented to every dele
gate to the United Nations gen-
eral assembly which. last year
denounced South. Africa’s. dis-
crimination. Photographs bear
out.. the booklet’s strong point:
white South Africans allow their
black countrymen to walk near
them on city streets.

The booklet completely ignores

the discriminatory pass laws
which prevent natives from
moving freely in the cities, toss-
es off the mammoth problem of
migratory labor with a comment
that “it seems to suit the
natives fairly well.” By this
type of misleading propaganda
Smuts’ hopes to hoodwink the
UN Assembly and obscure the
real state of affairs in. South
Africa.

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 1947

Fascism ‘not a crime’ says Labor minister —

LONDON—Many Britons in and out of Parliament today expressed frank concern at a resurgence of British fascism

almost as open and violent as in 1938 when Sir Oswald

Mosley led his blackshirts through London’s polyglot East End.

Anywhere up to 4,000 fascists and hecklers have been gathering Sundays in the Bethnal Green district of the East End.,
Advocacy of anti-Semitism by speakers is as virulent as anything invented by the late Josef Goebbels. In the last few

weeks, communists have been

challenging the fascist speak-

ers and fist fights are frequent.
Police have intervened for the first time to close a
meeting held under the aegis off the “League of Ex-Service-

men.” Hitherto the police have
concentrated mainly on squelching
hecklers. But this time they had
to call reinforcements including
mounted police when a_ free-for-
all involving 2,000 people threat-
ened.

Six persors—five men and a
woman—were arrested.

What worries officials most is
how fascism got started again so
strongly and so swiftly after ou
war intended to stamp it out.
Sir Oswald’s British Union of
Fascists has been dissolved but
its elements are now apparently
gravitating toward a common
centre whose mission is to study
the works of Sir Oswald himself.

One known factor is that some
of the more promizent fascists,
those detained during the war as
potential menaces, are back. at
the old stand again. Admiral Sir
Barry Domville for example, has
just pubiished a book, “From ‘Ad-
miral to Cabin Boy,” in which
he attributes Britain’s troubles’ to
“Judmas”’—Jews and Masons.
“Judmas,” he declares, controls
everything, including the news-
papers, and forced the war on
Hitler (whom he compares favor-
ably with Napoleon).

The Sunday newspaper, the Peo-
ple (circulation 4,500,000), cameu
the admiral’s book, which sells
for $2.50, to the attention of
Home Secretary Chuter Ede.

Ede, who is responsible for
internal affairs, said that he is
closely watching the fascist re-
naissance, but can do nothing
until they break a law, since
being a fascist is. not in itself
a crime.

He is under pressure by mem-
bers of parliament and by news-
papers to take some action be-
fore fascism gets any stronger.
Woodrow Wyatt, M.P., reported
that at a Bethnal Green meeting he
heard a speaker, unmolested by
police, recommend taking “whole
Jewish families in Palestine and
shoot them against a wall and
do the same to Jewish families
here.”

_ The 8,800,000 circulation Daily

Express said Ede’s tolerance of
the fascists was “democracy
gone crazy.”

“One of the difficulties of deal
ing with the matter,” Ede said,
“is that of defining fascism in
terms which do not include other
schools of political thought.”

q Clark’s list.

He added he may have to ask
for additional powers if he is to
deal with fascism.

Other members of parliament,
including Tom Driberg, Labor, and
Brigadier Christopher Peto, Core
servative, have also asked Ede
what are his intentions. Peto was
particularly exercised about ‘t‘he
League of Christian Reformers”
which treasures a $2,000 bust , of
Hitler and has declared the late
Fuehrer to be “the divine in-
strument.”

There again Ede said no law

was being broken.

’ Replying to the demands of
numerous London newspapers
that the Attlee Labor govern-
ment take steps to quell the
menacing growth of fascism in
Britain, Home Secretary Chuter
Ede said: “The government
could not suppress fascist meet-
ings, organiations or publica-
tions, without violating the
fundamental freedoms of de-
mocracy.”

Racist, anti-labor

groups not on list

WASHINGTON—Attorney
General Tom Clark is
working personally on the
list of so-called subversive
organizations to which un-
ion officers may not belong
if they sign affidavits as-
serting their loyalty to the
U.S. government.

Under the Taft-Hartley
law no officer of a union
may belong to one of the
proscribed organizations if
the union is to get recog-
nition before the National
' Labor Relations Board.

The Clark list, expected
to include largely left-wing
groups, will also be used
as a measuring rod for
the loyalty of all govern-
ment employees under the
Truman purge program. ,

Reporters on the govern-
ment beat and Washington
newspapers have not men-
tioned the_ possibility of
inclusion of anti-labor and
race hate groups such as
the Ku Klux Klan in

? .

Back to internment

The last of the ‘Exodus 1947’ Jewish refugees forcibly disem
barked from three British ships at Hamburg, now interned in the

Poppendorf camp, Tear-gassed, bleeding and battered,

4,400 of

these hapless refugees were held aboard ship, and then under ;
orders of the British government interned in Germany. Picture
shows British troops carrying struggling Jewish refugees from
the hold of the transport ship ‘Runnymede Park.’ .

Black market prices

ispark Italian strikes =.

ROME—Though some foreign correspondents and eve?

government spokesmen try to

toss off the current eutbrea

of strikes in Italy as “political and ‘“Communist-inspite’y
this country is bound to remain a hotbed of unrest unless

real economic roots of the trouble
are recognized a.d dealt with.
The American press, according
to reports here, says that the
strike wave is part of a leftwing
campaign to unseat Premier Al-
cide de Gasperi’s government. To
this a striker might well answer
that the people are ‘certainly
against a government which,
through its own failure to *act,
cannot get the people enough to

Phoney concept of ‘free speech’
helps promote British fascism

By ARTHUR LONG

LONDON—In this city which still shows the scars of Hitler’s bombs, street clashes
involving fascist hooligans are becoming regular weekend events. There is open anti-Sem-

wald Mosley, former head of the British Union of Fascists.

is heard again. These events are
not merely outbreaks of anti-
Semitic feeling aggravated by the
news of terrorism in Palestine.
They are a symptom of the re-
vival of fascist activity which
has been gathering momentum
ever since the end of the war.

According to a resolution adopt-
ed by the recent convention of
the British Trades Union Con-
gress, the problem is not being
dealt with because, of the Labor
government’s mechanical _ insis-

tence upon “the right of free
speech.” The TUC, in one of the
few resolutions passed criticizing
Labor government policies, de-
manded that immediate, effec-
tive steps be taken to silence the
fascists.

One of the first results of the
victory over German fascism was
the release of British fascists.

‘\itic incitement from public platforms. Organized bands chant in unison the name of Os-

Even the Horst Wessel song

In May 1945 the government an-
nulled a wartime order and freed
Mosley—jailed during the war as
‘a menace to the Allied cause—
from all restrictions.

The fascists not only regain-
ed their freedom. They were
given intact all their files, party
records and lists of subscribers
to prewar fascist publications.

At first the fascists moved
slowly. They concentrated on sup-
porting already-existing organiza-
tions such as the so-called League
of ex-Service Men and Women
which had been preaching anti-
Semitism in Hyde Park even in
late 1944.

In December, 1945, Mosley ap-
parently considered the time ripe
for a full fledged comeback. He
announced the opening of a pub-
lishing house to advance his fas-

cist program and made his first
public appearance in London.
“British prisons and concentration
camps have only served to
strengthen my ideas,’ he told his
audience.

Uncurbed by the government,
Mosley received his only setback
at the hands of a group of
printers employed by the Lon-
don firm which had cortracted
to handle Mosley’s publications.
The printers flatly refused to
touch the copy.

The TUC resolution—passed de-
spite arguments from top TUC
officials. that the government
has the situation in hand—shows
the British people have not for-
gotten that Belsen and Coven-
try had their origins in the kind
of hooliganism that their gov-
ernment now dismisses so light-
ly.

eat at reasonable prices. fit
strikers’ demands are not P0
cal; they insist that the bees
rise in prices be halted and
black market stamped out. ste
Far from defying the BOy od
ment, the General Confeder@ de-
of Labor (CGIL) offered #
tailed memorandum to dé 7)
peri’s cabinet on methods to ous
bat inflation. After four Wiig
of fruitless attempt to get se joe
consideration of its sugs’ og
the CGIL sponsored @ series
mass meetiogs and demonst™
to protest the high oe of i
The CGIL prop
other things that industrialist
be compelled to distribute sae
established quota of shoes cote
tiles and essential foods at tio?
trolled prices; that produ gov
costs be supervised by the and
ernment and that workers
consumers be drawn into P
control machinery. work
The strike of agricultural je
ers in the north for unio |” pe
nition and wage increase’ -, of
ing prolonged partly becaus atth
the government’s offha? :
tude toward the six-millioP
labor organiation. .
feeling they will be
by the government,
fused to negotiate.
Already there are 2,300,000 Be
employed in Italy. In 5 1
day period from August tw
15 alone food costs ToS? per?
percent. Even those news PAF jo
which customarily
Gasperi to the hilt have
to question his policies.
Momento: “Although St
summer the situation 16 the
grave. What will happem_”” had
winter? We have already igo
occasion to point out th neil
of the government's a to
measures have contrib’ ato”
worsening the price si conser
Even the organ of the “Tialy'#
eration of Industrialist “io
CMA, hits de Gaspert’s
lack of any harmonle ee
orderly economic pla®-

’
PACIFIC TRIBUNE?” .

tro!
oye

v
packed re
simply

s