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‘Press e

TORONTO — In one of the
sharpest condemnations to date
of the Trudeau government’s
pro-militarist stance, the
Communist Party of Canada’s
central executive accused the
prime minister of putting Cana-
da’s interests second to those of
the Reagan clique.

“Prime Minister Trudeau is
prepared to betray the security of
Canada end her people to the

nd

CANADA

arms race madness of the Reagan
administration,’’ the CPC
charged in a March 25 statement
to the press.

“This is the meanning of his
Statement that his government
will permit the testing of the
Cruise missile if the U.S.
Government asks it to do so,”’ the
statement said.

“The U.S. Government,” it
said, ‘thas already asked, indeed

Karl Marx year in
Communist Viewpoint

Throughout this year of com-
memoration of the 165th anniver-
sary of the birth of Karl Marx and
the centenary of his death, Com-
munist Viewpoint celebrates the
legacy of this great man. In the
March issue just published,
Marx the scholar, the fighter, and
the person is brought to, life in
“Reminiscences of Karl Marx’?
by French revolutionary Paul La-
fargue (first published in 1890).

“Technology under Capital-
ism, Progress for Whom?”’ offers
a penetrating analysis of technol-
Ogy in the context of capitalism,
and looks at the contradictions
and implications for the working
class.

The article ‘‘Marxist Psycholo-

tively little has been written from
a Marxist perspective.

B.C. Communist Party leader
Maruice Rush analyzes the les-
sons of the 1982 Vancouver civic
election, showing how a labor-
backed progressive alliance made
a major breakthrough.

_. The issue also includes an

interview on the situation in
South Africa with Alex La Guma,
Chief Representative of the Afri-
can National Congress in Cuba;
Latin America and the Carib-
bean.
Communist Viewpoint is avail-
able at your local bookstore
($1.50); subscriptions for the
quarterly journal are $5 a year and
are available from Progress

it twisted the government’s arm,
to get agreement for the tests.

“Prime Minister Trudeau co-
vered up this submission to U.S.
imperialism by saying this is part
of Canada’s membership in
NATO.

“This is a brazen lie.

“This agreement to test is not
vith NATO. It is with the USA.
“Prime Minister Trudeau tries to
placate public opinion by saying
those who oppose the Cruise are
honest but naive, well-meaning

people who don’t know any bet-
ter. ;

“Apparently, President Rea-
gan and now Prime Minister
Trudeau know better.

**What balderdash!”’

The Communist Party state-
ment charges that, ‘‘Prime Min-
ister Trudeau is playing a danger-

Trudeau putting Canada’s interests second

very MP to

ous game, the aim of which is to
dissipate and undermine the
ever-growing opposition of
Canadians to Cruise missile test-
ing on Canadian soil.

““He won’t succeed. The
churches, in their response to
Prime Minister Trudeau’s latest
duplicity, were right in saying the
struggle will continue, to ‘Refuse
the Cruise’,’’ the CPC declared.

“That struggle,”’ it said, ‘‘will
indeed continue. It will increase,
because it is part of a world-wide
movement to prevent nuclear war
and achieve disarmament based
on equality of security as it is part

of the struggle to win a truly inde-.

pendent foreign policy for
Canada.”’

The Communist Party stresses
that the need for this kind of
struggle ‘‘has become even more

oppose Cruise’

obvious with the scenario laid :
by President Reagan. He not oat
wants to destroy the world

space as well. Is this the strates)
the Canadian people are ™& ;
tied -to by the Trude@

. government? be

“President Reagan needs 10
quarantined by massive
world-wide actions for peace: ite

‘‘Preventing the testing 0! ©
Cruise missile on Canadian t
tory is a significant contribution
disarmament, to peace, tO
assertion of Canadian sovereign)

and independence,”’ the Comm’

nist Party statement emphasl iy
“With a federal election like

_ next year, every MP should !

pressed to oppose Cruise miss
testing,’ it urges. “‘Those W
line up with U.S. military strate)
should feel the full wrath of th?
Canadian people!”’

MOBILIZE ON APRIL 23!

gy” outlines in understandable

terms a subject on which rela- M5V 2P6. -

British Columbia Relief Camp workers had for months
fought to win real, not slave, wages and conditions, and
had in desperation (and clear-sightedness) decided on the
On-to-Ottawa Trek to put their views before the R.B.
Bennett, Tory government. In Regina, in June 1935 they
met with some of the most vicious police and establishment
brutality in Canada’s history. Ontario workers, in equally
dire straites took up the Trek. This is the fifth of a Series.

By ALEX McLENNAN

The On-to-Ottawa march was the answer of the Cana-
dian working class to Bennett’s attempt to smash the
movement for work and wages. ‘‘On to Ottawa!’’ be-
came the cry of Ontario’s unemployed.

They came trom Niagara Falls, Thorold and St.
Catharines; from Kitchener, Guelph, London and
Hamilton. Everywhere could be heard the battle cry of
the jobless: “‘Work and Wages’’, *‘Non-contributory
Unemployment Insurance’, ‘Free the boys arrested in
Regina’’, ‘‘Repeal Section 98 of the Criminal Code’’, and
“Close the Relief Camps’’.

THE ON-TO-OTTAWA TREK

The combined forces of the unemployed of southern
Ontario sang as they marched into Toronto’s Queen’s
Park and were welcomed by 10,000 unemployed already
assembled there.

Almost at once, reactionary forces were set in motion
to block the trek. The ‘‘socialist’’ mayor, Jimmie
Simpson, banned the collection of funds or soliciting of
food from local merchants. He made it illegal for truc-
kers to transport the unemployed into or out of Toronto.
At Queen’s Park, the Liberal government of Mitchell
Hepburn extended this ban to the Ontario border. Un-
employed workers found soliciting food for the trek were
arrested for “‘begging”’ and were sentenced to 10 days in
jail.

In spite of the combined efforts of the Mayor of Toron-
to, the local police and Ontario Government, their plan
to block the departure of the trek did not succeed. The
people of Toronto refused to be intimidated, and sup-
ported the trek with food and money. On July 19, 1935,
PACIFIC TRIBUNE—APRIL 8, 1883—Page 10

Se:

Books, 71 Bathurst St., Toronto

450 of the unemployed from southern Ontario set out for
Ottawa. This march was destined to change the course of
Canadian history.

The first stage of the journey was reached in Scarbor-
ough, where the trekkers camped for the night in the
school yard of the collegiate. The second day saw the
trek at Jungvelt, a Jewish socialist camp near Pickering,
where they stopped for lunch and a swim. The march
continued, and in spite of a heat wave, tormented by
hunger, thirst, blisters and police provocation, they
achieved what the Tory propagandists had said was im-
possible: they had arrived in Oshawa, their first
objective.

Government Fails

Now the government propaganda campaign began in
earnest. Hepburn charged that the trekkers were lazy,
and offered them farm work. The Trek Committee re-
plied: **Give us $35 a month for regular work, or $2.50 a
day and board for temporary work, with no deductions
from our family relief payments and we’ll take all the
work you can give us.”’

Hepburn did not reply. The provincial government
then offered to provide trucks in order to return the
trekkers to their homes. But there were no takers. The
government had hoped to break the workers’ morale, but
instead their morale grew stronger day by day. The trek
continued to advance on sheer will and unprecedented
courage.

In Whitby, an edict from the chief of police decreed
that all stores and places of business must be closed in
order to “prevent looting’’ by the marchers. The people
of Whitby responded with gifts of food and money.
Generous supplies of socks were donated by local mer-
chants. When a young girl had an attack of appendicitis,
free emergency medical care was provided. The concern
for the marchers was evident, everywhere. The people
expressed their resentment of the authorities by assisting
the trek in every way possible.

In Kingston, the CCF (Co-operative Commonwealth
Federation, forerunner of the New Democratic Party)
called out its members and canvassed the city for food
and‘money. They organized a mass meeting and invited
members of the trek to speak. When the CCF learned
that Mayor Jimmy Simpson of Toronto had joined forces

‘

“
i Mi sea ‘ :

Ottawa Trek changed Canadian history

with the Tories against the people, they sent him 4
resolution of protest, demanding the withdrawal of the

_ infamous Toronto ‘‘red squad”’, which was following thé

trek and harassing the marchers.

The front ranks of the trek consisted of a detachmes!
of 25 women marchers, led by Ann Walters and Lily
Himelfarb. During stopovers along the route of the
march, local citizens would invite the women into theif
homes for a bath. In a rare and unusual action, even thé
Ontario Provincial Police ‘‘escort’”? was moved to eX
press its sympathy. Lily Himelfarb relates how the OPP
approached her one day and made a financial donation s°
that the women trekkers could ‘‘get themselves a square
meal in the next town.”’

Never in eastern Canada had there been a greatef
show of solidarity and unity of the people in a common
cause. During this period, the government was becoming

_ More and more isolated. The farther the marchers ad-

vanced, the more cordial became the reception of the
people. Day by day they learned that the dedicated ac-
tions of the trekkers belied the negative propaganda of
the government. From Toronto to Port Hope and
Cobourg, from Napanee to Kingston and Ottawa, Cana-
dians were learning about the struggle for work and
wages, for unemployment insurance and the right of
poor people to a better life.

A report in the Toronto Star of August 9, 1935, stated:
“The Toronto marchers, joined at the city’s outskirts by
75 relief camp strikers from Petawawa, and 100 from
Ottawa, reached their final objective at six o’clock last
night. :

“They arrived at Parliament Hill, 600 strong, and
marched down Wellington Street singing, ‘We’ll make
Mr. Bennett work for 20 cents a day’, and ‘We’ll put

Hugh Guthrie (Minister of Justice and Attorney-general)

in the penitentiary.’ They sang the ‘Marseillaise’, and as
they approached the East Block where the cabinet was in
session, they sang, ‘Hold the Fort!’

This is how the On-to-Ottawa Trek arrived. Its mem-
bers had endured 22 gruelling days and covered 350
miles. They marched proudly along the streets of Otta-
wa, confident of their strength and the justice of their
cause, prepared to place the der: -nds of Canada’s un-
employed before the Tory rulers of their country.