The People’s Advocate

Published Weekly by THE PROLETARIAN PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION Room 10, 163 West Hastings Street, Vancouver, B.C. Telephone: Trinity 2019 One Year Half Year _____-_- $1.00 Three Months _______-50 Single Copy —______ -05 Make All Checks Payable to the PEOPLE'S ADVOCATE — Send All Copy and Manuscript to the Chatrman of the Editorial Board, Send all Monies and Letters Pertaining to Advertistng and Circulation to the Business Manager.

Vancouver, B.C., Friday, April 30, 1937

The B.C. Elections

OMINATION DAY in British Columbia provincial elec tion is May 11. Voting day is June 1.

For the first time in a long period progressive forces have an opportunity to test their strength in a tilt with reacionaries.

Tt is idle to think that reactionaries, composed of right wing Liberals and Tories, will let things slide easily into the hands of the Liberal party. There are forces in British Columbia standing to the right of Pattullo. To forget this is to forget everything. Such forces are centred in the shipping federa- tion, in the boss Joggers’ association, 1m the big mining interests —those who want to preserve B.C. for the open shop, for the unchallenged rule of big capital. :

Tn the next B.C. legislature, if there is not a strong group of progressives ready to put up a battle against the openshoppers, the Liberal politicians will retreat still more as the pressure from big capital becomes more severe, and betray the people and their ewn Liberal supporters. + :

The erying need in B.C. is for such a nnited labor-progressive bloe which will:

Compel the enactment of legislation +0 bargaining; to act in favor of the farmers, to start a public works program, to raise the purchasing capacity of B.C. people, to save the natural resources from the looting profit-grabbers and to brmg in a minimum wage for youth. :

What is needed in B.C. is a resounding program of people’s needs, voiced by united candidates of labor and progressive forces, resulting in the election of a majority of fighting MLA’s, elected by a mass movement of the people. : :

“ The Communist party has sionified its willingness to do this. The COF has not. By this deed it complicates the situation and renders unity extremely difficult. But despite the stubborn oppo- sition of the OCF provincial executive, ways and means must be found to establish unity in some constituencies, 1f necessary over the heads of the CCF provincial executive. The future of B.C. and the need to check the reactionaries transcends all narrow party considerations.—Daily Clarion.

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Pattullo’s Ethiopia

HE startling eye-ofthe-election announcement by, Premier

Pattullo that British Columbia is about to annex the ter-

ritory of the Yukon has produced a storm of protest and opposition that increases in vehemence and extent every day.

Tt is quite evident that Pattullo is trying to appear before the people as a conqueror (by negotiation and intrigue ) ot “co- Jonial” territory, much in the manner of Mussolini in the matter ef Ethiopia. He sought to make it appear as if the jitney one-cylinder Napoleon of B.C. politics has procured something of value forthe people of the province.

Tt is too bad—for Pattullo and the Liberal Party—that the} people of B.G. no less than the people of the Yukon are up 12 arms against the proposed anp exation. And no wonder. or what could the people of B.C. expect from such a consummation? And what could the people of ihe Yukon gain from it? Some three- guarters of a million people in B.C. are now saddled with a public debt of nearly two hundred millions of dollars piled on to their backs by Tory and Liberal governments taking turns at the pub- lic trough, a debt that is constantly imereasing.. Why force the people of the Yukon, who haye not a dollar of publie debt, to assume a share of this burden 4

Tt cannot be said that the people of B.C. would benefit by this proposed sharing of the burden of debt, for the cost of ad- ministration of the vast territory by the province would cost far more than the revenue derived. The only people who stand to gain—and these are the people behind the whole outrageous scheme—are the mining and utility interests. There is great mineral wealth in the territory, and those interests, the imterests that are involved in the Hedley Mines scandal, want the country for exploitation, with the government building roads and other- wise subsidizing them under the guise of “public jmproyements at the expense of the taxpayers.

Tf the people of B.C. have been silly enough in the past to listen to the honeyed yrords of ambitious soltice greedy Tory and Liberal politiicans and have got themselves into a financial hole, it is no reason for involving the people ot the Yukon into the sorry mess. The thing to do now is to oust Pattullo while making doubly sure that ihe Tories are defeated, and elect a

"progressive goyernment. ee No Division in Westminster

HE nomination of Rev. Edwin H. Baker by the Communist

Party in New Westminster riding in the provincial election has given renewed hope and enthusiasm to all progressive people in that constituency and throughout the province. Baker is a man well known in that section of the province and has a wide eircle of friends who fully appreciate his sterling character and devotion to the cause of the poor and oppressed.

Baker was the candidate of the CCF in the last federal elec- ¢ion and came very close to being elected. If he was regarded at that time by the CCF as a worthy candidate for the federal house and he was all of that—he should surely be regarded now as worthy tor the provineial house. Or even more worthy, since he has advanced further to che front of the class struggle by joing the Communist Party.

With all due respect to the members of the OCE in New Westminster and elsewhere, it can hardly be said that they have anyone available who would be a stronger, more popular, or more reliable candidate than Baker. Tt is certain that Blake is not such a candidate. Clearly then, for the CCE to persist 1m running a candidate against Baker, will be a continuation of a splitting policy as well as evidence that the controlling elements $n the leadership of the C mst reaction 1m

euarantee collective

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GFE are not fighting agai the most effective manner.

Tn the present situation in which reaction is making such a strong and bold bid not ouly to entrench itself but also to ad- vance, it will be of no service to progress for the CCF to persist in running a candidate in the field against Baker. To do so would only make possible the election of a Liberal or Tory eandidate.

Baker was first in the field, which was a logical consequence ef his being a candidate in the last federal election under the banner of the CCE and of his present standing in the econstitu- ency. The thing for all progressive people, including the CCF, js to all rally around the candidacy of Baker as the sole opponent of the old line capitalist parties and elect him.

CD

Commendable Community Effort

E FEW days ago a delegation representing a moyement for better transportation im Vancouver East proved once again ¢he correctness and practicability of the united front. Among the delegates were, a Catholic priest, a protetsant pastor, delegates from eommunity taxpayers’ associations, a CCE

Pe Oe ES

ADVOCATE

April 30, 1987

By HAROLD GRIFFIN “Tt can’t happen here,” is a favor- ite remark of those who scoff at the idea of a Fascist movement de- veloping in Canada. In Britain, despite Fascist at- tacks on Jews in London’s East

Writer Exposes Activities Of Canadian Guard Here

FASCISM - --- Can It Happen Here

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End, Mosley is regarded by most | people as a political fanatic, trouble- some, but not dangerous.

In Germany, many refused to treat Hitler and -his Nazi storm troops as a menace to democracy until Der Fuehrer had actually gained power and was ruthlessly stamping out all opposition.

Yet in the principal cities of Can- ada—Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg, VWancouver—there are already Fas— cist forces in embryo, quietly or- ganizing toward the day when Ca- nadian financiers and industrial- ists consider “the time has come for far-reaching changes,” to quote one Canadian HMascist writer, Fred- erick Edwardes.

Nazi Agents Here.

Wazi agents, under the mask of German-Canadian trade relations. are active in parts of Canada, par- ticularly in Quebec. In Montreal the official organ of the Parti Na- tional-Social Chretien, “be Fasciste Canadien,” screams against the Jews in typical Nazi tradition. And this organ is only one of several newspapers openly supporting Has- cism.

In Winnipeg there is the Nation- alist party led by William Whit taker: other cities also have their Fascist groups.

Those who deny the possibility of a Fascist movement developing in Canada are asserting that Canada is free from the opposing forces of progress and reaction evident in every other country in the world.

Least publicized, but, by its own boast, best-organized of Canadian

“At present it is a Semi-secret or- ganization ... It pursues three ob- jects simultaneously, Firstly, the gathering of information (intelli- gence) and, in order to pursue this object, it has gained contact with several other anti-Communist or- ganizations throughout the world. The second object is the educating of popular opinion to know the real danger of the Red Peril (sic) and the Guard’s policy to overcome and smash it. The third object is or ganization and at present the Guard is busily increasing its membership and establishing branches through- out the country.

No Mass Movement Yet

“Byen so, there is no attempt, as yet, to make the Guard into a mass movement ... The Guard prefers to be a small but efficient force which can strike hard _. .”’

These excerpts are taken from a history of the Canadian Guard pub- lished in the Qverseas Bulletin of the British Union of Fascists and Wational Socialists.

Founded in 1928 as the Praetorian League of Canada (Canadian Fas- cisti), the Guard was reorganized at a meeting in Victoria in 1933 (a few months before the last pro- vincial elections), with a fine sound- ing, super-patriotic platform “op- posing alll revolutionary, secession- jst, annexationist and anti-nation- alist movements.”

Included, however, were planks caleulated to appeal to the masses, patterned after the demagoguery of Wational Socialist parties elsewhere.

The Canadian Guard “. .. stands

|Seen how closely the Guard is to

abuses of party politics.

“The Ganadian Guard stands for co-operation between Capital and Tabor and for a comprehensive pol- icy of social reform.”

While in one statement, “..- not actually calling itself a Fascist movement’—in another paragraph Frederick Edwardes, the writer of the history, asserts “. . . it ean be

Fascism, although it may not give its policy that label.”

As an organization it has a di- rectorate — “the leader ideal from which all authority must pass’—a central executive, units and forma- tiens. Units must possess not less than six active members and “the Guard wishes to have no paper strength.”

The badge, formerly a fasces sup- erimposed on a maple jeaf or varia- tions of this design, has since been charged to a flaming torch. The uniform is a grey shirt, adopted be- cause the Guard is in touch, not only with blac’x-shirted groups, but with the Young Crusaders, a F'as- cist organization in Harbin, Man- churia, whose members wear white shirts.

Groups in City.

an British Columbia the organiz- ation claims some strength in Yic- toria, where the Young Gitizens’ League is an affiliate.

Address of its public relations committee in Vancouver, of which Fred Paterson is secretary, is given as 1015 Robson street, in which the organization goes one better than

In a letter to Donald McCoy, Ga- nadian national secretary, Toronto, the report of “R-P.M.S.,” staff sec- retary for Greater Vancouver area, gives the “quarterly strength re- turn” as follows:

Yan. West End unit: 682 active; 519 associate; 249 protective group; total’ 1459. Wan. Centre unit: 542; 497; 114; total 1153. Van. East End unit: 309; 216; 95; total 620. Van. Hitsilano: 140, 126; 69; total 335. Wan. HKerrisdale: 537; 502; 212; total 1241. Van. Mt. Pleasant: 128; 54; 55; total 237. New Westminster: 519; 454; 55; total 1028. North Vancouver: 187; 138; 107; total 432. Total strength: 3044 active; 2506 asso- ciate; 956 protective groups; 6496 in all.

Allowing for padded figures (it will be noticed the figures do not tally), for multiple listing of membership, this report points to the existence of an organized Fascist group in this city with a definite program of ac- tion.

Progressive Unity Needed.

.. . As constituted at present it is not a political party, but its constitution allows it to become one... should its politico-economic progrem . not be brought into force by existing political parties.”

Tt faces the fact that “circum- stances might arise in which the rapid development of an authori-’ tative government might be the only alternative... .”

There are progressive forces enough in Canada that, if united in common opposition to Fascism, can destroy such organizations be- fore they become a definite threat; can giye the lead to youth which may otherwise be attracted by the false patriotism of Wascism, its demagoguery and promises. But, so long as progressive forces Tre-

“

And meet the challenge in the eyes Of these from dark upsurging—

From factory, from mine and mill New strength emerging.

Why crouch

In the darkness? Fearine the touch Of a strenesth in its passing.

Meet steel with steel. Beyond this dark The workers massing.

Too oft Have dreams been carved from stone too soft That better were wrought in steel, Steel of sinew and flame of flesh Moulded on the wheel.

—Harold Griffin.

their ideas, united? They were united on one fundamental proposition that they all shared in common, the need for better

transportation facilities in their community.

Does not this simple’ example prove that protestants and Catholies, Communists and CCF’ers, and those who do not fol- low any particular political theory can all stand together on specific issues for the good of the common people ?

It proves that when the vital needs of the people are found they will unite in support of a struggle to satisfy these needs. It proves that the people want unity of action, that they have no fear of the Communists, and that in forging unity they can

bring about a betterment of their conditions right now, today.

Tf unity of action on a community scale can win victories, is it not clear that unity of action on a wider scale can win greater victories? The building of such unity of action in the provin- cial elections would defeat reaction, better the conditions of the people, and strengthen cheir power in going forward to. greater and greater victories over the enemies of the people.—B.L.

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May Day, 1937

be years ago four heroic workers of Chicago, Parsons, Engel, Fischer and Spies, went to the gallows, a sacrifice in the long and bitter struggle for the right to organize in trade unions and to establish the eight-hour day; but out of their sacrifice and that of many others grew the immortal spirit ot international labor day, May Day.

The history of May Day is inextricably bound up with the history of trade unionism. And despite many defeats, trade unionism is on the march today with a hope, a method, and a spirit that bids fair to win many victories for those who toil.

Today the workers of Canada are stubbornly fighting for the right to organize; for collective bargaining; for putting an end to the use of police against workers in industrial disputes; for the destruction of the pernicious company unions, the infamous spy system, the use of stool-pigeons and provoeateurs, and for a oreater share of what they produce.

While the forces of reaction are massing and uniting as never yefore, the workers are learning the value of organization and wmnity. The lords of privilege use any and every means, inelud- ng the most brutal force and violence, to increase their profits at the expense of the workers. A Hepburn does their dirty work at Oshawa and Sarnia, and a Pattullo and a Sloan is at hand to assist the Shipping Federation te smash unionism in British Columbia.

But the workers are devising new forms of struggle and or- ganization. New leaders are coming to the front. The CIO has scored history-zmaking successes i organization, in smashing company unionism and winning wage inereases and better con- ditions for more than a million workers in recent qnonths.

Yes. labor is on the mareh. The people of the Soviet Union have established socialism; the heroic people of Spain are giving their blood in torrents to stem the tide of foreion fascist invasion which is in league with Spanish traitors. And im Canada, there is a erowing desire to organize and struggle against exploitation. and reaction.

“There will come a time when our stlence will MOre nowerful. than the vowces you strangle today.” cried Spies through the death hood which coyered his face just before the trapdoor was sprung. And history has proved he wa sright.

On this May Day, let the workers of Vaneouver and eyery eity and town in the province live up to the great traditions of B.C. labor and turn out in mighty demonstration of class soli- darity as a declaration to reaction that labor will not be denied

b a

youth club and a Communist.

How were all these people, who differ so much in many of

its rights, that labor in this province, too, is on the march.

F ere z : : the local Trotskyists who chose the | main divided, so long will the seeds

cee groups, is the Canadian |for honest, statesmanlike govern-|address of a Ghinese laundry re-|of Fascism, already planted here,

uard. ment and the elimination of the cently. continue to germinate and flourish. nee Leon I rots ky

ropes

eon Trotsky’s investigation of himself has proved farcical as, un- der the circumstances and duly con- sidering the individuals involved, it was inevitable that it would. Not even the liberal coat of whitewash applied by his sycophantiec followers ean hide the essential facts from the world that the “trial” is de- liberately being conducted with a view to focussing the spotlight of capitalist press publicity on Trotsky and thus furthering his slanderous attacks on the world’s first Social- ist state.

Trotsky refused the offer made by the Socialist Front of Lawyers in Mexico to appoint three leading judges to examine whatever evi- dence the arch-counter-revolution- ist wish to present. Imstead, he set up his own “impartial” committee of investigation, composed entirely ef those prejudiced in his favor with one or two individuals whose connections with US reactionaries are easily proven.

And now it appears that Trot- sky will mot permit all his corre- spondence to be examined by his.

friends. 5.5 Counter - revolu- tionaries do not trust each other- Certainly what correspondence is released for public reading wiil give the impression that the whole world is wrong (Fascists excepted) and only Trotsky is right. Even Napoleon could have asked ne more.

But fair-minded people have not forgotten the overwhelming evi- dence of the Moscow trials which branded Trotsky as a traitor. Even Trotsky must recognize the weight of this evidence which linked him with German Fascism and Japa- nese imperialism, with spies and murderers, or he would not be try- ing so desperately to refute it.

The whole farce has been too much for Carleton Beals, a writer who had joined the Investigating Committee, and who announced his “irrevocable resignation” and labeled the whole stage play a “school boy joke.”*

Said Beals:

“T am merely passing a fair judg- ment on the commission and its in- tolerable methods. To labol their efforts an investigation is to sully a fair word.

“The hushed adoration of the other members of the commission for Mr. Trotsky has defeated all spirit of honest investigation. . - When our lawyer, Mr. Finerty, got through with his long-winded and Meaningless cross - examination of Trotsky, the Russian leader actu- ally had wings sprouting from his shoulders.

“The methods thus far followed by the commission have been 2 schoolboy joke and I do not wish further to be a party to something so utterly ridiculous.

“The final cross-examination was put in a mold that prevented any search for truth. The other commissioners repeatedly inter- rupted my questioning in order to destroy its efficacy. . - - No serious examination of the Trotsky archives is planned by the commission.

Himself

For Nothing!

By OL’ BILL That estimable Something sroup of charit-

able -minded citi- zens, at whose head stands Sir Herbert Holt, the B.C. Collectric, again comes into the spotlight. This because of the things they give away “free.”

For their employees, there is the “mployees’ Magazine,” free, gratis and for nothing. This, however, may be one of the sifts the Greeks are supposed to bring, as I notice that the 3000 tax-paying citizens who work for that delectable body have been given the task of selling $90,000 worth of gadgets in their own time and in the Presidents honor, during May, for $67.50 worth of prizes, and the “vim and yigor’” is worked up by this “free” maga- zine.

Then, to ease the painful impres- sion made by the light and gas pills, we fet a natty, free monthly that tells us how to cool: patti du foi gras and trufiles a la Murram with the beneficient juice that is “cheap in Vancouver.”

Best of all though, is the little Friday morning visitor that litters the floors of the rattle-trap street cars at the week-ends, the “Buz gerd,” free as the water of life oF the pie in the sky promised in other places.

Ajl of them have the same settled editorial policy; to warn the unsus~ pecting populace of the big, bad public-ownership wolf awaiting out in the Stygian gloom that envelopes the territories where the B.G. Col-> jectric provides the street lighting, to gobble up the poor dividend-dos” of the best street car system We have in Vancouver, or Victoria or Westminster.

Last Friday's A Vaneouvyer “Buzzerd” was particularly illum-

Street Car inant, so much so

“The cross-examination con- sisted of allowing Trotsky to spout propaganda charges with

eloquence and wild denunciations, with only fare efforts to make him prove his assertions. The work of ihe commission has large- ly consisted in an effort to fill in the gaps left by Mr. Trotsky’s own attorney in the proving. of Trotsliy’s case. :..

“The cross-examination - . was conducted in such kindergarten fashion and with such eager adora- tion for Mr. Trotsky . .. as to make the proceedings the laughing stock

of any intelligent person. . - There was no valid attempt to get at the euilt or imnocence of Mr. Trotsky.

“How can L possibly pass on the euilt or innocence of Trotsky if the very foundations of the commis- sion’s work are eaten with the termites of partiality. No fumbling: over documents later in New York ean overcome the commission's er- rors already committed in Mexico.

“The commission henceforth can do him only serious harm, more serious harm than thes Moscow trials. And the one and only proved aceusation against Mr. Trotsky at present in my mind is that he was and still is willing to be a party to such trickery.”

in fact that it gives one the im- pression that the collaborators whe produced it° must have been welt ‘Nit up’; better than the streets of Vancouver are, anyhow.

On the front page is a picture of a Hastings East car, or maybe it is a Grandview or a Victoria Road. It bears a Moscow sign on it .but one elance proves the sign does not be- long there. It has a trolley pole and Moscow cars don’t have poles- They are connected to the power by a piece of apparatus called & pantogram, the rig general through- out the Huropean continent and in Asia.

Tor the rest, the car bears alt the hallmarks of the vintage that serves the people of Vancouver, that of 1893 with some of the disguises invented by Plem Proddy of Tooner- ville, with which Fontaine Fox has made us so well acquainted. It is not a bit like the modern stream~- lined cars of Moscow driven by the - most powerful streetcar motors in the world.

The story that goes with this work of art is so admirably deserip- tive that there is no doubt what- ever but that Vancouver is the habitat of the gallumping old trolley; “small, dirty, rattling, dilapidated trams that totter and shake along their way .. . too tightly jammec

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‘The y Say.

NX e seo? f t

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“The quibblers of ancient Greece were intellectual slug- gards as compared with our Su- preme Court.”’—John L. Lewis.

“Poday, when the winds of Nazism are blowing from across the waters, we must guard free- dom with eternal vigilence.’* — Rev. Harry Emerson Fosdick.

“A German religious move- ment will have to declare that the ideal of neighborly charity must implicitly be subordinated to the idea of national teaching.” —Alfred Rosenberg, Nazi leader.

“J most earnestly advocate do- ing all that we can to mitigate the sufferings of those who are gallantly fighting for those ideals, for our ideals, in a world where dictatorship and tyranny have boldly set up their challenge.”— Dr. Walter B. Cannon, Harvard Medical School, chairman of the

Medical Bureau to Aid Spanish Democracy.

together for strap-hanging to be necessary or even possible.”

“Getting down to work and home again is a pretty momentous matter

to most people,” injects the “Buz--.

zerd’’ scribe, which reminds me of a man I heard of lately living at Hastings and Salisbury, who claims he has never been able to get & seat in two years, either going to or coming from his work.

Moscow street cars were crowded. The city bas doubled its population sincs 1917. In New York in its busiest years, the average number of rides in public conveyances per inhabi- tant did not exceed 500. In Moscow, it is 700. In 1930, one billion pas- sengers were carried; in 1934, two billions. Moscow streetcars carry six million passengers daily, more than half the population of Canada, besides those carried by trolley busses, auto busses and the subway- The ‘“Buzzerd” is probably jealous,

Car Service In Moscow

With this enormous traffic to handle, does the Moscow sgovyern~ ment cut down the number of cars or impose speed-up time schedules on the workers as the BC Collectric

While Rubens was serving as am- bassador to the egurt of Spain he was detected by a courtier in the act -of painting a picture.

Being unaware of Rubens’ fame, the man exclaimed, “Does an am-

passador to his Catholic Majesty amuse himself with painting pic- tures?’’

“No,.’’ replied Rubens, “the painter sometimes amuses himself with di- plomacy.”’

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REV. EDWIN H. BAKER

Communist Party Candidate in New Westminster, will be guest speaker on the G.P. Broadcast over

does? No, they extend the service? When I was in Moscow in 1933, they had just added 700 new Cars and 50 busses to their rolling stock; they were also working on the Metro subway. Between 1931 and 1934, 90.6 kilometers of new track was laid and 25 new streetcar lines opened. The first 12 kilometers (7% miles) of the Metro was also opened. Compare this with South Vanco ver where a committee of their vic- tims, is now trying to get a few concessions in the way of extended service from the measly, grafting plunderbund.

Yet Mr. Murrin, in a presidentia? message in the April number of the “Employees’ Magazine,” infers that “in one Huropean country” where the ‘fear of unemployment has been removed” if is at the price of “a good many things we in Can- ada prize and would be loth to lose. Among these is the vyery large amount of personal freedom which Wwe enjoy.” e

The “Buzzerd’ wonders if they would put up with the “Buzzera” in Russia. If this didn’t have to be printed. I’d tell him.

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