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We can say that one- of the Purposes of the War Measures Act proclamation was to create a climate of fear in Canada among. the Canadian people, and to use this climate of fear to press for reactionary legislation, Communist Party leader W. Kashtan told the Canadian Tri- bune. Since the War Measures Act was introduced, they have already ‘been firing people from their positions in different parts of Canada.

There is censorship over the

student press, and the imposition of a witch hunt against progres- Sive-minded people in Quebec, which has been used to influence the outcome of the municipal elections, and to prevent the election of a substantial number of FRAP candidates.

One of the main aims of the War Measures Act, he said, is to check the movement for social Change in Canada and to shift

Politics to the right. What is in-

Fishermen's

The heroic strike of the fisher- men of Canso Strait in Nova Scotia continues. Their,battle is for collective bargaining rights and for the right to choose the union that is to represent them.

Latest reports are that an in- terim agreement between the two foreign-owned fishing com- panies and the strikers’ ad hoc Committee -is tobe expected Shortly. An important issue still

at stake for this interim contract.

1S the fishermen’s absolute in-

Sistence that all charges against the strikers be dropped. They ‘are also demanding guarantees that the Mulgrave plant of Aca- dia Fisheries remain in opera- tion and not be closed as the Company threatens.

In an interview with the Cana- dian Tribune, the British Colum- bia northern organizer of the United Fishermen and Allied Workers Union, George Hew-

ison, who has just returned to.

BC after several months spent With the union’s striking Nova Scotia members, said, “Even if an interim contract is signed, it will take a-month anyway before full work resumes. The amount

and kind of support given now —

will have an important effect on the conditions under which these brave men will go back to Work,”

Explaining that all the strikers continue to wear their UFAWU buttons, Hewison declared, “Al- though the strikers and their families are suffering near-star- vation conditions, they are very determined to win decent con- ditions for themselves. They are fighting for status as first class human beings with the right to bargain collectively. To a man, they’ll not go back under threats of blacklisting, and they are firm that their union do the bargain- ing for them.”

Hewison stated that the newly- elected Liberal minority govern- ment in Nova Scotia, was elect- ed on a program that included its undertaking to give de facto recognition to the-collective bar- 8aining rights of the fishermen. He pointed out that the two New Democratic Party members of the N.S. Legislature, who now hold the balarice of power there, have consistently supported the fishermen’s strike and their de- mands.

volved is not only the right to

dissent but the right to bring

about change in the capitalist system of society and an end to the exploitation of man by man.

To have any illusions about the intention of the War Meas- sures Act would be dangerous indeed. It is not only directed to

_ maintain inequalities in Quebec,

but to take away democratic and civil rights of Canadians every- where. The government now states it will introduce new leg- islation to replace the War Measures Act. From what has been reported in the press it will be just about as dangerous as the War Measures Act, and in some respects even more so. The main direction of such new legislation will be aimed at what the government calls “civil insurrection.” From the past ex- perience of the working class and democratic forces, it should clear that this is a broad um- brella which could embrace any

strike solid

No final settlement of the

strike is expected, however, un- til the Nova Scotia Supreme Court brings down its ruling on whether the N.S. fishermen are under provincial or federal juris- diction. Under the present anti- quated N.S. law, the fishermen are still classified as ‘‘co-adven- turers” with the giant fishing companies!

Hewison told of some of the recent donations received by the striking fishermen:

e The students of McGill Uni- versity Arts and Science Under- graduate Society have given $250 to strike fund.

e The Sudbury Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers Local 598 gave $600 outright and continues with regular weekly contributions.

e@ The National Farmers Union, “that all along has given magni- ficent support with gifts of food”, also contributes weekly.

e@ Some 10 locals of the United Auto Workers Union have sent separate financial contributions, and these include the striking UAW-GM locals in St. Cath- arines and Oshawa.

e Many United Steelworker locals across the country have sent financial contributions.

e “Clothing, warm, winter clothing is very important now down there,” said Hewison. Last week two large shipments of

such contributions were received .

in Mulgrave from the Port Cre- dit local of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Union. “This was in addition to three trans- port trailers full of clothing that the strikers previously received from Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia strike supporters,” reported Hewison.

e Members of the. Canadian Seafood Workers Union in Hali- fax last week sent $168.

e Canadian Brotherhood of Rail and Transport Workers (CBRT) crews of fishing vessels are currently taking up collec- tions for the striking UFAWU members. ‘

All donations, and all mes- sages of solidarity with the striking fishermen, should be sent to: ~ be

United Fishermen and Allied Workers Union

Box 298, Mulgrave, N.S.

strike, any mass protest against unemployment or rising prices— any move directed against mon- opoly policy.

All that has been carried through under- the War Meas- ures Act — and the propaganda. — are all based on the claim of the government that a state of “apprehended insurrection” ex- isted in Quebec.

When asked to produce the facts, neither Mr. Marchand, Mr. MacDonald, Mr. Turner nor Prime Minister Trudeau could produce any facts. All they could pro- duce was the kidnapping of two men and the assassination of one, of them. While we deplore kid- napping and assassination as a method of struggle, this gives no justification to invoke the War Measures Act or introduce any new repressive legislation. What is obvious: is that the govern- ment was not so much concern- ed with kidnapping and assassin-

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ation, but with the growing de- mand for social change in Que- bec and throughout the country, and that this is what they want to stop with such draconic legis- lation.

From this point of view the statement by some NDP spokes- men that the party was prepared to cooperate with the govern- ment in writing new repressive legislation is, to put it mildly, ill-advised. Any such new legis- lation will be aimed at the demo- cratic rights of the people and to. maintain monopoly power and profits. :

We urge the NDP to recon- sider, and not to allow them- selves to be sucked into a four- power united block in parliament which Trudeau so sorely wants.

Trudeau knows that while at the moment he may appear to have support for his position, it is temporary and will wither away. Those who stand firmly

against it will in the end be the beneficiaries of public support for their principled stand.

The present situation is a dangerous one. No single organ- ization or party can defeat the War Measures Act, but if all democratic forces in Canada unite they can bring about such a defeat. The real question for the Canadian people and for la- bor is not only to demand the restoration of democratic rights

but to unite for the extension of

these rights, without which the struggle for democratic advance and for further social change will be made much more diffi- cult. :

The various committees which have sprung up throughout the country, and the strong actions taken by the trade unions, par- ticularly in. Quebec, he conclud- ed, point up the fact that the possibility exists to compel the government to retreat.

Mr. Trudeau rewrites history —

By MARK FRANK

Prime Minister Trudeau has invoked the ghost of Alexander Kerensky one time chairman of the provisional government of old Russia whose regime was

_ overthrown to make way for

history’s first socialist revolution in 1917. : Irked by opposition probing in

Commons on Oct. 23, for more .

information on why the War

‘Measures Act was put into ef-

fect, he urged NDP leader T. C. Douglas to “ask himself how much information Kerensky had in the spring and summer of 1917 when he was pooh-poohing the possibility of an insurrec- tion, which in fact happened in October 1917.” :

_ The comparison between the political situation in Quebec and war-ravaged revolutionary Rus- sia of 1917, where millions of peasants, soldiers and workers were demanding peace, bread and freedom—and had just over- thrown the hated tsar, shows how feeble an historian — and how demagogic our~PM really iss 77

To draw a far-fetched com- parison between the two situa- tions is bad enough, but to side with Kerensky in the situation that faced him in the spring and summer of 1917 is odious in the extreme—a case of supporting one of history’s most ardent ad- vocates of violence and killing on a grand scale.

The call for the armed insur- rection in Russia of 1917 was

not a putsch or act of terror. It

was decided on at the 6th Con- gress of the Bolshevik Party July 26-Aug. 3, 1917 and arose out of:

1. The new political situation, the danger of a counter-revolu- tionary thrust for power, involv- ing the continuation of the senseless butchery on the East- ern Fronts in World War 1, and the violent destruction of all the gains of those who had over- thrown the hated tsarist regime in February of 1917.

2. It envisaged mass support of the workers, peasants and soldiers, a support based on

» those elected to. the Soviets. It

was not a narrowly-based move- ment. As a matter of fact in

September of 1917 before the armed insurrection Lenin was able to say “We have the follow- ing of the majority of the peo- ple.” 3 ‘

Then why the armed insurrec- tion?

John Reed writes in Ten Days that Shook the World — “Instead of being a destructible force, it seems to me that the. Bolsheviki were the only party in. Russia with a constructive program and the power to impose it on the country. If they had not succeed- ed to the Government when they did, there is little doubt in my

mind that the armies of Imperial -

Germany would have been in

_ Petrograd and Moscow in De-

cember, and Russia would again be ridden by a tsar...”

Kerensky’s provisional gov- ernment was endangering all the gains of the democratic revolu- tion that overthrew the tsar; he was opening the door to the conquest of Russia by the Ger- man imperialists; he was giving comfort to the pogromists and Black Hundreds of tsarist days; he was seeking to block the road to the socialist revolution in the interest of foréign and Russian capital.

This is the black record of Mr. Kerensky who seems to have been adopted overnight by Mr. Trudeau to justify his ac- tions in the present political sit- uation in Canada.

Kerensky was a_ Socialist- Revolutionary, the Provisional Government’s War Minister in June of 1917. He favored the continuation of the war, when millions demanded peace. Peace to the allies of old imperial Russia like the U.S., Britain and France was a dirty word. But Kerensky supported this most unjust of unjust wars.

On: July 8 he was appointed prime minister and on July 18 General Kornilov was made commander-in-chief. At a State Conference held in Moscow Aug. 12, Kerensky called for continu- ing the war and the establish- ment of “order” in the army and in the country. (A familiar enough slogan in North America today). Only the much-maligned Bolsheviks exposed this drive to “terror from the right” and the

threat to the gains of the demo- cratic revolution. On Aug. 25 Kornilov moved into action with the Third Mounted Corps taken from the front and directed against the workers of Petro- grad. This was violence with a vengeance — the counter-revolu- tion, which placed armed popu- lar insurrection on the order of the day for the defense of lib- erty and the advance of the socialist revolution now beyond the stage of what was possible earlier—peaceful transition. Ker- ensky was profoundly involved in this ill-famed “Kornilov Re- volt” which was quickly put down despite his disclaimers.

Lenin wrote: ‘“Kerensky is a Kornilovite; by sheer accident he has had a quarrel with Kor- nilov himself, but he remains in

intimate alliance with all the

other Kornilovites.”

To carry through his unpopu- lar policy, Kerensky ordered the arrest of Lenin and suppression of the revolutionary workers and soldiers. Capital punishment was reinstituted in the army. Print- ing presses where workers’ pap- ers were printed were raided, sacked and closed.

On Oct. 25 (Nov. 7—our calen- dar) the provisional government was ousted. Kerensky fled to lead a counter-revolutionary mil- itary operation on Oct. 27

against Petrograd which failed.

The socialist revolution had tri- umphed.

Who then were the progeni- tors of violence and terror in the Russian Revolution — those who wished to continue the sav- agery of World War I the Keren- sky’s et al; or the Bolsheviks led by Lenin who brought a separ- ate peace to all Russia and the liberation of their peoples from the knout of tsarism and the ter- ror of unbridled rule and exploi- tation of native and foreign capi- talists. ee

Surely Mr. Trudeau knows bet- ter than to distort the history of the Russian Revolution to serve his current purpose: to red bo- gey all opposition out of exis- tence to his present draconic

War Measures Act and pending -

emergency legislation against the rising movements of the peo-

ple.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—OCTOBER 30, 1970—PAGE 9