Page Four

PEOPLE’S ADVOCATE

October 20. (er

BOOKS
and
AUTHORS

All books reviewed in this col-
umn can be obtained at of
through the New Age Boolistore,
28 East Hastings Street, Van-
couver, B.C.

The Spirit and Structure of

German Fascism. By Robert
A. Brady. Gollancz. Left
Book Club choice.

Reviewed by Edward Charles

ECAUSE this book is

very restrained and
simple, it would be easy to
underestimate its value.
Professor Brady does not try
to show the horrors of Fas-
cism, to describe the ma-
chinery of individual terror
or of class torture which is the
mechanical and external aspect of
Fascism.

All the horrors inside the con-
centration camps and all the
thwarting of individual lives and
of social lives and of social prog-
ress outside the concentration
eamps follow as inevitably from a
deliberate perversion of philosophy
and science as disease in the
human body follows an injection of
the active virulent micro-organ-
isms of disease.

And, roughly speaking, what
Professor Brady has set out to re-
mind us in this book is that a
hypodermic injection of virulent
micro-organisms able to induce
disease and death can be admin-
istered as skilfully, as painlessly
and as suavely as any injection ot
the most beneficent cultures.

Those, Professor Brady does not
describe in any detail or otherwise
than by implication the now more
or less familiar horrors of the
succeeding Stages of decay induced
by the injection of an active poison
into the system of society; but he
dees, throughout his whole book,
examine how the poisonous eul-
ture is being produced in the la-
poratories of the ‘scientists’ and
in the studies of the ‘philosophers’
where ,only a few years ago, the
antidotes to these very poisons
were being prepared.

e

HIS book, in other words, is a

detailed but enthralling ac-
count of how “‘science’’ can be per-
verted into necromancy, how
“truth? can be perverted into
sophistry and how “philosophy”’
can be perverted into a kind o£
anesthetic, so subtly that the pro-
cess can pass unnoticed until it is
too late, until another dark age of
history has been ushered in.

The dark ages of history are
dark in precisely the measure im
which sophistry supplants truth.
That is what we mean by dark,
dark in that the clouds of ruling-
elass-inspired truth have obscured
fhe light of scientific enquiry
which would otherwise have been
available then and there.

What we do not mean by dark
azes 1S ages which did not enjoy
the “advantages” of the particular
knowledge which we have since

acquired.
Knowledge is not an “advantage”
in an absolute sense, any more

than a given hundred yards of rail-
way track is an advantage in any
absolute or isolated way; and what
we imply by darkness is darkness
relative, not to our time, but to
conditions which had existed al-
ready and might have continued
fo exist in the period under exam-
ination.

Wow in order not to know today
somethine= which we did know yYeS-
terday. It is necessary that our
minds shall have been filled in the
interval with a lie to take the place
of the truth we knew before, since
clearly we cannot empty a mind
and leaye a vacuum.

cS

ROFESSOR Brady’s book is an

examination of this lie and of
the vast and immensely organized
machinery for manufacturing and
distributing this le with which the
minds of the citizens in Fascist
eountries are being filled, the lie
of race-hatred, the “science” of
‘H]lood and soil,” the “sublime
heroism’ of the “warrior, the
“fate-decreed subjection” of the
“\;oman like the cow.”

Tt is in his excellent summary,
in the last chapter, that Professor
Brady shows how the injection of
this lie, this mecromancy, this
sophistry, can be adopted by mod-
ern technique almost unnoticed and
will be effected, not only in Ger-
many, but in all Hureépe and in
Canada and America, unless those
who care for the lite of the mind,
equipping themselves with a gen-
uinely scientific analysis of world
history, join the working class in
the struggle to defeat Fascism.

@

BOOKS RECOMMENDED.

WHEN CHINA UNITES: An in-
terpretative history of the Chinese
Revolution, by Harry Gannes.
Knopf, $2-50-

MEN WHO LEAD LABOR, by
Bruce Winton and John Stuart.
Modern Age Books, 35 cents.

RACE: A study in modern super-
stition, by Jacques Barzun. Har-
court, Brace, $2.50.

RECONSTRUCTION: The Battle
of Democracy, by James Ss. Allen.
Jnternational Publishers, $1.25.

1837 — THE BIRTH OF CANA-
DIAN DEMOGRACY, by Stanley
Ryerson.

Trade Unions Are Base For Unity

HE Wighth Dominion
Convention of the Com-
munist party of Canada will
long stand out as a4 great
landmark in the march of
Canadian labor towards
unity and progress. Linking
the revolutionary traditions of
1937 with the struggles of today,
the convention established beyond
all argument that the Communist
party of Canada is a worthy in-
heritor of every ideal that fired
the hearts of Canadian revolution-
aries a century ago.

Goming hard on the heels of the
Ontario provincial elections, which
in many constituencies out-cor-
rupted the Family Compact of
Mackenzie’s day in order to defeat
Jabor, the convention, in the bril-
liant report of Tim Buck, gave the
answer and the challenge; union-
ization and a fuller life now for
the working people of Canada, as
a prerequisite in the struggle for
a people’s front, and the ultimate
realization of a Soviet Canada.

Returning from the convention,
I had occasion to stop over in one
of Canada’s main cities and at-
tended the meeting of the trades
and labor council. There I saw the
old “safe and sane’’ forces® of re-
action at work. Lhe issue under
debate is the attendance of execu-
tive members at meetings.

“x77. Chairman, I would like to
know if Brother thinks it
more in the interest of this trades
and labor council to attend Com-
munist conventions than to at-
tend! the business of this eouncil?”’

The trade unionist at whom this
provocative question was hurled,
replied quietly that it was true, he
was at the convention, but he had
no apologies to make in this re-
gard. He told them that the con-
vention recorded what the Com-
munist party in past years had
done in building up and consolidat-

ing the Canadian trade union
movement to bring unity in place
of internal strife, a fact which was
fully recognized at the 53rd con-
vention of the Trades and Labor
Congress. He told them that the
keynote and whole tone of the con-
vention was for the continuation of
this unity and the organization of
tens of thousands of Canadian
workers unorganized as yet into
the Trades and Labor Congress of
Canada, as a primary medium of
securing for the unorganized work-
ers a greater share of the wealth
they produce.

And finally he told them that no
single decision of the 8th conyven-
tion of the Communist party was

inimical to ‘this’ or any other
section of the CGanadian trade
union moyement, but that on the
contrary, decisions made were

truly commensurate with the ideals

and aspirations of organized Jabors —

in every field of endeavor;
particularly in
field.

and
the trade union

4 eee little episode of disruptive
provocation missed fire entire-
ly because the majority of trade
unionists Know-today that in every
locality the Communists are the
most devoted, energetic and tire-
less workers for a strong, united
trade union movement.

The trade union resolution of the
convention indicated this unity
throughout; recognized the chang-
ing attitude and will to co-opera-
tion among those whom the Com-
munists had hitherto (and not with-
out some justifiable grounds) re-
garded as opponents of any form
of unity. It clarified further the
position of the Communist party
of Canada on the CIO and the
basic differences existing in Can-
ada and the US.

For us in Canada the CIO is not
something that can be imported
to help us (with a pattalion of or-

ganizers and a mint) to jump over
difficult stages of unionization.
Even in the US its progress has
only been possible at tremendous
sacrifice on the part of tens of
thousands of workers, fired with
the will to struggle for the right
to organize and collective bargain-
ing.

With greater emphasis than
ever before the 8th convention
stressed the primary importance
of the trade unions. There can be
no immediate improvement in the
common and social conditions of
any group of workers without a
trade union. True, some employers
do give “‘voluntary’’ wage increases
or other slight concessions, but in
every instance, upon close analy-
sis, it will be found that the bene-
volent action of “giving” a wage
increase is to head off unioniza-
tion, or fertilize the soil for com-
pany-unionism.

*

HERE can be no effective peo-
ple's front built against re-
action without the bulwark of a
powerful united trade union move-
ment. The inspiring message of
Alfred Costes of the Communist
party of France, metal worker and
member of the Chamber of Depu-
ties, was precisely this: Only when
the two ereat sections of the
French trade unions were united in
common, mutual interest, did the
French People’s Front become a

Canadian Youth to

F ever there were a gather-
ing of people who were
deeply and seriously con-
cerned with the problems of
Canada’s young people, that
gathering was the 8th na-
tional convention of the
Communist party of Canada,
held recently in Toronto. Further-
more, if ever there were 2 party
to pledge itself to champion the
cause of Canada’s new generation,
a party which in life has already
proven itself, that party is the
Canadian Communist party.

The convention set up 2 special
youth commission to deal with the
problems of young people and to
bring in recommendations to help
in mobilizing Canadian youth in
the mass struggles of the Cana-
dian people for 2 ereater share of
the fruits of economic recovery,
in the struggle to stop the war-
makers and to make the world
safe for democracy.

Among Canadian young people
two important and distinct devel-
opments are taking place, which

indicate the growing progressive

mass movements among youth.

First of these is the develop-
ment of the Youth Congress Move-
ment, representative of half-million
Canadian youth. The Congress
movement is based upon a pro-
gram for social justice and world
peace ta which the entire youns
generation of Canada can sub-
seribe.

The second important -deyelop-
ment among Canadian youns peo-
ple can be seen in the large influx
of young workers into industry
and consequently into the trade
unions.

The significance of this feature
is that economic recovery is pre-
senting thousands of young Ppeo-
ple with their initial opportunity
jn industry where they are coming
in contact, in many cases for the
first time, with the labor movye-
ment.

*

HIS development among young
Canadian workers presents the

Today, with union member-
ships growing by thousands,
every day, the local labor paper

stands at the doorway of its
sreatest opportunity. - - - Labor
paper publishing is as necessary
as organizing. Papers are voices,
needed always. — The Labor
News, Worcester, Mass-

A Woman’s Diary =

Faced with the prospect of
either buying some new stockings
or being forever diseraced, I went
into one of the big

Silk or stores in Vancouver
Cotton determined to find out

whether it was at all possible to
buy stockings that weren't made

from Japanese silk.
The assistant looked very wor-
ried when I told her what i

wanted, and fetched another girl

to help change my mind. But I
wasn't going to have Japanese
silk stockings, so she showed me

some rayon, which were awful, and
some Emelish lisle which were

worse. I had visions of Scotch
moors, heather, and women strid-
ing along in tweeds and low heeled
shoes! No, I felt they wouldn't

¢rade unions with a number otf
problems.

In the various drives to organ-
ize the unorganized much attention
will have to be given to young
people in industry. Every effort
must be exerted to make our trade
unions not only places where the
economic interests of youth will
be protected, but also where young
people will find an outlet for their
cultural, athletic and educational
requirements. In short, all sorts
of activities must be developed by
¢he unions in order to make them
centres for youns people’s inter-
est and activity.

The Communist party conven-

es
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Gibralter against which French
Fascism broke its head. Only when
that unity was effected did the
power outside of parliament, the
united, organized French working
class in action, secure substantial
improvements amidst the blue-ruin
eries of France’s millionaire big
shots.

By and through the report of the
commission for the organization
of the unorganized, the convention
set its face resolutely towards this
task. The great Canadian war in-
dustries, like International Nickel,
the powerful metal-mining syndi-
cates in Northern Ontario, Con-
solidated Mining and Smelting
and its numerous subsidiaries in
BC, are still unorganized.

Almost the entire products of
the powerful industries go into the
manufacture of war materials, to
pe sold to Italy, Germany, Japan
or other war-fevered States,

From the ‘society column’’ of 2
Trail paper we read the following:

‘y. Karashima of the Mitsubishi
Mining Company, Tokio, Japan, is
visiting officials of the CM and S
Company here.”

CM and § officials, who sponsor
company unions; who have, ac-
cording to the Financial Post, built
a “Labor Utopia’ in Trail; whose
agents and police Know every
bona fide union organizer out of
town; who practice, with less re-
finement perhaps, all the anti-labor
union practises of the Japanese
police, visit the Mitsubishi Mining
Company and negotiate their
bloody deals for the massacre of
Ghinese women and children,
Simultaneously as they deny the
workers of Trail, of the INGO, of
thousands of hard-rock miners
throughout the length and breadth
of Ganada, the right to organize
and collective bargaining.

*
A leer gth convention of the Com-
munist party, in the light of

the decisions of the 53rd conven—
tion of the Trades and Labor Con-
gress of Canada, called a hait to
this state of affairs, demanding
for all industrial workers the
statutory right to organize; to
bargain collectively, to live in
neighborly peace with their fellow
men within and beyond the
borders of Canada.

Vitally important also is
convention endorsation of inde-
pendent labor political action
through the medium of Labor Rep-
1 sentative Association groups.

[The great strides in this field
i) Ontario can well become an ¢€x-
ample to other sections of Canada.
Tabor representation direct from
¢ + trade unions, taking its place
in the legislative assemblies of
Ganada is long overdue.

Because of the natural reluctance
of the trade unions to tie them-
selves officially to this or that
workers’ party, Socialist, CCE or
others, thousands of trade union-
ists have been yirtually silenced,
or worse, have become the targets
and dupes of the old-line capitalist
parties.

In how many centres in Canada
do we find good trade unionists
hooked up one way oF another
with the _ existing fovernments
machinery, inveigled into positions
that are not commensurate with

the

the best interests of organized
labor?
With trade unions taking an

active part in the political life of
ther province and country, through
LRA or similar set-ups, much of
these weaknesses would rapidly
disappear. Such action would also
change the official CGF attitude
from that of a political representa-

tion monopoly to united and
mutual action with the trade
unions.

This is the road to the unity
needed to defeat reaction—the road
to a People’s Front in Canada.

he Forefront

tion pledged to champion the needs
of youth. The Communist party
ealled upon all of its constituent
organizations to conduct a fight
for social legislation that will
benefit young people.

As part of the legislative pro-
gram for youth it names: enact-—
ment of minimum wage laws and.
stipulations for their enforcement;
establishment and extension of
yvoeational and technical training;
introduction of a system of ap-
prenticeship under trade union
supervision; scholarships for needy
students; grants to farm youth;
creation of recreational centres;
jobs with decent wages for unem-

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which will be shown at the

Globe Theatre in this city next month. The picture opens its week’s run with a midnight preview, 5um-

day, November 7th.

suit me!

I appealed to the manager. He
told me that it was impossible for
me to buy silk stockings that
weren’t made of Japanese silk.
How did I expect to make that
boycott stick? he asked. Women
weren't going to stop wearing silk
stockings just because China and
Japan were at war.

“Anyway, he said, “Japan has
bought more goods from us than
we import from her, and there-
fore we are the ones who will
suffer by the boycott, not Japan.”

“Ah” I said; “put you don't
realize what a united boycott by
all the democratic nations will do
to stop the Japanese invasion in
China. Japan will find that she
has to come to terms if they all
refuse to buy or sell to her. Also,

you will find that women will be
proud to wear cotton stockings
when they know that by so doing
they will be stopping War.

With that I left him to think
it over, and probably next time I
go in, he'll haye some stockings
from somewhere else to show me.

One interesting thing I found
out is that most of the stockings

sold in England. are sent from
Canada. I’]l remember this when
my English friends. talk to me

about the superiority of ‘‘Eneglish”’
stockings.

By the way, don’t forget that a
Jot of the tea we drink comes from
Japan—better drink coffee in
future and be sure!

6
that marriage be
only,

A proposal
made for certain periods

with option of renewal, has been
Option On put forward by Rev.
‘ 5 Dr. Beldon, superin-
Marriage tendent minister of

Whitefield’s Tabernacle in London,
England.

Marriage is at present too easily
entered into, and divorce too hard
to obtain. Dr. Beldon thinks that
some equalizing of this matter is
demanded by religious common
sense.

Jf the opportunity to dissolve
a marriage after ten years were
given to couples, in most cases
the desire would not arise.

State endowment for ‘¢hildren
is Dr. Beldon’s solution to that
problem, and he suggests the ter-
mination of marriage be by private
agreement without entering 4
diverce court.

ployed youth; this program to be
further supplemented by local
needs and requirements.

OWEVER, tne carrying

through of such a program
requires that the needs of the
youth, outlined above, must be-
come not only the effort of one,
or a handful of erganizations, but
the demands of the entire labor
and progressive movement. Unity
of labor is particularly essential
at this time. Lhe joint forces of
the trade unions, Communist party,
CGF, and all other progressive
elements, together with the united
youth movement, can bring about
a decided improvement in the
lives of the youth of British Co-
lumbia.

Who can deny that, if the ranks
of the people were united, the
events of last week which so
aroused public jndienation, when
hundreds of single unemployed
were arrested and a course, Un-
precedented in democratic Canada,
of opening prison camps for the
youth adopted, would never have
occurred?

The convention strongly raised
the question of the Communist
party giving active assistance 10
the Young Communist League in
building and transforming its or-

ganization into 4 Jarge and in-
fluential body that can render

valuable service to the entire labor
movement; and further, that will
help to build and unite the labor
youth movement.

During the months of November
and December, the YCL is conduct-
ing a recruiting drive. The object
of this drive is to build and trans-
form existing YCL branches into
Jarger and more youthful organiza-
tions, as well as a strons Youngs

Communist League to help organ=s

ize and unite the working youth
of British Columbia can best be
judged on the merits of the work
it has done in the province during
recent months.

The Sth Dominion convention is
of great jmportance to the younseer
generation of Canada, for it poimts
the road to a better life.’

Latest regulations in Germany
reduce the gilt-edging of dinner
plates and silver cocktail shakers
have been bannéd. Just as soon
as he can get around to it, big-
hearted Adolph promises to en-
large the holes in the dough-
nuts—.St. Louis Post-Despatch,
St. Louis, Mo.

by Victoria Post

When marriages evolve inte 2
series of wrangling arguments
over trivial things, then they
should be dissolved, as such a life
is a travesty of the whole mean-
ing of marriage—a contract which

two people undertake for the
‘benefit of each other’s companion-
ship.

@

The wonien’s side of the war in
Spain is beims presented by Mrs.

Lord, wife of Major Frederick

Lord, who served as
Mrs. Lord a pilot in the Loyal-
In City ist air force in Spain.

Mrs. Lord undertook a survey of
the plight of the women and chil-
dren caught in the turmoil of the
civil war in Spain, and Will tell us
all about her experiences on Eri-
day night, 8 pm, at the Auditorium.

STAGE
and :
SCREEN ~

How the New Film Alliance sizés
the new pictures up:

YOUTH ON PAROLE: Interest-
ing material, poorly handled, of
two white-collar workers, a girl
and a boy, falsely accused and
trying to rejoin society after doing
time.

ALCATRAZ ISLAND: Misses
fire. Story of gangster sent to Al-
eatraz. Ann Sheridan, Mary Ma-
guire, John Litel are young actors
who do a fine job and will be heard
of in more important roles.

THE GREAT GARRICK: Fiction
about the great 18th century actor,
David Garrick, filmed with no
Stint of work, money and care. _
Brian Aherne in title role. Picture
has many funny situations at a
French wayside inn, but is paced~
a trifle too slowly for the farce

material.
THERE GOES THE GROOM:
Local boy (Burgess Meredith)

makes good, returms to his campus
Sweetheart, finds a young psychi-
atrist has beat him to it. But the
mother (Mary Boland) wants the
money, and the sister (Ann Soth-
ern) really falls in love with him.
Funny complications.
e@

HE New Gulliver, universally

hailed by critics as a master—
piece of Soviet film art, will short-
ly be shown in Vancouver, accord-
ing to Norman Clavir, British
Columbia and Alberta distributor
for Cosmopolitan films.

Wext Soviet picture to be Shown
here- will be Beethoven Concerto,
which opens at the Globe theatre
for a week's run November 8.

.)

By JOHN R. CHAPLIN
OLLYwWOOD.—Do movie stars
haye the same constitutional

rights as other American citizens?
That is a question which the law
courts may be called upon to an-
swer shortly. For the studios have
decided to put a stop to their con-
tract stars, writers and directors
having any political opinions—or
at least expressing any publicly.
The claim is that pro-labor, anti-
Fascist activities and Statements
of some of the stars have affected
sales of American movies in Ger-
many, Italy and Japan and other
Fascist countries. Of course, this
claim is unfounded: for those
countries, since dictatorship set
in, represent very small markets
{any intelligent film is immediately
banned by Hitler, Mussolini, et al).

Fact is the Hays Office and
studio reactionaries are upset by
the liberal ideas of labor-conscious
Hollywood, and they hope to put
a stop to them. One major studio
has already advised all people
under contract that they make no
public statements on any subject
whatever, without express studio
permission, Studio heads are con-
sidering putting a “‘political clause”
into contracts, Similar to the
“morality clause’ Wich permits
them to cancel a contract if the
star becomes inyolved in 2 public
moral scandal. But the constitu=
tion, as we recall, guarantees even
movie stars freedom of speech. -. .

@
1\V/ Geers fan mail of Joan
Crawford (among many other
known anti-ascist Stars) has
jumped immeasurably, due to peo-
ple writing to congratulate her on
her stand against the presence
here of Wittorio Mussolini, and so
on. In that connection, the
Motion Picture Artists Commiuttes
(to help Spanish democracy) just
received this wire: “Appreciate
cordially your solidarity toward
republican Spain as proved by your
subscription funds and newspaper
protest against the son of Enemy
No. 1 of world democracy thus
manifesting your leye for justice
and iiberty. (Signed) (General
Miaja.’ Franchot Tone, Beverly
Roberts, Lewis Milestone, Florence
Bldridze and Nancy Carroll are
amone those of the committee who
led the Hollywood boycott on Hal
Roach’s Vittorio Mussolini. - -
Paul Muni has accepted an in-
vitation to appear with the Mos-
cow Art Players, and will do so
in two months or so, when he hits
the Soviet Union on his current
world tour. . -
@
TS accent on France these days
here. The great People’s Front
republic currently represents Hol-
Iywood's best foreign market out
side of the British empire, and as
a result, the studios are buying an
unusual number of French books,
plays and films, to film here for
special Gallic appeal. There are
more than 20 top French person-
alities now on the rosters of the
major studios, and more to come.
The Italian star, Isa Miranda,
who has a good proletarian back-
ground, may not be completely op-
posed to that anti-Fascist publicity
we talked about last week: they
tell us she’s applying for Us:
citizenship, and will never return
to Italy if she clicks in Hollywood
t
Geo Arliss will return to the
US next week to portray the late
John D. Rockefeller in a move fi-
nanced and produced by the Rocke-
feller clan .. - Since his Nazi tour,
newsreel pictures of the Duke of
Widsor have been drawing hisses.
The London Left Theatre Guild
will produce William Koslenko’s
play, “This Barth Ts Ours,”’ based
on the Crempa case. - - - Trwint
Shaw's next play will pe backed
by the Shuberts. Sherwood
Anderson has written a one-act
labor play called “Textiles.” Hen=
rik Wan Loon will become pres-
jdent of the Authors’ League of
America, Succeeding Mare Con;
nolly.