Page Two

fESSE2D SSaa ese 2

ADVCGCATE

June 30, 1938

THE PEOPLE’S
ADVOCATE

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THURSDAY, JUNE 30, 1938

The CCF Convention

HORTLY after this paper

eomes off the press, the
British Columbia section of
the CCF will meet in conven-
tion at Kamloops.

The People’s Advocate ex-
tends its hearty greetings to
the delegates.

At this time of storm and
stress each labor convention
takes on added significance,
because labor’s. responsibility
to the common people be-
comes more stern as time
goes on.

This paper is a staunch ad-
vocate of labor unity. We ar-
dently believe that co-opera-
tion between the two working
class parties, the CCF and the
Communist party, is the key
to the unfoldins of tremen-
dous democratic movements
inclusive of the vast majority
of the common people —
movements which will defend
and extend political and econ-
omic democracy, defeat the
reactionaries and prevent the
repetition of attacks on the
single unemployed.

Without for one moment
wishing to interfere in the
affairs of the CCF, we urge
that every delegate calmly
and dispassionately weigh
the experiences in Canada and
abroad for the past year, and
on the basis of that estimation
conclude for himself as to the
value of unity.

In the interests of the whole
labor movement, CCE dele-
gates should ask themselves:
Is the progress we have made,
despite the successes achieved,
keeping pace with the ad-
vance of reaction in Canada?
Were the results of the BC,
Ontario and Saskatchewan
elections as good as they could
have been if co-operation had
prevailed among the forces of
labor? Is there not a real
danger that disunity of the
labor movement, with its re-
sulting weakness of the demo-
eratic forces, will permit the-
victory of the reactionaries
in Canada?

This is no time for narrow
partisan prejudice—that curse
of the labor movement. This
is a moment that can and
must be seized to press every
advantage, to nip fascism in
the bud, to defeat the Hep-
burns and Duplessis before
their policies lead to fascism
and the spoilation of the labor
movement, union, CCF club

and Communist party branch
alike.

Here in BC we have a glor-
jous opportunity to build a
front of all democratic people
to stem the growing tide of
reaction; to launch a great
campaign for jobs and secur-
ity; to win a greater measure
of civic liberty; to increase
wages and shorten hours; to
defeat the reactionaries like
Pattullo in the Liberal party;
to win for a people’s demo-
cratic program those thou-
sands of BC people who are
against fascism, but who are
not Socialists.

We in BC stand at the gate-
way to the Far East. We are
the Canadian open window
through which we can gaze
on the depredations of Japa-
nese imperialism. Our prov-
ince is the scene of fascist
penetration by Japanese im-
perialism, the source from
which that military-fascist
machine which is invading
China gets much of its war
supplies.

How long can we in BC re-

main safe from bombing
‘planes if Canadian foreign

and trade policies continue to
give aid and comfort to Japa-
nese imperialism?

These are the vital issues
of the moment on which labor
should speak with one voice.

We sincerely hope the CCF

-army,

convention in Kamloops, and
later the national CCF con-
vention in Edmonton, will re-
solve to join hands with all
other democrats, with all sec-
tions of the labor movement,
to change the course of events
in our country into the direc-
tion of democracy and secur-
ity at home and a vigorous
fight for peace abroad.

Dominion Day

EVENTY-ONE years ago

the scattered and hitherto
disunited sections in the great
area from the Atlantic to the
Pacific ocean, from the US
border to the Arctic, came to-
gether and as provinces and
territories entered into a con-
federation.

“Thus was achieved a partial
realization of the democratic
asperations of which the revo-
lutionary democratic move-
ment led by Mackenzie and
Papineau thirty years earlier
was the chief expression.

But the democracy achieved
was limited. The compromise
between the rising industrial-
ists and semi-feudal landlord
interests left many fetters
upon the new nation. Safe-
guards against a wide democ-
racy for the people were
erected.

The elected representatives
of the people in the House of
Commons were hampered by
a mnon-elective Senate with
power of veto. The franchise
was a restricted one with
property, residential and
other qualifications. Wide
powers were given to the pro-
vineial governments, which
prevented the full unification
of Canada and placed barriers
in the way of enactment of
social legislation.

Just as the bourbons of the
South and the reactionary in-
terests of the border and
Northern states made use of
the slogan of “states rights”
to perpetuate and extend slav-
ery, so the cry of “provincial
rights” is raised in Canada to
retard progress; and just as
Lincoln fought for the pres-
ervation of the Union, so the
people of Canada must fight
for amendments to the British
North America Act which
will make it possible to bring
about a greater unification of
Canada, a wider democracy,
and much needed social les-
islation.

The reactionary press and
the despoilers of Canada on
this Dominion Day utter the
usual self-righteous, patriotic
platitudes. We would warn
the people against these
apostles of reaction, for just
as Franco plotted with foreign
states against his country, so
in Canada today there are
traitors in high places at work
undermining democratic in-
stitutions and plotting against
the people.

Fascism is boldly and im-
pudently asserting itself. Men
in high military circles are in
the fascist organizations and
directly linked up with Ger-
man Nazism and Italian Fas-
cism. These men are being
sovered up and protected by
she government. No less an
authority than William E.
Dodd, lately resigned as US
ambassador to Berlin, pub-
licly declared:

“There is no doubt that
the Nazi government has
paid spies in America and
that many of these are rank-
ing American officials.”

It has been established be-
yond doubt that the same Nazi
spy ring is at work in Canada
and that men high in the
financial and industrial life of
Canada, as well as in the
the civil service, and
governments, are associated
with them.

These men do not want
further unification of Canada.
Rather do they work through
such men as Duplessis and
Hepburn to keep Canada
virtually dismembered and its
people helpless before the at-
tacks of organized greed and
reaction.

These traitorous elements
must be combatted and ex-
posed. The common people of
Canada must be welded into a
solid progressive democratic
front against reaction in all
its forms if the democratic in-
stitutions for which our fore-
fathers fought and bled are to
be preserved and further
progress assured.

The Fight For Democracy In BC

By Leslie Morris

WN THIS Dominion Day all Canadians who have at heart the best interests of our country

can not but be alarmed at the advances of the political agents of the Fifty Big Shots, the
reactionary politicians in the two old-line parties.

The very essence of Dominion Day is the national unity of our country. Yet there exists
a very real danger that instead of national unity to tackle national problems like unemploy-
ment, we shall go backwards to a system of provincial autonomy under which low wages,
repression, poverty and political toryism will flourish and fascism be bred.

In one sense, 1938—the 7Tist year after Confederation—can be viewed as a race between
those who stand for national progress, and those who would push the hands of the clock back
wards to reintroduce those very conditions which the real fathers of our country, William
Lyon Mackenzie and Louis Joseph Papineau, fought to remove.

How can democracy win that
race? How can we make certain
that the process of national uni-
fication, begun in earnest in 1837,
will continue? How can Dominion
Day be given democratic flesh
and blood and rescued from the
paltry lip-service of those very
people who at heart are against
Canada?

HE recent meeting of the Do-

minion Committee of the
Communist party sought to an-
swer that question. It understood
full well that while the Commun-
ists can and do give a vigorous
reply, the final answer and the
ultimate decision rests with the
whole labor movement and the
broad masses of the Canadian
people, no matter what their im-
mediate political ellepiance= may
be and regardless of whether or
not they now accept the final aim
of Socialism.

Let us be quite specific. It is a
fact that large numbers of the
people who supported the single
unemployed in their magnificent
fight for a works’ program were
mot Socialists. They came from
the most varied sections of the
population and included clergy-
men of several denominations,
the Junior Board of Trade, retail
merchants, professional people,
trades unionists and others.

In fact, judging by the demon-
strations and the popular indig-—
mation aroused by the govern-
ment’s police attack, there is now
being formed in British Columbia
a democratie front for work and
wages. And who can separate the
ight for work and wages from
the whole struggle for democracy
and against reaction? The fight
for economic security is the very
heart of the fight fer political
democracy, for it is on economic
issues that the Hepburns and Du-
plessis’ attack the masses of the
people.

The Communist vision of the
democratic front is nothing if not
the participation in such fights
of the largest number of people
from all walks of life. Such par-
ticipation clearly cannot at this
stage include election agreements
or formally signed pacts between
parties or groups. We have not
yet reached the high stage of de-
velopment of labor unity and the
people’s front as they exist in
France, Spain and China.

The people's front, as a mass
movement in which united labor
plays the role of leader and edu-
cator, must come in Canada to
save our country from fascism.

But the- people’s front does not
drop from the sky. It is ham-
mered out in the heat and dust
of life. It is prefaced by the most
varied forms of the urge for dem-
ocracy, as in the fight for work
and wages, or for Spain and
China, against the Quebec pad-
lock law, for the rights of the
young people, etc.

T IS not for the want of public

issues that we have as yet a
weak and scattered democratic
movement. Let us list a few of
them which occupy the attention
not only of Socialists, but of the
daily newspapers and spokesmen
of the old-line parties:

Railroad amalgamation.

Works programs.

Reduction of interest
debt.

Prairie rehabilitation.

Road construction.

Reduction of direct taxation
and increased income taxes on
big fortunes.

Rights of trade unions to or-
ganize freely and bargain col-
lectively.

Civil liberties, attacked by
the Quebec padlock law.

Federal responsibility for un-

and

employment, wage and hour
legislation, unemployment in-
surance.

Need for a foreign policy of
eollective action and refusal to
trade with the fascist agegres-
sors.

Defense of Canada from fas-
cist invasion through collective
action abroad and social secur-
ity at home.

Here is the groundwork of the
fight for democracy in Canada
now. None of these issues is the
product of Communist or CCF
agitation. They shoot up straight
from the economy and politics of
the Canadian scene and inevyi-

tably must be the heart of any
really people’s program.
Unfortunately, although such
political coalitions as the reac-
tionary Wepburn-Duplessis  alli-
ance, have arisen to block pro-

gressive action on the issues list-
ed above, there has as yet been
no corresponding © progressive
coalition (except in the case of
the Social Credit movement in

Alberta) to achieve results for
the common people.

Therein lies the danger at the
moment. It becomes even more
sharp when we see the Liberal
premier of BC go right over to
the line of R. B. Bennett in deal-
ing with the single unemployed,
or when the federal cabinet re-
fuses to disallow the Quebec pad-
lock law or to enact unemploy-
ment insurance at the same time
as it wipes out 12 Alberta acts
and increases the taxation on the
poor in its latest budget.

Truly, reaction is growing in
high places. From such develop-
ments as the Pattullo swing to
the right and inaction at Ottawa,
the forces of reaction get their
nourishment, It is therefore ne-
ecessary that the labor movement
and the people strive now to. in-
fiuence the government and the
course of events, to prevent the
further consolidation of reaction-
ary measures—and to compel the
governments to act on the nation-
al and provincial needs of Can-
ada.

It is obvious, then, that we can-
not wait until some miraculous
birth of a people’s front. It is
of the daily stuff of life that
democratic movements are born
and gather speed and strength.
That is the Communist concep-
tion of the democratic front.

HE situation to hand in British
Golumbia demands action at
once.

Under the protection of the
existing trade union act, Premier
Pattullo and Minister of Labor
Pearson are obeying the employ-
ers’ instructions and hindering
the organization of labor and the
gaining of better working condi-
tions. !

The exhibition of force and vio-
lence on Sunday, June 19, is the
high point of the government's
“policy” regarding unemploy-—
ment. More such exhibitions face
the people of the Coast.

Tf British Columbia is to be
pulled out of the gathering eco-
nomic storm with any degree of
safety for the workers, farmers
and small business men, then im-
mediate works projects must be
created, and the government com-
pelled to ease taxation on the

Books
and

Authors

BICLOGY AND MARXISM — By
Wiareel Prenant. International
Publishers, New York. OQbtain-
able at New Age Bookshop, 50-A
East Hastings St. Vancouver.

ERE is one of those works
that are greeted with the cry,
“This book is long overdue.’ The
author is professor of zoology at
Sorbonne University in Paris and
his book proves that he is not only
eompetent to teach biology but
also to teach the biologists a
method of thinking that will point
to the solution of many problems
of their branch of science that are
still obstacles to them — Marxian
dialectics.

&

This is the purpose of the book.
Tt is an advance on the contribu-
tions of Pennekoek, who hereto-
fore has been the only biologist to
link up biological research with
Gialectical materialism. Professor
Prenant is chary about quoting
authorities lest he should create a
false impression of dogmatism.
He has made a good job, however,
in the quotations he uses from
Marx and Engels.

Professor Needham, in the in-
troduction, claims for Marx and
Engels a universal genius which
enables them to understand very
well what- was going on in the
sciences of their time, and biclogy
was no exception te this. In
places in this work one feels that
Marx and Engels are expounding
dialectical materialism, but the
author uses his material so skil-
fully that there is no sense of be-
ing dogmatized.

It is a guide, a help to the bi-
ologists that indicates a method
which will solve all their prob-
lems, but it is at the same time
an introduction for the layman.
Tt is written in the simplest form
(with a guide to further reading)
and is an excellent sketch of the
standing of biology today. The
next time somebody tells you Dar-
win has been thrown over by sci-
ence, you will know how far and
why if you have read “Biology
and Marxism.’—WeB.

small man and place it on such
Siants as the Consolidated Min-
ing and Smelting Corporation,
which is enjoying unprecedented
profits partly because of the
fascist invasion of peaceful coun-
tries.

if British Columbia’s territory
is to be safe from Japanese fas-
forces, progressive leaders must
see to it now that the whole popu-
lation is aroused to the meaning
of the penetration of the province
by the agents of Japanese im-
perialism and the spies of the
Japanese intelligence depart-—
ments, and the white friends of
Japanese fascism who are en-
couraging tne rape of China and
providing the war materials for
that rape, publicly and merci-
lessly exposed as traitors to Can-
ada.

These are but a few of the
things that face the democrats of
BC. And the truth stares us in
the face that BC democrats are
not solely to be found in the CCE
or the Communist party — and
equally that the forces of the
CCF and the Communist party,
particularly in the absence of
joint action on these matters, are
alone not strong enough to stop
the drive to reaction and war.

HAT can be aone? First of all,

let us remember that insist-
ing on the acceptance of Social-
ism, or demanding of every lib-
erty-loving person that he accepts
the full program of Socialism, will
never build a democratic front in
BC. Let us understand once and
for all that there is no contra-
diction between defending democ-
racy and defeating reaction now,
and the fight for Socialism.

Det us also be much more en-
ergetic in rooting out of the labor
movement the poisonous Trotsky-
ist Slander that those Socialists
who fight to stop fascism comings
to Canada are betraying the
eause of Socialism—such “argu-
ments” are splitting devices to
serve the cause of fascism.

The task of every true So-
Cialist in BC, whether he be in the
CCF, or the Communist party, is
to seek by every possible means
and as quickly as possible to
arouse a great popular movement
of BC people in all walks of life,
and to pay special attention to
those thousands of voters who
faith, believe that Liberalism or
Conservatism is ready and vwill-
ing to defend their daily inter-
ests.

It may be the experience of B
© that great sections of the old-
line parties (and not alone the
voters but including the lower
officials) will come to active par-
ticipation in the fight against re-
action. Such a process is going on
in Ontario. It can be seen in the
US and Britain. It is a likely
consequence, inside the TLiberal
party in BC of the substitution of
tear gas for works programs by
a government elected to introduce
work and wages.

4 Paes > great movements which
will arise with greater rapid-
ity as time goes on, cannot be ex-
pected to agree to the full pro-
Bram of the CCH or the Com-
munist party. For example, many
people in BC thoroughly alarmed
about Japanese fascist penetra-
tion of this province, would not
agree to the possession of full
political rights by the Japanese
population. But does this mean
that these people’s anti-Japanese
feeling should serve to alienate
them completely from a egreat
movement against Japanese im-
perialism, which is the specific
aggressor confronting the people
of the Pacific Coast?
It is then,
amount of

with the greatest

understanding, pa-
tience and forbearing that Social-
ist and Communist workers

should ally themselves and give
advice and assistance to the de-
mocratic movements of the peo-

ple. Every indication of demo-
eratic, anti-fascist feeling, no
matter from where they may

come and as long as they are hon-
estly expressed, should be wel-
comed and encouraged.

There is no blueprint for the
democratic front. Its arising in
BC will take on forms peculiar
to the province and the people,
just at it will in other provinces.
All Socialists must be aware of
this and refrain from pushing
people’s movements into precon-
ceived forms.

But one thing the democratic
front everywhere in Canada will
have in common—and that is, the

-preservation of everything of va-

lue to the common people, both in
the past and present of our coun-
try, and opposition to any clique,
group or faction which tries to
destroy those institutions built
up in the course of the common
people’s fight for freedom.

co]
By
OL’ BILL
If anyone ever
Barefaced carned the wages of
Treason! treason to his coun-

try it is the present
British prime minister, Chamber-
lain.-Imn concocting the infamous
Anglo-Italian Pact he sold the
British Empire to Mussolini and
has already, at Geneva and in
Spain, made partial delivery of
the goods.

As surely as any madman who
ever occupied a cell in a lunatic
asylum imagined himself to be
Wapolean Bonaparte or Alexan-
der the Great, Mussolini imagines
himself to be a Roman Caesar.
Let us see then, how the Caesars
rewarded those in whom they
suborned treason.

About 2100 years ago, Spain
was a prosperous country. The
Romans of that day, just as the
fascists today, theught it needed
protecting. They over-ran the
country, occupying province after
province and enslaved the in-
habitants.

The Spanish people, proud of

their independence, naturally re-
sisted, just as they are doing to-
day. In YViriato, whom the Ro-
Mans called VYViriatus, a hunter
and shepherd, they found a fear-
less leader, a brilliant military
strategist who placed the liberty
of his country from imperialist
rule before even his own life, a
national hero who ranks with
Sir William Wallace, John Zizka,
William Tell, LFoussiant l’Quver-
ture, Simon Bolivar and Giuseppe
Garibaldi.
Practising guerrilla
warfare as the 8th
Route Army is doing
today in China, the Spanish peo-
ple defeated the Roman legions,
Slaughtering a whole army, in-
cluding the Roman governor, and
made themselves masters of an
entire’ province.

Against his will. Viriato was
proclaimed king. He retained his
primitive simplictiy and set about
organizing the resistance to
Rome. Army after army sent
against him were defeated and
destroyed until Rome was com-
pelled to recognize him as king
of Lusitania and sign a treaty of
peace.

Defeated in war, Rome turned
to the cunning and deceit of -her
jurists and politicians to secure
the ends denied her armed sol-
diery. Bribery and corruption
were to accomplish what could
not be won on the field of battle.”
They corrupted some weaklings
close to Viriato and bribed them
to assassinate him, a precedent
that is followed by Mussolini.
Viriato was murdered by them,
the Spanish people left without
a capable leader-and the country
finally conquered by Roman arms.
When the assassins went to col-
lect their promised reward they
were told by the Roman fovernor,
“Rome does not pay traitors.”

Everything that has happened
Since the signing of the Anglo-
Italian thieves kitchen agreement
indicates that Mussolini will give
the same answer to Chamberlain
when he goes to collect as the
Roman governor gave to the
murderers of Viriato.

The cult of the
Good-bye “Aryan” took it on
“Aryan” the chin, physically
and metaphorically,
when Joe Louis “pasted the livin’
daylights” out of the Nazi
Schmeling in the worst beating
ever handed to a claimant in a
championship fight. :

Schmeling started to expose the
Aryan nonsense when he was
awarded the championship, with-
out winning it, from Jack
Sharkey, a non-Aryan Lithuanian,
a race despised by the Nazis,
125,000 of whom now living in
Germany were only made into
Aryans by military conquest .

The next sock in the eye came
when Schmeling was dressed
down and lost the championship
to Max Baer, a member of an-
other despised non- yan race,
whose very name brings froth
and venom to the lips of Hitler
and his madhouse following—one
whom they call “a filthy Jew.”

Then came the knock-out from
the hammer-blows of the black
fists of another race despised by
the Aryans, the Negro cotton-
picker from Alabama via Detroit
—and exit Aryan claims to be
“supermen” destined to rule over
all other peoples. Schmeling’s pro-
gress proves Hemmingways as-
sertion that ‘“‘the fascists fight
well only when the conditions ap-
proximate those of assassination.”

: Trevor Wig-
“The Best mall occu-
Laid Schemes—”

pies a posi-

tion amon:

sports writers in England similar
to that of Grantland Rice in Am-
erica, except that he does not so
consistently pick losers as Rice,
who showed his racial and politi-
eal animosities in supporting

Viriato.

Schmeling in the last fight.
Wignall claims to have inform-
ation from Berlin that if Schmel-
ing beat Louis he was to allow
the title to go to Neuzal in His
next fight and himself be made
in the Nazi

minister of
“cabinet.”

sport

wid sible

ks to eid

i

“SST