By ALAIN PATRIE

MONTREAL — “McCarthyism
and witch hunting has come to
Canada and Quebec.” This is the
gist of the declarations made by
Many of the key labor spokes-
Men on the scene in the prov-
ince,

In an attempt to synthesize
the often confused picture and
Obtain a deeper understanding
Of how Quebec labor is reacting
to the recent implementation of
the War Measures Act, the Cana-
dian Tribune made a survey of
the leading labor spokesmen. All
Of them were unanimous in their
condemnation of what some de-
Scribed as Trudeau’s Folly and
Some went further by anticipat-
Ing the new special measures
that will be forthcoming from

tawa.

Fernand Daoust, Secretray
General of the Quebec Federa-
tion of Labor was unequivocal in
his stand. He pointed out the
lead that the QFL took in or-
8anizing a common front of all

Eee labor against the WMA.

€ WMA is an instrument no
democratic government has the
Tight to employ. No self respect-
img labor leader would want
Such a weapon in the hands ’of
© government. It smacks of
ascism.”

He went on to explain that
Many of those arrested were in-
Nocent people who were victim-
zed. He made no bones about
labor’s hostility towards any
New special measures that Ot-
awa might envisage. “We must
Tepeal the WMA and use the al-
Teady existing criminal code.”

- Gui Dupuis, Secretary General
of the Montreal Labor Council

Teminded the Canadian Tribune

Of some of the features of Mc-
arthyism in the WMA. “Witch
unting is an inherent feature

Of the act,” he explained it. R

18 worse than guilt by associa-

tion since it lends itself to peo-

Ple being denounced. Anyone

Who bears a grudge or wishes

to create harm can simply sug-

8est a name to the authorities
and they are detained immedi-
ately. No warrant, no lawyer, no

Charge, no bail. Incarceration at

the discretion of the federal

authorities.

“The Montreal Labor Council
actively opposes the WMA or
any other special measures Ot-

in"
litt

“Our Indochina policy is simple. We call for peace—

tawa may devise,” he summed
up.

The President of Local 568, In-
ternational Brotherhood of Elec-
trical Workers’ is Henri Gagnon.
The local is very large with a
membership of more than 10,000.
Mr. Gagnon was visibly agitated
as he spoke about the recent
events that have shaken the
country. He himself had been a
labor candidate in the recent
civic elections which had seen
the Drapeau-Saulnier - clique
sweep back into power.

“The War Measures Act until
proven differently*has acted as
an electoral measures law. The
shadow of machine guns coin-
cided with the total elimination
of any opposition at City Hall.
It now seems as if Drapeau will
even remove the freedom to
think differently in Montreal.

“Drapeau is a latter day Mc-
Carthy. The only crisis we have
apprehended so far is that there
is 9% unemployment and that
this will rise to an anticipated
15% this winter. There is a
crisis of unemployment in Que-
bec. In the city of Sherbrooke
we electricians are preparing for
50% unemployment-

“These are the facts which ag-
gravate the class struggle. The
only way Quebec and Ottawa
can escape the wrath of labor is
by disarming them. And this is
what the War Measures Act is
all about.”

Jean Marie Bedard, the burly
Quebec leader of the Interna-
tional Woodworkers of America,
said it with a vehemence, “I
am opposed to the War Meas-
ures Act. It is a psychological
offensive against all labor, all the
left and all change.”

He went on'to decry the FLQ
and their “impermissible” tac-
tics. It was they who permitted
this pandora’s box of reaction to
be opened by Trudeau. -And he
went on to say:

“Bourgeois democratic rights
belong to the working class too!
We fought for them. The terror-
ists want to throw out the baby
with the bath water.”

Mr. Bedard went on to remind
us of Section 98 and the old Pad-
lock Law which haunted Quebec
for 20 years. It was used against
labor as well as dissenters and
the parallel with the WMA is
well within reality, he explained.

At. the headquarters of the

then bomb ‘em all to hell.”

Confederation of National Trade
Unions we spoke to Michel Ri-
oux, journalist and spokesman
attached to the union. We asked
him how the union viewed the
War Measures Act.

“We view the entire episode

as a frame-up,” he declared.
“The suppression of liberty
threatens democracy much more
than it threatens terrorism.
“We are convinced that Ot-
tawa is trying to intimidate the
more militant sections of the
Quebec population. Only recall
that 24% voted for independ-
ence and then you can appre-
ciate how frenzied and frustrat-
ed the Trudeau gang are.
“Ottawa’s action reminds us
of a recent film that was issued
by the National Film Board en-
titled, Tonight We Frighten You.

They are actually trying to.

breed a psychosis into the peo-
ple.”

He pointed out of his window
to where we could see army heli-
copters fluttering over the city.
Down below on .the streets,
army vehicles rigged for action
careened around corners. He
told us of innocents being per-
secuted, private homes violated
even their own union agents ar-
rested.

“The government used its fist
instead of its head. To rid Que-
bec of: terrorists requires not
military occupation but pro-
found and deep social reforms.
With the developments that
have occurred we can only as-
sume that Trudeau is building
or nurturing the strength of an
ultra-right group in Canada.”

The concensus: is clear and
forthright. The working class of
Quebec condemn the FLQ. They
demand the immediate repeal of
the War Measures Act. They
want those arrested and detain-
ed to be set free and their rights
protected. They call for a united
front of all those who have the
same objectives and they urge
immediate development of a
new political program.

Hitler’s spawn

The ‘anti-Lenin’ display

_By JOHN WEIR

With the proclamation of the

War Measures Act and the con-
certed effort to swing politics in
Canada to the right (similar
drives are under way in the U.S.
and Britain), encouragement has
been provided for every slimy
creature there is to come out
from under the rocks.

The once ultra-British Empire
and ultra-Waspish Toronto Tele-
gram has become fervently Zion-
ist, for example, but while fall-
ing all over itself over Golda
Meir and Moshe Dayan, it also
opens its pages to calls for the
rehabilitation of . . . General
Vlasov!

Who was Vlasov? He was a
Soviet commander who not only
surrendered to Hitler early in
the war but tried to organize
and actually did recruit a few
hundred traitors and criminals
from among Russian war prison-
ers to fight with the German
Army against their own — and
Canada too. They were among
the most brutal of the Nazi
janissaries. Vlasov was captured
by the Soviet Army at the war’s
end, courtmartialed and shot.

Vietnamization
via desertion

HANOI — Mutinies by Saigon
puppet forces and the desertion
of 70,000 in two years from May,
1968, to June, 1970, are disclosed
in tabulations compiled by the
press agency of the Provisional
Revolutionary Government of
South Vietnam.

The agency said Saigon mu-
tineers had put out of action a
large number of their officers
and had destroyed 200,000 tons
of ammunition, 50 aircraft, 11

naval vessels, 240 motor vehicles .

and many supply depots.

The Telegram wants him back
—or at least his shade! It be-
lieves, then, that Canada was on
the wrong side in World War I.
Of course, even at that time its
heart was never in the battle
against fascism.

And look at the conglomera-
tion gathered together with
Mayor Dennison’s blessing (by
the way, is he still a member of
the NDP?) to put up the “anti-
Lenin display” in the Toronto
Public Library. Just take two of
them, the League for the Libera-
tion of Ukraine and the Anti-
Bolshevik Bloc of Nations. If
Dennison doesn’t know their ori-
gins and colors, he should make
it his business to know before
he takes patronage over them—
unless it’s a question of birds of
a feather, of course. If the press
doesn’t know who it’s dealing
with, it should find out before
lauding and popularizing them,
and printing their ravings as
gospel either in the news col-
umns or letters pages.

They have no excuse for not
knowing.

From the Ukraine has come
plentiful material, naming gam-
es, citing facts and quoting offi-
cial documents—with photostats
— from Hitler Germany and
Mussolini’s Italy, as well as tes-
timony of eyewitnesses — both
victims and former colleagues—
to prove to anybody whose mind
is even one-quarter open to rea-
son, that here we have to do
with a background of fascist es-
pionage, treason and terrorism
going back for decades. These
materials have been made avail-
able: in Canada (Taras Mihal’s
pamphlet, “Assembly of Buf-
foonish Nationalists,” for exam-
ple) in  fEnglish translation.
There’s no excuse for ignorance.

Why are facts ignored?
Why are lies given full ‘play?

Why are the living corpses of
Hitler’s spawn dug up?

Who benefits from this pois-
oning of the atmosphere?

Theatre Review

CHILDREN'S GHETTO

VOICES

The stage of the Crest Thea-
tre, dormant these three years,
has come alive again, offering
shelter to The Me Nobody
Knows, a rock musical which
may well shiver the timbers of
the old Mount Pleasant house
for some time to come.

The Me is based mostly on a
New York “inner city” school
teacher’s collection of writings
he encouraged his kids to put
on paper—no holds. barred, no
marks granted or deducted, no
grammar or spelling restrictions.
Stephen M. Joseph wanted his
pupils to speak their minds, lay
bare their souls, assault their
dragons. And they did.

The children, mainly black
and Puerto Rican, describe their
ghetto. Bitter, angry and scared,
even foul-mouthed and obscene,
they talk of the drugs, the
crimes and the rapes, the rats
and the poverty that surrounded
them.

But the emphasis is altogether
too negative; little hope is seen.
Besides, one becomes impatient
with the current stage formula
that requires a quota of shock
words and (precociously here)
sex scenes to grab audience at-

tention, especially since some of
the young performers are very
young indeed. I don’t think it’s
at all cute.

In the Toronto edition, whose
producer has been joined by two
Torontonians, and which has
been staged here by Robert H.
Livingston, who directed the
Obie award-winner (best 1970
musical) three children and nine
young teenagers afford ample
evidence of their stage talents.
But I was not much moved. Per-
haps it is because I am leery

of “performers” and consider it
a special kind of profanity to
make small children (especially.
small black children) posture
and prance like mechanical adult
show-business entertainers.

Individually the youngsters
have energy and charm but, with
three or four exceptions, it
seems they have Leen trained to
perform rather than to feel. The
result is that we are watching
a series of exhibitions and not
responding emotionally. And if
the portrayal of tragedy in the
ghettoes (including our own in
Canada) can evoke only ap-
plause and little emotion, then
something very important has
been lost.

Nevertheless there are more
than a few rewarding things
among the twenty-one numbers
— the poems and essays of the
children, Will Holt’s lyrics, Gary
William Friedman’s music, the
slum setting by Clarke Dunham,
the Stan Goldberg and Mopsy
film projections, numbers like
Black, If I Had a Million Dol-
lars, and the affecting readings
of a reformatory boy’s letters
by Jose Luis Gomez. —

—Miartin Stone

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1970—PAGE 9