Published Weekly at ROOM 104, SHELLY BUILDING 119 West Pender Street Vancouver, B.C. by the TRIBUNE PUBLISHING CO. MArine 5288 TOM McEWEN fess Mditor IVAN BIRCHARD .- : . Manager EDITORIAL BOARD : Nigel Morgan Maurice Rush Minerva Cooper Al Parkin 1 Year, $2.00; 6 Months, $1.60 Vancouver, B.C. Ottawa Subscription Rates: Printed By UNION PRINTERS, 2803 Bast Hastings Street) — — = Authorized as second-class mail _by the post-office department, aeraeene g ‘Peace is indivisiole DECADE ago Maxime Litvinov, then Soviet foreign minister, proposed in the League of Nations that all nations disarm—total disarmament. The career diplomats of Anglo-French imperialism, whose plaything the League had become, pooh-poohed the idea. ‘“Prepesterous,” “ab- surd,” “impractical,” “impossible,” were only a féw of the milder descriptive adjectives these monocled gentlemen ap- plied to Litvinov’s proposals as they sipped their whiskey and sodas and afternoon teas in Geneva’s swank cafes. Lit- vinov’s further proposal of “partial” disarmament suffered a like fate. “Gad, it just isn’t done, you know, old _chap,” murmured the fraternity of the old school tie in their best Oxford English, fully conscious of the fact that their respec- tive governments were even at that moment building up Hitler as the instrument of their. conspiracies against the Soviet Union. : On October 30 before the assembly of the United Na- tions, Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov called for universal disarmament, laying a specific 4-point plan before the UN for its achievement: (1) That the general assembly considers a general reduction of armaments necessary ; (2) that the use of atomic energy for military purposes be banned; (3) that the general assembly recommends to the security coun- cil the practical achievement of points 1-2; (4) that the general assembly calls upon the governments of all states to render every possibls assistance to the security council in this undertaking. Senator Warren R. Austin, US delegate to the UN, characterized Foreign Minister Molotcv’s disarmament pro- posals as “tough” and “smart.’ Other repercussions from UN delegates on the Soviet proposals were “clever,” “im- pressive,” “aggressive,” with indications that in the course of the sessions the atomic diplomats of the Anglo-American bloc would find the going much harder to pooh-pooh a dis- armament program for the establishment of stable peace and international security, than did their monocled prototypes in the imperialist-ridden League of Nations. Foreign Minister Molotov’s program will give impetus to the demand for a genuine people’s peace; for the curtail- ment of excessive expenditures for armaments and war pre- parations which do not correspond to peaceful post-war per- spectives, and confirms what millions of the world’s peoples have learned through cruel suffering and experience, that “peace is indivisible.” It will also aid in smoking out those imperialistic phillistines like Churchill, whose lips frame pretended desire for “friendship” with the USSR, but whose actions express hostility and the urge to take up where Hitler left off. End fascism in Spain RYGVE LIE, secretary-general of the UN, startled the supporters of the Anglo-American bloc in the:open- ing sessions of the UN when he called for action to “re- store liberty and democracy in Spain.” “It is an unhappy fact,’ Lie told the assembly, “that the Fascist control of Spain has continued despite the defeat of Germany and Japan.” : = When the Polish delegate raised the issue in the last session of the UN, the atomic appeasers and their servile press sought to play Poland’s demand down on the grounds that the latter was ‘a Soviet satellite. An ‘investigation’ committee was struck off to inquirs as to whether Franco Spain constituted a threat to world peace. This was some- thing like having a committte struck off to see whether fire is hot. And Sir Alexander Cadogan, the suave profes- sional diplomat who serves His Majesty’s Socialist Govern- ment as potently as he formerly served His Majesty’s Con- servative administration, opined that the Franco regime did not menace world peace. ; : : A few days ago, Prime Minister Attlee addressed the British Trade Union Congress at Brighton. The sum and substance of his speech was “those terrible communists who menace our democratic way of life,” or words to that effect. Not a word on the unfinished business of wiping out fascism in its last European stronghold, a terroristic regime imposed upon the democratic people of Spain by the bayonets of Hitler and Mussolini, through the ‘non- intervention’ of those who now take up Hitler’s anti-com- intern mantle and see no danger to peace in the existence of Franco Spain. Attlee’s plea (an exact parallel of Cham- berlain’s appeasement explanations) was that any concerted action against Franco Spain ‘would strengthen Franco.’ PACIFIC TRIBUNE — PAGE 4 Short weighting the people Rea cti ona ry Gg an Gg -U 2) avwwvwtZTZ_w_ ATTACH Against Bill 9 AU CRT NTT by Mo r ri Ss Ru sh MATTER of very great importance to the wel- fare of Canada is now be- ing debated before the Privy Council in London. The is- sue being decided is wheth- passed which gave the Canad- jan parliament power “to repeal or amend any act of the Parli- ament of the United Kingdom, or any order, rule or regulation made thereunder, insofar as the same is now part of the law of er appeals to the Privy this Dominion.” Council shall be discon- _ Under these Statutes the Ca- tinued nadian parliament had the au- When Confederation was car- ried through under the British Worth America Act in 1867 the inant position in Canadian life thority to end appeals to the Privy Council. But the reac- tionary interests still opposed it. ‘rising monopoly interests “se Finally in 1939, Bill 9 was aae ed guarantees that their dom- troduced into the Canadian Commons. This Bill would abolish the right of appeal to would be maintained. They ithe Privy Council. Bill 9 was sought protection from the i : people, and these safeguards referred to the Supreme Court were given in the form of the Privy Council in London. For generations the demo cratic people in Canada fought of Canada which in a majority judgment ruled that it was within the law for the Canadian parliament to take such action. to end appeals to the Privy e Council Not only did it in- INGE then the reactionary fringe on the sovereignty of financial circles in Canada this country, but has also been have conspired to defeat Bill 9, used repeatedly by big business and have succeeded in getting to stifle our democratic develop- the . provincial governments of ment and prevent popular ac- tion against the monopolies. Popular pressure finally fore- the three main industrial prov- inces—Ontario, Quebec: and B.C. —to oppose the Bill and thereby ed changes, and in 1931 the maintain the right of appeal to Statutes of Westminster were to the Privy. Council. TTR TMNT TTT Te Regardless of this Munich eyewash, the Trade Union Con- eress, representing millions of British workers, demanded an immediate break with the bloody Franco regime. - Among the many representations which will be laid before the UN by the World Federation of Trade Uniens, the issue of placing the Franco regime beyond the pale of democratic nations will be uppermost. Representing nearly 70 million workers of many lands, the demands of the WFTU for the ousting of Franco cannot long be ignored by those who would turn the UN into another bloc-ridden League of Nations. Now is the time for Canadian workers, anti-fascists in every walk of life, to make their voices heard in the UN assembly; to back the efforts of the WFTU with wires and resolutions demanding action against Fran- co. Too many graves constitute the grim monument erected by democratic peoples through their governments’ appease- ment of fascism. Some 600 Canadians died in the ranks of the International Brigades fighting fascism and the defeat of their cause delivered Spanish democrats to a decade of terror. The cause in which those few hundred Canadians died during the Spanish civil war triumphed at the cost of many thousand Canadian lives in the second world war, but the triumph cannot be complete while fascism rules in Spain. Let the democratic peoples of the world speak through the medium of the UN and the Spanish people will sweep the hated Franco\and his Nazi-inspired Falange into the Mediterranean overnight. ' This coalition of Drew, Du- plessis and Hart is seeking to perpetuate the power of reac- tionary monopoly interests. Sig- nificantly it was the same three provincial premiers who under- mined the Dominion-Provincial conferences! The action of the MHart-Ans- comb coalition in opposing Bill 9 and spending the public's money to fight it before the Privy Council should not be passed over lightly. It is further proof that the coalition repre- sents the basic imterests of the big monopolies in B.C: It em- phasizes the‘ position taken by the LPP that the-coalition can- not be relied upon ‘to defend the people’s interests against big business. e HIE public, and in the first place the labor movement should not forget that in the near future the CPR and the timber interests of Vancouver Island are appealing to the Privy Council to uphold their Tight not to pay taxes on the former FEisquimalt-Nanaimo rail- road lands, through which means they have robbed the provincial treasury of eight mil- lion dollars in the last ten years. If this case were heard in 2 Canadian court than the people would have more direct -say in its outcome. As it is, this is- sue, like many others, will be fought out in a high court thou- sands of miles from B.C. where echoes of popular resentment could not be heard and where high-priced lawyers, backed by the unlimited financial resources of the big corporations, will be able to fight their case on more favorable grounds. Here is seen the roles the Privy Council plays in protecting monopoly inter ests. The Hart-Anscombe coalition — must be brought to task on this issue. The people of B.C: oppose 2 policy which lines up our prov- ince with the notoriously reac] tionary Drew and Duplessis om! basic issues facing the people. 4 | wave of resentment should rise)! from the labor and progressivé | movement against this betraya! to monopoly interests. 2 i FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 19%