The toiler. [volume] (Cleveland, Ohio) 1919-1922, 1921-04-23
The Shop Commfttee-Wh Kind?

you see, even here there is lot of
educational work to be done before
the shop committees may be put in
a proper working condition.
When, How and What For?
1t is an absurd policy to go ahead
and create shop committees without
first carefully preparing ground for
them. Through such action we may
only discredit the idea and gain moth
ing. A timorous weakling can be
created in any shop, especially if
self appointment is practised. But
this is not what we want! We want
shop committees which are active
and aggressive, striving for workers
control over the shop.
l do not believe, as one comrade
writes:
A voluntary (self appointed) shop
committee "can take the lead in
taking up grievances of the workers
against the management and by ag-
gressive action to redress their
grievances, establish their confidence
in the shop organization and the
shop committee system" Evidently
the comrade who wrote the quota
tion has not been inside Of re-
preventative American shop for some
time.
Let us take any large industrial
establishment. 1t is easy to find a
half dozen fit men for a shop COM
mittee. Suppose these men forget
what they have seen, and, finding
grievances, 60 to the employers and
demand redress. What will happen? ?
"Ah, you must be the Anarchists
who are distributing bolshevik liter
ature around here. / am running this
place the way l see fit; you get
your hats and coats and get out"
Thus the shop committee will be
liquidated quicker than it was con-
stituted, and it's ex-members, when
looking for new jobs, will never dare
tell their last place of employment.
During my thirteen years in Amer
lea / have not met an employer who
will not Immediately get rid of a
committee which is organized in his
shop for aggressive action against
him, and the firing Of which would
not cripple his business to a cor
siderable extent. Therefore, it is a
useless waste of time to set up
voluntary shop committees. The kind
of shop committees we advocate can
not exist in any shop before the ne
cessity for such thing is fully
understood by considerable number
of workers, who would be ready to
protect it. Hence, our primary task
in this direction shall not be to set
up worthless shop committees, but
to concentrate all efforts on GER
tain educational work leading to-
wards establishment of powerful
ones in due time.
"The campaign in favor of the
shop committees must be conducted
in such a way that into the minds
of the popular masses, even not di-
rectly belonging to the factory pro-
letariat, there should be instilled the
conviction that the bourgeoisie is re-
sponsible for the economic crisis, while
the pro'etariat, under the motto OF
workers control of industry, is
struggling for the organization of
production, for the suppression of
speculation, disorganization and high
prices. Our duty is to struggle for
control over production on the
ground of the most insistent ques-
tions of the day, the lack of fuel,
the transport crisis-to unite the
different groups of proletariat and
to attract wide circles Of the petty
bourgeoisie, which is becoming more
and more proletarized day by day,
and is really suffering extremely
from the economic crisis"
1--WE must instill into the minds
of the masses the consciousness that
a systematic reconstruction of the
public economy on the basis Of a
capitalist order, which would mean
in favor of the capitalist class, is
now totally impossible. The organi-
zation Of the economic management
corresponding with the interests of
the working masses, is only possible
when the government is in The hands
of the working class" Thus Is sum-
med up the immediate work in the
agitation for the Shop Committee.
In order to be able to carry out
our work in this spirit, we must
organize our own educational groups
in every shop and labor union. These
groups, the bosses and reactionary
labor leaders shall not know. Only
when a considerable number Of work
ers show unmistakable signs that
they are ready to back UP aggres-
sive leadership, when discomfort has
reached high level, only then a
meeting Of all workers Of shop
shall be called and the shop COM
mittee elected TO takn care Of the