The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1925-03-25
WHAT The MINERS
INTERNATIONAL is
AND OUGHT TO Be
Dawes Plan is Slave Plan
For World
BY ALEX REID.

10 bSSOAhlh5 HOlb ScluOAlt anu uOllC-
ing that the condition of the miners
thruout the world is becoming more
deplorable, the same situation pre-
vailing everywhere, it might not be
amiss at this time to inquire into the
cause from well-informed sources.
The cause Of the bad situation in
Europe, which is reflected in America,
is neither more nor less than the mon.
umental disgrace-the prostitute child
of the international chamber of COM
merce, better known as the despicable
and infamous Dawes plan"
The effect of this plan is seen in
the German mining industry, which
has speeded up to a terrifying degree.
Approximately 20 per cent of the
miners have been discharged from the
industry since 1922, and yet produc-
ton has been increased approximately
Is per cent. Wages have been de-
creased until the miners receive
barely enuf to subsist upon.
The average wage of the German
miners is SLIPS per day, and their work
day has been extended from seven,
to 10 and IL hours per day. The cost
of living has increased to the point
where wages cannot touch the bare
necessities, which is reducing the
miners to abject slaves exerting
themselves to the limit Of endurance,
as is seen in the enormous increase
in accidents.
On top of this, the threat is made
to cut further into their wages, and
the importation of men from the sur
rounding countries is steadily going
on for use as scabs if necessary.
Similar conditions prevail in Poland
and other countries in Europe. In
Great Britain, France, Holland, and
Belgium, the miners are practically
starving. Hundreds of thousands of
miners are unemployed. Wages are
being cut on every hand. The hours
of labor are frightening, and condi-
tions, the result of years of struggle,
are being lost with every break.
The conditions forced upon German
labor and the workers in like coun-
tries of Europe, thru the Dawes
plan, is the standard being set for the
whole world French, Belgian, and
British miners are unemployed be-
cause cheap German reparations coal
has taken their market. British and
American coal is being undersold in
Spain and Italy at $1.25 per ton.
Competition is the slogan-and the
mine owners are stressing every
means to break the miners union so
that no organized opposition may pre-
vail against them.
On this side of the ditch, the Dawes
plan is getting in it's work just as it is
in Germany and the rest of Europe
The mining districts of West Virginia
Kentucky, Tennessee and Alabama
are mostly "open shop" and the con-
ditions of the miners there are hor-
rible, working 10 hours per day on
starvation wages, with no provisions
for safeguarding the life and health
Of the miners.
The companies owning the mines
there, also own the stores, so if a
miner chances to make anything at
the mine he is relieved of it at the
store. The houses the miners live in,
mostly like barns, are also owned by
the companies, as likewise the town,
the doctor. the judge, the police
thugs-literally everything in and
around the mines.
Hundreds of miners with their fam
lilies are living on the hillsides, in
tents, all thru the long hard winter,
with scarcely anything to eat--the lit
tie children without shoes or proper
clothing, and no school to go to. The
miners in this pitiful condition are
being threatened with further wage
cuts and longer hours.
And the coal coming from these dis
tricts in competition with that from
the organized fields, has resulted in
unemployment and starvation thru.
out Illinois and the union-produced
coal all over America.
Nova Scotia is on strike against an
other reduction, and conditions there
are heartrending. The beasts Of
BESCo, the mine owners of the prov
ince, are organized for crushing on.
slaught against the miners, and the
miners have met them by stripping
the mines completely. The miners
have withdrawn even the engineers
and pumpmen, in this fight which
promises to be a fight to the finish
and one OF the hardest in their his
tory.
Wherever international capitalism
rules today, we have a similar condi
ton. Standing out prominently in
contrast to such conditions in CAPT
talist countries. however. is that Of
the miners in Soviet Russia, the only
country which has not been affected
by the Dawes plan. and the only
country in the world whore the min.