The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1926-11-06
Russian and American Trade Unions

les, and taken the fundamentally nee
essary step Of building a mass pohti-
cal party II the workers. They are
lined up Aeek by jowl with all the
crooked politicians in the country.
The disastrous results speak for them
selves.
Compare the Russian situation with
this political debacle. The govern
msIt is IL The hands of the workers.
They donE9 ate the whole political and
industrial situation. The workers
hsg9 EAstT own party. the Russian
Communist Party and it is the master
II the Situation. In the United States
the capitalists are in complete con-
troll shd in the Soviet Union the work
s1s are in control. Yet the American
trade uaton .bireaucrats venture to
snesr at 3he Russian workers.
Workers Education.
Wi4hia the past few years the A. r.
Of = Sstbns have made faint ges-
turs - ssie direction of workers edu-
cation But this, as expressed thru
the workers Education Bureau and
various other organizations, only en-
phasfzes the weakness and capitalists
character of this education. Ameri-
can tSads union journalism is a calarn-
ity 20 our labor movement. Many OF
the papers are indistinguishable al
most from those Of the company
unions. This is to say nothing OF the
dozens Of grating sheets in various
industrial centers, which brazenly
take brides from the employers to
fght everything progressive in the la
Dor movement One can read miles
Of printed matter in American trade
union journals and never run across
an idea Of Importance in the solution
OF the workers problems. BY and
large, no important labor movement
has such a pitifully weak educational
system as the trade unions Of this
country.
On the other hand, the Russian
unions are absolutely supreme in this
respect of education. 1t is safe to sax
they are carrying on more education
mot to speak Of its inco1aparably obesal
ter quality than all the rest Of the
worlds labor movement put together.
Their splendid workers clubs and
various other educational systems are
carrying on an enormous work of en-
Tightening the workers everywhere.
Their system Of trade union journals
are beyond compare. A splendid ex-
ample is the daily paper OF the rail-
road workers, The Gudok. This paper
has about 100000 circulation, and is
of a. easTmous influence in the life Of
the railroad workers. Compared to
the Russians, the American trade
union leaders have not learned the
first A, B, C's of workers education.
Ugaroff's Question. -
When in Leningrad recently our
party met with Ugaroh, the secretary
of the local Central Labor Council.
AS we were about to leave he said
We'll, We have shown you our unions
and how they are carrying on their
work in the factories. You come from
a great industrial country where the
unic@S are much older than ours. Now
you tell us what your unions have to
teach Us In the way Of labor organiza.
tiCa- What have they that is better
than ours1 We will be only too glad
20 learn from them if we can"
We were stumped. It was such an
unexpected question We cudgeied
our brains, trying to conjure up a
single feature OF the American unions
that the Russian unions could profit
ably pattern after. But in vain. We
could think OF nothing. and we said so.
In their structure, leadership, manner
OF conducting business-in every re-
spect. the Russian unions are thou
sand miles ahead Of the American
unions. cursed as the latter are with
reactionary and faker leaders, anti
quated craft structure, B. & o. plan
class collaboration conceptions, etc.
All the vyny bark 10 Moscow In fart