The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1926-10-02

| to a QUESTIONABLE sent to labor Of
flcials of high rank" the leading query
being: Does your experience reveal
rather general state Of Indifference
on the part of the rank and file of
organized workers. Epstein says:
Twenty-Five Of the twenty-slx an
swers received unequlVocally de-
clared that their experience reveals
general state of Indifference at the
present time more pronounced than
ever before.
THE reasons given by these union
officials for the apathy they en-
countered are in themselves proof of
the charges made by the Communists,
|. Q. that the present labor leadership
has no understanding of the problems
of the labor movement, that it has
nothing but the most superficial view
of the period and that where it is not
merely superficial it is reactionary
and without any program except that
of dependence upon the capitalist
class. l quote again:
IN explaining the causes of this
inertia, the labor leaders blamed
the present stagnation upon them
selves, upon the war, business condi-
tions, on the Automobile, the radio,
the desire for pleasure, jazz,
the movies, games, good times, the
bad times, President Coolidge, the
ignorance Of the workers, the Com
munists, the autocratic and corrupt
management of the unions, the gross
materialism of the labor movement,
the capitalist press, the lack Of labor
press, the Church, the general disil-
llusionment and the like.
TN other words there were Just as
4 many reasons given as there were
labor leaders questioned and with one
or two exceptions which we may be
sure represented a negligibly small
minority of the labor officials replying
to the QUESTIONABLE, the answers are
a complete confession of bankruptcy.
The replies reads like a symposium
on whats Wrong With the World"
written by a collection of hell-fire
evangelists.
But the lack of interest in union ac-
tivities on the part of the rank and
file noted by these officials is fact
a dangerous but obvious fact which
demands the most serious attention
and a remedy. ~
A FEW concrete illustrations will
"A show that union attendance is at
what is probably the lowest ebb reach
ed in years. The Chicago two local
unions of the Amalgamated Associa-
ton of Street and Electric Railway
Employees have total membership of
10000. Yet it is on rare occasions
that the attendance at a meeting is
in excess of 100. Fs
A local union of machinists helpers
whose members are employed in the
largest and worst paid shops in the
city Of Chicago, and which has total
membership of around 600, has an
average attendance of IS or 20.
TIN the building trades the local union
4 meetings are little more than com.
,mittee sessions unless there is some
matter of unusual Importance.
Even in the local meetings of the
United Mine Workers of America,
where attendance has always been on
a far higher average than in the rest
of the trade unions, reliable reports
state that attendance is now at a
minimum in spite of the bad external
conditions and the interest in the
struggle now going on inside the
union. This is especially true in the
anthracite district.
THE conventions of important state
declarations Of labor held this year
Illinois, New York, Minnesota, Ohio
Pennsylvania, Michigan-have wit
messed triumphs of reaction and as a
consequence have been as dead as the
proverbial herring.
Almost all of them have been greet.
ed by the chamber of commerce in the
convention city and as a correspond
ent who attended the Illinois conven.
ton writes, quoting a reporter work
ing for capitalist sheet, ut is almost
impossible to tell this gathering from
meeting of the chamber of com.
MERGE"
ITO Be Continued)