The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1927-03-25

Continued from Page One)
counter-revolutionary press. Now It
is barking on a cold trail. The latest
fashion in anti-Soviet propaganda
calls for tears over "Russia's hordes
of vicious, homeless children" who
"stand in ragged filthy groups on the
corners Of the city's busiest streets,
their bare feet stirring restlessly in
the snow, their arms hug their meagre
chests, while their eyes eagerly APP
praise the fur coats of the passerby."
This was contained in a story sent by
mail by a Moscow correspondent to
his paper six weeks before the first
heavy snow flew in Moscow, thanks
to an unusually late winter and long,
mild autumn. So we have to do here
obviously with made-to- order horror
story reminiscent of Hearst's cable to
the artist, Remington, sent to Cuba
for war pictures" just prior to the
sinking of the Maine: "You furnish
the pictures and I'll furnish the war"
the millionaire publisher wired the
artist when he reported from the scene
that there was no war for him to
depict. The Moscow correspondent
needed only to furnish the date-line,
the snow and the freezing children
could be furnished in New York.
Heritage of Past.
No Communist denies that there are
homeless children in Russia. There
are-many thousands of them. The
problem is frankly and publicly recog-
nized, and the Soviet government is
making most strenuous efforts to COM
pletely eradicate this evil, inherited
from Tsarist days ard tremendously
aggravated by years of imperialist
war, following by Intervention and
counter-revolutionary massacres, and
by one Of the worst famines in his
tory.
The government is doing more and
spending more to overcome this evil
than any other country on earth to
overcome the identical evil in its
boundaries, and this does not exclude
the richest of all: the United States.
1t has already astounding successes to
its credit and the complete liquidation
of the problem is reckoned with in the
course Of a three-year program of
governmental and voluntary social ac-
tivity.
- ] shall try to show not only how
greatly the capitalist newspaper sto-
ries about "children who Turk like lean
and hungry wolves in the shadows of
Russia's cities" distort and exaggerate
the problem, nor how false are the
tales of exile prisons on Arctic islands,
and the crime-wave Of &c and 7-year-
old bandits" but, in addition, these
articles will show the origin and true
extent of this problem, and the meas
ures employed TO cope with it. It will
then be seen that not only are these
fairy-tales untrue-but that from the
very nature Of social relationships in
the Soviet Union they CANNOT POS
SIBLY be true.
How Many Are There?
On this question the plute propa-
gandists ought to get together first to
agree on a common line. A two-page
Hearst Sunday spread" tells us with
its customary Scientific" accuracy
that: "Official estimates place the to-
tai strength of this Juvenile army Of
the wretched at between 100000 and
100000" Surely there is enough lee
way here, It Is as II one said that the
population Of New York City is be-
tween 10 million and 80 million-even
the lowest Ia about twice TOO hiph.
and another hundred percent is added
for good-measure. This is a typical