The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-06-23
Continued From Previous Is8ue.)

Oppression of Negroes.
Comrades, one of the planks in our
Party platform deals with the ques-
ton of the oppression of the Negro
race. This plank 1 want to empha-
size here. The Workers (Communist)
Party appears in the United States as
the sole champion, organizer, and de-
fender of the Negro race. Our fight
| is for full social, political, and in
dustrial rights for Negroes. In all
our work we must keep this phase of
our Party program squarely before
our eyes. In the past we have been
all too inactive in this respect. But
we must make this campaign the be-
ginning of fresh efforts to unite the
Negroes in behalf of their race and
class interests, so that the world can
recognize that the Workers (Commu-
nist) Party is really the defender and
leader of the oppressed Negroes in
this country. (Applause.)
At this time l shall not deal with
the whole Negro question. There is
only one angle that 1 want to touch
upon now. Our election campaign
will take US into the southern states.
(Applause.) We have plank in our
platform on the Negro question that
will arouse the most violent opposi-
ton in every element in the South
that is determined to hold the Negro
race in subsection. Nevertheless, we
will go into the ultra-reactionary
South and we will speak for the Ne
gro. We will defend our platform.
(Applause.) In the land of lynch law
we will denounce lynching Gap
plause.) In the home of jim Grow,
we will attack segregationism. Gap
plause.) The entry of the Workers
(Communist) Party into the South,
and the bold raising of the issue of
the emancipation of the Negroes dur
ing the coming electiop campaign,
will stand out as one of the historical
events in the development of the class
struggle in the United States. Gap
plause.)
The Political Parties.
Comrades, let me give you just a
brief Characterization of the various
political parties. The workers have
nothing to look for from the repub-
lican and democratic parties except
a continuation and intensification of
the hardships under which the work
ers suffer. Both are controlled by
big capital A list of the campaign
fund donators to either party reads
like a roster of trustified industry.
Both represent the interests of big
business. Their whole record is one
of oppression of the workers for the
benefit of the employers. In its poll
cies the democratic party is as much
the party of big capital, of big bank
ers and manufacturers as the repub-
lican party itself. Smith is just as
loyal a servant of capitalism as
Hoover.
Between the two old parties there
are no real issues. The issues that
once divided them, the tariff, states
rights, ETC., money question, ETC., no
longer play this role. Such differ
ences as exist over farm relief, pro-
hibition, religion, etc., are not differ
ences between the old parties but of
groups within each of them. The
capitalists have made themselves
masters of both big parties, with
their miscellaneous following, and use
them to further their own class in
terests.
The reactionary trade union Off
Gals who call upon the masses of
workers to vote for the candidates of
these two old parties are misleaders
of labor. They betray the workers
into the hands of their class enemies.
They are the political lickspittles of
the, republican and democratic poll
ticianss the agents of the exploiters
Of labor
What is true for the workers re-