The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-05-26

still work more than AZ hours a week,
that women and children, Negro and
foreign-born unskilled workers are ex-
plotted at least as mercilessly as the
most exploited strata of the Euro
pean working class. The prosperity
of the people" is best illustrated by
the miserable shacks of the Southern
cotton fields and the poverty-stricken
slums of the Eastern cities. In his
1926 address to Congress President
Coolidge said: "The power of the
purse is the power over liberty" A
handful of millionaires exercise pow
er over the purse, and they exercise
power over the liberty of the over
whelming majority of the United
States. A handful of powerful mil
honaires own all the means of pro-
duction-the factories, machinery,
mines, railroads, water power-of this
country, and are thus in position to
force the overwhelming majority of
the people into wage slavery. The
wealth of the few is the poverty of
the many; the liberty Of the few is
the bondage of the masses.
Indictment of American Capitalism
Overproduction and starvation,
overtime and unemployment, accumu-
lation Of wealth and accumulation of
poverty-these are the features of
capitalist prosperity for the workers
and working farmers. The very fact
that there can be such a thing as
overproduction as long as the needs
of every member of society are still
unsatisfied is the most terrible in
dictment against capitalist economy.
Capitalist society is unable to control
it's own forces of production. AS the
President of the United States Cham
Der of Commerce put it in his speech
of May 10, 1928: "there has been an
economic thunderbOlt of increasing
production Embossed by industry"
Unemployment is a permanent phe-
nomenon in capitalist society. There
is at any time IL million unem-
ployed. The constant industrial re-
serve army is one of the props of
capitalist society. The present de-
preston with it's or 5 million I'M
employed workers brings untold mis-
cry. The labor of millions of chill
dren is one of the basic institutions
of capitalism. Peonage no better than
chattel slavery, Jim Crowism, and
lynching are acknowledged sources of
present day capitalist prosperity. The
shameless exploitation of the un-
skilled foreign-born workers and the
oppression of the whole races are
parts of the capitalist system. The
modern industrial serfdom of COM
pany towns is in existence to the
glory of the "freest" constitution in
the world. Capitalist industry con-
ducts in the form of industrial acct
dents determination against the
working class. The infamous speed
up system causes The workers to age
prematurely. Old workers are thrown
away like slack, like useless by-prod-
ucts. Not less than 100000 old peo-
pie are forced to live the life of ode
pendents." Sickness and early death
are the punishment for poverty. The
United States Public Health Service
states: "Both sickness and death are
much more frequent among those with
low incomes than among those with
incomes adequate to comfortable liv-
ing"
Capitalist decency and morality is
symbolized by almshouses, brothels,
slums, and bootleg saloons. Prostitu-
ton of science, literature, and art is
on the same level as prostitution of
women. There is a crusade against
the "crime move" against petty lar
ceny by the poor, conducted by those
who are guilty of large-scale corrup-
ton and lobbying. With the excep-
ton of backward and impoverished
China and India the powerful and
rich and civilized United States is the
only country which does not have anv
social legislation. Jingoism, militar-
ism, robber wars against Nicaragua
and China these are the results of
American capitalism.
President Coolidge summed up in
the following way his picture of Am
erican capitalism: "Those are some
of the economic results which have
accrued from the American princi-
Piles of reliance upon the initiative and
the freedom of the individual. 1t is
the very antithesis 6f Communism.
And President Coolidge is right.
American capitalism as it is-with all
its economic, political, and moral re-
sults-is the very antithesis of Com
munism. There is no other alterna-
tive. The issue is capitalism or Com
munism. The Workers Communist
Party of America declares itself the
deadly enemy of capitalism. 1t has
as its aim the overthrow of capital
ism, the establishment Of a workers
and farmers government, the estab-
lishment Of a Communist society in
which the means of production will
not be the private property of the
few, a society which viii not be based
on profit bl1t on labor which will NOT