The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1929-12-05
SOUTHERN COTTON
MILLS AND LABOR

whole system of capitalist robbery and oppres-
sion, take on almost from their inception,
sharp revolutionary characteristics.
The so-called left wing of the American
Federation of Labor and its socialist party
allies, precisely because its role is to preserve
capitalism and not destroy it, approaches the
whole question of the struggle in the South
as though the Chartist revolts Of the l83Os In
England had been transferred to the United
States in this period, in the persons Of the off
spring of the early immigrants, and from this
false premise, draw the conclusion that the
whole struggle of the southern working class,
and especially in the textile industry, is mere
ly struggle for the right to organize unions,
etc. and is not political struggle having
definite revolutionary characteristics. Like
wise, having a social democratic conception of
the role of the oppressed races, attempting to
strengthen capitalism in this imperialist epoch
by trying to convince white workers that they
should act as "big brothers" to the oppressed
Negro masses in the approved Y. M. c. A.
style, they will not tell the American working
class that the mass basis for a victorious
struggle in the South, and consequently in the
whole United States, consists precisely in the
mobilization of the ten million Negro workers
into the ranks Of the American proletariat for
the sharpest class battles against American
imperialism.
The key by which the southern masses will
wrench open the door to victory, is the closest
union of the poor whites" so Enthusiastically
described in this book, and the still more OPP
pressed Negro masses.
The entry of our Party into the South, the
traditional stronghold of reaction in the United
States, as the leader of sharp class conflicts, is
an event of supreme Importance to the revo-
lutionary movement of the world. This book
marks an end of one period and the beginning
of another-the beginning of the revolutionary
epoch in the United States. 1t symbolizes for
all revolutionary workers the third period.
Lenin never tired of insisting that Communist
programs and tactics must be based on most
detailed knowledge of the conditions and sent-
ments of the masses. Were he alive today |
am sure he would consider this book as mark
ing the ripeness of the new southern prole-
tariat for revolutionary struggle. The book is
a feminist document.
The fact that wide sections of the new
southern proetariat, Anglo-SaXon in ancestry,
unschooled in MARKHAM theory of the social
revolution, have fought bitter struggles under
the leadership of our Party in the last few
months is sufficient evidence to prove that our
Party can and does act as the leader of mill
tant American workers as the slogan of "class
against class" takes on deeper meaning each
day from life itself.
The wealth of first material in this
book would alone make it stand out as work
ing class document in contradstinction to the
reformist drbble compiled by social welfare
workers. But coupled with the tremendous role
played by our Party in the South, the upsurge
of the southern proletariat and the growing
will to struggle of the whole American work
ing class, this book has direct revolutionary
significance.