The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1929-04-27
PORTO RICAN
NEGROES MUCH
EXPLOITED HERE
Pay High Rents for
Miserable Rooms

tOOHttHUtU JjOH UJ6 OHEt
kee enlightenment. They tried to
evadn the enacles of the monster
only to find themselves caught in it's
flame and fire.
During the last six years this
wave of immigration grew and is
still growing today. Porto Ricans,
being natives of United States, can
pass the statute of liberty, in as
many numbers as they please. They
are allowed to seek slavery nearer
the torch of liberty if they choose.
AS a result of the Porto Rican
hurricanes the immigration has
swelled considerably.
Many Are Negroes.
1t must be remembered that many
OF the Porto Ricans are Negroes. 1t
is estimated that so per cent of the
Porto Ricans IN New York City are
Negroes.
The Porto Rican toilers of the soil
came to New York City, and found
that not only must they live in filthy
and crowded tenements, but that
they would be constantly subjected
to the ripping teeth of the saw of
discrimination and racial prejudice.
Their lot is even worse than that
of American Negroes. They do no
know the language. The sound of
foreign syllables added to the color
of the skin gave the exploiters the
excuse to make a doubly strong
sound and color l.arrier of frenzied
hatred.
They learned this soon enough.
They found that real estate men
would not rent them apartments, I'M
less they would live in Negro Har-
! lem, where every available bit of
space was taken and where the
shears of rent raises cut many lives
to pieces.
They also learned this, when Ly
mere force of numbers, they broke
their way into lower Harlem, and
were allowed to live in large num-
bers when the landlords discovered
that they could use the color of
their skins and the strange sounds
of their language to demand higher
rents.
Many Porto Rican Negroes were
welcomed to the tune of street
fights and the splash of blood. They
found that there was some strong
force at work arousing antagonism
between them and the Jews. The
petty bourgeoisie of Harlem-own-
ers of small grocery stores and
other businesses, many of them
Jews-were threatened by the grow
ing tide of immigration. Some
Porto Ricans turned into petty
bourgeois themselves, opening small
dingy grocery stores and poached
upon the property of the Jewish
businessmen. The antagonism which
developed grew out of this competi-
ton between the petty businessmen
of different nationalities. Jewish
pushcart vendors found that Latin
American housewives would buy
from men of their own color.
The landlords had no small part
to play in instilling this antagonjsm.
They took advantage of color and
languages to set up different scales
of rent, refusing to give the least
comfort to the newcomers.
Out of this antagonism between
the petty vendors there grew street
fights, murders, standings. 1t was
dangerous for two Porto Rican
Negroes, during the period of these
artificially instilled riots, to be
heard talking Spanish on the streets.
The workers of all races and ma
tionalities have no reason for such
antagonism. The causes of the race
riots in lower Harlem are a clear
indication of how race barriers are
built up by petty trading people and
exploiters. The antagonism was
made all the stronger when the
chain stores began putting these
small fry out of business, making
their struggle for profits all the
sharper.
More Discrimination.
On top of all this, and in addi-
ton to discrimination when they
tried to work for bread, the Porto
Rican Negroes found that the ex-
ploiters here had developed their
system of barbed-wire fences of
racial prejudice into so subtle net
work, that in the radiating point of
enlightment, degree of color offered
the occasion for another grade of
discrimination.
They found that there was a
barbed-wire fence between them
selves and white Latin-Americans
and Creoles. The poisoned fangs of
exploitation and discrimination, hiss
their way through lower Harlem.
In tomorrow's Daily Worker,
read how landlords and bosses
reap the profits of barbed-wire
fences. how the workers are
cOrralied off into these fenced
areas for mere vicious exploita-
ton.
Tenants of all colors and ma
ti0nalities, of all parts of the
country. write your letters to
your Daily Worker and tell
about the house you live in.
Workers Strike, Prove
CIT c1kx,V Dead -