The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1930-05-16
WHALENS FORGERIES, MAY
DAY, AND OUR PARTY


and all of them drawn back into the Party.
Already we can see, at least this Is true
in Connection that some Of the older Il do not
mean aged) Party comrades show signs of not
being able to keep up with the necessities of
the present situation. This is especially true
of some of the foreign language comrades
whose main activity has always been in frat
ernaI organizations of all Sorts These conf
rades are no. prepared and not willing to keep
up with the activity of the Party and more and
more are drawing themselves into the safe and
comfortable folds of these fraternal organiza-
tons, where they are not forced to face sharp
battles, clashes with the police, arrests, victim
ization, etc. The places of these comrades must
be taken by the new, more Americanized ele-
ments who have been drawn into the Party
during recent months Many of these workers,
having entered the Party through its recent
struggles are better prepared to carry on the
struggle than some of the older comrades.
The raising Of this problem of the probable
driving of our Party into illegality need not
create a panic in our Party as was the case
before and after March in certain districts.
However, this question must be faced squarely
and met with campaign by our Party against
such panic tendencies.
One other point I wish to raise in some of
the tactics utilized in the May Day demonstra-
tons in some of the smaller cities in Con-
necticut. These cities, like Waterbury, New
Britain Stamford, highly industrialized towns
which are owned and ruled completely and
openly by the bosses of the large metal and
hardware factories located in them. The work
ers in these towns are almost completely un-
organized, no traditions of struggle and the
company's hand is so heavy that the workers
are completely bulIdozed. In such towns it is
a very difficult thing to be a Communist, espec-
tally an active one and our Party has to func-
ton in semi-illegal state. In these cities on
May l just as on March we could not secure
permits for demonstrations of any sort and
since the police Immediately arrest any and
all who attempt to speak or raise sign it
was necessary for us to work out some ways
and means to carry on our demonstrations at
least long enough to make the workers
quainted with out slogans and demands. On
March the demonstrations in these cities,
despite very large turnout of workers lasted
only several minutes before our small handful
of comrades were all arrested and the demon
strations dispersed.
In New Britain on May LIST, three to four
thousand workers gathered and when our
speakers attempted to address them they were
Immediately arrested. However, one comrade
had been stationed in hotel room facing the
demonstration and soon as the arrests start
ed he began to address the crowd from the
ledge of the window of the hotel ROOM 1t was
fully Is minutes before the police, taken COM
pletely by surprise succeeded to batter down
the locked and well barricaded (by all the fur
niture from the hotel ROOM door of the hotel
room. In the meantime the comrade continued
his speech and the workers at least heard our
demands and slogans. Such methods must be
and can be developed in other cities where the
comrades are few and the difficulties in carry
ing out the demonstrations are many.
In Stamford.
In Stamford we had a somewhat similar sit
uation. On March 6 our comrades were ar
rested so quickly that the 5000 workers gath
cred did not even know anything about it I'M
til they read the afternoon papers. The fol-
lowing plan was therefore worked out. Our
comrades were divided into four groups each
stationed in a different part of the square
where the demonstration took place. At a given
time one of the groups was to raise its signs
and start addressing the crowd of workers.
Then at given intervals following this the other
groups were to follow the same procedure. This
would have the effect of firstly dividing the
police into four different squads and would
enable us to carry on the demonstrations for
a sufficient length of time to at least let the
workers gathered know that the Communists
had attempted to address them This also
divided our comrades in such manner over
the entire square as to reach all the workers
gathered and to draw in large sections of the
workers into active participation in the DEM
onstration. OF course, such plan may be
sdered faulty in that it divides our comrades
and lessons the possibility of resistance to the
police breaking up the demonstration. How
ever, in such cities, where Party is small
arrest is almost inevitable in the staging of
such open demonstrations and must try
our utmost to lengthen their duration and
increase the participation of the workers in
the demonstrations.
These two tectics have their connection with
the above in that such plans of carrying thru
these demonstrations must be worked out in an
ever growing number of cities in the country,
especially in the smaller highly ndustrialzed
cities and such tactics should be popularized in
our Party, each district learning from the
other, for he question of organizing and carry
ing through such demonstrations becomes an in
important one.