The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1930-01-31
The Cherry
" Where with our
we tell the truth
about many things. sometimes pro-
foundly, sometimes hippantly,
sometimes recklessly.


GRAFTON of Labor is doing through
its campaign of organization in the
South, not the least is its displace-
ment of communism as an active force
among working people.
Perhras Southern employers will
| never understand just what trade un-
ionism means today as the foe of COM
| munism. The trade unions have as
their main object the compelling of
decent conditions for workers. They
will fight for decent conditions, not
only in the South, but everywhere.
The campaign in the South has no
different object than in the North, the
East or the West. If there are back
ward, exploiting employers in the
South, that does not change the OBJ
jects of trade unionism; it may make
it little more difficult to achieve
| those objects.
But meanwhile, if the employer is
compelled to be decent he is, and not
as paradoxically as it seems, being
saved from something much worse.
He is being saved from communism.
1t happens to be the fact that Amer
lean trade unions believe in democ-
racy, believe in American institutions,
are born of American institutions and
will have nothing else, either at the
hands of brutal and autocratic en-
ployers or at the hands of autocratic,
brutal and destructive communists.
1t happens to be the fact that com
munism is the foe of every democratic
stitution-though there are some
mental misfts that can not grasp the
fact and it happens to be the fur
ther fact that communism and trade
unionism can not exist side by side.
There has been and still is plenty
of communism in the Southern States.
There was plenty at Gastonia, there is
plenty in Charlotte and there is plenty
in several other places. The logical
and inevitable outcome of communist
organization is violence and destruc-
ton; if communism wins, everything
else dies. This is as certain as the
rising Of the SUM-
Trade unionism in the South means
just what it means everywher-
peace, freedom, democratic practice,
decency, self-respect - the finest,
truest, best kind of Americanism.
The tea-sipping intellectuals (why
are they entitled to be called intel
lectuals y never seem able to under
stand that communism is a real men
ace to American institutions and it is
fair to assume that in some cases
there are substantial reasons for the
blindness.
There are those who cry "red bait
ers," those who scoff, those who will
not see and those who cannot see.
But the day of their awakening will
come. Communism and democracy
can not exist side by side, or within
the same spaces, The one is the death
of the other-the sworn and implac-
able foe.
The mercenary army of commun-
ism has had its vicious fling in the
South, showing it's tactics toward the
objective which is never secret. but
which is carefully yelled by the apollo
gists as well as by the avowed pro-
tagonists.
Trade unionism is offering the in
dustrial life of the South the one and
only possible protection against de-
struction. There is as little sense in
Understanding The strength of the
communist machine as there is in
misunderstanding its aims.