The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1931-03-06
BY EARL BR0WDER

ANE year ago. on March g. 1880. unemploy-
Vment as the main issue before the capitalist
world was registered in the tremendous demon
STATIONS of 1,2500o0 workers in the cities and
towns of the United States coming into the
streets in response to the call Of the Commu-
mist Party and revolutionary trade unions
That date marked the beginning Of mass
struggle against unemployment. Now year
has passed. year full of struggles OF achieve
ments and mistakes. from which is emerging
vell-defined mass movement, which knows
what it wants and is learning rapidly how to
fight for 1t. Organized mass activity becomes
more and more the characteristic activity OF
the unemployed movement.
Superfcial examination can easily make
case to show that the movement has declined
since March of last year. Never before nor
since have there been such masses on the streets
in a nationwide demonstration. Unemploy-
rnent Day this year, February Is, brought out
only 100000 workers, one-third the number OF
a year ago. But we must look beneath the
surface, examine the realities, and judge the
quality the fighting power OF the movement
Such IN examination must. with all allowance
for serious weaknesses in the movement, reg
lister decisive advance in the year.
Program of the Unemployed Movement
opgnent of the program The first stage was
in the closing months of 1929, and the first
1,,71tks of 1880 until March 6, when our mass
s1r-,1 of "Work or Wages" and the basic de-
raslds for unemployment insurance, at the
expense of the bosses and administered by the
workers with unity OF employed and unem-
ployed through the establishment OF Unem-
ployed Councils. was broadcast through millions
of leaflets and the sale of 10000 pamphlets con-
tanning an analysis of the causes OF unemploy-
ment and how to fight
AS the Councils grew and developed in fights,
the general slogan was concretized in the Work
ers Unemployment Insurance Bill, which pro-
posed definite legislative act embodying, the
in millions of copies,
With the approach of winter, our program
took on more and more practical and innmedi-
ate character Concrete demands upon the
CITY governments demanding the appropriation
of certain revenues for immediate relief This
was most sharply brought forward on October
16. by the delegation to the New York City
budget commission, which resulted in an I'M
mediate appropriation Of a million dollars.
The fight against war was closely linked up
with the unemployment movement, with the
slogan, Not one cent for war, all funds Tor
the unemployed.
Struggle against the eviction of unemployed
workers from their homes developed on a mass
scale with organized resistance to eyictionS. This
was so effective that in many cities, eviction OF
the unemployed was largely checked.
And now as we enter the second year OF
struggle against unemployment, the Councils
faced with the deepening of the crisis and the
absolute refusal of the capitalist governmental
organs to do anything effective for relief of the
starving. are beginning to take up the direct
supply of food through their own activity, Tor
the most desperate cases The exposure OF the
hideous atrocities Of bourgeois charity Is pelng
developed more and more, and millions OF work
ers are disillusoned with the Red Cross, the
Salvation Army, and the various Citizens COM
mittees."
Today our program is sharp and clear, and
millions of workers know it and fight Tor 1t.
This is substantial progress. The weaknesses
lay ir the length of time necessary to develop
The latest concrete measures.
ORGANIZATION Of the Struggle
weakest of all phases of the movement has
been its organization. General uniform meth
DDS we're worked out, first in the National Con-
ference in New York in March, 1880, with three
hundred delegates from all over the country,
and later, in Chicago, on July d, when 1900
delegates came together in National ConVen-
ton of the Unemployed Councils. The plans
worked out were generally correct, and have had
10 be modified very little, but it took long
time to learn how to get the tens and hundreds
of thousands Of active workers to really take up