The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1931-04-22
Bq GRACE HUTCHINS.

Bq GRACE HUTCHINS. 1-IT
MIR. THOMAS TIPPETT, extension secretary of
in Brookwood Labor College, writes for the New
Leader a review of Labor and Coal, by Anna
Rochester international Publishers, SD and
says, quite frankly, that he doesn't like the Ma
tional Miners Union at all. OF course not. Why
should he
Didn't the "progressives" have little miners
union" Of their own in Illinois few weeks ago?
Only it politely gave in to Mr.. John L. Lewis,
and then it wasn't any more
To make his point against the National Miners
Union, Mr.. Tippett says the Communists twisted
facts about the Illinois strike of Dec, 1929-Jan
1880. He lifts out of its context part of SEN
tence in Comrade Rochesters book and ignores
the point of the sentence. She wrote:
TN Southern Illinois when some 10000 mine
workers struck under the NMU leadership in
December, 1929, the Fishwick machine followed
the same old Lewis tactics, sending thugs
to attack the picket line. welcoming the state
militia, and helping the operators to bring
the strikers back to the mines. "The Illinois
Miner has kept up with the United Mine
Workers Journal in spreading slanderous
stories against the National Miners Union"
Mr.. Tippett knows it was true that his pre-
cious Fishwick union was scabbing and doing
its best to break the Left Wing strike, but he
doesn't say anything about that. Instead he
tries to say there wasn't really any strike any,
way:
not one miner struck in Southern
Illinois where the unions strength was great
est; 1000 miners came out In the Taylorville
district when the Communist pickets appeared
and after their own followers had failed to
respond to their strike call. But many of the
q nNn
but because the militia had been brought into
put down their strike. That ended the
Communist union in Illinois,
And there he is quoting almost word for word
what the Illinois Miner, organ of the Fishwick
faction, was saying at the time.
But few eye witnesses, not Communists, were
on the spot in Illinois in December, 1927, and
they had few things to say about that strike.
A Federated Press reporter (not a Communst)
from the strike district wrote the following &C
count, released Dec 10, 1929:
'The effectiveness of the strike call could
not yet be gagged but the estimate of the
stoppage all the way from $4,000 miners
claimed by the National Miners Union to
mere 1000 credited by the United Mine Work
err officials to the new union.'
Again in the Federated Press of Dec. 49, 1929:
ARREST of the leaders a means of stop
ping the rapidly spreading strike of the Ma
tional Miners Union in three districts Of South
crn Illinois tried by national guard Of
ficers and the sheriffs of two counties. Free
man Thompson, NMU official who led the first
walkout at Taylorville, in military
tody. Four other leaders were in the San
CANON county Jail after being corraled by dep
uty sheriffs at the successful strike of the Au-
burn miners near Springfield"
And from the same field reporter for Fed
trated Press, Dec. 16, 1929:
'The first mine in the Belleville section to
be affected by the NMU strike. one of the
largest in the sub district, was Lumaghi Coal
Co. No. 2. Forty pickets Of the new union
threw line about the mine and succeeded
In turning back the whole force. The State
officials of the NNU claim the BelIeville ac-
QUESTION brings the total striking miners to
over 10000"
In an Associated Press despatch to the New
York Times of Dec. ID, 1929 we read:
Word came from mass meeting of strikers
at Pans that mines at BuIIpit and Nokomis
were to he picketed. =. Deputies used tear
bombs TO dispcrse picket lines in the Coello
Field near West Frankfort, ILL.,"
In the Peoria, Illinois. Journal "a capitalist