The daily worker., 1932-12-15


lack OF discipline. 1t was the UNI
tiring moral strength of the Mar
chers that compelled the attention
and hatred of these cops. Deprived
Of their weapons, they wouldn't
have dared for a moment to en-
gage in hand-to-ha encounter
with the Marchers, because they
perceived the fierce fighting power
of men and women who knew what
they we're fighting for. Bourgeois
military experts, often the shrewd-
est members of their class, realize
this fact to their great dismay.
GAS SQUAD
MOST ACTIVE
Obviously enough, it was the gas
squad that swore and cursed the
loudest. Of all the cops they were
the closest to the ranks of the
Marchers - they needed courage
most q all. Huddled together in
a close group, they kept each other
worked up into murderous rage
by constant snarling abuse of the
Marchers. eff those goddammed
baStards go out of here, they'll go
out dead" Unemployment insur-
ance? Come up here and get it,
you dirty sons-of- bitches" The
speaker of these defiant words
f1ourishes his gas gun.
The amazingly disciplined move
ment of fifty truck-loads of Mar
chers without any previous train
ing or preparation was a great feat
of proletarian organization and the
cops knew it, and in their dense
way, Sensed its significance. They
did everything they could to dis
turb it and create serious disorder.
They approached a car carrying
white and Negro MarcherS and
forcibly tried to separate them, re-
Wiling the whites for riding with
Negroes. They tore posters from
the trucks, five minutes after they
were ordered not to do so by their
officers. Each time a cop tore away
poster, he waved it aloft as
though. it were a scalp, shouting
while his less valiant fellows cele-
brated the capture of the trophy
by forming snake.dances and
whooping like moving picture In
dianS. They connived at the
throwing of stones into the Mar
chers meeting by vicious news
paper men, eager for a STORY"
They brazenly slashed the tires of
taXis engaged to carry out mar
chers to lodgings, despite orders to
permit them TO pass. They did
their best to hinder the admission
of food. A dozen of them at a
time would beset solitary Negroes
and attempt to Jim Grow them
with taunting insults. They raced
back and forth at terrifying clip
with their automobiles and motor
cycles through the crowded street
where the marchers were forced to
encamp.
DUT the Narchers refused to give
~ the cops a single break The
most diSheartening conditions fail
ed to lower their spirits and dis
cipline by a jot. After weeks of
gruelling travel and constant har-
rassment by police en- route, the
Marchers accepted all the miser-
able conditions of their Washing
ton camp = lacking water supply,
satisfactory food, and sanitary con-
ditions, sleeping on cold pave
ments, and more police - without
once thinking of surrendering to
defeat. They met all the provoc-
ations of the cops with complete
obedience 10 their column captains
orders. And so conspicuous was
this provocation that a Washing
ton reporter said, We'll, boys,
when are the police going to start
the revolution?"
Every proletarian activity suffers
distortion by the bourgeois press.
1t is to be expected. But one of
the bitterest lies to swallow was
the attempt of the press to dis
credit the Hunger March by des-
cribing it as made up OF profess
sional pan-handlers and paid mar
chers. If such were the compo-
sition of the March, it would have
fallen to pieces at the first blow.
But the fact that it maintained
its cohesiveness and active organ
ization throughout many and sew
ere blows, should prove to the
greatest sceptic, if he is honest,
the wholesome proletarian mem
bership of the March. Only men
and women who have realized that
they are doomed to starvation and
impotence unless they achieve Or
ganization and creatively submit
to its discipline, could tave en-
drred what they had
INTELLECTUALS LEARN, TOO,
Intellectuals, who before may
have had a slightly inflated sense
of their own revolutionary import
ance, suddenly stood in awe of the
masses and their proved potential
tiles. We read in the books of
the liberals that the Russian Re-
volution was a success because of
the habitual submissiveness and
slavishness of the Russian soul"
but that the proud, independent
American will never permit such
infringement on his liberties" We
know now-the Hunger March has
taught us that the submissiyeness
Of the Russian masses really means
the organizational strength of class
consciousness, and that the Amer
1can masses are already showing
the sane nroletsrtan strength.