The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1933-04-01
By NATHANIEL BUCHWALD.
(DaiIv Worker CORRESPONDENT


On the initiative Of one of the
newcomers, a group Of foreign cor
respondents of workers papers ar
ranged an interview with the vice
president of the Moscow Soviet, Com
rade Khvesin, on the municipal af-
fairs Of Moscow.
The interview was scheduled for
II p. m. 1t lasted until two O'Clock in
the morning. The rush of business
made it impossible for Comrade
Khvesin to find 8 more suitable hour
for US.
Seated in two rows at long table,
the correspondents fired questions at
the vice president Of the Moscow
soviet. The questions were many and
varied, and Comrade Khvesin made a
notation of each of them. The quer-
les ran something like this:
How does the rule OF the workers
express itself in practice in the ad-
ministration of Moscow"
els it true that the water Of Mos
COW is polluted?"
'WilI Moscow ever catch up with
itself in the matter Of dwellings?"
What about the traffic accidents
in the city?'
els it true that Moscow will be
completely rebuilt in the next five
years?"
How does the city stand in the
matter of schools and kindergartens?"
How are the new markets work
ing?"
The interview was informal, and
both the questions and the answers
were largely impromptu. AS the cor
respondents devoured Comrade Khve-
sins answers, they also found time to
swallow several rounds of sandwiches
and tea.
A Decisive Answer.
To begin with, Comrade Khvesin
called for glass of tap water and
drank it avidly. Having satisfied his
thirst and the curiosity Of one of
the questioners in one gulp, he pro-
ceeded to unravel the intricacies of
Moscow's municipal affairs.
Without concrete knowledge OF
the geography and landscape of
Moscow, the reader will hardly be in
tereSted in the details Of the pro-
gram of city planning, and a few
general observations will suffice.
The first circumstance that i'm
pressed me was the fact that Mos
COW had no real estate problem. In
New York or any capitalist city, mu-
nicipal projects are blocked some
times for years by private property
rights. Many a politician or real
estate robber has made a fortune by
a legal hold up Of the city govern
ment. Remember the Libby Hotel
affair in New York;
No Greed in the Way.
Moscow has no real estate problem,
no contradiction between the needs Of
the masses and the greed of the land
lords. There is only one landlord In
Moscow: the citys toiling population
Old Moscow was built to suit the
needs of its merchants and noble
men. New Moscow must be made to
suit the needs Of It's workers.
The problem is not a simple one,
To some it is so stupendous that
they would like to see the old city
entirely abandoned and a new capital
built along the lines Of socialist cities
which sprang up In the dozens in the
course Of the last few years. But
this extremist view is scoffed at by
the practical Bolsheviks of Moscow
Factories Needed.
Nor is there much support to be
found for the plan of solving the
housing shortage of Moscow by the
simple" process Of moving the larg-
est factories elsewhere, thus cut
ting the working population of Mos
COW and running the housing prob
lem out of town. Moscow needs it's
factories as much as it needs its
proletarian population.
The problem is to provide COM
Portable dwellings for the toilers Of
the Red Capital AS yet the prob
lem has been only partially solved
Congestion is still great in Moscow
and despite the thousands of new
houses built in the last few years, the
average dwelling area" per person
Of the working population is still no
greater than about SIS square feet
(say, room six by nine feet).
And when one takes into consider
alton the fact that tens Of thousands
Of workers families occupy newly
built spacious apartments, the
dwelling area" for the remainder