The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-12-19
N.R.A. BACKS SLASH
In WAGES OF NEGRO
TEXTILE WORKERS
Permits So Cut Because
Negroes Need Longer
Training
By Carl Reeve

] The MIRA. has once more taken
a stand approving discrimination
against Negro workers.
In vicious statement on the de-
cision on the Central Weaving and
Spinning Corporation of Fayette-
vile, N. c., the National Industrial
Recovery Board (N.R.A. press re-
lease No. 9085), exempts this firm
from the minimum wage provisions
for period Of six months. This firm
employees mostly Negroes. The min
imum wage for these Negro workers
was reduced from the cotton textile
code wage of $l2 for the South, to
$40 a week.
The statement of the Industrial
Appeals Board now upheld by the
Recovery Board, contains the follow
ing scarcely yelled attack on Negro
workers, and upholds the Jim Grow
lily-white superiority position of the
lynchers, "The workers in the ap-
pellants plant may require and de-
serve a somewhat longer period of
training in order to obtain normal
efficiency. The recognition of this
fact implies nothing derogatory to
their native ability or their capacity
for development. 1t implies merely
realistic and honest appreciation
of conditions which would have
proved an equally formidable barrier
to the progress Of any other group
of employees similarly situated"
The decision is tn a t for six
months an increasing number of
the employees are to receive the code
wage minimum Of twelve dollars I'M
til at the end of the six months
period ninety per cent must get the
code wage. During the six months
period, the minimum is reduced to
ten dollars a week.
Recently the California MIRA.
Board upheld the discrimination
against Negro workers. The motion
picture, code authorities refused to
intervene in a case brought before
them by Negro motion picture pro-
jectioniSts employed at theatres To-
Gated in the Negro district who are
getting less pay than white projec-
/ tionists.
The Board cynically told these
Negro workers they could work out
the wage scale themselves with their
employers. The operators used the
excuse that they paid lower wages
to the Negroes because the Negro
district is very poor" The MIRA.
order thus sanctioned the lower
wages paid the Negro projectionists,
and gave them no redress but their
own organized strength.
The N. R. A. recently dismissed
Myra Callas, a Negro member of the
National Federation Of Federal En-
ployes, who has protested many
times against the N.R.A.'s discrim-
ination against Negroes. She was
dismissed without any definite
charge against her and without a
/ hearing
| The rank and file in the American
Federation of Labor unions should
at once protest against this discrim-
ination and Jim Grow of the MIRA.
against Negro workers. This discrim-
nation is winked at by William
Green and his machine, which az
the last American Federation of La
Dor convention killed a resolution
against discrimination in the Amer
lean Federation of Labor unions
against Negro workers. The demand
for equal treatment and equal pay
and conditions for the Negro work.
ers, and against Jim Grow or any
discrimination should be pushed by
all workers to achieve solidarity of
the working class and to raise work
erS' living standards.