The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-09-07
GOrman'S Agreement

NORMAN, the leading U. T. w official in
u the present textile strike, has just of
fered a proposed agreement to the textile
employers upon which he offers to end the
strike.
Every textile striker now fighting for
better wages and against the killing speed
up should discuss this proposed agreement with
his fellow workers the picket lines.
Every striker should ask himself the question,
does this agreement adequately protect my inter
ests? Does it give what and my family
need in our fight for better wages and for the
end Of the frightful stretchout in the mills?
The very heart Of the textile strike is contained
in the demands on the wage scale and the linlita-
tions of the speed-up formulated at the recent
United Textile Workers Convention
1t is fundamentally on the question of wages
and speed-up that one million textile workers
now out on strike
AT THE recent convention of the United Textile
n Workers Union program representing the
minimum wage demands of the rank and file mem
bership Of the union was forced upon the officials
by q unanimous vote.
These demands define exactly what the rank
and file textile workers want. What they are fight
ing for on the picket lines. They want minimum
wage Of $1S week with the rates rising up to
$50 for highly skilled workers They listed very
definite demands on the number Of looms and
spindes to be worked by each worker in every
department.
And yet it is just these definite cOnven-
ton demands of the rank and file on wages and
stretchout that Germans agreement leave the
field open to victory for the textile employers!
It is just the question Of wages and spccd-up
that Germans proposed agreement offers to "ar-
bitrate" with the employers through the Roosevelt
Mediation Board. German lists all the other con-
vention demands Just they were originally passed.
But he does this only to detraet attention from
the fact that the central issue of the strike,
wages and speed-up, he drops the convention de-
mands and leaves the way open for concessions and
betrayals.
Germans agreement merely proposes that wages
and work loads shall be discussed with the en-
ployers and the Mediation Board.
This is tantamount to letting the EMPLOYERS
know that the U. T. w. officials are ready to act
IN the spirit of Mcmahon U. T. w president,
who declared two days ago that the union Off
sals are willing to give way here and there
That is to say, on the most vital issues for which
The textile workers 50 bravely fighting
Any strike settlement that goes back on the
convention wage scale, leaving the textile work
ers as hungry as before, driven by the stretch
out as before, is defeat for the workers and
betrayal of their struggles.
THERE must not be one single settlement of any
question involved in the strike without vote
taken by the strikers themselves It is the strikers
the pckets who must have the real authority to
decide all agreements. The strikers must see to
it that they have the final vote on every settle
ment, rather than leave the decisions to the upper
officials.
No arbitration" of any wage or speed-up de-
mands! All questions of settlement to be submitted
TO the strikers for general vote! The convention
demands are clear and definite. The strikers will
see that they not betrayed