The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-05-17
The Struggle for 4 United
Movement Of the Unemployed
Pittsburgh Councils Fight Around One Central
Demand, Raise Issues of Women and Youth

mitteeS, struggles to increase relief
from 9Oc to $110 per week per
person-an increase of % per cent.
Not a hell Of lot, but something
the workers felt they won as re-
suit of struggle. The question Of
single mems and single women's
relief was undertaken sharply by
our Council and won for them and
by them.
Mass committees and delegations
are a matter of daily routine not
only in the city Of Pittsburgh, but
throughout the county. So far this
year, the first three months of 1884,
we have already taken down to the
Welfare Bureaus the cases of Is, 600
families, and in most cases OBJ
tanned favorable results. We have
organized mass hunger marches,
children's and youth marches, mass
women's delegations on their de-
mands, etc. But one thing I wish
to emphasize in connection with
the whole discussion on Negro
work. 1t is not enough to talk and
pass pious resolutions on the Negro
question and fighting against white
chauvinisn. We must undertake
especially through our mass organi-
cations serious struggles in behalf
Of the oppressed Negro people by
organized mass delegations, demon
STATIONS, COMMITTEES, etc. In Pitts
burgh, the reason that we have
some 1000 Negro workers in the
Unemployed Council has been the
fact that we have led and organized
serious struggles against diScrim-
nation, for special demands of the
Negro jobleSs, and at the head OF
these delegations and demonstra-
tons marched white workers to-
gether with the Negroes them
selves. AS a result OF the correct
application OF the united front
tactic from below, joint united
struggle OF our members and rank
and file of Unemployed Council
League, the Music controlled Penn
Sylvania Unemployed Leagues, have
only three locals, one of which Is
under the leadership of the Com
munist fraction working there.
Whereas the Socialist organization
has not shown any growth in &C
tivity or membership in the recent
period
But it is nos sufficient simply to
point out the achievements. We
must also examine the weaknesses
of our unemployed movement. First,
the serious lack of Party fraction
work. Only recently have we Sc
riously taken up organization of
unemployed fractions. The queS-
ton of lack of collective leadership,
the Unemployed Council has been
one or two men organization in
the entire county. While we have
recruited into the Party Negro and
white members, this was not done
Systematically, nor with sufficient
vigor in building the Party and
increasing the circulation of the
Daily Worker. The main weakness
is in the concentration point of the
Party. We have only two or three
small locals around there. In con-
nection with concentration we have
not undertaken serious struggles in
order to root the unemployed move
ment in the south side and through
1t being able to help build the Steel
Workers Union.
In connection with the Party and
fighting for its nne-this is only a
phrase. Where we build a mass
organization we come in contact
with stool pigeons and crooked
politicians and the hegemony of
the Party has been challenged and
in some cases we have lost out be-
cause of no fraction there. And the
most serious lesson learned in
fighting for the line of the Party
has been the life and death ques-
ton of organizing the instrument
of the Party amongst the masses
inside of the Unemployed Council
through the Party fraction.