The daily worker., 1934-07-05
The Government and the
Dock Strike

covered guns.
A police airplane drones above the
San Francisco waterfront.
Foot police, mounted police, police
riding in automobiles, with pistols, rifles
and shotglms roaring, hurting gas bombs and swing
ing clubs, charge down on striking longshoremen.
'The port is technically open!" gleefully shouts
Frank Carmody, representative Of the San Fran
cisco Industrial Association, two strikers are
I shot and hospitals crowded with wounded
fl working men,
THE capitalist class of the United States with
Franklin D. Roosevelt acting the general field
marshal will go to any length to protect It's mil
lions and beat down the working class to state
of abject slavery and misery.
Murder and destruction-this is the last re-
sort of the capitalist state to maintain its rule
over the workers.
When it comes to protecting profits Of multi
millonaires, when it comes to cutting wages or
beating down the millions of unemployed the
capitalist rulers be they named Hitler or Roosevelt,
all resort to the same method-force and violence
The longshoremen have just grievances. They
demand higher wages to meet the advancing cost
of living They demand shorter hours and the
elimination of the terrific speedup and intensified
ton of labor on the piers. They demand union
control of hiring and firing. In short they want
to live as human beings should live.
They struck for these demands on May 9th.
Thirty thousand stevedores walked off the piers
along the entire Pacific Coast They were joined
by the seamen, the masters, mates the pilots The
truckers also joined them in their just fight.
Leaders of the International Longshoremens AS
sociation and the international Seamen's Union Of
Toll
and Andrew Furuseth-made every effort to be-
tray this great strike. They signed agreement
with the shipowners promising that the men would
' return to work without guarantee that their de-
mands would be granted
But the longshoremen and seamen had set up
their own rank and file strike committee to guar
antee that there would be no such betrayals The
strikers refused to accept the settlement terms of
the A. F. of L. leaders.
The strike continued under rank and file lead
ership. Ships did not in San Francisco Bay
1t was obvious that the maritime workers,
through their excellent working class solidarity
well the way to forcing the shipowners to pay
them decent wages and recognize their union.
The shipowners realized this and 50 did the
state and city governments of California and the
United States government.
Police were ordered to the waterfront by the
diplomatic maneuvers of the Roosevelt Board by
arbitration were the cold steel guns of the U. s. S.
Holland
ALL this proves that the government is a capi-
n talst government ready at all times to serve
the bankers manufacturers and shipowners. 1t is
ready to use all its power in an attempt to crush
the militant workers organizations to force them
to accept the dictates Of the rich.
All this shows clearly the necessity of drastic
change in the social order-a change that will place
political power in the hands of the working class,
supported by the poor farmers, the Negro people
and the lower middle class.
Only under such workers government, under
Soviet Power under the Dictatorship of the Pro-
letarat will such bloodshed and violence as RACES
today against the working class on the West Coast
be eliminated Only under such a workers state
can all the demands of the toling population be
realized.
The Communist Party, the true leader of the
toilng population in America is leading the fight
for such government.
In the great class struggles, in strikes such as
the marine transport strike, the Toledo strike and
the Milwaukee street-car strike the need of workers
organ hing behind the Communist Party for the
overtN row of the capitalist system becomes more
oDvios
1Ne StTlkSS GOOdy lOT Ign6r wages ana I'M
proved conditions must be stepping stones toward
Soviet Power in America. In these strikes the
workers must be taught the need for preparing
for the seizure of political power
MORE than ever before must the working class
III give their support to the maritime strike in the
West
The strike can be won with the combined forces
of the workers. Protests against the bloody ter
ror should swamp the U. S. and California govern
ment offices. Financial support should be sent by
unions and labor organizations the Central Strike
Committee and the Marine Workers Industrial
Union.
Solidarity actions in all ports, on the ships
and docks and the waterfronts, must be
launched at in support of the heroic West
Coast strikers
Demand that the terror against the Iongshore-
cease!
Demand the right to strike and picket!
Demand that the warshp Holland be removed
from the vicinity of the Frisco piers.
Pacific Coast workers, answer the terror with
O general strike.