The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-01-17
COngreSSMOVeSFaSt
to Pass Roosevelt
Initiation Message
Continued from Page y


which inspired Roosevelt's new pro-
posal, is only about 81, 00,000000.
I asked liberal pacif1st Of the
House what about the sharpening of
the economic war for markets and
whether it were not inevitable that
this should lead closer into substi-
tuting guns for currency in the strug-
gle, and he evaded. well, there S
nothing harmful in trade among ma
lions. We're trying to get trade"
Coughlin also touched the vital
point of markets. So bluntly that
Senator Gore OF Oklahoma, sitting
in on the hearing, remarked:
you say that if we put up the
price of silver it will help the people
in China, but I'm worried about
something. We're trying to put the
price of gold up so as to increase
prices. Now if We increase the price
Of silver, aren't we putting up prices
and hurting the Chinese who haven't
got silver, helping only the banks
who have it, in China? .. you know,
I asked someone about this the other
day and he answered, I don't give a
damn about China. I'm thinking
about the United States"
Coughlin had asserted that the
United States would help the 800,-
100000 people Of China and India
by doubling the price of silver for
coinage. It is this part of the pro-
gram Gore questions-the workable
ity of the silver phase, not the prin-
ciple Of price raising. Finally, when
he kept asking whether it wouldn't
hurt the man who has only tea and
rice" in China, Coughlin gave him
self away completely, saying, yes, it
would-but we've hurt him for 500
years"
Coughlin is working with the Com
mittee for the Nation, an industrial
lists group. including leaders of the
Sears-Roebuck, Remington-Ran and
other big businesses. They have
been flooding the country with infla-
ton propaganda for months With
them also, Senator Thomas of Okla
homs, leader of the initiation bloc
in Congress, is working.
The House Committee greeted
Coughlin with unctuous difference,
Chairman Somers, Tammany Demo-
crat, calling the witness zone Of the
best authorities on money in Amer
ica."
Coughin took occasion to declare
his primary interest in finding mar
kets for the manufacturers and in
dustrialists-and to declare war on
"Stalinism" and Communism.
A very smooth demagogue, he
played upon the misery of the masses
in America, toyed with the thought
of revolution, and then bluntly de-
clared that the way out is reform
of the abuses" of capitalism. He
called on god and Roosevelt to eradi-
cate these abuses" and solemnly
proclaimed that all could be cured
by changing banking and currency
practices. 1t was just because of the
failure of the Federal Reserve Bank
ing law, Coughlin said, that men
began to question not exactly the
soundness of capitalism think the
sane people of this country will al
ways give allegiance to that economic
philosophy-but the abuses" and that
"the Socialist was on the soapbox,
the Communist agitating in his
darkened half during recent years
apparently Coughlin thinks all this
has ceased!)
Setting himself up as an authority
on capitalism, Coughlin forgot that
the primary contradiction-th ever
deepening rift between production
and consumption - cannot be af-
fected, in fact increased, by initiation,
which leaves the masses of the pro-
ducing workers with less buying
power than they had before. Wise
cracking and posing at length for
the crowd of news photographers, the
priest made the most of the occs-
sion.
Well-fed, Well-dressed, referring
jauntily to visits to him by the Lord
Mayor of Bombay, he never failed to
emphasize his alliance with the DOM
inant powers-and never did he fail
to refer with equal feryor to his in
tense interest in the masses who are
exploited by these powers. He
pleaded for vast new circulation Of
money-to give more to the aver
age laborer, who earns only $14 q
week" But he didn't mention that
wage increases are the only way
workers can get more of the circu-
lating money.
Instead, he hammered on new
markets for the owners. He got in
some words for mother church, too
telling the Congressman that the
real reason" he became interested in
these matters was that Catholic and
Protestant missionaries" reported to
him it was difficult % to get the
Indians and Chinese to accept the
Christian gospel of brotherhood from
Americans whose country denies
them our bathtubs." He reported, too
that 1t was a churchman and not a
boy friend of Queen Elizabeth" who
originated the economic law of Ores
ham, that "bad money drives out
bad
Because of this law, Coughlin pro-
posed bimetallism-a coinage in
which gold would be mixed with sill