The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-10-08

the circumstances. This indicates
that there is pretty fair under
standing that the important issues
in this 54th annual convention do
not consist of the issues In the in
ternal official fight for position and
prestige in the building trades
council; that they do not get their
best expression in the formal pro-
posal Of John L. Lewis, head Of the
United Mine Workers of America
and his supporters in the official
delegations of various national and
international unions, for industrial
unionism as against craft union
ism; that the main issue in this
convention is not the expected bat
tie between so-called horizontal
and vertical unionism, but that the
main issue is a struggle of a scope
far wider than that of the dele
gates assembled in the convention
hall, affecting and involving enor-
nous numbers of the American
working class.
This main issue is: A demand
for the complete reorganization
of the American labor movement,
not only on a formal industrial
union basis in the fashion of
Lewis, but on q program eX-
pressed in the rs resolutions of
the delegates supporting the
Rank and File Committee of the
A. f. of l., bringing the class
struggle issues into the organized
labor movement in a clear and
definite form, demanding as the
main guarantee that the mem
bership without compulsion or
restriction shall be allowed to
discuss and then decide for the
program of action the member
ship desire.
1t cannot be said that A. F. of L.
officialdom has covered itself with
glory in the first week of the con-
vention. This is mainly because OF
the murderouS official internal fight
in the building trades, and because
Roosevelt, with his demand for a
truce, reviving the old Hoover form
ula Of mo strikes and no wage
cuts" which meant precisely no
strikes and plenty Of wage cuts,
has. kicked the moral props from
under the leadership of the A. F.
of Lone of his main supports in
his program of recovery of Ameri-
can capitalism.
Cracking the Whip
The only explanation for this
seeming contradiction is that there
is a new and much more acute
sharpening of the economic crisis
in the United States. Consequently
there is a crisis in the Roosevelt
administration, in its official family
of the labor bureaucracy, and, as a
result of these factors, it has be-
come much more difficult and to
some extent even impossible to
maintain what might be called the
ordinary decencies of official rela-
tionships.
In other words the crisis in the
United States and the internal cri-
sis in the leadership of the labor
bureaucracy in the family of it's
parent and protector, American
monopoly capitalism, is of SO acute
character that the strengthening
of organizational loyalties on the
basis of prestige and jobs has be-
come paramount so far as the life
of both these administrations is
concerned.
In other words, it is necessary
now to crack the whip and to call
the boys to order no matter what
happens. This means, of course, so
far as general national policy is
concerned, a much more intensive,
vicious and brutal drive against the
entire American working class, its
organizations and the whole living
standard forced down to the coolie
level.
These are the main conclusions
to be derived from the sessions OF
the first week of the 54th annual
convention of the A. F. of l..