The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1935-02-20
Demand for Insurance Can't
Be SiILed, Says Earl BrO.Vder

ana social insurance Bill, h. II.
1927, introduced by Congressman
Ernest Lundeen OF Minnesota. This
Bill, H. r. 1927, while still suffering
from few defects, embodieS in the
main the principles which we sup
port theoretically and uncondition-
ally, and for which we have been
fighting for many years Only the
principles embodied in H. R. 1927
can provide any measure of real
social security for the toilers Of the
United States.
It is one Of the symptoms of the
nationality of our present govern
mental system. from the point of
view Of the interests Of the masses
Of the people, that this Committee
is considering legislation on unem-
ployment insurance without having
before 1t the Workers Bill, the only
project which has organized mass
support throughout the country
based upon intelligent discussion in
volving millions of people. The
Workers Bill is supported not only
by the Communist Party and its
600, 900 supporters for whom I speak,
but by several million other organ
lied workers, farmers, and middle
class people.
Workers Back Bill
There is a fashion, nowadays, for
every upstart demagog to try to i'm
press Congress and the country with
fantastic figures of tens of millions
Of supporters for each new utopia,
each quack cure-all, which exploits
the misery of the masses. 1 have no
desire to compete in this game, the
paper counters of which cannot be
checked against any reality. The
figures which we cite of organized
supporters Of the Workers Bill are
verif1able membership figures of es-
tablished mass organizations, almost
all Of them Of long standing and in
Guiding great section of the !
American Federation of Labor.
An attempt is being made to
smother in silence the Workers Bill, !
both in Congress and in the news
papers. To make more plausible this
silence on the Workers Bill, which
is the only practical alternative to
the Wagner-Lewis Bill, there has
been trotted out as the alternative"
a straw-man in the shape of the So
called Townsend Plan. It is very
easy to tear to pieces this straw
man, in spite Of its very praise
worthy desire to care for the aged,
and to consider that this disposes Of
the Workers Bill, which makes
really practical provision for those
over working age. But 1t will not be
so easy to get the masses to accept
this verdict. Even such loyal SER
wants of the Administration as the
Executive Council Of the American
Federation of Labor, who have swal-
lowed one after another the injuries
and insults dealt the workers for
two years, and who have Bitterly
opposed the Workers Bill, have
been forced to draw back before the
discredit and mass revolt against
them which must inevitably be the
lot Of all who identify themselves
with the Wagner-Lewis Bill.
"a New Insult"
The Workers Bill is before the
Congress and before the country.
You have not answered it. Your
present Bill is no answer, but only a
the contrary, measure to prohibit,
new insult to the suffering millions. |
You cannot continue to answer only
with silence.
We know, of course, that the enc
mics of the Workers Bill have pre- |
pared and are preparing their argu-
n1ents against 1t, when it shall A.
nally force itself upon the floor of
Congress. 1t would be more honest
if they would at once place their
arguments, and the comparison of
the two alternative programs, before
this Committee and others, and be-
fore Congress as a whole.
All arguments against the Work
ers' Bill finally resolve themselves
into one, the argument that sit
costs too much" that "the country
cannot afford it,"
"The Country Can Afford IT.
What does this mean, the state
ment that "the country cannot af-
ford it,?
Does it mean that our country is
too poverty stricken to care for its
own people at minimum decent
living standard? Does it mean that
in our country we do not have
enough productive land, natural re-
sources, plants, machinery. mines,
mills, railroads, ETC., or that we lack
trained, skilled people to operate
them?
Such an answer would be, of
course, only nonsense. All the wise
men and authorities of the country
are wailing that we have too much
of these things and of the commodi-
ties they produce. The Government
has been exerting all its wits to re-
duce the supply, to destroy the sur
plus which it claims causes all the
trouble.
Government Can Raise Fund
Does it mean that the Govern
ment is unable, is too weak, to raise
vast sums of money on short no
tice? That answer, too, is excluded.
Our memories are not so short that
we fail to recall how, in 1917-1918,
the Government raised tens of bill
lions of dollars for participating in
destructive war; if we can afford
to sink tens of billions in explosives,
poison gases, battleships, and other
materials to destroy millions of peo-
pie abroad, why cannot we spend
similar sums to provide food, cloth
ing and shelter to save the lives of
millions of people at home?
No, that phrase "the country can