Montana labor news., 1939-03-09
BUILD THE TEACHERS
UNION

The beginning Of this new school
term is a most opportune time for
recruiting new members into the
Teachers Union. The state legisla-
ture is in session and our bills in the
interest Of the children, the teachers
and education generally, r before
it. The forces of reaction are pre-
pared for strenuous battle against
social and progressive legislation of
every kind. In sharper and ever
sharper focus we are witnessing
what has been characterized as a
race between time and catastrophe.
In the field of education the respon-
sibility for meeting this challenge
rests in large part with US. How
well we succeed depends to a con
siderable degree upon how strong
we succeed in building our Teachers
Union.
The best weapon we possess in
this struggle is our affiliation with
organized labor. Our membership
in the American Federation of Labor
and our active participation in the
New York State Federation of Labor
guarantees as our immediate ally the
million and more working men and
women who are organized in the
labor unions of this state. These
organizations are committed to a
program of expansion of educational
facilities, characterization of the
school system, abolition of child
labor and a high compulsory school
age, increased state and federal aid
for the schools, academic freedom,
and the expansion Of educational
services. Our labor affiliation makes
us more than a small organization
of $500 members. It makes us part
of an army numbering millions. With
the American system of free public
education under attack from so many
directions, the value and importance
of this added power should be
obvious.
At the present moment bills have
been or are being introduced into
the state legislature by the Teachers
Union to decrease class size and re-
lieve overcrowding; to provide ade-
quate appropriations for clothing,
medical care, dental care, and the
like, for needy school children; for
full absence refunds and many other
items of teacher and school person
mel welfare; and to solve the substi-
tute problem adequately. Through
local bylaw proposals in some in
stances and appropriate state or fed
eral legislation in others, we are
working to effect the democratiza-
ton Of the school system, to pro
mote and support progressive edu-
cation, and to provide federal and
state financial aid which will make
the application of our proposals pos
sible. In each instance it is our
policy to confer with other teacher
organizations in an effort to achieve
substantial agreement on the details
of these measures and to bring about
that kind of unity of action which is
the "sina qua non' of success.
The enemies of the kind of prog
ress which our program represents
find great difficulty in meeting the
issues on their merits. They there
fore resort to every manner of
epithet in an effort to delude the
unwary. Thus, for example, our
support of the activity program ex-
pertinent and progressive education
generally has been characterized as
both "communistic' and "atheistic."
There are many who refuse to de-
eide major issues on the basis of
intelligence and reason, because it
serves their purpose better to resort
to intrigue and appeal to blind
passion. It is more discreet to i'm
pute Interior political detectives
to p~rogressives than frankly to
espouse the social detectives Of their
own reactionary program.
Without reservation Of any kind,
the only political tendency endorsed
by the Teachers Union is American
democracy. The Teachers Union
does not seek to promote any other
political system. AS stated above,
our support of democratic govern
ment has been made perfectly clear
in our publications and demonstrated
in our actions. The false cry Of
communism which has been raised
r.