Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1953-03-10


once stopped him cold.
The story of Stains early eff
fort to unhorse John L. Lewis as
Third Of a Series.
head of the United Mine Work.
ers is part of the record of Mos
cows campaign over the three
decades of Stain rule to sweep
the United States into the Soviet
orbit.
That record has been compiled
in two years of hearings before
the Governments Subversive
Activities Control Board, where
reformed Communists and FBI
planted agents told the fantastic
story of how Moscow directed the
Communist Party's strategy in
America toward the ultimate
goal of revolution.
It was in 1923 that Stain and
his lieutenants decided to have
a go at an extremely ambitious
project-defeating John L. Lewis
for reelection as president of
the United Mine Workers.
Lewis Always Conservative.
This most famous of all Amer
lean labor leaders has been
thunderhead of controversy
throughout his long career, but
he never deviated from his con-
viction that capitalism was the
best system for the American
working man. He might halt the
wheels of industry to gain a big
ger chunk of the dollar for his
union, he might rant and rave
and illuminate, but John L. was
always a conservative as far as
the base of the economic system
was concerned.
Perhaps this combination of
power and economic Orthodoxy
enraged the Communists. At any
rate, under Stains guidance.
they decided to GUST John l.. from
his labor throne.
The story was told the Sub
versive Activities Control Boards
two-member hearing panel by
Joseph Kornfeder, who helped
form the American Communist
Party in 1919 and remained a
comrade until he left the party
in 1884.
U. S. Passports Stolen.
The year 1928 was a year of
big American decisions in Mos
COW. The secret police had de-
vised an intricate passport forg-
ing scheme, including the theft of
blank passports from the State
Department through Red cells al
ready functioning in Washing
ton. Scores of American Reds
thus got to Moscow without
arousing suspicion.
In the Russian capital the
American Reds conferred with
such Soviet leaders as Nikolai
Bukharin, president of the Com
intern, Dimitri z. Manuilskky.
secretary general Of the COMM
tern and Lasovsky. secretary of
the Red international Of Labor
Unions, as well as Communist
chiefs from half a dozen other
nations.
The gathering of the Red clans
dovetailed with a world Congress
OF the Red International of Labor
Unions.
InfiltratiOn Fund Allotted.
Responding to the Labor Inter-
national demand for an en-
HANGED labor drive in the United
States, the Comintern earmarked
100000 to finance union inf1lt-
ration and sent an extra $27, 902
as a special fund to the Com
muniSt Party in America.
1t developed that this strange
total of $4,000 was dedicated to
the project of unseatting Mr..
Lewis as head of the United Mine
Workers.
Moscow forged the decision to
beat Mr.. Lewis in the Anglo
American secretariat of the
Comintern at meetings attended
by Kornfeder. The full COMM
tern ratified the project.
Russian leaders planned to
dispatch the special anti-Lewis
fund to the United States in
amounts of $4,000 and $4,000.
How much actually was sent is
unknown, since only $27, 902 has
been traced. American Commu-
nists brought it back from Mos
COW in the summer of 1928.
Special Committee Named.
The Reds named a special
committee to take over the an
thracite dispues and dethrone
John L.. who had been the anti
Red president of the UNIV since
1920. The committee allotted
$1,000 of the fund to Marcus, a
Russian Comintern agent as
signed as overseer of the futile
campaign.
The Reds made no Roadway