1,000 DEMONSTRATE:

Detroit's JoblessanizeCampaign

or Jobs forBy Robert Black

(The following article was written by a YS supporterWhile active in the unemployed ivorkers' movement in De-troit.)

DETROIT- -The recent demonstration of 1,000 unem-ployed workers, including many youth, before Detroit's Com-mon Council has had a major* impact on this city and on thecountry as a whole.

As a result of the militant organized action of the un-employed, a U.S. Senator threatened to introduce a bill inCongress calling for 30 hours work for 40 hours pay; WalterReuther and the whole UAW leadership have been put on thespot to act for the unemployed; the governor and state leg-islature are considering the demand of unlimited extensionof unemployment benefits.

The Detroit Free Press, spokes-Mian for big business in the state,greeted the initiative of the un-

About a Little BabyWho Owes $1,600With military expenditures

at their highest during peace-time, Eisenhower's new $77billion budget divides the taxdollar thusly:Military 59 centsInterest on back debt to

pay for past wars) 10 centsVets (injured in war) lOc

Total for wars, past andpresents 76 cents

Agriculture 8 centsOther 16 cents

Total back war debts datingback to the Spanish-AmericanWar total $270.5 billion. Thatmeans before a little baby takesa drop of his mother's milk, heowes $1,600 for wars he nevereven heard of.

France: Why Reaction Triumphed — Page 4

YOUNG SOCIATen Cents Voice of America's Future

VOL. 2, NO. 5 February, 1959

employed with a vicious cartoon.The unemployed are now plan-ning a demonstration in front ofthe paper's offices to demand apublic apology.

It all started when, on January12, 1,000 unemployed picketedDetroit's Common Council to de-mand that it endorse the 30 hourweek at 40 hours pay. Signs say-Ing, "30 for 40 means 200,000 jobsin Detroit alone" and "The 30-

Other signs demanded, "publicworks—homes, schools and hos-pitals," "Unemployment compen-station for entire period of unem-ployment," "Moratorium on debts—No foreclosures, no evictions." j

Banning overtime during per- .iods of unemployment was an- |other demand paraded on the!posters.

On the 13th floor of the CityHall, Common Council was in ses-sion. Three delegates from theUAW's Skilled and ProductionWorkers Unemployed Committee,which sponsored the demonstra-tion, presented their demands tothe Council. The gallery, withseats for 70 people, was jammedto overflowing. More than 100people witnessed the session.

The Council heard the dele-gates, and promised to take upthe issue more completely the fol-lowing weeks. The mayor, LouisMiriani. was "out of town" onthat day.

UNEMPLOYED PLIGHTAt the Council session, the

delegates pointed out that 200,000are unemployed in Detroit and75,000 of these have exhaustedtheir benefits. In Michigan as awhole 245,000 exhausted theirbenefits in 1958. Quoting fromFortune Magazine, one delegatesaid that in Michigan, 328,000are considered "productivity un-employed," that is. out of workdue to automation. Of these he

A chief point of interest at Oberlin College is an arch ercted to commemorate the Ameri<-can missionaries who died in the Chinese Boxer Rebellion of 1900. Oberlin students put up their ownarch to commemorate the Chinese who were killed while defending their country.

hoar week means another shift," I Quoted that 150,000 are consid-

Schools, Teachers, Students FightLoyalty Oath for College Loans

were carried by demonstrators. I Continued on Page 2)

by Richard DeHaanIn Greek and German, "education" means the same thing as

"culture" or "civilization." In French, "to educate" is rendered as"to elevate," while Latin edueere means "to lead forth." "to educe."In Americanese, unfortunately, education has not been recently of

so high a station.Robert M. Hutchins, president

of The Fund for the Republic,last week noted that the only wayan education bill can be passed inthis country is to call it a defensebill. (He was referring to the Na-tional Defense Education Act of1958, passed by the 85th Con-

"SCHOOLS SHOULD TEACH THE TRUTH

Young Socialist Runs for Bd. of EducationLOS ANGELES, Calif.—After a

vigorous and successful petitioncampaign, Peter Buch, a 24-year-old YOUNG SOCIALIST support-er, placed fcis name on the ballot Ifor the spring elections to the Los jAngeles Board of Education, of-fice No. 3.

Buch holds a B.S. degree fromU.C.L.A. and is presently con-tinuing his studies there. He isalso active in the Eugene V. DebsClub, a U.C.L.A. student socialistdiscussion group. While distribut-ing and selling the YOUNG SO-CIALIST near campus, he wasred-bated and slandered by theDaily Bruin, U.C.L.A. studentdaily, ;Mid became known as theonly open, public advocate of mil-itant socialist activity at the uni-versity.

"Our schools should teach thetruth," declared Peter Buch. "Notonly is socialism misrepresentedand the real nature of the war-breeding capitalist system con-cealed in the classrooms, but theactual profound role in Americanhistory played by the labor raove-

PETER BUCH

merit, the Negro people and oth-er minorities is either ignored ordistorted."

run on an anti-war platform call-ing for education toward worldpeace. As a student as well as asocialist, I demand the abolitionof all loyalty oaths and thought-control measures that constrictindependent thinking and genu-ine learning, restoration of aca-demic freedom for both studentsand teachers, and granting thestudents a voice in the adminis-tration of their schools.

COLD WAR TEACHES FEAR"The cold war atmosphere per-

meates our schools. Every care istaken to teach the students howto crouch furtively under d e s k sin atomic drills — presumably for'protection' against missile -bombthat gouges a mile-wide craterout of the ground with only a fewseconds' warning."

"As a Board of Education mem-ber," Buch went on to announce,'I would call for a halt to the

senseless drills that only ter-rorize our children with cold war

gress.) Meanwhile, th ColumbiaUniversity Spectator believes that"the recent announcement thatRussia has quadrupled its outlayfor education is frightening."

This fright and the corollary be-lief that education should becomea gambit in the Cold War wasapparently communicated by theColumbia University editors toour august legislators. Theirabove-mentioned National De-fense Education Act was con-sciously calculated to utilize our

national "brain power" in a cru-sade against Russian technicalachievements. It allocated $900,-000,000 and for the encouragementof language and science (i.e. phy-sical science and engineering)teaching. Educators, having learn-ed not to look a gift horse in themouth, welcomed even this pit-tance.

But our Cold Warriors, notknowing when to leave well enoughalone, decided that no "defense'"bill could be safe without tack-ing' on additional qualifications.Thus they appended the require-ment that any recipient of theloans or grants would be requiredto sign two loyalty oaths: one

ICo!ithi««i»r] on Pase 3)

,"As the only socialist in this | neuroses. The billions now ear-campaign," Buch stated. "I will (Comiimned on Page 3)

Pickets to Bring 'Kiss Case' Before MM(For a background story on the "Kiss Case," "A Southern Town

becomes a Battlefield of Prejudice," see page 3 ) .NEW YORK—A mass picket line of mothers and youth in front

of the UN building here is being planned by the Youth Committeeto Free Hanover Thompson and David "Fuzzy" Simpson for Fri-day, Feb. 20' 2:30-5 P.M. The aim of the demonstration is to bringthe famous "Kiss Case" to the attention of the UN General- Assembly,which is opening on that day. The Committee feels that the Declara-tion of Human Rights should apply to the U.S. as well as the restof the world.

The Youth Committee, which is an affiliate of the Committeeto Combat Racial Injustice has been carrying on extensive activitiesover the last month to free the two boys from reform school. Com-fittee representatives have spoken before NAACP youth councils,church groups and college organizations in the New York area aswell as throughout the country. On February 1, the Youth Committeeheld a reception for Robert Williams and Dr. Perry of the MonroeN.C. NAACP. Close to 100 persons, largely Negro and white teenagers,attended.

In expressing his gratitude for the work being done by the YouthCommittee, Williams gave special thanks to the YOUNG SOCIALIST.Describing the visit to Monroe by Nora Roberts and Joan Garrettof the YS, he said that when they arrived the local NAACP didn'teven have a lawyer for the boys. It was the YS reporters that sug-gested Conrade Lynn and upon their return to New York told theirstory to Lynn, he stated.

Page 2 YOUNG SOCIALIST February, 1959

DISCUSSION:

We Should favor Pemefal(The following communica-

tion was received from A. Rob-ert Kaufman, YS CorrespondingEditor for Baltimore, in answerto our invitation to discuss thequestion of "peaceful co-exist-ence with Scott Nearing in ourDecember issue. Evelyn Sell ofDetroit comments on the sametopic in the January issue.)

It is correct to say that the lastgreat barrier to a world of peaceand plenty is the capitalist sys-tem. In order to ensure peace wemust, therefore, destroy capital-ism.

However, this does not meanthat a policy of peaceful co-ex-istence between blocks of nationsis not something which socialistsshould advocate. Peaceful co-ex-istence, let us remember, meansprimarily an end to the cold war.It also means no historical needor excuse for infringements onfreedom and democracy on eitherside' of the great ideological di-vide.

The co-existence which follow-ed World War II lasted only un-til peace-time production hadfully met effective consumer de-mand and then the Frankensteinmonster of capitalism was re-es-tablished—i.e. the problem of sur-plus production and underem-ployment of workers in a world of,meed.

Twenty percent of the grossiBalional product of the United

States is now devoted to produc-ing war materials. Millions ofworkers are employed in variousphases of cur war industry as wellas the armed forces.

What do you think would hap-pen to these men and to the en-tire capitalist economy should thearms race end? We would havea depression far greater than theone of the Thirties. Capitalismcould never survive such a de-pression. The American socialism

which would grow out of such acapitalist crisis would remove thelast great barrier to peace andplenty.

The capitalists well know thatpeace equals depression whichequals the end of their rule. It isfor this reason that they opposepeaceful-coexistence. I t m i g h tvery well be that we can hastenthe d o w n f a l l of capitalismthrough the popular demand forco-existence.

Boston Young Socialists j*ian ConfersmBOSTON—With the formation of the Harvard Radcliffe So-

cialist Club in November of this year, the ice was broken in theBoston area for socialist activity on campus. Almost simultane-ously and independently a discussion group was set up at M.I.T.for the purpoe of studying socialism. Since November socialiststudents from different campuses have been discussing the pos-sibility of forming an inter-college socialist grouping.

Then in December Tim Wohlforth came to the Boston areaand spoke at Harvard, Brandeis and Boston University. He alsospoke before an informal group of socialists representing differentcolleges around the Boston vicinity. This led to the organizationof a committee for the formation of a United Socialist Studentgroup of Greater Boston.

This committee is calling a conference for February 22 of allsocialist students from the campuses around Boston for the for-mation of the group mentioned above.

The committee and the organization to be formed is and willbe open to socialists of different tendencies. The committee itselfcontains the Y.S. arid YPSL Boston representatives plus a varietyof independent socialists.

The conference is expected to draw students from M.I.T., Har-vard, Radcliffe, Brandeis, Boston College, Wellesley and Tufts.

Detroit's Jobless Organize Campaign(Continued from Page 1)

ered permanently unemployed.Another of the delegates de-

scribed machines that compiledata from blueprints, feed it totapes, and these tapes run lathes,milling machines, grinders, press-es, drills and so on without theaid of workers. "All this could bea good thing," the delegate said,"but the present results of itmake it a threat to employmentinstead."

At the surplus food stations inDetroit, people received for themonth of January, one poundeach of rice and butter. "That'sabout $1 worth of food." One mansaid angrily while picking up hisfood, "I could have bought aboutas much with the carfare I spentto come down here and pick upthis food."

It was also pointed out at theCouncil session that the futurelooks grim. Ford's Rouge factoryhas laid off 100 with more to fol-low from its glass plant. The en-

gine plant has just gone on a 4-day week.

One thousand unemployed aday exhaust their benefits inMich., 100 a day lose their homes,often with only a few paymentsto go, and 1 out of 3 will be de-nied welfare, who are not firstdiscouraged from applying. Wel-fare aid has been further cut bythe labor-endorsed Mayor of De-troit, Miriani. Evictions mountdaily.

Many of the nation's unem-ployed are young people, ex-GI's,and the hundreds of thousands ofstudents poured into the labormarket each year.

The conditions here led a hand-ful of young unemployed workersto begin the organization of anunemployed committee .

The international leadership ofthe uAw had done nothing aboutunemployment or 30 for 40. Theseworkers made the rounds of thelocal unemployed councils andunions and called a meeting latein December to set up a city wide

Canadian Students in Actionby Cliff Cotton

Developments of the p a s tmonth show that Canadian stu-dents have not been silent on is-sues concerning them.

VANCOUVER: 500 VictoriaCollege students booed, hung ineffigy, and threw lunch bags atBritish Columbia's Premier, B. C.Sennet. The students demandedhis resignation following the con-viction of a British Columbiancabinet member, Robert Sommers,on a bribery charge.

WINNIPEG: One of Canada'smost publicized civil rights cases,the firing of H. C. Crowe fromthe United College staff, caused80 students to boycott classes indefense of his academic freedom.The protest was joined by 15 ofthe 52 members of the facultywho resigned in support of Pro-fessor Crowe. The 3,400 membersof the Canadian Association ofUniversity Teachers backed Crowecompletely. 104 professors fromthe University of Manitoba and 22from the University of Toronto

signed petitions joining the weightof public opinion causing the res-ignation of the principal of UnitedCollege.

OTTOWA: Two of the editorsof the University of Ottawa's stu-dent paper. La Rotunde, weretold not to return to campus be-

j cause they had printed articleslast spring criticizing the admin-istration for "religious paternal-ism." The expulsion caused con-siderable protest from the stu-dents of the Catholic institution.But, with no support from thefaculty, the editors lost the fightand no French student newspaperis now being published on thecampus.

M O N T R E A L : After .ninemonths of struggle on the part of18,000 students, (see May-June1958 YS) Quebec's Premier Du-plessis agreed to meet representa-tives from six student bodies inthe province. The students wereprotesting the Premier's refusalof a grant to college studentsamounting to $13,000,000.

j committee. The meeting wassuccessful and plans were madefor action.

A group went to meet with Sen.McNamara (Dem.-M.) to ask himto introduce a bill in Congressfor the 30 hour week. At first herefused, but later said he woulddo so providing Waiter Reuthersent him a letter saying he sup-ported the move. Reuther andMcNamara have done nothingsince then. The committee at-temped to meet with Reuther.The militant unemployed did notlet their actions begin and endwith politicians and labor bweau-crats. More than 30,000 leafletswere passed out by willing hands

j to bring the unemployed out todemonstrate on Jan. 12, at CityHall.

Detroit Common Council mem-bers unofficially s t a t e d theywould support the 30 hour week.but like McNamara, only ifReuther supported it. This escaperoute is rapidly becoming a wellblazed trail.

When news of McNamara's! "promise" hit the papers, Reuth-er sent a six point statement tothe press for the next day. Noneof the six points included 30 for40. This was Reuther's aaswer.

The behavior of these politi-cians shows that labor endorse-ment of them was a mistake. The

j unemployed are learning this les-son and are beginning to under-stand that a third party—a laborparty—is needed to fight unem-ployment.

On the state level. Democratic"friend of labor" Gov. Williamshas shown no more considerationof the problems of the workers.

As a result of the actions of theso-called friends of labor, the un-employed are beginning to takematters into their own hands. Theunemployed movement is growingand progressive. It is a good ex-ample of how working people canorganize and come to grips witha problem in order to solve it andmake life better for themselvesand others.

It is significant that young peo-ple are in the forefront of thisstruggle as they hare been in thefight against nuclear tests andagainst . racial discrimination.

Young SocialistTim Wohlforth, Managing EditorAllen Taplin, Business Manager

Editorial Board: Bert Deck, George Payne. Tim Wohlforth, Riclt-ard DeHaan, James Lambrecht, Martha Curti, Allen Taplin.

Corresponding Editors: Philadelphia—Arthur Phelps; Detroit-Evelyn Sell; Chicago—John Worth; Minneapolis—Tom Leonard;Denver—Leonard Hodg'ett; Los Angeles—Peter Allan; Bay Area—Richard Kenny; Seattle—John Severn; New York—Daniel Freeman;Baltimore—A. Robert Kaufman; Boston—Pete Samejo; Annapolis—Robert McCormick; Canada—Cliff Cotton; Britain—Janet Downs;Germany—Wolfgang KaiserRoving Correspondent: Shane Mage. Western Representative: JamesRobertson.

SUBSCRIPTION PRICE :$1.00 a year, $.50 for sit months. Bundle rates: $7.00 forfirst 100 copies. $3 00 lor each additional 100. The YOUNG SOCIALIST is publishedmonthly. P.O. Box 471, Cooper Sta., N.Y. 3. N.Y. Phone EN 2-3722. Opinions expressedin signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of the YOUNG SOCIALIST,which are expressed in editorial statements.

VOL. 2, No. 5 February, 1959

Luxemburg and LiebknechtIn the middle of the night on January 15, 1919, 40 years ago,

Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, two of the finest revolution-ary socialists of all time, were brutally murdered by military group.?that later became the nucleus of the Nazi party.

Implicated in the murder, and directly responsible for it, was theSocial Democratic Government of Ebert, the Guy Mollet of his day.The "crime" for which Liebknecht and Luxemburg were murderedwas their leadership in the struggle against war and their supportto the "Sparticus" rebellion which aimed at establishing socialismin Germany. The Second International refused to condemn the ac-tion of the Ebert Government just as today it refuses to condemnGuy Mollet for his support to Prance's war against the Algerian peo-ple and to deGaulle.

Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht have always had a specialplace in the heart of socialist youth. Rosa was probably the greatestwomen socialist and symbolizes the possibility of women to freethemselves from the secondary position they are forced into in capi-talist society and assume real leadership in the worker's movement.

Karl more than any other single individual can be considered thefounder of the socialist youth movement. As early as 1904 he proposedto the Social Democratic Party that they initiate an independentyouth movement whose aim would be to fight the influence of militar-ism over the youth. The Social Democratic leaders fearing the inde-pendence of the youth and also fearing an open confrontation withthe militaristic drive of the government fought the proposal.

However, Liebknecht was able to organize a South German youthgroup and with this called the first international congress of socialistyouth in 1907. In this venture he received the full support of RosaLuxemburg and Lenin. The congress adopted a strong anti-militaristdeclaration which stated "the struggle against militarism cannot beseparated from the socialist class struggle in general." In 1908 whileLiebknecht was in jail for his anti-war views, the Social DemocraticParty passed a resolution subordinating the youth to the party andthus contradicting the aims of Liebknecht to establish an independemtyouth movement.

The Socialist Party-Social Democratic Federation leadership, thelegitimate heirs of Ebert and Co. likewise is afraid of the .independ-ence of the youth and insists on subordinating the Young People'sSocialist League to itself. We, on the other hand, continue to cham-pion the independence of the youth movement. Further we agree withLiebknecht's words: "If you want peace, prepare for war, war againstmilitarism!"

YPSL Opposes Unity11 t/In the Last issue of the YS we printed an editorial challenge to

the Young Peoples Socialist League in which we suggested to YPSUmembers that instead of orienting towards the right they move toleft and seriously consider uniting with YS supporters in the joint effortto build a socialist youth movement in this country. We suggestedas a programmatic basis for such a unity the YPSL members con-sider the editorial policy .statement adopted at our Detroit conference.

On January 16 in a debate with YS editor Tim Wohlforth,Michael Harrington gave the YPSL'g answer to our challenge. Heflatly turned down any possibility of the two groups uniting on thebasis proposed in our editorial. Further, he made it clear that hewould not even accept unity with most of the YS supporters on hisbasis. He stated that he would oppose allowing most of the YS sup-porters to join the YPSL even if they choose to.

The record is now clear. We will continue in our efforts to buildan independent broad and militant youth movement in the UnitedStates despite the opposition of YPSL.

SOCIALIST CLUB LISTANNAPOLIS: c/o Bob McCormick. Box

16, St. John's College.BALTIMORE: Socialist Study Group.

c'o A. Robert Kaufman. 2733 Reister-town Rd. LA 3-3703.

BAY AREA: Young Socialist Alliance.2431 Dwlght Way, Berkeley. E. V. DebsClub. 2431 Dwight Way, Berkeley.Mark Twain Club, 196-& ConnecticutSt., San Francisco.

BOSTON: c/o Camejo, 495 Monroe, MIT.Cambridge.

BUFFALO: c/o Neva Kescemetic, 831Main St.

CHICAGO: Voting Socialist Committee,c/o Calne's, 1501 E. 68 St.

DENVER: Young Socialist Club, Box 724.DETROIT: Young Socialist Committee.

c/o 3310 Cortland.LOS ANGELES: Young Socialist Com-

mittee, c/o 1708 .E. 4 St.MADISON, Wis.: Wisconsin. Socialist

Club, c/o Landau, 1028 Clymer PI.

MONTREAL: McGill University SocialistSociety, c/o McGill Students' Union,690 Sherbrooke St., W.

MILWAUKEE: Young Socialist Club, Uni-versity of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

NEW YORK CITY: Young Socialist Al-liance. Box 471. Cooper Sta.

O8ERLIIT. Ohio: Oberlin Socialist Club,Oberlin College.

PHILADELPHIA: Youjg Socialist Club,c/o Phelps. Apt. 4to, 3506 Powelton Ave.

PORTLAND. Ore.: Focus, Reed College.RICHMOND. Ind.: Socialist Discussion

Group, Barlham College.TWIN CITIES: Independent Political

Youth. c,'o Jean Bradford. 1822 LaSalle Ave., Mpls.

TORONTO: Socialist Youth Forum, LE4-8040,

YELLOW SPRINGS.. Ohio: Socialist Dis-cussion Club, Aatioch College.

February, 1959 YOUNG SOCIALIST Paoe 3

BEHIND THE 'KISS' CASE:

A Southern Town Becomes a Battlefield of Prejudiceby Barbara Doritty

Who will prevail in Monroe,North Carolina? Split with theknife of race hatred and violence,this Southern city received in-ternational notoriety as the citythat produced the "kissing case."Two little Negro boys, eight andten, have been thrown in a refor-matory possibly until they are 21years old for having been kissedby a white girl.

Monroe is a divided city. An in-creasingly typical Southern phe-nomena, Monroe's white and Ne-gro population make up two arm-ed camps. On the one side, thewhites a majority in the city, havetheir Ku Klux Klan which hasplanned and carried through notonly terrorist but full-scale mili-tary attacks on the Negro min-ority. On the other side are theNegroes, fighting to exist freelyas equals with all citizens. Theyhave organized themselves in theNAACP. They have utilized rifles,steel helmets, sandbag barricadesand a grim solidarity to preservethe new dignity won by all South-ern Negroes over the past fewyears. Monroe is a divided cityand more—it is a battlefield.

How did this small Southerntown become a battlefield of raceprejudice? Monroe, North Caro-lina is located in the region knownas the "Black Belt." This circulararc, which begins at the Missis-sippi Delta and ends in Vicksburg,Va., is the backbone of the Southand the bastion of "white supre-macy." The history of this statereflects all the prejudices, hat-reds and violence that are partof the southern reality which re-tards and blocks the emancipa-tion of the American people.

As far back as 1797 Negroes ofthis state petitioned to Congressfor their rights. In 1829 a Negromilitant, then in the North, pub-lished a pamphlet against Negroinequality. The demand for Ne-gro higher education, federal sup-port of education, uniform re-quirements of salaries for Negroand white teachers are not solelydemands of the present, but also

i t covte

i

date as far back as the Recon-struction days.

Side by side with the small gainsmade by the Negro in Monroe ex-ists race violence in the form ofthe Ku Klux Klan. whose cam-paign of night-riding, cross-burn-ing, and "evangelical rallies" havebecome a symbol of terror.

DEFEND RIGHTSFor the last three years the Ne-

groes of Monroe have intensifiedthis fight for their equality. Firstthe battle to desegregate the townlibrary was won with the help ofthe local NAACP president, Rob-ert F. Williams. In July 1957 therewas a fight to integrate recrea-tion facilities. The Negroes weredefeated in that struggle, thereby

i laying the groundwork for a de-| segregation suit. This actionI brought about terrorist attacksfrom the Ku Klux Klan againstWilliams and Dr. A. E. Perry, vice-president of the NAACP. A Klanmotorcade of sixty cars—headedtowards Perry's home—was beat-en back by the armed Negro com-munity. And finally, last OctoberWilliams formally petitioned theMonroe school board for the trans-fer of his two sons to the white

| school. It is against this back-ground that Monroe's most scan-dalous incident — the Carolina"kissing case" took place.

Like the Negroes in the Southat large, Monroe's Negroes areoutnumbered by whites; their un-

usual militancy is being outflank-ed, again like other Southern Ne-groes, by legal attacks. For in-stance, Dr. Perry has been ar-rested on a trumped up charge of iperforming an abortion on a white jwoman. He had joined Robert F.Williams in the fight to deseg-regate the local municipal swim-ming pool.

Recently Monroe was awakenedby another case, that of a 16-year-old Negro boy who was sentencedto 110 years in prison on a man-slaughter charge after a whiteboy was killed in a fight.

Even more recently a Negrochambermaid, Mrs. Georgia Dav-is, 29, in a hotel in Monroe wasthrown down a flight of stairs bya white man because he claimedher calling out to another cham-bermaid had disturbed his sleep.She went to the police who re-luctantly swore out a warrantwith a very low bail. In retalia-tion the chambermaid is beingprosecuted on an old unemploy-ment comDensation charge, accus-ing her : - earning $4 while draw-ing compensation.

LABOR ALLYThere are hundreds, perhaps

thousands, of cases like these oc-curring every day in the South.When their cry is not heard thebig fight remains isolated and theNegroes suffer another defeat. Wea«k ourselves what other forcescan be brought to their aid.

Union attention and supportmust and will be attracted to thestruggle in Monroe. Dr. Perry andRobert F. Williams are in theforefront of the newly formedCommittee to Combat Racial In-justice, whose national committeeincludes Reverend C. K. Steele,leader of the Talahassee bu's-boy-cott. Their purpose is to spreadthe call for union aid to theSouthern Negro. Unionization onan integrated basis is the onlyway Negro equality can prevail.

The most significant factor in-volved in this phenomena is that,the Negroes have begun to seekout the support of whites who arevictims of the same oppressorsand will carry on a struggle withthem. By the same token the en-tire South will begin to feel theresults of "who will prevail." Thestruggle is not unique for Mon-roe but at the same time Monroe'svictory will give strength and mil-itancy to the majority of the Ne-groes stiil suppressed.

It is for us now to help the "kisscaise boys," mere children, notcriminals. What can we do? Do-nate money to help the Commit-tee to Combat Racial Injustice winunion support. Petitions to freethe boys can be obtained from thecommittee—spread them in yourcommunity! Send money andsigned petitions to the Committeeto Combat Racial Injustice, Suite1117, 141 Broadway, New York 6.

Protest College Loyalty Oath ...

Election..(Continued from Page 1)

marked for war should be chan-neled into higher salaries to se-cure better teachers, into build-ing more and better qualityschools and expanding the freelunch and health programs. Nomore children in the school sys-tem of Los Angeles, one of thewealthiest cities in America,should need to go hungry or with-out complete health care."

"Students should be given anobjective consideration of social-ist ideas,"' stated Peter Buch."They should be taught friend-ship and respect for peoples ofother lands "

Other points in his programcall for -non-discriminatory hir-ing of teachers and assignmentof school districts; a council ofrepresentatives of labor, Negro,Mexican-American and other mi-nority groups to supervise the se-lection of unbiased textbooks.

Although the office is non-par-tisan, the candidacy of Buch isendorsed by the Socialist WorkersParty,- which has supported can-didates running on socialist plat-forms in previous elections forLos Angeles Board of Educationas well as for mayor. In addition.the editorial board of the YOUNGSOCIALIST has come out in sup-"port of the campaign and its sup-porters in Los Angeles will ac-tively campaign to bring Buck'sproposals for better educationand a peaceful, prosperous, so-cialist world to the workers andthe students of Los Angeles.

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(Continued from Page 1)pledging: allegiance to the govern-ment and Constitution, the other jswearing- that the applicant doesnot believe in or support any "sub- |versive" organization (Section1001 ( f ) , Title X, of the Act). Thesecond of these requirements has !

at last soaded the sleeping giantof American academe into action.UNIVERSITIES PROTEST OATH

First, the 40,000-membor Amer-ican Association of UniversityProfessors sent letters protestingthe oath requirement to Congres-sional committee members, brand-ing the provision as "humiliat- ,ing," and pointing out that itjudges students to be "a particu-larly suspect part of your popu-lation."

Then the issue was raised ev°n;n the conservative Associationof American Colleges, which hastraditionally played a role vis-a-vis the AAUP somewhat analo-gous to that of management vis-a-vis labor. When the issue wasraised at the AAC's annual meet-ing, proponents of the oath ar-gued that the meeting was notsufficiently representative to en-sure a democratic decision, andit was accordingly decided to noilthe 750 member institutions of theAssociation on the question. Theresults of this poll have not yetbeen released.

Several of the member insti-tutions, however, jumped the gunon the AAC, and made publictheir own views. The three Quaker jcolleges in the Philadelphia area, jB r y n Mawr, Haverford a n dSwarthmore, demanded repeal ofthe provision, and the first twostated that they would not parti-cipate in the program unless therequirement is removed.

Three Maine colleges. Bates,Bowdoin and Colby and the presi-dents of Yale, Harvard andPrinceton joined the protest.

None of the colleges took excep-tion to the companion require-ment of the act that applicantstake an act of allegiance. To re-quire such an oath was held tobe "a necessary accompanimentof citizenship" and the "right ofthe Government."

At YOUNG SOCIALIST press -time, .student opposition was also

beginning to form in isolated ar-eas. The Oberlin College StudentCouncil took a forthright standagainst the requirement as did theUniversity of Michigan a n dSwarthmore student councils.

But one student organizationhas been conspicuous in its weak-ness. The National Student Asso-ciation joins its voice with Secre-tary of Health, Education andWelfare Arthur S. Fleming in con-demning the "loyalty" provisionas unenforceable against hard-core "subversives" — who, theybelieve, will sign the oath mny-way.NSA: 'OATH NOT EFFECTIVE'

NSA adopted a resolution bya 23-3 vote of its National Execu-tive Committee meeting of De-cember 29, 1958 welcoming theNational Defense Education Actwith one objection. Its objectionto the requirement clause is noteven as courageous as those ofconservative colleges. "We do notoppose positive affirmations ofloyalty to the United States ..."declared the student organization,"However, Section 1001 (f) failsto offpr 3 r-^ar and unobjection-able affirmation of loyalty . . . willfail to eliminate those workingtoward the overthrow of the gov-ernment, but may work hardshipson innocent individuals."

Few of the protestants seem toappreciate that the oath require-ment is really of a piece with thewhole new-found American con-cern for "education." Once edm-cation becomes just another ployin the Cold War, then there Isno logical reason why "securityrisks" should not be summarilyeliminated from it. Once educationloses its basically democraticfunction, there is no reason whystudents should not be denied thepresumption of innocence whichis the basis of all democratic law.

There is, indeed, much to toesaid for the Greek belief that ed-ucation has something to do withthe general character of the civil-ization. Were Plato familiar wittyour educational system as an ad-junct of American foreign policy,,he would surely have to reaffirmhis statement that "what is re-vered in a society wilt-be taujrhtthere." ,

Page 4 YOUNG SOCIALIST February, 1959

THE WORKERS' PARTIES ARE RESPONSIBLE:

France: Why Reaction TriumphedShane Mage, presently roving correspondent for the

YS, was one of the founders of the paper. He was in Franceduring the period of the Referendum and elections analy-sed in this article.

By Shane MageCASABLANCA — Reaction has

triumphed in Prance. The major-ity of the French people havegiven a sweeping mandate to theparty of Jacques Soustelle andMichel Oebre, "The Union for theNew Republic," and its ultra-conservative allies, the "Inde-pendents." In doing so, they haveapproved the military coup d'etatof May 13, 1958, which killed theFourth Republic. The Frenchhave voted in favor of the waragainst the Algerian people—awar which has as its conse-quences inside France steadilyrising prices (further aggravatedby de Gaulle's devaluation of thefranc), political repression and agovernmental budget so unbal-anced by the cost of the war thatthe most elementary needs of thepeople must be ignored.

This is a shocking result forthose who think of France as thecountry of liberalism and "TheDeclaration of the Rights ofMan." So, too, is it for those whorecall that less than three yearsago the French sent to the Na-tional Assembly "men of the left"Who campaigned on a programcalling for an end to the Algerianwar and the start of a new era ofisocial progress. But especiallymust it be a revelation to thosewho had seen in the huge FrenchCommunist Party a reliable bul-wark of democratic liberties.

It is incumbent upon every po-litical conscious person to under-stand how France has been hand-ed over to a militarist and quasi-fascist leadership for the nextfive years. Why did parliamen-tary democracy fail, and whywere the Communist, Socialistand liberal forces all powerlessbefore the sweep of Gaullist-Sou-stellist reaction?

While deGaulle himself is thebest-known character in thisstory of the Fourth Republic, thestory cannot be understood with-out knowledge of three infinitelymore important characters: theSocialist Party, the CommunistParty and colonialism.

SOCIALISTS SUPPORTREACTION

Led by Leon Blum, the SocialistParty was typically social-demo-cratic. Swept to power (in thefamous "Popular Front") by ageneral strike in 1936, Blumquickly proclaimed himself a"loyal administrator" of Frenchcapitalism. He did not betray hisword. French capitalism wassaved at the cost of a few minorreforms, while international so-cialist solidarity was broken bythe refusal of the Blum govern-ment to intervene on the side oftheir Spanish Loyalist comrades.

Once far to the left of the SP,the French Communist Party be-came domesticated in the 1930's.When the Kremlin made dealswith the French capitalists, suchas the Stalin-Laval pact of 1935,the CP was obliged to support agovernment which the day beforeit had called "fascist." The CPentered the "Popular Front" in

1936, and loyally did Blum's bid-ding, even to the point of strike-breaking,

The two parties neverthelessretained the allegiance of theworking class because they rep-resented the only, organized polit-ical force available to the work-ers.

Our third character, colonial-ism, has always been an integralelement of French capitalism.French industry was backwardand uncompetititve as againstGermany, England and the U.S.Its archaic industrial system wasshored up only by the profitsstreaming from a vast coloniale m p i r e , including Indo-China,Morocco and Algeria.

During the Nazi occupation ofFrance in World War II, mostFrench capitalists and conserva-tives collaborated with the Ger-mans through the Vichy Govern-ment. A smaller section of the

Socialists are constantlyconcerned that their politicsuphold sound principles. TheTexans, however, seem to havesettled that problem. "Politicsis politics," said one "LoneStar" lobbyist to a Texas Ob-server reporter. "Don't try tomix principle with it. Politicsis pure, but you start mixing:principle in it, and everything:gets murky."

capitalists, principally those as-sociated with light industry, sup-ported the British side under theleadership of deGaulle. But inFrance itself, a powerful Resis-tance was formed, made up large-ly of workers, mainly socialistsand communists, and their pro-gram was the establishment ofsocialism in France.

After the war, the Resistancemovement was the strongest sin-gle political force in France, andmilitarily stronger than deGaulle'sarmy and police. With the Vichycollaborators in hiding, the Com-munist and Socialist parties to-gether polled an absolute major-ity in the first post-war elections.Nothing, it seemed, could stopFrance from becoming socialist.

But the Communists and So-cialists, having: learned nothingfrom the disastrous lessons of thePopular Front, pursued the samepolicies in 1945 and they had in1936, and with the same results.Instead of forming a socialistgovernment, they entered a coal-ition with a Catholic, capitalistand colonialist party, the "Pop-ular Republicans." Despite thepresence of Socialist and Com-munist ministers, this coalitiongovernment continued with a ven-geance the policies of colonialism.In 1945, 50,000 Algerians wereslaughtered at Setif, and Damas-cus was bombed mercilessly. In1946, Haiphong was bombed, andthe war in Indo-China began. In1947. 80.000 natives of Madagas-

car were slaughtered for demand-ing independence,

Meanwhile, in France the CPused its prestige from the Resis-tance movement to persuadeworkers to support the coalitiongovernment. Under cover of slo-gans like "Produce First" and"The Strike is the Class Weaponof the Irusts." the CP for twoyears prevented the workers fromgoing on strike. Most disastrousof all, the CP forced the workers'militias to disarm themselves onthe basis of CP-leader MauriceThorezs slogan, "A Single Army.A Single Police, A Single State."What Thorez neglected to tell theworkers was that this army, po-lice and state were to be usedagainst them and against the col-onial peoples.

WORKERS REBEL AGANST .'RESTRAINT'

The working class, by 1947, hadenough of this "restraint" and agreat wave of wildcat strikesbegan over CP protests, includinga strike at the enormous Renaultautomobile factory. The CP wasforced to withdraw from the gov-ernment, a decision which wasgreeted with relief by its Socialistand Catholic "friends" who werebeginning to shiver in the ColdWar winds blowing from Wash-ington.

The years following the break-up of the three-party coalitionwere somber ones for France. Theevent symbolizing the period wasthe disastrous Indo-Chinese war,which while producing huge for-tunes for some shrewd currencymanipulators w i t h governmentconnections, ruined French fi-nances and ate away the value ofthe franc.

When the CP left the coalitiongovernment, it announced that itwas going into opposition; yet itfollowed the most sterile and in-effective policy conceivable. Itsteadfastly opposed any unitedclass action against capitalismand colonialism, either as aunited front of communist andsocialist workers or in the formof a general strike. (In 1948, theFrench coal miners were defeatedin a bitter two-month strike sole-ly because the CP prevented theRenault workers from coming totheir aid). The CP frittered awaythe strength of the working-classmovement in isolated and adven-turist actions such as the "Ridge-way Riots."

Meanwhile, the first Gaullistmovement, the "Rally of theFrench People," made its ap-pearance in 1951, showing alreadythe fascist stigmata of its laterincarnation.

With the victory of the Indo-Chinese people at Dienbienphuin 1954 and the emerging ofpowerful anti-colonial movementsin Tunisia and Morocco, it seemedfor a moment as though a changewas in the offing. The liberalPierre Mendes-France b e c a m epremier, negotiated a settlementin Indo-China and promised au-tonomy to Tunisia. At the sametime, however, he continued therepression in Morocco and Algeria,and then cut his government's po-litical throat by forcing Germanrearmament through the Nation-al Assembly in January. 1955.

People stand in front of a closed stock exchange office in Parts,discussing De Gaulla's decree pegging the franc at 493.7 to the dollarinstead of the previous 420. The effect of the devaluation move wasto lower the ability of the French workers to buy foreign goods.

With the end of the Mendes-France "experiment," French col-onialism faced a yet more seriousthreat: the Algerian revolution,which had broken out in October,1954. The Faure-Pinay govern-ment, which succeeded that ofMendes-France, abandoned Mor-occo in order to concentrate onAlgeria, but to no avail. The Al-gerian revolution flourished in theface of ail that French militarismcould offer.

GOVERNMENT FACESALGERIA

The last great hope of theFourth Republic came in the elec-tions of January, 1956. The "Re-publican Front," headed by SP-leader Guy Mollet, was broughtto power on a promise to end theAlgerian war and to c a r r ythrough real social reforms.

As it was the last hope of par-liamentary domocracy, so was ;tthe last betrayal of the "PopularFront." Instead of ending thewar through negotiation, Mollet—through his Socialist minister,Lacoste—intensified it by a policyof military "pacification." On thebasis of special powers voted byall parties, including the Commu-nists, the war took on the mac-abre character of massacre andtorture which is now all too fa-miliar. Into the bottomless pit ofAlgeria also went all hope of so-cial reform, as inflation wiped outthe gradual improvement in theFrench workers' real wages.

The Mollet government was be-set by many contradictory forcesin its prosecution of the Algerianwar: the intransigent colons, theinexorable economic necessity ofending the war and the mutepresence of the French workingclass—paralyzed by the CP's di-rect and indirect support of thewar, but capable at any time of jspontaneous revolutionary actionagainst it.

These forces finally came intoopen collision on May 13, 1958. jwhen, rightly suspecting that the jParis government was preparing jto negotiate with the Algerians. Ithe army and colons, of Algeriastaged their coup d'Etat. The re-bellion could have been easily

crushed, as is now generally rec-ognized, and a similar coup taFrance itself could have been pratdown instantly by workers' mili-tia and a general strike.

But the Pflimlin governmentwas far more frightened of suchmeasures than of the fascist plot-ters of May 13, for both it andthey represented the same cap-italist order. To break with thearmy would have meant relyingon the power of the working class,

T h e SP-Popular Republicangovernment did not seek to putdown the revolt, but to capitu-late to it. The CP did not desertthem in this, b u t supportedPflimlin and Mollet absolutelyand uncritically, even going so faras to join in a vote of confidence

| in the arch-conspirator, Salan.The CP opposed the tendencies inthe labor movement, such as theTeachers' Union, which called fora general strike. "Unnecessaryand provocative," they said, "forMollet and Pflimlin will defenddemocracy against deGaulle."

When Pflimlin and Mollet hadfinally turned over absolute pow-er to deGaulle, the CP posed asthe only "real" defender of dem-ocracy. But its record is writtenin its parliamentary votes and inthe pages of L'Humanite duringthose crucial May days: the CPhad acted as an effective accom-plice in the murder of the FourthRepublic.

Disillusioned with Socialist andCommunist betrayal, the workersturned to deGaulle, the only realforce in France. Their defeat setback progress everywhere in theworld. It behooves all of us tolearn the lesson of that defeat.

It has aptly been said that so-cialists today are used by thebourgeoise to do the dirty workwhich no capitalist party couldget away with. The regenerationof socialism requires a sharpbreak with the old traditions ofparliamentary maneuver and pop-ular front with liberal capitalists.It was the workers' parties whichorganized the workers' defeat.inFrance. That defeat can be over-come only by united, militant anddemocratic working-class action.

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