86 led a delegation which included Marcel Scherer and Jules Korchien to the White House where he presented a drafting board and honorary membership in the F. A. E. C. T. to President Roosevelt for his services "as a great social architect" (Daily Worker, December 10, 1938, p. 4; December 15, 1938, p. 3, photograph). That was the period when the Communist Party was going all-out for "collective security against the Fascist aggressor" and the President was calling for the quarantine of the aggressor nations. The line of the Communist Party on foreign affairs was then most actively promoted by the American League for Peace and Democracy, of which Berne was a sponsor and member of its national labor committee. In a telegram to President Roosevelt, Berne promised: I will urge our members to be vigilant in their daily work in drafting rooms and Government departments where national plans are developed, to take personal responsibility as technicians to be watchful of any activities harmful to national defense (Daily Worker, December 12, 1938, p. 3). That promise was made before the Stalin-Hitler Pact of August 1939. Like a flash, Berne's attitudes changed after the signing of the Stalin-Hitler Pact. In a keynote address delivered at the fifth annual convention of the F. A. E. C. T. at the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York City, Berne excoriated the Roosevelt administration for its "drive to war under the guise of a defense program." Addressing delegates from shipyards and Government defense projects, he declared: We hold * * * no part in its outbreak and want no part in its prosecution. It is the result of the the position that this war is none of our making, we had most outstanding betrayals in history, the incompetence, the connivance, secret diplomacy and self-greed on the part of those responsible for the destinies of the nations now involved * * * who have shown contempt for democracy, who try to destroy civil-service rights We cannot trust our national defense to those for Government workers * * of the Johnson Act, permitting loans to belligerents (Daily Worker, June 1, 1940, *。 We must demand that there be no easing pp. 1, 5) Berne pointedly asked the assembled delegates to take the "peace" resolution of the convention back to the technical men of the country and urged them "to exert pressure to make this resolution and its objectives a reality" (Daily Worker, June 4, 1940, p. 3). He was too shrewd to state explicitly what he expected them to do in the "drafting rooms and Government departments," but his implication was only too clear. Sounding off for his fellow members engaged in vital war work, he sent a defiant telegram to Secretary of the Navy the Honorable Frank Knox, charging the administration with being "a party to this exploitation of the defense program to depress standards and violate the law." He announced that the draftmen's and designers' unions would not consider themselves bound by the Shipbuilding Stabilization Agreement and that "our organization cannot be considered to come within the terms of that understanding" (Daily Worker, February 22, 1941, p. 3). It was a call to action against the Government. As an example to his fellow technical men, he sponsored the American Peace Mobilization and became a member of its national council. This organization gave full encouragement to political strikes in defense industries, and agitated against conscription and lend-lease, and gained considerable notoriety by its picket line around the White House. Then came Hitler's march against Russia and the end of the communazi fellowship. In complete conformity with the present Communist Party line, Lewis Alan Berne now, like all Communists, waxes superpatriotic. Under his leadership, the F. A. E. C. T. has published a pamphlet entitled "Producing for Víctory, A Labor Manual for Increasing War Production." His New York chapter recently announced a series of lectures on "Planning in War and Peace," including one lecture on "Planning in the U. S. S. R." (C. I. O. News, January 3, 1944, p. 8). Like others of his ilk, the name of Lewis Alan Berne furnishes a convenient prop for all sorts of Communist-front organizations. We cite a few typical ones: Joint Committee for Trade-Union Rights, defending Com- Member.. munist furriers. American Committee for Protection of Foreign-Born... Sponsor. Daily Worker, Mar. 5, Daily Worker, July 19, Booklet, 600 Prominent Letterhead, Aug. 3, 1939. 1939, p. 2. Daily Worker, Mar. 2, 1939, p. 2. These Americans Say, Daily Worker, Nov. 11, Lewis Alan Berne was a delegate to the 1943 convention of the C. I. O., held in Philadelphia, in November. At that convention, Berne pledged the resources of his Communist-dominated F. A. E. C. T. to Sidney Hillman's C. I. O. Political Action Committee. There are staggering implications for the future of America in the growth of these Communist-controlled unions, of which the F. A. E. C. T. is only one but a very important one when the highly strategic technical positions of its members are considered. 24 NEIL BRANT Neil Brant (also known as Brandt) is the international representative of the Washington office of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, one of the C. I. O. affiliates in which scores of well-known Communists such as William Sentner, James Matles, and Julius Emspak occupy important strategic positions. Neil Brant writes frequently for his union's paper, the U. E. News. Few union papers are giving as much space to the C. I. O. Political Action Committee as the U. E. News, and few unions are working as energetically for the C. I. O. Political Action Committee as the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America. Neil Brant, as international representative of his union in Washington, is participating fully in this enthusiasm for the C. I. O. Political Action Committee. The Communist record of Neil Brant is an open book. It is, furthermore, indicative of the nature of the pretended patriotism of so many of the outstanding leaders of the Ĉ. I. O. Political Action Committee. On February 14, 1941, Neil Brant was arrested and charged with "defiling the United States flag" in the State of New Jersey. His police description attached to the record of his arrest reads as follows: White, male, 37, 5' 6'', 145 lbs., grey eyes, dark brown, grey hair, slim build, sallow complexion, small mustache; occupation, labor organizer; birthplace, Russia. This Russian-born traitor of 1941 and "patriot" of 1944 is a part of Sidney Hillman's political machine for 1944 elections. It will be noted, of course, that Brant's arrest for defiling the United States flag occurred during the period of the Stalin-Hitler Pact when the American Peace Mobilization was engaged in its Nation-wide seditious activities and when the Communist Party of the United States was lending every possible aid to Hitler by obstructing the Nation's military-preparedness program. Brant's attitude toward the United States flag during that period accurately reflected the Communist Party's views as they have been expressed throughout most of the Party's 25-year history in this country. For example, when William Z. Foster, national chairman of the Communist Party, was a witness before a committee of Congress, he was asked the following question: Do you owe allegiance to the American flag; does the Communist Party owe allegiance to the American flag? After some sparring, Foster replied: And all capitalist flags are flags of the capitalist class, and we owe no allegiance to them. In the Daily Worker of July 14, 1936, page 5, there appears the following question: "Should Communists salute the American flag?" And the Daily Worker answered: "Our flag is the red flag of the international working class." Also: when one of the leading members of the Communist Party returned from the Soviet Union, he engaged in a demonstration during which he clashed with the local police, and this Communist's own account of his words was published in the Daily Worker, as follows: I told the police to hell with the U. S. A. flag. I said that the flag I claimed was the one with the hammer and sickle, the red flag, which we will have someday. On December 15, 1940, the New Jersey State Industrial Council had before it a resolution which read as follows: The council condemns the dictatorships and totalitarianism of nazi-ism, communism, and fascism as inimical to the welfare of labor, and destructive of our form of government. Brant led the fight to delete "communism" from the resolution. Neil Brant is a member of the executive board of the National Federation for Constitutional Liberties, one of the most influential of the Communist Party's fronts of recent years, and also an organization which the Attorney General named as subversive. In 1937, the International Labor Defense set up a Trade Union Advisory Committee of which Neil Brant was a member (Labor Defender, October 1937, p. 18). The International Labor Defense, as almost everyone knows by this time, is the legal arm of the Communist Party. In 1941, the Communists established a school in New York City which was known as the School for Democracy (now merged with the Workers School into the Jefferson School of Social Science). Neil Brant was a lecturer at the School for Democracy. There is no doubt whatever of Neil Brant's allegiance to communism nor of his using his strategic position in his union and in the C. I. O. Political Action Committee to advance the cause of communism. 25 HARRY BRIDGES Harry Bridges and the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union (C. I. O.), of which he is president, are in the forefront of the activities of the C. I. O. Political Action Committee. Bridges is a member of the C. I. O. executive board which launched the Č. I. O. Political Action Committee on July 7, 1943. For years the case of Harry Bridges has been discussed in the public prints. His defense against deportation has been almost exclusively in the hands of Communists, a circumstance which throws considerable light on whether or not he is a Communist. The Harry Bridges Defense Committee, the Citizens' Committee for Harry Bridges, and the Harry Bridges Victory Committee must be designated as front organizations of the Communist Party, U. S. A., on the following grounds: (1) That conclusive evidence establishes the membership of Harry Renton Bridges in the Communist Party, U. S. A., which would naturally defend so important a party member. (2) That Harry Renton Bridges carried out the official policies of the Communist Party, U. S. A., in the San Francisco general strike of 1934, in his general trade union and political activity, and that the Communist Party, U. S. A., would logically be expected to defend so consistent and vigorous an advocate of its position. (3) That the Communist Party, U. S. A., through its official spokesmen, units, organs, and front organizations, has given Harry Renton Bridges its full support from 1934 to date, both in connection with his activities and with defense committees organized in his behalf. (4) That an analysis of the sponsors, writers, officers, and attorneys of the committees for the defense of Harry Bridges discloses the activity and association of these persons with numerous other front organizations and campaigns of the Communist Party, U. S. A. The San Francisco general strike of 1934 was planned and directed by the Communist Party, U. S. A., with Harry Bridges as its acknowledged leader. In an editorial appearing in The Communist of August 1934, a theoretical organ published monthly by the Communist Party, the following claims are made with reference to the San Francisco strike: What do the present strikes, especially the general strike in San Francisco show? In the first place, as was pointed out by the recently held meeting of the central committee of the Communist Party, higher forms of class action are being developed by the American proletariat (p. 741). * * * The Communist Party played a very important role, first in the development of the maritime strike and in calling the general strike in San Francisco. The Communist Party developed a revolutionary opposition in the I. L. A., which soon established its influence over the majority of the workers (p. 748). The party will utilize the lessons from these gigantic class battles to carry out the decisions of the thirteenth plenum of the E. C. C. I. (p. 749; note: E. C. C. I. stands for Executive Committee of the Communits International. * * * |