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UNITED WITH THE GERMAN WORKERS
The American Unions and German Social Democracy

The New York "Volkszeitung" writes:

This year's session of the Executive Board of the American Federation of Labor, which took place in Miami during the first half of February, dealt with a well-filled agenda and, alongside other important subjects, also discussed a matter which is certain to interest all those who have the present and future welfare of the German Labour Movement close at heart. One of the chief items on the agenda was:

The relationship of the A.F.L. to the exiled
German Social Democratic Party's Executive Committee

and the free German Labour Movement it represents. This question came up for very thorough discussion in such a way as to lay down the lines of policy to be followed.

The Executive Board, under the presidency of William Green, had invited two representatives of the German Social Democrats (Sopade) to attend the meeting of the 7th February, Friedrich Stampfer and Dr. Rudolf Katz, for the special purpose of the debate. The Board wished to get a clear understanding of and de-

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tailed information regarding the work, tasks and aims of the exiled German Executive Committee.

The desired explanations were afforded in abundance. Friedrich Stampfer, in a lengthy speech, depicted the actual situation of the German Labour Movement. He showed in detail how the movement had developed during the Empire, and afterwards during the Weimar Republic and how today the Nazi Dictatorship has for seven long years brutally forced it to silence and compelled it to resort to illegality, but has in no way succeeded in definitely stamping it out. He foretold that very soon after the end of the Hitler despotism which was now looming ahead, the free German Trade Union Movement and its political exponent, a new Social Democratic Party in a second free German democratic Republic will celebrate their resurrection. Practically speaking, a similar state of affairs has already existed, in the twelve years of Bismarck's Socialists Law. Whoever believes in human liberty and in progress, knows that liberty will come to its own again even in Germany.

During the subsequent debate, various points in connection with the Anti-Nazi Movement and the struggle for the overthrow of the Brown Dictatorship were dealt with in detail.

The result of this special meeting was a resolution which is of great fundamental importance.

The Executive Board resolved that the American Federation of Labor (AFL) shall officially give its full moral and financial support to the work of the Executive Committee of the German Social Democratic Party.

The Executive Board at the same time makes known its complete solidarity with the aim of this German

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movement to restore full economic and political liberty and to restore the Trade Unions and the Party in Germany on a democratic basis. All the American Trade Unions connected with the AFL are to be instructed by the Executive Board to put this resolution into practice and to give their help to this effect both politically and practically.

The importance of this resolution is chiefly its fundamental character. In this respect the Miami Resolution of the 7th February 1940 is an event which opens up new paths, an event which one must greet with enthusiasm. The principal representative of the great American Labor Movement, the AFL, now for the first time binds itself in an official decision, to the formal recognition and effective support of the organised democratically-minded German Labour Movement, which is, at present, in political exile. The American Labor Movement, therefore, takes the lead of the Labour Parties and Trade Unions of England and France, and of all other democratic countries in the world, giving them a courageous and glorious example.

We earnestly hope that this resolution is only a prelude and that, as time goes on, the present collaboration will have great and important results. The resolution is definitely a sign of political farsightedness. It is more than that, it is proof of the practical solidarity of the whole labour movement throughout the civilised world.

At a time when in the name of a so-called labour movement in Russia, a series of terrible crimes against humanity are being committed in the spheres of home and foreign politics, at a time when another political adventurer, a certain Dr. Ley[1], has the impudence officially to call upon world labour to make common sense with the Nazis and henceforth to fight against the "English-democratic-Jewish world capitalism", at such a time the tribute paid by William Green and the Executive Board of the American Federation of Labor is definitely encouraging and stimulating. It is an act which German Labour will never forget.

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" G E R M A N Y "

Monthly Reports by the Executive Committee
of the
Social Democratic party of Germany (Sopade)

The "Germany Reports" give extracts from the "Deutschland-Berichte" which the Vorstand der Sozialdemokratischen Partei Deutschlands (Domicile Paris) has been publishing monthly since 1934. It is the task of the "Deutschland-Berichte" to follow the development in all important social spheres in Germany. They are founded upon the work of an organised political body of reporters.

Please write for particulars to: Dr. Erich Rinner,
Bureau Sopade, 30, Rue des Ecoles, Paris 5e.

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