State of the Party

Two members of the anti-Communist Bloc Populaire last week asked the Dominion Parliament to outlaw the Labor Progressive Party "because it is in fact a Communist Party under another name." The motion probably will not get far. The Government knew that banning the Labor Progressive Party would not stop the Communists. The Communists are always a name ahead of the Government.

In London last week, Canada's Red boss, Tim Buck, told a convention of Empire Communists that the party (which had been banned in 1940) was going right on operating under its new Labor Progressive name. It now claimed 24,000 members and, boasted Buck, was making great strides in Ontario. But British Columbia was still "the most fertile soil."

Buck laid down the current party line.

Canada, he said, had "double-crossed" Russia while she was still a wartime ally by giving super-explosives to the U.S. but withholding them from Russia. Now Canada was going aggressively "imperialist" as a "junior partner" of the U.S. The party would fight this policy and would look for support to the trade-union movement and the "politically conscious forces in French Canada." These bucko words were more exaggerated than usual. The Reds did have potent cells or control in many a Canadian union, e.g., the International Woodworkers of America, and the Canadian Fishermen's Union (TIME, Jan. 13). But anti-Red movements are strong in some of the unions. And in "politically conscious French Canada" the Reds have been whacked down harder than ever recently. Actually, the party seems to have made little progress since war's end. But the Reds were still trying harder than ever. On May 1 their weekly paper, the Canadian Tribune, will become a daily to give them a brassier horn for propaganda in Canada.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.