From Labor Action, Vol. 10 No. 38, 23 September 1946, p. 8.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for the Marxists’ Internet Archive.
LOS ANGELES, Sept. 14 – Gerald L.K. Smith, America’s No. 1 fascist, Jew-baiter, Negro-hater and labor-buster, returned to Los Angeles at the beginning of this week to the accompaniment of loud protests and busy preparations on the part of labor and progressive groups to fight him. It is understood that Smith has been brought back largely in time to campaign against the state FEPC bill which will be voted on in November as Proposition No. 11.
This is the city which “greeted” Smith at the end of last year with two mass picketing demonstrations of 20,000 and then ousted his stooge McClanahan from the City Council by a recall election. It will be seen whether the fight this year can be pushed even further.
The fascist fuehrer had two permits for rallies at the Polytechnic High School granted him by the Board of Education before people were even well aware that he had slunk into town. Mayor Bowron’s administration, whose police cooperated with Smith so neatly last October, is still giving the rabble-rouser what he wants.
First of the list of “Gerald L. KKK” Smith’s activities has been a series of five meetings at the Embassy Auditorium, beginning last Sunday and ending Thursday, described as a “Christian Nationalist Convention” of “62 organizations” – so to speak, the gathering of the Klans. There anti-Jewish and anti-Negro filth filled the air. The chairman was the notorious Jonathan Perkins, who has authored anti-Semitic booklets and has been expounding the fascist gospel in between the master’s visits.
The Mobilization for Democracy, a united front of organizations formed last year to combat Smith, decided to organize only “token” picket lines in front of this affair, with a different organization appointed in charge each evening. On the last evening, Thursday, there were about 125 on the token picket line, with the CIO and the strikers at Hearst’s Herald-Express in charge.
The big send-off for Smith is scheduled to take place on September 22, a Sunday afternoon, in front of the public rally which Smith has called at the Polytechnic for two o’clock. At the initiative and request of the CIO Council, the Mobilization has called for a mass picket line again, to form at 1:30. Present indications are that the turnout should top last year’s effort.
The Workers Party branches in Los Angeles and San Pedro are getting behind this demonstration with 100 per cent support and are organizing all members and friends to come out. The slogan is: Drive Smith Out of Town – For Good!
To this end militant workers are looking forward to steps, by the CIO especially, to press the fight against Smith beyond the point it reached last October. The fact that Smith’s attempted rally in Minneapolis was stopped cold by the labor movement has gotten around, and practically everybody would like to see Los Angeles be at least equally effective There is no telling as yet whether Smith’s audience on September 22 will be his usual flock of old ladies and Model T anti-Semites, or whether it will consist of irate workers in no mood to applaud a fascist spewing forth racial hatred and anti-labor lies. There is enough honest spontaneous indignation afloat to make it quite possible that Smith will have difficulty filling his hall with friendly hand-clappers.
Next week’s Labor Action will carry a full report on the demonstration and Smith’s rally.
Last updated on 3 April 2020