A valuable report from Tom Barker, a self-educated, working-class Marxist, a leading figure in the New Zealand and Australian I.W.W., deported to Latin America for his anti-war and union activities, where he worked the Buenos Aires docks and became a leader of the international marine workers organizing and delegate to the Red International of Labor Unions.

‘The Labor Movement in Argentina’ by Tom Barker from One Big Union Monthly. Vol. 2 No. 8. August, 1920.

During the last eighteen months the industrial organizations in Argentina have almost trebled their membership. In all directions and all industries the strides made have been phenomenal. The impetus has largely come about as a result of the brutal attack of the Irigoyen administration upon the working class in Buenos Aires in January, 1919, when the streets literally ran with blood.

The National Socialist Party is an influential institution with a bad reputation. It stands for national defense and its leaders are middle-class bellwethers. Their daily organ “La Vanguardia,” opposes, tooth and nail, the militant campaign of the Federacion Communista. During the boycott of the “43” cigarettes by the industrial organizations during 1919, the Socialist daily published the advertisements of the company, thus earning the well-deserved opprobrium of being a scab newspaper. It is the intrigues of this outfit that maintains a very deplorable division in the industrial movement in the Republic. The International Socialist Party is the political equivalent of Moscow, and is a divergence from the National Party. Politically it is of minor importance, and it has little marked industrial inclinations. They publish a weekly paper, “La Internacional.”

There are two “Federacion Obrera Regional Argentinas” (Regional Labor Federations). The one of importance is known as the “Quinta” and adheres to the principles established at the Fifth—or Quinto —Congress, in which the organization declared itself for the proletarian revolution based upon the principles enunciated by Michael Bakunin. The dissenters broke away and created what is known today as the “Decimos,” or Tenth Congressionales. This outfit is of little importance, and sizes with Sammy Gompers and the A. F. of L. It is, however, as is to be expected, on good terms with the exploiters, who always manage to send some of the “Decimos” bell-wethers to foreign conventions. The “Decimo” Marotta, who toured Europe and America during 1919, was a person of the rottenest industrial type.

The Quintos, on the other hand, cannot obtain passports from the government, and, in addition, had all their premises closed by the authorities. It is a secret organization, but contains affiliated members numbering over 200,000 organized workers. I am carrying credentials from the Federacion, and represent them in Europe.

Affiliated with the Quintos is the “Federacion Portuaria,” numbering 47,000 members. This is the longshore organization in the Republic, and to it belong all the ports excepting two yellow sections in Buenos Aires, known as the “Carboneros” (Coal Workers) and the “Diques y Darsenas” (Docks and Basins). These two organizations have been a constant nuisance to: the fighting Federacion. Run by pimps, many of whom are secret service men, they are constantly used to scab on the militants of the branches at California and the South Dock. One of the secretaries of the Diques and Darsenas was found embezzling funds. He disappeared for a few weeks and then he was found to be a police commissary at a small town out in the country.

In October, 1919, in Rosario, there were only 500 members in the Federacion. In this year they had the closed shop with 6,500 members. In Bahia Blanca, Santa Fe, Ensenada and Campana, the Federacion has grown and taken control. In Rosario, in December,.the authorities arrested the secretary. They held him a few days, and then one day about 3,000 wharf laborers suddenly appeared before the gaol with knives and revolvers. He was immediately released.

In Villa Constitucion, late last year, there was a strike. Scabs were brought in. The union men attacked them. The police were sent to protect the scabs. The next thing was that the police and the union men united, and what they did to those scabs would shock Mr. Gompers. But, of course, this was in Argentina, where people are not civilized!

The Federacion Portuaria was founded in December last year, and aggregeated, less the two “carnero” (yellow) unions, all the port workers in the Republic. Among the port workers the names of Damonte, Vidal Matte and Armada Lopez will long be remembered for their fearless pioneering of an organization that is to Argentina what the I.W.W. is to the North.

The “Federacion de Transportes y Rodados” is another excellent and militant organization. The secretary, F.W. Sanmartin, is a capable industrialist and knows his work. The Federacion contains the chauffeurs, wagon drivers and quite a number of railwaymen. When the latter are brought in, the “Wheeled Transport Federacion” will be powerful, and will strengthen the Quintos Federacion. The “Conductores de Carros” (wagon drivers) is very militant, perfectly organized, which is: quick in action and sparing in words. The bosses hate it, and so do the port authorities and their tools in the yellow union.

Then there are several textile unions, including the Boot and Shoe Workers, who adhere to the Federacion Communista, and lastly comes the U.T.A., “Union Trabajadores Agricolas” (Union of Agricultural Workers), the new and rapidly growing child of the Federacion, which secured 30,000 members in its first three months of existence, and which, as I described in my article in the March “One Big Union Monthly,” transformed conditions and wages from the day the enthusiasts of the Federacion Communista launched it. Long may the Federacion Obrera Regional Communista de Argentina continue to live and fight for the proletarian Revolution. I lift my hat to the enthusiasts of the “Quinto” Congress! of the I.W.W., and at all their conventions they telegraph their greetings to Chicago. They are out to establish the “Pacto de Solidaridad” with all the advanced workers in all countries. Their form of organization works upon the same line as the delegate system of the I.W.W. and the shop steward movement in Great Britain. The executive committees of the organizations in the transport industry meet every night. They take action quickly and drastically. The secret executive meetings are connected with each other, and the well oiled machinery not only stops the ships loading, but also the wagons that carry the cargo to the waterfront, the handlers in the depot yard, to the man who loads the railway cars at the country depot.

One of the most important events in the history of the Argentine labor movement took place last year, when the M.T.W. (Marine Transport Workers) was established in Buenos Aires by 250 homeless and hungry marine workers. This proved to be the great connecting link between the Argentine and the outside world, and there is surely no country in the world where the interests of the foreign-going seamen and the shore organizations are more closely allied for action, offensive and defensive.

A flattering thing was said of the M.T.W. branch a little while ago by a member of the local union, “Los Marine Transport Workers se habla poco, se hace mucho.” (The Marine Transport Workers say little, they do much.) And that is the spirit of the class-conscious organizations in South America, to act, and to leave talking to the Gomperians of the Decimo Congress. By the way, when the M.T.W. got its foothold in Buenos Aires, Gompers sent a wire to the Argentine authorities to root it out, as it was a branch of the I.W.W.

The telegram killed the A.F. of L. in South America, and Gompers’ Pan-American F. of L. is dead as the dodo there as a result. Which is as it should be. In closing, I may say that there was not a delegate of the M.T.W. who wasn’t in the calabosa less than four times. But gaol deterred them not, and the result is that the ports in Argentina belong to the only sound industrial organization for marine workers, the Marine Transport Workers.

In the Republic over the Hills (Chile), the I.W.W. increased its membership from 200 in August, 1918, to over 25,000 in January, 1920, due to the magnificent work of the fearless fighter, Juan O. Chamorro of Valparaiso.

In Uruguay, the “Federacion Obrera Regional Uruguay” is I.W.W. in sentiment, and although it is small in numbers, the day is rapidly coming when it will, like its peers in Argentina and Chile, throw down the gauntlet to the ruling class of that republic.

Viva los Portuarios, los Rodados, los Conductores de carros, los Agricolas. Y Viva Los Quintos, y los Trabajadores de Ultramar!

VIVA! VIVA!

One Big Union Monthly was a magazine published in Chicago by the General Executive Board of the Industrial Workers of the World from 1919 until 1938, with a break from February, 1921 until September, 1926 when Industrial Pioneer was produced. OBU was a large format, magazine publication with heavy use of images, cartoons and photos. OBU carried news, analysis, poetry, and art as well as I.W.W. local and national reports.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/one-big-union-monthly/v02n08-aug-1920_One%20Big%20Union.pdf