In their fight with the Empire’s United Fruit Company, the Honduran Trade Union Federation (Federacion Syndical Hondurena) had to address themselves to Black workers and assure them they would fight racial oppression. Text of a leaflet below.

‘Honduran Unions Fight Capitalist Race Prejudice’ from The Daily Worker. Vol. 7 No. 191. August 9, 1930.

BOSSES SHOW PREJUDICE IN CENTRAL AMERICA

CAPITALISM throughout the world seeks to isolate the Negro masses by poisoning the minds of other workers against them. In the United States this is accomplished by the imperialist ideology of Negro inferiority and “Nordic” superiority and “divine right” and with the help of a corrupt and fascist labor bureaucracy and a treacherous socialist party. In Central America the methods are somewhat different but the objective is the same.

In Honduras, the capitalists represented by the giant United Fruit Company which controls vast areas and native governments in the Caribbean area, are doing everything possible to create hostility between the native and West Indian Negro workers. In the face of widespread unemployment and hunger wages those employed, the United Fruit Company has continued to bring in Negro workers from the West Indies under false promises of employment at good wages. This it does for the purpose of sharpening job competition among the workers and creating hostility to the Negro workers on the part of the native toilers.

Native Bourgeois Betrayers.

As is the case throughout the world, the capitalist oppressors of the masses have the full cooperation of the native bourgeoisie. The workers of Honduras are organizing into the Honduran Trade Union Federation (Federacion Syndical Hondurena) and are waging a determined struggle against both foreign capitalist oppressors and their native tools. The Federation has just issued an appeal to the Negro workers brought in by the United Fruit Company from Jamaica. etc., which we reprint here in full because of its tremendous significance:

Called to Organize.

“Fellow workers:

“The Federacion Sindical Hondurena is a federation of labor unions that is fighting to organize the working class that we may obtain better conditions and a living wage right now, and eventually, our complete liberation from capitalist wage slavery.

“We come to you in a brotherly spirit, with the assurance that you will join us in the common struggle against the bosses and their hirelings, the brutal foremen who drive you and speed you up for a miserable starvation wage. We, the organized native workers, hold no race prejudice against you, as the North American capitalist class, lynchers and murderers of Negro workers, have against you. We realize that men and women of the working class are equal everywhere whatever their race or color—for they are equally oppressed and exploited by the bosses class.

“In this country our common enemy and oppressor is the United Fruit Company, supported and encouraged by governments of corrupt and villainous native politicians. We have seen the newspaper advertisements of the company in Salvador, inviting laborers to come to this coast. Now, what is the object of this action of the company? Simply this, comrades: the greater the number of workers looking for a chance to earn a piece of bread, the greater the competition amongst them, and the cheaper they will sell their labor. The company will pay what they please and the workers will not object, for fear of losing the chance to earn the hunger wage.

Capitalists Sow Prejudice.

“If in the past, you have been insulted and even threatened by unorganized native workers, remember that this race antagonism was sown by the North American slavers. They are responsible for poisoning the minds of certain ignorant native workers against you. The company wants to keep us divided arid hostile to each other, so that each group, native and Negro, will compete with each other to serve the Company better.

Workers Fight Prejudice.

“We now pledge ourselves to fight against race prejudice and for solidarity and a brotherly spirit between native and Negro workers. We expect your cooperation in our common fight.

“Let us organize under the leadership of the Federacion Sindical Hondurena. Join our labor unions. When you meet an organizer, you meet a brother and a friend: listen to him.

“For greater fraternity between Negro and native workers. Let us present fighting front to the foreign and native bosses and slave drivers!

“Let us present a fighting front to the foreign and native bosses and slave drivers!

“Executive Committee

“FEDERACION SINDICAL HONDURENA.

“San Pedro Sula, June, 1930.”

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1930/v07-n191-Nat-aug-09-1930-DW-LOC.pdf