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COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

Communism

in the United States

BY EARL BROWDER

General Secretary, Communist Party of the United States

International Publishers • New York

Copyright, 1935, by INTERNATIONAL PUBLISHERS CO., INC.

Second Printing, October, 1935

PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

This book is composed and printed by union labor.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION vii

I. MANIFESTO OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY

OF THE UNITED STATES 13

II. THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 21

III. THE FIGHT FOR BREAD 94

IV. IS PLANNING POSSIBLE UNDER CAPITALISM? 102

V. WHY AN OPEN LETTER TO THE PARTY

MEMBERSHIP? m

VI. WHAT EVERY WORKER SHOULD KNOW

ABOUT N.R.A. 161

VII. THE SITUATION IN THE UNITED STATES 177

VIII. NEW DEVELOPMENTS AND NEW TASKS 188

IX. THREE MAIN POLICIES OF THE COMMUNIST

PARTY 205

TRADE UNIONS, LABOR PARTY, UNITED FRONT

X. THE COMMUNIST PROGRAM: ONLY WAY

OUT FOR LABOR NOW 215

THE SAN FRANCISCO GENERAL STRIKE

XL MAKE BETRAYALS OF THE WORKERS IMPOS- SIBLE! 218

THE GENERAL TEXTILE STRIKE

XII. UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE— THE BURNING

ISSUE OF THE DAY 222

XIII. UNITED FRONT AGAINST FASCISM AND WAR 237

XIV. THE STRUGGLE FOR THE UNITED FRONT 240

vi CONTENTS

XV. THE SITUATION IN THE SOCIALIST PARTY 273

XVI. THE COMMUNIST POSITION ON THE LABOR

PARTY QUESTION 284

XVII. FOR THE NATIONAL LIBERATION OF THE NEGROES! WAR AGAINST WHITE CHAUVINISM! 290

XVIII. WIPE OUT THE STENCH OF THE SLAVE

MARKET! 304

XIX. "THEORY IS OUR GUIDE TO ACTION!" 308

XX. COMMUNISM AND LITERATURE 311

XXI. THE REVISIONISM OF SIDNEY HOOK 316

XXII. RELIGION AND COMMUNISM 334

INDEX 350

Introduction

Earl Browder's book offers the key to an understanding of Com- munism in the United States. This work was hammered out in the very heat of the struggle of the American masses for a better life in a most momentous period of their history. It was produced in the fight for the great historic liberation struggle of the American workers, toil- ing farmers, Negroes, middle classes, and all oppressed and exploited. It was produced by one who is guided by the scientific theory of Marxism-Leninism and by its great masters — Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin.

Very appropriately, Browder's book opens with the famous Mani- festo of the Communist Party of the United States adopted at its 8th National Convention, held in April, 1934. In a concrete and con- vincing way, this historic document shows that there is only one way out of the present state of insecurity, imemplo5niient, mass misery and untold suffering, oppression, capitalist reaction, fascism and war. It is the revolutionary way, the Bolshevik way, the way of the Socialist Revolution and Soviet Power in the United States.

Millions of American toilers — ^workers, farmers, Negroes, intellectuals and other middle class groups — are still wondering in daze and con- fusion at the "sudden" change to the worse that has taken place in their lives. They ask: Where has this disaster come from? What was it that has knocked the bottom out from under our feet? What shall we do to help ourselves? What can we do to ward off the coming of even greater disasters — fascism and a new war?

Earl Browder's book helps us to find an answer to these questions. In chapters 2, 3, 4, 6, 7 and 9, we are led to an examination of the nature of the economic crisis and its passage into a "depression of a special kind," the capitalist way out and the revolutionary way out, the role of reformism and how it perpetuates capitalism and paves the way for fascism, the impossibility of planning under capitalism, etc. Having gained a correct understanding of these fundamental questions, we are then in a position to see clearly the class content of the policies of the American bourgeoisie.

But the book does much more than that. Its pivot is the struggle of the Communist Party of the United States to win and lead the toiling masses of this country — in the first instance, the industrial proletariat — to the fight for the revolutionary way out of the crisis. It is from this central angle that Browder deals with all the questions

viii INTRODUCTION

of the present epoch. It is a scientific examination and analysis of existing conditions with the aim of determining the road to the aboli- tion of these conditions and the way of organizing the masses to struggle for it. In other words, this book undertakes to answer not only the question of why things are as they are but also what changes are necessary and how they can be brought about.

As is well known, the author of this work occupies an outstanding position of leadership in the Communist Party of the United States. This fact has a direct and intimate bearing upon the nature and char- acter of the book which is made up of articles and speeches by the author produced during the last three years. This makes the contents of the book a presentation of Communist Party principles and policies, of its theory and practice, of its day-to-day struggles to win the American masses for the revolutionary way out and for a Soviet America. It is a presentation of Communism in America.

Earl Browder analyzed the New Deal, at its very inception, as a new way of carrying through in life the same class policies of the monopolies as those championed by the Old Deal. In making this analysis, the author pointed out the contradictions inherent in the New Deal, contradictions which were bound to sharpen, in the first instance, the relations between the capitalist class and the working class (and all toilers), and also the relations between the conflicting and competing groups within the capitalist class itself. This was the Communist Party's answer to the position of the President of the American Fed- eration of Labor, William Green, that the New Deal constituted a "partnership between Labor and Capital" leading to even closer class collaboration than heretofore. This was also the answer of the Com- munist Party to the position of the leaders of the Socialist Party, among them at the time, Norman Thomas, that the New Deal con- stituted a "step to Socialism."

The Supreme Court decision has brought to a head all the contra- dictions of the New Deal. It signalizes first of all, as already pointed out, a new offensive upon the toiling masses by the capitalist class. Precisely because the New Deal, in the two years of its operation, has done its best to weaken the position of the working class and all toilers, the most reactionary circles of the monopolies and their spokes- men, Roosevelt's Right opponents, feel now that the time has arrived for a fresh and more widespread attack upon the standards of living of the masses and upon their democratic rights. At the same time, Roosevelt continues his special New Deal maneuvers, resorting even to more "Left" phrases and methods, whose effect is to assist rather than hamper the offensive of the reactionaries and fascists. Thus the Supreme Court decision also shows a sharpening of the contradictions within the capitalist class itself. In brief, this whole development demonstrates fully the correctness of the position of the Communist

INTRODUCTION ix

Party, as expounded by Browder in this work, that the general crisis of the capitalist system is deepening, that the revolutionary crisis is maturing also in the United States, and that fascisation and war prep- arations are becoming evermore the major line of policy of the American bourgeoisie.

This brings us to the central task of the present period — the struggle against war and fascism. The author devotes a considerable part of the book to this question, notably the six chapters from lo to i6 inclusive. From a study of these chapters, and of the book as a whole, the reader wilt gain a thorough understanding of the whole question of the United Front. It will become clear why the Communist Party takes the posi- tion that, in the present period, the United Front of the workers and all toilers against the capitalist offensive, fascisation and war preparations, is the only way to defend effectively the interests of the masses, to ward off the outbreak of a new war and the coming of a fascist dictatorship. It will also become clear why the Communist Party considers the United Front, in this period, the major road along which the masses will be- come prepared, on the basis of their own experiences, to struggle for the revolutionary way out of the crisis and for a Soviet government in the United States under the leadership of the Communist Party.

In the struggle for the United Front against the capitalist offensive, the strike movements of the workers in the industries and the fight for unemployment relief and insurance (H. R. 2827) occupy a foremost position. It is on this sector of the class struggle that the most decisive battles have occurred during the past three years, and will continue to occur, in the unfolding of the epochal fight between the capitalist way out of the crisis and the revolutionary way out. Just recall the San Francisco general strike and the Pacific Coast marine strike of which it was an outgrowth, the national textile strike, the great unemployed movements and the growing mass support for H. R. 2827, etc. These cannot, of course, be isolated from the whole course of events with which Browder's book is concerned. However, for a special study of these particular developments, chapters 10, 11, and 12, are of special value.

It will become clear, from a study of this work, why the Communist Party considers the organization and unfolding of strike struggles a basic phase of the fight against the capitalist offensive, fascisation and war preparations. This has to do first with the Communist conception of the role of the working class as the leader of the fight against capital- ism, the leader of its allies, the toiling farmers, the Negroes and the oppressed middle groups of the cities. And it also has to do with the particular significance of strike struggles in the present period in the United States which is characterized especially by the growth and im- portance of strike movements.

Bearing this in mind, the reader will follow more profitably Browder's discussions of the role of the Communists in trade unions. The reader

X INTRODUCTION

will then be able to grasp more fully the significance of one of the most fundamental strategic principles of the Communist Party, namely, the fight for the organization of trade unions (and against company union- ism), the fight for trade union unity, and the entrenchment of the Com- munist Party itself in the large shops of the basic industries. In this connection, the reader will find of special value chapter 5 of this work which discusses the Open Letter to the Party issued by its Extraordinary Conference held in the summer of 1933.

Closely connected with this is the position of the Communist Party on the question of the formation of a Labor Party. Chapters 9 and 16 are devoted more particularly to this question. The reader will find here an exposition of the whole political situation out of which the ques- tion arose and the solution of it proposed by the Communist Party — the struggle for a mass anti-capitalist Labor Party based primarily upon the trade unions — as against bourgeois third party movements including those which carry the label (but not the essence) of "Labor" Party. In the coming period the struggle for a Labor Party will develop into a major feature of the class struggle in the United States, organically con- nected with all the other phases of the class struggle especially with the fight for militant mass industrial unions in the basic industries and for the extension of the United Front.

The book deals throughout with the vital question of the allies of the American proletariat — the toiling farmers, the Negroes, the exploited middle classes of the cities, and the revolutionary movements of the colonial and dependent countries, especially those oppressed by Ameri- can imperialism (China, Cuba, the Caribbean and South America gen- erally). Chapters 17 and 18 go into a special discussion of the liberation struggles of the Negro people, the meaning and special char- acteristics of these struggles, and their basic value as allies of the socialist revolution in the United States. The reader will gain a clear understanding of the vital importance of such struggles as the fight for freedom of the Scottsboro boys, for the freedom of Angelo Herndon, and for equal rights for the Negroes generally.

A major feature of this work, one that underlies and crowns the whole structure, is the treatment of the question of how to build the Com- munist Party into the mass party of the American proletariat and the leader of all oppressed. Strictly speaking, the entire book deals with this question, and for this reason: that the existence of a strong mass Communist Party is the chief prerequisite for the United Front and for the overthrow of capitalist rule. This flows from the Marxist- Leninist conception of the leading role of the proletarian party, the new and special type of party that is embodied in the Communist Party, and of the role of the non-Party mass organizations of the workers and other toilers as "transmission belts" (Stalin) from the Party to the class. More specifically and concretely this question is dealt with in chapters

INTRODUCTION xi

2, 5, 7, 8, 9 and ii. These show how the Communist Party of the United States continually works to improve itself, day by day, eliminat- ing weaknesses of methods of work and forms of organization, develop- ing more effective ways of reaching the masses and organizing them for the struggle against their enemies.

Inseparably connected with the above, and with the entire contents of this work, is the relation between the Communist Party of the United States and the Communist International of which it is a section. In every phase of this book the reader will see how the Communist Party of this country functions as an organic part of the world party of Com- munism. It will become evident to the reader how the experiences and struggles of the various national sections of the Communist Interna- tional give rise to the general line of the world party formulated by its world Congresses and by the plenary sessions of its Executive Commit- tee. It will also become evident from this work how this general line of the world party, the Communist International, serves as the starting point and daily guide for the national sections, such as the Communist Party of the United States, in the formulation of their special policies and methods directed to the realization of the international line and dis- cipline. This world party of Communism, which the Second (Socialist) International was never able to achieve, a world party with such a lead- ing component part as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and such a leader as Stalin, is the source of the greatest strength and inspira- tion to the revolutionary movement in each capitalist country.

We are now brought to a question which is of decisive importance in the present epoch. It is the question of the struggle for the defense of the Soviet Union. Browder's book demonstrates its full significance. It shows concretely and in a living manner how the Soviet Union, by its historical successes in the building of socialism and by the tremendous growth of its economic, political and military strength, has come to be the center of a new world system, the system of socialism, undermining the decaying capitalist system and revolutionizing by its very existence the whole world situation. Browder shows throughout the book how the socialist successes of the Soviet Union, the abolition of unemploy- ment and establishment of social security, and the great cultural up- swing, the steady improvement in the conditions and well-being of the masses in contrast to the nearly 17 million unemployed in the United States, the growing ruination of the toiling farmers and the emergence of an American peasantry, the steady deterioration of the standard of life of the American masses, the degeneration of American bourgeois culture, the growth of reaction and fascisation, the preparations for new imperialist wars of the American bourgeoisie in contrast to the consistent and truly international peace policy of the Soviet Union — how these contrasts revolutionize, inspire and strengthen the American proletariat and all fighters against capitalist reaction. Browder further shows how,

xii INTRODUCTION

in virtue of the above developments, the Soviet Union stands out as the chief fortress of international working class strength, the chief bulwark against capitalist reaction, national hatred and chauvinism, fascism and war. In brief, Browder shows how the Soviet Union is the only father- land of the workers and all toilers the world over, whose major inter- national task is to seek the defeat of the enemies of the Soviet Union, chief among them being German fascism, and to engage daily in the defense of the Soviet Union. Browder does that by showing how the accomplishment of this chief international task is vitally dependent upon and inseparably connected with the daily revolutionary struggles of the American masses against their main enemy at home, the American bourgeoisie.

And lastly some basic questions connected with the philosophy of Communism, its world outlook, its methods of studying the world in order to change it. The reader will find an introduction to this subject in chapter 19 dealing with theory as a guide to action. It will impress the reader as an eye-opener and key to the solution of many difficult problems which remain hopelessly insoluble on the basis of bourgeois philosophy. Chapter 21, dealing with the revisionism of Sidney Hook, a shining light in the camp of counter-revolutionary Trotskyism, carries the discussion of this subject further, throwing a critical light upon the methods and nature of Pragmatism, a variety of idealism. And chap- ters 20 and 22, on literature and religion, discuss other angles of the same subject, besides offering a method of United Front approach to certain important non-proletarian sections of the toiling population of the United States.

This work of Earl Browder offers the reader an invaluable source of knowledge on Communism in the United States. And by virtue of this fact, it also points the way to what to do and how to promote the revolutionary struggle for an America of happiness, plenty and security.

Alex Bittelman.

Manifesto of the Communist Party of the United States^

To All Workers of the U.S.A.:

We speak to you in the name of 25,000 members of the Communist Party who elected the delegates of this Eighth National Convention ; in the name of several hundred thousand workers who elected fraternal delegates from trade unions, unemployment councils, workers' clubs, fraternal societies; in the name of the miners, steel workers, metal workers, auto workers, textile workers, marine workers, railroad workers, whose delegates constitute a majority of this convention.

To you, the working class and toiling farmers of the United States, this Convention of workers addresses itself, to speak a few plain words about the crisis, and about the possibility of finding a way out.

The crisis of the capitalist system is becoming more and more a catastrophe for the workers and toiling masses. Growing millions of the exploited population are faced with increased difficulties in finding the barest means of liveUhood. Unemployment relief is being drastically cut and in many cases abolished altogether. Real wages are being reduced further every month, and labor is being speeded up to an in- human degree.

The vast majority of the poor farmers are slowly but surely being squeezed off the land and thrown on the "free" labor market to compete with the workers. The oppressed Negro people are loaded down with the heaviest economic burdens, especially of unemployment, denied even the crumbs of relief given to the starving white masses, and further subjected to bestial lynch law and Jim-Crowism. Women work- ers and housewives are especially sufferers from the crisis, and from the fascist movements to drive them out of industry. Millions of young workers are thrown upon the streets by the closing of schools and simul- taneously are denied any chance to earn their living in the industries.

WHAT THE NEW DEAL HAS GIVEN THE WORKERS

The suffering masses have been told to look to Washington for their salvation. Mr. Roosevelt and his New Deal have been decked out with the rainbow promises of returning prosperity. But the bitter

♦Manifesto of the Eighth Convention of the Communist Party of the U.SA., April, 1934. — Ed,

13

14 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

truth is rapidly being learned that Roosevelt and his New Deal represent the Wall Street bankers and big corporations — finance capital — ^just the same as Hoover before him, but carrying out even fiercer attacks against the living standards of the masses of the people. Under Roosevelt and the New Deal policies, the public treasury has been turned into a huge trough where the big capitalists eat their fill. Over ten billion dollars have been handed out to the banks and corporations, biUions have been squeezed out of the workers and farmers by inflation and by all sorts of new taxes upon the masses. Under the Roosevelt regime, the main burden of taxation has been shifted away from the big capitalists onto the impoverished masses.

The N.R.A. and the industrial codes have served further to enrich the capitalists by estabhshing fixed monopoly prices, speeding up trusti- fication, and squeezing out the smaller capitalists and independent producers.

The labor provisions of the N.R.A., which were hailed by the A. F. of L. and Socialist leaders as "a new charter for labor," have turned out in reality to be new chains for labor. The fixing of the so-called minimum wage, at below starvation levels, has turned out in reality to be a big effort to drive the maximum wage down to this point. The so-called guarantee of the right to organize and collective bargaining has turned out in reality to be the establishment of company unions. The last remaining rights of the workers they now propose to take away by establishing compulsory arbitration under the Wagner Bill, camouflaged as an attempt to guarantee workers' rights. Roosevelt has given official governmental status to the company unions, in the infamous "settlement" in the auto industry. This new step toward fascism is announced as a "new course" to apply to all industries.

All these domestic policies are openly recognized as identical in their content with the measures of professed fascist governments. This rapid movement toward fascism in the United States goes hand in hand with the sharpening of international antagonisms and the most gigantic preparations for war ever before witnessed in a pre-war period. More than a billion dollars have been appropriated for war purposes during this year. A large proportion of this has been taken directly out of the funds ostensibly appropriated for public works. Hundreds of mil- lions are being spent on military training in the so-called Civil Conserva- tion Camps, run by the War Department.

The policies of the government in Washington have one purpose, to make the workers and farmers and middle classes pay the costs of the crisis, to preserve the profits of the big capitalists at all costs, to estab- lish fascism at home and to wage imperialist war abroad.

MANIFESTO OF COMMUNIST PARTY 15

A. F. OF L. AND SOCIALIST PARTY LEADERS SUPPORT ROOSEVELT

How can the workers and farmers fight against these policies which are driving them into starvation? The leaders of the A. F. of L. have openly identified themselves with the policies of the Roosevelt admin- istration. To the extent that these leaders control the trade unions, they prevent or demoralize the struggle of the workers and deliver them helpless into the hands of the capitalists. The Socialist Party supports the A. F. of L. leaders and endorses and actively supports every par- ticular policy of the New Deal: inflation, N.R.A., A.A.A., P.W.A., C.W.A., C.C.C., the Wagner Bill, etc., haiHng these fascist and war measures as "steps toward socialism."

It is clear that the workers and farmers cannot fight back the cap- italist attacks unless they break away from the policies of the A. F. of L. and Socialist Party leaders. As against the united front which these leaders have set up with the capitalist government, the toiling masses must establish their own working-class united front from below, against the capitalist class and the Roosevelt administration.

ONLY THE COMMUNIST PARTY FIGHTS FOR THE WORKERS

Only the Communist Party has consistently organized and led the resistance to the capitalist attacks. The enemies of the Communist Party try to scare away the workers and farmers from this struggle by shouting that the Communist Party is interested only in revolution, that it is not sincerely trying to protect the living standards of the masses. They do this in order to hide the fact that they, one and all, pursue the single policy of saving the profits of the capitalists, no matter what it may cost in degrading the living standards 01 the masses.

The Communist Party declares that wages must be maintained no matter what is the consequence to capitalist prohtj.

The Communist Party declares that unemployment insurance must be provided at tjie expense of capitaHst profits.

The Communist Party declares that the masses of workers and farmers must not only fight against reduction in their living standards, but must win constantly increasing living standards at the expense of capitalist profits.

The Communist Party declares, if the continuation of capitalism re- quires that profits be protected at the price of starvation, fascism and war for the masses of the people, then the quicker capitalism is de- stroyed, the better.

It is no accident that the only serious project for unemployment in- surance that has come before the Congress of the United States is the Workers' Social and Unemployment Insurance Bill H. R. 7598,* which

* Later introduced as H. R. 2827.— JEd.

i6 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

was worked out and popularized among the masses by the Communist Party. Only the Communist Party has made a real fight for unemploy- ment insurance and by this fight finally forced before Congress the first and only bill to provide real unemployment insurance.

It is no accident that the Workers' Social and Unemployment Insur- ance Bill is being bitterly fought, not only by the Republican and Democratic Parties, but also by the American Federation of Labor and the Socialist Party leaders, as well as by little groups of their satellites, Musteites, Trotskyites, and Lovestoneites.

It is no accident that whenever a big strike movement breaks out, the capitalist press shrieks that it is due to Communist influence, and the A. F. of L. and Socialist Party leaders wail that the masses have got beyond their control.

It is true that all struggles for daily bread, for milk for children, against evictions, for unemployment relief and insurance, for wage in- creases, for the right to organize and strike, etc., are directly connected up with the question of revolution. Those who are against the revo- lution, who want to maintain the capitalist system, are prepared to sacrifice these struggles of the workers in order to help the capitalists preserve their profits.

Only those can courageously lead and stubbornly organize the fight for the immediate interests of the toiling masses, who know that these things must be won even though it means the destruction of capitalist profits, and who draw the necessary conclusion that the workers and farmers must consciously prepare to overthrow capitalism.

The crisis cannot be solved for the toiling masses until the rule of Wall Street has been broken and the rule of the working class has been established. The only way out of the crisis for the toiling masses is the revolutionary way out — the abolition of capitadist rule and capitalism, the establishment of the socialist society through the power of a revolu- tionary workers' government, a Soviet government.

EXAMPLE OF THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT

The program of the revolutionary solution of the crisis is no blind experiment. The working class is already in power in the biggest country in the world, and it has already proved the great superiority of the socialist system. While the crisis has engulfed the capitalist countries — at the same time in the Soviet Union, where the workers rule through their Soviet power, a new socialist society is being victoriously built.

The Russian working class, from its own resources and its socialist system, restored the national economy which had been shattered by six years of imperialist war and intervention. It overcame the age-long backwardness of Russia and brought its industrial production to the first place in Europe, to more than three times the pre-war figure. It

MANIFESTO OF COMMUNIST PARTY 17

rooted out the last breeding ground of capitalism by the successful in- clusion of agriculture in the socialist system. It completely abolished unemployment and tremendously raised the material well-being and cultural standards of the toiling masses. Upon the basis of its socialist system, the Soviet Union has become the most powerful influence for peace in an otherwise war-mad world.

Its victories are an unending source of inspiration and encouragement to the toiling masses of every country. They are the living example of the possibility of finding a way out of the crisis in the interests of the toilers. The experience of the victorious workers of the Soviet Union before, during and after the seizure of power, throw a brilliant light showing the path which must be followed in every land, the path of Bolshevism, of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin.

In the same period of successful testing of the Bolshevik road in the Soviet Union, we have also the example of the results of the policies of the Socialist Parties of the Second International. The Socialist Parties stood at the head of the majority of the working class in Ger- many and Austria. The revolutionary upheavals of 19 18 in these countries placed power in the hands of the Socialist Parties. Their leaders repudiated the Bolshevik road, and boasted of their contrasting "civilized," "peaceful," "democratic," "gradual transition to Socialism" through a coalition government together with the bourgeoisie on the basis of restoring the shattered capitalist system. To this end they crushed the revolution in 19 18.

They followed the policy of "the lesser evil," supported the govern- ment of Bruening with its emergency decrees against the workers, dis- armed the working class, led the workers to vote for Field Marshal von Hindenburg, and finally crowned their infamy by voting in the Reichstag for Hitler after having paved the way for fascism since 19 18. In Austria they supported the Dollfuss fascist government as the "lesser evil," enabling Dollfuss to turn his cannon against the homes of the Austrian workers.

Their "civilized" methods opened wide the gates for the most bar- barous regime in the modern history of Europe. Their "peaceful" methods gave birth to the most bloody and violent reaction. Their "democracy" brought forth the most brutal and open capitalist dictator- ship. Their "gradual transition to socialism" helped to restore the un- controlled rule of finance-capital, the master of fascism. The German and Austrian working class, after 16 years of bitter and bloody lessons of the true meaning of the policies of the Socialist Parties, of the Second International, have now finally begun to turn away from them and at last to take the Bolshevik path.

i8 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

U.S.A. IS RIPE FOR SOCIALISM

In every material respect, the United States is fully ripe for socialism. Its accumulated wealth and productive forces, together with an inex- haustible supply of almost all of the raw materials, provide a complete material basis for socialism. All material conditions exist for a society which could at once provide every necessity of life and even a degree of luxury for the entire population, with an expenditure of labor of three or four hours a day.

This tremendous wealth, these gigantic productive forces, are locked away from the masses who could use them. They are the private prop- erty of the small parasitic capitalist class, which locks up the warehouses and closes the factories in order to compel a growing tribute of profit. This paralysis of economy in the interest of profit, at the cost of starva- tion and degradation to millions, is enforced by the capitalist govern- ment with all its police, courts, jails and military.

There is no possible way out of the crisis in the interest of the masses except by breaking the control of the state power now in the hands of this small monopolist capitaUst class. There is no way out except by establishing a new government of the workers in alliance with the poor farmers, the Negro people, and the impoverished middle class.

There is no way out except by the creation of a revolutionary democ- racy of the toilers, which is at the same time a stern dictatorship against the capitalists and their agents. There is no way out except by seizing from the capitalists the industries, the banks and all of the economic institutions, and transforming them into the common property of all under the direction of the revolutionary government. There is no way out, in short, except by the abolition of the capitalist system and the establishment of a socialist society.

WHAT IS "AMERICANISM"?

The necessary first step for the estabUshment of socialism is the setting up of a revolutionary workers' government. The capitalists and their agents shriek out that this revolutionary program is un- American. But this expresses, not the truth, but only their own greedy interests. Today, the only Party that carries forward the revolutionary traditions of 1776 and 1861, under the present-day conditions and rela- tionship of classes, is the Communist Party. Today, only the Com- munist Party finds it politically expedient and necessary to remind the American working masses of how, in a previous crisis, the way out was found by the path of revolution. Today, only the Communist Party brings sharply forward and applies to the problems of today that old basic document of "Americanism," the Declaration of Independence.

Applying the Declaration of Independence to present-day conditions,

MANIFESTO OF COMMUNIST PARTY 19

the Communist Party points out that never was there such a mass of people so completely deprived of all semblance of "the right to Hfe, liberty and pursuit of happiness." Never were there such "destructive" effects upon these rights by "any form of government," as those exerted today by the existing form of government in the United States. Never have the exploited masses suffered such a "long train of abuses" or been so "reduced under absolute despotism" as today under capitaUst rule. The "principle" which must provide the foundation of the "new gov- ernment" mentioned in the Declaration of Independence is, in 1934, the principle of the dictatorship of the proletariat; the new form is the form of the workers' and farmers' councils — the Soviet power. The "new guards for their future security," which the workers must estabUsh, are the installing of the working class in every position of power, and the dissolution of every institution of capitalist class rule.

WHAT A WORKERS' GOVERNMENT WOULD DO

The first acts of such a revolutionary workers' government would be to open up the warehouses and distribute among all the working people the enormous unused surplus stores of food and clothing.

It would open up the tremendous accumulation of unused buildings — now withheld for private profit — for the benefit of tens of millions who now wander homeless in the streets or crouch in cellars or slums.

Such a government would immediately provide an endless flow of commodities to replace the stores thus used up by opening all the factories, mills and mines, and giving every person a job at constantly increasing wages.

All former claims to ownership of the means of production, including stocks, bonds, etc., would be relegated to the museum, with special pro- visions to protect small savings. No public funds would be paid out to anyone except for services rendered to the community.

Unemployment and social insurance would immediately be provided for all, to cover all loss of work due to cause outside the control of the workers, whether by closing of factories, by sickness, old age, maternity, or otherwise, at full wages without special costs to the workers.

Such a government would immediately begin to reorganize the present anarchic system of production along sociaHst lines. It would eliminate the untold waste of capitahsm ; it would bring to full use the tremendous achievements of science, which have been pushed aside by the capitalist rulers from consideration of private profit. Such a socialist reorganiza- tion of industry would almost immediately double the existing pro- ductive forces of the country. Such a revolutionary government would secure to the farmers the possession of their land and provide them with the necessary means for a comfortable living; it would make it possible for the farming population to unite their forces in a co-operative socialist agriculture, and thus bring to the farming population all the advantages

20 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

of modern civilization, and would multiply manifold the productive capacities of American agriculture. It would proceed at once to the complete liberation of the Negro people from all oppression, secure the right of self-determination of the Black Belt, and would secure uncon- ditional economic, political and social equality.

With the establishment of a socialist system in America, there will be such a flood of wealth available for the country as can hardly be imagined. Productive labor, instead of being a burden, will become a desirable privilege for every citizen of the new society. The wealth of such a society will immediately become so great that, without any special burdens, tremendous surpluses will be available for use as free gifts to the economically backward nations, in the first place, to those which have suffered from the imperialist exploitation of American capitalism — Cuba, Latin America, the Phihppines, China — to enable these peoples also to build a socialist society in the shortest possible time.

FIGHT FOR BREAD IS A FIGHT AGAINST CAPITALISM

The capitahst way out of the crisis Hes along the way of wage-cuts, speed-up, denial of unemployment insurance, fascism and war. The revolutionary way out of the crisis begins with the fight for unemploy- ment insurance, against wage-cuts, for wage increaseSj for relief to the farmers — through demonstrations, strikes, general strikes, leading up to the seizure of power, to the destruction of capitalism by a revolutionary workers' government.

The Communist Party calls upon the workers, farmers and impov- erished middle classes to unite their forces to struggle uncompromisingly against every reduction of their living standards, against every back- ward step now being forced upon them by the capitalist crisis, against the growing menace of fascism and war. The Communist Party leads and organizes this struggle, leading toward the only final solution — the establishment of a workers' government.

The establishment of a socialist society in the United States will be at the same time a death blow to the whole world system of imperialist oppression and exploitation. It will mark the end of world capitalism. It will be the decisive step towards a classless society throughout the world, towards World Communism!

II The Revolutionary Way Out *

Introduction

Our Eighth Convention meets at a time when the capitalist world is approaching a new explosion. Any day, any month, we may receive the first news of Japanese imperialism beginning its long-prepared invasion of the Soviet Union. At any time the madman who holds power in Germany may launch the wild adventure of anti-Soviet in- tervention which is the keystone of his policy, or may set fire to the fuses of the whole system of explosive European relations. Who can say on what day the powers now engaged in a gigantic naval race may have their present navies thrown into action by one power's fear of being left behind in the race? Who can foretell when the tightening lines of class struggle in any one of a dozen countries may not, by some "small" incident like the expose of Stavitsky corruption, be ignited with the flames of a revolutionary civil war?

The world stands on the brink of revolutions and wars. This is the fruits of more than four years of unprecedented capitalist crisis. This crisis period is approximately the period between our Seventh and Eighth National Conventions. Through this period capitalist society has continuously disintegrated. The crisis has penetrated into and undermined the industry and agriculture of every capitalist and colo- nial country; it has upset the currency and credit relationships of the entire world. Even the United States, still the strongest fortress of world capitalism, has been stripped of its last shred of "exceptional- ism," stands fully exposed to the fury of the storms of crisis, and, relatively speaking, is registering its deepest effects. The economic losses due to the crisis, in the United States alone begin to approach the figures of the total losses of the World War.

A great upsurge of class struggles is sweeping the capitalist world. A wave of liberation struggles sweeps the colonies and oppressed nations. In Spain the fascist dictatorship has been overthrown and the forces of a Soviet revolution are gathering. In Cuba a revolution- ary upheaval drove out the bloody tyrant, Machado. A general strike sweeps France, embracing the main body of the working class. In

* Report of the Central Committee to the Eighth Convention of the Communist Party, held in Cleveland, Ohio, April 2-8, 1934. — Ed.

22 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

Germany the rising wave of proletarian revolution is checked, but only temporarily, by loosening the fascist mad dogs, the foul refuse of the insane asylums and criminal underworld, against the German masses. In Austria, the lightning flash of the heroic barricade fighting of the betrayed Austrian workers, revealed for an instant the doom that is being prepared for capitalism beneath the blanket of fascism with which the bourgeoisie seeks to smother the flames of revolution. Also in the United States the upsurge of mass resistance to the capitalist policy of driving the masses into starvation, a policy intensified behind the demagogic cloak of Roosevelt's "New Deal," has already been answered by the capitalists with machine-guns at Ambridge ; by increas- ing appropriations for police and military; by fascist preparations of War Department occupation of the strategic points in the economic system; by incorporating the A. F. L. leadership into the government machinery; by the "new course" of compulsory arbitration and legal- ization of company unions "charted" by Roosevelt in the automobile settlement and the Wagner "labor" bill. A wave of chauvinism is being roused by capitalist press and statesmen, without precedent in time of peace. Fascism is rearing its ugly head more boldly every day in the U. S. A.

The rape of China by Japanese imperialism, the wars in Latin-America in which American and British imperialisms begin to settle accounts — these were but the first links in the chain of imperialist wars being forged by the blows of the crisis. The rise of fascism in Germany and Austria further shattered the post-war system of international rela- tionships. The imperialist powers are arming to the teeth. They are desperately striving to come to an arrangement that the next decisive step in the armed redivision of the world shall be a counter-revolution- ary invasion of the Soviet Union. War budgets are shooting upward at a speed matched only by the speed of deterioration of the living standards of the masses.

Meanwhile, the Soviet Union, the land where the victorious working class is building socialism, moves in a direction exactly opposite to that of the capitalist world. While the capitalist world suffered eco- nomic paralysis, in the Soviet Union a historically backward land has leaped forward to the first place in Europe, and in the whole world second only to the United States. While living standards in the capitalist world took a catastrophic drop of 40 to 60 per cent, in the Soviet Union they leaped upward by more than 100 per cent. While capitalist policy is directed with all energy to cut down production in the face of growing millions of starving and poverty-stricken workers and farmers, in the Soviet Union the productive forces have been multiplied manifold, a half continent of 52 nations, of 165,000,000 population is being lifted out of poverty into material well-being and

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 23

a rich cultural life. While the capitalist world drives feverishly toward war, the Soviet Union emerges more and more as the great bulwark of world peace. Clearly the world is divided into two systems, mov- ing in opposite directions.

This is the world situation, described by the general staff of our World Party, the Executive Committee of the Communist International, as a situation "closely approaching a new round of revolutions and wars," in which the Communists of the United States meet in our Eighth National Convention to chart our course for the next period, to pre- pare our forces for the next great task, to win the majority of the American workers and their allies for the revolutionary way out of the crisis, for the uncompromising fight for immediate economic and political needs, for the overthrow of capitalism, for the building of a new, socialist system by a revolutionary Workers' Government.

I. THE GROWTH OF HUNGER, FASCISM, AND THE DANGER OF IMPERIALIST WAR

The economic crisis is in its fifth year. It has lasted far longer than any previous crisis. It has been more far-reaching and destruc- tive. That is because it occurs in the midst of the general crisis of the whole capitalist system. Characteristic of this fact are:

(a) The crisis affected every capitalist and colonial country.

(b) It penetrated every phase of economy, industry, agriculture, trade, credit, currency, state finances.

(c) The crisis itself resulted in intensifying the concentration and centralization of capital, with consequent intensification of labor, which was a basic cause for the unexampled depth of the crisis.

(d) It has at the same time sharply degraded the technical level of agriculture, causing it to abandon machine labor for hand labor, mechanical power for horse and man power, further sharpening the contradiction between city and country.

(e) The chief feature of overproduction is that it is sharpest in the field of means of production, far exceeding the capacity of capital- istically-limited society to use them to the full, thus closing the doors to a revival by vast new capital investments.

(f) Existence of giant monopolies, further strengthened during the crisis (as by the N.R.A. codes, etc.) results in sustaining monopoly profits at the cost of the rest of economy, reducing mass purchasing power, and hindering the absorption of accumulated stocks.

(g) The crisis comes in a period when the imperialist powers have already divided the world among themselves, when there are no further fields of expansion, except at the expense of one another (or of the Soviet Union), and when the uneven development of the imperialist powers makes imperative a redivision of the world which is only pos- sible through the arbitrament of war.

24 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

(h) Finally, this crisis comes after world capitalism has already- suffered the fatal shattering blows of the last World War, as a result of which its world-system was broken at its weakest link, out of which emerged a new, a rival world economic system, the system of socialism in the Soviet Union.

The influence of the general crisis of capitalism upon the course of the economic crisis can be seen in volume of industrial production during the past five years in the principal industrial countries. I quote the figures given by Comrade Stalin in his report to the 17th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union:

VOLUME OF INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION (Per Cent of 1929)

1929 1930 1931 1932 1933

U. S. S. R loo.o 129.7 161. 9 184.7 201.0

U. S. A loo.o 80.7 68.1 53.8 64.9

England lOo.o 92.4 83.8 83.8 86.1

Germany loo.o 88.3 71.7 59.8 66.8

France loo.o 100.7 89.2 69.1 77.4

These figures clearly reveal the division of the world into two sys- tems which are travelling in opposite directions. While in the capi- talist countries production declined between 1929 and 1933 by from 15 to 35 per cent, the socialist industry of the Soviet Union increased by more than 100 per cent.

These figures also show that from 1932 to 1933, the capitalist world increased its production in all countries, whereas previously the course had been downward from year to year. This fact has been joyously hailed by capitalist spokesmen as heralding the end of the crisis, the beginning of recovery, the promise of returning prosperity. This conclusion is also supported by the Socialist Party leaders and the reformist trade union bureaucrats. What is the true significance of this fact?

A clear answer was already given to this question by Comrade Stalin at the 17th Congress, supplementing and further developing the Thesis of the 13 th Plenum of the Executive Committee of the Communist International. Comrade Stalin said:

It means that, apparently, industry in the principal capitalist countries had already passed the lowest point of decline and did not return to it in the course of 1933.

Some people are incHned to ascribe the phenomenon to the influence of exclusively artificial factors, such as a war-inflation boom. There cannot be any doubt that the war-inflation boom plays not an unimportant role here. It is particularly true in regard to Japan, where this artificial factor is the principal and decisive force in some revival, principally in the mum'-

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 25

tion branches of industry. But it would be a crude mistake to attempt to explain everything by the war-inflation boom. Such an explanation would be wiong, if only for the reason that the changes in industry which I have described are observed, not in separate and chance districts, but in all, or nearly all, industrial countries, including those countries which have a stable currency. Apparently, side by side with the war-inflation boom, the opera- tion of the internal economic forces of capitahsm also has effect here.

Capitalism has succeeded in somewhat easing the position of industry at the expense of the workers — increasing their exploitation by increasing the intensity of their labor; at the expense of the farmers — by pursuing a policy of paying the lowest prices for the products of their labor, for foodstuffs and partly for raw materials; at the expense of the peasants in the colonies and in the economically weak countries — ^by still further forcing down the prices of the products of their labor, principally raw materials, and also of foodstuffs.

Does this mean that we are witnessing a transition from a crisis to an ordinary depression which brings in its train a new boom and flourishing industry? No, it does not mean that. At all events at the present time there are no data, direct or indirect, that indicate the approach of an indus- trial boom in capitalist countries. More than that, judging by all things, there cannot be such data, at least in the near future. There cannot be, because all the unfavorable conditions which prevent industry in the capitalist countries from rising to any serious extent still continue to operate. I have in mind the continuing general crisis of capitalism in the midst of which the economic crisis is proceeding, the chronic working of the enterprises under capacity, the chronic mass unemployment, the interweaving of the industrial crisis with the agricultural crisis, the absence of tendencies towards any serious renewal of basic capital which usually heralds the approach of a boom, etc., etc.

Apparently, what we are witnessing is the transition from the lowest point of decline of industry, from the lowest depth of the industrial crisis to a depression, not an ordinary depression, but to a depression of a special kind which does not lead to a new boom and flourishing industry, but which, on the other hand, does not force it back to the lowest point of decline. (Joseph Stalin, The State of the Soviet Union, pp. 13-15.)

It would be a vulgar fatalism to think that no matter what meas- ures the capitalist class undertakes, they have no effect upon capi- talist economy. It would equally be wrong to think such effects are exclusively negative, to fail to see how capitalist industry has eased its position (even if only temporarily) at the great expense of the workers and toiling masses. We must avoid such mistakes, to be able to unmask the crude illusions propagated by the labor agents of capi- talism, and prevent them from sowing confusion in the working-class ranks.

Many facts lead to the conclusion that the economic crisis in the United States has already passed its lowest point. Furthermore, the various measures undertaken by the capitalist class itself, and the

26 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

operation of the internal economic forces of capitalism, facilitated the passing of the economic crisis into the stage of depression.

In the course of the crisis, American capitalism lowered production costs and increased its profits mainly through a more intensive ex- ploitation of the employed workers. In this process, the productivity of labor was increased mainly through more intensive exploitation and speed-up. American capitalism has utilized the great standing army of the unemployed for this purpose where it could select the best, most physically-fit, workers whom starvation forced to work under the worst conditions at lowest wages.

The improved situation for capitalist industry came as a result of the sharp reduction of the living standards of the workers and the further ruination of the poor and middle farmers. But this is not all.

It is a fact that through the long duration of the crisis the index of overproduced commodity reserves declined. This decline in great de- gree proceeded through actual physical destruction of commodities. It is very likely, also, that especially in the light industries where production sharply declined, there consumption at the existing low prices served to greatly diminish the overproduction. Increasing profits also serve, even in small degree, to encourage new capital investments in production goods and building. Further, a large part of debts were wiped out through bankruptcy, further mergers; while confiscation of a huge portion of middle-class savings through the closing of banks, made a serious contribution to capitalist profits.

This is the road travelled by American capitalism in the crisis. It is not the road to a new prosperity. At the same time, however, it would be absolutely stupid to refuse to see those improvements in its economic situation that American capitalism did make. But whatever improvements took place, as a result of war-spending and inflation, and also from the further impoverishment of workers and farmers and the operation of the internal economic forces of capitalism, they all facilitated the passing of the crisis into the stage of depression.

The economic crisis in the United States, as in the rest of the capi- talist world, is interwoven with the general crisis of capitalism. The depth of the general crisis, the blows delivered by the world crisis to United States economy, are the first factors which make it impossible for American capitalism to return to boom and prosperity. The very measures employed to improve the immediate situation, even though they helped in passing over from crisis to depression, had the effect of deepening the general crisis of capitalism.

Even the capitalists, in their confidential discussions, are adopting the view that the depression will be a prolonged one, that a quick recovery is impossible. Thus the Kiplinger Agency, in its weekly letter of March 17, speaks on this point as follows:

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 27

Washington feeling about the course of recovery: Most private discus- sions by the authorities here reflect a resignation to the idea of slow and irregular recovery, not rapid recovery. Some progress, then a set-back. Further progress, then a breathing spell. Talk of spring boom has disappeared. Talk of fall boom, under belated inflationary influences, has lessened.

Yes, there is an improvement in business and industrial activity in the United States. There are also changes in the movement of the economic crisis. It is apparent that the crisis has passed its lowest point and entered the stage of depression. This has been accomplished by measures which deepen the general crisis (war preparations, infla- tion, ruination of farmers and small business, impoverishment of the masses, etc.). That means that the depression is not the prelude to new boom and prosperity, as the minstrels of the "New Deal" are singing. It will be prolonged. It will be a period of increased misery for the toilers.

Against this background of the perspective of continued and pro- longed depression, given us so clearly in the analysis of Comrade Stalin, it is more than ever clear that the policies being followed by the capitalists, in their frantic efforts to find a way out of the crisis, "in the near future cannot but lead," as the 13th Plenum of the Execu- tive Committee of the Communist International pointed out, "to the still greater disturbance of state finances and to a still further in- tensification of the general crisis of capitalism." Thus the economic and political factors at work determine that "the capitalist world is now passing from the end of capitalist stabilization to a revolutionary crisis." This it is that determines the "perspectives of development of fascism and the world revolutionary movement of the toilers." (13th Plenum of the E. C. C. I., Theses and Decisions.)

What is fascism? It is "the open, terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary, most chauvinist and most imperialist elements of finance capital." [ibid.)

What is its purpose? It is to enforce the policy of finance capital, which is to bolster up its profits at the cost of degrading the living standards of the toiling population, to violently smash the resistance of the working class, to behead the working class by the physical extermination of its leading cadres, the Communists.

Where does it find its mass basis? Among the petty-bourgeoisie, by demagogic promises to the desperate, impoverished farmers, shop- keepers, artisans, office workers and civil servants, and particularly the declassed and criminal elements in the big cities. It also tries to penetrate the more backward strata of the workers.

How is it possible for fascism to develop sufficient power to defeat the workers? This is only possible by obtaining help within the working class, thus disrupting its unity and disarming it before fascism.

28 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

But fascism cannot win mass support directly in the working class ranks. It must find indirect support. This it finds in the Socialist Party leadership and the reformist trade union officialdom. These leaders, influencing the majority of the working class, hold back the workers from revolutionary struggle which alone can defeat and destroy fascism, and under the slogan of defense of democracy, and "choosing the lesser evil," lead the workers to submit to and support the inter- mediate steps to the introduction of fascism. That is why we call these leaders "social-fascists," and their theories "social-fascism."

In the United States, fascism is being prepared along essentially the same lines that it was prepared in Germany and Austria.

The Socialist and A. F. of L. leaders are taking essentially the same course taken by their brothers in Europe. But the workers in the United States have the tremendous advantage of having before their eyes the living example of the events in Europe, of being able to judge by results the true meaning of policies which they are asked to follow here. That is the supreme importance of every worker in America studying and thoroughly understanding the experiences of our brothers across the waters.

What are the ideas, the misconceptions, with which the social-fascists confuse and disarm the workers?

First, is the idea that fascism is the opposite of capitalist democracy, and this democracy is therefore the means of combating and defeating fascism. This false idea serves a double purpose. By means of coun- terposing "democracy against dictatorship," it tries to hide the fact that the capitalist "democracy" is only a form of the capitalist dicta- torship; it tries to identify in the worker's mind the fascist dictatorship with the proletarian dictatorship in the Soviet Union, and thus cause the worker to reject the road of revolution. At the same time, this slogan is used to hide the fact that capitalist democracy is not the enemy, but the mother of fascism; that it is not the destroyer, but the creator of fascism. It uses the truth that fascism destroys democ- racy, to propagate the falsehood that democracy will also destroy fascism. Thus does the Socialist Party and trade union officialdom, to the extent that the workers follow them, tie the working class to the chariot wheels of a capitalist democracy which is being transformed into fascism, paralyze their resistance, deliver them over to fascism bound and helpless.

In Germany this meant support to Hindenburg, Bruening, Von Papen, Schleicher; and their "emergency decrees" directed against the workers. In the United States, it is support to Roosevelt, LaGuardia, the N.R.A., and the "emergency decrees" of the strike-breaking labor boards, arbitration boards, "code authorities," etc. In each case, the slogan is "choose the lesser evil"; in each case, the workers are asked

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 29

to "fight against fascism" by supporting the men and measures that are introducing fascism.

Second, is the idea that fascism represents, not finance capital, but rather a "revolutionary movement" directed against both finance capital and against the working class by the impoverished middle classes. This idea helps finance capital to get and keep control over these middle classes, strengthens their illusions, divides the workers from them and prevents the workers from setting themselves the task of winning over the middle classes to support of the proletarian revolution, causes the workers to support their misleaders in their alliance with finance capital "against fascism." In Germany, this idea was, concretely, alliance with Hindenburg against Hitler; in Austria, with DoUfuss against the Nazis; in the United States with Roosevelt "against Wall Street."

Third, with the victory of fascism in Germany and Austria, the Socialist and trade union leaders bring forth the idea that this event is the crushing defeat of the revolution, the restabilization of capitalism, the beginning of a new and long era of fascist reaction. This helps fascism by spreading panic, defeatism, and passivity among the workers. It serves to create a fatalistic acceptance of fascism as inescapable and undef eatable. The true significance of the rise of fascism is quite different. True, fascism is a heavy blow against the working class. True, fascism turns loose every black reactionary force against the working class, and tries to physically exterminate its vanguard, the Communist Party. But at the same time it is a sign of deepening crisis of capitalism; it solves not one of the basic problems of the crisis, but intensifies them all; it further disrupts the capitalist world system; it destroys the moral base for capitalist rule, discrediting bourgeois law in the eyes of the masses; it hastens the exposure of all demagogic supporters of capitalism, especially its main support among the workers — the Socialist and trade union leaders. It hastens the revolutionization of the workers, destroys their democratic illusions, and thereby prepares the masses for the revolutionary struggle for power.

Through fascism, the capitalist class hopes to destroy the threat of revolution at home. Through imperialist war, it hopes to destroy the successful revolution in the Soviet Union, and by armed redivision of the world to find the way out of the crisis.

What are the prospects for success of this capitalist program?

Such prospects are very bad indeed. The revolutionary movement of the working class and poor farmer allies cannot be destroyed. This was proved by the fall of the bloody tsarist autocracy in old Rus- sia. It was proved again by the failure of the ferocious terror of Chiang Kai-Shek in China to halt the rise of the victorious Chinese Soviet Republic. It was proved on our own doorstep last August, by the revolutionary overthrow of the Butcher Machado and his fascist

30 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

dictatorship in Cuba. It is being proved every day by the heroic work of the Communist Party of Germany. It is proved by the crisis in the Second International, and the mass turning of European workers toward the Bolshevik path. It was proved by the destruction of the fascist dictatorship in Spain. Terror cannot destroy the prole- tarian revolution.

Neither is there hope for world capitalism that it can solve its prob- lems through war. It tried this way in 1914-1918. But instead of solving problems, this only reproduced them on a larger scale and in sharper form. That effort lost for capitalism the largest country, one- sixth of the world, to the victorious working class of the Soviet Union. Now they speculate on recovering this lost territory for capitalism, through another war. But this time they will face a working class infinitely better prepared than in 1914-1918. The working class in the Soviet Union is now fully armed with the weapons of modern warfare, based upon a modernized industry and a solid socialist economy. The working class in the capitalist countries is no longer under the undis- puted sway of the Socialist and trade union leaders. In every country there is a growing mass which has already begun to learn the lessons of the victory in the Soviet Union, which has already grouped itself around the Communist Party, which is arming them with the weapons of revolution — the theory and practice of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin — of Bolshevism.

If the imperialists venture upon another war, they will receive a crushing defeat worse than the last war. On the borders of the Soviet Union they will meet military defeat at the hands of an invincible Red Army. At the rear, the working class will be transforming the im- perialist war into a civil war of the oppressed masses for the overthrow of capitalism. Such a war will surely end in the birth of a few more Soviet Republics.

II. THE UPSURGE OF THE MASS STRUGGLES AND THE WORK OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY

The United States, stronghold of world capitalism, exhibits at the same time its deepest contradictions. The blows of the economic crisis struck heaviest, relatively, here. The contrast between mass hopes and illusions in 1929, and bitter reality in 1934, is greater than almost anywhere else. The greatest accumulated wealth and produc- tive forces, side by side with the largest mass unemployment and starvation of any industrial country, stares every observer in the face. Revolutionary forces in the United States, developing more slowly than elsewhere, are yet of enormously greater potentiality and depth.

All capitalist contradictions are embodied in Roosevelt's "New Deal" policies. Roosevelt promises to feed the hungry, by reducing the pro- duction of food. He promises to redistribute wealth, by billions of

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 31

subsidies to the banks and corporations. He gives help to the "for- gotten" man, by speeding up the process of monopoly and trustification. He would increase the purchasing power of the masses, through infla- tion which gives them a dollar worth only 60 cents. He drives the Wall Street money changers out of the temple of government, by giving them complete power in the administration of the governmental ma- chinery of the industrial codes. He gives the workers the right of organization, by legalizing the company unions. He inaugurates a regime of economy, by shifting the tax burden to the consuming masses, by cutting appropriations for wages, veterans, and social services, while increasing the war budget a billion dollars, and giving ten billions to those who already own everything. He restores the faith of the masses in democracy, by beginning the introduction of fascism. He works for international peace, by launching the sharpest trade and cur- rency war in history.

Roosevelt's program is the same as that of finance capital the world over. It is a program of hunger, fascization and imperialist war. It differs chiefly in the forms of its unprecedented ballyhoo, of demagogic promises, for the creation of mass illusions of a saviour who has foimd the way out. The New Deal is not developed fascism. But in political essence and direction it is the same as Hitler's program.

Under cover of these mass illusions, Roosevelt launched the sharpest, most deep-going attack against the living standards of the masses. Even though the workers were still under the influence of illusions about Roosevelt (these illusions continue to stand up under repeated blows!) they could not but recognize what was happening to them. They answered with a wave of strikes. More than a million workers struck in 1933 in resistance to the New Deal policies. Over 750,000 joined the trade unions.

During this period the unemployed movement also deepened and consolidated itself, in spite of a serious lag. Especially important, it reacted to the new forms of governmental relief, the C. W. A. and forced labor camps, and began a movement on those jobs to protect living standards. The movement for the Workers' Unemployment Insurance Bill began to take on a broad mass character.

Struggles involving the masses of impoverished farmers, veterans, students, professionals, stimulated by the strike wave, gathered about the rising working class movement, and to a greater degree than ever before came in political contact with the workers.

This first wave of struggle against the Roosevelt "New Deal" was stimulated and clarified by the fact that the Communist Party, from the beginning, gave a bold and correct analysis of the "New Deal," and a clear directive for struggle against it. Events since last July confirmed entirely the analysis then given. Every serious effort to apply that program to struggle has brought gains for the workers.

32 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

There is no need to revise our analysis. Now we can sum up the results of nine months' experience.

What has happened to the "New Deal"? Has it failed? ^ Many workers, in the first stages of disillusionment, come to that conclusion. They are disillusioned with the result, but still believe in the intention. The S. P. and A. F. of L. leaders try to keep them in this stage. But this conclusion is entirely too simple. The "New Deal" has not improved conditions for the workers and exploited masses. But that was never its real aim; that was only ballyhoo; that was only bait with which to catch suckers. In its first and chief aim, the "New Deal" succeeded; that aim was to bridge over the most difficult situa- tion for the capitalists, and to launch a new attack upon the workers with the help of their leaders, to keep the workers from general resist- ance, to begin to restore the profits of finance capital.

At the recent code hearing in Washington, this purpose was stated frankly by General Hugh Johnson, in an effort to overcome the resist- ance of the more backward capitalists to some features of the N. R. A. program. General Johnson, speaking of the difficult position of capi- tal at the time of the birth of the "New Deal" and what was its aim, declared:

I want to tell you, if you have not yourselves observed, that throughout that whole difficult and trying period, when in panic and under the urge of extremists, the wreck of our system was threatened, the strong, sane, moderate mind that upheld you was that of the President. I ask you to remember that at that time both industrial and banking leadership had fallen, in the public mind, to complete and utter disrepute. Humanity always seeks a scapegoat. A British Government, unable to sustain itself on any other issue, was elected on the slogan "Hang the Kaiser." Don't forget that, at that time, these gentlemen and the bankers were almost (to an inflamed public mind) the Kaiser.

That is clear enough. No Communist could have put it more clearly!

Without the collaboration of the A. F. of L. leadership, it must be emphasized, this program could never have been carried out over the resistance of the workers. This truth, which we pointed out in ad- vance, is now the boast of Green, Lewis & Co., in their conferences with Roosevelt, Johnson and the employers. Whenever a strike has been broken, the main "credit" belongs to Green and his associates. Every vicious code provision against the workers, for company unions, has borne the signature of Green & Co. Section 7a, the new "charter for labor," turned out in reality to be the legalization of company unionism and compulsory arbitration. Even the A. F. of L. leaders are allowed to organize only where and when this is required to block the forma- tion of revolutionary or independent trade unions. The Wagner Bill to interpret Section 7a, now before Congress, which received such

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 33

vigorous support and high praise from Socialist and A. F. of L. leaders, is already, even before passage, openly admitted to be legal confirma- tion of the company unions, the enforcement of compulsory arbitration. Again we turn to the outspoken General Johnson for a colorful de- scription of the role of the A. F. of L. leaders. In his March 7th speech to the capitalists, Johnson poured out his soul in eloquent tribute to Green & Co. He said:

We know something about what is toward in this country — the worst epidemic of strikes in our history. Why suffer it? Here is a way out. Play the game. Submit to the law and get it over quickly. I want to tell you this for your comfort. I know your problems. I would rather deal with Bill Green, John Lewis, Ed McGrady, Mike MacDonough, George Berry and a host of others I could name, than with any Frankenstein that you may build up under the guise of a company union. In fact — ^take it from me and a wealth of experience — their interests are your interests.

Again the worthy General leaves nothing to add I

Now, for a brief glance at the results of the "New Deal" as regis- tered in governmental statistics.

First, the Reconstruction Finance Corporation: Payments authorized by the R. F. C. up to the end of 1933, amounted to $5,233,800,000. More than 80 per cent of this enormous sum went directly to banks, insurance companies, railroads, mortgage loan companies, credit unions, etc., in loans or piurchase of preferred stock; and for what is called "agricultural credit" which means advances to financial institutions holding uncollectable farm mortgages. About 12 per cent went for "relief," payment for forced labor on municipal and state work. These enormous subsidies, the size of which staggers the imagination, are the source of a large part of the renewed profits of the big corporations.

Second, inflation and price-fixing: These measures have resulted in such rise in living costs that even the A. F. of L. leaders, close partners of Roosevelt and Johnson, have to admit a decided drop in the pur- chasing power of employed workers. An indication is the drop of nine per cent, from September to December, in the volume of consumers' goods actually purchased.

Third, the Government budget: Here we find the realization of Roosevelt's promise to remember the "forgotten man." The shift of the burden of taxes, the basis of the budget, comparing the current year with 192 8- 192 9, is as follows:

Government income from taxation on corporations, rich individuals, and wealthy middle-class, declined from $2,231,000,000 to $864,- 000,000 — a saving to the rich of $1,467,000,000. At the same time, taxation of workers and consuming masses increased from $1,571,- 000,000 to $2,395,000,000 — an increase of the tax burden amounting to almost the total taxes now paid by the rich.

34 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

On the expenditure side of the budget, changes took the following direction: To banks, corporations, wealthy individuals and property owners, increased payments of 413 per cent. Expenditures for war purposes, increased by 82 per cent. Against these increases, economy was practiced by reducing wages of government employees, and veteran allowances, by 38 per cent and 27 per cent.

Fourth, distribution of National Income: Roosevelt promised that he would begin to remedy the maldistribution of the national income, whereby the rich get too much and the poor get too little. How this has been carried out is disclosed in a report submitted to the U. S. Senate by the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce on Jan. i, 1934. Summarizing its findings, the report says:

Wages have suffered the most severely in the general decline since 1929, with a falling off of sixty (60) per cent in those industries in which it was possible to segregate this item. Salaries dropped forty (40) per cent, much less rapidly than wages, with the most severe curtailment occurring in 1932. A significant divergence in declining trends is apparent as between labor income and property income; by 1932 the former had fallen off by forty (40) per cent, while property income distributed receded but thirty (30) per cent. This situation was brought about by the maintenance of interest payments rather uniformly up to 1932, with only a small decline then.

This pictures the development under the Hoover regime. Roosevelt's "New Deal" promised to reverse this trend. Actually, what happened in 1933 was that the purchasing power of the workers went backward (a fact testified by the A. F. of L. and the Bureau of Labor Statistics) while property income took a sharp rise. A recent report of a group of large selected corporations which in 1932 showed a loss of about 45 millions, showed that in 1933 they had been restored to the profit side of the ledger by about a half-billion dollars.

Fifth, the workers' housing: In estimating the social effects of the shift of national income away from the workers and to property owners, it must be remembered that even in 1932 the majority of workers lived just at or even below the subsistence level. Every loss of income has been a direct deduction from daily necessities of life. This is sharply expressed in the catastrophic worsening of housing conditions. The epidemic of tenement house fires, burning to death hundreds of men, women and children, is but a dramatic revelation of one corner of the inhuman conditions under which growing millions are reduced.

Sixth, breaking up the home: A barometer of the degeneration of living standards is the growing army of wandering, homeless people, especially children. The "New Deal" proposed to turn the army of unattached boys into a military reserve through the Civilian Conser- vation Corps. Some 380,000 boys were so recruited in 1933; but in spite of this mass militarization, all reports agree that a larger number than before of homeless youth wandered the country.

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 35

Seventh, collapse of the school system: Conditions in the school system in rich America reflect the catastrophic situation of the masses. No improvement is to be seen under the "New Deal," but on the con- trary, a sharp worsening takes place. Just a few details, presented not by Communist agitators but by the U. S. Commissioner of Education, George F. Zook, and the National Education Association, describing the current school year, after Mr. Roosevelt's "New Deal" was at work. Over 2,290,000 children of school age cannot find a place. Over 2,000 schools in rural communities failed to open this year in 24 states (the other 24 states, probably, being ashamed to report because their condi- tions are worse!). Some 1,500 commercial schools and 16 institutions of higher learning have been completely liquidated. School terms in nearly every large city are from one to two months shorter than they were 70 to 100 years ago. The average term in the United States, 170 school days per year, is less than that for France, Germany, England, Sweden, Denmark. School teachers' wages are generally from four to twenty-four months in arrears, although interest on bonds is paid promptly. In Chicago, where teachers are behind in their wages by $25,000,000, the committee enforcing the economy program contains, among its 29 members, all affiliated with big business, five directors of the largest banks, and 14 residents of exclusive Lake Shore Drive ("the Gold Coast"). Unemployed teachers are estimated at a quarter million. Teachers' wage rates have been cut by 27 per cent. In 14 states even this reduced salary is far behind in payment.

It is impossible to go into all the ramifications of the result of a "successful" New Deal program. We have shown enough to fully expose that the "success" was in giving more to the rich, and taking away from the poor even that which they had.

The New Strike Wave and New Steps in Fascization

Our Central Committee, at the moment of the ebb of the 1933 strike wave (our 17th Plenum), was able already to foresee the rise of a new strike wave in the early spring of 1934. It is now being realized all around us on a large scale. In this movement an even larger role is being played by the revolutionary forces than in 1933. This also results in a larger proportion of victorious strikes.

This new wave of struggles has already brought the Roosevelt ad- ministration to a new stage in the development of its labor policy. This was announced by Mr. Roosevelt himself, when he declared that "we have charted a new course," in his announcement of the "settle- ment" in the automobile industry.

What is this "new course"?

The auto manufacturers themselves gave a correct estimate of it, when they declared to the correspondent of the N. Y. Herald Tribune their "delight" with the outcome. "The manujacturers were pariicu-

36 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

larly pleased that the clarification of section ya seems to uphold their contention in behalf of the company union"

This "new course," like the previous "new courses," is launched with the signature of William Green and the officialdom of the A. F. of L., with the blessings of Norman Thomas and the Socialist Party.

What is new in this course, is the public adoption of the company union as an integral part of the "corporate state" scheme, where previously, in the official plans, the A. F. of L. had been granted (on paper) a monopoly. This means more open coming forward of the government to prevent or smash the strike movements. For months a debate raged behind the scenes among the capitalists, on which horse to place their money, the A. F. of L. or the company imion. Two camps had existed, which sharply divided the highest councils. Upon the basis of experience in the first strike wave and the beginnings of the second, both camps had modified their views and came together in one united judgment, embodied in Roosevelt's "new course." On the one hand, the company union advocates had been convinced of the complete docility and reliability for their purposes of Green, Lewis, and the whole official A. F. of L. family; they have been converted to the view of Johnson m this respect. On the other hand, the proponents of the A. F. of L. have been convinced that, in spite of Green & Co.'s absolute "reliability" in purpose, their ability to control their member- ship is growing less and less each day. Already last fall, Roosevelt had a sharp intimation of this, when John L. Lewis had to admit his failure to drive the strikers of the captive mines back to work, and Roosevelt had to do the job personally. Another major example of the same sort was the auto situation, where the A. F. of L. leaders frankly told the President that they were helpless to stop the strike movement unless Roosevelt himself intervened. The whole strike wave, rising against the Canute-like commandments of Green & Co. drove the lesson home. Conclusion: Neither one nor the other, neither A. F. of L. nor company union, alone, but both together, in a constantly closer association, and in preparation for merging the two under Gov- ernment auspices. That is the essence of the "new course." Of course, differences continue — ^we must not be confused by them.

This "new course" is now in process of being incorporated into the Wagner Bill, which in its original form provided for a sort of Watson- Parker Law (compulsory arbitration on the railroads) for all industries. The original purpose to bind the unions with the strong chains of arbitration machinery, to choke down the strike wave, is now to be supplemented by guarantees of effectiveness through binding the trade unions with the company unions.

LaGuardia, in the midst of "handling" the taxi drivers' strike in New York City, knew how to "take a hint." He promptly abandoned the settlement which he had prepared, to which the workers had agreed

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 37

but which the companies had rejected, and called a representative of the A. F. of L. from Washington to negotiate the incorporation of the taxi company union into the A. F. of L. He was "correct in principle" in this question, but too hasty and crude in action, so the execution of his proposal has been postponed for a more favorable stage setting.

An organic part of the whole "new course" toward labor is the sharp turn in the question of unemployed relief. Roosevelt has in his hands unexpended billions, which he demanded from Congress for relief pur- poses. But suddenly, so suddenly as to shock a host of loyal "new dealers" and bring bitter protests from them (including such a close friend of Roosevelt as Governor Lehman of New York), the C. W. A. is closed down, and millions of unemployed are thrown back upon the bankrupt local governments. Why this "new course" toward the im- employed? The answer is given in the cynical words published on the front page of the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Sunday, April ist) :

Those not so pleased with the new relief standards think the administra- tion, finding perhaps that its grants of power to the labor unions were greater than the administration would now like to have them, may have thought of an abrupt ending of C. W. A. and a lowering of direct rehef expenditures as an effective way of glutting the labor market and taking some of the spirit out of the unions.

What are the main strategic tasks of the Communist Party, that flow from this analysis of the situation?

First, to help the masses of workers, who are coming to realize that they must halt their mutually destructive competition and begin to act unitedly against a hostile ruling system, to find the road to independent class organization and class struggle in the fight for their daily bread.

Second, to organize every possible form of resistance and counter- struggle against the attacks of reaction, against every reduction of living standards, for wage increases, for more relief, for jobs, for un- employment insurance, against cultural reaction, against Negro oppres- sion, for civil rights, for the right to organize and strike.

Third, to find the broadest possible forms of organization of the struggle, to apply, with Bolshevist flexibility, the tactic of the united front from below.

Fourth, to expose the true role of every hidden agent of capitalist reaction in the ranks of the working class — the leaders of the A. F. of L., of the Socialist Party, the Muste group, the renegades, by concrete analysis of their actions and policies.

Fifth, to raise the political consciousness of the struggling workers, to bring to them an understanding of the class structure of society, of the fact that two main classes are fighting for control, that Roosevelt, leading the present ruling class, finance capital, stands for degradation, hunger, misery, oppression, fascism, war — that only the working class

38 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

exercising state power, can open up a new era of peace, progress, and prosperity for the entire human race.

Sixth, to imbue the broadest masses with the fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism, to arm them with the lessons of successful revolu- tion, against the treacherous slogans and ideas of social-fascism.

Seventh, to create strongholds of revolutionary mass organizations in the most important industries, localities, and factories.

Eighth, to consolidate everything that is most active, intelligent, fearless and loyal in the working class into a compact, monolithic leadership of the mass struggle, into the Communist Party, organically united with the revolutionary workers and oppressed peoples of the world in our Communist International.

Results of the First Wave of Struggle and Organization Under the New Deal

The year 1933 and beginning of 1934, with its wave of strikes and organizations, left its mark upon the working class. All forms of labor organizations increased. We can divide these into four main groups: (i) company unions, embracing workers estimated variously from one to three millions; (2) A. F. of L. (and allied organizations such as Railroad Brotherhoods), 500,000 new members with a total member- ship of two and a half to three million; (3) independent unions — 150,000 new members, with a total membership around 250,000; (4) Trade Union Unity League, and allied organizations, — 100,000 new members; total membership 125,000.

The first conclusion that must be drawn from these figures is the tremendously increased importance of the struggle against company imionism. The company union is the first line of defense in the fac- tories for the capitalists against the rising strike wave. The line of struggle against company unionism requires simultaneous development of revolutionary work inside the company union, utilizing every oppor- tunity for raising the demands of the workers, fighting for these de- mands, and putting forward militant candidates for all elective posts, thus disrupting the employer-controlled organizations from within. It has been proved possible, at times, to transform them into real trade unions, but only by open struggle. At the same time we must mobilize all independent trade union forces for the open smashing of the company imions.

The second conclusion is the greatly increased importance of revolu- tionary work inside the American Federation of Labor. The largest section of newly organized workers in trade unions is in the A. F. of L. The bulk of these, in turn, are in some of the most important industries — such as mining and textile, with important groups also in auto, steel and metal. Precisely these new strata in the A. F. of L. are the least consolidated under the reactionary leadership, the most active in press-

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 39

ing forward their demands, and therefore the most ripe for revolutionary leadership. In connection with the struggle against company unionism, a struggle for the rights of the A. F. of L. workers to fight for their immediate demands, large numbers of them can be immediately brought under revolutionary leadership by correct work. These new recruits to the A. F. of L. are not contentedly witnessing the A. F. of L. leaders signing away their rights as was done in the steel and auto codes; they are not content when they see their unions smashed through the mediation of the National Labor Board (Weirton, Budd, Edgewater, etc.). They are in open revolt when, as in the auto settlement last week, their leaders commit them to the legalization of the company union, and the outlawing of their strike movement. Now, more than ever before, correct and ener- getic work among the members of the A. F. of L., giving them independent leadership through the crystallization of revolutionary op- position groups, bringing them into action against their leaders and in open strikes and other forms of struggle for their immediate demands, is a first line task of the Communist Party.

How supremely important is this work, is shown by the serious results flowing from every smallest effort that is made. The broadest circle of this work is the movement for the Workers' Unemployment Insurance Bill (H. R. 7598). This bill has secured the direct support of over 2,000 A. F. of L. local unions, many city central bodies and even a few State Federations of Labor. In 23 cities, we have func- tioning general leading committees for work in the A. F. of L. The revolutionary elements, directly under our guidance, are established leaders of around 150 local unions, with 50,000 to 60,000 members. Minority opposition groups function in about 500 more local unions. This considerable beginning is of significance because it emphasizes the enormous possibilities that exist when we get a full mobilization of all available forces in this field. These results, which change the course of development for hundreds of thousands more, come from only the first steps with very fragmentary mobilization, and in the face of still existing underestimation of and even opposition to sys- tematic development of this work.

The independent unions have emerged as a major factor in more than a few light industries only during the past year. In the main, they are the result of the mass revolt against the A. F. of L. betrayals, and could not yet be brought into the revolutionary unions for vari- ous reasons, chief among them being the weaknesses in the work of the T. U. U. L. Systematic building of revolutionary groups inside them, with careful formulation of policies and leadership of their strug- gles, is an essential feature of our trade union strategy. In the inde- pendent unions we must have the most careful distinction between the honest but confused leadership which has been thrown up from the

40 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

rank and file, on the one hand; and the conscious opportunist, reform- ist, social-fascist elements in the leadership on the other hand, who head the independent movements only in order to bring them back under the domination of the A. F. of L. leadership. In this latter group, an important role is played by the Musteites, Lovestoneites, and Trotsky- ites. The sharpest political struggle must be made agamst the "left" reformists and the renegades, while every effort must be made to win over to our class struggle policies the honest elements in the independent trade union leadership.

The revolutionary unions of the T. U. U. L. with their 125,000 members, while numerically the smallest of these main groups of the trade union movement, are by no means least important. The T. U. U. L. unions in developing the whole mass movement of resistance to the N. R. A. and the whole capitalist offensive, in the development of the strike movements, have played a decisive role. This is brought out by an examination of the statistics of the strike movement in 1933, as shown in the following table:

Membership

A. F. of L 2,500,000

Indep. Unions 250,000

T. U. U. L 125,000

Unorganized

2,875,000

Led in	New
Strikes	Members
450,000	500,000
250,000	150,000
200,000	100,000
100,000
1,000,000	750,000

From these figures we see that the T. U. U. L. although not quite 5 per cent of the total trade union membership, directly led 20 per cent of all strikes and gained 20 per cent of all new members. The inde- pendent unions, a little under 10 per cent of the total membership, led 25 per cent of the strikes. The A. F. of L. unions, comprising over 85 per cent of the membership, led 45 per cent of the strikes. This illus- trates the role of the leadership of these three groups m relation to the strike movement. The A. F. of L. leadership is the center of resistance to strikes, and center of strikebreaking activities within the ranks of the workers. The T. U. U. L. unions were the driving force in the leadership and development of the strikes against all the strikebreakers. The independent unions represented those masses breaking away from the A. F. of L. leadership, but still carrymg with them part of the old burden of unclear and even openly reformist leadership which continued trying to carry through the A. F. of L. policies within the unions.

The growing importance of the independent and T. U. U. L. unions is emphasized by the fact that they comprised fully one-third of all the increased trade union membership that resulted from the strike movement, and that together they led 45 per cent of the strikes, an

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 41

equal number with the A. F. of L. In addition to this, it is clear that the 450,000 strikers under A. F. of L. leadership were not led into struggle by that leadership but in spite of and against it. Our opposi- tion work in the A. F. of L. played in this a significant part in some industries. It would have been impossible for a strike movement of such volume to rise from the A. F. of L. ranks without the influence of the strike movement of equal volume outside the A. F. of L. developed and led by the T. U. U. L. and independent unions.

Our Draft Resolution places before the Convention, as a central point in our present trade union strategy, the task of unifying the independent unions with the revolutionary unions, beginning separately in each industry, and, upon the basis of successful work there, moving towards the consolidation of all class trade union forces into a single Independent Federation of Labor.

We must avoid, if possible, the crystallization of a third trade union center, intermediate between the A. F. of L. and the T. U. U. L. We must be prepared to go a long way to secure organizational unity of all genuine class trade union forces. The possibility of success in this direction is already indicated in the partially successful merger of the T. U. U. L. and the independent Shoe Workers' Unions. This experi- ence gives a clear indication of our general line in practice.

Of great importance to us in this period was the rise of mass revolu- tionary unions on the Pacific Coast area, among agricultural and can- nery workers, fishermen and lumber workers. These organizations and the historic struggles conducted by them have definitely established the fact that our movement has fully taken over and absorbed the specifi- cally American revolutionary traditions and forces in that territory, which before the rise of the Communist Party was organized in and around the I. W. W.

The rise of the revolutionary Agricultural Workers' Unions, especially in the California area, has a further special significance for our Party. This is the first beginning of mass organization among a category of workers which, in spite of the scattered and decentralized character of its labor in most areas, constitutes numerically the largest single category of the working class. Agricultural workers in the United States comprise two and a half to three million workers. Large num- bers of them are favorably situated for organization, especially in the sections of the industry organized on the lines of mass production for the city markets — fruit, vegetable and dairy farming. Large numbers of these workers are massed around the industrial centers, in the East and Middle West also, within easy reach of the organized labor move- ment in the cities. Serious trade union organization of these workers provides a most important extension of the working class base of the revolutionary movement. At the same time, they furnish the necessary class base for revolutionary organization among the poor and middle

42 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

farmers, who are more and more revolting against the capitalist at- tacks. It is the organized agricultural workers which in the first place will provide a firm basis for working class hegemony in the alliance between the working class as a whole with the movement of the revolt- ing farmers. The necessity of the general leadership of the working class over the movements of all other sections of the exploited popula- tion if all of their forces are to be unified for the common struggle against capitalism, should make it clear to every district of the Party that their work in reaching and organizing the agricultural workers acquires an extraordinary importance at the present time.

Struggles of the Farmers and Movements of Mixed Class

Character

The movement for organization of rising strike struggles among the employed workers, together with the growing organization and struggles of the unemployed, has served as a powerful stimulus to the activities of other sections of the exploited population, and attracts these other groups around the working class as the leader and organizing center. We have seen the serious beginnings of this process in relation to the farmers' movement. This movement is beginning to take on a different character from that seen in previous farmers' movements. The new characteristics have been brought forward most clearly in those strug- gles and organizations of the farmers which have found their organizing center in the Farmers' Committee of Action, and the two national Farm Conferences held by it in 1932 in Washington, and in 1933 in Chicago, and especially its left wing, the United Farmers League. What is new in this farmers' movement is first, the political clarity with which it has attacked the traditional nostrums with which the farmers have been fooled so many times in the past (Currency Reform, etc.), and its resolute combating of the anti-farmer policies of the Roosevelt "New Deal" (crop reduction, etc.). It is distinguished by its ability to rise above sectional and race divisions, by its proclamation of the unity of Negro and white farmer, by its formulation of a na- tional outlook and program, as against the narrow, regional, provincial approach. It has struck at the heart of the farmers' problems in its demand for the cancellation of mortgages, debts and back taxes, raising sharply the most vital issues which determine class alignments. Above all, it has been able not only to proclaim the abstract principle of the worker-farmer alliance, but actually to begin to realize it in daily life and struggles.

A mass movement of a mixed class nature that has begun to take on a revolutionary trend in the United States in the past period, is that of the war veterans. The veterans' movement comprises workers, farmers and a larger proportion of middle class elements. It is unified not by its class composition but by its common demands for payment

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 43

of the adjusted compensation certificates (bonus), for disability allow- ances and hospitalization, all of which have been under heavy attack by the Roosevelt administration. The tremendous revolutionary potenti- alities in this movement were startlingly revealed by the great Bonus March in 1932, which was a tremendous outburst of mass indignation against the Hoover regime. That these forces are again gathering, that they are exerting tremendous pressure, that they are threatening to burst forth again into mass action, was dramatically shown by the panicky action of Congress in over-ridmg Roosevelt's veto of the Con- gressional replacement of a small portion of what the Roosevelt regime had stolen from the veterans. An indispensible role has been played in this veterans' movement by the still small, but very active Workers' Ex-Servicemen's League. If this organization would receive more co- operation and assistance, more systematic help in recruiting all the potential forces of veterans, who are as yet inactive in this work, the results in bringing into active expression the mass forces of the veterans' revolt would mature much faster. The veterans' movement is a most valuable ally to the revolutionary working class movement. It stands as one of the important tasks of the entire Party in mobilizing the auxiliary forces for the working class movement in the United States. Another auxiliary movement of growing importance that has appeared as a serious factor only in the last two years, is the revolutionary move- ment among the students. In the student movement we are also dealing with a mixed class composition. The movement began principally in the higher institutions of learning with predominantly middle class composi- tion. It has rapidly spread to the secondary schools and involved a large number of proletarian students in its activities. Led and organized by the National Student League, this movement has established a base in hundreds of high schools, colleges and universities; it has become national in scope; it has exerted a great and growing influence upon all intellectual circles. From the beginning it has been clearly revolu- tionary in its program and activities. One of the strongest points has been its clear recognition that the leading role belongs to the workers and not to the students in the general revolutionary movement. Es- pecially the students' movement has made a valuable contribution in extending the organized mass movement against war and fascism among the masses of youth. The students' movement, in fact, is a pioneer in the development of the general anti-war movement through its Students' Anti-War Congress in Chicago in December, 1932, which first united, on a national scale, anti-war forces of various political and class origins. Its participation in the youth section of the American League Against War and Fascism has constituted one of the most active and valuable phases of that organization's work. By organized participation in helping strike actions, defense movements, the Scottsboro case, etc., the students have been brought to participation in the general class strug-

44 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

gles and learned the practical meaning of working class leadership. The weakness of this movement still remains that its leading cadres are still largely drawn from the middle class elements of the colleges and universities, that it does not yet sufficiently base itself upon the larger bodies of proletarian students in the secondary schools, nor sufficiently draw them into active leadership of the movement.

The broadest movement of mixed-class composition has been the American League Against War and Fascism, formed at the great U. S. Congress Against War, held in New York last October. The Congress itself, while predominately working class in composition, embraced the widest variety of organizations that have ever been united upon a single platform in this country. It gathered the most significant strata of the intellectuals. The breadth of the movement was not secured by sacri- ficing clarity of program. On the contrary, while its program is dis- tinctly not that of the Communist Party, it is so clear and definite in facing the basic issues, that to carry it out in practice entails clearly revolutionary consequences. It is a real united front program of im- mediate struggle against war and fascism. That is the reason for the frantic efforts to break up and scatter the American League Against War and Fascism that have been and are being made by the Socialist Party leaders, Musteites, and the renegades from Communism. The unbridled ferocity of the attacks made against the League by these elements, and by their comrades-in-arms of the National Civic Federa- tion, Ralph Easley, Matthew WoU & Co., should be an indication to us of the revolutionary value of this broad united front organization. In serious self-criticism, we must say that although our movement responded excellently (in most places) to the call to the National Congress, it did not follow up this congress everywhere with serious local organizational work to consolidate the potential movement that had been brought together. Only in a few places has this work been seriously begun. In every locality the non-Party and mixed-class character of the movement must be carried forward, but not at the expense of dropping the working class and Communist participation as has too often been the case. The American League in its program proclaims that the working class is the basic force for the struggle against war; from the beginning it has never tried to avoid the issue of Communist Party participation in this broad united front. It is our task to see that the American League, organizationally, gets that working class foundation and active participation of the Communists for which its program provides.

The Struggle for Negro Rights

One of the chief tasks of the Communist Party, which has come sharply to the front of our practical work, is the liberation of the Negro people from the special oppression under which they suffer. In

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 45

organizing and leading the struggle for Negro rights, the Communist Party is carrying out the slogan first enunciated by Karl Marx when he was organizing international support by the European workers to the emancipation of the Negro chattel slaves in America. Marx said: "Labor in a white skin cannot be free while labor in a black skin is branded." The cause of the emancipation of the Negroes from their special oppression is inextricably bound up with the cause of the emancipation of the working class from the oppression of capitalism. Because our Party, as a whole, has not yet firmly mastered the theo- retical basis for our Negro program, it is necessary again at this con- vention to continue to discuss it.

From its inception, the Communist Party of the United States placed the demands for Negro rights in its program. In the first period of our work, up to 1929, we cannot claim any important results. This was because the Party, in spite of its correct general orientation, did not have a clear Bolshevik imderstanding of the Negro question as the problem of liberation of an oppressed nation. The Party had not yet entirely emancipated itself from the limitation of the bourgeois- liberal approach to Negro rights, nor from the social-democratic denial of the Negro question with its formula that the Negroes can find their emancipation only with the establishment of Socialism, and as a part of the working class. The Party, however, was continually struggling with this question and constantly raising it again for discussion. As a result of this, the problem was brought to the consideration of our World Party at the Sixth Congress of the Communist International. The resolution there worked out, subsequently elaborated by a special resolution in October, 1930, finally armed our Party politically for a decisive step forward in rousing and organizing the liberation move- ment of the Negroes, in uniting Negro and white workers in a firm and unbreakable solidarity.

The characteristic of the position of the Negroes in America as an op- pressed nation is expressed in: (i) the fact that the basic Negro popu- lation, engaged in cultivating the land, is systematically excluded from independent possession of the land which it cultivates; (2) that it is thereby reduced to a position of semi-serfdom in the form of specially exploited tenants and sharecroppers; (3) that this special exploitation is enforced by a system of legal and illegal discrimination, segregation, denial of political rights, personal subjection to individual exploiters, and all forms of violent oppression culminating in the most brutal and barbarous system of murder, that it has become notorious all over the world as lynch-law. It is difficult to find anywhere in the world such examples of barbarous tortures as are used in America to enforce the special oppression of the Negro people.

The historical origin and development of the Negro population of America as chattel slaves imported from Africa, together with their

46 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

ready identification due to their special racial characteristics, have facilitated the efforts of the white ruling class in the creation of the institutions and customs of special national oppression that were set up following the smashing of the system of chattel slavery in the Civil War.

These things give the Negro question its character as that of an oppressed nation. The Negroes have never yet been emancipated. The form of their oppression was only changed from that of chattel slavery, which constituted an obstacle to the further development of capitalism, to the more "modern" forms of so-called free labor (which means that the employer is freed from all obligation when he has paid the hourly or daily starvation wage), and half -feudal forms of share- cropping, etc., whereby an imperialist nation oppresses and exploits a weak nation. The position of the masses of the Negroes, as farmers denied the possession of the land, is the foundation for the special oppression of the Negro people as a whole. All phases of struggle for Negro rights must take as their foundation and starting place, therefore, the struggle for possession of the land by the landless Negro farmers. This can only be achieved by breaking through the rule of the white landlord ruling class, the carr5dng through of the agrarian revolution, such as was carried through in Europe in the first half of the nineteenth century when the foundations were laid for modern capitalism. The agrarian revolution, that is, the distribution of land among those who work the land, is historically part of the bourgeois- democratic revolution. But this revolution was never carried through entirely in any country, and hardly at all in the weak nations; the pre-capitalist social and economic forms of oppression and exploitation of the weak nations has been carried over to modern times and incor- porated into the system of finance capital and modern imperialism.

The struggle for the completion of the bourgeois-democratic revolu- tion for the Negroes, as for other oppressed nations, thus becomes today objectively a revolutionary struggle to overthrow imperialism. As such it is an ally of the revolutionary proletariat against the common enemy — finance capital. Such agrarian revolution can be realized only through winning national self-determination for the Negroes in that territory in which they constitute the majority of the population and the basic productive force upon the land, or as a by-product of a victorious proletarian revolution in the country as a whole. The basic slogan of Negro liberation is therefore the slogan of self-determination; the basic demand of the Negroes is the demand for the land. Through- out the United States the struggle for Negro liberation is expressed in the struggle for complete equality, for the abolition of all segregation laws and practices (Jim-Crowism), the struggle against the ideas, propagated by the white ruling class, of Negro inferiority (a form of national chauvinism which we call white chauvinism), which is used

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 47

to justify the oppression of the Negroes and to keep the Negro and white toilers divided.

These basic poHtical considerations have been, by experience, proved to be absolutely necessary weapons to make effectual even the smallest struggle for Negro rights. Let us consider, for example, the world famous Scottsboro case, which has represented one of the major political achievements of the Communist Party in the last period. How im- possible it would have been to rouse the Negro masses in the United States in millions to the support of the Scottsboro boys ; how impossible to have joined with them millions of white toilers and middle classes; how impossible to have stirred the entire world, as was done — if the Scottsboro case had been taken up from the liberal-humanitarian point of view, or if it had been approached from the narrow social-democratic viewpoint! The Scottsboro case stirred America to its depths, not merely because nine friendless Negro boys were threatened with an unjust death, but because their cause was brought forward clearly as a symbol of the national oppression of twelve million Negroes in America, because the fight for their freedom was made the symbol for the fight of the Negro farmers for their land, of the fight for the self- determination in the Black Belt, of the fight against lynchings, against Jim-Crowism, against the smallest discriminations, for unconditional social and political equality for the Negroes.

Only the Bolshevik understanding of the Negro question makes possible such an effective fight for the smallest advance for the Negroes to realize their smallest demands; that is why historically it was left for the Communist Party to be the first to raise effectively, on a na- tional scale, the slogan of Negro liberation, since the almost-forgotten days of the Abolitionists.

The Communists unconditionally reject the social-democratic ap- proach of the Second International to the Negro question and to the national question generally, which under the guise of a strictly "working class" evaluation of the Negro question, in actuality carries through the capitalist class program of national oppression. That does not mean, however, that the Communist Party ignores the class divisions among the Negroes, or that it is indifferent to what class influences and leads the Negro masses.

The Communist Party points out that the Negroes also are divided into classes; that in addition to the class of Negro farmers, there is a considerable and growing proletariat, a Negro middle class and a Negro bourgeoisie. The Negro bourgeoisie, also subjected to the special op- pression of the Negro people as a whole, has been corrupted into accepting this position of inferiority, and even capitalizing upon this inferior position for its own class gain. This Negro bourgeoisie has be- come the thorough-going agent of the white ruling class. It maintains a pitiful "superiority" to the Negro masses by means of the con-

48 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

descending support offered to it by the white ruling class. It capi- talizes a share of the double rents extracted from the Negro masses by the white landlords through the system of Jim-Crow segregation; it earns these concessions from the white ruling class by energetically exhorting the Negro masses to be patient and long-suffering, to realize their own inferiority, to understand the position of white capitalists and landlords as their rulers as an inescapable visitation inflicted upon them by an all-wise God.

As the Negro masses begin to revolt against this position of inferi- ority, the Negro bourgeoisie begins to develop special means of heading off and controlling this revolt. They speculate upon the distrust and suspicions created among the Negro masses against white workers gen- erally through generations of oppression. They appeal to the Negroes to make a virtue out of their segregation, to voluntarily isolate them- selves, not to trust any white man, to rely upon themselves alone; they bring forth all sorts of Utopian schemes, such as the Back-to- Africa movement, the Support-Negro-Bminess movement, the so-called Pacific (pro- Japanese movement), and so forth, to create the illusions of some possible way out of their misery without direct conflict with the white ruling class. All of these ideas, tendencies, and moods are what we identify collectively as bourgeois-nationalism, or national- reformism.. Such a nationalism contributes nothing to the national liberation of the Negro people; on the contrary, it is an instrument of the white ruling class, just as is white chauvinism, to keep the white and Negro masses separated and antagonistic to one another, and thereby to keep both enslaved.

We have had a thousand practical examples of how this Negro bourgeois-nationalism works out in practice. We saw it in the Scotts- boro case, when all the bourgeois Negro leaders held up their hands in horror because white and Negro Communists joined hands together to rouse the masses to save the Scottsboro boys. They declared that the Scottsboro boys were in danger, not from the white ruling class whose hearts could, they said, be touched by quiet humanitarian pleading, but that they were in danger rather from the prejudices raised against them by the fact that masses were demanding their release as a part of the demand for national liberation. It was clearly revealed that the bourgeois proposal that the Negroes "stand on their own feet" was not merely a proposal to keep them separate from the white workers, but to throw themselves on the mercy of the white ruling class.

From all these facts flow the Communist position on the Negro question. The Communists fight ever3^here against white chauvinism, against all ideas of Negro inferiority, against all practical discrimina- tion against the Negroes; the Communists fight especially against white chauvinist ideas in the ranks of the workers, and above all against any

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 49

white chauvinist influence penetrating the ranks of the Communist Party. The Communists declare that the white workers must stand in the forefront of the struggle for Negro rights and against white chauvinism. At the same time, the Communists fight against Negro bourgeois-nationalism which is only the other side of white chauvinism. In this fight against Negro nationalism, it is especially the Negro Communists who have to be the most active and alert.

The danger of Negro nationalism is at the moment especially sharp, precisely because of the fact that the successes of the Communist leadership in the fight for the Scottsboro boys has aroused the Negro bourgeoisie under the proddings of their white masters to a most active and bitter counter-offensive against us.

The main organizational channels of the struggle for Negro rights are, first of all, the trade unions and unemployment councils. Here we draw in the Negro working class forces, we secure the only reliable leading forces to organize the struggle of the Negro masses as a whole. Further basic forms of organization of the Negroes are the unions of sharecroppers and tenant farmers. It is one of our most proud achieve- ments that we have been able through our political influence to bring into existence the Share Croppers' Union in the South, which is already approaching 6,000 members.

A more broad and all-inclusive organizational form for the Negro liberation struggles is the League of Struggle for Negro Rights. This should embrace in its activities all of the basic economic organizations of Negro and white workers standing on the program of Negro libera- tion, and further unite with them all other sections of the Negro popu- lation drawn towards this struggle, especially those large sections of the petty-bourgeoisie, intellectuals, professionals, who can and must be won to the national liberation cause. The L. S. N. R. must, in the first place, be an active federation of existing mass organizations; and secondly, it must directly organize its own membership branches composed of its most active forces and all supporters otherwise unor- ganized. The present beginnings of the L. S. N. R. and its paper, The Liberator, which with only a little attention have already shown mass vitality, must be energetically taken up, and spread throughout the country.

The Party Must Win the Youth

A few words are necessary here about the special problems of the youth, although this will be the subject of a special report and dis- cussion. The winning of the working class youth is the problem not of our youth organizations alone, but the problem of the entire Party. In the past this has not only been forgotten, but there has even been allowed to develop a sort of organizational rivalry between the youth and adult organizations, a rivalry not in the nature of socialist com-

so COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

petition, but of the adult organizations trying to grab away as quickly as possible from the youth organizations every rising young leader who shows special organizational or political capacity. The idea has been that as soon as the youth movement produces a leader who is "good enough for Party work" that this means he is wasting his time if he remains any longer in what is looked upon as a sort of probationary kindergarten. This frivolous attitude toward youth work must be eliminated from our movement. Certainly, our enemies are more seri- ous about winning the youth, and especially the rising fascist groups. Who shall blame the unprepared, politically unarmed, and desperate masses of young workers who fall victim to the demagogy of fascism, if we drift along without any serious, large-scale efforts to reach these youth, to organize them, to politically educate them, to fight for their daily needs, to raise their class consciousness, and to give them a recognized place in the whole revolutionary movement? Every Party unit, and every Party committee, must take as a part of its daily concrete tasks, the work among the youth, the establishment of their organizations, the solution of their political problems, and material help to their movement. The Young Communist League, instead of being less than a fourth the size of the Party, must be expanded in the next period to become larger than the Party; that means, that the youth must find a serious place in the trade unions and other mass organizations; that it must be helped to politically enrich the life of its organizations, to concretize its struggles for the young workers' needs, to broaden out the scope of its activities, to include everything that interests, attracts and holds the masses of young workers, also including their social, sport and cultural needs.

Special attention is also necessary to the tasks of winning and or- ganizing women industrial workers and housewives in the revolutionary movement. The capitalist class has drawn women into industry on a much larger scale than we have drawn them into revolutionary ac- tivities and organizations. We will continue to lag behind the capital- ists in this respect only at the price of continued weakness in the revolutionary movement. This question becomes all the more pressing because we are faced with a perspective of imperialist war in the near future. Under war conditions, everybody knows vast additional masses of women will be drawn into industry and especially into munitions manufacturing. Furthermore, large-scale mobilization of men workers into the armies will create gaps in our ranks which can only be filled by the bold promotion of women workers. That means we should. long ago have been seriously and systematically preparing the women forces, and boldly promoting them to leading responsible posts. The mobilization of masses of women workers requires special attention to their particular needs, formulation of special demands, the creation of special opportunities to consider their problems in con-

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nection with the problems of the whole working class, through con- ferences, etc. Especially, it requires more systematic recruitment of women into the trade unions, and above all, into the Communist Party.

Problems of the Struggle for the United Front

The increasingly sharp attacks against the workers raise more in- sistently than ever the necessity of establishment of the working class fighting front to resist these attacks and to win the demands of the workers. The working class in the United States is still largely unor- ganized. That part which is organized is largely under the influence of the A. F. of L. bureaucracy, which keeps it split up in innumerable ways by craft divisions, by discriminations against the Negroes and foreign-born, by divisions between the skilled and unskilled, etc. That smaller section which has begun to question the capitalist system is further divided between the leadership of the Socialist Party and the Communist Party, while a considerable section stands aside, still bewildered by these divisions and the problems it does not yet under- stand, and further confused by the shouts of those small but active groups, the renegades from Communism, the Musteites, etc.

What is the road to working class unity in the midst of all this disorganization and confusion? The A. F. of L. and Socialist leaders shout that the Communists are splitters and disrupters. This charge is repeated by the renegades and the Musteites. The capitalist press is especially active in spreading this explanation of the divisions among the workers. According to them, if the Communist Party could only suddenly be abolished, the working class would find itself miraculously united and happily on the road to the solution of its problems.

These gentlemen will excuse us if we cannot accept their version of the problem of working class unity. We cannot achieve the united front of the auto workers under the leadership of William Green and the A. F. of L., for example, in the fight against the recent sell-out and legalization of company unions, because it was precisely William Green who signed his name to that sell-out, and who is using all his efforts to prevent the workers' struggle against it. We cannot get the united front of the steel workers to fight against the monstrous steel code under the leadership of William Green and the other A. F. of L. bureaucrats, because Green is one of the sponsors of this code. We can't build the united front under the A. F. of L. and S. P. leaders in the fight for unemployment insurance, the Workers' Bill (H. R. 7598 — later in the 74th Congress, H. R. 2827), because they give their support to the Wagner Bill, which is a refusal of unemployment insurance. We can't have the united front led by these gentlemen and the Negro reformists for Negro rights, because it is precisely they who deny these rights to the Negroes in the trade unions, who declare the Negroes themselves provoke lynching by the demands for equal rights. A united

52 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

front with Norman Thomas and S. P. leaders, to develop strike strug- gles of the workers would be immediately wrecked by the statement of Norman Thomas, "Now is not the time to strike." No, it is clear, unity behind these gentlemen means a united surrender to the capi- talist attacks. That is not the kind of unity the workers need. We need a united fighting front of the workers against the capitalists and all their agents. But that means that unity must be built up, not with these leaders on their present policies, but against them. That means not a united front from the top, but a united front built up by the workers from below in the organization and struggle for their im- mediate needs.

The Communists set no conditions to the united front except that the unity shall be one of struggle for the particular demands agreed upon. But on this condition we must be sternly insistent. Sometimes we find people who want to make a united front with us in words, but who seriously hesitate to carry it out in action. When we insist upon action, they tell us we have bad manners, that we are disrupters; that we are breaking up the united front. For example, only last August, here in the city of Cleveland, we participated in a conference together with delegates from hundreds of workers' organizations, including Muste and his associated leading group. We worked out a program of strug- gle against the N. R. A., for unemployment insurance and relief, and the unification of the unemployed mass organizations. From that con- ference we went out to fight, to carry out the program adopted. Mr. Muste and his associates left the conference only to forget all about the decisions taken there, to which they had signed their names. They never turned a hand to realize the decisions they had agreed to. They had pledged themselves to support the Workers' Unemployment In- surance Bill, but they have maintained ever since the silence of death on this question. Instead, they support the Wagner Bill along with the Socialist and A. F. of L. leaders. They pledged themselves to help merge the unemployed mass organizations; instead, they have done everything possible to prevent any unification from below, and have themselves refused to even answer any letters on the question so far as the top leadership is concerned. They pledged an uncom- promising fight against the N. R. A.; but instead of this, they carry on an agitation copied from the Socialist Party, asking the workers to use the "good sides" of the N. R. A. to achieve the "benefits" that it grants them. United front with such leaders on such terms is no united front at all. The Communist Party will continue in the future, as it has in the past, to denounce all such "unity" in words which is violated in deeds.

In spite of all of these enemies of the real united front, the Com- munist Party moves steadily forward in building a broad united front movement. Let us examine just a few of these successful united front

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 53

efforts. First of all, the movement for unemployment insurance: It was the Communist Party that popularized the issue of unemployment insurance, formulated the Workers Unemployment Insurance Bill; it took the lead in bringing into existence the broad mass unemployment council movement, which popularized the bill; it helped to initiate the A. F. L. Rank and File Committee for Unemployment Insurance, which has held two national conferences in support of the Workers' Bill and has secured the endorsement of 2,000 unions, over a dozen central bodies, and several state federations; it was the work of the Communist Party which resulted in the endorsement of the Bill by dozens of city governments, including that of the city of Minneapolis which, joined with the pressure of the whole mass movement, caused Ernest Lundeen, Farmer Labor congressman, to introduce the Bill in Congress although his Party refuses to support the Bill. It was the Communist Party which took the political lead and did most of the practical work which gave organized expression to the support of this Bill by a million to a million-and-a-half organized workers.*^ Truly, this is a united front in struggle for unemployment insurance. The A. F. L. leaders. Socialist Party, the Muste group, the Lovestoneites, the Trotsky ites, one and all, they sneered at the Workers' Unemploy- ment Insurance Bill, they sabotaged the fight for it or openly opposed it; they threw their support to the Wagner Bill which is the Roosevelt government's attempt to head off unemployment insurance; they did everything possible to prevent the unity of the workers in support of the only real unemployment insurance bill that is before the country. But we Communists have built up the united front of the workers over the heads of these leaders, and against all of their disruptive efforts. In this united front we have lined up all the awakened, honest and intelligent elements in the labor movement and the sympathizing middle classes. We have welcomed them, one and all, into the united front. We have made possible and easy their participation in it; we have been the main force that brought this united front into existence and we have jealously guarded its unity.**

Another illuminating experience was our relations with the Socialist Party leaders in the U. S. Congress Against War, and in the American League Against War and Fascism that was set up there. The National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party voted to join this united front. Eleven of their nominees were added to the Arrangement Com- mittee; their first act was to propose to exclude from the Congress the revolutionary unions of the T. U. U. L., a proposal which was, of course, refused. Their second act was to demonstratively withdraw

* In January, 1935, this had increased to approximately five million, ** At the hearings of the Labor Committee of United States Congress in Febru- ary, the S. P. and the unemployed organizations led by its members and by the Musteites, finally endorsed the Workers' Bill.

54 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

from the Congress Committee in an attempt to disrupt the Congress before it was held. Surely the workers will not gain unity through following such leadership.

Some of the "left" socialist leaders remained with the Congress, and the League for a time, such as J. B. Matthews and Mary Fox. It is interesting to re-read today, the words of J. B. Matthews, spoken only a few months ago. He said: "This Congress proves beyond any dis- pute that the United Front of working class elements, of pacifists, of middle-class war-resisters, is a possibility . . . This program presented to you is the basis for continuing this Union — for strengthening it step by step. We must stand together. We dare not fail."

But the Socialist Party leaders put heavy pressure on them and threatened them with expulsion (and incidentally the loss of their jobs). Then these valiant "left" leaders quickly found an excuse to withdraw and make another attempt to disrupt the united front against war and fascism. They abandoned this program to which they had already pledged themselves. Already their names are signed to a new program issued by S. P. and liberal leaders which sees the war danger in the movements of the Red Army in Siberia.

In this latest effort to break up the united front, the Socialists have found their most energetic helpers in Reverend Muste, Mr. Cannon, and Mr. Lovestone, who have attacked us with a bitterness of vitupera- tion that is surely the envy of Ralph Easley and Matthew Woll. The renegades furnish most of the ideas for the struggle against Com- munism. This is especially true of the counter-revolutionary Trotsky and his agents. They lead the shouts for smashing the Communist Party. All this is done in the name of "unity." Each and all proclaim that they are the unifiers, and that the Communists are the disrupters.

From the beginning of this movement, the Communist Party safe- guarded itself against all the lying accusations of its enemies by having a large majority of non-Communist individuals in every controlling committee of the movement. The Communists threw all their forces into support of the U. S. Congress Against War. We welcomed every person and every organization that came into the movement, and agreed to support its declared objectives. The political and organizational platform of the American League was adopted unanimously at a Con- gress of 2,616 delegates, from 35 states, embracing a variety of organi- zations, ranging from churches and peace societies. Socialist Party branches, religious organizations, workers' cultural clubs, fraternal societies, revolutionary trade unions, A. F. of L. unions, independent unions, farmers' organizations, Negro organizations, youth organi- zations, the Muste groups (including even the Lovestoneites), and 130 delegates from various branches of the Communist Party. Was there ever a more promising beginning of the establishment of a united front movement against war and fascism in the United

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States? Since the Congress, a serious start has been made in spreading this united front throughout the country and among all strata of the population who were sincerely interested in fighting war and fascism. It is true there was some lagging in this work because we Communists mistakenly refrained from pressing ourselves forward, hoping that our initiative would be taken up by the non-Communists. That was a weakness and mistake on our part. It only encouraged every enemy of unity, every jackal of a renegade, to rally their forces for their latest attempt to disrupt the League. Again we have defeated the disrupters. The place of the deserting leaders is being taken by new recruits to this united front, non-Communists, whose influence reaches wider than that of the deserters. Into the front ranks must be drawn trade unionists, especially from the A. F. of L. We are calling upon all Communists and sympathizing organizations to boldly step forward in comradely co-operation with all other elements, to build the League in every locality to circulate its excellent monthly journal, Fight, and to prepare for the great second U. S. Congress Against War, which is being called for next October.*

We could recite a thousand local examples of the successful applica- tion of the united front tactic, initiated by the Communist Party. The Communists are the only organized political group in America that is always, day in and day out, consistently, earnestly and loyally striving to build up the united front of the workers and their allies in the fight for their immediate political and economic needs.

Immediate Demands and Revolution

Our enemies accuse us that we are not really interested in winning these immediate demands. They say that we only use them as a means to an ulterior purpose, which has no relation to these demands, i.e., the revolution. They say we only use the united front in order to manipu- late our associates as cats' paws to pull our own revolutionary chestnuts out of the fire.

For example, I have a recent issue of the Haverhill (Mass.) Evening Gazette, which contains a vicious editorial attack against the Com- munists. The occasion is a shoe workers' strike that has been going on for more than three weeks. The Haverhill shoe employers want to defeat the workers' demands by forcing them to submit to arbitration.

Some of the leaders, among them the Lovestoneite, I. Zimmerman, wanted to submit to the bosses' demands. The Communists showed the workers how defeat has come to all workers who have submitted their cause to so-called impartial boards. They called upon the workers to strike until the bosses grant them their very reasonable demands. The Communists have been the most active and devoted organizers

* See p. 198.— £d.

56 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

and leaders of this fight. This enrages the Haverhill Evening Gazette. Let me quote a few paragraphs from its editorial:

Today Haverhill's shoe industry with its scores of factories and thousands of workers is in grave danger of destruction.

The industry cannot survive under the terms laid down by the strike leadership. To yield to those terms is to submit to industrial death. To compromise with this leadership is to make a fatal dicker with an evil force.

This leadership does not care what becomes of Haverhill. Let Haverhill become an industrial leper. Let the homes of the Haverhill workers be lost because Haverhill jobs have been destroyed. Let the hopes of Haverhill workers be doomed because their means of livelihood have been taken from them. What does this leadership care? It doesn't care.

This leadership's motive is poUtical; its purpose, revolutionary. Haverhill has been dehberately selected as the site for a demonstration of Communist Power. The demonstration is now taking place. It is part of the grandiose Communist scheme for an American revolution.

Then the Gazette draws the conclusion that the workers must "forget for the moment negotiations to end the strike, forget compromises or an agreement, forget everything but the urgent necessity of ridding the Haverhill industry of this evil, dangerous, strike leadership."

This attack is a typical concrete example of the general charge against the Communists that we are not really interested in winning immediate demands, but only in an abstract "revolution." Keeping this m mind, let us analyze this concrete charge a little more closely. What is the substance of it? It is, that if the bosses grant the demands of the workers (to recognize the union and give a small wage increase) that "the industry cannot survive." The bosses cannot afford to grant the workers what they demand. The leadership of the workers is "evil" and "dangerous," because this leadership refuses to abandon the demands of the workers, refuses to hand them over to a supposedly impartial tribunal to decide. The complaint is that this leadership is fighting, too uncompromisingly, to achieve now the immediate demands of these workers. That's why the Haverhill Gazette proposes to drive this leadership out of town and tries to rouse mob violence against it. They are interested in preserving the profits of the bosses at the expense of lower wages to workers. They don't give a rap about the hypo- thetical revolution that they talk about. That's why they speak very kindly about other leaders and Mr. I. Zimmerman, who also claims to be a Communist and for the revolution, but who is ready to abandon the workers' demands in Haverhill at this moment. They will allow Zimmerman to talk all he wants to about some future revolution as long as he doesn't fight too hard for the immediate demands of the Haverhill workers.

This is the reality behind every concrete example of the charge

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against the Communists that we sacrifice the immediate interests of the workers to the future revolution.

Is it true that there is a determining relationship between the fight for immediate demands and the revolutionary goal of the working class? Yes, there is such a determining relationship. But it is not that put forward by the Haverhill Gazette and all the other enemies of the Communist Party. The relationship is quite different. Let us take the case of a group of leaders heading a fight for immediate de- mands of a particular body of workers. They unitedly formulate these demands with the participation and approval of all the workers; they present demands to the boss; the boss says: "No, it is impossible for me to grant such demands without going out of business." The workers in other shops and industries are putting forward their demands. All the bosses get together and say: "It is impossible to grant such demands without sacrificing profits. Profits are the mainspring of the capitalist system. To sacrifice profits means to destroy capitalism. This means to destroy the jobs of the workers. Therefore, in the interests of the workers, we must fight for lower wages as the only way to preserve capitalism." Among the workers' leaders there takes place a division into two groups — one group says: "Of course, we're not trying to overthrow capitalism; we're not trying to put our boss out of business; we're not revolutionists; if our demands endanger the boss or the capitalist system, we're ready to compromise them or abandon them altogether, and even submit to worsening of conditions; we're willing to do whatever is necessary to save our boss and the capitalist system." The other group says: "The workers' demands are just and necessary; they must be granted; the productive forces of this industry and the entire country are sufficient to provide this and many times more; the capitalist is only anxious to protect his own profits ; he can easily afford to pay; but even if he can't, then so much the worse for him and his system. We understand that the workers sooner or later must do away with capitalism and establish a Socialist system. If our fight for higher wages, now, hastens the coming of socialism, hastens the coming of the working class revolution, then so much the better. We will fight all the harder for higher wages."

This gives an example of the true relation between immediate de- mands and revolutionary aims. The A. F. of L. leaders and many Socialist Party leaders set as their guiding rule to do everything to avoid revolution, to save capitalism; that is why they join Roosevelt in putting across the New Deal and the N. R. A., that's why they say "now is not the time to strike"; that's why if the workers strike in spite of them, they try to break the strike and send the workers back without gaining their demands, to tie up the workers' organizations in arbitration courts, etc. That is also why those who are revolution- ists, those who are preparing the working class to establish socialism, to

58 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

overthrow capitalism, they are the only ones who can at all times and in all places be depended upon to fight to the last ounce of energy for the winning of the immediate demands of the workers, without consideration of what result this has in decreasing the profits of the bosses. We revo- lutionists know that in America we have productive capacity sufficient, if properly used, to give every man, woman and child, a comfortable and happy life. We're going to organize and fight for the realization of a constantly improving standard of living; we're going to resist with all our power the capitalist efforts to reduce the standard of living, no matter how much Roosevelt may tell us of the necessities of "economy" and "sacrifice." The workers have sacrificed too much already, and we're going to prepare the working class to stop sacrificing. We help them to understand that to realize a full and happy life, they will finally have to take power, overthrow the capitalists, and take pos- session of the industries themselves through their own Workers' Gov- ernment.

Thus we see that it is only the revolutionists who will fight to the end for the immediate demands of the workers, and for better food, clothing and shelter for the toilers. Anyone who is against revolution or afraid of it, inevitably comes to the point where he betrays the workers' interests, surrenders them to the interest of capitalist profits.

The tactic of the United Front must be applied in all mass activities. In each case a special form suitable for the occasion must be found concretely. That means the whole Party must be trained to alertness against distortions of the united front and against deviations. These are of two general types: the right deviation which consists of hiding the face of the Party, sacrificing the main political line, emphasizing the formal aspects of the united front at the expense of the real struggle. The "left" deviation, which is opportunism covered with deft phrases, is characterized by contempt for the patient, systematic, daily work necessary to win the workers who are under reformist leadership; by rigid and mechanical approach to united front problems; by fear to plunge boldly into the broadest mass struggles.

In all of our election campaigns, we have the problem of giving them a united front character. The coming Congressional elections must everywhere be made a real united front drive, with the objective of electing at least a few Communist Congressmen from a few concentra- tion points.

We must pay a good deal of attention to two important local united front efforts, namely, the Cleveland and Dearborn elections last year. In Cleveland, the comrades correctly set themselves the task of involv- ing the mass movement of small homeowners in the Communist election campaign. But they made many serious errors in doing this. They encouraged or tolerated the tendency of the Homeowners' Federation to go into politics on its own hook and to transform itself into a

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political party. The Homeowners' Federation took the initiative in nominating aldermanic candidates, and only as an afterthought, were other working-class organizations drawn in, while the Communist Party, as such, was pushed entirely into the background. Let nobody under- stand our criticism of this as trying to protect narrow Party interests as against the interests of the Homeowners' Federation. No, we are insisting equally upon the interests of the Homeowners' Federation, when we demand that such an organization shall not be transformed into a political party. To attempt to make a political party out of such mass organizations is to seriously threaten their future work and growth, and turn them aside from their proper function. At the same time this has a liquidating effect upon the Communist Party. It does not consolidate the unity of the masses of workers, but rather threatens to break up that unity.

Similarly in the Dearborn election campaign: Dearborn is the city of the Ford Motor factories; it is a company town. There was a mass revolt against the Ford domination in the city government. We cor- rectly decided to unite this revolt around a workers' ticket, participated in by the Communist Party and with Communists as the central can- didates. But in practically carrying through this correct line, the comrades retreated before the "red scare," hid the face of the Party in this united front, evaded some of the most crucial political issues. Thus, our comrades contributed to the creation of such an atmosphere of timidity and evasion, that under sharp attacks from Ford's agents, some of the weaker elements on the workers' ticket fell into panic en- tirely, and the candidate for Mayor, at one point, signed a resignation from the struggle.

We must again emphasize that, while workers' tickets are per- missible under certain special circumstances, and especially in company towns, this under no circumstances means the abandonment of the in- dependent role of the Communist Party. To push the Communist Party into the background, to allow it to be forgotten, is fatal to the success of a particular campaign, as well as endangering our future development. The tendency to bring forward workers' tickets in large industrial cities as a substitute for the Communist Party is generally wrong; it is a tendency to surrender to Farmer-Laborism.

Recently, in South Dakota, our comrades seized the opportunity of a broad State conference of farmers and the Unemployed Council movement to launch a campaign of a leading Communist for Governor of that State. This was correct under the circumstances y even though the Communist Party, as such, had not yet named publicly its candi- dates. But there is a danger that the further development of this campaign in South Dakota may have a tendency to develop under the flag of non-partisanism. If this is permitted, the movement is in danger of sliding off into the old traditional path of Farmer-Laborism with

6o COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

disastrous results to the workers and farmers in South Dakota. To prevent this, the Communist Party there must come to the front most energetically. The candidate for Governor must make his campaign openly and frankly as the nominee not only of the broad united front, but also of the Communist Party. He must speak as a Communist. The Party must not dissolve its own activities into the broad move- ment and lose itself there. On the contrary, the Communist Party must be tremendously strengthened in the course of this campaign and must prove in practice its right to the title of leader of the exploited masses of South Dakota.

There are still some tendencies in our movement to look upon the united front as purely a matter of addressing letters to the top com- mittees of various organizations and conducting negotiations with these committees. But this is not the essence of a united front at all. Letters and negotiations with top committees of reformist organizations have their place at certain moments: they can be used to dramatize issues before the broadest masses and arouse these masses to action and to a movement toward unity. But if such letters and negotiations become an end in themselves, if they are constantly repeated without any results, then they serve not to build the movement for unity, but on the contrary, to demoralize and dissipate it, to discredit the whole slogan of the united front.

The united front tactic plays a growingly important role in the trade union field and strike movements. This is especially true in the struggle against company unions, and in those industries where two or more trade unions are already being built among the workers. In every case, revolutionary forces must come forward as the practical fighters for uniting all workers against the company unions, for finding the forms to unify the struggles of the workers in the A. F. of L., T.U.U.L. and independent unions. An excellent example of correct effort in this direction was the proposal for united action submitted by the delegates of the Steel and Metal Workers' Industrial Union to the Conference of the Republic Steel Mill locals of the Amalgamated Association of Iron, Steel & Tin Workers held recently in Ohio. An- other example of the correct united front tactics in the trade union struggles was the work in the Western Pennsylvania mine fields during the big strikes there, in which the National Miners' Union declared its support for the demand for the recognition of the United Mine Workers, and in which the S.M.W.I.U. successfully began the establish- ment of united action of the striking miners with the steel workers. Another example of the correct application of the united front was the Automobile Workers' Conference held last week in Detroit on the joint call of the Auto Workers' Union and the Mechanics Educational So- ciety, participated in also by rank and file delegates from the A. F. of L. auto unions, with the slogan of joint struggle against company

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unions, and for the auto workers' demands. Many other examples could be brought forward and should be analyzed. Comrade Stachel in his special report on the trade union question is going to go more into detail in analyzing the whole of our trade union problems now.

In all united front activities, the Communists must always grant the right to all other groups, and reserve the right for themselves, of mutual criticism. It is permissible and correct to make specific agree- ments of non-criticism during the actual carrying through of joint actions agreed upon, within the scope of the specific agreement, so long as these agreements are loyally adhered to by all sides. But the Communists can never agree to be silent, to refrain from criticism, on any breaking of agreements for struggle, on any betrayal or deser- tion of the fight. Any such agreements would not be contributions to unity, but rather to disunity.

"Left" Social-Fascism and Its Role

The relationship between immediate demands and revolution has become closer than ever with the deepening of the capitalist crisis. The capitalists are driving more and more to reduce the standards of living. The Socialist leaders and the A. F. of L. are more and more driven by their subordination to the Roosevelt program to openly betray the struggle of the workers for the means of living. Where formerly they had time and room to maneuver in and fool the workers, they now more and more have come out quickly and openly with their strike-breaking role. As a result, the masses are becoming quickly disillusioned. There is a real crisis among the social-fascists; their followers are turning away from them.

A little example of the speed of this development has been seen in the two taxi drivers' strikes in New York City. Two months ago the taxi workers went out demanding the recognition of their union and in- creased pay. When they first struck, who were their leaders? Mayor LaGuardia, himself, appeared as a sort of godfather to them; Socialist Judge Panken was their principal spokesman; liberal Socialist Morris Ernst was the arbitrator; the Socialist Party spoke of it patronizingly as "our" union. Quickly the scene changed. The arbitrators got to work. When the men hesitated to compromise their demands, La- Guardia quickly changed from the kindly godfather to the threatening policeman. The liberal Socialist councillors and arbitrators pressed the taxi men to accept the settlement dictated by LaGuardia; the men finally accepted under the impression that they had gotten part of their economic demands, plus the recognition of their union. The Com- munists told the taxi strikers they had been betrayed. The taxi strikers were still loyal to these "leaders" and they tore up the Daily Worker that told them the truth, and beat up the Communists. Disappointed though they were, they would have nothing to do with the "Communist

62 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

disrupters" and "reds." But when they got back to work, they found that they had been not only cheated out of their supposed victories, but were completely denied the right of their own organization. The companies began installing company unions; the men threatened to strike against them; they returned to their old leaders for advice and were told not to make any more trouble, to submit to the N.R.A. code of $13.00 per week; that the company had a right to organize company unions if they wished. In desperation, the men went on strike again to enforce the recognition of their union. Already they had arrayed against them all their former friends; every newspaper in the city vilified them; LaGuardia threatened them; the police arrested them and beat them up; the Socialists washed their hands of them; the A. F. of L. threatened to come in and take over, sponsorship of the company union. Only the Communist Party, the revolutionary trade unions and the Daily Worker came to the assistance of the taxi strikers. Result: the same taxi drivers who a few weeks ago were tearing up the Daily Worker, and beating up Communists, today cheer the Daily Worker, send delegations to the Communist Party Convention, and are no longer afraid or ashamed that their union is being called a red union. In a few brief weeks the social-fascists lost their influence over them; these men, who in overwhelming majority a few weeks ago were actively antagonistic, became Communist sympathizers.

The same thing is happening on a larger and smaller scale every- where. The class lines are tightening; the class struggle is sharpening; the masses can learn quicker now than ever before on which side the leaders stand — ^with the capitalists or with the workers. The social- fascist leaders are being exposed before the masses as capitalist agents.

In this crisis the social-fascist leadership finds it necessary to invent new means to keep the workers fooled and under their control. For this purpose, they are beginning, wherever the situation gets too hot for them, to establish a division of labor — one part of them becomes the "right wing," which carries through the dirty work of the direct sell-out; the other part becomes a "left-wing" which mildly deplores the necessity of submitting to the sell-out, and which consoles the workers with an ineffective opposition and a sugar-coating of radical and even revolutionary and Communist phrases. This left-reformism, left social-fascism, is springing up everywhere today, and is especially dangerous. One form of it is the self-styled "American Workers Party," headed by the Rev. Muste. Another is the Lovestone group, with its I. Zimmerman in the shoe industry and its S. Zimmerman in the needle trades. Another is the Trotzky group in the food industry. They are characterized by the multiplicity of their banners, their hatred of the Communists, their radical hot-air, and their practical service to the A. F. of L. and Socialist Party officialdom.

A classical example of this left social-fascism is given by the "Com-

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munist Oppositionist," S. Zimmerman in Local 22 of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union. Zimmerman's "Communist" revolu- tionary phrases have become invaluable instruments in the hands of the I.L.G.W.U. officials and the Socialist Party. The workers in Local 22 are becoming disillusioned with the officialdom. They can't be fooled any more by the old means. They are prepared to give a large vote for revolutionary policy. So the S. P. and A. F. of L. officials decide that here is an occasion to apply the good old American saying "if you can't lick 'em, join 'em." They find ready at hand in the person of S. Zimmerman their own "Communist" to lead Local 22, and safely preserve these workers under their control. They assure the workers: "Your choice is no longer between reformist and revolutionary leadership. Now you choose between two kinds of revolutionists — the practical, the realistic Zimmerman, or the impractical, Utopian, dis- ruptive Communists. You're not even choosing between non-Com- munists and Communists, because we're even prepared to give you a Communist to lead you." Thus in the recent elections in Local 22, the A. F. of L. officials, Socialist Party, the Socialist press, created a firm fighting united front in support of the "Communist" Zimmer- man. Thus, these little groups of renegades, trading on the name of Communism, hire themselves out to the blackest reaction in the labor movement, and become "mass leaders" in the service of social-fascism.

The example of the Zimmermans gives the type of the whole tribe of left social-fascists that is being born out of the crisis of social-fascist leadership. They are the most dangerous enemies of the workers' struggles today. We can move forward only to the extent that we expose their true character, and thus drive them out of the workers' movement.

In this respect we must say that too often we still see remnants of a certain liberal, tolerant attitude towards the renegades. To some extent this is born out of the fact that we have such a new membership in our movement — because we are growing so rapidly. Many of our members are not familiar with the direct facts of the history and func- tions of these people who call themselves "Communists." Too many of our members still do not understand that Trotsk3dsm and the Trot- skyists are not a "branch" of the Communist movement but rather a police agency of the capitalist class.

There is also a real leftward movement among Socialist workers which tries, often confusedly, to give expression to a revolutionary policy. A symptom of such a movement is the platform recently issued by the Revolutionary Policy Committee in preparation for the S. P. Convention in June. Some of its proposals have been included for action in the official agenda adopted for the Convention. It must be said that the Revolutionary Policy Committee comes much closer to revolutionary formulations . on central issues than does the Muste

64 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

"A.W.P."; and further that it is much less vicious in its attacks upon Communism than is Muste or the renegades. The composition of this "left-wing," however, gives little ground for expecting it to lead the real leftward development of the S. P. members toward the united front with the Communists and eventually toward unification. It is not homogeneous ; many of its members are known for their vacillating, compromising character. In all probability this effort also will collapse into another contribution to that "left" social-fascism whose object is to disrupt and disperse the left-ward movement of the workers.

All Socialist Parties, in their division of labor, are producing not only "left" wings, but also open fascist groupings. Thus in Japan, the Socialist Party split with its general secretary going over with a section of the Socialist Party to "national socialism," a crude imitation of Hitler adapted to Japanese war policy. Thus in France, the "neo-socialists" have split from the Socialist Party, in order to pass over openly to a national chauvinist platform, open fascism. The American Socialist Party also has its open fascist grouping, which centers here in Ohio. Its spokesman is Joseph W. Sharts, state secretary of the S. P. Let me give you a few samples of his new fascist program for the S. P.:

Frank recognition of the futility of all socialist efforts so long as we ignore or oppose those elemental emotional forces implied in "Americanism," "nationalism," and "patriotism," and therefore the need of utilizing or at least neutralizing them by a shift of attitude and propaganda so as to enlist national pride and love of country.

The socialist appeal which relies on a vague internationalism and a mythical working-class instinct of solidarity is easily crushed whenever it meets the elemental emotional forces roused under the name of patriotism.

These great traditions cluster around the Stars and Stripes and make it worthy to be fought for, regardless of the capitalist connections in recent years.

Not by the pacifist but by the patriotic approach lies our path to power and freedom.

It would be difficult to improve on Mr. Sharts by quoting directly from Hitler.

Progress in the Bolshevization of the Communist Party

What is meant by Bolshevizing the Party?

It means to master all the lessons taught us by that first Communist Party, the most successful one, created and led to victory by Lenin, and now successfully building socialism under the leadership of Stalin. It means to become a party of the masses; to be a Party with its strongest roots among the decisive workers in the basic industries; it means to be a Party whose stronghold is in the shops, mines and factories, and especially in the biggest and most important ones; it

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 65

means to be a Party that leads and organizes the struggles of all the oppressed people, brings them into firm alliance with the working class ; it means to be a Party that answers every question of the struggle, that can solve every problem ; it means to be a Party that never shrinks from difficulties, that never turns aside to find the easiest way; that learns how to overcome all deviations in its own ranks — fight on two fronts; it means to become a Party that knows how to take difficulties and dangers and transform them into advantages and victories.

Are we such a Party? Not yet. We have a strong ambition to become such a Party. We are making progress in that direction. But when we consider the extremely favorable circumstances under which we work, when millions are beginning to move, to organize, to fight, when only our program can solve their problems, then we must say that we are moving forward entirely too slowly. Our task is to win the majority of the working class to our program. We do not have unlimited time to accomplish this. Tempo, speed of development of our work, becomes the decisive factor in determining victory or defeat.

The Bolshevik method of work necessary in this period was con- cretely outlined for the Party in the Open Letter of the Extraordinary Party Conference last year. It called for concentration of our forces upon the most important tasks, upon the workers in the basic industries, upon the biggest factories. It set certain minimimi, practical tasks to be accomplished within a certain period; it called for periodical re- examination, check-up and control on the execution of these tasks.

This 8th Convention of the Party must make such a check-up and control for the entire Party. We must review the work of our Party since the 7th Convention and especially since the Extraordinary Con- ference, and establish what we have succeeded in accomplishing. Where have we failed, and where are our weaknesses? Upon this basis we can then correctly set ourselves the control tasks for the next period. We must forever put behind us that time when we wrote resolutions and set ourselves tasks on paper, then took this paper, carefully locked it up in the drawers of a desk, forgot about it and proceeded to drift along as best we could according to the exigencies of the moment with- out plan, without direction, and then at the next conference write another resolution like the one we wrote before and proceed to forget it like we forget the other one. When we write a resolution, this is the most serious binding of ourselves to carry it out. If it is not carried out we must know why, and in the next resolution we write we must take all necessary measures to guarantee that the resolution will actually be put into execution.

In 1930, at the 7th Convention, our Party had just emerged from a long period of relative stagnation and even retrogression, resulting from protracted inner party factional struggles, and the domination of the opportunist policies of the Lovestone leadership. The 7th Convention

66 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

consolidated the unification of the Party, confirmed the throwing off of the opportunists, and turned the Party resolutely towards the correct Bolshevik policy of mass struggles and mass organization. But the Party was still very weak in practice. It had only 7,545 dues-paying members; its factory nuclei were few and functioned very weakly. The revolutionary trade unions had no more than 25,000 members, and were poorly consolidated; revolutionary work in the A. F. of L. was at its lowest ebb; mass organizations around the Party, mostly language and cultural organizations, were not politically active and a very gen- erous estimate of all mass organization membership could not possibly exceed 300,000.

Since that time important changes have taken place. Consider firstly only the dues-paying membership of the Party. If we take this by half yearly averages, we obtain the following very instructive figures:

1931 — First half 8,339

1931 — Second half 9,219

1932 — First half 12,936

1932 — Second half 14474

1933 — First half 16,814

1933 — Second half 19,165

1934 — ^Three months 24,500

From these figures it is clear that the unification of the Party and its correct general political line from the 7th Convention and during the period of the crisis, has resulted in a constant increase in member- ship from half year to half year. Today our Party is more than three times its size at the 7th Convention. But it is also clear that it is the past six months which show the most decisive upward turn. This corresponds with the period when the main body of the Party began seriously to improve its work, that is, since the Party studied and began to master the Open Letter.

This becomes even more clear when we study the figures of our shop nuclei. At the 7th Convention, we had a little more than a hundred shop nuclei. At the time of the Open Letter there was still only 140. Even taking into consideration that the intervening period had witnessed the closing down of innumerable factories, and the consequent de- struction of many nuclei, still it is clear that we only little more than held our own. Since the Open Letter, however, due to our concen- tration and improved work, assisted, of course, by the general atmos- phere of struggle that has swept the factories, we can now report 338 shop nuclei. The proportion of total membership in shop nuclei has risen from 4 to 9 per cent, and the proportion of employed members is 40 per cent.

What kind of shops are these in? Last year, 68 of them were in basic industries. This year, there are 154, with a proportionate increase

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m membership. The majority of these shop units are in small factories. A growing number are in the larger and more decisive factories. We have shop units functioning now in our concentration points in the steel industry, the big mills of Pittsburgh, Youngstown, and Calumet Valley areas. We have nuclei in the important auto shops as well as in many of the smaller shops; we have a growing number of mine nuclei. In the shops where these 338 shop nuclei operate, there are at work a total of over 350,000 workers, showing a general average of about 1,000 workers per shop.

In these enterprises where our shop nuclei work, there was one year ago very little trade union organization. The total membership of all categories in the shops of the 140 nuclei was a little more than 7,000. Today in the 338 shops where our nuclei operate, there are over 10,000 members of the revolutionary unions, more than 5,000 members in independent unions, and over 21,000 members of the A. F. of L. These figures represent a very important increase, comprising more than 10 per cent of all the workers in these enterprises. That the Communists have had a great deal to do with this growth in trade union organization is demonstrated by the relatively high proportion of revolutionary and independent unions. The most serious weakness that these figures disclose is that as yet only a little more than 10 per cent of the workers have been brought into the unions.

It is clear that precisely at this point we have the key problem to the future growth of our Party and of the revolutionary trade union movement. The problem of our shop nuclei is to win the leadership of the overwhelming majority of these 350,000 workers, bring the best fighters, the most capable forces, into the Communist Party and the whole mass of workers into the trade unions. Is it Utopian to set such a task for ourselves? No, it is not. Weak as our shop work has been, we already have examples showing that it can be done, and done quickly.

Let us take, for example, the case of a certain metal shop, the ex- periences of which I have personally examined. This shop is of medium size in the lighter section of industry. It employs in this period about 500 workers. A year ago we had a stagnant nucleus of three members. Following the Open Letter, the Party committeee in the section where this factory is located, assigned some politically capable comrades to work with and help the nucleus. In connection with the Metal Workers Union, the shop was drawn into a strike movement, together with many other small metal shops. The demands of the strikers were won, and the employers signed a contract with the union. The nucleus was still functioning very weakly. It had worked only as a fraction of the union, without showing the Party face. Consequently, it recruited very slowly. The workers in the shops didn't know the Party existed there. The union leaders were afraid that if the Party nucleus took any initia-

68 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

tive it might disrupt the mass organization of the union in the shop. As a result of this poHtical weakness, the shop committee of the union elected as its chairman one of the most reactionary elements in the shop, a very conscious supporter of the Socialist Party leadership, and an enemy of the union. The opinion prevailed that this was the way to secure full unity of the shop, but this shop chairman sabotaged the work of the union. The shop nucleus meeting every week with the personal participation of representatives of the section, and discussing all the problems of the shop and the union, gradually became conscious of these weaknesses and dangers. They saw the boss becoming very arrogant again and threatening to refuse to renew his contract with the union, or to consider the new demands the workers were formu- lating. They saw a spirit of passivity and defeatism spreading among the workers in the shop. The nucleus decided that it must become active and make its presence known in the entire shop. Its first move was to secure the defeat and removal of the sabotaging shop chairman. A shop paper began to appear regularly. It is interesting to note that our trade union leaders resisted the developing initiative of the shop nucleus. They were afraid of it; they even developed the theory that the shop nucleus was merely a fraction of the union, and subject to the directives of the leading fraction of the union as a whole. But the nucleus correctly and successfully overcame this resistance. At the crucial moment when it seemed that the union in the shop was about to be wiped out, the nucleus distributed throughout the shop to every worker a leaflet in which, speaking as a unit of the Communist Party, it pointed out the dangers to the workers, called upon them to rally their forces to the union and to win their demands. Within a day the atmosphere in the shop was entirely transformed; defeatism and demoralization vanished. The Communist who had been discharged for distributing the leaflets in the shop was quickly reinstated in his job by the action of the entire body of workers, who threatened im- mediate strike if this demand was not complied with. The employer quickly changed his tone, and instead of tearing up the imion contract, he negotiated a new one, embodying additional gains for the workers. The union meeting in the factory thereupon invited an official speaker from the Communist Party to come and speak at their meeting; greeted the speaker with an ovation. It is the common talk of the shop that "our union is strong because we have an active, strong Communist Party nucleus among us." The Party and Y.C.L. membership in this shop now comprises 14 per cent of the whole body of workers. The shop is 100 per cent unionized in the revolutionary union. These workers are raw and inexperienced, the type usually known as "back- ward." The leaders of the shop nucleus and the shop committee of the union is now composed of new, active, capable forces in command of the situation, displaying strong initiative; the individuals who make

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 69

up this leadership were three months ago looked upon as "backward workers," who rarely raised their voices in meetings.

Imagine the tremendous steps forward our Party would make if the experience of this shop was repeated in just half of our existing shop nuclei 1 Imagine how quickly we could develop a mighty mass Party when we get a few hundred strongholds like this throughout the country, especially in the basic industries! WTiat a transformation would take place in the Chicago District! If the Packinghouse and Steel nuclei would repeat this experience, if the comrades had not forgotten their own good resolutions! What a new District Pittsburgh would become if a similar work were done in the Jones and Laughlin steel mill!

The greatest weakness of our shop nuclei is that they are not so much secret from the bosses as they are from the workers in their shops. They are afraid to speak to the workers in the name of the Party. They rarely issue leaflets. Less than 15 per cent of our shop nuclei issue a shop paper of any kind. We even find theories popping up — for example, in Cleveland and in some sections of New York — that Party shop papers are really a danger and a hindrance to penetrating the factories, that we must work by stages and have first only union papers; then later on, carefully begin to introduce Party shop papers. This opportunistic hiding the face of the Party in the shops is the most serious right danger.

Our street nuclei are also beginning in some cases to learn how to do mass work on their own account. We now have 1,482 street nuclei. What a tremendous power even these can become when they learn Bolshevik methods of work. That they are not such a power today is only because they still look upon themselves merely as dues-collecting agencies, as agencies to distribute leaflets handed down to them from above; at best, as political discussion clubs of a general character and a timid distributor of the Daily Worker. That is the picture of the average nucleus. But in these cases where a street nucleus begins to understand its independent political function as being the Party in its own neighborhood, as being the organizer and leader of the masses in that neighborhood, when it begins to set itself the task of winning the majority of the workers in its neighborhood, and to take the initiative in accomplishing this task, the results are simply tremendous. Street nuclei are finding out that very often with only a little attention they can, themselves, give birth immediately to important shop nuclei out of their own membership. They are finding that individual con- nection with particular shops can quickly be built up into a shop nucleus, and especially they are beginning to find the proper activity for a street nucleus, as such, rooting the Party among the masses in the neighborhood, building neighborhood strongholds for the Communist Party.

Above all, the street nuclei must become serious organizers and leaders

70 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

of the unemployed. From 60 to 70 per cent of our members are them- selves unemployed, but relatively few of them are active in building block committees and Unemployment Councils winning strongholds for the Party among the 16,000,000 unemployed. We must declare that just as it is the duty of every employed Communist to be a leader in his trade unions, so also is it the duty of an unemployed Communist to become the leader of 10 or 100 other unemployed workers in block committees and neighborhood councils.

Let me cite only one good example of a street nucleus which is be- ginning to get itself on its own feet, politically. This nucleus has no great achievements yet in factory work. A year ago it was a rather discouraged group of good, loyal comrades who didn't exactly know what to do. They began to apply the Open Letter to their neighbor- hood problem. They opened a neighborhood Workers' Club and kept it open at all hours, especially for the young people in the neighborhood. They introduced organization of a primitive sort among these people, giving them activities, games, music, etc. In another part of the neighborhood, with a considerable Negro population, they began to build a branch of the L. S. N. R., with white and Negro members. Some members of the nucleus took the initiative in launching a branch of the C. W. A. Workers' Union. The nucleus undertook action in sup- port of strikes that affected the neighborhood, and rallied some support for picket lines. As a result of these activities, the unit began to grow, more than doubling its membership. It has drawn into the Party several excellent new Negro workers. At its last meeting, it spent a couple of hours discussing the most difficult problems that have arisen with the mass influx of raw young American workers from the streets into the neighborhood club. Large groups of such youngsters that had for months been avoiding the club as "disreputable red" headquarters, had suddenly changed their attitude, and presented themselves for mem- bership in the club, and were making all sorts of demands upon the leadership for organization and activities. The life of this unit is now rich and intense with the problems of the daily life of the neighborhood. It has become a mass influence among thousands of people.

An interesting sidelight on our methods of work is given by an ex- perience of this unit in conducting its neighborhood club. In order to raise the political level of the club life, they have been inviting speakers from various mass organizations and the Party from other parts of the city. They report almost invariably these speakers are absolutely unintelligible for the neighborhood crowd that attends this club. The speakers never find any point of contact with their audience. They talk over their heads, use long phrases which may have been very good in a thesis, but of which these neighborhood workers haven't the slightest understanding. As a result, the audiences grow restless; the young people get boisterous, and even contemptuous of these po-

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litical spouters. This phase of politicalization has been a dismal failure, as it was bound to be with such an approach. Here is a lesson for the entire Party, in its work of mass agitation and propaganda, of political education of the new raw masses that are coming to us. It is the virtue of parrots and of phonographs that they mechanically repeat the phrases given to them. But that is no virtue for Commimist speakers. We must completely overhaul our methods of mass education; we must absolutely put a stop to this business of our Party speakers copying parrots and phonographs, putting forth the Party program in such unintelligible terms that it is just so much Greek to the audience and doesn't touch their lives in any way or arouse a spark of interest.

The next central point in Party building after the shop and street nuclei is the Party Section Committee, Section bureau. This is the real cadre of the Party's mass leadership. To the extent that this is broadened and strengthened, to the degree that it becomes the decisive and controlling force in our daily work, to that degree, the Party will become a mass Party. That means that our sections must be small enough for the committee to actually know the problems, find the solu- tions, and give direct leadership in carrying through the work. A Section Committee must be the general staff of the revolution in its territory. It must know every house, street, and factory. It must know the daily problems of life of its population. It must know all our enemies and learn how to defeat them. It must turn its section into a Communist stronghold. That means a larger number of sections, more careful selection of leadership, and a better quality of leadership to the Sections from the Districts.

We have made progress in development of Sections of our Party, but not nearly enough. Where in 1930 there were 87 Party Sections, there are today 187. The geographical extension of the Party organiza- tion is shown in the fact that these Sections include functioning Party committees in 463 cities. The works of these Section Committees have improved, but we must place before the leadership of the Party today as a decisive question for our future progress, much more decisive improvement of the quality of our Section leadership.

A most serious problem of Party growth is the fluctuation in mem- bership. Since 1930, starting with a membership of 7,545? we had recruited up until February, 1934, 49,050 new members. If we had retained all old and new members, we would have had in February, 56,595 members. Instead of this, we have dues-payment of only about 25,000. Two out of every three recruited members have not been retained in the Party. Fluctuation is being reduced, but is still high. It is no explanation for us to cite the fact that organization member- ship is in America traditionally unstable and fluctuating. It is precisely the task of Bolsheviks to be different from everybody else. It is no explanation for us to cite the unsatisfactory character of this recruiting^

72 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

which was largely from the unemployed, from open-air mass meetings, etc., and not the basic building of the Party through struggles and in the midst of struggles in the factories, in stable neighborhood organiza- tions, in the mass organizations, trade unions, etc. It is precisely the task of Bolsheviks to improve the quality of recruiting itself, so that Party recruits are permanently assimilated into the life of the organiza- tion. The proper use of the new forces drawn to us, their activization and education in Bolshevism, is our basic task. This is the creation of the main instrument for building a socialist society in America. Every weakness, and especially such weakness as exhibited in this still high degree of fluctuation, signalizes a danger to the successful building of the revolutionary movement in America. The whole Party must be roused to a consciousness of this problem. All the forces of the Party must be concentrated upon the task of holding and consolidating every new recruit.

On Using Our Strongest Weapon, the "Daily Worker"

The Open Letter set a main task for the Party in improving and popularizing the Daily Worker and transforming it into a real mass newspaper. This problem has two distinct sides, which are, however, very closely interrelated. These are the editorial improvements of the Daily Worker contents and the creation of a mass circulation of the paper. In the first respect we have made a decisive step forward. Since last August the contents of the Daily Worker have been enlarged, enriched and improved in every respect. The paper has become of interest to its readers every day, and is more and more showing what an indispensable weapon it is in the building of a mass Communist Party, as well as for the conduct of the everyday struggles. It is still far from the ideal Bolshevik newspaper; the editorials are as yet weak, not simple and clear enough ; it is not yet sufficiently decisive in its role as political educator of the masses; it is not yet sufficiently bound up with the daily life of the masses in the decisive districts and factories. We can say it has made important steps in the right direction.

Unfortunately we cannot say the same about the Daily Worker circulation. With regard to circulation the situation is really alarming. The number of copies printed daily (not taking into consideration the large special editions and the special Saturday circulation) still remains considerably below the level of 1931. True there has been a certain improvement even here, so far as payment to the office of the Daily Worker for this circulation. The amount of money received by the Daily Worker for its papers has slightly increased above 1931. It is also true that there has been an improvement in circulation from the low point of a year ago by about 50 per cent. But this has been almost entirely the product of the spontaneous response to the improved con- tents of the paper and only in a small degree the planned, conscious,

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 73

systematic activity of our Party. Shall we wait until it costs us our head to be caught with a copy of the Daily Worker before we realize its inestimable value? We are only playing around with the Daily Worker, until we have given it a minimum circulation of 100,000 copies a day. We already have grouped around our Party, under its mfluence, far more than that number of workers who need a Communist newspaper and are not served by our language newspapers. To set the goal of 100,000 circulation is merely to reach with the Daily Worker those workers with whom we are already in contact. Until this goal is reached we must declare the circulation of the Daily Worker is the weakest sector in our battlefront.

Check-Up on Our Control Tasks

The Open Letter set us the task of decisively strengthening our work in the A. F. of L. and other reformist trade unions. We can register some serious beginnings of improvement in this field. I have already sjx)ken of the broad scope of the movement for the Workers' Unemploy- ment Insurance Bill inside the A. F. of L. We can record that the work of the revolutionary oppositions under Communist direction is now the decisive leadership in approximately 150 local unions of the A. F. of L. with a membership of from 50,000 to 60,000. This opposi- tion work is improving in the most important industries such as mining and steel. In addition to those local unions in which the revolutionary opposition has the support of the majority of the workers, there are serious minorities in a larger and growing number of unions. The weakest field in this respect remains the railroad industry. Here we cannot yet say that the Party has taken up the task with full serious- ness, nor even made a considerable beginning. Throughout the work in the A. F. of L., the characteristic weakness remains the formal char- acter of the opposition work, its tendency to remain content with participation in union elections and formal debates, the legalism of the work, its failure to orientate itself to the shops and establish its or- ganizational base there, and its weakness in developing independent leadership of the daily struggles.

The most decisive advance in the trade union field in the past year has been the emergence of the revolutionary trade unions as real mass organizations, directly leading the struggle of 20 per cent of all the strikers in this period, and winning a far higher proportion of the vic- tories won by the strike movement. Especially important has been the advances in steel, agriculture, marine, as well as the serious advances in lighter industries, such as, shoe, needle, furniture, etc. Over 100,000 new recruits, offset by fluctuation of about 15,000 gives us at present about 125,000 members in the revolutionary unions. The increased stability of these organizations is due to the fact that they were built in struggle, that they are mastering the art of trade union democracy,

74 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

are developing their own responsible trade union functionaries and exhibit a growing and active inner life.

The Unemployment Council movement was only in its first beginnings in 1930. Four years of rich experience in local, state and national struggles and actions, the high points of which were the great March 6, 1930, Unemployment Day Demonstrations, the National Hunger Marches in 193 1 and 1932, and the recent National Unemployment Congress in Washington in February, 1934, have crystallized real mass organizations on a nation-wide scale. In the Washington Conference, which brought together the Unemployment Councils, trade unions and all forms of mass organizations that support the struggle for the Workers Unemployment Insurance Bill, there was organized represen- tation of about 500,000 workers. In the Unemployment Councils, C.W.A. Unions, Relief Workers Unions, etc., there is comparatively stable organization of from 150,000 to 200,000. In spite of the fact, however, that the Unemployment Council movement under our leader- ship is the predominant organizational expression of the unemployed on a national scale, we must say in many localities it exhibits the most serious weaknesses. These weaknesses are both political and organiza- tional. Especially we have not fully involved the trade unions in unemployed work. The Party has answered in principle all the prob- lems and found the solutions to these weaknesses, but due to insufficient, direct political and organizational leadership by the Party, from top to bottom, units, sections and districts, and the weak functioning of the Party fractions, the full benefit of our experience has not been carried to the movement as a whole. The result is a big lag behind the possi- bilities on a national scale, with the most dangerous weaknesses in the majority of localities. As a result, we see in many places new organiza- tions of unemployed, in which the "left" social-fascists and renegade elements live off the capital of our weaknesses and neglect. The move- ment under our leadership is the only broad, unifying force, and the only section of the unemployed with a clear and consistent program. It has a growing cadre of the best leaders of the unemployed movement. If we will give it the proper guidance, with persistent, systematic support, it can in the coming year organize millions instead of the present hundred thousands.

Since the 7th Convention, we have made another important addition to the list of mass revolutionary organizations. This is the mutual benefit society. International Workers Order. Since the Open Letter, the I.W.O., through its membership campaign, has multiplied itself, and now contains about 45,000 members. Even more important, it has built strongholds among the workers in the basic industries and has extended beyond its foreign language sections by recruiting native- born American and Negro workers. The I.W.O. has before itself the problem of how to consolidate and further extend its mass membership,

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 75

without lowering its previous high standard of revolutionary activity, of political education of its members, especially through involving them more directly in the class struggle.

Surveying the whole field of language mass organizations (including the I.W.O.), we find in 20 language groups that these mass organiza- tions have grown from about 50,000 in 1930 to over 133,000 at the present time. Besides these organizations led by Communists, large gains have been made in building revolutionary opposition movements inside the reformist language organizations, on which it is difficult to give reliable statistics. The Party's foreign-language newspaper circu- lation has increased from 110,000 in 1930 to 131,000 in 1934. Most of this increased circulation has come within the past year. It is clear that the language press is by no means keeping up with the extension of the language organizations. We must set for our language bureaus and language newspapers the task of raising the political standard of their work, to draw their membership much more intimately into the main stream of the American class struggle, to activize it, to bring forward new leading cadres, and to speed the process of a Bolshevik Americanization — that is, the welding of a united proletarian mass movement that transcends all language and national barriers.

Especially important for stabilizing the lower Party organs and mass organizations has been the program for Bolshevizing our financial methods and accounting. A special sub-report will be made on this question. It is not a technical question. It is of first class political importance. Bolshevik planning, budgeting and a strict responsibility are being instituted. This must become the universal rule. There must be no loosening up on this question.

Scores of smaller mass organizations have arisen in the past year, each serving some special need, and each contributing to the general strengthening of the revolutionary movement. We have no time to review them all here, important though many of them are. Special mention must be made of the International Labor Defense, which has won many serious political victories in this period, chief among them the conduct of the Scottsboro case. The I. L. D., however, lags seriously behind in organizational consolidation and in the systematic develop- ment of its whole broad field of activities. Most serious political guidance must be given by the Party to the work of the Communist fractions in the I. L. D. to overcome these weaknesses. The Com- munists who participate in the broad non-Party organization of the Friends of the Soviet Union, have done good work here. Only a hand- ful of Communists are in this organization, but they have rallied around it the most varied circle of sympathizers, individuals and organizations which was demonstrated in an excellent mass convention held recently in New York City. The many other organizations, which we will not go into in detail; one and all can find the road to strengthen themselves,

76 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

to improve their work, by studying the methods of our Party in the larger fields of mass work, by mastering the art of Bolshevik self- criticism, and detailed study of their problems. Special sub-reports will deal with the problem of training new cadres and the related question of our growing system of Party schools. We have advances to record in dealing with these questions in a planned way, as special problems. But again we must say, this is not characteristic for the entire Party. Planned training and promotion of new cadres is the essence of Bolshevik leadership.

If we make a conservative estimate of the total membership of mass organizations around the Party, and under its political influence, allow- ing for possible duplications of membership, we will see that we have approximately 500,000 individual supporters in these organizations. Compared with the estimated 300,000 at the time of our 7th Convention, this is not quite a doubling of our organized supporters. The quality of this support we must say, however, is on a far higher level; it is more conscious, more active, more consolidated, and has been tested in the fires of four years of struggle against difficulties, against the sharpening attacks of our enemies. The largest part of this gain has come in the past year as the result of serious efforts to carry out the line of the Open Letter, and to execute the control tasks set by the Extraordi- nary Party Conference.

We have been able to make these advances because we have begun to learn how to apply Bolshevik self-criticism. We have learned to face our weaknesses and mistakes, boldly and openly.

On Learning the Art of Self-Criticism

We have learned to use the powerful corrective influence of collective self-criticism. Our enemies gleefully exhibit our self-criticism as the sign of a dying movement. We can afford to let them have what satisfaction they get out of this, when we know that it is precisely through self-criticism that we have begun seriously to overcome these weaknesses. We are beginning to master, according to our own weak abilities, the art of self-criticism, so ably taught to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union by Comrade Stalin. We can still, with great profit, read again and again the reports of Comrade Stalin to the Congresses and Conferences of the C. P. S. U. As one such con- tribution to our 8th Convention, I want to read a few pages from the report of Comrade Stalin to the 15th Party Congress in 1927, almost every word of which has a direct lesson for us in our work. Comrade Stalin said:

Let us take, for instance, the matter of guidance of economic and other organizations on the part of the Party organizations. Is everything satis- factory in this respect? No, it is not. Often questions are decided, not

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 77

only in the locals, but also in the center, so to speak, en famille, the family circle. Ivan Ivanovitch, a member of the leading group of some organiza- tion, made, let us say, a big mistake and made a mess of things. But Ivan Federovitch does not want to criticize him, show up his mistakes and correct him. He does not want to, because he is not disposed to "make enemies." A mistake was made, things went wrong, but what of it, who does not make mistakes? Today I will show up Ivan Ivanovitch, tomorrow he will do the same to me. Let Ivan Ivanovitch, therefore, not be molested, because where is the guarantee that I will not make a mistake in the future? Thus every- thing remains spick and span. There is peace and good will among men. Leaving the mistake uncorrected harms our great cause, but that is nothing! As long as we can get out of the mess somehow. Such, comrades, is the usual attitude of some of our responsible people. But what does that mean? If we, Bolsheviks, who criticize the whole world, who, in the words of Marx, storm the heavens, if we refrain from self-criticism for the sake of the peace of some comrades, is it not clear that nothing but ruin awaits our great cause and that nothing good can be expected? Marx said that the proletarian revolution differs, by the way, from other revolutions in the fact that it criticizes itself and that in criticizing itself it becomes consolidated. This is a very important point Marx made. If we, the representatives of the proletarian revolution, shut our eyes to our shortcomings, settle ques- tions around a family table, keeping mutually silent concerning our mistakes, and drive our ulcers into our Party organism, who will correct these mistakes and shortcomings? Is it not clear that we cease to be proletarian revolu- tionaries, and that we shall surely meet with shipwreck if we do not exterminate from our midst this philistinism, this domestic spirit in the solution of important questions of our construction? Is it not clear that by refraining from honest and straight-forward self-criticism, refraining from an honest and straight making good of mistakes, we block our road to progress, betterment of our cause, and new success for our cause? The process of our development is neither smooth nor general. No, comrades, we have classes, there are antagonisms within the country, we have a past, we have a present and a future, there are contradictions between them, and we cannot progress smoothly, tossed by the waves of life. Our progress proceeds in the form of struggle, in the form of developing contradictions, in the form of overcoming these contradictions. As long as there are classes we shall never be able to have a situation when we shall be able to say, "Thank goodness, everything is all right." This will never be, comrades. There will always be something dying out. But that which dies does not want to die; it fights for its existence, it defends its dying cause. There is always something new coming into life. But that which is being born is not bom quietly, but whimpers and screams, fighting for its right to live. Struggle between the old and the new, between the moribund and that which is being bom — such is the basis of our development. Without pointing out and exposing openly and honestly, as Bolsheviks should do, the shortcomings and mistakes in our work, we block our road to progress. But we do want to go forward. And just because we go forward, we must make one of our foremost tasks an honest and revolutionary self-criticism. Without this there is no progress.

78 COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

The task of our Party today, the tasks of this Convention, have been clearly and systematically set forth in the documents before us for adoption, especially the Theses and Decisions of the 13th Plenum of the Executive Committee of the Communist International, and the Draft Resolution prepared for this Convention by the Central Com- mittee. My report has been for the purpose of further elaborating these fundamental directives and discussing some of our central problems concretely in the light of these directives. All these tasks set forth in the documents before us are particular parts of the one general task to rouse and organize the workers and oppressed masses to resistance against the capitalist program of hunger, fascism and imperialist war. They are parts of the one task of winning the majority of the toiling masses for the revolutionary struggle for their immediate political and economic needs as the first steps along the road to proletarian revolution, to the overthrow of capitalist rule, the establishment of a revolutionary workers' government, a Soviet government, and the building of a socialist society in the United States.

It is the source of our greatest strength that in our work in the U. S. A., we are not isolated from our brothers in the rest of the world. We are organizationally united in one World Party with all that is most fearless, devoted, honest and energetic in the working class of every capitalist country, as well as of the toiling masses struggling for their liberation throughout the world. We draw additional strength and inspiration from the magnificent achievements of our brother Commu- nist Party in China, which stands at the head of the powerful and growing Chinese Soviet Republic. We are proud and inspired by our unity in one Party with such fighters as George Dimitroff and his comrades, who, single handed, met and defeated the Nazi murder bands in the courts of Leipzig. It is our strength that we are of the same Party with Ernst Thaelmann, and the thousands of heroic fighters in the German Communist Party, who, through prison cells and concen- tration camps, defying the Nazi headsmen, maintain and carry on every day struggle for the overthrow of Hitler. We take special pride in the achievements of our brother Communist Party in Cuba, which roused and led the mass upheaval that overthrew the bloody Machado, and which is now gathering the forces of the Cuban masses to drive out Machado's successors and establish a Soviet Republic of Cuba. We are stronger in the knowledge that the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands stands shoulder to shoulder with us in the joint struggle to overthrow American imperialism. Our work in the United States gains additional power from the fact that, reaching across the border, both north and south, we grasp the hands of our brother Com- munist Parties of Canada and Mexico. Throughout Latin-America, our brother Parties are challenging us to socialist competition as to who can strike hardest and quickest against the imperialists and their agents.

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 79

When we contemplate the tasks of struggle against imperialist war, for the defeat of our own imperialism, our muscles are further steeled by the knowledge that our brother Communist Party of Japan is blazing the way for us by their heroic struggle for the overthrow of Japanese imperialism in the midst of war. Above all, do we arm ourselves with the political weapons forged by the victorious Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with the mighty sword of Marxism-Leninism, and are strengthened and inspired by the victories of socialist construction won under its Bolshevik leadership, headed by Stalin. Our World Com- munist Party, the Communist International, provides us the guarantee not only of our victory in America, but of the victory of the proletariat throughout the world. {Prolonged applause.)

SUMMARY

We have come to the end of the discussion of our Eighth Conven- tion. In the main, these discussions have revealed a unanimity of political line in every essential problem before the Party such as our Party has never known before.

There are not many political questions to clear up in the summary. A few points that have been the subject of controversy must be dealt with. I take in the first place the questions that stand between us and Comrade Zack. I will not attempt to go into a catalogue of the deviations of Comrade Zack. That would take entirely too much time. I will take just three points on which Comrade Zack has not only been in the past resisting the line of our Party, but on which Comrade Zack still stands stubbornly defending his errors.

The question of work within the A. F. of L.: Comrade Zack de- clared that he is in complete agreement with the decisions of this Convention regarding the work in the A. F. of L., and then in the next breath he proceeded to declare that when the leadership of the Party removed him from New York they made an unwise and un- just decision, that his line on this question in New York was 100% correct. We have to tell Comrade Zack that evidently he simply does not understand the decisions of this Convention. He does not under- stand the line of the Party if he thinks he was carr)dng it out in New York. I will just cite the kind of thing that made it necessary for him to be removed as a warning that he had to correct his line, a warning which Comrade Zack did not take seriously.

Here is a circular gotten out in New York by the independent union of Alteration Painters, addressed to the members of the Painters Union of the A. F- of L.

[Interjection by Zack: "Not written by me."]

which Comrade Zack endorsed and defended

[Zack: "Not true."]

and which represented the influence of Comrade Zack in the

8o COMMUNISM IN THE UNITED STATES

leadership of this work, and this leaflet, in the midst of a struggle and the attempts on our part to develop a left wing in the A. F. of L. union, calls upon these members: "Come into our union — the doors of our union are open to every honest rank and filer, exchange your Brotherhood book for a membership book of the Alteration Painters Union." This kind of line has absolutely nothing in common with the line of our Party. Such a line is bound to result in pulling the militants out of the A. F. of L. unions at a time when the mass of the workers remains in them. Such a line means leaving the workers in the A. F. of L. under the complete influence of the reformists, instead of building a strong rank-and-file opposition to challenge the leadership of the corrupt A. F. of L. officialdom.

On the qmstion of shop papers: Comrade Zack stated in his speech that he admits the mistake on the question of shop papers and stands corrected, but he said this only as a preface for a bitter denunciation of the article in The Communist, v^^hich polemized against his mis- take. According to Comrade Zack, such a polemic against his mis- takes is impermissible slander which cannot be allowed against such a leading comrade as Comrade Zack. It is clear that Comrade Zack has not corrected himself on this point in which his first formulation on the question was an apparent admission of his mistake.

Finally, Comrade Zack has been of the opinion that the Central Committee and its Political Bureau is unsound on the whole question of trade-union work, that it is in constant danger of heading off into the swamp of opportunism and becoming objectively counter- revolutionary. Comrade Zack came into the open with this opinion in the article he wrote in the discussion, printed in The Commtmist. Comrade Zack's contribution to the pre-convention discussion was a warning to the Party not to trust its Central Committee. Comrade Zack has repeated his accusations in the Convention, and further specified who he believes to be the source of danger to our Party. He looks upon Comrade Stachel as the would-be liquidator of our trade-imion work and the rest of the leadership of the Party as under the influence of, and conciliatory towards, the liquidation tendency of Comrade Stachel. What is at the bottom of these accusations? What, but an obstinate resistance to the stress upon work in the A. F. of L. — a resistance that constitutes a downright opportunist deviation from the Party line on work in the trade unions? What can we say about such slander as this, which is at the same moment coupled with a verbal declaration of support for our resolution? Com- rades, we have to characterize this as double bookkeeping, and the attempt to establish a factional platform in the Party — a kind of thing which carmot be tolerated and which must be eliminated from our Party life. This is not Bolshevik political discussion, such posi- tions as these Comrade Zack has taken on these questions. Comrade

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAY OUT 8i

Zack has not spoken one word directed towards further strengthening the solid, firm unity of our Party, without which nothing can be achieved. Comrade Zack has yet to learn some of the first funda- mentals of Bolshevik work, namely, the ability to collectively hammer out a line, to arrive at unanimous decisions, and to proceed to turn all forces unitedly and unanimously into carrying out these decisions. (Applause.)

And let me repeat: One of the most important tasks of the incoming Central Committee as well as of every District and Section Committee will be to organize a broad revolutionary opposition inside the A, F. of L. unions — an opposition that shall be able to win the workers from the influence of the reformists, to lead and organize the struggles of the workers against the will and over the heads of the bureaucracy. And we will not tolerate a single comrade in any leading position who is not prepared to carry through with all his energy this important work. We mean business and not such phrasemongering as indulged in by Comrade Zack.

I pass on to the questions raised around the case of Comrade Nowell: I don't want to review the full discussion of our Negro Com- mission and the excellent contributions that we had there. We have had a rich discussion — a discussion that I am certain has been a help to everybody in the Party from the first to the last delegate at this Convention, and it will further serve the entire Party membership and the whole struggle for Negro liberation. The crushing convincingness of our correct line even forces Comrade Nowell to come before this Convention with an admission of the true character of his political tendency and his activities as petty-bourgeois, nationalist and fac- tional, and a confirmation of the correctness of the Central Commit- tee. Whether this statement by Comrade Nowell represents a true enlightenment on his part or whether it represents an additional maneuver, time and the work and activities of Comrade Nowell will demonstrate. The Party will be alert to see just exactly what this statement means in life.

And Comrade Nowell should not imagine that we shall believe him so readily! Too long has he indulged in underhanded maneuvers against the Party. One more attempt in that direction, and the Party, in the interests of our revolutionary work, especially as concerns our work among the Negro masses, will clear him from its ranks. The Party has far too long been patient with such methods of disintegration.

I pass on to the question of the activities of Comrade Harfield in Buffalo. Comrade Harfield has submitted a statement confirming the correctness