The Daily Worker Newspaper, March 15, 1924, Page 6

.yere ee i rE SET Sah ON RR, et Re i a aeeeenERESEEnERSnnnnnentianeneneemnnenmemeneneenemndeendtiaetantenentantianeemeaatnitaameemaiiaiaenanee Zinoviev’s Speech to » (NOTE—The DAILY WORKER today publishes the sixth install- ment of the great speech delivered by Gregory Zinoviev to the party conference of the Leningrad Dis- trict. Those of our readers’ who have read lurid reports of war.be- tween Communist leaders should follow this discussion close! Its true that Trotsky: had a nce of opinion over questions y organization with Zinoviev’ and others. But the enemies of the Soviet Republic may rest assured that a discussion on tactics will not give them the opening to rush in their war dogs and lap up the blood of the emancipated Russian work- ers. A further installment will be published Monday). 7 © @e ZINOVIEV CONTINUES: HERE are two further questions o which I must still refer: that of the economists, and that of the difference of age among the members of the Party. With reference to the economists, I must state that we of the Lenin ‘trend of thought’ make every en- deavor to agree with tne economists of our Party. The matter is fre- quently represented in-such a man- ner that one might think we regard- ed the economists as Party members of a second class, What is our actual attitude to- wards the economists? I know, as all of uS know, that we in the Pa: do not choose the work accorded to us, but are given it by the Party. It is, therefore, ridiculous to find fault with the economists, The Party has placed them in the Position they ‘oecupy; they did not go there of themselves. Would any self-respecting Communist take up economic work if he were not con- vinced that he had the Party behind him, that the Party does not con- sider him a be a Communist of in- ferior quality? There are a large number of old revolutionists, excellent function- aries, who have om many oceasions +proved their devotion to the Party, now engaged in economic work, We have not yet gathered together the whole stratum of the economists, but we are doing so, we are—feeling our way and ‘doing our ‘best. This is a most important and responsible mat: ter. This alliance of economists can only fulfill its tasks properly if it feels that it is backed up by the sup- port of the, whole Party. j It is unallowable to regard the economists are second-class Party members. They form a group of decisive importance, everything de- pends on their success, and their at- titude is the criterion upon which our non-partisan comrades form their judgments, But it is possible, comrades, to go to the other extreme. Among one small section of the economists we Sometimes come across the following feeling: Why does the Party control me to such an extent? There ig the government Party headquarters, and their organizations, and the dis- rty | trict headquarters and its organiza- tion department, and the collective— it 7 more than the strongest man can ear, We need not seek to cover up the Leningrad Communists sin: We worry the economists fre- quently with regard to trifies. This cannot be allowed. What we have to say to the econ- omists, and what every honest econ- omist knows by himself, is that the conditions induced by the NEP ex- pose the economists to the danger of division. Comrade Preobrashensky is right here. In the course of the speech which he recently made in Moscow, he pointed out that the economists are forced, under the conditions brought about by the NEP, to leave the trenches and fraternize with the enemy. This is very true, who is obliged to co-operate with the bourgeoisie is actually forced to hold intercourse with the bourgeoisie, even if it is not an actual fraterni- zation. ‘This involves danger. Every profession has its attendant danger.‘ The Party has to admit this openly and definitely, and no self- respecting economist will deny it— it is an incontestable fact. And there is only one remedy against it; Party control, comrade-like alliance, and discipline. And there is no need to fear this, 5 Comrades, quite at the beginning I told you that we must differentiate between the New Economic Policy and the “NEP.” When Comrade Lenin said: “Learn to trade,” some comrades interested in the practical execution of the idea took it to mean that the NEP implies dirty work, that it smells somewhat of the devil. It is an unavoidable zone thru which we have to pass. Under the ‘“‘Nep’”—so they think— Anyone’ it is impossible to be an out and out Communist, the tasks of the revolu- tion have to be more superficially viewed, and so forth. But when this has been overcome, and we arrive at a fresh one, then we can put on clean clothes again, so to speak, and be- come real Communists. This inter- pretation is not correct, and does not accord with the the idea expressed by Comrade Lenin. The meaning which Comrade Lenin intended to put into his slogan was: Do not let yourselves be deceived, you must co-operate with the bour- geoisie in such manner that the ad- vantage is to the workers’ state. The NEP—the NEP is a whole chapter in the history of the workers’ revo- lution, it is not merely a zone thra Which we can hasten with closed eyes, with the intention of becoming Communists after we have -got thru. No; make it your endeavor to be Communists during the Nep itself. We must make it claar to our. selves that in the Party there can be no division -into economists, trade unionists, purely Party workers, etc, Such a division would destroy us if not unified. Hs We must be a Party in which the various departments perform their duties on the basis of a definite divi- sion of work. No shadow of differ- ence in our relations to the econ- omists as if. they were second-grade Party members, is to be allowed. At the same time, we must not ignore the special dangers to which those engaged in work connected with the NEP are exposed. : (To Be Concluded Monday). We Come to the End of “A WEEK” By IURY LIBEDINSKY Published by THE DAILY WORK- ER thru special arrangement with B. W. Huebsch, Inc., of New York City. Coyprighted, 1923, by B, W. Huebsch & Co, ee 28.79 VESTERDAY morning they had occupied the town. Only yester- day shots had been thundering in the streets, but now all those little houses seen from the hill looked so quiet and peaceable. But Gornuikh knew that yesterday’s flame had been thrown up by them. He knew, and feared a new eruption, and was taking precau- tions against it. This fear had made him instantly suppress the sobbing that had shaken him over Klimin’s corpse, the sobbing caused by almost a week’s lack of sleep and the most terrible nervous ~ strain, take on the management of the enquiry, and, tho he was not actually the senior of the surviv- ing Chekists, the direction of ‘all the work of the Cheka had some- how fallen of its own accord into his hands, Few of the bandits left the town. The red-headed fellow, wounded during the seizure of the Communist Company’s Headquar- ters, had been made’ prisoner, and Gornuikh confronted-him with the other bandits, with the peasants from the neighboring villages who had been caught in the town and were now mild, timorous and de- jected as if after a drunken head- ache, and had no difficulty in dis- covering in him one of the leaders of the revolt. And Gornuikh, who had already appointed the day and hour when he was to be shot, now promised him pardon, now threat- ened, now wheedled, and was tire- less in the use of a thousand cun- ning tricks of cross-examination, And sometimes it seemed to the red-headed one that he had fallen into the hands of an‘ attentively quiet devil, or rather into the teeth of a merciless machine, one of those ingenious, precise, Amer- ican machines which in ten min- utes turn a living, squealing pig into a silent mound of sausages. If Gornuikh was not himself cross-questioning, he was walking thru the rooms of the investiga- tors, not interfering, but following the questions, reading the proto- cols of the evidence, and now and again going off by himself to his office, where he shut himself up, sat there alone for a long time, propping his shaggy head on his hands, and apparentty without a single thought, staring at the sheet of paper lying before him on the table,-and now and again carefully, sparingly, writing down a word, another, as the course of the revolt became ever clearer and clear to him. Now, in half a dozen sentences he told Karaulov the whole result of the many hours of the minute labor of the enquiry. — Karauloy interrupted im: “You see that girl standing there? She’s a schoolmistress.. . went thru a lot during the revolt and can tell you something of the murder of Robeiko. I told her to come to the meeting to meet you. There, standing by the entry. ... Comrade Gratcheva, come here.” And Gornuikh saw the pale face of a girl, long straight locks of pale flaxen hair falling on fore- head and cheeks, frightened blue eyes, and heard a trembling voice: “I want to give evidence .. . about the murder of Comrade Ro- beiko. . . . I was present at it. I lived in the same fiat as he, and ++.” She began to tell of the appearance of Repin, so handsome, kindly and cunning, of Mr. and Mrs. Senator, and of her relations with them, of her wandering thru the town during the night of the revolt, Now and again she went off into unnecessary details, and then Gornuikh gently and confi- dently asked questions, and steered her story in the direction he need- ed. At first her shyness inter- fered with her talking, and she spoke disconnectedly, but after- wards she was more and more car- ried away, her voice grew more and more confident, and she even began timorously to gesticulate. When she told of the murder of Robeiko her eyes overflowed with tears. 0.08 “Listen, Gornuikh,” said Karau- lov, when Gornuikh left Lisa, “I’ve been watching you just now and been amazed to see what a capable fellow you are. For example, how well and quietly you questioned that young lady. And then.... Do you know if it had not been for your fifty railwaymen they’d have taken. the station and then . .» things would have been bad. Then I could have done nothing to help with my battalion. liquidation of the revajt would have dragged out for a month. That’s a fact. And how many more com- rades would have died... .” Then Karaulov said with shak- ifig voice: ana enennee “You, now, are working like a horse, hurrying everywhere, you are in the Cheka, you are looking after the wood-getting, and have written an article for the paper besides... .. But I. ..I1 can’t do anything. As soon as I learned from that young lady that they had killed Robeiko,-I saw red, turned into a wild beast and went for the bandits with my own sword, And then I learned that Ziman too, and Stalmakhov, and Klimin. .. » And Klimin and I went thru the whole civil war together. ... And now there’s nothing for me to do. The town has become abso- lutely em to me. Swear at the old man if you like, but remember, I am thirty years older than you. . .. And yesterday ‘I got drunk from wretchedness. The thing 1s, I can’t. weep when sober. But get drunk a bit and it’s as if some one opened your soul and you howl. Then you are ashamed, and after that you feel better. Wait and you'll find it out for yourself, and. will remember old Karaulov. -.» Well, well... .” Already the bell had tinkled, the room had grown silent, and from the middle of the arena, stuttering and blushing, the secretary of the Town District Committee was. pro- posing the election of a President. heavy puzzled murmur roll- ed-along the benches. Whom were they to elect, when the very best, the most staunch and capable were lying in coflins covered with red flags: Some one shouted the name of Klimin, some one doubtfully named Simkova. . But these names the secretary did not write down. “Comrade Karaulov,” came the thin, sugary voice of Matusenko. But Karaulov refused. ... He did not know how to preside. Of that the comrades were well aware. Be- sides, today he wag not well... . And suddenly, from above, frem the gallery, a strong voice thew ‘name: : “Gornuikh! . . . Comrade Gor- nuikh!” And at once he was seconded from various sides; ‘ ‘rade Gornuikh, ” “Who is this Gornuikh!” several loud! mand. ... A fighting fellow.” It was the first time in his life that Gornuikh had had to preside over so large a meeting. . . . Gor- nuikh lost his head a little, did not know what to do, while the meeting, like a tamed beast of prey, lay submissively at his feet, grew quiet, and fixed its many- eyed gaze on him, its master. And insteat of the common sentence, “T declare the meeting open” and the reading of the agenda for the day, from his tongue came other words, heavy and sharp, which en- tered into the consciousness of his audience, like nails into wood un- der the heavy blows of a hammer, words smelted and wrought by Gornuikh’s strong judgment and determination during that critical week. He told how grave had been the danger of the revolt already past, and how the Communists we walking on thin ice, under whi was surging the savage elemental force of the peasants, ready to drown and destroy the work of the Communists, how this elemen- tal foree must be tamed not only with bayonets and bullets but by the organization of socialistic ex- change of goods between town and: village. , “Comrades, it will be more diffi- eult for us now. . .. In the Ex- ecutive Committee nine are left, in the Party Committee four work- ers. In the Politdep both the Chiefs are gone, and in the Cheka, the President, Vice-President and three workers. The center cannot send us reinforcements. There is little to be hoped from it. And the work has now become more complex, It’s not enough to get seed-corn, We must get ready for the sowing campaign and carry it thru over the whole of our trackless country. And the bandits are still not final iy liquidated. It amounts to this, that we must carry heavier loads, Take me for example. I am now as President. That is be- cause we have no Klimin, no Ro- beiko, no Simkova, who would these duties out better... . So fA will be everywhere, we must take on our shoulders the work of those who have been killed. It will be hard, but, if we remember their example, we shall manage it... .” And then the “Internationale” was , and the meeting turned to of business, he guided it quietly, confidently and