The Daily Worker Newspaper, July 19, 1924, Page 10

By DAVID I' IVON JONES. ((Continued from last week.) It is inevitable that we should be- come more and more familiar with their historical qllusious, as allusions to our classic history. For Lenin was wont to say, “It is an axoism of the “Marxian dialectic that there is no abstract truth, truth is always. con- crete.” And one may say that what the “Communist Manifesto” is to Marxism in its first phase, so is “What Must We Do?” to Marxism in its sec- ond phase, the phase of action, in its Leninist phase. Take the second chap- ter of this brochure, entitled “The Elemental and the Conscious.” Op- portunism, at first taking the form in Russia of “economism,” magnified the role of the elemental or the spontane- ous in the workers’ mass movement. The “economists” accused “Iskra” of exaggerating the factor of conscious- ness (vide Engels’ definition of the party as “the conscious expression of an unconscious process.”) The “economists” opposed what they term- ed their “tactic-process” to the “Iskra’s tactic-plan.” Lenin -was filled with profound uneasiness at every spontaneous uprising of the workers in the absence of mature party guid- ance. The backwardness of the party disquieted him. He invented a special nickname for the “economist” tactic— “hang-on-the-tailism,” which is used today in the Russian movement. He accused the “economists” by their genufiections before the “elemental” of wanting the party to be forever “studying the hindquarters of the pro- letariat,” of making the principle of the class struggle an evcuse for wait- ing on events, instead of forestalling them, dominating them. “Every exag- geration of the elemental, and depreci- ation of the conscious, factor in the Labor movement is a strengthening of bourgeois influences among the workers.” He denied the current im- pression that Socialist consciousness comes to the workers inevitably from their conflicts with individual capi- talists, “The workers by their own strength can only achieve Trade Unionist political action.” “The spon- taneous workers’ movement of its own accord is capable only of forming (and it inevitably forms) trade unionism; and trade unionist political action of the working class is precisely “-bour- geois political action.” Lenin roundly accuses the “economists” of an “ob- lique attempt to prepare the ground for transforming the workers’ move- ment into a tool of bourgeois demo- cracy.” Further on Lenin devotes several pages to “Trade Unionist versus Social Democratic political ac- tion,” with copious references to English Trade Unionism. Reading these chapters, one receives a flash of revelation as to why great waves of working class mass action have swept over England and receded again, leaving hardly a trace in the collective experience. For this col- ‘lective experience can only be garner- ed by a Communist Party. This res- ponsibility of the individual before history, the role of human initiative SPOT TT er , (Continued from page 3) ing fountain of life. The attendant, having lost his head completely, rushes from nun to nun... then behind the screen. Jakie Rosen- feld’s head hangs limp over the edge of the cot. His eyes are rigidly fixed upon the picture of Christ. The last stream of blood forms a clot on his face... He is crfiason and white... . it is poor Jakie Rosenfeld. * ¢ ¢& Jakie Rosenfeld is no longer to be seen, A nun fetches a pan. Nothing but the splashing of water is heard. The attendant has collected his wits... Whispered commands from behind the screen... A long white gown makes its appearance... « An- other splash in the pan. It is late... . nearing dawn. The nun ia charge has come to see Jakie Rosenfeld. Here he lies amid the sixteen cots of the party, is the great Leninist cor- rective to the conception of Marxism hitherto prevailing in the West. If the “great man theory” he regarded as the thesis, and his- torical materialism (vulgarized) as the antithesis, then Leninism, the restoration of the emphasis on con- scious initiative, is the synthesis of it all. In “What Must We Do?” we feel this power, this revolutionary driv- ing force, permeating every phrase. He conceives the role of the revolu- tionary as the liquidator of outworn historical periods, the refuse of which encumbers the way. He concludes the preface to this book with the words, “For we cannot move forward unless we finally liquidate this period (the period of the groups).” Lenin’s chief antagonist among the “economists” was Martuinov (not to be confused with Martov). Now Mar- tuinov is-in his own person’ a living symbol of Lenin’s driving power on history. Martuinov started his career with the “narodniki” (the Populists) and left the “narodniki” when their position became untenable from the attacks of Plekhanov and Lenin. He then became an exponent of “eco- noism” in the Social-Democratic move- ment. “Economism” in its turn was smashed under Lenin’s sledge-ham- mer blows, and Martuinov had to move forward to a more consistent position. Later he took the Menshevik side in the great division, and even became its official theoretician.. Last year, after twenty years, Martuinov uncon- ditionally capitalited to his old op- ponent and signalled the complete downfall of Menshevism by going over to the Communist International. “Thou hast conquered, oh Galilean!” Before leaving the subject of “EHle- mental versus Conscious Action,” let us indulge ourselves in one more quo- tation: “Only the most vulgar under- standing of Marxism, or the ‘under- standing’ of it in the spirit of Strouv- ism,* could engender the idea that the uprising of the spontaneous mass movement of organization as that of the zemlevolio,** nay, of forming an incomparably more efficient organiza- tion of revolutionaries. On the con- trary, this mass movement precisely imposes upon us this duty; for the spontaneous struggle of the proletariat does not become a real class struggle until it is directed by a streng organ- ization of revolutionaries,” “What must we do?” devotes much space to the question of party democ- racy; and the recent discussion in the Russian Communist Party can only be fully comprehended in the light of these early works of Lenin. In the days of “Iskra” it was a question of party democracy in a severely con- spirative organization, but the Lenist axioms retain their force. “A revo- lutionary organization,” he says, “never could and never can with the best of intentions, instal the broad democratic principle.” Primitive dem- ** Zemlevolio (Land and Freedom) preceded the “narodvoltzi” (Peoples Freedom Party) in the revolutionary seventies. _ ON A HOSPITAL COT that had been his neighbors. Sixteen invalids have felt his dy- ing breath. a>" Morning. A bleak wintry sun blinks thru the window. An attendant enters, accompanied by another, They carry a pair of white stretchers. The screen is removed. There lies Jakie Rosenfeld, white and clean, shrouded in a long gown. His face looks like chalk; his eyelids are tightly closed. Two hands, two transparent hands | so are folded symmetrically, held to. gether by two strips of white linen. Cautious yet unsteady feet carry Jakie Rosenfeld to the waiting hearse, whose tires are of heavy rubber. Jakie Rosenfeld is placed gently on the hearse. A white sheet tops it all. The carriage rolls away. Silently it rolls far, far away... . far beyond California. The “Spark” That Grew Into A Flame ocratic notions, such as the one that a people’s newspaper should be edited directly by. the people, were among the -revolutionary youth, as a revulsion from absolutism. Lenin had to fight against these prim- itive notions in order to establish his organization of “ironsides.” - “The broad democratic principle is im- possible without full publicity.” Lenin was a sworn enemy of the principle expressed in the “words “from the bottom up.” He demanded that the Party be organized from the top down. Not on democracy, but on the mutual faith of comrades. “Vulgar democratic tendencies in the Party reflect bourgeois democratic party tendencies.” Lenin published a reprint of “What Must We Do?” in 1907, dur- ing the temporary spell of political freeedom under the Duma. In the preface to that edition, he refers to the organization of professional revo- lutionaries as having well completed its work and planted the party on impregnable foundations. In the same connection, he welcomes the intro- duction of the elective principle in ‘the party organization owing to the greater freedom of action. But that freedom was short-lived. The party had to return underground. And it is only now that the Party, emerging from the period of civil war, has been able to apply “workers’ democracy” to the Party apparatus. Nevertheless, Comrade Kameney warned the Party against “vulgar democracy,” which is only bourgeois democracy, excluded from all other avenues, knocking at the door of the Party. Who said that Lenin had no hu- mor? His was a versatile, many- sided genius. “What Must We Do?” like all his brochures, teems with hu- morous asides, a certain pawky Scotch humor which keeps close to the gist of the matter. He refers for example to Soubatov, the Czarist agent, who was known to be in favor of legalizing trade unions, and who instigated strikes, Lenin said in ef- fect, “All right, we’ll gain from it in spite of the tares in the wheat, we don’t want to grow wheat in flower pots.” The spirit that animated Lenin was a pride in the working class, un- bounded faith in the proletariat. He denounced any and every attempt to degrade its political role. “The con- sciousness of the working class can- not be a truly political one unless the workers respond to every case of oppression, violence and abuse, no matter to what class they are ap- plied.” (p. 78). When the Czar’s government drafted 183 students of Kiev University: into the army, in punishment for insubordination, “Is- kra” called for workers’ demonstra- tions of protest. And the workers responded, a fact which Lenin ex- ultantly shows to the “economists.” This exalted view of the role of the proletariat is balanced by a sense of tremendous responsibility. “Our backwardness,” he says, “will be inevitably taken advantage of by more agile, more energetic ‘revolu- tionaries’ outside Social Democracy; and the workers, no matter how bold- ly and energetically they may fight the police and the soldiers, no matter how revolutionarily they may act, will be only a force in support of these ‘revolutionaries’; they will be just the rearguard of bourgeois democracy, in stead of being called eats cot cee (read Com- t) advance guard. He hurls the word “tinkers” again at the “economist” defenders of party backwardness. And then, all at once, we have another Lenin, the master, unsparing above all towards himself. “ ‘Don’t be aggrieved with me for this harsh word,” he says, “For, in far as it is a question of unpre- paredness, I apply it to myself. I worked in a group which set before itself a very broad, all-embracing task, and to all of us members of that group tame the torturing feel- ing that we were nothing but tinkers, at a historic moment when it was possible to say, adapting rife| which I then experienced; the more Russia.’ And, since then, the more I |” recall that bitter feeling of shame, does my choler rise against those false Social-Democrats who, by their preachings, debase the revolutionary name; against those who do not un- derstand that our task is not to con- done the debasement of a revolution- ist into a tinker, but to raise the tink- er to be a revolutionist.” These lines are written many years before the October revolution, but, in reading “What Must We Do?” one feels that the critical days of the Oc- tober revolution were not the days of October. It would have been too late in 1917 to form that ironclad Party—=steeled in two revolutions, and in innumerable contests with the Czar’s police—capable of leading the proletariat along the inconceivably difficult paths of the proletarian dictatorship. And this titanic strug- gle of the Russian proletariat, a strug- gle which has also cleared the path of the Western revolution, was only possible as the fruits-of an equally titanic theoretical struggle waged by Lenin in the first years of the cen- tury. And Lenin, in “What Must We Do?” pierces into this future, as is his wont. Marvellous prophet—in the power of his revolutionary logic the future blends with the present in one iron inevitability, He has just been quoting Engels on the leading role of the German proletariat in the inter- national movement, and says: “Before the Russian workers now stand immeasurably heavier trials, now stands a struggle with monsters, compared with which the exceptional laws in a constitutional country are a mere bagatelle. History has placed before us the immediate task, which is the most revolutionary of all the immediate tasks of the proletariat of any country. The realization of this task, the destruction of the most powerful buttress, not only of Europe- an, but also (we may now say) of Asiatic reaction, would make the Russian proletariat the advance guard of the international revolutionary pro- letariat. And we have a right to ex- pect that we shall achieve this honor- able role, already earned by our pre- decessors of the seventies, if we can’ inspire our movement. which is a thousand times deeper and wider than theirs, with the same unsparing devotion and energy.” And so it came to pass. Whatever Lenin ‘set himself to do he achieved. And his deathless name shall still lead us on from strength to strength; and revolution after revolution shall be monuments to his memory. ~ Finnish-Russian Rail Pact. MOSCOW, July 18.—A railway con- ference is to be opened very shortly at Melsinfors between the U. S. S. R. and Finland, to draw up agreements in development of the Russo-Finnish railway convention. Among others, there will be’concluded an agreement on direct passenger and freight tra- ffic between the two countries; an- other co-ordinating the regulations of Passenger, baggage and cargo trans- port; an agreement, too, ruling the mutual settling of accounts and the movement of trains at frontier sta- tions, ete. Krasnaya Dacha is the site selected for the Commune Herald Situated between Odessa, Kherson and Nikolaev. It forms an ideal place for dairy and -poultry industry. Qualified workers interested in such an enterprise must join now before full quota has been reach For more information write or call to secretary Ss. MILLER, 1243 N. CLAREMONT, AVENUE, Chicago, Ill. Tel. Armitage 5776