The Daily Worker Newspaper, January 17, 1925, Page 11

Bolshevism or Trotskyism? : (Continued from page 2) this peasant army had not been ren- dered desperate by the imperialist war which the bourgeoisie had to.conduct; lf the weight of more than hundred millions of peasants had not excer- cised pressure upon _the whole course of the social-political life of the coun- try—then the development of the revo- lution would have proceeded accord- ing to Trotzky and the astonished humanity would have experienced the apotheosis of Trotzkyism. It apparently has never occured to our author that “if ifs and ands were pots and pans” if there had not been an imperialist war with all its in- evitable consequences, there would probably never had been the revolution of 1917 and no such relatively easy victory. Our author is also obviously unaware that precisely the develop- ment of the revolution from February to October, 1917, confirmed “in pass- ing” the already obvious truth that the whole Trotzkyism with its theory of its “permanent” revolution was nothing else than a cleverly though- out intellectual schema which was cut according to the requirements of menshevism. Let us refer once more to Comrade Lenin: “Hence their (the mensheviki) mon- strous, idiotic, renegade idea that the distatorship of the proletariat and of the peasantry contradicts every course of economic development. With us there appears at every crisis of our epoch (1905-1909) a general democratic movement of the mushik and to ignore this would be a pro found error which in fact would lead to menshevism.” Thus wrote Lenin in December, 1909. But Comrade Trotsky even in the year 1924, does not understand that the role of the mushik in such a crisis as 1917, was not by chance ne remov- ed from the course of the class strug- gle. It is obvious that it has also never occurred to our author that the course of the great revolution between Feb ruary and October, 1917, wonderfully confirmed Leninism, among othev things in that section in which Lenin with the theoretical ruthlessness pe- culiar to him, deals with the Trotsky- ist variety of menshevism. A collaborator of Comrade Trotsky and the “editor” of his book 1917, Comrade Lenzner, asserts in all seri- ousness that already in the articles written by Trotsky at the beginning of March, 1917, in America in the paper “Novy Mir” (“New World’) he anticipated the attitude to the ques- tions taken by Comrade Lenin in his famous “Letters from Abroad.” Com- rade Trotsky did not even know what the question was whilst Comrade Len- in in his truly famous “Letters from Abroad” already submitted to the Russian working class the scheme of the real October worked out in almost all details. But this is only half the trouble. The present trouble is that Comrade Trotsky can say nothing better than if there had been no imperialist war and if the peasantry had not predom- inated in our country, then Trotsky- ism would have been right as opposed to Leninism. Is any further proof necessary that Comrade Trotsky understood the Bol- shevist attitude to the question of the peasan‘ry as little as he understands it now? 53 The “Lessons of October” have clearly shown one thing; that even now in the eighth year of the prol- has not grasped the true nature of Leninism and that he now as previ- ously is revolving round in the same circle—in the question of the peasant- ry—in the question which is the chief source of the false conclusions of Comrade Trotsky beginning from his wror of Brest to his error in the ques- tion of the trade unions in 1921, end- ing with his errors at the present time. In the “Lessons of October” there are almost as many erroneous asser- tions as there are assertions at all. Therefore, the Communist Youth had littie difficulty in detecting that Com- rade Trotsky confounded Lenin with Hiiferding (in the question of the con- stituent assembly and the so-called combined type of the constituent as- sembly and the Soviets*). Hence it comes that Comrade Sokolnikov dem- onstrated to Comrade Trotsky that the “left” errors of Comrade Bogdat- jev were ascribed by the esteemed author of the “Lessons of October” to Comrade Lenin (the history of the demonstration of April, 1917). Hence it comes that Comrade Kuusinnen can easily prove by means of documents that Comrade Trotsky in the question of the German revolution**) said the exact contrary in January, 1924, to what he now says im the “Lessons of October.” Hence it comes that such important episodes of the revolution as the ques- tion of the July demonstration, as the fight for Kronstadt and even the ques- tion of the July days are described by Comrade Trotsky after the manner of Suchanov and the paper “Denj” (The “Day” bourgeois) and not as they actually occurred. Hence it comes that the question of the tac- tics of the Bolsheviki with regard to the preliminary parliament and the tarian revolution Cemrade Trotskydemocratic conference are dealt with in am equally incorrect and biased manner. These “small” errors have been suf- ficiently refuted by authoritative wit- nesses of the events. Perhaps we shall be able on another occasion to give an exact description of some of the very important episodes of the revolution. *For the rest we learn from the sec- ond part of “1917” that as late as Oc- tober 29, 1917, Comrade Trotsky him- self on behalf of the council of peo- ple’s commissionars wrote in an ap- peal: “The only thing which ean save the country is the constitutional assembly which consists of represent- atives of the working and exploited classes of the people.” It is permit- ted to ask in which respect this is better than the “combined type”? {(“1917” second part p. 133). **One example suffices: “We have seen there (in Germany) in the sec- ond half of the past year a classical demonstration of the fact that a most extraordinary favorable revolutionary situation of world historical import- ance can be missed” thus wrote Com- rade Trotsky in September, 1924, in the “Lessons of October.” “If the party (the C. P. of Ger- many) had declared the revolt in Oo tober (last year) as the Berlin com- rades have proposed, it would now been lying with a broken neck.” We read these words in the draft thesis of Comrades Radeck and Trotsky in January, 1924. In such a question one cannot have two opinions, one in January, 1924, and another in September, 1924. If however, one has two opinions regard- ing such a question, one must not so attack the E. C. C. L as Comrade Trotsky has done. (To be Continued) Views of Our Readers On Many Subjects Cuba Persecutes Labor Leaders. To the- DAILY WORKER:—The Cuban government at the request of sugar and tobacco trust magnates gave the gate to 30 Spanish labor lead- ers in the strike that is paralyzing the life of the islands. The exeuse given is always the same—a pretext, a sub- terfuge, but in reality is the hand of the same capitalistic monster that shot Filipinos in Hawaii, Negroes in Hayti, peons in Vera Cruz. or any noble sou! crying for justice, for lib- erty or simply a decent livirg. Bunt it forgets that in every dissatisfied worker there is a potential leader. The czar didn’t know that when he put to death the brother of Lenin: Porfirio Diaz forgot that when he sent his rurales against Madero and Za pata; England ignores that and jails Indian and Egyptian workers. When the writer was eating cold sweet potatoes at 5 o’clock in the morning under the dirty guano of a Cuban hut. in a tobacco plantation at Pinar del Rio, the sugar and tobacco dukes, who then were burying everything from the defeated Spaniards, were victims of the same mental ataxia. They never dreamed that in the famished body of that unknown, sock- less, tired worker was a soul full of enthusiasm and of resentment. They never knew that in that whipped beast. working 14 hours a day for $10 @ month were all the potentialities of a rebel. - Before he was a faithful catholic, seeing only visions of angels in em- Piric regions. But carrying 125-pound bags of fertilizer on his shoulders at the age of 19, just out of a catholic college, and sleeping all crumpled up in a dirty hammock, inhaling all night the dust in a tobacco storehouse he soon began to see as red as those the Cuban government sent back home as “agitators.” The productivity of the Cuban soil Paris, among the hectic crowds of Montmarte, in Monte Carlo or in Florida. These aristocrats, these plutocrats, never see, or care, how miserably tive the producers of the wealth they se enjoy. But the worker. knows how the masters enjoy themselves in their palatial homes and‘first class hotels, while they and their families are cen- tinually facing the horrible specter of hunger and disease. BY SCHOLASTICUS, Newport, R. I. Wants Information. To the DAILY WORKER: — —You have in the Dec. 26 issue of the DAILY WORKER an article dated Vienna, Austria, concerning one Stephan Rad- itch, an alleged Communist leader of Croatia. Now it happens that Mr; Raditch was not in the Communist Party of Jugo-Slavia at all, but of course he called himself a leader of the indepen- dent Croation republican party. In 1922, the Jugo-Slavs called for 2 parliamentary conference. When Raditch saw that the Communists were coming into power, he went on a speaking tour thru the cities and vil. tages of Jugo-Slavia urging the mass- es to withdraw their support for the Communist. Party. I wish to ask, if I may, the source ef your information contained in the article—N. M. Rasovich, Muskegon, Mich. s-¢e Stephan Raditch went to Russia about four months ago. While there he joined the Peasants’ Internatiofial. On returning to Jugo-Slavia he im- mediately started propaganda for ad. herence to that organization by the Croatian Peasant Party with the re sult that a large part split away from the old leadership and joined the Peas- To the DAILY WORKER:—Colone} Rascoe Conklin Simmons. “red” baiter ead commander of the corporal’s goard of good nigger, handkerchiof.. headed, self-styled race leaders, cries ike a new born babe in the Defender Foc. 27, 1924. “The colonel tells how he is abused, ssumed in evil words, denounced, slan- cered by envy, et. Poor thing. Mr. Simmons says that he has more friends among southern white people (aan any living Negro. Here is an erample of an ass loudly braying. to one in the world envies the cedonel, Bvery sane, sensible, intell- gent Negro and many whites pity him. Simmons is so devoid of manhood that if a southern cracker kicked him he would grin and thank the cracker. Simmions is so crooked that he can* trey in bed straight at night. For a few blood dollars, Simmons would tegad a ku lux klan tar and feather party to the home of any Negro who siews apy sign of manhood. Rosees Conklin Simmons, the yal- ‘=~ libertine, is like a faded harlot, shern of her beanty and attractive Lema. and who no longer appeals to men. The colonel ig no longer able w heedwink the Negro masses with da bunk, and he will soon be drop +eé from the capitalist payroll. Toug* dem these for faded flowers GORDON W. OWENS. To the DAILY WORKER:—I want to protest against the article in the “Viows of Our Readers” column of the DAILY WORKER by Doty, Bowman & Co. Besides slandering the white work- ets, we are informed by this company that white workers do not suffer from discrimination, police interference and mob violence—it is only the Negroes who suifer, As a workingman and ex-wobbly, I know this statement to be a false- hood out of the whole cloth: These fellows never heard of Frank Little, Joe Hill and scores of other victims class struggle. They never tured and lynched by business men and thugs. The white workers are called stupid and ignorant, for good measure, by these race patriots; if they would read the DAILY WORKER they could find out that viotenee is practiced against union men every day all over the country—not alone Negroes. _ Finally, it is demanded the DAILY WORKER must “constantly contain more editorials and Negro propa- ganda.” I protest against race propa- ganda, articles filled with lies and prejudice being injected into the col- rmns ef the DAILY WORKER. L. ROBERTSON, 1340 Wabash Ave. A Correction: To the DAILY WORKER: I have just received a copy of an article that has been sent to the DAILY WORKER by Comrade Watt from Washington, D.C. I wish to make a correction: He quotes me as follows: “We need action more than we need study.” This ought to be changed to the fol- lowing: We must get the comrades in the party to study, but we must un- derstand that not all comrades can be thoro Marxian students. What we need is action in the party. We need workeres who understand the funda- mentals of the movement and we must not permit the party to become a study class: We must not drive ac- tive members from the party by hurl- ing Marxian questions at them, but rather by trying to teach them. Harry Winitsky. IMPRESSIONS. Coolidge, alias “Silent Cal,” with his stovepipe on, looks like an un- dertaker. | Mussolini, Italy’s chief, black shirt with all his medals looks like a luna- tic escaped from an insane asylum and trying to imitate Napoleon. Prince of Wales with his his bent hat looks like a child given an over- dose of Castor oil. Calles, president of Mexico, looks like an enraged bull waiting for some- thing ta eat. Fred H. Herzberg.