The Daily Worker Newspaper, January 17, 1925, Page 7

| UR party has just passed thru its effects on the party have b cial, It was a symptom, not of de- cay, but of growth. These comrades who feared its effects and who be- came alarmed at its intensity, have missed the point, The discussion was a furnace from which the party is emerging strengthened and tempered, and better equipped for its historic task. A party which could stand such a severe discussion and grow strong- er by it proves that it is maturing and developing into a genuine Com- munist Party. Never in the history of our party was a minority given such full and . free opportunity to put its case be- fore the membership. There was ab- solutely no limit or restriction upon their rights. It was the aim of the Cc. E. C. fromthe beginning to widen and deepen the discussion and to draw the entire party membership into it. In this we were successful. Never before was the party so deeply stirred in the discussion of its tasks. “Bolsheviks do not fght over trifles.” So said Kamenev at a meet- ing of the Moscow party organization during the controversy with the op: position in the Russian Communist Party last year. Tliese words of Kamenev apply very well to the dis- cussion in our party. clear now to all that the controversy which has shaken the party to its foundations, has not been over trifles. In the discussion, the party had to consider two questions of fundamen- tal importance. -First, the question of the main line of party policy, and, second, the question of leadership. The prevailing policy of the-party is indissolubly bound up with the pro- letarian leading group of the C. E. C. Consequently, the attempt of the mi- nority to reverse our fundamental policy went hand in hand with the attempt to undermine and discredit the C. E. C. To both questions, the party has given a decisive answer. That answer is, against the policy and leadership of the minority and for the policy and leadership \of the c. E. C. The final results of the discussion could already be foreseen in the first series of membership meetings held on Sunday, December 28. The failure of the minority to carry such import- ant party centers as New York, Chi- cago, and Minneapolis, showed that their case was hopeless. Comrade Foster was quite correct when he said that the results of the first series of meetings spelled the defeat of the minority, and the repudiation of their policy. This analysis, however, was disputed by the minority. They placed all their hopes in the second series of meetings and made glowing predic- tions in regard to them. But these predictions did not materialize. Boston, Philadelphia, Buffalo and Pittsburgh all gave majorities for the ‘C. E. C. This was followed by deci- sive and overwhelming victories in such important party organizations as Los Angeles, San Francisco, Balti- towns adjacent to New York, and a number of other centers, until the question of the minority gaining a ma- jority in the party passed out of the range of possibilities. But the membership meetings, de- cisive as they were, do not fully in- dicate the strength of the C. E. C. To It should be: ‘The Results and Lessons of the Party, Discussion A STATEMENT BY THE CENTRAL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE sd party organizations in the centers of the farmer-labor movement and those party comrades who had been most active in our labor party campaign in the unions during the past two years which made up the vanguard of the C. E. C. support. The labor party centers, practically without ex- ception, supported the C. E. C. Most illuminating of all were the results of the membership meetings in New York, Boston, and Philadel- phia. The minority passes over in silence the result in Chicago, the pro- letarian center of the party; but‘for their decisive defeat in New York they have brought forward a number of “explanations,” each one contra- dicting the other. The events in the New York district during the recent months are of profound significance to the party. The minority wants to attribute their crushing defeat there to an “alliance” of the C. E. C. with the Lore group. But in this, as in many other matters, the minority is substituting wishes for accomplished facts. These “explanations” of the minor- ity do not in any,,.way change the fact that during the discussion, and thanks to the discussion, a new group came to the fore in the New York district, standing on the platform of the C. E. C. and that this group took over the leadership of the fight for the C. B. C. policy, and proved: itsett in the struggle to be stronger than either the Lore group or the minor- ity. The Lore group could live and’ grow on the stupid tactics of the mi- nority, but in conflict with the group of the C. E. C., which, in accord with the decision of the C. L, puts the question on a political and ideological basis, it will have no more success than the minority. One of the most fruitful results of the party discussion has been the emergence and crystallization of the C. B.C. group in the New York dix trict The fight between the minor ity and the Lore group for the con- trol of the New York district no long- er oceupies the center of the stage. The group of the C. E. C. has provod itself strong enough to conduct a struggle on political grounds against both groups simultaneously, and to defeat them both. The leadership of the New York district belongs neither to the minority nor to the Lore group. but to the C. E. C. The weakness of the minority was nowhere so clearly demonstrated as in Boston. Here the party apparatus was completely in the control of the minority. Comrade Ballam has fo: months been using his office of dis trict organizer as an instrument in the faction fight, even going so far as to compromise the party in the C P. P. A. conference, in order to make an “issue” against the C. EH. C. The district executive committee, under his leadership has been occupying it- self almost exclusively with the pass- ing of factional motions which were used as a basis for the propaganda of the minority, Comrade Ballam used his well-known abilities as “caucus or- canizer” to the limit in preparation for the Boston membership meeting. But all these “preparations” came to nething. The Boston membership meeting was a crushing blow to the hopes of the minority and to the fac- tionalism of Comrade Ballam. In Philadelphia, Comrade Jakira, who exceeded all bounds in his fac- tional conduct of the office of district organizer, made an even poorer show- ing. The rank and file revolt in the Detroit are already beginning to swing into line with the rest of the party in support of the C. E. C. The campaign of the C. BE. C. to re-edu- eate the party and to purge it of far- merlaborism will have the same suc- cess in these centers as_ elsewhere. More thoro consideration by the par- ty of the fundamental principles in- volved in the discussion will enable the C. E, C. to go to the next party convention with the support of at least ninety per cent of the party membership, The membership meetings not only registered a complete defeat for the farmer-labor policy of the minority; their fight for leadership shared the saine fate in an even more decisive fashion. The real aim of the minor- ity, which they have pursued in a coustious and organized manner, for the past year, was to overthrow the C. E. C. To this end a nation-wide caucus organization has been main- tained. The minority has confronted the C. BE. C. as an organized opposi- tion ever since the last convention and has resisted all our attempts to come to an agreement with them and to dissolve the factional organization. {n violation of all principles of Com- munist organization, tne smallest de- tails of C. BE. C. proceedings were transmitted, by means of the minor- ity caucus, down to the branches and the party was literally flooded with anonymous “documents,” rumors, “is- sues,” etc. A number of feder:.tion secretaries and editors were incorpor- ated inte this caucus under the lead- ership of C. FE. C. members of the minority, and it was attempted by this moexuns to mobilize the support of the federation members for the minority. The leaders of the minority could not by any means reconcile them- selves to a situation where the party leadership was in the hands of “hallt- educated workers” and “syndicalists,” as they characterized the proletarian elements in the party, especially those who emphasized the importance of work in trade unions. They were not wifling to recognize the validity of our mandate from the last party convention, They seemed to take it for granted that we would not be able #® varry out our responsibility. They expected us to turn the party over to -hem in desperation, since’ they were the self-acknowledged “Marxian trunk” of the party. Our efforts to formulate policies received no sym- pathy from them. And that we should uctually presume to write theses, etc., was considered almost a personal in- sult. The party during the past year was eenfronted with the most difficult problems since its founding, which tested and tried the leadership of the party as never before. The wild exag- gerations and overestimations of events, which had been committed by the C. E, C. last year, reacted against the party this year with full force. We were compelled to readjust our- selves a number of times and to adapt the party to an entirely new situation. Our party was sick with the fever of “high politics” and it was no easy task to lead it back to basic Com- mounist work. The decision of the Communist International against the “third party alliance,” the collapse of the farmer-labor movement, the presi- dential candidacy of LaFollette, the necessity that we put up our own party candidates—ali these events re- quired a series of quick changes in policy and it was a real achievement to carry them thru without any seri- ous disturbances or crises in the par- ty. Coupled with these external dif- ficulties, we constantly had the prob- lem of the organized opposition fight- | th ing for control of the party, striving to distort every action of the C. E. C. to seize upon and magnify every little mistake, real or imaginary, and use it for factional purposes. One of the greatest weaknesses of our young party in the past has been the lack of stable and authoritative leadership. There never yet has been, up to this year, a central executive committee which has been able to withstand an organized opposition. Continuity of leadership was a thing “Overthrowing the C. E. C.” has hitherto been any easy “pastime.” There is a section of our party which still carries with it the traditions of “permanent opposition,” which grew out of the long fight in the socialist party and which was even a part of the philosophy of the syndicalist and anarchist movements. This hostility and prejudice against all leaders offer- ed favorable soil in which to start an opposition and was fully exploited by the minority. Such comrades who have not yet assimilated the Leninist conception of proletarian leadership, who draw a line between the leaders and the party membership, and who do not understand their indissoluble connection, all rallied for the “raid” on the C. E. C, But with all these factors in their favor, with a year-long caucus organ- ization, and with a considerable amount of fundamental opposition in the party ranks to our main line of policy, the attack of the minority on the C. E. C. met with a decisive de- feat. This has an outstanding signifi- cance for the party. For the first time in the history of the party an organ- ized fight against the C. E. C. has failed. The C. E. C. has proved it- self fully able to lead the party thru the most difficult year of its *exist- ence, to execute a number of neces- sary changes in tactics, to adapt the party to the constantly changing po- litical situation, to cope with an or- ganized opposition, and at the same time to keep a firm hold on the party and to strengthen itself in the confi- dence of its most active and dynamic elements. These facts are the best augury that the party ranks will be unified and consolidated, and that fac- tionalism will soon be liquidated. In the course of the discussion, the opportunist and revisionist character of the farmer-labor policy of the mi- nority was established beyond all question by the minority themselves; and the reactions of their rank and file supporters merely gave it the final confirmation. From the slogan raised in Comrade Pepper’s pamphlet, “For a labor party” of “A labor party or the capitalist dictatorship,” it was only one step further to Comrade Lovestone’s book “The Government— Strikebreaker” and his pamphlet “The LaFollette Illusion” in which the role of the Communist Party is complete- ly eliminated from consideration. And from these deviations the proposals of many rank and file supporters of the minority, expressed at all the membership meetings, “to bore from within” the LaFollette movement and create a left wing there, followed na- turally and logically. The C. E. C. does not follow a pol- icy of reprisal and has no desire to prolong or accentuate the bitterness of the controversy. Nevertheless, we feel duty-bound to call the attention of the party to the superficial and cyni- cal attitude toward the party, mani- fested in the concluding article by Comrade Lovestone. In this article, which from beginning to end is filled with misrepresentations and perver- sions of facts, with flippant sneers and jibes, Comrade Lovestone even goes so far as to speak derisively of the party apparatus as the “state pow- er.” We know of nothing more anti- Bolshevik and anti-proletarian than such a contemptuous attitude toward the party apparatus, and we believe that all that is serious, proletarian and revolutionary in the ranks of the minority will repudiate it. The pro- letarian movement is neither a game nor an adventure. The party appara- = is not something separate from party. The party will find ways and means of making plain its point of view on these questions. The central feature of the “opposi- tion” in the Russian Communist Party was its attack on the party apparatus, made in much the same spirit as that of Comrade Lovestone, and in this, as in all else, it showed its fundamen- tal departure from Lonin’s teachings. In this connection our whole party can profitably study the words of Comrade Varski, of the Polish Com- munist Party, who now joins the cen- (Continued on page 6)