The Daily Worker Newspaper, October 24, 1925, Page 13

Carrying the Education Into the Shops By BERTRAM D. WOLFE. HE reorganization of our party implies. the reorganization of all of its departments. The discussions in the agitprop committee of district 2 have revealed that even members of that committee do not understand this fundamental fact. The educa- tional activity of our party must be thoroghly reorganized as to form and content if it is not to remain on the old social-democratic and narrow “monopolistic” basis on which it has hitherto stood, The gulf between the leadership of our party and the membership must be bridged over. The _ theoretical fundaments of Communism must cease to be a monopoly of a little group, Every member of every shop nucleus must be educated stimultane- ously in the fundamentals of Lenin- ism. The political level of our whole party must be raised. The Role of the Shop Nucleus. Tf the reorganization is not to be & mere mechanical change in struc- ture; if the shop nucleus is not to degenerate into a mere center for “shop talk” in which the level of the discussions will never rise above the discussion of the unsanitary condition of the toilets in the shops and the “toughness” of the foreman (im- portant as these may be); if the shop nucleus is really te become a basic Political unit of the party and the eenter of all discussions from the immediate problems of the shop to the fundamental political problems of the American and world working class;—then our educational activity must not stop at the central school, the library and the study class but must go further along with the rest of the party into the shops. VERY big crisis in the American party—and the history of our party has been a series of big crises —has demonstrated the unpleasant fact that great masses of our mem- bers, the majority of them, have little or no theoretical basis for their political thinking and do not know how to judge and execute a correct policy. To mention only two such crises—the “goose” crisis and the “labor party” crisis—is sufficient to demonstrate the fact that when a change in objective conditions moti- ates the adoption of a new policy by | party. our leadership, it is soon face to face with the powerful passive opposi- tion of a whole majority of our mem- bership and that the party must in each case go thru severe crisis be- fore the mew policy is adopted. This can only mean that however low the theoretical level of our leadership Tay be, even so there is between it and the mass of the membership a considerable gulf in capacity for Political thinking and analysis which gulf must be bridged over. I do not mean to say that we must neglect the necessity of further educating a leading group in our party, but of much more fundamental importance is the task of raising the theoretical leyel of the whole mass of our mem- bership and this must be done, not in a few scattered classes in geograph- . ical areas, nor in a central sehool but precisely in the shops where the mass of our membership is to be Every Member to Be Trained in Fundamentals of Leninism. educating every ry shop nucleus, right his nuélegs, in the fundamentals Leninism. — “But where teachers?” “There will, no doubt, be a hundred or several hundred shop nuclei in the will you get so many cation?” These were objections raised in the school committee to the plan of the reorganization of the educa- tional work and a motion was made SECTION TWO (PULLMAN AND VICINITY) Attention! finer section membership meeting of Section No. 2, which takes in the following branches: | Italian Dauphin Park, Italian Grand Cross- ing, Ukrainian Br. No, 2, Polish, Russian, Lithuanian No. 47, South Slav, South Chicago, Ukrainian No. 7, Nucleus No. 1, Nucleus No. 2, Nucleus No. 3, Nucleus No. 4—(all of Pullman), Chicago Heights, Lith- uanian Br., will be held Wednesday, Nov. 28, 1925, 8 p. m. at Stancik’s Hall, 205 East 115th street, Pull- man, : Every member of the Workers (Communist) Party attached to any- one of the above named units, must attend this meeting, if he or she wishes to retain membership in the Workers (Communist) Party. Registration of all members will take place here, for reorganization purposes; and assignments, as to where the various comrades belong, will be made. f It is of the utmost importance to the successful reorganization of the party in the city of Chicago that every member belonging to Section No, 2 attend this meeting. o delay the execution of this plan mtil the necessary corps of teachers iad been trained. This, of course, is 1 proposal to delay the effective re- organization of the party for an inde- finite period, and to continue the old system which has been in practice ever since we have had any educa- tional work in the American move- ment and which, up till the present, has naturally failed utterly to produce the mecessary corps of teachers to educate the entire mass of our party. lt also implies, although it was not so intended, the continuance of-our edu- cational activity as a monopoly of a small group of leading comrades for an indefinite period. The comrade who made the objection failed to see that in opposing the reorganization of our educational activity of the shop nucleus basis, he was objective- ly opposing the reorganization of the BOUT the middle of November, the work of making every shop nuc- leus a center of political discussion and of preparing the corps of direct- ors of that political discussion in the Central School will begin simultane- ously. Every shop nucleus will select one member, preferably the shop nuclens organizer, to go to the Central School one night every other week }and receive instruction in what is known as the “Shop Nucleus Training Course” under Comrade Jack Stachel. The shop nucleus will pay for the course (2.50 for three months) and exact the attendance of its designee. What the Course Will Offer. The one chosen by the shop nucleus to take the training course will re- ceive: 1. An outline of each of the lessons that he is to give in his shop nucleus. 2. A lesson on the content of that: outline, wt BaF aie dincee ! u | ee fi itse |i REE sees 2 BS d be on the ‘practical rather than the theoretical side of each subject stud- ied so that the course will be a sort of guide for directing the political discussion of the nuclei. and their practical activities. So much will the practical aspect be emphasized that the course may well be entitled “How to be a member of the Communist Party” for that is exactly what the “Fundamentals of Leninism” prepares for, for active conscious membership in the Communist Party, the vanguard of the proletariat. The course will include such fundamental topics as: What is a party? What is the role of a Communist Party? The relation of the party to the masses of the proletariat and to other elasses in society, with special refer- emce to class divisions in the U. 8. The structure, organization and functioning of our party. Communist work in the trade un- ions. ’ Participation in election campaigns. Other major campaigns of the party. Theory and practice of the united front with special reference to Amer- ican conditions. Bolshevization. ; Loreism; and other pressing party problems which form the basic con- tent of our political work at present. ’ was further objected against this plan that “It is dangerous to permit the discussion of the ‘United Front’ in the shop nuclei under the direction of untrained, or only partly trained, comrades.” Political Discussions Must Go On in the Nuclei, This objection again reveals an un- couscious objection to the reorgan- ization of the party; the failure to understand that, well or ill, every shop nucleus must discuss the united front and other basic problems and determine its policy through their discussions and decisions and must also carry its policy into effect. Also, underlying this objection, there exists @ vague, unconscious feeling that educational activity is the monopoly of that section of our party which gets to the class room and that the directing of such discussion is the monopoly of that small section of our party which is “versed in’ theory.” It is not a question of how well this) discussion in the shop nuclei will be directed but it is, rather, a question of whether this discussion shall be directed at all. Discussion on the united front and other basic political problems of our party must take place SECTION FIVE (NORTH SIDE TERRITORY) Attention! $ Sapa: section membership meeting of Section No. 5, which takes in the following branches: North Side English, Finnish, German, Hungar- ian, Italian Terra Cotta, Lakeview Scandinavian, Roumanian, will be held Thursday, Oct. 29, 1925, 8 p. m. at Imperial Hall, 2409 North Halsted street. Every member of the Workers (Comunist) Party attached to any one of the above named units, must attend this meeting, if he or she wishes to retain*membership in the Workers (Communist) Party. Registration of all members will take place here, for reorganization Purposes, and assignments, as to where the various comrades belong, will be made. It is of the utmost importance to the successful reorganization of the party in the city of Chicago that every member belonging to Section . 5 attend this meeting. ea ————— = in every shop nucleus if our reorgan- ization is to be Bolshevization in its ideological content as. well as in its | mere form. The question is not be-’ tween well-directed and ill-directed discussion but between directed dis- cussion and discussion without any direction at all. The shop nucleus discussion leaders’ will not be en- couraged to regard themselves as “last word authorities” on all of the problems raised during the discussion. On the contrary, they will be required to report on the discussion and the problems raised at the next session of their shop nucleus training course in the Central School and here’ the discussion of the group leaders and of the instructor will iron out differences, decide disputed points and furnish a sort of “court -of “appeal”. for, the | decision of differences which arise in the nucleus discussions. TH the plan outlined above, the agitprop committee of District 2, hopes to be able, in some small meagure, to contribute to “the com- bining of the propaganda for Lenin- ism with the actual political questions, struggles and organization work of the party” and to contribute to the Bol- shevization of our party in ideological political respects as well.as in the structural reorganization. - MINNEAPOLIS WAGING AGGRESSIVE CAMPAIGN TO RAISE IMMEDIATE. | FUNDS FOR THE DAILY WORKER MINNEAPOLIS, Minn., Oct. 23.—Minneapolis is the latest district or- ganization of the party to go over the line to save The DAILY WORKER. top and take its place on the fighting The national organization department has just received a report from the district office showing that the WORKER is certainly being met. response to the call of The DAILY In reporting on the progress of the district to mobilize along the lines of the plans laid down by the organization department, Comrade Hathaway, the Minneapolis district organizer, says: “Immediately upon the receipt of best of it is that a considerable por- tion of it is being raised from non- party members. “St. Paul is carrying on a similar campaign. I have no definite report on the amount collected except that one comrade raised $45.00 last Sun- day and several other teams worked all day.” 3,000 Spanish Miners Live on Doles After | Digging Too Much Coal (Special to The Daily Worker)