Page THE MILITANT February 1, 1929.
February 1, 1929.
THE MILITANT Page On the Situation in Russia Miners Protest the Expulsions to being to our Party.
duty vitcapitalist morning we sect class correct carThe Minneapolis Meetings the proletariat. appears which change and well organ: formed Trotsky Deportation from Russia a.
Communist Continued from page and is also not diminished. The adventure with taken began already with the Sixth Congress. We Whoever poses the question in that way, puts the Thaelmann is of course no accident. The present must develop these steps, broaden them and deepen slogan of the secret ballot not in relation to the regime is a hothouse for Smolensk affairs on an in them.
skipting situation, from which so far no way out ternational scale. And these gentry, the people of bound us with these international events. Only a has been found, but puts it in relation an ideal. Smolensk and Hamburg, condemn us and expel us.
ized situation where all workers vote and firmly according to their convictioneageously Their work consists of befouling the banner of fool could draw from that the conclusion that this Communism and destroying the Comintern.
the case, the existing domestic policy and the sion, one must abolish the slogan of the secret bal. HISTORIC MISSION OF THE OPPOSITION policy of the Opposition are equivalent for the fate even in in order better to de The more they do this, the more they demon building of socialism in one country; that is known.
and have never said not say that Velop activity and courage. In China one could strate the gigantic mission of the Opposition on an we possess a of course summon the brave hearted workers to wonder working recipe international scale. We must bend all our energies which will remove the conbrave would lose to form the genuine Bolshevik cadres in the struggle tradictions of socialist development in a capitalist their besing, but the next What have to offer is is a correct of secret ballot (in all elections) can have an ex That is the chief difference between the third five orientation, a correct prognosis, and the traordinary significance. since this slogan is dictated years of the Comintern and the second. Six years line deriving from it. The axis of our domestic by the relation of class forces. Although the socia were necessary in order to bring the weightiest policy is the maintenance of power in the hands regime has with us a different foundation, never questions and differences out of the bureaucratic un the proletariat or or more accurately, the return to theless this foundation is already in great part overderworld into the world arena. That point is now the of this power, which has been usurped grown with weeds. It is not true that the character reached. No power can again suppress the prob by the apparatus, and a further reinforcement of our elections and ballots is determined today by lems and counter problems now presented. The the dictatorship of the proletariat upon the basis kers. No, it is already to a great degree determined grow through their own experience. We are not life conditions of the working class. There are no by the changed relations of the class forces. This demanding a commandeering of the International other recipes and none are needed.
finds its objective expression in the governOpposition in the spirit of the Executive Committee The Opposition has correct line. The task is mental apparatus, in has truly said: These cadres can only be destroyed atic exchange of theoretical experiences. an content to make this the line of the proletarian vanguard.
ation in the sphere of the Marxian analysis of sciousness of the great historic mission which is also a certain bureaucratic boasting and intimida events, and a working out of slogans for action ours, and we must act with genuine Bolshevik tion. With a real wave from below the apparatusthat is the beginning. The first serious steps to be courage.
man will duck: he will not let it come to a civil war.
In any case this course the course of a reform through powerful pressure of the masses must be tried out to the end. At the present stage the slogan the secret ballot drives the masses forward towards activity, and away from passivity. At Continued from page ber, the organizer and leader of the Red Army. He and every meeting where there is talk of self cri Trotskyites Take to Armed Counter Revolution; Rakovsky, Smilga, Mratchkovsky, Smirnov, Fishe has exiled or imprisoned Radek, Preobrazhensky, shevik Leninists must and can say: In order to the Soviet Power Must Destroy Them. He writes: lev, Schmidt and thousands of other heroes of Octo Trotskyism shows itself as genuine menshevik counter ber. He who in 1917 proposed a coalition with the make it possible for us to vote accordino to our revolution boldige sket bas everthrom plate Sovie Dowier. Party life without disagreements, is convictions, without fear of loss of employmentis virulently inIt is absolutely certain that the and the workers that is secretly. Then all the apparatus men will government under its Leninist guidance, will mercilessly Party today; every diversion or opinion from the rultolerant of the slightest disagreement within the be held in check.
crush this new counter revolutionary conspiracy. It is must begin with the Party, then go on to the We ing bureaucracy is slashed at with an axe. On the their duty to the international working class to do so.
road to capitulation the splitting and disorganizaunions. As to the Soviets, where different classes Minor can write these disgraceful lines even take part in the voting, the question must be sub though it covers the Party with shame and dishonor.
tion of the Party is only an incident.
ordinated until we have gathered the necessary exThe renewed arrests and persecutions assail the He is an old hand at this game. He writes now perience.
class conscious workers everywhere with the insistent about Trotsky just as he wrote about Lenin in the question: Whose hand is here? What class is PERSPECTIVES OF THE STRUGGLE Red hating New York World of February, 1919. strengthened by these measures? Trotsky long ago As regards the general perspectives of the strugHe said then: warned Stalin: gle, both domestic and international, must limit The main fact in the new situation is that the so called myself here to general remarks, reserving the right nationalization of Russian industry has put insurgent in We are familiar with repressions. We are accustomed to come back to these questions in the near future, to blows. We will not surrender the October Revolution in order to treat them more concretely, and also guise their activities by giving orders under the magic to the policies of Stalin the entire essence of which is contained in these few words: Repression of the proletarian reference to the more important individual title of People Commissaries. Our emphasis. nucleus, fraternization with the compromisers of all councountries. as have already done in part with refertries, capitulation before the world bourgeoisie.
At that time he was defending the genuinely counence to China. The Chinese Question after the. considerable part of the about whom he substituted lies for understanding sheviks in Russia. The arrested Bolsheviks are ter the ter revolutionary anarchists against the Bolsheviks, Such is the meaning of the new arrests of the Boldocuments we sent to the Congress was dedicated and sympathy. Today, he lies with the same ease upholding the banner of the October Revolution.
gle with the international strunde. out her theoretical about cians of Democratic Centralism do not understand Bolshevismsky, the authentic living leader of world The American Communists who defended the Rusand calls for his head, and for the mersian Revolution since 1917 must understand this.
this relation thev ciless crushing of Trotsky comrades.
in general no line.
In the international question there annear, not accidentally, print certain purely adventurist blocs with people who by Trotsky. We print the article referred to on ing and circulating a counter revolutionary article sian Opposition is the one and only means of continuing that fight.
have altogether with Marxism, people like another page of this issue. Our readers can see Trotsky has been banished to Turkey, because Korsch and Co. In his latest pronouncements, that it is saturated with the unbreakable will of the none of the imperialist countries, these allies of Smirnov is merely a Left caricature of Stalin. Opposition to maintain the victory of the October counter revolutionary Trotskyism would permit Europe is now passing through a phase of a Revolution, to defend it all of its enemies, their arch enemy to enter their borders. He has rather lively strike movement. This wave is to a quard it it from the insidious attacks of the Kulak, the been sent to Turkey, whose capital swarms with certain extent economically belated. since it co. the bureaucrat, the foreign bourgeoisie, counter revolutionary, White Guard vermin, who incides with a considerable lowering of the econ instruments from the conscious never lost their heir hatred for the man who organized omic prosperity. The belatedness of the strike wave conscious agents of the Thermidor who stand be the Red Army that drove them out and deprived was caused by growing influence of the social democrats, by the hind the policies of Stalin, with a smug and satis them of their estates and privileged positions. His the previous heavy and the ficd leer at every new step he takes against the deportation there means virtually to deliver him to bureaucratic passivity in the policy of the Comin Leninist Opposition. There is not a breath of the White Guards. Should any harm come to TrotA further lowering of the economic proscounter revolution in this brilliant document for it sky at their hands, the revolutionary working class peritu must bring the economic struggle into the is predicated on the only correct program of strug of the world will hold Stalin personally and politpolitical field, and favor the leftward move gle, in the Bolshevist sense, against the increasing ically responsible for the crime! Let this be said ment of the workers. It will have a different tem aggressiveness and impudence of the class enemies openly and let all workers know its meaning.
po in different countries. But an extraordinary of the Russian proletariat.
sharpening of the political situation in certain Euro Trotsky is again sounding the alarm. He is warnpean countries not impossible even in the ing against the destructive role of Stalin, for Stalin Ready Nowfuture. This denends to a large degree upon the is splitting the Party and the proletariat, the ranks denth, the duration and the extent of the oncoming of the revolution. When Lenin died, the remain THE DRAFT PROGRAM OF THE crisis, not only in Europe but also in the United ing leaders of the Parts and a united leadership gave repeated assurances COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL will overcome its crisis at the cost a united By TROTSKY of Europe, and can, with its pressure could continuation of Lenin course.
With an Introduction by James Cannon countries. Germany in the first place, bring them Stalin is following a consistently opposite path. He THIRTY FIVE CENTS PER COPY In lots of or more 25 cents per Copy immediately revolutionary situations. Here ap has drained the Party of its best blood.
pears in our perspective the chief contradiction, that Order now from between the tasks of the enoch and the maturity of international disarmament and gains the praise of He who now proposes to the world bourgeoisie THE MILITANT the Communist Party. The danger of missing new Box 120, Madison Square Station the bourgeoisie pacifists by proposing to disarm the New York, revolutionary situations is absolutely not removed, Red Army. has driven into exile the Lion of OctoWe print herewith the protest of a group of the skyism. We have made an earnest effort to be but by having both sides of the question fully repreoutstanding leaders of the National Miners Union come steadily better Communists, steadily more ef sented and all documents bearing on the subject against the expulsions of Communists from the Par fective in the class struggle, for the emancipation of made available to the membership.
ty and their demand for Party democracy and a the working class and in so doing render the ut We most vehemently protest the splitting bureaureal discussion of the questions in dispute. most service and loyalty to Jan. 13, 1929. less of what is said and done by others. And regard cratic policy of expulsions from the Party for politwe shall conIt must cease and all those expelled tinue to do so, but we consider it highly necessary Communists To the and to the District again be reinstated to full membership and real Dear Comrades: Communists and Party members in the Party with their rights and duties.
At our last meeting of Springfield mine nucleus by squarely before us without any attempts at intimto demand that the issues of this controversy be put Signed byregular motion the following resolution was unan idation; not by the method of expelling all these George Voyzey, Joseph Angelo, Roy Jones, Stanley Horbut, Leone Michelangeli, Doimously adopted. menico Domini, Shimkous.
We the undersigned, members of the Springfield, revolutionists who take the one side of the question, Illinois party unit, view with great alarm the policy of expulsion of proletarian members ried on by our party leadership in what appears to us as being in pursuance of purely factional aims. policy which we have faced to great detriment of One of the largest and most rousing Communist methods. It has won the support of the great mathe revolutionary cause as it us in other meetings in years here was held last night at jority of the sympathizing workers and has strengthelds of the class struggle in which we have been Hall under the auspices of the Opposition Com ened its own morale and conviction. Our work in active for years. policy we maintain to be munists with James Cannon speaking on The the coming period will be animated by a move dethe most arrogant form of of bureaucratism and to our Truth about Trotsky and the Platform of the Oppo termined and militant spirit than before.
mind has absolutely no place in a workers pro sition. Over 250 workers packed the hall to the VINCENT DUNNE.
letarian Communist party when applied as in this doors and listened with the closest attention to Cancase to members whose record proves themselves non two hour exposition of the Opposition cause. The Mink nunist by their services to the movement perduring years of activities.
ized Workers Guard the meeting was protected Hasn he (Shadow the Weasel) any enemies asked Peter Rabbit.
political views alone is a policy of splits, of wrecks brought the police to Thursday meeting and re Oh, yes, replied Old Mother Nature. Reddy ing the Party and should and must be most decisively sulted in it being broken up by them were not at Fox, Old Man Coyote, Hooty the Owl and various condemned by the membership.
members of the Hawk family have to be watched for tempted by him. But they do not worry him much. You As it appears to us, the party leadership in an At Wednesday meeting held at Hall see he moves so quickly, dodging out of sight in a effort to cover up the series of right wing errors gang of thirty or more hooligans organized by the flash, that whoever catches him must be quick inand its complete right wing line, has now resorted Party leadership rushed the hall early in the even deed. Then, too, he is almost always close to good cover. He delights in old stone walls, stone piles, to the destructive expulsion policy as a last des ing before the crowd arrived. Comrades Skoglund brush grown fences, piles of rubbish and barns and perate act reaching a point at present of utilizing and Coover who were alone, handling tickets at the old buildings, the places that Mice delight int. In the door, were attacked by the entire gang and badly such places there is always a hole to dart into in corrupt bureaucratic leaders in control of the trade beaten by black jacks and brass knuckles. The time of danger. He hunts whenever he feels like unions, the old miners union being an outstanding slugging of these two prominent militants was ac it, be it day or night, and often covers considerable ground, though nothing to compare with his big, dastardly example. We as Communists, many of complished by a division of labor between the memus belonging to this union, have fought with all our bers of the Lovestone brown, water loving cousin, Billy Mink. It is beFoster factions. The lat cause of his wonderful ability to disappear in an revolutionary devotion this expulsion policy of the ter held the arms of Coover and Skoglund from be instant that he is called Shadow.
union bureaucracy, receiving at all times the full hind while the former wielded the black jacks over The Burgess Animal Book for Children.
and undivided support of the entire their heads.
Consider the curious case of George Mink, the secretary of the Seamen Club in New York, who stepped forward Party and all its members only to see it now re The attempt of the hoodlums to prevent com in the Daily Worker of January 28, 1929, to disavow sorted to and applied in the same ruthless manner rade Cannon from speaking resulted in a fight any and all connections with the Cannon Trotsky moveby a bureaucratic leadership in the Party itself. In which brought the Police who broke up the meeting stolen by her care. co jinmy artists along with other one constructing the National Miners Union, and in lay pulling Cannon down from the platform and driving down laws to govern its officers and members ing the crowd from the hall. This collaboration terial. Among the receipts was one made out to George we have taken particular care and made the most of the police and gangsters in the suppression of the dollar. Not satisfied with the results of their burglary, strenuous efforts that the establishment of such workers right of free speech aroused violent bureaucracy should not be repeated and these meth: ment among the radical workers throughout the city plishments that of forgery, and they faked a receipt to the ods never again be used against the left section of who have seen the Minneapolis Oppositionists in unfortunate Mink to make it appear that he had contributed 50. 00 to The Militant. few days after this crude the membership. This was also carried out with the vanguard of every struggle of the militant wor forgery, and on the basis of it, Mink was declared by the the full support and under the guidance of the Party. kers for past.
Polcom to be suspended from the Party and removed from In our Party it appears to us, it is now the left The cancelled a forum program of their his work among the seamen.
wing section, the opponents of the right wing line own and rented their hall to us for the Saturday statement that have never at any time subscribed to of the Party leadership who become the expulsion meeting, as a demonstration against violation of The Militant, or supported it in any way, nor have ever victims.
We fully recognize that our Communist Party fered to help in protecting the meeting from disrup Cannon Trotsky movement, or to Cannon, or to the Trotcan never be put in the same category as a trade tion by the gangsters. The latter however failed sky movement in any way, shape or form. And he then union, that our Party must have a solid foundation to show up. They were brave enough to fight with proceeds to bow his head and beat his breast and renounce the Trotskyite devil and all his works and all his of discipline, but we are just as decidedly opposed thirty against two but lacked the courage to show pomps. His terrified tremolo rises above the chant of the any usurpation of power within our Party which up at the Saturday meeting where a larger group of congregation and he calls the assembled brethren to witsubstitutes expulsion for Communist education to militants were on hand early and prepared to meet ness: defy anyone, inside or outside of the Party, to perpetuate a bureaucratic, extremely factional con them.
prove that have supported Trotskyism, or been lax in my trol, to make permanent duty to fight it. intend to continue struggling against incorrec wing Comrade Cannon speech, his array of arguments, Trotskyism.
political line and completely destroys any real foun suppressed facts and documents, made a profound We understand Mink predicament and we feel for him.
of Communist discipline built on correct impression and won many completely over to our He might have refrained from reciting the cheap, standard side. Thirty five workers in the audience handed class against us, and denounced, instead, the genuine slanders of counter revolutionaries and anti working In addition to the many expulsions having taken in their names and addresses for notification of criminals in the Party who will not stop even at forgery place, just recently, one of the members of our other meetings and activities of the Opposition. and worse to insure the domination of opportnuist adSpringfield unit, Comrade Joe Angelo, has been On the invitation of the comrade Canventurism in the Party. But Mink must watch for Reddy suspended for a period of three months by the non remained over for Sunday night and gave a Lovestone, Old Man Pepper, and Hooty the Gitlow. He Chicago without even the formality of a lecture at their forum on Free Speech in the Labor that whoever catches him must be quick indeed. There is must move so quickly, dodging out of sight in a flash, trial, and without having been given the opportunity Movement to the great satisfaction of another always a hole to dart into in time of danger. It is beof stating his views in any respect in regards to the packed hall.
cause of his wonderful ability to disappear in an instant present controversy within the but that he is called Shadow. Thus speaks Burgess. And having committed the crime of protesting the Extensive meetings of the Opposition group were we add: It is by these traits, so peculiarly their own, that pulsion of proletarian members of the Party. Suching his visit which resulted in the clearing up of the Minks manage to eke out their precarious existence in a these hectic days. Their life is a miserable and unhappy methods are a reproduction of the corrupt official number of tactical questions and the unanimous one, but they probably reason that, after all, a Mink in the dom of the old reactionary bureaucracy of the trade agreement of the entire group on the line of action hole is better than no Mink at all!
unions of this country, especially the John Lewis for the future. The group passed a resolution de machine in the old of This method we manding the weekly publication of The Militant CURTIS ARRESTED IN ST. LOUIS ST. LOUIS, Mo. Sam Curtis was one of the seven men have vigorously fought in the union and we con and pledged 25 a week toward its maintenance. and women arrested here by the police for participation sistently and most decisively denounce as ultra fac Gangsterism has defeated and discredited itself in a picketing demonstration in front of the British Conbureaucratic and sulate in the Federal Commerce Trust Company building control of the worst sort ding to establish clique completely in Minneapolis. The Opposition has as a protest against the arrest and imprisonment of comwon a great moral and political victory over fascist rade Johnstone in India. Comrade Johnstone, wellThese expulsions and suspensions we notice, are known worker in the labor and revolutionary movement all as a result of what is known as TROTSKY CRITICISM OF THE DRAFT in the United States, was arrested by the British imperialare of the firm opinion that this is PROGRAM TO BE CONTINUED ists while acting as a delegate from the League Against purely a smoke screen used to eliminate certain op Owing to the heavy demands made on the space Imperialism to the trade union congress in India, at which ponents to the present leadership of the Party. We, of this issue of The Militant by comrade Trotsky he spoke.
letter on the Situation in Russia, the installment of like many others of the rank and file members of Comrade Curtis, arrested in St. Louis, was Young Worhis Criticism of the Draft Program of the Comin.
kers League sub district organizer in that territory, until a the Party, regret we have had practically no oppor tern had to be omitted. These installments will be little while ago when he was expelled for supporting the tunity to even become familiar with any of the issues continued in subsequent issues until the entire Russian and International Opposition. The opportunist involved in the dispute of the question called Trotdocument is run.
fakers in the Party have been denouncing him as a counter revolutionary and a renegade ever since.
with to an have in broken dation from to policies.
and their and un tern.
tern merely exis near tional, that only guarantee the taking to Trotskyism, we