August, 1st, 1929.
THE MILITANT Page rThe Crisis in the Communist Party nt ed יוב 1су The crisis in the American Communist movement By James Cannon ity this is literally the case. The is only the is a part of the crisis in the International which has rubber stamp for the Representative of the been maturing over a period of years. The Commu Lovestone in every infamous practice against loyal who in turn relies on cabled instructions at every nist movement throughout the world is paying, in dis Communists, who were his accomplices in gangsterism, change in the situation. The does not even integration and defeat, for the false leadership of in burglary and slander, nake this accusation with ill venture to write its own statements; this is obvious Stalin Centrism and the mechanical extermination of grace.
from their language. Such expressions as defeat all the Leninist wing.
efforts of drawing the Party away from the political The American Party was slow to manifest open reTHE OPPOSITION AND THE RIGHT WING path of the 6th Congress and sending the direction actions the International crisis, and particularly There can be no combination of the Communist Op to the devil show that the does not even do slow to develop a conscious participation in the world position with the Lovestone faction. serious dis a decent job of translating the staements it signs.
struggle over the basic questions which lie at the bot cussion in which the political issues are elucidated will STRENGTHENING THE RIGHT WING tom of the crisis, but it is catching up now with de make this absolutely clear. When we speak of the vastating speed. And what we see now is only a begin Lovestone faction in this sense it goes without saying Their method of fighting the vight wing only ning. Greater storms are ahead. The life of the move that we refer to the leaders only and not to the hon: strengthens it as an ideology in the Party. There is no ment is at stake. Only those who rouse themselves to est Communist workers who have been deceived by cducation of the party on the political issues. The think and act can play the part of Communist soldiers them with the help of the Many of these victories over the right are mechanical and temporary.
now and in the days ahead. Theological worshippers of are already finding their way to our platform and will The Lovestone right wing was nurtured too long to be formulae handled down from above, automatic hand be among its staunchest defenders.
suddenly uprooted by decree.
raisers, are worse than useless. The cult of corpse The right wing of the Russian Party, with which The political line of the leadership is heading toward obedience serves only the bureaucratic destroyers Lovestone is unquestionably connected, is the repre: catastrophic defeats for the Party which will weaken and holds back the awakening of the movement and sentative of the class forces in the Soviet Union its position in the class struggle and sharpen the crisis which are driving the restoration of capitalism. This in the party. Dhe false tactics of counterfeit leftism in its regeneration.
fact, now openly proclaimed by the Stalinists, was the preparations for the Conference, in the It is necessary first of all to tear aside the curtain also the case when it was in one bloc with Stalin to Gastonia defense, in the Needle Trades and in other of falsehood, deception and trickery behind which the exterminate the Leninist wing of the Party, and its questions will bring swift and devastating reactions.
pitiful subsidized agents of American Stalinism try bloodthirsty campaign against the Trotskyists was to conceal the real state of affairs from the party. the clearest expression of its Thermidorian character The leadership which promises to unite the Party The spurious enlightenment campaign is such a cur The dissolution of the Communist International would will itself fall apart into factions, in fact it is already tain. It talks of discussion of the issues and prohi be an inevitable corollary of its victory. For those doing so. The groupings which are taking place around bits it by organization measures and threats. It crus who want to fight for the preservation of our commu Koster on the one side and Bedacht on the other are ades against factionalism. under the direction of the nist movement, any kind of support for the right common knowledge in the circles of informed funcmost unprincipled and corrupted faction mongers. It faction to say. nothing of a blac with its American tionaries. These are not purely arbitrary and personal cries about the unity of the party and plunges the agents. cannot be spoken of lightly; it cannot be groupings, as may appear. They have a political base party headlong into a new split, the second in less than spoken of at all. An absolutely irreconcilable war in the impulse of Foster, whose real trend is toward a year.
The enlightment campaign is a bare faced against the right wing is the first and foremost duty labor progressivism, to find a way out of the blind alfraud, an insult to the party and a target for the of the American Opposition Communists.
ley of take leftism on the trade union field and the ridicule of its enemies.
The idea that the right wing Thermidorian elements wish of Bedacht to make good for his confessed sins Contempt for the Communist rank and file is a cha in the Russian Party can really espouse party demo of opportunism. This base will widen as the harmful racteristic of Stalinism which rules by apparatus com cracy an idea suggested in an editorial in the New results of the present tactics accumulate. Under the pulsion and corrupts by subsidy. Take the case of York Volkszeitung is the greatest and most danger impact of the class struggle, and of the blows of the Lovestone. For years the Stalin supported ous illusion. The right wing, by its very nature, by right wing on the one side and the Communist Opposihim in his criminal factionalism; time and time again the class forces of capitalist restoration it represents, tion on the other the present Central Executive Com.
Foster was his comrade in arms in the expulsion of the sion of the Bolshevik Leninists and to drive the Stalin any real principle foundation, is doomed to defeat Opposition Communists. Stachel, Bedacht Co. were Centrists who were allied with them onto this path. and collapse.
his partners in every perfidious faction manoeuvre, as. The condition for the existence and growth of the Stalinism is breaking up the ranks of International suring the Party that he represented the line of the right wing is the annihilation of the Leninists who communism, and the American section is now beginCommunist International. With the help of the are fighting for the October revolution and the rege ning to feel the full force of the International crisis. and with the help of Stachel, Bedacht and Wein neration of the Comintern on the line of Lenin. De This is the meaning of the crisis in the Party. The stone he gained the support of 90 per cent of the del mocracy for the right wing is only an expedient in the Communist forces must reform themselves and build egates at the Party Convention a few months ago. faction struggle with the Centrist Apparatus, not a anew. Help will not come from above; the source of Now, out of a clear sky, without Lovestone having principle of party organization which they would or the disruption lies there. The struggle against disinchanged his character or his actions in the slightest could apply, tegration must be organized from below. The redetail, he is expelled from the Party as an opportunist This is true also in America. The Lovestone who volutionary workers must awaken. They must give up and renegade. And Stachel, Bedacht and Weinstone demands party democracy expelled the Opposition blind obedience and begin to think and to act indeconduct a campaign to enlighten the party about Communists from the Party for their views alone. pendently. The struggle must cease to be an affair of the watter; explaining, however, that they, like Saul They went further the Lovestones and Fosters to the bureaucratic upper crust and become the conof Tarsus, suddenly saw the light and can now be gether. and expelled Communist proletarians for mere cern of the Communist workers in the mass. The detrusted safely.
ly protesting against the expulsion of the others. velopment of the initiative of the Party ranks and Party democracy is an absolute prerequisite for the their conscious intervention in the struggle is the hope THE STALINISTS AND THE RIGHT WING Party. It will be the mightiest weapon in the hands for the future of the movement. This means, as a beWhy should anyone be surprised if the enemies of of the proletarian elements for the salvation and re ginning, a fight for definite aims along the following Communism laugh and if the party members and sym. generation of the movement and for its normal de lines: pathetic workers fall away in bewilderment and dis. velopment on the revolutionary path. But Lovestone THE WAY OUT OF THE CRISIS gust? When we spoke at the December Plenum of the is not and cannot be the champion of this slogan.
Central Executive Committee about the growth of the FAILURE OF NEW LEADERSHIP In place of the fraudulent enlightenment camright wing in the Russian Party and the crisis in the paign. a real discussion of the three political tenRight Center Bloc, we were accused of scandal mon The re unification of the Party and the elimination dencies which are now taking definite shape in the gering and speculation. Pepper, who made the re. of factionalism are categorical tasks for the accomplish American Party. Such a discussion calls for the pubport against us, denied the existence of any differences ment of which the conscious revolutionaries must band lication of all important documents and a free opporbetween Stalin and Bucharin, and Foster nodded ap together and fight. The Open Address and the tunity to explain and clarify the conflicting views.
proval of the statement. Now the Party, which was measures which followed it have not and cannot solve Only in this way can the Party be educated politically left in ignorance of all the developments, is blandly this problem. Crisis, splits, paralysis and disintegration and enabled to act consciously, solving its problems informed that Lovestone is aligned with the Russian are the results so far. And the coming period will only without inner convulsions. We stand for such a discusand International right wing and therefore must be intensify the crisis, widen the splits and increase the sion because we know that in it the Leninist line will expelled.
demoralization until the course is changed. To bring prevail and the right wing, which thrives on bureauThe Party member who takes official pronunciamen this change about a discussion and an education of the cratic measures, will be politically annihilated, tos on faith does not understand this rigamarole Party, a correct line of tacties in the class struggle Genuine party democracy in place of the regime and for a good reason. The Right Center Bloc (Stalinty and standing on its own feet, are necessary. They must be created where nothing is taken for granted and a bona fide leadership, freely chosen by the Par of administrative terror and suppression. situation Rykov Bucharin) which has ruled the International through the six year war against Trotzkyism has are lacking now.
conspired all the time to prevent the Communist work of yes men and parasitical place hunters who confess and take the right to speak out what they think withThe present make shift leadership, a conglomeration behind official authority. The members must assert and where incompetent bureaucrats can no longer hide ers from knowing the truth about the conflict within their sins for self advancement, patched together from out fearing organization measures and threats. There it. p to the present moment the identity of the lead the tag ends of the old factions and appointed by ers of the right wing (Rykov Bucharin Tomsky) has cablegram from above, cannot overcome the crisis and rights to defend their views is the first prerequisite.
instatement of the expelled Oppositionists with full not been disclosed in the official Party press, although unite the Party. The stop gap leadership of today only without this party democracy is a sham.
everyone knows it except the loyal Party member makes matters worse. It has all the faults of the Lovewho is supposed to know everything. The question of stone regime without any of its strength or independthe right wing in the Russian Party is indeed a burn ence. It confuses the Party by giving the outward ap activities who have independent opinions and the abi: genuine proletarianization of the leadership in which bona fide workers, leaders in class struggle of the Russian Revolution of the Comintern and, con dom and factional corruption which does not exist in lity to defend them, play an active part in all the leada sequently, of our Party is bound up with it. But the reality. enlightenment campaign only obscures and muddles the great issue, keeps the membership from under is in charge of the campaign against factionalism. Is poses only.
Lovestone is out but Stachel remains. And Stachel electing harmless proleterian elements for show purstanding it and thus strengthens the right wing and this not a spectacle for gods and men? Stachel, the orLovestone, its uotstanding American representative. reorganization and reduction of the Party apmanoeuvre of Stalin Centrism which evil enterprise of disruption, the most dubious charac ployees of auxiliaries, now exceeds ten per cent of the ganizer and right hand man of Lovestone in every paratus which, including the functionaries and embrands Lovestone as an opportunist and expels him ter that ever floated to the top in the foul waters of Party membership. These paid officials, remote from from the Party seven months after he expelled us party factionalism, an individual with no tradition, ex the actualities of the class struggle, are a crust over cannot change the position of the Communist Opposi perience, ability or integrity, the faction monger who the party, stifling its normal life and monopolizing tion on any of the principle questions, above all on the lived by factionalism Stachel has made the sign of party discussion and direction. The drastic reduction question of the right wing. It was the Bolshevik Lenin the cross and become the apostle of unity.
ists in the Russian Party. the. Trotskyists who of this staff and the election of fresh worker elements analyzed its social basis and exposed its Thermidorian Wicks, equally characterless and with far less ability, Wolfe is removed from the Political Committee and will strengthen and invigorate party life.
character. The Opposition alone wages a real struggle takes his place: Gitlow is slated to go but Bedacht, and the Party adjusted to operate by its own means Subsidies of all kinds must be absolutely abolished against it in defense of the Prolearian Dictatorship. who by his own confession was steeped in moral and derived from membership dues and contributions. OpThe present sham battle of the Centrists against the political corruption is promoted. Add a few Amters position to subsidy is no prinsiple. Mutual assistance right wing is carried out only under the whip of the Opposition.
and Tallentires the numer makes no difference be of revolutionary parties has played a positive role in cause they weigh nothing and Foster. This is the the past and no doubt will do so in the future. But in The newly appointed leadership of the Party, in new leadership.
the present situation subsidy has become an order to create confusion, spreads rumors of a combin The new leadership has no real authority. Its tem ment for corruption, for bureaucratization and crushation between the Opposition Communists and the porary existence signifies the abolition of a genuine ing out independent life. Opposition to subsidy under Lovestone faction. Weinstone predicts such an leading body and the establishment of a receivership these conditions is a fight for the integrity of the Par.
eventuality in his article in the Daily Worker. These over the Party by the Stalin This so called ty.
people who themselves change with every wind and leadership enjoys no confidence in the Party ranks and 16. The Party must have a real. Convention, preceded every cablegram from Moscow do not understand a the loyal Party members who want salvation by by an honest dingussion and the honest selection of struggle on principle lines. The Weinstones and For faith alone ate falling back on the who ww not The new truTig ALT.