The Coming Dress Strike Talk with the Left wing Needle Trades Union Members Wicks at Large Again a November 1, 1929.
THE MILITANT Page well as he does its Brandlerite brother in Germany But not a word of that in the The first page contains a statement which says nothing at all about its position on the burning issues of the Russian revolution greatest crisis, about the struggle between three tendencies in the Comintern. Lovestone article on Russia is a cowardly mass of meaningless platitudes, in which he dares not come out boldly for the Russian Right wing, except through the furtive expedient of The New York joint board of the Needle Trade merman, Gold, et al. But Browder could never have calling the Five Year Plan Rykov plan. He does Workers Industrial Union Left wing) has finally conceived at that time (1925) that Zimmerman, Wortis not endorse the Right wing groups in the Internaadopted an official position on the dressmakers strike and Co. would go so far in their opportunist sectarian tional; only gives highly colored favorable news now being planned by the leaders of the Right wing ism as to adopt their present decision, or that he, about the Brandler, Jilek Hais, Huber, Flyg and Roy union, the The essence of this decision Browder, as one of the leaders of the Party, would factions. That is how Lovestone is preparing the has been known for some time among the Left wing endorse that decision!
followers for deeper swamps. The Revolutionary Age, workers, but it has aroused no enthusiasm among There was an occasion in the Party when one of its to borrow a term from Browder, is an organ of cowardthem. And the passive and even antagonistic reaction leaders was only partly guilty of the monstrous blunder ly opportunists.
of the workers is a healthy sign for the Left wing, for which the entire Party leadership is now zesponsibecause the decision that has been made by the offi ble. That was during the 1925 strike of 150, 000 ancials of the Left wing union, directed by the Party thracite miners, when Ben Gitlow developed his faspecialists, is certain to deal the one of mous thesis that: The anthracite coal strike is a the heaviest blows it has yet suffered!
conspiracy between the officials and the coal operators. An unsigned editorial by Wicks in the Daily At the membership meeting of the dressmakers in It will benefit only the coal interests. The strike will Worker (10 26 1929) strains itself to the utmost to the Left wing union, held in Webster Hall on October not benefit miners out on strike. It will cause explain away the recent defections of George Bessadov.
17, 1929, the recommendations of the joint board were untold hardships the workers in the eastern states sky and Paul Marion in France. In the course of the adopted, including the following, which forms the es that depend upon onth coal. The miners will short editorial, we inim of two wopping sential kernel of the whole question: 2) Should the remain out on strike for many months. They will lies, not to mention seventeen smaller ones, including Schlesinger coterie with the leaders of its dress bosses probably go back to work without any material ad. one slander of Militant.
association call the dressmakers to a stoppage, the said vantages gained. The check off will be won by Lewis. Wicks speaks of one George Bessadovsky, who call shoud be entirely ignored. Morning Freiheit, The strike is a John Lewis strike, a strike led by was dismissed from a subordinate post at the French 10 18 1929. Since this decision is qualified in absothe policy of class collaboration. It is cooperation be embassy (of the Soviet Union. and who gets together lutely no respect, it means in plain English: When the tween the officials of the union and the owners of the with counter revolutionary thieves and blackguards Right wing union calls its strike of the dressmakers in mines for mutual self interest. It does not in the least with the kind permission of Monsieur Briand. This New York, the workers in the Left wing union are in help the workers or attempt to solve their intolerable one, George Bessadovsky was not dismissed, and did structed to remain at work in the shops while the rest conditions. Ben Gitlow, The Workers Monthly, Nov. not hold a subordinate post in the Russian embassy.
of the dressmakers are striking and picketing. Or in 1925, page 17. He ran off of his own accord, and his post was that of still plainer English, the Left wing is instructed by At that time, such a hue and cry was raised against Acting Ambassador of the Workers Republic in the Zimmerman Wortis Gold Foster and Weinstone to scab! this reactionary sectarianism by Party leaders like absence of Valerian Dovgalevsky. As for his friendCan the decision adopted have any other significance Cannon, Foster, Dunne and. others, that not even Gitship with Briand, there is an interesting story to tell.
or result? Absolutely none. The whole needle trades low faction, which was then leading the Party, could After Comrade Trotsky was deported to Turkey, he market knows to a man that the Right wing bureaudefend his position and it was finally repudiated and applied to various European countries for asylum. One crats are unmistakably moving forward in their dress condemned. Substitute Schlesinger for Lewis, dressof the secretaries of the French Communist Party, makers organization drive (and this too because of the makers for miners, dress bosses for coal operators, Bouthonnier, ran to the Soviet embassy and pleaded grievous past blunders of the Left wing. It is known and you have exactly the same arguments made by frantically with Dovgalevsky and Bessadovsky to see that when Schlesinger, Dubinsky and Co. get ready to Messrs. Foster Zimmerman Gold today as were made Briand and influence him to prevent Trotsky from comin 1925 by Gitlow. But not even Gitlow ventured to call their stoppage or strike, their appeal will be foling to France. couple days later, the Soviet reprelowed, for one reason and another, by the bulk of the go so far as to call upon the Left wing miners to stay sentatives were visited for the same purpose by Marcel dressmakers, as was the case in the recent cloakmakers at work; he advocated the intervention of the then Cachin, who trembled and groaned that if Trotsky strike. If the senseless policy of the Left wing is carProgressive Miners Committee in an effort to make were to enter France he would ruin the Communist ried through in practise, it will mean that while the the anthracite strike a real struggle in the interests of Party. As is known, Comrade Briand accomodated majority of the shops are being struck, the Left wing the workers. Gitlow developed logically to his presComrades Bessadovsky and Cachin and the French workers will be compelled to work on scab garments.
ent position as one of the leaders of the Right wing Communist Party was saved. But while he is at it, The Left wing peculiar tactic will not only be misinside and outside the Party. Again, it is no accident will Wicks explain to us how it can happen that an understood by the needle trades workers in general, that the present policy like so many others of the out and out counter revolutionist could have remained but it will certainly discredit and set back the Left Party and the Left wing, so revolutionary at first in such a high Soviet post for so long a time, while wing movement for a long time.
sight, should prove in actuality to be only a further the Bolshevik fighter, Rakovsky, who was his superior Why did the Stalinist adventurers force this insane application of Gitlow Right wing thesis of 1925. The at one time, is today in exile at Barnaoul?
difference is that today, unlike 1925, there is no redecision upon the Left wing union? Is this really a Recently, in the world capitalist press, another radical policy or is it opportunism gone made? If sponsible Party leader to raise his voice in condemna pimple burst in the form flamboyant exposures by it is the former, how does it happen that such contion of the policy just adopted for the dressmakers.
an hitherto unknown soldier of counter revolution, Paul We speak primarily to the Left wing workers: Do genital opportunists in the Left wing as Zimmerman, Marion, a petty bourgeois intellectual, who sought a Rose Wortis, Gold and Boruchovitch are its staunchest not be swayed by demagogic appeals to sentiment. career in Communism. Being an intellectual he was protagonists? Will its application advance the interests Schlesinger is no better and no worse than John taught to need an education, and at what better place of the Left wing and the workers in general, or will Lewis, and the Party condemnation of Gitlow policy to learn than in Moscow, where, however, after workit be a crushing blow to them?
in 1925 must be repeated by the Left wing workers in ing in a minor position a while, he was sent back to This is the fourth change of policy by the Stalinistsed now for the dressmakers, which will bring discredit a rejection of the Gitlowist policy that has been adopt France with the testimonial to the French that in less than a year, and each has led the Left wing to he was a cheap careerist and an enemy of the working and defeat to our movement. The new path to which a worse position. The first was in the dressmakers class. Lots of lies here! Marion was not unknown; the irresponsible Stalinists have just jumped will not strike of about a year ago led by the same Zimmerman he was indeed no less a celebrity than the head of the lead to the eradication of Righ wing influence in the and Wortis. It was so scandalously conducted, and the industry, but to agit prop department of the French Communist Party.
consolidation. That is the path of He was not sent to Moscow for an education, but as settlement so indistinguishably similar to any ever the Schlesingers, the one they trod during the last made by Sigman or Schlesinger, that both the leaderone of Stalin educators of the Communists of the dressmakers strike. It cannot be ours. Ours must ship and the settlement had to be semi officially conworld. He was not sent back to France with that testibe the one that leads to the struggle side by side with monial, for if he had been, how could an enemy of the demned in the organ of the Labor Unity, by even the most conservative worker, even though for the Philip Aronberg The second was the policy in the working class remain in the ranks of the for 30 moment he is deceived by Schlesinger and follows his minutes? Marion left the of his own accord to recent cloakmakers strike called by the Right wing leadership. In the struggle, the Right wing workers After weeks of vacillation, the Party and the Left join the social democrats, where so many of the pillars can be won away from the misleaders of the Right wing union hit upon the unique idea of calling the of Stalinism have recently landed. What Wicks forwing, but not if you stay in the shops while they are workers to join the fake stoppage by quitting work striking, gets to tell us is that Marion, as head of the departand coming to the Left wing halls. Naturally, no one ment of agitation and propaganda, was the author came to the Left wing halls, but at least the stigma The severe defeats of the Left wing in the cloak of most of the manifestoes, theses, platforms, proclamof working during a strike was avoided by the makers and furriers strikes should be signposts of ations, directives, road maps and phillipics in the camI. The third attempt to retrieve the ground the warning. The Left wing can make headway, and re paign against Trotskyism. He was the lad who Left wing was steadily losing in the needle trades, was gain the strength and influence it enjoyed in 1926 and taught the French Party membership how counterthe poorly organized, ill prepared, badly conducted ad1927, if it knows how to approach the Right wing revolutionary Trotsky and the Opposition were, and worker, how to work for a united front against the venture it can hardly be called a strike in the fur how Bolshevized he, Marion, was (just as Bro. Wicks industry, which was lost before it began and was ofbosses. The Left wing must tale the initiative in the does today. For it was the Wickses, Marions, Bessaficially called off a few weeks later with an acknowlunited front. It must challenge Schlesinger and Co. dovskys, Lovestones and Peppers of the world who edgement by Gold of total failure.
openly to unite the divided ranks of the workers. It expelled and slandered the Opposition.
All of this irresolution, this squirming effort to must work for joint action, joint committees in the That why Wicks should be a bit more reserved in avoid adopting the proposals made in the Militant, has shops. The Schlesingers and Dubinskys will expose condem. ning Marion and Bessadovsky. After all, Wicks, not left the Left wing unscarred. On the contrary, themselves sufficiently in their actions during the who knows what the Third Period can do? few for the first time in years, the Right wing union, the struggle, but only if the Left wing shows its readiness yeais ago, you thought it necessary to line up the leaders and policies of which were the most discredited to work side by side with the Right wing worker. The Gary Chamber of Commerce and American Legion in the American labor movement, is virtual master of present attitude of the gives the Right wing against Communists. And does not the good priest the New York field and the Left wing is being rehypocrites every opportunity to strengthen their grip teach us that God alone knows what the morrow may duced ever more to an undecisive factor in the industry.
upon the workers. The cheap Leftism of the Love bring? So why make it harder for yourself to climb Now, the latest decision with regard to the coming stoneite, Zimmerman, and the Stalinite, Foster, must over the garden wall, like Bessadovsky, into the comdressmakers strike presents us with an act of mad be rejected by the Left wing workers before too much forting arms of the bourgeoisie and its Law?
desperation to recoup losses by paying for the openly damage has been done. LET NOT THY FIRST PAGE KNOW WHAT opportunist sins of the past with counterfeit radicalTHE SECOND PAGE SAYETH ism. That such an overnight reversal of position is The capitalist Scripps Howard newspaper syndicate not infrequent, and particularly in the needle trades openly rebukes the of for not doing more to Left wing dominated by Zimmerman, Wortis and their head off and suppress the workers strike movements, kin, is attested by no less an authority (nowadays, We will yet have occasion to return to the first, and because it has not succeeded in stopping the industrial Alas. than Earl Browder: When a reaction against other, numbers of the Revolutionary Age, the official warfare in the South. that is, stopping the workers the disastrous results of opportunism sets in, it gives organ of the Right wing (Lovestone group. Here only fight for better conditions. Daily Worker, October rise to wild adventures, leftist policies, splitting tena word: 25, 1929, PAGE ONE. dencies, etc. The opportunist who has reformed (but What strikes the reader is the political cowardice of The (Scripps Howard press) criticism was that the who has failed to grasp the essentials of Leninism) is the paper and its editors. We said some time ago that of was too cautious, reactionary and cowardly almost sure to become the putschist. the ultra left ad Lovestone is organizing his faction first on the basis to do anything for the workers, that it was an organvocate. Finding that being practical was a failure, of petty matters, and only after it has been mobilized, ization of labor aristocracy, and all aristocracy is he decides to be revolutionary without being practical will he unfurl his banner, will he develop in full his rotten. Daily Worker, October 25, 1929, PAGE TWO. The result is sectarianism. Earl Browder, The Work platform. The first issue of the paper bears this out Well, which is it? Is it too reactionary or not reers Monthly, August 1925, page 469. It is no accident entirely. Lovestone and his faction are an integral actionary enough? The first two pages of the Daily that Browder spoke in that article of precisely the part of the International Right wing. It is no secret Worker ought to get together and straighten out the present leaders of the needle trades Left wing, Zim that he supports the Bucharin faction in Russia as line. Cowardly Paper