Published Twice a Month by the Communist League of America (Opposition)
VOL. III, No. 33 NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 15, 1930.
PRICE CENTS THE MILITANT The Plot Against the Soviets Stalin Imprisoned the Opposition Bolsheviks and Allowed the Counter Revolutionists to Get Into Positions of Power words, For a Genuine United Front of the Millinery Workers Russia. While In a dozen other speeches and articles, Every worker conscious of his class to the growing danger of counter revolu Thermidorian threat to Trotsky warned against the Kondratieve by Interests must be profoundly alarmed at ionary gangs.
these epigones centered their attack upon name and by species. The Kondratleys the Left flank of the movement, the Right We must the exposure just made of the internationangwer flatly and openly: were kept in the apparatus where they al conspiracy to overthrow the Soviet gov The responsibility for this development fiank, the counter revolution took plotted the overthrow of the dictatorship: ernment. With a dramatic sharpness, it lles principally upon the present Stalin portunity to perfect its sinister plang.
the Oppositionists who fought them were snatches out of the realm of abstraction regime in the Communist Party and upon The strategy of the counter revolution sent to prison or exile.
the cold facts of the inexorable hostility the Stalin Bucharin regime that preceded was and is: First, we crush the Left OpAmong others arrested in the plot are it!
of the capitalist world to the workers re The credit for exposing these counterpositios, the proletarian heart of the dicpeople like Ramzin, who was nothing legs public. It makes real and living the fact revolutionary nests lies principally with tatorship then comes our day. The club than Fuel Power Director, and Kalinnikov, of the permanent state of war open or the Left Opposition, the Bolshevik Leninwith which to do the crushing was the a commander of the Central Military Acaconcealed that exists between the power is!
usurpatory faction of Stalin Bucharin. demy. How did these two, and countless of the proletariat and the power of the The Opposition Warning thousand facts prove this.
others reach these high posts, of such imbourgeoisie. Contrary to the soothing For years past, the Opposition raised Among the main leaders of the conmense strategical value to the Soviet powtheories which have been expressed even the cry of warning against the Thermi spiracy is the chief of the socalled Pea er? What Oppositionist was removed, exin the ranks of the Communist movement, dorian danger, that is, the dangerous sants Party, Kondratiev, now imprisoned. pelled, imprisoned, exiled or killed, in orthe Soviet state cannot live peacefully by growth of those capitalist elements in the Almost three years to the day before his der to make room for the Ramzins and the the side of the imperialist states: either country, who were even pressing down arrest by the comrade Trotsky Kalinnikovs? Did the latter take the places the one or the other must be overthrown.
upon the party, and whose aim was to un spoke before the Party Central Committee of comrades Ochotnikov, Kuzmitchev, BrolThe Denials of the Plotters dermine the proletarian dictatorship in (October 23, 1927) on the proposal by Stal dta and Capel, to mention only a few of The statements made by the Soviets, other the counter revolutionary in Bucharin and Co. to exclude him from the Oppositionists valorous fighters in the charging the existence of an international danger embodied in the kulaks, the Nep that body: civil war and some decorated with the plot that involves the imperialist masters man, the bourgeois specialists. the con. The thoroughly opportunist Order of the Red Flag who were expelled of hall a dozen countries and hundreds of cessionary, and the Right wing inside the faction which has dragged behind it in from the Military Academy and the Acacounter revolutionary elements in the Sov. Communist Party. For this warning, the recent years and still drags behind it. demy of Aviation. iet Union, cannot be taken lightly, or con Stalinists and the Bucharinists slandered the Chiang Kai Sheks, the Feng YuhsiIt is an incontestable fact, which all sidered as a a posing sensation Only those the Opposition. They denied the Therml angs, the Wang Chin Weis, the Pur the rabid howls of the Stalinist penman completely out of their senses would make dorian danger. They shouted down the cells, the Hickges, the Ben Tillette, the will not succeed in shouting down, that the such charges involving such respectable Opposition as alarmiets and people who Martinovs, the KONDRATIEYS and the ruling clique in the Party was too busy names as Poincare, Briand, Churchill, De speculate on the overthrow of the dic Ustrialovs, this faction cannot tolerate hounding the Opposition to notice the silterding, and the rulers of Poland, Finland tatorship. The Fosters and Lovestones in us in the Central Committee, not even ent advance of the counter revolution: and Roumania unless there were substan this and every other country still attack one month before the Congress. We The Stalin Bucharin regime tortured tial evidence to prove them.
the Opposition for its warning against the know why.
Continued on page We do not, of course, give a fig for the indignant denials of these imperialist bandits. Have not Churchill, Lloyd George, Poincare, Pilsudski, and all the others, spent millions upon millions of On Saturday, November 8, the Com that had already been workng and fighting bers, representing only themselves, and dollars, and thousands of working class munist Party leaders gained another one in Blockers Local 42 for some time in bound in advance by decisions they had lives, in previous attempts to overthrow of their customary victories in what was the past.
little part in making, while the others rethe workers republic by armed force? Can a horrible example of how a united front Then the group proceeded to negotipresented the overwhelming sentiment of anybody, except one without a memory, should be organized. The weeks of hard ate with the official Left wing in the In the union under the stress of an impendforget the military intervention in Russia work by leading Left wing militants in dustrial Union, which in essence means ing collective agrement and a lockout of all the imperialist powers after the end the millinery Industry in New York, who the Party. Endless discussion meetings of the world war, an intervention conducted The lockout threatened by the bossex sought to and a common working basis were held, with the basis for discussion for November 15, and the need of crystalon a dozen fronts? Can anybody forget in one of the most advantageous situations furnished by the need of working within the millions given to the Georgian Menlizing the resistance of the workers, made the Left wing has had for a long time, the existing unions. After a number of sheviks, to Denikin, Wrangel, Yudenitch, necessary for this committee to meet imwere nullified by the Party strategists deliberations, it was finally decided to call Tchaikovsky, Koltchak, to the Social Revomediately to decide on a course of action.
with the mechanical, wrecking policies for a joint meeting, consisting of all Left wing lutionists, to monarchists?
But there was a delay of almost two weeks, which they have become notorious.
millinery workers, and the headgear deWhy should any sane man put any caused by the fact that the broad Left The Origin of the Movement partment of the Needle Trades Workers credence in the denials of the conspirwing group had been meeting regularly and few weeks ago, a group of operators, to open up the question. The fact formulated the proposal to issue a program ators? There is no reason at all. It may members of Local 24 of the of that the Stalinists consented to meet with and call a meeting at a certain date rebe that this or that individual named in millinery union, who had found it impos militants in the old unions (who are theo gardless of the Party stand. One day the charges based on the confessions of sible for the last few years to be part of retically social fascists. is an indication later, a meeting was called of the enlarged arrested Russian conspirators cannot have the official Left wing in view of the pre of how the facts of the struggle compel committee together with the trade commithis connection proved, but the fact remains vailing Party policies, decided that the led them to retreat from their untenable tee of the Industrial Union, where, after that international capitalism is constantly situation created by the threatened imposi position another exhaustive discussion, the resoluseeking to overthrow the Soviet govern tion of a collective agreement necessi The joint meeting, held three weeks tion submitted by the broad Left wing was ment and to support those elements with tated finding working basis.
ago, had a discussion of seven long hours in the Soviet Union who represent the inaccepted by the Party to be presented at inery rkers recall what the duri the Party trade union position an enlarged meeting on November terests of the capitalist class.
workings of a collective agreement mean was riddled with holes. The company unThe conspiracy has no accidental or to their standards. Up to a few years ago, ion theory and the rest of the stock in The long delayed meeting Anally openpassing significance. It is a symptom of such an agreement prevailed in the trade trade of the third period were conclused on that day. It appeared as if it were a deeply rooted evolution in the relation and all the workers remember its effects ively revealed as false and unreal.
possible finally to create a unified basis for The ship of forces in the Soviet Union. How well. Now it is being proposed again. Zar idea of coming before the 40 percent of work in the reactionary unions, with the does it happen that thirteen years after itsky and the other Right wing union bur the workers organized in the of joint efforts of all Left wing militants, the establishment of the Soviet power, eaucrats have been peddling about this union with the cry that the union they regardless of their political or faciional there should be uncovered a well knit proposal for a collective agreement as a vullt up by struggle is a company union. affiliations. The resolution was presented, counter revolutionary organization of some means of stabilizing the trade. They which must be left it having been understood that it was to immediately, leaving 2, 000 people, many, if not most of them, have pointed out to the manufacturers that the mass of the workers at the mercy of be the only matter discussed. Suddenly of prominence? They are people who did it would put to a stop to the whold up tac the bureaucracy was shown to be quite Sonia Croll, organizer of the headgear denot become counter revolutionists yester tics of Local 42, the blockers, which has untenable.
partment of the came forday. Many of them have been in the Sov succeeding in raising working standards ward, made a long, puerile analysis of the The Committee of Seven iet apparatus for years. Their origin was and wages to a fair extent. To accept the trade (an insult to a worker intelligence. After a series of manuevers, a comknown, their past recorded. ex czarist of agreement would mean a general cutting and re stated the catechism: the existing mittee of seven was finally elected from ficers, technicians, manufacturers, nobles, of wages, a re introduction and extension unions are company unions; they must be Mensheviks, Cadets, etc. etc. How were the floor. It was shown that a really of piece work among the operators, the smashed; the collective agreement will be mocratic committee selection was impossithese types able to reach such high posts eventual increasing of working hours, and put over anyway; that will convince in the Soviet apparatus, and perfect a cenble at this meeting, composed of about 150 above all, the weakening of the safeguard the millinery workers of the futility of workers, 75 80 of whom were Party memtralized organization which converted into of job control by reorganization, which Continued on page an actuality the possibility of a counter rereally means to furnish the bureaucrats volutionary overthrow of the workers dic and manufacturers with a weapon for distatorship? They could not have started crimination.
yesterday such an organization must have Naturally, this situation aroused the required a few years; where was the spirit of the operators and blockers imU. in the past, where was the proletariat mediately Resistance to the impending secret service to unearth these people and agreement was shown right away. It was bring them to proletarian Justice. Collect for the Sustaining Fu expressed by the awakening of a moveIt was too busy framing up Left Op ment among the operators, whose leading BUY COUPON SELL COUPON positionists with the aid of provocateurs and most militant section organized as a fiet your intends and shopmates to and Wrangel officers as may yet be Left wing group. This group approached done in the present case to pay attention and collaborated with the Left wing group BUY COUPON SELL COUDY CONVERT CHRISTMAS TIME INTO MILITANT TIME