Notes of a Journalist Political Bureau in 1920by Voroschilov Kalinin Rykov were all against ALFA Dnieprostroy, with the exception of the Ukrainians who were for Dnieprostry for THE KNIGHTS OF ANTI TROTSKYISM succeeded in retaining their jobs in a facUkrainian considerations. Stalin declared The Pravda accuses Riutin Riutin of tory, very often in the same factory, for that to construct the Dnieprostroy station Trotskyism and the party must listen to all a period of 15 to 20 years prior to the revmight be compared to a peasant buying a this and suffer. This is what we have come olution? These are the meekest, the most phonopgraph instead of a cow. Voroschilov to! Let us briefly recall the past. The submissive, very often simply servile eleclamored that it would be ridiculous to coninitiators of the struggle against Trotsky ments, the participants in the religious pro struct a power station for factories that do ism were Zinoviev anki Kamenev. After cessions, those who bring gifts to the boss not yet exist.
some time they themselves came over to on his birthday. In the first years of the All this is preserved in the stenographic minutes of the Central Committee meetings.
the banner of Trotskyism; the fact that revolution they did not even dare to think they later desented this banner does not of entering the party. But once it is orTHE MYSTERY OF REPENTANCE change the matter. The chief, or rather, dered by the bosses, by the authorities, they Soviet Siberia informs us that in Kalthe only theoretician of anti Trotskyism was cannot refuse. These are the elements and atchinsk the chief work and concern of Bucharin, who fostered the whole cam layers inside the working class to which the Communists of late, has been the repaign. He turned to be Bucharin, the centrism looks more and more for support, cognition mistakes and self flagellation, author of the program of the Comintern! gagging at the same time, the most advanced which is done with a particular pleasure. bourgeois liberal and an agent of workers.
and frivolity.
the wreckers inside the party His reTHE GREATEST CRIME Only in Kalatchinsk?
peated repentance does not change this fact. Pravda has now formulated a new kind They now repent as easily as they blow The Moscow organization was entrusted into of crime: the Trotskyists methods of distheir nose. The not unknown Boguschevsky Uglanov hands especially to carry on the crediting the best pupil of Lenin and the who, for a number of months, was the prostruggle against Trotskyism. His services recognized leader of the party, comrade verbial extreme Right (in reality, he whs in this sphere were more than once given Stalin. Unfortunately, the most serious not a Right winger, he simply did not catch official recognition. But no sooner had he beginning of this Trotskyist method was the signal at the right moment and concrushed Moscow Trotskyism than he him. laid down in Lenin Testament where the tinued to play the old record. is now not self was exposed as an echo of the Kulak best pupil is accused of rudeness. disloyalonly the responsible editor of the paper Nepman. At the head of the Moscow CenFor Industrialization but he also conducts a ty. and the tendency towards the abuse of tral Control Commission which was expell power, and where the party is recommended furious campaign against the Rights. What ing Trotskyites was the not unknown Moroz. to remove him from his post.
was required of him for this high post?
No sooner had he completed his work of THE OPPOSITION YESTERDAY Nothing in particular: to cut his hair, take expulsion than it was recognized at the Pravda (November 21. criticizes in a a bath and repent. And the fellow is again joint session of the Moscow Committee lengthy article the mistakes of Smirnov, Ils good as new until a new zig zag.
and the Control Commission under the the former People Commissar of AgriculAfter these lines had been written, the direction of Stalin, that Moroz, who was ture, and his successor Teodorovitch Moscow papers brought the latest news: the personification of the party conscience (1926 1927. and reveals their adherence to Boguschevsky was called on the carpet for on the Moscow scale. in reality lacks all the Kondratiers and others. The article calling the repentance of Bucharin, his conscience whatsoever (literally. At the is fundamentally at paraphrasing of the teacher of yesterday, double bookkeeping.
head of the Krassnopresnensk district, the written declarations which the Opposition Again, he did not catch the signal on time main proletarian district in Moscow stood presented to the Central Committee in 1926and he overreached himself. It can be Riutir, the pillar and hope of Uglanov, the 1927. and which met with the indignant rehelped, it the risks of the trade.
main theoretician of anti Trotskyism in the jection of Stalin. Molotor and the others. THE BALD HEADED Moscow organization. Now he has been And so poor Pravda repeats the Opposition COMMUNIST YOUTH stamped a former Menshevik, a renegade, yesterday.
Why do you keep silent, a wrecker, and is expelled from the party, EVERYBODY REMEMBERS Nicolai Ivanitch?
But nevertheless, between his Menshevism of The paper For Industrialization, which few lines to you and Rykov 1917 and his wrecking of 1930 he has suc is conducted by the way, in a very frivolous We are ready to devote.
ceeded in executing the chief work of the manner, writes: everybody remembers the This is a fragment of verses of BezyMoscow organization in its struggle against idea, advanced at one time by the wreckers mensky. the accusor of those who cannot Trotskyism.
of the southern metal industry, that the defend themselves. Nussinov, who was exWe could continue this compendium in Dnieprostroy station should be constructed pelled from the party, he calls a most definitely beyond the confines of the only when there would be consumers for the vilbiinous abomination. There a bold In all the sections of the Comin power on hand. In other words. only after and quick witted poet for you! Further on tern the majority of those who (lirect the the factories will have demanded powe he speaks of the villainous carrion of all struggle against Trotskyism proved to be should the construction of the station be oppositions. even though the eminent Bezy.
Rights, counter revolutionaries and renegin. This was directed against Dnieprstroy mensky himself once belonged to one of the gades. We must ask, did not their rene (November 3, 1930. oppositions. And all this is in the style gacy consist precisely in the fact that they Everybody remembers! But some also of bald headeil Communist Youth.
conducted a struggle for the extermination remember, besides this, that all these argu play on the Russian name Nussinov.
of the only Marxist, the only Leninist fac ments were the basic arguments of the Gnoosni means abomination.
tion of contemporary communism?
HECKERT TEACHES LIEBKNECHT Frits Heckert writes in an anniversary article of the Pravda on the defeat of the The year 1930 closed with indications If past experiences are to be considered German revolution of 1918 1919: It was of a prolongation of the crisis in American in evaluating the length of time that it a great mistake that the Spartacist union capitalism and the further unloading of will take to reach a stage of normale. considere itself as merely a propagandist the burden of this crisis upon the shoulders then it is within reason to expect that an group in the ranks of the Social Democratic of the working class. This condition exists economic revival will not take place party. Further on, he acenses Karl Lieb despite the repeated forecasts of the econ at least another year and a half. In the knecht, Rosa Luxemburg and Leo Jogisches omists and business leaders to the effect table below, which appeared in the Annalist of not having understood the role of the that the revival would begin during the of January 16th (1930 review issue) cures revolutionary party.
latter part of last year.
appear showing the lowest point reached In this remark there rests a grain of The months of November and December in the business index during past crises and truth even though it is expressed pedanti 1930 witnessed increasing declines in business the number of months required in reachcally. torn out of its concrete historical activity and a growth of unemployment. ing normaley.
context. But this is not what we are con December closed with an index figure of Bottom Length of cerned with now.
75. for business activity. which marked of Recovery to If it can be at all considered a a drop of two tenths points from the NovDepression Nor (Mos. mistake that Rosa Luxemburg and ember figure of 75. The significance of February 1885 77 17 Karl Liebknecht maintained the Spartacus tlvis figure, is that it is the lowest point June 1891 72 13 group in the position of a revolutionary reached since March, 1908. These figures reNovember 1896 78 15 faction inside the Social Democratie party present a survey of the basic and most imMarch 1908 76 15 too long, and by that imperled the victory portant industries, numbering ten in all. Of November 1914 81 10 of the German revolution, then what can the ten types, automobile and bituminous March 1921 82 19 be said about the gentleman who forcibly coal production alone, show an upward It will be noticed that the average compelled the young Communist Party of uurve. But the rise of automobile and bit length of recovery totalled almost 15 months.
Chim to enter a purely bourgeois party, minous coal production is purely seasonal. However, with the exception of March abide by its discipline, and even to give up The month of January 1931. one in 1921. the figures speak of a period of the its duty of opposing Marxism to Sun Yat which a rise is to be expected because of ascent of world capitalism. In the first Senism?
its spring preparatory character, shows an crisis following the world war, and taking But it was precisely this crime that unshifting position. Indices of steel and pig place in the period of the world decline was committed during 1923 1928 by the lead iron production dropped sharply during the of capitalism the greatest number of months ership of the Comintern. Nevertheless it was first two weeks of the month. In addition required for a revival was reached. With Fritz Heckert who unfailingly defended the new orders in steel are far below the ex. the month of December closing at the lowest criminal policy of the Right Centrist bloe pectations of the economista in spite of the point renched in twenty two years and against the Left Opposition. Isn it clear expected seasonal rise and the advance in points below the first post war crisis of that Heckert should have been a bit more automobile production. Other factors point 1921. in addition to the factor of a decay.
careful in relation to Karl Kiebknecht and ing to the continuation of the crisis exist ing system, it is evident that a revival is Rose Luxemburg?
in the decline of freight loadings and the a long way off.
THE STALINIST decrease in electric power production. It In the field of foreign trade a decline RECRUITMENT is with the above indications in mind that of 737, 780, 000 from 1929 was recorded.
The newspapers print in almost every Benjamin Baker, editor of the Annalist, 18 The total exports declined per cent. in number: prompted to remark in the issue of January value, and 20 percent. in quantity. European We non party workers, in reply to the 16. 1931 that it may be that the compara exports dropped 20 percent. below 1920, double bookkeeping of the Opportunists de tive stability of the business index for the while the decline in areas exclusive of clare our adherence to the party.
last two months of 1930 indicates that the Europe declined 30 percent.
After this always follows a list of work bottom of the current depression has been The coming year will witness the at.
ers with note attached to each: twenty fully reached, but it is not easy to be con tempt of American capitalism to issue years of industrial experience. twenty five, fident on this point.
from the crisis by a two fold policy of intwenty nine and even thirty three. Thus it The irresistible force of the crisis has creased aggression in the field of foreign is a matter of workers from forty to fifty effectively answered the myth of unending trade and a continuation of the offensive years of age. All of them were mature at prosperity and the super power of American against the American working class. This the time of the October revolution and the capitalism. The object of capitalism at this is inevitable with the contruction of the Civil War. This did not prevent them from stage is to strive to emerge from the preworld and home market and the growing remaining outside the party. Only the clou sent crisis in a comparatively short period competition of the imperialist powers in ble bookkeeping of the two Chairmen of the of time. Reams of paper are written to efforts to issue out of their difficulties. The Council of Peoples Commissars Rykov and convey this propaganda to the masses of tendencies in this direction are long existSyrzov induced them to join the party, workers in order to quiet the growing disent; they are an integral part of imperialist What sort of workers are these who satisfaction.
capitalism, but in the present period of a within the brongest imperialist country in the world, they will be accentuated many times. Already the United States is making aggressive efforts to defeat the British Empire in the struggle for winning the Latin American market. The same type of penetration is to be observed with regards to the Orient. The Young Plan, the War Debts, and similar instances of attempts at economie domination point to the efforts made in putting Europe completely on rations.
The efforts to emerge from the crisis by dominating the world market more completely can have nothing but catastrophie results for capitalism. In the struggle for supremacy the United States will meet terrific resistance from the other capitalist powers and vice versa. We are living 15day in a period of the decline of world capitalism, a period which Lenin described as one of wars and revolution. There fore the struggles for domination of the world market can have no other effect hut that of weakening capitalism still further and preparing its eventual destruction.
At home the burden of the crisis rests entirely upon the shoulders of the working class. Capitalism has proved again that it annot and will not provide for the working class.
Every crisis in capitalism finds the working class suffering the burdens of such crises. The Standard Statistics Corpuration estimates that during the first nine months of 1930 dividends increased more than a billion dollars over the year 1929.
while wages during this same periodeclined over 800, 000, 000. The Annalist tigures point to a drop in factory employment 81. for December is against 82. for Norember. It is also recorded that factory payrolls are at the lowest point since April 1922. declining to 7:2. for December from the November index of 73. The estimated clecrease in wages for the entire year of 1930 is placed at a billion dollars a month!
The whole tendency is toward further rationalization. capitalism is making efforts to overcome the crisis by increasing the exploitation of the workers. This will he lecompanied by continued unemployment. increase of the working hours, and nationwide wage cuts. The table below taken from Labor News is illuminating in regards to the tendencies toward widespread wage cutting April May June Wage Increases 32 12 56 Wage Decreases 25 33 57 July Aug.
Sept. Oct. Xov.
44 33 36 16 68 63 136 93 The above figures represent the number of business organizations that instituted either wage increases or wage ents. The growing Wage cuts are easily obtained.
The ratio of this table shows that for every 15 workers that receive wage increases, S5 workers experience wage cuts. Of additional importance the fact that the granting of wage increases was contined in the main to the organized workers, while the great mass of unskilled and organized workers suffered heavy lesses.
In consideration of past experience, and the added difficulties of a moribund capitalism the end of the crisis far to seek.
The effects of the policy of American capitalism can have but a two fold effect. It will, on the one hand, accelerate the antagonisms of world imperialism and the stingules of the working class at home. The American working class has a long way to ko to reach the stage of class consciousness, am a will to struggle. But that it is on that road and will continue to travel it is indisputable. The coming year will witness no appreciable improvement in the present crisis. But the burden of that crisis will be placed more heavily upon the backs of not only the American working class but the world proletariat as well. ALBERT CLOTZER.
The Trend of the Economic Crisis No. 17 18 BULLETIN of the RUSSIAN OPPOSITION The latest issue of the official organ of the Russian Bolshevik Leninist Opposition. published as a double number. has just been received. Some of the material contained in this highly interesting issue is as follows: Success of Socialism and the Dangers of Ad.
venturism. Declaration of comrade Rakovsky and Others Statement of Rakovsky, Muralov and Others to the Contral Committee of the Russian Party. Comrade Selinitehenko in Stalinist Exile. New Victim of Stalin (Comrade kote Zinzadze)
etc. etc.
25 Cents a Copy Order from THE MILITANT 84 East 10th Street New York,