What Is Happening In Spain Today: Recent Events to come to one conclusion after reading these articles: if the bureaucrats strike so riolently against the Trotskyites. it is because they are pretty strong there. These readers will not be deceived. In fact, if we are not very strong from the organizational point of view, on the other hand, the penetration of the ideas of the Left Opposition, that is, of the Leninist ideas on the preparation of the proletarian revolution, is advancing from day day among the masses of the workers.
When the Peris and the Perezes write that the Spanish Trotskyites are working hand hand with the Republicans and the social fascists, the whole world knows that is a stupid and ridiculous lie. But in their information there is another lie, which the readers who are not familiar with Spanish affairs, cannot detect so rendily. That is when they put into one Trotskyite bag all the Spanish and Catalonian Communists save two dozen appointed by who pompously call themselves Partido Communista de Espana (S. de la In reality the Catalonian Federation, which has been expelled from the and which numbers nearly a thousand members and issues a few publications, is far from being completely won over to the Left Opposition. We can even affirm that in this Federation, which is the nemesis of the whole bureaucracy, there is a goodly mumber of Centrists (sincere and honest, because they are less corrupt than the éris and the Perezes) who do not accept our criticism of the mistakes of the Comintern and of centrism in the But what keeps them in the Catalonian Federation side by side with Left Oppositionists and semi Oppositionists is their agreement in principle with regard to bureaucratic methods of the in relation to the Spanish Communist movement. They have been expelled from the in an arbitrary fashion and they protest against this expulsion. But in their naiveness, they believe the expulsion was only the result of misinformation on the part of the leaders of the and a misunderstanding. They refuse to believe that the created by Lenin and Trotsky, can expel a whole organization and its most prominent militants, comrades esteemed by the workers like Nin and Maurin, solely because they have refused to carry out word for word the stupid directives of the narrow minded bureaucrats in Moscow. whole series of experiences is still necessary for these sincere Centrist comrades to arrive at our conclusions in our whole criticism since 1923, to this day. At present, when the awakening of the masses and their spirit of combativity is at its highest, it is important to come to an agreement on program of struggle for the proThis community of ideas een ourselves and the Catalonian Federation already exists in large measure. The Batalla Organ of the Catalonian Federation Ed. of this week has issued and unify all the Communist forces in the country. They have issued the slogan of the unification of all Communists, expelled and not expelled from the They have put themselves to their task and have begun to prepare the unity congress.
Péri and Doriot with their delegation have come here with the distinct mission to disrupt this action of the Spanish Communst movement. With their presence, they have hoped to raise the fallen morale of the functionaries in Spain. They want to make of them a real Communist party. But they realize that this impossible, and consequently they are attempting to destroy the Trotskyites. that is, the only serious Communist group that the working class of this country has.
This is a crime that we must denounce before the working class of a! countries.
Barcelona, April 26, 1931 OBIN. In the next letter, we shall deal with the situation in the rest of Spain.
recent (Continued from page 1)
called the book fair (during the feast of St. George, who is considered here as the protector of Catalonia and who was celebrated for the first time this year since the coup Etat of Primo de Rivera, book expositions are organized everywhere and lectures held on the importance of books and culture in general. our comrade Nin published in Catalonian the little pamphlet of Trotsky on his exile, entitled How Did It Happen. Que Hat Passat. This little pamphlet enjoyed an exceptional success; the students and workers grabbed it up. Nany workers students came to our comrades after having read it, and expressed their. deception. Why? Be.
cause, they say, as soon as the red pamphlet made its appearance in front of the newstands and bookstores of the Ramblas everybody thought that comrade Trotsky explained in this pamphlet how the fall of the monarchy in Spain happened. And even this supposition was advanced. since he has succeeded so quickly in making publie his opinions on the most events in Spain, he should certainly enter Spain incognito. But upon reading the pamphlet they found out with regret that comrade Teotsky spoke of things which are, actually, much less interesting than the Spanish events.
DEMAGOGY OF THE REPU mm The interest and the great sympathy for Communism does not manifest itself only by the interest in the life and the works of the great revolutionist of our epoch and of the first fighter for the Russian revolution. Already before the fall of the monarchy, the workers, the peasants and the petty bourgeois masses sympath ized with the most radical and boldest soclal doctrine. During the election campaign, it was not enough for the republican candidates and the Catalan nationalists of the Macia type to promise the electors of the city of the country the establishment of a democratic republican régime and the national independence of Catalonia. They were obliged to resort to demagogy by telling the credulous voters: you speak of decisive social changes, you speak of Communism? But we are Communists, we are your real defenders. Having come to power, we shall create conditions of existence of an ideal equality and we shall do it withont fratricidal struggle, without the spilling of broadly expounded in its articles the slo Times and the Daily PUBLICANS The Tasks of the Communists in Spain blood.
It is this social demagogy, plus the complicity of the anarchists who recruited an electoral clientele for the party of Macia, and the absence of a unified and solid Communist party which permitted the nationalist demagogues to win over tens of thousands of peasants and workers.
How will these workers and peasants who voted en masse for the Communism of Macia rather than for his Catalonian nationalism. conduct themselves in the future? There is the real question that one must put in order measure the imminence of the Communist peril. Today, it is still in the depth of the roots of sympachy for Communism and for Soviet Russia that thepotential force of the exploited masses of Spain must be measured. The democratie illusions still exist today: perhaps they will still exist tomorrow. But how much time will the workers and poor peasants in Spain require to find out that the advent of the republic, with the large Andalusian landowner, Alcala Zamora, at its head, in no way signifies rather the contrary the advent of a social régime favorable to the exploited masses?
Comrade Nin tells you in a thorough article on the basis of precise data and a profound analysis, what are the perspectives for the development of class struggle in Spain, given the present events. want to dwell here only on the immediate impressions that are communicated to every conscientious observer who comes to Spain today in order to distinguish amidst the deceptive noise of the Marseillaise the heart beats of the exploited masses who anguishedly seek the broad road of the social revolution.
Every Communist knows that without a firm and solid unified Communist party all the potential forces of the working class are in danger of being dissipated in vain, or still worse, of carrying water to the mill of the class enemy. What is the sitmation here from the point of view of the Communist party?
The French workers who read Humanite are informed every day that the real enemies of the Spanish proletariat are the Spanish Trotskyites. The articles of Juan Perez and of Gabriel Peri cannot (or dare not conclude. without pronouncing a few anathemas against the Trotskyites.
Those readers who are familiar with the customs of Stalinist journalism can only (Continued from page 1)
the slightest intention of touching either the sacred rights of the large landowners or the feudal survivals except in the form of foros. metayage. rabassa morta.
and so forth, which exist in the the country.
In the question of nationalities, one of the most serious in Spain, the attitude adopted by the government of Alcala Zamora is no less significant. It is indisputable that the proclamation of the Catalonian republic, which preceded that of the Spanish republic at Madrid, was the most revolutionary act accomplished on April 14. An authentie democratic government would have had to recognize without reservations an act which was supported by the overwhelming majority of the Catalonian people.
However, the new central power stood up against the young republie and demonstrated a chauvinist, absorptive, assimilative spirit, in no way more preferable than that of the central power which has disappeared.
As to the relations with the church, the provisional government has confined itself to decree the liberty of cults and the sec.
ularization of cemeteries, without saying a word about what constitutes one of the traditional demands of democracy the separation of the church from the state nor of the confiscation of the wealth of the religious congregations nor of the dissolution of the latter.
And the state apparatus? It remains the same as under the old régime, the most ardent partisans of which continue to occupy the most important positions.
Finally, what has the provisional government done to parry the probable blows of the reaction which eonspires and which finds itself in an extremely advantageous position since it has in its hands the deci.
sive levers of the state apparatus? It allowed Alfonso of Bourbon as well as the leaders of the organizations of assigsins founded by the former governor of Barcelona, Martinez Andio to escape: it takes no measures against the army officers who are conducting open and conspirative monarchist propaganda against the new order of things: it leaves intact and fully armed, the Guardia Civil. those butchers of the working class, deeply hated by the masses: it refuses, finally, to take any swift and energetic measures capable of disarming the enemy and rendering impossible every attempt at restoration.
WHO WILL CARRY THROUGH THE DEMOCRATIC REVOLUTION?
All this goes to show in a striking manner what we have constantly contended in these recent months: that the bourgeoisdemocrnic revolution cannot be accomplished by the bourgeoisie, that it can only be the work of the proletariat in power supgans of Revolutionary Juntas, rights of self determination for the various nation(Continued from page 6)
alities, arming of the people, the destruction of the old administrative apparatus, see, is supposed to be the opinion of Trotconfiscation of the great landed estates, sky! Can there be any doubt in any separation of the Church from the State, sane individual mind that a person capetc.
able of writing such tripe must be a halfwit himself? Continues Jorge: And withThe program by comrade Trotsky three out one word of condemnation of the months before the fall of the monarchy Czar) except that of weakness has proved to be the most adequate for This is such an idiotic, palpable stupidity the revolutionary situation in Spain. The that it would be of no purpose to menconscientious Communists of the Catalonian tion it, were it not that it appears in the Federation have understood it and are official organ of the Communist party.
adopting it in their actions. They have This, in a little cruder form, typifies the also understood that in order to put this whole content and method of the slander program into application it is necessary to umceasingly hurled at the Left Opposition on every possible occason.
Jorge raves further: All about the scandals of Czar family. he can explain endlessly how the Czar secret porting itself upon the peasant masses who, police reported night of was in Spain, represent seventy percent of the spent by the actress with Rasputin and laboring population More concretely: the He arrived at the Hotel Astoria with bourgeois democratic revolution can be realPrincess Endlessly! It is astonishized in our country only by the establishing: do these people really think that they ment of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
can slander with impunity when anyone But can the dictatorship of the prole can satisfy himself so easily as to the tariat be the slogan of the Communists in truth? It is all very symptomatic. Just the present stage of the revolution, or, to as the few citations by Trotsky from the put it differently, can it be not a slogan reports of the secret police portray the of propaganda but a slogan of agitation?
decay of a ruling clique doomed by the In our opinion, it would be a profound erprogress of history, so the disgusting reror in tactics which would be in manifest marks of Jorge reflect the political degencontradiction to all the teachings of Marx eration of the Stalinist bureaucratic clique and Lenin.
now strangling the life of the party, and Our fundamental task must be that of also condemned by history.
winning the decisive majority of the workJorge concludes his slander for the er and peasant mases. These masses are time being with the legend manufactured at the present time hypnotized by democraand circulated hy the Stalin school of tic illusions. It is on this ground that we fabricators that during the civil war in must win them, showing them, by their 1919 Stalin was appointed to reorganize own experience, the incapacity of the bourthe southern front while Trotsky was forgeoisie to solve the problems of the dembidden interiere. The full account of ocratic revolution, and thus winning them, the orgins of this legend Trotsky relates always on the basis of experience, by means in chapter XXXVI of autobiography.
of a constant criticism of the work of the For our purpose it will be sufficient to quote republic, to the idea of the dictatorship of from the resolution of the Central Committhe proletariat.
tee adopted July 6, 1919 (Real Situation Our slogan, then, must at the present in Russia, page 259 60. The Organization moment be the complete realization of the Bureau and the Politburo of Central democratic revolution, solring the agrarian Committee will do all that they can problem by the unindemnified expropriation make more comfortable for comrade Trotof the large landel estates and the dissky and more fruitful for the Republic, tribution of the land to the peasants; the that work on the southern front which recognition of the right of Catalonia and comrade Trotsky himself has chosen, and the other nationalities to dispose freely of which is the most difficult, the most dantheir destinies, without excluding separagerous, and the most important at the pretion it that is their desire; the separation sent moment. In his position as People of the church from the state and the ex Commissar for War and President of the propriation of all the wealth of the religi Military Revolutionary Soviet, and as memous orders; the destruction of the state apher of the Military Revolutionary Soviet paratus: the disarming of the Guardia of the southern front, with that CommisCivil and the arming of the workers and sar of the southern front, Yegorov, whom peasants; the trial by a revolutionary trihe himself nominated and the Central Combunal of all the avowed enemies of the mittee has confirmed, comrade Trotsky is free to act.
Parallel to this, we must work ener The Organization Bureau and the Polgetically to organize the masses and effecitburs of Central Committee give comtively direct their struggle, by strengthenrade Trotsky full authority by every means ing the revolutionary trade unions, by creatwhatsoever to achiere what he considers a ing factory councils, by establishing everywhere revolutionary Juntas of workers, peanecessary correction of policy on the milisants and soldiers, and above all, by unifytary question and, if he so desires, to attempt to hasten the congress of the party.
ing all the Communist forces that exist today the country The organization of The resolution was signed by Lenin, the evolutionary vanguard into a powerful Krestinsky, Kalinin, Serebriakov, Stalin Communist party is a question of life or and Stasov.
death the Spanish proletariat. The Let the slanderers slander. In the end Communist Left Opposition will spare no it will only help to annihilate them. The effort nor sacrifice to contribute towards work of comrade Trotsky on the Russian furnishing the working class of our coun Revolution through its analysis of the victry with the weapon of struggle which it tors 1917 will help prepare the interneeds so urgently. This weapon must be national victory of tomorow. Toward this forged at all costs. The whole future of end we will direct our energies.
the Spanish revolution depends upon it.
Barcelona, April 1931. GEORGE RAY.
people.