WORKERS OF THE WORLD.
UNITE THE MILITANT Weekly Organ of the Communist League of America (Opposition)
The Spanish Revolution On the Order of the Day for the Left Opposition and Central European Lands They can to help meting about a victory! Whole Communist Movement of Europe Now Put to the Test Sabotages the Opposition Defense our Entered as second class mail matter, November 28, 1928 at the Post Office at New York, under the act of March 3, 1879.
VOLUME IV, NO. 15 (WHOLE NO. 74 NEW YORK, SATURDAY, JULY 18, 1931 PRICE CENTS LEON TROTSKY Relief and Defense for the Striking Miners The coal operators and their gorernment have acted concertedly against the niners who are conducting so heroic and militant a struggle. It The course of events today puts on prerogatives of the Secretariat at a time Is the task of every worker, throughthe agendat an imposing question on the when we have no common basis in prin out the country, to come to the imme subject of which the Left Opposition can cirles with these groups. have to mina diate ald of the strikers, to give all And must say its word. speak of the above all the Prometeo group which is Spanish revolution. It is not a question in disagreement with the Bolshevik In. Kentacky, 17 miners are now of a criticism after the event; Leninists on all the fundamental quesbeing held on trumped up charges of is a question for the interuntional Lett tions of strategy and tacties. Nobody murder. Every worker knows what this means. No effort should be The latest reports arriving from Ger pecially in Central Europe where na facing Opposition of an active intervention in must be allonel to stifle these profound the test. Can they make their spared to defend thean. Funds to as many indicate that the adoption of the tional banks are also crashing. German program, the program of the proletarian the events in order to prevent a catas divergenees by noisy quarrels on organitrophe.
sist them in fighting a legal aseas Hoover plan has not achieved the task it currency is not accepted for payment. dictatorship that means an end to all zational grounds and by unprincipled We have few forces. But the advan blocs which degenerate inevitably into sination ald be sent to the Gene roclaimed for itself. The internal sit What the adoption of the Hoover plan imperialist treaties and reements, that tage of a revolutionary situation consiste intrigues behind the scene, Committee of the 565 Weat nation, instead of being relieved has ad perhaps achieve, is the postponement Institutes the socialized planning of inLake St. Chicago, Ill.
been greatly aggravated. The precisely of the fact that even a small delay of the formal and immellate downfall of uustry and abolishes crises and unemThe Lessons of China In Pennsylvanih, Tom Aserscough, brought about by the negotations between the Young Plan which would have ployment can they make this program group can become a great force in a Following the Russian experience, the brief space of time, providing that it question of democratie slogans in the organizer of the National Miners Un the Americans and the French has call brought into sharp view a whole series the program of the oppressed and disgives correct prognosis and that it revolution was posed anew in the courso fon, faces trinl soon for manslaugh ed forth an unprecedented light of capi of international entanglements of a cat inherited masses.
isques correct slogans in time. allude of the struggle in China. However, all ter following the killing by thugs of tal from Germany, Dearly 500, 000. 00 astrophic nature. As matters stand at not only to our Spanish section, directly the European sections did not have the a strike sympathizer. Others are in leaving the country within the period of present, the Brueuing governinent, feelInvolved by the events, but also to all possibility of following all the stages Ohio.
prison already in Pennsylvania and the last ter weeks. The collapse of the ing that for the time being its external our sections, because the further thel of this struggle. Thanks to this fact, Funds should be sent to tho Dannt Bank, the financial institution hardshire are over, is preparing for an revolution advances, the more it will the discussion on these questions had a International Labor Defense, 80 East most intimately bound up with the rise intensified campaign on the internal draw the attention of the workers semi academic character for certain com11th St. New York, of German imperialism and the subse front. The reliet brought about by the throughout the world. The verification rades and for certain groups. But to Desperately needed relief clothing quent bank holiday have brought in their suspension of reparation payments, has of the political lines will take place be day, these questions are the very incar and funds should be sent to the wake something resembling a little earth been amply offset by the withdrawal of fore the eyes of the world proletarian nation of the struggle, of life. Can wa Penn Ohio Striking Winers Feliet quake in central European finances. The foreign private credits and by the con How the present lenders of the Intervanguard. If we are really the Le permit ourselves to be bound hand and Committee locally or at 611 Penn Ave. mark is not being quoted at allontinued export of capital. The situation national Labor Defense have privately wing. It we are really strong through foot at so important a historical tarRoom 205. Pittsburgh, Pa. ACT NOW! several exchanges. In Belgium, llun in the Reich is even more serious than sent out deliberately misleading intorour correct revolutionary conception, we ing point? Just as during the Sino Rusgary and other European countries, es it was a month ago mation, to the point of downright lies, must show this strength in a particularly in contact which threatened to let In connection with the case of the two All hope of foreign ald Is gone. The Philadelphia Oppositionists, Atorgenstern sharp manner during a revolutionary sitloose a war we could not lose ourselves nation. If we are really international government is concentrating every effort and Goodman, who have just been conin discussions over whether it was nes ists, we must do this work on an interessary to support the Soviet Union of national scale sources by extending the already exist. clear from some letters which the Com Chiang Kal Shek so today, face to face New and Militant National Movement Two Basle Questions ing emergency decrees. Despite the pro munist League America (Opposition)
with the Spanish events, we cannot even mixes made on the basis of the morator now has in its possession, Two fundamental questions must be admit an indirect responsibility for the put squarely by us. 1) the question sectarian, semi Bakuninist superstitions In Industry of the country at the pre present. In comparison with the figures of Unemployed Insurance stands and a held a number of months ago in ihtluFrents are moving fast in the mio delegates representing 33, 000 miners are lum, the decree reducing the last crumbs The two militants were arrested and revolution and the strategical line that My practical proposals are summed up sent time. Aliners fight with suns in or the secretary treasurer of the rear whole string of even more outrageous delphia for distribution of a leatlet of our Kentucky flows from it, and (2) the question of in the following: Pennsylvania and Ohio min ticnary wing of the union, Walter Nes anti working class political measures organization on the question of unenthe correct tactical utilization of dem All the sections must place the ers courageously fight against some of b, 71 percent of the miners of Illinois are being contemplated, involving all playment.
ocratte slogans and of parliamentary and problems of the Spanish revolution on sands of West Virginia miners answer a responding after the first report of the and more reduction commedals benefits by the prosecution whiten trought about The leaflet was the evidence introduced revolutionary possibilities. endeavor the order of the day.
on these questions in my last work on Spatn. must form special commissions which and in support of the Pennsylvania and ity of the Ilinois miners are thus re Braemang government hasendrendy, ct the beginning of the case, the two workHere want only to express myself sum should have as their tasks to knther Ohio miners. Two thousands miners in presented making the convention on the last few days suspended all com. ers, persecuted under the same Flym marily on the totality of the questions material to go deeply into the questions, Franklin counts. Illinois, strike against great importance. Further estimation on munist publications, according to on which we must pass over to the of and above all to follow attentively the starvation while working Rumbling the importance of the delagation reveals patches, anul prohibited all open al Anti Sedition Aer and for the same rer fensive along the whole line of the Com activity of the official parties and the are heard from the Colorado coal fields that it comes mainly from mines that meetings. The reactionary Filmer sons as other Communist workers have Schacht, the foriner president of the to take over the defense of the case, munist International.
Rank and Alle miners in convention in are actually at work at the present time.
manner in which they pose the problems officially talk of the ealling of a gen According to the report of the Illinols Reichsbank and an avowed representivel Ought we to look forward in Spain of the Spanish revolution.
to an intermediate revolution between All the important documents of oral strike in Illinois soon. The coal department of Nincs and Minerals, 34, of the Hugenberg Hitler National Bloc to organize publle protest meetings, art the accomplished republican revolution Spanish Communism (of all its tenden miners of America seetie with repot 000 miners worked during the month of is being mentioned for the post of extra. refused to me the two militents be any assistance. On the contrary, it socalled workers and peasants rex. at least in the form of extracts, for the calls within their midst. Is it an aw. that 27, 000 miners actually working are especially created for him this forcibly ejected the two of them from a olution, with a democratie dictator Information of all our national sections ship. Yes or no? The whole strate After a necessary preparation, ench the miners of America into a powerful approximately 80 percent of the mineral ship cannot be disputed. Whether the sical line is determined by the reply to national section of the Opposition must movement after 12 dreary years of sur in the state who are working in the United States capitalists would consentence to which their organization had.
mines.
this question. The oficial Spanish party open the attack against the policy of the fering smashing defeats?
About 48. 000 miners are all that to the establishment of a German Fascist is sunk up to its neck in an ideological Comintern in the Spanish revolution The solitary reason why the I, Important events are taking place in there remains in the state. Readers wlu dictatorship, with all the neo imperial confuslon on this fundamental question: This offensive can have different forms: ninots while this is being written. 33. remember that 50, 000 miners have been in German ambitons that it involves and has sabotaged the defonse from the very a confusion which was sow and is still articles in the paper, critical resolution 000 miners are in session, attending driven from the Illinois conl felds in all the unrest that would inevitably fol outset Is that the two workers belong to being sown by the epigones and which open letters, intervention at meetings, rank and file miners convention, Called years.
low it on the scale of the entire contin seal views differing from those of the the Left Opposition, that they have polifinds its expression in the program of individual work, and work by groups, etc. for the purpose of rehabilitating their The convention convenied with attacks ent, is another question entirely. present officers and the Communthe We have here the possibility But al these forms must be rigorousls union and cleaning out the fakers, the from the three corners of the enemy.
ist party leaders who control them. This of unmasking from day to day before coordinated.
miners that have responded to this call The Illinois Coal Operators Association in the meantime, the crisis is tearing scandalous violation of the statutes and the proletarian vanguard, in the light of Following upon a certain preparare motivated this greater ideas than the came out with statement admonishing the one at a hish pitch. All the political for the traditions of the naturally living facts, the whole emptiness, the tory work in the national sections, as selection of a new set of oficers. The Illinois miners that when the contract Plons are re arming feverishly in the brought down upon the heads of its whole absurdity and at the same time, well as in the International Secretariat rotten starvation conditions that stalk expires midnight March 31, 1982 no other contest for state power. While the son officials a protect from all sides. Unable the terrific danger represented by the It is indispensable to work out a Mani throughout the country are not absent organization will be recognized but disernment is steering to the right, the to defend their sabotare, the of Action of a middle of the road, Interrae festo of the International Left on the Minots. The rank and file minerstrict No. 12, United Mine Workers of population as a whole is moving toward Actals instead lied about thelr position.
diate revolution.
Engdahls Falsehoods The leading comrades of all the sec in the most concrete manner possible and forts of a group of miners, miners who tional untons came out with statements stable mass basis, the social democracy On March 10, the following letter was tions must have in mind that it is pro in intimate collaboration with the Span have been organized solitly since 1897. attacking the convention. However, the which has followed at the tail of the cladly we, as the Left wing, who must ish section. This manifesto will have to us, to save their union and fight against attack of the Lewis wing was not so vereactionary Bruening government for the sent by the to Roger Baldwin place ourselves upon a solid scientific to given the largest possible distribution, the forces and their agents who would hement as the Walker district organiza past sixteen months, is regarded with director of the American Civil Liberties basis. Thoughtless dabbling with ideas. These are the concrete proposals. completely reduce them to the level of tion. Several days before the conven suspicion by lroad sections of the work Union: Journalistie charlatanism in the style of beg you to discuss them and at the same the unorganized fields. Frents in the ton, two leaders of different mines were in class. The Communists who, ac Dear Comrade. Landau and Co. are contrary to the time to send a copy to all the national Eastern states further bring hopes to placed in jail by the sheriff of Franklin cording to the admissions of the capital. In reply to your letter of March very essence of a proletarian revolution sections so that the discussion will for the miners of Illinois.
county. Immigration authorities invadedist press itself, are the only political Addressed to George Maurer, will state ary faction. The fundamental questions low simultaneously in all of them. The report of the credentials commit the fields and made threats to various group with a definite plan of action, are that the International Labor Defense of the revolution must be studied in the June 18, 1931 tee of the convention shows that 230 (Continued on page 3) once again, as several times in the past, both in the hiladelphia District, and same way that engineers study the rethrough our national buretu, has voted sistance of matter or doctors study ana.
to defend Goodman and Morgenstern, in tomy and pathology. The problem of the connection with the other cases it is depermanent revolution, thanks to the fending under the sedition law. We are wondering whether the Civil tral problem of the International Left Liberties Inton has taken any steps with Opposition.
In the July Issue The Stalinists Are Pursuing a Sectarian Policy Which keeps the Insurgent Movements Separated Frank Keeney, Mooregard to this case. intended to speak Democratie Slogans of the party theorney and others, and to you about this matter yesterday, but The questions of democratic slogans, etical organ, The Communist, William On the present occasion, far too much men and women, Negro and white is more or less Intimately associated it slipped my mind.
of the utilization of the elections and. Foster writes about the ennsylvania is at stake to allow such contemptible are in the best tradition of the glorious with the Muste movement, one of whose Vers sincerely later on of the Cortes, are questions of Ohio coal strike in the following words: horse play to pass for sagacity and lead struggles of the American aniners in the spokesmen. Tom Tippett, is in charge International Labor Defense revolutionary tactics subordinated to the It is too early to speak of the mistakes ership. The situation is rife with splen past, and are excelled only by the mur of the relief at Charlestown. The griev. Sgd. Louis Engdahl general question of strategy. But the and shortcomings of the strike. With did opportunities for the militant labor derous ferocity and abominations with ances of the long suffering men are those General Secretary.
most correct strategical formulae are this sentence. Foster achieves an invol movement. combination of circun which the coul operators and their of the ennsylvania, the Ohio, the Ken On March 11, in reply to the protest worth nothing if one does not find a untary frankness which must be exam stances is at hand which has not been armed forces have answered the resist tueky miners, of the miners throughout of a Brooklyn worker, Benjamin Gross, tactical solution to these formulap at ned before it is too Inte to speak of there for a long time past. Now moro ance of the workers the country.
the not only repents the falso every given moment. However, matters the principal mistake which is being than ever is a correct course impera But the movement guided by the In the Southern Illinois coal field the hood about its alleged willingness to look very bad in Spain from this point made by the leadership of the tens of tire. mistake in policy is trebly and does not complete the picture of resentment and dissatisfaction of the handle the case, but Asserts that it has of view. The French newspapers com thousands of miners who are Aghting tentold disastrous in such a big situation. what is happening in the American coal miners continues to make itselt heard taken over the defense. The letter in munteate the news according to which such a magnificent battle in the Eastern That is why Foster whole approach to fields. There are at least three other with growing insistence. Unfortunately full reads: the leader of the Catalonian Federation, coal fields.
the problem of the possibly wronx distinct, active movements in other parts dominated by confusion and lack of cer Dear Comrade: Maurin, was to have said in his Madrid Is Foster looking forward, as has bo polleles in the strike is so dangerously of the country.
tainty as to the way out of the morass In reply to your letter of March speech that his organization will not come the custom in the official Commun false. It is not too early. We must In Harlan Kentucky, thousands of into which the coal operators and their we can only say that you are very much participate in the elections because it 1st movement, to such a fatal outcome speak out now while there is still time miners have been out on strike for labor agents have dracked them, they in error regarding the defense of stor does not believe in their Sincerity. Ta of the struggle as will require that typo to act.
it possible that this be true? It would of self criticism which contented WHAT IS HAPPENING IN weeks. The and the Commun are nevertheless groping for a solution. genstern and Goolman. Our organizaists are not leading that strike and up Deeply indicative of ferment among them tion in the Philadelphia District, has mean the Manrin is not approaching the bureaucracy has made 80 to the present, at least, have virtually are the various rank and file conferences taken over the defense of these two problems of revolutionary tactics from type of criticism which repeats mech THE COAL FIELDS?
no influence upon it. The strike, as which are held for discussion and ac workers, giving them the same protection the point of view of the mobilization of anically that our line was correct buz To know what to do, we must first he militant in every respect as the one in tion. Both the Lewis and the Fthwick as all the other workers facing persecuthe forces of proletariat, but from it was not applied correctly by func clear about what is. Driven under the Pennsylvania, is led by the local organt machines 80 thoroughly discredited tion under the Flynn Sedition Law in the point of view of morality and partytionary or committee or rank and lash of a desperation induced by terrization of the United Mine Workers of that they dare not put in appearance. Fox Pennsylvania.
ourgeols sentimentalisin. Two weeks filer C: Every recent action of the file suffering and accentuated by a series America, and, from fairly reliable re its blunders of the past and of today, With comradely greetings, ago would have believed that the party, every struggle it has undertaken of wake cuts, tens of thousands of min ports, the has an appreciable the has little Influence bere Louis Engdahl Lourgeois press is recounting stupidities: or led, has wound up with this sorrsers in Western Pennsylvania went out influence among the strikers.
as well. Worse yet. political sharpers. General Secretary.
but after having acquainted myself with epitaph. Every important action, at on strike, the working miners Joined in in the mining section around Kan smooth demagogues, hungry aspirants to Thus, on March 11, Engdahl announced the platform of the Catalonian Federa whose commencement it was too early intimate solidarity with those thrown awha, West Virginia, some 23, 000 miners office. concealed henchmen of Lewis or that the had already taken over tion, am obliged to acknowledge that to speak of the mistakes and shortcom out of work. Under the intluence of went on strike last week in this field Farrington all rub shoulders at those the defense. Yet on March 25, the this news monstrous as it may beings found its tragic conclusion in the their resistance, thousands of other min of bitterly fought battles and betrayals.
conferences with the reformists of the replied to a protest from a member nevertheless not impossible and must columns of the party press, Alled with ery from the coal fields of Eastern Ohto Here too, the influence of the Muste school, each seeking to cupitalize of Its National Committee, Gerry Allard, not be excluded in advance.
lamentations, with criticisms of what and Northern West Virginia have joined and the Communists is negligible. The upon the discontentment of the miners by writing: On this line, we must inaugurate was wrong. with blustering apologies in the walkout. The strike is almost strike is under the leadership of the in All these movements have a common Dear Allard: pitiless struggle in our own ranks. It calculated to place the blame on an entirely under the leadership of the Na dependent Miners Union of West Vir root: the attempt of the coal barons to We have your long letter concerning is entirely absurd and unworthy to body or anything, so long as the printional Miners Union and the Rank and sinin, which split away from the rotted load the burdens of a sick industry upon the case of the two Philadelphia workquarrel with various groups on the sub ciple of the infallibility of the leader File Committee organized by it. The hulk of the Lewis It is led the shoulders of the miners, and the ers, their arrest, and the attitude of the nt of the functions, the rights and the ship of the day 18 preserved intact. militancy and solidarity of the strikers by such former leaders as (Continued on page Continued on page 3)
Combine the Miners Struggles into a United Front!