DECEMBER 9, 1939 SOCIALIST APPEAL THE LABOR WITH WHITE SKIN CANNOT EMANCIPATE ITSELF WHERE LABOR WITH BLACK SKIN IS BRANDED. KARL MARX.
NEGRO QUESTION Page from Finnish History Mannerheim and Kuusinen Destroyed the Socialist Revolution Once Before, in 1918 MUTINY!
Russian Brigades in France praten By JOHNSON. Outline of Course at the Marxist School)
Destiny of the Negro By VICTOR SERGE Let us for a moment review our analysis of the Negro in his contact with Western civilization. In previous articles in this series we established that the Negroes in Africa had built high if simple. This war is nothing except coming a vassal of the Kaiser. lish here for the first time in Nicholas II made brutal at obtained by cynical fraud on the The social democratic leaders, civilizations up to the Fourteenth century. It was necessary to em the continuation and the last act The Kaiser generals inserted English Editors.
tempts at Russification of Fin part of the bourgeois parties. Kuusinen, Tanner, Sirola, formed phasize this, to destroy the imperialist fostered conception of Africa of our war for liberation, de into the Brest Litovsk treaty a land: he only succeeded in es But no more than the Finnish the Council of People Delegates, as a land of eternal savagery and barbarism from which it has to clared General Baron Manner provision forcing the evacuation FINLAND WAS READY tranging the entire Finnish peo proletariat could resign itself to under the control of a supreme some degree been raised by the gentle hand of the European in heim, commander of Finland of Soviet troops from Finland, FOR SOCIALISM ple. Two years after the Revolu this electoral defeat, could the Workers Council of 35 delegates vaders.
army, on December The War and provided Mannerheim with If Russia was, as Lenin often tion of 1905, which forced the bourgeoisie content itself with so. ten from the social democratic European contact with Africa began with the rise of European for liberation of 1918 to which German regiments against the remarked, one of the most back Czar to grant her a constitution, precarious a victory. An extra party, ten from the Red Guard, imperialism. new continent, America, was discovered and Africa, he refers was, however, nothing Finnish Red Guards. When Ger ward countries of Europe, Fin Finland instituted universal suf parliamentary settlement was on five from the Helsingfors workwhich had always lain within easy reach of European ships, was of the kind. Finland right to na many lost the war, Finland be land was of the most ad frage. In the first election, in the order of the day. The bour ers organizations. What were penetrated. Commercial capitalism developed the mercantile sys tional independence was guaran came a British sphere of influ vanced in the world. Her cus 1907, the social democrats ob geoisle had foreseen it for long, they to do? To march day by tem, which needed labor the American tropical plantations. When teed by one of the first acts of ence.
toms, her advanced political edu tained eighty seats out of two and prepared seriously for civil day toward the socialist revoluthe Indians proved unsatisfactory, slaves were brought from Africa. the Soviet governmeut of Lenin The same Kuusinen whom cation, the victories of her so hundred in the Sejm (parlia war. But the social democracy, tion. declared the People DelOn the basis of the wealth created by the slave trade and the and Trotsky: the Decree on the Stalin has set up as a puppet cialist movement, even her in ment. The 1916 elections gave twenty years in the school of the gates. They instituted workers colonial trade directly dependent upon it, the commercial capitalists Rights of the Russian Peoples. government was in 1918 leader dustrial structure, seemed en them an absolute majority, one powerful German social democ control of production, made easy of Europe and America built up from their ranks a new section of promulgated on November 2, of the Finnish social democracy sure the easy victory of social hundred three out of two hun racy, and dominated by reform by the high degree of concentra1917.
the capitalist class, the industrial capitalists. These, whose and led the Finnis workers to ism.
majority voted the ist Illusions, hoped to avoid the tion of the main industries, lumfunction was the application of large scale This decree established the disaster. An opponent of the the part of Sweden since the eight hour day and an intelligent conflict.
ber, paper and textiles; they put to industry, came inevitably into conflict with action and science the planters: slave equality and sovereignty of the ory of the dictatorship of the Twelfth Century, a country of program of public legislation. Three thousand young Finns a stop to the sabotage of the labor was too expensive, too backward, for the new methods. This different nations in the former proletariat, he opposed the ex small proprietors whom feudal Then parliamentary socialism of the wealthier classes were in banks. Public life and industrial economic conflict was the basis for political conflict. The commer czarist territories and their right propriation of the capitalists; he ism had never overcome, Finland found itself at the point of death, the 27th Jaegers battalion of the production soon returned to an cial bourgeoisie and the feudal aristocracy still had the political to determine their own destiny, did not summon the workers to passed to Russia in 1809, through Was it possible to continue peace German army, fighting against almost normal state.
power their former economic predominance had given them, and for even to the point of separating take up arms against the the alliance between Napoleon fully marching toward socialism their hereditary enemy, Russia. KUUSINEN THROWS AWAY Clandestine military schools ex THE REVOLUTION The issue in Finland in 1918 late. In Stalin service Kuusinen a Grand Duchy, she enjoyed a The Finnish bourgeoisie allied isted in various places throughmeant a struggle.
Was the dictatorship of the therefore, was not the question remains, as before, an opponent large degree of autonomy, all itself with Kerensky against the out the country. After the fall proletariat possible? Was it necThe Bourgeois Revolutions of independence but whether Fin of proletarian revolution, cyn the larger as the Finns were red social democratic Diet; the of the Czar, a volunteer rifle essary? The social democratic This was a progressive struggle. It took place in great revolu land would be a workers repub cally serving the Kremlin bu able to defend their autonomy Provisional Government in Pet corps was formed in the North to leaders did not think so, although tions in France and in America, and in Britain it took not only the Lic or a bourgeois state. That is reaucracy in its annexation of against the attacks of her Grand rograd, following the line of the maintain law and order. This five hundred thousand, of a total threat but the actual beginning of a revolution to break the power of sue was decided by a civil war Finland.
Dukes, the Czars of Russia. Fin autocracy, declared the Diet dis was General Herrich Schutz population of three million, were the feudal aristocrats. In all these the Negro played tremendous precipitated by this same ManThe story of the civil war of land kept her Diet, her own mon solved. Russian soldiers guarded corps, the first White Guard unit engaged in industry. The workpart. In America he was given the opportunity of doing this be nerheim, in which the White 1918 is a damning indictment of ey, her postal system, her its closed doors. In the follow formed in the open. Its headquar ers and agricultural laborers to cause his emancipation was in the interest of the Northern indus Guards were victorious thanks to both Mannerheim and Kuusinen schools, her own army, and her ing elections, the social demo ters were at Vasa on the Gulf of gether numbered half a million trialist bourgeoisie. All these great movements of politics thrust the two things. then and now. The story is own internal administration. She crats gained fom 375, 000 votes Bothnia; it received arms from men. The small and middle farmcolor question into subordination and unimportance. It is economics. The aid of German imper. told in a chapter of Victor grew up, like the other Scandi. the year before, to 440. 000 votes Sweden and Germany. ers, the rural majority, could be and politics, not color, that are decisive in history.
ialism, purchased by the Finnish Serge The Year of the Rus navian countries, as a part of but lost some of their seatswon over or neutralized by the To see what happened after the industrialist bourgeoisie took bourgeoisie at the price of be sian Revolution. which we pub Western Europe, from 103 to 92. This result was GENERAL STRIKE revolution. Unfortunately, Until OF NOVEMBER, 1918 they were defeated, the majority power, it would be best to follow the course of one country, any The October Revolution proof the leaders were not at all Great Britain. The industrialists seized power in 1832. They struck voked an echo in Finland: a great clear as to the goals of the revterrific blow at the landed aristocracy in 1847 by abolishing the corn laws. Through these laws the feudal aristocrats had artificialgeneral strike, in mid November, olution (Kuusinen. Without ly maintained the price of grain by restricting foreign competition We Want to Go Home!
brought on by a serious famine, either establishing the dictatorwhich affected, only the poorer ship of the laboring masses or with the produce of their fields. Rising with the industrial bourgeoisclasses, and by the reactionary expropriating the wealthy classic was a new class the industrial working class, the proletariat.
policies of the Finnish Senate, es, the social democrats tried to And by 1848 the Chartist Movement of the workers was feeling its 1917: The Mutinies of the which seemed inclined to place establish a parliamentary democway towards revolution, the reactionary Svinhufvud, at racy in which the proletariat was But in this year began a great era of prosperity. So prosperous was the industrial bourgeoisie, thanks to the home market its victhe head of a dictatorial Direct the leading class.
tory had given it, that it treated the idea of colonies in Africa with The principal measures taken The workers quit work every by the Council of People Delescorn. Disraeli wrote in 1866 that the British had all that they wanted in Asia. For, he continued, what is the use of these colonial where. The railways stopped. Bates were: the institution of the Workers Red Guards, supported eight hour day, the payment of deadweights, the West Indian and West Africa colonies. Leave by Spartacus the Canadians to govern themselves; recall the African squadrons; by Soviet Russian troops in wages for time out during the places, occupied all public build revolutionary strike, the emangive up the settlements on the southeast coast of Africa, and we ings. Bloody encounters occurred cipation of servants and bondsshall make a saving which will at the same time enable us to build ships and have a good budget. In the year he wrote, only one tenth. them by sending them to the deadly, fever ridden Salonika between the Whites and the men from the farms (they were or less of Africa was in the hands of European imperialists. They Both Russian brigades were marched into the interior, to front: The Russian commander, General Zankievitch, issued frightened de regelister consented and subject every severe Tawers hadele vastanede the continuinite almost seemed we have frica wouna a camp of huts near the village of La Courtine, some two hunc orders to break up camp and march to a nearby town. The to the application of the eight ene abolition of the rest method be left in peace.
dred miles south of Paris. Their numbers are variously put at social composition of the two brigades was quite different. hour law and to the enactment of allocating land, which was New Need For Africa from 10, 000 to 15, 000. No attempt was made to disarm the The first had been recruited in Moscow from clerks and work of a new program of social leg based on a system of corvee and But capitalist production leads inveltably to the concentration men. The French were too busy dealing with the widespread ers, the second was made up almost wholly of Siberian peas ocratization of power, which small tenants, the institution of of wealth in the hands of a few and the corresponding increasing mutinies in their own army to pay any attention to the Rus ants. In this final crisis heavy artillery had already been passed from the Senate to judicial reform, abolition of the death penalty, tax exemption for poverty of the masses. The workers cannot buy what they produce. sians once they had been safely interned. so to speak. The moved up within range of the camp the peasant brigade Det the victorious The capitalists must find abroad new markets, sources of raw maRussian officers, not relishing the new democratic manners of obeyed Zankievitch order and marched out of the camp. The strike of the workers ended in comes of more than twenty thou, on In 1885 Jules Ferry the French statesman, used the famous their men, and perhaps a little alarmed for the safety of their first brigade refused to move. Now, with French bayonets at the constitution of a bourgeois sand marks, a tax on apartments words: own skins, went off to Limoges to live.
their backs, the second brigade was forced to attack their com cabinet, headed by the same re of more than one room, liberaactionary Svinhufvud! It was the tion of the press from ancient Colonies for rich countries are one of the most lucrative methods of utilizing capital.
abortion of a revolution. Finnish regulations, workers control of. say that France, which is glutted with For four months the camp at La Courtine presented an rades. Trotsky describes the operation. capital, has a reason for looking on this side of the colonial question extraordinary spectacle of democratic communal living. The The second Russian brigade was brought into action against revolutionists are of the opinion the factories.
the first. The artillery occupied positions on the nearby mountain that the seizure of power was The Council drew up constinew masses of consumers in other parts of the globe, ele we share thousands of soldiers in the huge camp, left strictly to themslopes, the infantry, employing all the rules of engineering scipossible at that time; it would tution, to be adopted by referput modern society into bankruptcy and prepare for social liquida selves, showed the talent for social organization which is usu ence. dug trenches and approaches to La Courtine. The surroundeven have been easy; the support endum, which expressed the tion with the dawn of the twentieth century.
ally shown by the masses under such conditions and which of the Bolsheviks would have Ideal Democracy which motivatings were strongly occupied by Alpine sharpshooters, to make Cecil Rhodes once told a friend, If you want to free civilizasure that no single Frenchman should enter the theatre of war been decisive. Otto Kuusinen, ed the social democrats. An astion, become an imperialist. With the glut in the home market, never fails to astonish bourgeois observers, who cannot conthen one of the leaders of the sembly of people representaof the two Russian brigades. Thus the military authorities of colonies were no longer deadweight. While in 1880 only one tenth ceive of an army existing without officers bawling orders Center wing of the Finnish 80 tives, elected every three years of Africa was in the hands of European imperialists, by 1900 less and keeping discipline. any more than they can imagine a France set the stage on their territory for a Russian civil war, cial democracy, later wrote: by universal, direct secret sufthan one tenth of the land remained in the hands of the African factory producing goods without high salaried executives prudently surrounding it with a hedge of bayonets. This was Not wishing to risk our demo frage (women voting, the age That saturation of European consumption to which Ferry merely a rehearsal. Later on the French ruling classes organized cratic conquests, and hoping to limit twenty years. according to peoped and the part that Africa played can be shown by the fol sitting behind niahogany desks.
a civil war on the territory of Russia herself, surrounding it with skip that great historical turn proportional representation, was lowing simple calculation. Great Britain has invested abroad rough According to the later official reports, the Russians raped the barbed ring of the blockade.
ing point by clever parliament to be the supreme authority of ly twenty billion dollars. The total investment in Africa from all and looted the whole countryside for miles around. But the methodical bombardment of the camp began. Several hunary maneuvers, we decided to the People Republic of Finsources is roughly six billion dollars, and of this almost five billion elude the revolution. We did land. Any amendments to the dred soldiers came out of the camp, agreeing to surrender. They is in British territory. That is to say, almost one fourth of British local villagers seem to have been completely unaware of any were received, and the artillery fire immediately began again.
not believe in the revolution; we constitution were to be submitted of these outrages. They said afterwards that the Russians foreign investment is to be found in Africa.
had no hope in the revolution, to a referendum. minority in This lasted for four days and four nights. The La Courtine men But this process of saturation that forced the imperialists to were doux et correctes. gentle and well mannered. fine surrendered in detachments. On the sixth of September there we did not want it at all the assembly which mustered expand to the colonies has now itaelt spread to the colonies. The men who liked nothing better than to play with the children. Kuusinen, The Finnish Revolu one third of the votes had the remained about two hundred men who had decided not to give tion, an Essay in Self Criticism, right to veto all but tax legislaand the increasing poverty of the masses is now not only a Euro The villagers distinctly preferred them to the Americans who themselves up alive. At their head stood a Ukrainian, Globa, a 1919. With leaders of such mind, tion. The import of prime compepitalism, is onlik Pulpe. The war on esi 1918, the worldwide Series but a world phenomenon. Imperialism, the highest stage of came to La Courtine later Baptist, a fanatic: in Russia they would have called him a Bol the cause of the Finnish prole modities was exempted from all shevik. Under cover of artillery, machine gun and rifle fire, comtariat was certain to lose. taxation. Officials and magis.
since 1929, the new world war of 1939 these are items from the bining in one general roar, the place was stormed.
BOURGEOISIE PREPARES trates were to be elected every ledger of imperialism. Only the overthrowing the bankrupt class The Social Patriots Try Oratory five years and subject to recall by a new class, only the triumphant proletarian revolution, can bal Frequent political meetings were held in the camp. Various were executed on the spot, and another eight hundred were their own strength to the work to be checked by a control comAccording to Wintringham, two hundred of the rebels FOR CIVIL WAR by one fifth of the electors at And in the same way as the Negroes played an important role eminent Russian exiles of a respectable social patriot com officially declared to be missing.
ers, and to the bourgeoisie their mission for the administration in the revolution of the industrialists in unseating the feudal aris plexion, of course were sent in by the French authorities to peril. The Finnish bourgeoisie un and application of laws. two tocracy, so tomorrow the Negroes will play a decisive role in the show these ignorant and stubborn soldiers why they should The End of the Story derstood that it was lost with members of which could veto any declared intentions, Lincoln was forced to free the slaves. Revolu die for la gloire, la victoire, liberté, egalité, fraternité, etc. etc. The first brigade was rewarded for its loyalty by being out reinforcements. Svinhufvud new legislation, etc. etc.
tionary France had to recognize the revolution of the Santo Domin For all their eloquence, these patriotic democrats were sent to Africa, together with the thousands in the second The Whites armed feverishly in marked of this constitution: In go blacks. In the stress of economic and political conflict, color was never able to make clear to the soldiers what the revolution brigade who had surrendered before the final assault on the the North, where they collected theory, it attained the widest de forgotten and the rising class took help where Negroes in Africa and in America, wherever they are the most was all about. Always their fine words about freedom and camp. More thousands were added from Russian regiments large stocks of food. The govern velopment of bourgeois democ oppressed of people, are going to strike even more deadly blows for democracy rang false when thrown on the hard counter of the serving on the Salonika front, who had also been demanding ine in working class centers by possible under a capitalist sys: freedom, against the capitalist system of exploitation, in alliance soldiers single, unalterable demand. We want to go home to be allowed to go home. Instead they were all shipped off holding back reserve food sup tem. This bourgeois democracy with the white workers of the world.
But Miliukov and his successor, Kerensky, had enough to Africa, where, in the words of Henri Barbusse, who years ples. The proclamation of Fin could only go torward to the air Marxist School rebellious troops on their hands at home. They wanted these later talked to some of the survivors, they melted down. ing. The possibility of Swedish the workers were victorious, or For the Coming Week Felix Morrow editor of the So YORKVILLE FORUM to stay and help France win the war, They were dragged from camp to camp, from inferno to in or German intervention alarmed backward to a bourgeois dictaThe best efforts of all these dignitaries and distinguished ferno.
The following lectures will be cialist Appeal, will be the speak former exiles were not enough to persuade these simple soltorship if they were defeated.
Finally, the French sent the survivors home to fight in by 97 87, a motion containing un ly utopian project. The weakTo cap matters, the Diet voted. It was a beautiful and completegiven at the Marxie schon, Meer at the Yorkville Branch forum diers to keep on fighting and dying, any more than Kerensky the army of Denikin against the Bolsheviks! Once more mistakable alustons to the nec: ness of the bourgeoisie, Kuusiwork city. coming the week be at the National Bohemian Hall, brilliant oratory was enough to hold together the Russian they mutinied, once more they were decimated. But they stood essity for a bourgeois dictator nen said, let us into democratic 321 East 13 Street, New York armies at home. It was necessary to brand these brigades as fast and refused to fight against their brothers in the Red posed once more, even more seri march toward socialism by paro War and Inflation. Frank City, Friday, Dec. 8, at p.
DembyMonday at 7:15. Will Roosevelt keep us Out rebels and let the French deal with them at bayonet point. Army. Finally the adventurer Denikin was beaten and fled to fously than on the eve of the No liamentary debate and the com The Tradition and Touchings of War. is the topic of the lec For these troops at La Courtine were fellow countrymen of Paris. Those remnants of the Russian brigades who had sur vember general strike. This time ocratization of the government.
of Marx and Engels German ture.
and Italian National Unitythe soldiers who had overthrown the Czar. They too were vived the bombardment of La Courtine, the sun and fever of the social democrats realized that such was the terrible effect of The Irish and Polish Questions infected with the bacilli of revolution. Trotsky writes: Africa, and the brutal reprisals of Denikin these veteran solution were exhausted. It was ists. Such was their fatal misun Pan Slaviam Max ShachtWILLIAMSBURGH FORUM The Russian soldiers had carried this dreadful infection with rebels at last were able to return home and take part in build necessary to fight.
man Monday at 8:50.
derstanding them across the sea in their canvas knapsacks, in the lining of The red flag was hoisted over class struggle. War and the Negro People Africa Today The Position of ing up the new Russia.
their coats, in the secret places of their hearts. This dramatic the Workers House in Helsing And now at last, writes Barbusse, the little throng of tors during the night of January ocratic illusions, one African will be discussed by James Burn(How, in return for these demthe Native Johnson Tuesday, at 7:15. ham, McKinney, and other episode at La Courtine is significant. It was a kind of consciously Russian soldiers have triumphed over events. At last they have 23. The rest of the city was make thousand Finnish workers alto4. Class Society and the state prominent speakers, at a free ed arranged ideal experiment, almost as though under a bell glass, become true soldiers of the revolution. They have encom and the government took refuge gether about one quarter of the George Novack Tuesday at ucational meeting Friday. Defor testing out those inner processes in the Russian army, the 8:50.
cember 8, 8:00 pm, at St. Augus foundation for which had been laid by the whole past history of passed that definite thing which they saw in their dreams when at Vasa. In a few days, the work working class. were struck Stalinism in the Wed tine Church, Lafayette and the country they refused to serve the ends of those who massacre the ers mastered the larger cities of nesday at 7:15.
Marey Avenues, Brooklyn. The When they had finally mastered the mutinies in their own peoples. Never, in all the history of mankind, was promise Abo, Vyborg and Tammerfors, down by the White Terror, will Expect batter Day James Cialist Workers Party, Williams: army, the French authorities turned their attention again to more splendidly kept by a band of men both greater and more of the country, without meeting cluding instalment of Victor Burnham Wednesday at 8:50. burgh Branch.
the Russians at La Courtine. It was decided to get rid of human than their fellows.
any serious resistance.
Serge story. the laws hundred