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The New York Communist The Executive Committee Statement By Maximilian Coben מן The following letter was sent to The New York delegates (excepting three. all to act, however, un rank and file to express itself ever since the St.
Call in answer to the Local Executive Committee til new elections took place. The first meeting was Louis Resolution was adopted by the rank and file.
ukase thich was published in that paper. In spite packed by the Rights and the motion to. ecall was Permit me to enumerate them chronologically. 1)
of is belief in the freedom of the press, which led it lost by nine voles: at the next meeting they succeed. The Meyer London re nomination. 2) The Social.
to publish such letters as Shaplen defense oj Kol. ed in xalling them with the stipulation referredist Alderman and the Third Liberty Loan. 3) The chat, Tlie Call refused to publish this letter, which to above. They could have elected new officers Socialist Aldermen and the Fourth Liberty Loan.
is one side of the controversy now raging within the and delegates right then, if they were so minded, so (4) The Socialist Aldermen and the Victory Arch Socialist Party: the charge that ihey wantonly dissolved the branch appropriation. To say nothing of every attempt to is pure bunk. They merely wanted to make sure DITOR of The Call: Permit me to answer consolidate the locals of Greater New York being that the Central Committee would sest their dele blocked by the oficialdom. To say nothing of the the statement issued by the Executive Com.
gates.
mittee of Local New York, and printed in resentment of the rank and file against the 10 day issue of The Call, pertaining to The Right Wing was faced with the immediate Call attitude towards the Bolsheviki in Russia and Left Wing controversy.
In view of the loss of their majority in the Central Committee. the Spartacans in Germany, which again was Action, and quick actio was necessary.
Other crushed by the officialdom, without redress by the gravity of the crisis precipitated by their illegal acts, and in view of their statemen!
bratches were in the process of recalling their dele members because the Call is not party owned or which is nothing more than a tissue of lies gates electing Left Wingers in their places. controlled.
concocted for the purpose of fooling the member With the exception of the Finnish Branch (counter These well known incidents give the lie direct to ship as to the actual situation, feel that you will revolutionary and social patriotic in all their ac their claim thai the regular party channels are open.
be fair enough to grant me space in which to reply. tions for the past year and a half. most of the lan. Slimily and hypocritically they prate of petty In the first place, the Executive Committee is guage branches were going to the Left. mention platforms and tac ics not being the main issue; givthese facts to show the desperate situation the Righting the impression that they are in favor of a radi.
solutely without any authority to re organize any branches in New York, until the referendum issued Wing was facing. What did they do?
cal revision along the lines laid down in the Left by the State Committee has been passed, and then Comrade Julius Cerber (whose heart was bleed. Wing Program. Here, we must call Comrade Gerthey not only have that right but also the right to ing with righteousness and wrath. issued a secret ber and Comrade Waldman to testify. Comrade automatically expel them. Why then does the Ex. call for an organization mecting of his trusted Gerber in his letter to his cronies, for that secret ecutive Commitee proceed to deprive Branches of cronies on Monday, April 21st, at his office. In his meeting before the Central Committee meeting of the right to rote on this rejerendum by re organizing them nou?
May 1st. he says, Tuesday evening, the Central While the control of the party by these irresponsi Their only semblance of an excuse for their Committee meets. At this meeting the die will ble people will make tie party an outlaw organbe cast as far as Local New York is con.
ization, and break up the organization.
wholesale re organizations is that at the last Cen.
And yet tral Commillee meeting. Comrade Karlin, who was cerned. Further on he continues, have for what would these irresponsible people do?
Merely carry out the letter and spirit of the Maninot chairman, moved ihat, when the Central Com myself. decided as to my course and my action.
mittee adjourns, it adjourn subject to call by the At this secret meeting this gang decided to festo and Program within the party. Get that!
What has Waldman to say on this subject of reExecutive Committee, and that the Executive Com: push through by hook or by crook, the concurrence by mittee be empowered and instructed to re organize Centrul Committee with the action of the vision of party policies and tactics? The follow.
Exerutive Coinmittee, in illegally re organizing the ing, delivered at a speech in the Bronx and reprint This motion was adopted. This is a deliberale lie.
17th with methods that would put the Tam.
No such motion was ever put much less carried, many machine to shame. The only thing lacking organ of the Right Wing: Industry must be under collective If an industry is municipal.
for one reason, the meeting had been adjourned the new hero ficial sanction by the Central Commit by the chairman: secondly, the room was in an indescribable iurmoil with the entire action was lega! and binding. That this going to be possessed of the ownership of that in police captain driving was but the prelude to a series of wholesale such dustry. If on industry is state wide, in its nature, the delegates out. What really occurred and this will be corroborated by most of the unbiased mem.
reorganizations we were certain, and openly the state is going to be possessed of that industry.
charged them with it in the Central Committee, If an industry is national in its character, such as bers and delegates present, was that during the which they dared not refute.
railroad, water ways, coal mines, telegraph and height of the confusion Comrade Karlin, after consultation with the group around him, suddenly is true that the Left Wing delegates had telephones, the nation will own it.
a steering committee and we never hid that fact; in Right Wing. They talk about revising party poliThis is the kind of Socialism advocated by the arose and cupping his hands over his mouth shouted above the din, that there would be no further fact we openly stated so, and even gave Phillips cies and tactics quite glibly, but only with the inand Gerber copies of our rules. He entered the meeting of the Central Committee until the Executive Committee decided to call for same.
tention of side tracking the revolutionary sentiment We meeting at ten minutes after eight and found, conticed the recording secretary writing furiously at trary to the usual custom. most of the delegates in of the rank and file who are clamoring for a thorthis time and predicted among ourselves that they their seats and the meeting already opened; that ough. going change on the basis laid down by the would claim that this motion was passed. As a mat.
meetings were never opened before eight fifteen is Left Wing Manifesto and Program. They do not a well known fact. We were surprised, but on the they can help it; certainly wish to revise the party policies ter of fact it was a physical impossibility for any tactics if vote for chairman realized that the meeting was not for the one either to put a motion or have the vole counted.
Fights were going on simultaneously all over the packed and something was to be jammed through.
hall. Members and delegates mingled indiscrimWe were not wrong in our surmise. when immer repudiating the Second International, they are not for affiliating with the Third International, called inately. voices were shouting, hisses and epithets, diately after Comrade lee blossomed out as a dele by the Communist Party of Russie (Bolsheviki. tion was passed at this time! Why, in their sheet, ated by his own branch. Comrade Gerber called They are not for making revolutionary industriai The The Socialist, they went furthet and purported to off the credentials of delegates from the illegally unionism, a part of its general propaganda give the exact vote by which this motion was re organized 17th ies from all over the quotation from Waldman speech distinctly states passed. 71 to 36 are the ſigures given. This then house for the reading of the credentials from the what their conception of Socialist is: nothing more or less than State Socialism in its most per is their basis for the Re organization methods. legitimate branch caused that worthy to bow to the leave it to the comrades to judge the merits of He read them apologetically and with talist state and utilizing it for the inauguration of nicious forms. They believe in preserving the capi: In their statement they give an account of the Beckerman rose, was granted the floor, and moved of the proletariat as a principle and violently opin the 17th showing how it led up to They the fillibuster the last Central Committee meet of the Executive Committee in re organizing the posed to it as the tactic of the revolution.
17th are the exact courier parts of the Ebert Scheide.
ing. Aside from misstating the facts, distorting mann moderate Socialists of Germany.
others, and omitting important ones, it is a fairly Granted the floor next, moved an amendment Bourgeois parliamentarism is their means and accurate account. The Executive Committee does that a committee of seven be appointed from this not state why a branch could not withdraw and body, three from the Right, three from the Left and State Socialism is their goal.
an impartial chairman selected unanimously, who Comrades! The Left Wing organization is the elect officers and delegates the same night, although there is nothing in the by laws prohibiting such ac should investigate the case of the 17th and organization of the rank and file. It is your an.
tion. The bv. laws only relate to the annual nomin. report back to the Central Committ at the next moet swer to the politicians, the officials, the traitors and the betrayers in our party, who boek to naintain ations and elections. In recalling delegates and of ing. This amendment, eminently fair and just, was themselves and their clique in control, despite the ficers, the clause says nothing about such proce deleated. Later on, when appealed to the dele fact that the membership clamors for new policies, dure. As a matter of fact this has been the gates to hear a committee of three bearing creden new tactics, new spokesmen.
procedure for years! But when the Leit Wingtials signed by members of the 17th my Now a word as to the heinous crime of having an became a factor in the 8th and had appeal was again lost. Did not this prove that the organization within an organization. The Right an overwhelming majority in the branch and Right Wing was out for its pound of they proceeded to use their legitimate power to So much for events. Now let us analyse their trol of such an organization. Our answer is that Wingers claim that the rank and fic have no conrecall those pets of the Right Wing Machine, Wald. theoretical position, viz. Do not be deceived. the rank and file have control, but the machine pris man. Lee and Block, and elected three Left Wingers The question at issue is not merely one of revising ticians have not. That is why they are opposed to in their place, the Central Committee refused to our party platform or its tactics. Differences of it so bitterly. But let us put the question this way.
seat the new delegates on the grounds that a spe. opinion on these matters are always in order. The Have the rank and file an opportunity of controllcial meeting should have been called, nominations constitution and by laws of the party give ample ing organizations outside of the organization och made, then and elections at the next moeting. The opportunity for discussing such questions and do as the Call and the Rand School?
Left Wing in the 8th sure of their majority, ciding them wy the will of the majority. Your We accuse them of having organized organizacomplied with the unfair ruling, and at a subse Executive Committee has neither the right nor the tions outside of the organization. which are most quent meeting, having duly notified the members of desire to interfere in such matters. On the con harmful to the Socialist movement. We accuse the the branch, recalled the old delegates and nomin trary, it is striving to maintain the normal condi. Right Wing of controlling them and being to it ated new ones. Elections were held at the follow tions for free and Fair discussion and decision. that the rang and file have no say in their manage ing meeting.
This quotation is from their statement in today ment, ownership or control. Is the red card per Now, then, the 17th realizing that if they Call. It sounde plausible. To the uninitiated it se an open scoame to those outside organizations?
recalled and elected delegates on the same meeting may even scem eminently fair. But is it? La us The charge has been made in the offcial organ night they would besubject to the same treatment, and Kec.
of the Right Wing, The Socialist. that the left further realizing that their pormal majority would Any sane Socialist knows that the organization of Wing is the only organization where the red card be sure to be diminished by the colonizing of their the Left Wing was due to the inertia and actual is not honored. That is not true. The fact is that opponents, dociend to recall all their ufficers and blocking by the oficials of very attempt of the The Call Association and the Rand School, claimstorm.
sneert.