Transcriber’s Note: Two pages of advertising material were moved to the
end of the book.
J. EDGAR HOOVER
Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation
MASTERS OF DECEIT
The Story of Communism in America
and How to Fight It
[Illustration: CARDINAL EDITION]
POCKET BOOKS, INC. · NEW YORK
_Masters of Deceit_
[Illustration]
Henry Holt edition published March, 1958
Book-of-the-Month Club edition published June, 1958
GIANT CARDINAL edition published October, 1959
11th printing October, 1961
[Illustration]
This GIANT CARDINAL edition includes every word contained in the
original, higher-priced edition. It is printed from brand-new plates
made from completely reset, clear, easy-to-read type.
·
GIANT CARDINAL editions are distributed in the U.S. by Affiliated
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_Notice_: GIANT CARDINAL editions are published by Pocket Books, Inc.
Trademark registered in the United States and other countries.
Copyright, ©, 1958, by J. Edgar Hoover. All rights reserved.
This GIANT CARDINAL edition is published by arrangement with
Henry Holt and Company, Inc.
PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.
_Foreword_
Every citizen has a duty to learn more about the menace that threatens
his future, his home, his children, the peace of the world—and that is
why I have written this book.
If you will take the time to inform yourself, you will find that
communism holds no mysteries. Its leaders have blue-printed their
objectives. The time is far too late not to recognize this “ism” for what
it is: a threat to humanity and to each of us.
Moreover, there is the sobering fact that since the end of World War II
we have spent billions of dollars to defend ourselves from communist
aggression. This burden will continue to mount until the world is free
from the communist menace.
This book is an attempt to explain communism—what it is, how it works,
what its aims are, and, most important of all, what we need to know to
combat it.
In writing this book I have been guided by many years of study and
observation of the communist conspiracy in action in the United States.
As a Special Assistant to the Attorney General of the United States
in 1919, I was assigned to prepare a legal brief on the newly formed
Communist Party and Communist Labor Party. This necessitated an extensive
and penetrating study.
The amount of material was voluminous: Party statements, resolutions,
platforms, news accounts, manifestoes, the very first documents of
American communism. I studied also the writings of Marx, Engels, and
Lenin as well as the activities of the Third International.
In this brief, which was submitted to the Attorney General, I concluded:
These doctrines threaten the happiness of the community, the
safety of every individual, and the continuance of every home
and fireside. They would destroy the peace of the country and
thrust it into a condition of anarchy and lawlessness and
immorality that passes imagination.
Today, as I write these words, my conclusions of 1919 remain the same.
Communism is the major menace of our time. Today, it threatens the very
existence of our Western civilization.
In November, 1917, the Bolsheviks seized control in Russia, gaining
state power for the first time. That breach has today widened into a
vast communist empire. The attack is still being pressed. International
communism will never rest until the whole world, including the United
States, is under the hammer and sickle. This is what has happened to the
Russian people, now held in bondage, who would be free if they could.
(I wish to distinguish here and elsewhere in this book between these
unfortunate millions and the small clique of communist rulers of Soviet
Russia.)
Communism is more than an economic, political, social, or philosophical
doctrine. It is a way of life; a false, materialistic “religion.” It
would strip man of his belief in God, his heritage of freedom, his trust
in love, justice, and mercy. Under communism, all would become, as so
many already have, twentieth-century slaves.
Ever since 1917, I have observed the rise of international communism with
great concern, particularly communist efforts to infiltrate and infect
our American way of life. The Communist Party, USA, started in 1919
as a small, disorganized group of fanatics. Today, it is a dedicated,
conspiratorial group operating under modern conditions as an arm of
revolution. There is no doubt that America is now the prime target of
international communism.
Obviously, this book does not pretend to disclose a body of material
known exclusively to the FBI. What it does express is the hope that
all of us may develop a shared body of rudimentary knowledge about
communism: a body of knowledge that we _dare not_ be without. It
attempts, in almost primer form, to set down certain fundamentals of
the day-to-day operations of the Communist Party, USA: how a communist
meeting is conducted; how a top Party official lives; what goes on in
the underground; how discipline is enforced; how Party members collect
money, attend indoctrination schools, hand out propaganda leaflets.
Party members are shown organizing agitation campaigns, infiltrating
noncommunist organizations, and manipulating communist fronts. The best
way to appreciate the nature and objectives of an enemy is to observe him
in action.
The Communist Party, never forget, is a state within a state. It has its
own system of “courts,” legislative assemblies, schools, and press. It
enforces its own laws, has its own standards of conduct, and offers its
own road to Utopia. The Party member may physically reside in the United
States, but he “lives” in a communist “world.”
The Party, moreover, serves as a “transmission belt” whereby the Soviet
mentality is being imposed, both directly and indirectly, on thousands
of Americans. The Party’s objective is to produce a “politically mature”
comrade—“communist man”—who will work ceaselessly for the revolution that
would make our United States part of the Soviet system.
I have deep faith in the American people and in our American way of life.
But I know what communism could do to us. Not because it is stronger
than we are; it is not. Not because it has something better to offer; it
has not. But we may not learn until it is too late to recognize who the
communists are, what they are doing, and what we ourselves, therefore,
must do to defeat them.
It is my sincere hope that members of the Communist Party will take the
time to read this book—to see how, right before their eyes, the Party
is deceiving them. As we know, many members, once awakened to the true
nature of communism, have renounced the Party. By casting aside the
communist spell, these men and women can do much to aid the cause of
freedom.
I have sought to avoid sensationalism, even though much of the FBI’s work
in keeping abreast of day-to-day activities of American communists makes
us ask in wonderment, “Can this be possible?” To recount the sensational
activities of communists would defeat my objective. My purpose has been
to assemble, organize, and present basic, everyday facts of communism
which will be of maximum help to the people of our country in recognizing
and fighting the enemy in our midst. Consequently, where illustrative
incidents seemed advisable, I have selected those that have occurred most
frequently and are most typical of the communism that is seeking daily
to undermine our liberties. I have also deliberately avoided identifying
many names and places.
I owe deep thanks to many for help in the preparation of this book.
On the technical side, I am grateful to William I. Nichols, editor
and publisher of _This Week_ magazine, for much editorial guidance
and advice. In a wider sense, I owe much to the courageous and
self-sacrificing men and women of the FBI who have contributed so greatly
to America’s fight against communism.
But most of all, I have been guided by the thought of millions of loyal
Americans everywhere and in all walks of life. Never has there been a
time when we have so much need for one another. And we must never forget
that if our government is to remain free, it needs the help of every
patriotic man, woman, and child.
[Illustration: J. Edgar Hoover]
Washington, D.C.
December, 1957
_Contents_
_Page_
=Foreword= v
=Part I. Who Is Your Enemy?= 3
=Part II. How Communism Began=
1. Marx—And the “Science” of Communism 13
2. Lenin—And the Russian Revolution 23
3. Stalin—A Fallen Idol 35
4. How U.S. Communism Began, 1919-21 48
5. The Party Grows Up 61
=Part III. The Communist Appeal in the United States=
6. Who Are the Communists? 75
7. What Do U.S. Communists Claim? 89
8. Why Do People Become Communists? 97
9. Why People Break with Communism 108
=Part IV. Life in the Party=
10. How the Party Is Organized 123
11. This Is the Party! 138
12. Making Communist Man 149
13. Communist Discipline 163
=Part V. The Communist Trojan Horse in Action=
14. Communist Strategy and Tactics 181
15. Mass Agitation 185
16. Infiltration 199
17. The Communist Front 212
18. Communism and Minorities 226
19. The Communist Attack on Judaism 237
=Part VI. The Communist Underground=
20. How the Underground Works 255
21. Espionage and Sabotage 271
22. What Can You Do? 287
=Part VII. Conclusion=
23. Communism: A False Religion 297
24. How to Stay Free 308
=Glossary= 315
=Bibliography of Major Communist “Classics”= 328
=Appendices=
I: Key Dates in Lives of Communist “Big Four” 333
II: International Communist Organizations and Publications 335
III: Communism in Russia 337
IV: Communism in the United States 339
=Index= 341
_Part I_
WHO IS YOUR ENEMY?
Many Americans have not stopped to realize what a “Soviet America” would
mean. The communists, however, have no doubts. Their blueprints are
already made. So, at the very outset, let us look at their dream and see
what it would mean to you and me and all the people we know.
In June, 1957, Nikita Khrushchev, Soviet Communist Party boss, was
interviewed before a nation-wide American television audience. With calm
assurance he stated:
... I can prophesy that your grandchildren in America will live
under socialism. And please do not be afraid of that. Your
grandchildren will ... not understand how their grandparents
did not understand the progressive nature of a socialist
society.
William Z. Foster, former National Chairman of the Communist Party
of the United States (now Chairman Emeritus of the Party’s National
Committee), also predicted that this nation will one day become communist
when he stated in 1949, in dedicating his book, _The Twilight of World
Capitalism_:
To My Great-Grandson Joseph Manley Kolko Who Will Live in a
Communist United States.
These words of Russia’s top Party boss and one of the highest-ranking
communists in the United States reveal the nature of the enemy we face.
To make the United States a communist nation is the ambition of every
Party member, regardless of position or rank. He works constantly to make
this dream a reality, to steal your rights, liberties, and property. Even
though he lives in the United States, he is a supporter of a foreign
power, espousing an alien line of thought. He is a conspirator against
his country.
The communist is thinking in terms of _now_, in your lifetime. Remember
that within four decades communism, as a state power, has spread through
roughly 40 per cent of the world’s population and 25 per cent of the
earth’s surface. Some years ago communists were complaining that their
“fatherland,” Soviet Russia, was encircled, a communist island in a
“capitalist” sea. Today the situation is changed. The world communist
movement is on the march, into Germany, the Balkans, the Middle East,
stretching across the plains of Asia into China, Korea, and Indochina.
Communists have never won over an entire country by a free election
and have never hesitated to shed blood if this would best serve their
purposes. Moreover, in noncommunist countries thousands of Party members
are working for Moscow. Communists firmly believe they are destined to
conquer the world.
This belief is held in the United States too. A disciplined Party of
hard-core fanatical members is now at work, with their fellow travelers,
sympathizers, opportunists, and dupes. Communists in our country, though
small in numbers, do not feel lonely. They have faith in the “big Red
brother” who will come to their help. William Z. Foster’s hope, a Red
America, is today inspiring thousands of Party members and sympathizers
to determined effort. They want to add America to Soviet Russia’s list of
conquests.
In recent years there has been a tendency to discount the menace of
domestic communists solely because of a decline in Party membership.
In fact, some have gone so far as to say, “... the party ... is almost
over.” Let’s examine that statement:
In 1922, when Communist Party membership reached 12,400, William Z.
Foster said, “... we no longer measure the importance of revolutionary
organizations by size. In some places where there are only one or
two men, more results are obtained than where they have larger
organizations....”
This has been the communist line down through the years. Foster in 1951
stated, “Communist strength ... cannot be measured even approximately by
statistics.... The Communist parties’ strength runs far beyond all formal
measurements....”
The Party’s membership in this country reached a low in 1930 when it had
7500 members, and a peak of 80,000 in 1944; its membership at five-year
intervals since 1930 has been as follows: 1935—30,000; 1940—55,000 (a
drop of 15,000 from 1939); 1945—64,600 (a drop of 15,400 from 1944);
1950—43,200; 1955—22,600; and by the summer of 1957 membership had
further declined. However, over the years it has been estimated by the
communist leaders themselves that for every Party member ten others are
ready, willing, and able to do the Party’s work.
Fluctuations in the American Party parallel those in foreign countries.
The record clearly establishes that Communist Parties have the power of
swift and solid growth when the opportunity arises. The following figures
reflect how Party membership can dwindle and then spurt:
In Italy, Party membership went from 6000 in 1943 to 2,500,000
in 1951; in France, from 20,000 in 1929 to 400,000 in 1956;
in Syria, from 250 in 1931 to 10,000 in 1956; in Brazil, from
25,000 in late 1947 to 100,000 in 1956; and in Indonesia, from
30,000 in 1953 to 500,000 in 1956.
_When the Communist Party was at its peak in the United States it was
stronger in numbers than the Soviet Party was at the time it seized power
in Russia._
The size of the Party in the various Soviet satellites at the time
each came under Soviet control discloses how a well-organized band of
revolutionaries can impose its rule over the majority population:
_Date of
Communist _CP Membership _Population
Take-over_ on That Date_ on That Date_
BULGARIA September, 1945 20,000 7,020,000
ROUMANIA March, 1945 800,000 16,409,000
POLAND January, 1949 1,000,000 25,225,000
CZECHOSLOVAKIA May, 1948 1,329,000 12,338,000
HUNGARY August, 1947 750,000 9,383,000
ALBANIA December, 1945 12,000 1,120,000
YUGOSLAVIA Mid-1945 141,000 14,500,000
Under communism, a tiny minority, perhaps ten to twenty men, would rule
the United States. An open dictatorship called the “dictatorship of the
proletariat” would be established. (For a definition of “dictatorship of
the proletariat,” see the Glossary, page 323.) Communists, in all their
teachings, make this point clear. The capital city, as one communist
leader pointed out, would be moved from Washington, D.C., to a large
industrial center, probably Chicago. National as well as state and local
governments would be eliminated. “Soviets” (meaning councils) would be
formed throughout the nation. These would consist of local Communist
Party henchmen who would depose and probably liquidate your mayor, chief
of police, clergymen, and leading citizens.
The Constitution, and all our laws, would be abolished. If you owned
productive property you would be arrested as an “exploiter,” hauled
before a revolutionary court, and sentenced to a concentration camp—that
is, if you convinced the “judge” you were worth saving at all. All
property used in production would be confiscated, thus leading ultimately
to total communization, meaning state ownership. This confiscation
would include your home, business, bank deposits, and related personal
possessions. These would “belong to everybody.” You have no “right” to
own them under the communist scheme.
The revolution would affect every man, woman, and child in America.
Communists do not propose to remodel our government or retain any part of
it. They would tear it to the ground, destroy all opposition, and then
create a new government, an American province in the Soviet world empire.
Their recipe for action? The 1917 Soviet revolution, tailored to modern
conditions. The communists themselves have made the claim:
The principles upon which a Soviet America would be organized
would be the same, in every respect, as those which guided the
Soviet Union.
William Z. Foster, long-time head of the communist movement in our
country, has boasted that the communist revolution, after the actual
seizure of power, would “develop even more swiftly” than the Russian.
All industry would be nationalized and farms taken away from their
owners. A small businessman is just as guilty as a large businessman;
both must be liquidated. Rents, profits, and insurance would be
abolished. Countless occupations, termed by the communists as “useless
and parasitic,” would be ended. Here is a part of their list:
wholesalers, jobbers, real estate men and stockbrokers, advertising
specialists, traveling salesmen, lawyers, “whole rafts of government
bureaucrats, police, clericals, and sundry capitalist quacks, fakers, and
grafters.” The communists have a special disdain for lawyers. Perhaps it
is because there will be no need for lawyers when there are no rights
to defend. At any rate, Foster has said, “The pest of lawyers will be
abolished.”
Action would be drastic, immediate, and without appeal. An armed “Red
Guard” would enforce the orders of Party henchmen. Hotels, country clubs,
and swimming pools would be used for the benefit of “workers,” meaning,
in most cases, Party bosses. The workingman in the mines, factories,
and mills would be told to work certain hours for certain wages. Labor
unions, as we know them, would be obliterated. All such organizations
would be owned and operated by the communist government, and no laborer
would be permitted to organize a union or to strike against his
“government.”
The press would be muzzled, free speech forbidden, and complete
conformity demanded. If you expressed an opinion contrary to the Party
line, you should have known better and your “disappearance” would
serve as a lesson for others. Fear becomes an enforcement technique.
Movies, radio, and television would be taken over by the government
as agencies for government propaganda. Churches would probably not be
closed immediately, but they would be heavily taxed, their property
seized by the state, and religious schools liquidated. Clergymen would be
required to accept the Party line. “God does not exist. Why worship Him?”
say the communists. Children would be placed in nurseries and special
indoctrination schools. Women, boast the communists, would be relieved of
housework. How? Huge factory and apartment-house kitchens would be set
up, so that women would be “free” to work in factories and mines along
with the men.
This picture of a communist America is not overdrawn. Here are the words
of William Z. Foster:
Under the dictatorship all the capitalist parties—Republican,
Democratic, Progressive, Socialist, etc.—will be liquidated,
the Communist party functioning alone as the Party of the
toiling masses. Likewise, will be dissolved all other
organizations that are political props of the bourgeois rule,
including chambers of commerce, employers’ associations, rotary
clubs, American Legion, Y.M.C.A. and such fraternal orders as
the Masons, Odd Fellows, Elks, Knights of Columbus, etc.
Under this schedule many Americans are eligible for liquidation not once
but several times, depending on their present freely chosen affiliations
and social interests.
Communism is many things: an economic system, a philosophy, a political
creed, a psychological conditioning, an educational indoctrination, a
directed way of life. Communists want to control everything: where you
live, where you work, what you are paid, what you think, what streetcars
you ride (or whether you walk), how your children are educated, what
you may not and must read and write. The most minute details, even the
time your alarm clock goes off in the morning or the amount of cream
in your coffee, are subjects for state supervision. They want to make a
“communist man,” a mechanical puppet, whom they can train to do as the
Party desires. This is the ultimate, and tragic, aim of communism.
These statements are confirmed, day after day, by documented reports from
areas where communists have already taken over: Hungary, East Germany,
Bulgaria, Poland, Roumania, Czechoslovakia, Red China, and other areas.
When you read such reports, do not think of them as something happening
in a far-off land. Remember, always, that “it could happen here” and that
there are thousands of people _in this country_ now working in secret to
make it happen here.
But also, thank God, there are millions of Americans who oppose them. If
we open our eyes, inform ourselves, and work together, we can keep our
country free.
_Part II_
HOW COMMUNISM BEGAN
1.
_Marx—And the “Science” of Communism_
The principle of communism is not new. Some primitive societies practiced
a limited brand of communism in that the whole tribe lived in common and
shared property, food, and housing. But modern-day communism, known as
the “science of Marxism-Leninism,” is just a little over a century old.
This kind of communism is also known as “scientific socialism” to
distinguish it from “Utopian socialism,” which, according to the
Marxists, is unplanned and does not operate on “laws” of society.
“Utopian,” or early, socialism predated Marx; and its exponents, such as
Robert Owen, believed in making society socialist by peaceful means. Many
of these men were visionaries, hence the word “Utopian.”
A few years before the American Civil War “scientific socialism” stemmed
from the mind of an egotistical, crabby, stubborn man who from student
days showed no interest in productive labor to support his family and who
used to pawn his overcoat in the middle of winter to buy a few loaves
of bread. This man was born in Germany, became an exile in France and
Belgium, later lived and wrote in England. From his extensive writings he
is known as the “originator” of communism and is today regarded with the
greatest respect by communists everywhere. His name was Karl Marx.
Marx was born in Trier, Germany, in May, 1818, the son of a prosperous
German lawyer. He was an intelligent child, but temperamental. At school
his marks were superior, and his capacity for work, a trait that was
to continue all through life, tremendous. But he did not make friends
easily, perhaps because of self-pride. He made arrogant remarks and wrote
satirical verse. He was a “smart” young man, but already vain, bitter,
and rebellious.
Strangely, his heart held an inner love for a home-town girl, Jenny
von Westphalen, a devotion to remain bright despite the utter squalor,
poverty, and despair that lay ahead. Jenny, four years older than Karl,
was the daughter of a government official in Trier. She was beautiful,
charming, and of a socially high rank, much higher than that of the Marx
family. She, too, was desperately in love, but she feared to tell her
parents. What would they think—the daughter of Privy Councillor Ludwig
von Westphalen marrying Karl Marx?
Young Karl was obsessed. He wrote feverish love letters and poetry. “...
a new world has opened for me,” he wrote his father in 1837, “the world
of love ... art is not as beautiful as Jenny.”
The time for marriage, however, was still distant. Karl was away at
school. Then, after graduation, he did not have a job and did not seem
to care to find one—another lifelong trait. He preferred to dabble in
atheism, socialism, and polemics. After seven long years Jenny was still
waiting, but finally, on June 12, 1843, they were married.
Marx had hoped to teach but drifted into journalism. He wrote acidly,
pouring ridicule on everything and everybody with whom he disagreed.
Strongly influenced by the teachings of Ludwig Feuerbach, a German
philosopher who preached materialism, Marx had become an atheist and
called for war against religion, a war that was to become the cornerstone
of communist philosophy. In 1842 he became editor of a new left-wing
paper, the Cologne _Rheinische Zeitung_, and immediately launched
into bitter tirades against the Prussian government. As expected, the
authorities took action, the paper was suppressed, and Marx, a short time
later, went to France. Finally, in 1849, with his family, he went to
England, where he was destined to remain until his death in 1883.
Marx was a man with few friends. But one friend, Friedrich Engels, a
fellow German whom he first met in 1842, was to become his intellectual
comrade, his financial support, his faithful champion. Engels, a vivid
contrast to the morose and crotchety Marx, was gay, mannerly, from a
wealthy family, and interested in having a good time. He too was an
atheist and a revolutionary, a fact that deeply offended his father, a
leading textile manufacturer and churchman. He would provide money for
school, the elder Engels said, but none for revolutionary activities.
Conflict was inevitable. “If it were not for my mother ... whom I really
love,” young Engels wrote, “it would never occur to me to make even the
smallest concession to my fanatical and despotic father.”
Marx and Engels were close friends for some forty years. Engels,
most appropriately, can be called the “collaborator” of Marx. He had
an encyclopedic memory and his far-flung interests and knowledge of
industrial techniques supplied Marx with important information. He also
wrote independently and, in some instances, under Marx’s name (For a
list of writings by Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin, see pages 333-337.)
Together they conceived and formulated the doctrine of communism. They
were the parents of “scientific socialism.”
Engels spent much of his time in Manchester, England, tending to his
father’s business, while Marx lived in London. Engels was tall and thin,
blue-eyed, two years younger than Marx, and a lover of horses and women.
He lived for years with one girl without marriage and then, upon her
death, with her sister. He finally consented to marry the latter on her
deathbed.
Marx, in contrast, lived in squalor. He was often sick; he suffered from
boils, headaches, and rheumatism. Jenny’s health began to give way. Her
seventh child was born dead. She became wretchedly nervous, irritable,
and upset. “Daily, my wife tells me she wishes she were lying in the
grave with the children,” Marx wrote in 1862. “And truly I cannot blame
her....”
Marx did not have a regular job but depended on pittances, especially
from Engels. He lived from pawnshop to pawnshop. It is a bitter irony
of history, indeed, that the founder of communism should be literally
kept alive by a wealthy industrialist, and that a “capitalist’s” son,
turned communist, should become the second “father” of this revolutionary
movement.
The great classics of communism, such as _Das Kapital_ (_Capital_), were
“hacked out” amid the most trying conditions. For a period the Marx
family lived in two furnished rooms on Dean Street, Soho (London). Listen
to this description translated from an article by Gustav Mayer:
In private life Marx is a highly disorderly, cynical person....
Washing himself, combing his hair, changing his underwear and
shirts are a rarity with him.... He is often lazy for days, but
if he has a great deal of work, he works day and night with
untiring endurance. Very often he stays up the entire night and
then lies down on the couch fully dressed at noon and sleeps
through until evening, undisturbed by the hustle and bustle of
family life.... The room overlooking the street is the parlor
and the bedroom is to the rear. In the entire apartment there
is not a single piece of clean and good furniture. Everything
is broken, tattered and ragged; everything is covered with
finger-thick dust, everywhere there is the greatest disorder.
In the center of the parlor stands a large table covered by an
overhanging oilcloth. It is cluttered with his manuscripts,
books, newspapers, the children’s toys, scraps of cloth from
his wife’s sewing as well as some tea-cups with chipped rims,
dirty spoons, knives, forks, a lamp, an inkwell, drinking
glasses, a Dutch claypipe, and ashes. In short, all this
conglomeration is piled high and on one table. A junk-shop
would have to cede honors to this extraordinary ensemble. When
stepping into Marx’s room the coal and tobacco smog makes one
grope around the room as in a cave until one’s eyes gradually
develop a tolerance to these fumes and one is able to make out,
as if in a fog, a few objects in the room. Everything is dirty;
everything is full of dust. As for sitting down, that is a
really dangerous matter. Here is a chair with only three legs;
over there the children are playing at cooking on another chair
which happens to be still unbroken. Sure enough, that is the
one which is offered to the visitor, but without any effort to
clean off the food. You sit down at the risk of ruining a pair
of trousers.... Such is a faithful picture of the family life
of the Communist chief, Marx....
Money was always short. Little Franziska died before her first birthday.
There was no money for the funeral. A pittance was obtained from a
neighbor which, as Jenny says, “... paid for the small coffin in which
my poor child now sleeps in peace.” Marx sometimes couldn’t go out of
the house: his overcoats were pawned. His wife was sick, but he couldn’t
call a doctor. There was no money for medicine. “For a week or more
I have kept my family alive feeding them bread and potatoes, and it
is questionable whether or not I will be able to scare any up today.”
Another time he complained, “... the children are without clothes or
shoes in which they can leave the house.”
But Marx was stubborn. He kept plugging away, writing, reading,
denouncing “capitalist” poverty, and letting his family starve. No
wonder a remark, attributed to his mother, was made that instead of
writing about capital it would have been better if Karl had made some.
The main source of help was money from Engels, from a relative, or from
writings. The “only piece of good news we have,” Marx wrote to Engels on
February 27, 1852, “is from my ministerial sister-in-law [wife of the
Minister of Westphalia], namely, the news about the illness of my wife’s
indestructible uncle. If the brute dies now, I will be out of this mess.”
Marx, in scornfully referring to his wife’s uncle as “indestructible,”
meant the fellow simply would not die. On March 2, 1852, Engels replied,
“My congratulations on the news of the old ... inheritance-obstructor’s
illness and I hope that the catastrophe will finally take place.”
If the mind of Marx was perverted and biased, it was at the same time
sharp and keen. He was a deep student of history, philosophy, and
economics. Sitting in his dingy apartment or in the British Museum, this
German-born social theorist surveyed the world. In his arrogant pride he
thought he could recast it on his own terms; through his writings and his
revolutionary organizations he undertook to do so.
“The Moor,” as his children called him because of his coal-black hair
and eyes, developed as his first line of attack an atheistic view of
the world. He joined two very old ideas: (1) That everything in the
universe, whether a blade of grass, a human being, or society itself,
is constantly changing and at the same time is in conflict. This is
called _dialectics_. (2) That God doesn’t exist and the world is composed
only of “living” matter. Hence, man is walking dust, without spark or
image of his divine Creator. This idea is called _materialism_; hence,
_dialectical materialism_. (For a fuller definition of this and other
communist terms, see the Glossary.)
This concept was to undergird the whole communist “world outlook.” Human
society, as well as the physical universe, Marx said, is affected by
this outlook. The principles have universal application. Noncommunist
thinkers, as well as human experience, have punctured many holes in the
thesis; but to communists it applies with the same certainty as does the
law of gravity.
Constant and bitter struggle is not bad, Marx said, because it achieves
progress. In fact, he viewed the whole recorded history of the world as a
story of class struggle. Mankind, he said, has always been divided into
_classes_: groups of people who have special interests, ideals, and ways
of doing things. These classes, he added, have been struggling from the
very beginning of time, and still are.
Marx explained this struggle by means of a special formula, commonly
called the _thesis-antithesis-synthesis_ dialectic, which he distorted
from the philosophy of the famous German philosopher, G. W. F. Hegel.
Here is how it works for communists:
Start, for example, Marx said, with a certain economic class (a
_thesis_). This class is the dominant power in society, controlling
the means of production, the way houses are built, the kind of clothes
worn, and so forth. Soon an opposing class arises (an _antithesis_)
which seeks to overthrow the first class. It has different ideals,
motives, and ambitions. What happens? A fight occurs and soon a new class
(_synthesis_) emerges which, according to Marx, incorporates only the
best of both old classes. (Why some of the bad does not seep in, too,
Marx does not explain.)
Then the process starts all over again. This is history, for as Marx
held, historical materialism was nothing more than applying the concept
of dialectical materialism to society. The new class (_synthesis_) is
now dominant and thus becomes, in turn, a new _thesis_. It directs how
to build houses, who gains wealth, etc., but, following Marx’s ideas,
another opposition class arises (a new _antithesis_). They struggle, a
new _synthesis_ is obtained, and again the world is off on a new cycle.
These ideas obviously are distorted and theoretical. But to understand
modern-day communism, it is essential to grasp the underlying theory.
False as it is, this theory is the spark that kindles the communist flame
This class struggle, in Marx’s reasoning, always produced a higher stage
of civilization. First, years ago, came slavery. The slave-owning class,
as expected, developed its own “antithesis” (meaning its rivals, who
wanted to abolish slavery). A struggle ensued and feudalism developed,
representing the best of both opponents. But feudal society, then the
dominant class, was attacked by its own “antithesis,” forces within
its body which opposed its ideas. For hundreds of years this struggle
continued, issuing forth finally in a new “synthesis” (capitalism), again
representing the best features of both rivals.
When Marx wrote, history was still in the capitalist stage, but he said
it could not remain there. It must (there was no alternative) move
on to communism. The capitalist class had already developed its own
“antithesis,” which Marx identified as the “proletariat” (the working
class), which was striving to overthrow the old system.
Communism, Marx proclaimed, represented the new “synthesis” of the
capitalist-proletariat struggle and the apex of all history. At this
point, said Marx, conflict would now cease, although, again, he does
not say why. This new world would be the “perfect” and “final” society:
stateless, classless, godless, where all property used in production
would be held in common, and human activities would conform to the
principle “from each according to his abilities, to each according to
his needs.”
Marx, with shrewd cunning, applied these concepts to the society of his
day. He aimed this appeal to catch everyone who was greedy, ambitious,
discontented, or downtrodden. Also, since the Industrial Revolution had
led to some very real social abuses, the doctrines of Marx appealed to
many sincere idealists and reformers who were impatient with slower
and more gradual methods of improvement. The class struggle, Marx
said, was now in progress between the “capitalists,” who owned the
tools of production, such as factories, railroads, mines, and the
“proletariat,” or people employed by the capitalists—the wage earners,
the “propertyless,” the “exploited.”
When Marx wrote, capitalists were the dominant class. According to his
interpretation, they set economic levels, what wages could be paid,
what standards of living the workers could have, what social customs
would prevail. They were the greedy “exploiters,” wanting more and more
profits. But, said Marx, according to his “law,” capitalists were digging
their own graves. The very rise of capitalism, Marx emphasized, called
into existence its conqueror, the proletariat. The higher the state of
capitalism, as then rising in France and England, the greater the number
of workers required to tend the mills, mines, and shops; hence, the
larger the proletariat would become. Wealth would accumulate in the hands
of fewer and fewer people, the masses would become increasingly poor.
Thus, conflict between the two classes was inevitable.
Already, Marx said, this conflict was in progress, as witnessed by
European strikes, lockouts, and revolutions. The proletariat was
striking against its oppressors, and the result of the struggle would be
communism. The working class was destined to win. That was the “law.”
This was the way Marx viewed history and how he distorted events and
situations to support his thesis, which followers were later to call
a “science.” This “science” has long since been disproved by man’s
experience and the record of events and situations in the free world.
In this struggle between the capitalist class and the proletariat, what
is the role of the Communist Party? The Party, said Marx, was to be the
vanguard of the proletariat. Most workers are stupid, uneducated in
Marxism, and duped by capitalists. They could never start a revolution
by themselves. They need guidance, the job of the Communist Party.
Communists are wide awake, intelligent, and, most important of all,
“learned” in Marxism. They know the “laws” of revolution, the “mysteries”
of the development of society. Their task: to be the “general staff” of
the revolution.
What about force and violence? Must they be used? Marx emphasized that
capitalist society, most naturally, would not voluntarily turn over
its factories, banks, and money to the workers. Moreover, it would
probably organize a “counter-revolution”—which means defending itself.
Hence, under the leadership of the Communist Party, the workers must, if
necessary, be prepared to use force, that is, violent revolution. If the
capitalists submit peacefully, good; if they resist, slaughter them.
But this is not all. After power is seized, opposition will remain which
must be stamped out, utterly, completely, mercilessly. Again, this is
a job that cannot be left to an untrained, untaught proletariat. It
is a job, according to Marxist thought, for the _dictatorship of the
proletariat_, conceived as a transitional stage between actual revolution
and the arrival of the highest and final form of communism.
Who would direct the dictatorship? The Communist Party, of course. And
what would it do? It would serve as a steam-roller, liquidating through
sheer force all “capitalist” elements. Then, and only then, could new
“socialist” construction begin. The dictatorships in Russia and the
satellite countries with their secret police, slave labor camps, and
mass regimentation are living examples of the “dictatorship of the
proletariat” in action.
These were, and are, vicious principles, destined to shake civilization
to its roots. In 1848, Marx, in collaboration with Engels, prepared the
platform of the Communist League, a revolutionary organization which
included a large number of German exiles. This was the famous _Communist
Manifesto_, the first sweeping blueprint of communist aims. The language
is violent, the threats dire. “A spectre is haunting Europe—the spectre
of Communism,” it starts off, and ends by calling for a violent overthrow
of existing society. “The Communists disdain to conceal their views and
aims.... Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communist revolution. The
proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to
win. Workingmen of all countries, unite!”
Well-intentioned and goodhearted men, Marx said, cannot be depended on to
improve society. They are dabblers and botchers who make things worse.
Mere social reforms strengthen capitalism, prolong “exploitation,” and
keep the corpse alive. Tear capitalism down, completely. Use force and
violence. Set up a communist government!
To the very end of his life Marx remained a ruthless fighter. Invective,
anger, and abuse were his weapons. He defiantly defended his position
against all comers. He bitterly denounced all who dared disagree with
him, such as Ferdinand Lassalle, the German Socialist leader, and Mikhail
Bakunin, the Russian anarchist. He fought wordy battles that lasted for
years. Always, by skill or skulduggery, he tried to impose his point of
view. If he found that impossible, he worked furiously to destroy his
opponent.
In 1864 Marx was involved in founding the First International, a motley
group of “radicals,” “have-nots,” “socialists,” and “anarchists.” A
number of congresses were held, but little was accomplished. Finally, in
1872, after many feuds and quarrels in which Marx was deeply involved, he
succeeded in having the group’s headquarters transferred from London to
New York, then considered a remote outpost. This was a move made out of
spite, Marx preferring to see the organization die rather than fall into
the hands of his enemies. In 1876, at a congress in Philadelphia, it was
dissolved. The First International’s chief legacy to the cause of world
communism lay in giving international structure, for the first time, to
communist ideas.
Here is another irony of communism. This man who attacked the domination
of the capitalists showed his own dominating nature again and again. In
theory, he was “for” the common man and wanted to correct the ills of
society. In practice, his fanatical intolerance and overbearing ego made
him a tyrant, an autocrat, a dictator.
Marx’s character helped shape the whole philosophy of communism and, as
we shall see, forged a hideous instrument of power for those who were to
follow him.
2.
_Lenin—And the Russian Revolution_
Marx and Engels formulated the basic doctrines of modern communism.
However, they supplied few guides to everyday revolutionary activity.
Remaining in the Marx-Engels stage, communism might well have been
drowned in an ocean of angry words, manifestoes, quarrels, and personal
feuds. If so, the world today would be a much different place for all of
us.
But there was another man, whom Marx and Engels never knew, Vladimir
Ilyich Ulyanov, later known as Lenin. It was Lenin’s destiny to lead
the first successful communist revolution, about which Marx and Engels
had dreamed so long. He was the man who took communist _theory_ and
galvanized it into communist _organization_ and _action_. Lenin’s
activation of communist theory resulted in the seizing of power in
Russia. Lenin stands today, just after Marx and Engels, as the movement’s
third force. More than any other man he is the “developer” of modern-day
communism and the father of Party structure and dictatorship. His
importance is reflected in the communist description of its way of life
as the “science of Marxism-Leninism.”
Today Lenin’s prestige has been inflated even more as a result of the
“downgrading” of Stalin. He is looked upon as the “ideal” communist
leader and, in the words of N. A. Bulganin, Chairman of the U.S.S.R.
Council of Ministers, “the great founder of our party and the Soviet
State.”
Lenin was born April 22, 1870, in Simbirsk, now Ulyanovsk (changed after
Lenin’s death in 1924), a town on the Volga River, deep in Russia. His
father was a school inspector and a devout member of the Russian Orthodox
Church. Vladimir, one of six children, was a model student. He had a
great capacity for concentration and could quickly answer his father’s
questions about schoolwork.
Youth, however, was short-lived; Lenin soon was on the way to becoming a
“revolutionary.” It is interesting and important to note here, as with
Marx and Engels, that atheism was the first step toward communism. At the
age of sixteen, as he later said, Lenin ceased to believe in God. It is
reported that he tore the cross from his neck, threw this sacred relic to
the ground, and spat upon it.
Soon after, in 1887, when Lenin was seventeen, Alexander Ulyanov,
his elder brother and boyhood hero, was hanged in the courtyard of
Schlusselburg Fortress in Saint Petersburg, later known as Petrograd
and Leningrad, along with four companions, charged with conspiracy to
assassinate the Czar of Russia. Alexander was a member of People’s Will,
a revolutionary organization. This event deeply affected young Lenin.
In the fall of 1887 Vladimir entered Kazan University and soon became
involved in student disorders. He was arrested and lived for a while
under police surveillance. A short time later, at the age of eighteen,
he started reading Karl Marx and soon was expounding Marxist principles
to his sister Anna and organizing Marxist discussion groups. In 1891,
in Saint Petersburg, he passed his law examination with honors and
was admitted to the bar. Although young in years, he was “old” in
disposition. At the age of twenty-four, a companion remarked, Lenin
already had a tired-looking face. His head was entirely bald, except for
fringes of hair at the temples. “The most striking thing about him,”
went another description, “was his large head, with its large white
forehead. His rather small eyes seemed perpetually narrowed, his glance
was serious....”
Within a few short years Lenin was to dominate the Russian Marxist
movement. This man who loved to play with children, who, after he became
dictator of all Russia, occasionally liked to sleep in a hayloft rather
than in a bed, was utterly cynical and ruthless. In one instance an
associate in Stockholm complained that couriers were not delivering
newspapers on schedule. “Please send me their names,” Lenin curtly
ordered. “These saboteurs shall be shot.”
Another time a companion complained about his work. Shut up, were Lenin’s
orders. “I will turn you over to the party court; we will shoot you.”
Without tenderness, with not a muscle responsive to mercy, he had one
goal—revolution. For twenty years, whether as an exile in Siberia or as a
wandering conspirator in Europe, he kept working, dreaming, and thinking
about revolution. Guided by his “evil genius,” he never deviated from
that goal.