characterized by two main trends: (1) the development of a disciplined
Party structure or, in the words of William Z. Foster, “the building of
a Leninist Party of a new type,” and (2) the complete and unquestioning
subservience of the Party to Soviet Russia. Every word and deed, hope and
aspiration, of American communists over the years has promoted these two
objectives.
The conventions of the CLP and CP were over, but “civil war” continued.
Communists roamed the country, denouncing each other.
Just a few weeks after the Chicago conventions Charles Ruthenberg,
Executive Secretary of the Communist Party (the “American Lenin,” who
died in 1927 and whose ashes lie buried in the Kremlin), mounted a
platform in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
He began his address. The Communist Party was the heir of the
revolutionary spirit and its rival, the Communist Labor Party, was wrong.
The CLP, he charged, was “centrist,” a vile word to communists, just like
the Party in Germany where the communists had failed. But _his_ group,
the Communist Party, was without sin. It represented the thoughts of the
victorious Bolshevik Party of Soviet Russia.
When would the revolution come? Ruthenberg did not know; tomorrow or next
week. But he was optimistic. The communists, he said, had better hurry to
learn how to run the government.
Communist Labor Party orators replied in kind. They denounced their
opponents. They alone held the sacred communist truth. Splinter factions,
and they were many, raised their voices. They attacked everybody but
themselves. American communism in these early days was bedlam.
There were other complications. Just a few weeks after the founding
conventions, in the fall of 1919, the federal government and local
authorities initiated prosecutive action against the communists.
As a consequence the communist movement went underground. Comrades met in
secret hide-outs, maintained underground headquarters, and sent messages
by couriers. Hidden printing presses poured out propaganda.
Underground or not, the “civil war” continued. The cramped quarters
did not hinder the oratorical artillery. The inter-Party strife became
fantastically bitter.
Moscow did not like either this bickering or the enforced underground
work. The Kremlin wanted a single, unified Party, able to operate legally
(above ground) as well as illegally (underground). Communism simply could
not thrive on factional fights or in stuffy undercover cellars.
Moscow intervened through the Third International, an organization
designed by the Soviets to control Communist Parties in other nations and
to serve as an instrument of world revolution. The founding Congress of
the Comintern, which opened March 2, 1919, in the Kremlin, was a bizarre
affair.
The “delegates” were chiefly make-believe, picked from prisoners of war,
visitors in Moscow, or “rubber-stamp” friends. The main problem was to
find as many nationalities as possible. This was an “international”
organization. That these individuals were not truly representative of
their “home” groups did not matter. England was “represented” by a
Russian emigré; Hungary by a prisoner of war.
The proceedings were impromptu. It is related that Lenin, during one
session, sent Angelica Balabanoff (later to become General Secretary of
the Comintern) a note on a scrap of paper instructing her to take the
floor and announce the affiliation of the Italian Socialist Party with
the International. She replied that she could not. She had not been in
contact with Italian Socialists. They were “loyal.” There was no doubt of
that, but she could not speak for them.
Lenin’s answer was prompt, scribbled in another note: “You read _Avanti_
[their newspaper] and you know what is going on in Italy.”
The Comintern soon became a powerful weapon of communist control. The
Second World Congress of the Communist International, held in Russia
during July-August, 1920, adopted the notorious twenty-one points of
admission for Comintern membership. These were basic rules that every
Communist Party must accept before being admitted. The twenty-one points
established an ironclad discipline, a single type of Party structure from
which there could be no dissent. Here are some of the conditions:
—All party publications must have communist editors.
—If communists cannot carry out their work legally, “a
combination of legal and illegal work is absolutely necessary.”
—Vigorous and systematic communist propaganda must be carried
on in the army. If forbidden by law, it must be pursued
illegally.
—Each Communist Party must develop communist agitation in rural
areas, within trade unions, workers’ councils, and other mass
organizations.
—“Parties belonging to the Communist International must be
built upon the principle of democratic centralism,” that is,
“organized in the most centralized manner,” controlled by
“iron discipline,” and with a leadership possessing power and
authority.
—Parties operating legally must “make periodical cleanings” of
the membership to weed out dissenters.
—“Every party that desires to belong to the Communist
International must give every possible support to the Soviet
Republics in their struggle against all counter-revolutionary
forces.”
—“All decisions of the Congresses of the Communist
International, as well as the decisions of its Executive
Committee, are binding on all parties affiliated to the
Communist International.”
Here is the final, clinching point:
—“Members of the Party who reject the conditions and theses of
the Communist International, on principle, must be expelled
from the party.”
The Comintern made its position clear: either join on its terms,
involving complete surrender, or become a renegade. Later congresses
elaborated on this communist discipline. In July, 1921, for example,
an order was issued by the Comintern Executive Committee that national
congresses were to be held after the Comintern congresses so that they
could ratify decisions. The Fourth Congress (1922) ruled that all
Comintern delegates should arrive in Moscow uninstructed. Lenin was
determined to make the Comintern the iron fist that controlled communism
throughout the world.
The Third International exercised supervision not only by instructing
American communists who flocked to Moscow but by sending representatives,
or “reps” as they were called, to this country. These individuals would
openly sit in communist meetings, participate in decisions, and issue
orders. The “reps” represented Moscow, and that fact alone was proof of
their communist “divinity.”
The Comintern “reps” contributed to a picturesque period in the history
of American communism. Many were riffraff European Bolsheviks, of various
nationalities, themselves knowing little about communism, who were
hurriedly dispatched to the United States. Often, by their inept actions,
they made American leaders more confused than ever. To gain admittance
to the United States, they often used fake names, false passports, and
special “covers.”
This sounds like a crude system, and, in the light of present-day
communist “diplomacy,” it was. Nobody would imagine an official Soviet
representative so identified in today’s communist meetings or American
communists openly going to Moscow to receive instructions. This “crudity”
has been polished. The same channels of communication are still open, but
more “professional” ways of supervision have been perfected.
Soon after the 1919 founding conventions, the Executive Committee of the
Communist International sent a letter to the two underground Parties, the
CP and CLP. The split, said the Comintern, had harmed the communist cause
in the United States. Unity must be established “in the shortest possible
time.” The letter recommended the calling of a joint convention. The
condition for unity was acceptance of the program of the Comintern.
This meant that personalities must be submerged, cliques ousted, and a
uniform, standardized structure instituted. The concepts of a small,
tightly knit Party (as taught by Lenin) must be put into practice. The
Russian mentality must be imposed on _every_ Party member. The Comintern
was emphatic:
... unity is not only possible, but absolutely necessary. The
Executive Committee categorically insists on its immediate
realization.
In May, 1920, a “unity” convention of the Communist Labor Party and
a faction (led by Ruthenberg) of the Communist Party was secretly
held at Bridgman, Michigan, resulting in the formation of the United
Communist Party of America (UCP). The delegates, as a security measure,
used assumed names. _The Communist_, in a special convention issue,
was secretive: “Sometime recently, somewhere between the Atlantic and
Pacific, between the Gulf and the Great Lakes, two groups of elected
delegates assembled as the Unity Conference of the Communist Party and
the Communist Labor Party.” A Comintern “rep” was present.
Many elements of the Communist Party, however, refused to go along and
boycotted the new UCP. A chief point of dispute between the CP and
CLP was the position of the foreign-language federations: should they
be autonomous within the Party, having the right, if they desired, to
withdraw, or be completely subject to the will of the Party? This issue
touched the very heart of communist doctrine. No Communist Party could
ever allow a member the “right” to withdraw. The misguided members
seeking to retain some of these “rights” were swimming upstream, destined
to failure.
Finally in May, 1921, after another year of bickering, the UCP and the
remainder of the CP formed the Communist Party of America, Section of the
Communist International, at a secret two-week convention at Woodstock,
New York. The group’s program, among other things, provided that the
Communist Party would work for violent revolution, preparing “the workers
for armed insurrection as the only means of overthrowing the capitalist
state.” The convention officially accepted the twenty-one points for
admission to the Comintern. The CP was now a complete prisoner of Moscow.
By early 1921 an “outward” unity was achieved in the communist movement,
but the second problem still remained: bringing the Party into the open.
The Third Congress of the Comintern (June-July, 1921) defined the problem:
The Communist International draws the attention of the
Communist Party of America (unified) to the fact that the
illegalized organization must not only serve as the ground for
collecting and crystallizing the active Communist forces, but
that it is the Party’s duty to try all ways and means to get
out of the illegalized condition into the open, among the wide
masses.
The outline of the Party of today was beginning to take shape, the true
Party conceived by Lenin, having both a legal and illegal apparatus. The
legal aspect would be necessary to conduct communist propaganda among the
noncommunist masses, to infiltrate organizations and operate communist
fronts. But the underground must exist, for the revolution, the final
aim of the Party, could never be anything but illegal. The underground
apparatus would handle espionage, super-secret Party work, and would
always be ready to expand if the legal Party, because of “capitalist”
opposition, could not operate fully. The Communist Party at all times has
desired both an upper and a lower level.
In December, 1921, the Workers Party of America was formed, a “legal”
outlet for the underground Communist Party. The founding convention,
held in New York City, was organized, controlled, and directed by
Party leaders. Acting as a front for the underground communists, the
Workers Party set up “open” headquarters, issued a “public” paper, and
operated in full view. The communist movement now had a dual setup: the
underground Communist Party, affiliated with the Third International in
Moscow, commonly known among members as _Number One_, and the Workers
Party, not so affiliated, known as _Number Two_. They were, however, the
two faces of the same communist coin.
Those were turbulent days in the American communist movement. Party
leaders were grotesque characters, making speeches in underground
meetings, sitting in secret conventions (sometimes in the middle of
woods), or traveling to Moscow. They usually had several aliases for
use on fake passports and in Party correspondence or to be given to the
police if arrested.
Their obsessive love was Soviet Russia. Communists of all varieties
streamed to Moscow. William Z. Foster, Earl Browder, Jay Lovestone,
Benjamin Gitlow, John Reed, “Mother” Bloor visited there. Many had
business: to attend Comintern meetings, to serve as “representatives” of
the American Party, to enroll in a communist school. Others went as plain
sight-seers, to view at first hand this land of “paradise.” Sometimes
whole groups would go, as for example a delegation that sailed in 1927 to
celebrate the tenth anniversary of the revolution.
The visitors were received cordially and treated well unless reason
existed to the contrary. Some actually got to see the great Lenin.
William Z. Foster, telling of seeing Lenin for the first time in 1921,
commented that “It was one of the most inspiring moments” of his life.
They attended Comintern Congresses, talked to high Party officials,
looked around the town. They were being primed for their roles, puppets
to fight the communist battle in America.
Then back they came to tell their comrades of the marvels of this new
land. In speeches all over the country they shouted communist propaganda:
Russia is the only “real democracy” on earth; the working
people are better off in Russia than in America.
Never has the American communist movement expressed itself in more
revolutionary, violent, and bitter terms than in the early 1920’s. Party
leaders shunned the cautious, evasive double talk of today’s communists.
They believed in violent revolution and said so. The underground
communist press was filled with revolutionary statements. One journal
tried to outdo the other in the use of violent language.
The Party was controlled, just as it is today, by a very few. Moreover,
policy, at all times, was subject to the approval of the Kremlin, acting
through the Comintern. Loyal Americans should always remember that the
Communist Party, USA, has never existed as an independent organization.
Soviet control was instituted at the very beginning. Acceptance of the
twenty-one points confirmed the imprisonment.
Party business of the underground apparatus and the above-ground Workers
Party was supervised by the Secretariat, a group usually consisting
of three of the most trusted leaders. A larger group, the Political
Committee of some seven to ten comrades, handled many of the Party’s
day-to-day affairs, such as manipulating a strike, designating a new
Party official, planning infiltration tactics. The Secretariat, elected
by the Political Committee, however, handled the most confidential
matters, items not even brought to the attention of the Political
Committee: the safeguarding of records, receipt of subsidies from abroad,
maintaining contact with Russian espionage agents. These activities were
too confidential even to be mentioned in minutes.
Relations between the Comintern in Moscow and American communists were
almost like those between feudal lord and serf. Moscow wanted to know
everything: the background of Party leaders, how a certain strike was
getting along, the strength of the Party in various localities. The
“reps” did not hesitate to criticize. In one Political Committee meeting
a letter from the Comintern “rep” was read. It contained the following
criticisms:
—Lack of information received relative to the Party convention;
—The Party’s campaign on a certain issue, though going well,
was not strong enough. The “rep” recommended a pamphlet be
written;
—Editorials in the _Daily Worker_ [the Party’s newspaper] were
politically incorrect;
—The Party had not taken a correct position against certain
enemies of Russia.
The minutes of the meeting indicate that a motion made to accept the
letter was “carried unanimously.” The Comintern’s influence was felt in
practically every communist meeting. Every move of the American Party
was watched from Moscow. No wonder a joke making Party rounds went
as follows: Why is the Party like the Brooklyn Bridge? Because it is
suspended on cables!
Besides controlling its over-all policy, the Comintern used the Communist
Party in a variety of ways, especially to help the new Soviet government
in its work. In one instance the Comintern sent over a “rep” known as
Comrade Loaf. He sent a statement, which was read at the meeting of the
Political Committee in New York City presided over by Max Bedacht,
as Acting General Secretary, outlining his need for assistance in
collecting information on the American labor movement for the Communist
International. The Political Committee agreed to help.
In another instance, Moscow referred a request for a visa by an official
of the New York _Jewish Daily Forward_ to United States comrades. Moscow
in these years often used the Communist Party in the United States as a
consular clearinghouse, seeking its advice as to whether visas should
be granted or denied. In answering this request, the already inherent
anti-Semitism of communism dictated the decision. The Soviets were
advised that the visit of the _Jewish Daily Forward_ representative would
be detrimental to the Soviet Union and the communist movement.
On occasions, also, the Comintern helped the Party by arranging to
receive cordially American visitors sponsored by the Party, thereby
hoping to create a favorable impression of communism. A prominent
author, for example, desired to visit Russia for _The Modern Quarterly_.
The Political Committee instructed that a letter be written to Moscow
requesting that he be given a royal welcome. The Party wanted him to be
favorably impressed. Then, it hoped, he would “paint a glowing picture”
of the Soviet Union.
Russian control, moreover, was implemented through the operation of
another institution, the Lenin School in Moscow. This training center was
an adjunct to the Marxist-Leninist Institute. Founded in the 1920’s, the
Lenin School had for its purpose the training of an international corps
of communist leaders. These graduates, regardless of the country in which
they operated, acted in accordance with the discipline and policies of
the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
Each Communist Party was assigned a quota of students. To be eligible,
students had to have a working-class background with experience in a
trade, shop, or union. They had to be under thirty-five years of age,
either a charter member or a member with at least five years’ experience
in Party work, and possess a “clean” Party record. The Comintern studied
the students’ background and approved those selected by the Party to
attend. As a general rule, students traveled to Moscow under assumed
names and with fraudulently obtained passports.
The original Lenin School was located in an old Czarist palace. Students
and faculty lived under strict security conditions. The curriculum
included not only Marxist-Leninist tactics but the theory and practice of
organization, underground and conspiratorial operations, and the tactics
of revolution and civil war. The students were taught how to erect stout
barricades, conduct guerrilla warfare, and handle firearms. The Soviets
wanted rough-and-ready revolutionists, men who would kill, murder, blow
up trains, and start revolutions.
Many of the top leaders in Communist Parties around the world are
graduates of the Lenin School. The National Committee of the Communist
Party in the United States today includes such graduates of the Lenin
School as Eugene Dennis, Claude Lightfoot, Carl Winter, Simon W. Gerson,
William Weinstone, Nat Ganley, Steve Nelson, and others. Former Lenin
School graduates also include such well-known communists as Betty
Gannett, Gus Hall, Albert Lannon, Phil Bart, Rose Wortis, Loretta Stack,
Henry Winston, and numerous others. The Lenin School became so notorious
that it, like the Comintern, was discontinued. After all, it had turned
out thousands of graduates, and the communists probably thought it had
fulfilled its usefulness.
The American Communist Party began to grow up. From an infant, mostly
mouth and little body, it gradually began to take on shape and form. It
was soon to increase its participation in American life.
5.
_The Party Grows Up_
Prior to 1921 communists in the United States had been so concerned with
their own private squabbles and organizational problems that they had
little time for external activities.
After the 1921 “unification,” however, the Party, although still
weak, emerged with greater stability. It was now being equipped with
two striking arms: (1) the underground Party apparatus and (2) the
above-ground, or “false-face,” apparatus of the Workers Party.
The time was ripe for communists to move in on American life and American
institutions. The first objective was organized labor. Later the
battlefront was to be extended to include all aspects of American life up
to and including activities of the federal government in Washington.
Prior to 1921, by their own admission, communists had not been
particularly effective among trade unions. True, William Z. Foster
had helped found the Trade Union Educational League in 1920, but this
communist-dominated group had made little headway. The Party at that
time had lacked the discipline and training to exploit strikes. Its aims
were usually visionary and, above all, too openly revolutionary. During
the 1919 steel strike, for example, the Communist Party had issued this
proclamation:
THE WORKERS MUST CAPTURE THE POWER OF THE STATE. THEY MUST
WREST FROM THE CAPITALISTS THE MEANS THROUGH WHICH CAPITALIST
RULE IS MAINTAINED.
The answer to the Dictatorship of the Capitalists is the
Dictatorship of the Workers.
No wonder the Party was left in complete isolation. Such impractical
statements were but noise and scared away normal trade-union people.
But the communists soon learned. Gradually they worked their way into
trade unions, and under the name of the Workers Party propagated their
program. Little by little they became more active above ground. In 1924
the Workers Party nominated, as candidates in the presidential elections,
William Z. Foster as President; Benjamin Gitlow, Vice-President. In 1925,
becoming still more bold, the Workers Party changed its name to the
Workers (Communist) Party. The underground Party in the sense of being
a separate organization was discontinued, although, as in all Communist
Parties, a small underground was maintained. In 1928 communist candidates
in the presidential elections polled almost 50,000 votes Finally, in
1929, by discarding the word “Workers,” the camouflage was dropped, and
the Party became known as the Communist Party of the United States of
America.
During these years the communists multiplied labor troubles and
participated in a number of strikes, such as the textile strikes in
Passaic, New Jersey (1926); New Bedford, Massachusetts (1928); and
Gastonia, North Carolina (1929); as well as the coal strike of 1922, the
railroad shopmen’s strike of 1922, and the New York furriers’ strike
of 1926. Moreover, they were becoming more active in other agitational
fields, such as economic problems, race relations, and nationality
groups. The Party, now becoming stronger, was testing its wings in mass
agitational work.