in America. Gradually many contradictory policies and personality
conflicts were eliminated. But important differences still existed. Many
communists, for example, thought the Party should remain underground.
They opposed founding the Workers Party. In one phase of this fight
the communists were divided into three groups, known as the Geese, the
Liquidators, and the Conciliators. Another dispute involved the proper
method of infiltrating labor unions, with some members being uncertain
how far the Party should go to the “left” or to the “right.” In 1923 a
bitter struggle developed between factions headed by Charles Ruthenberg
and William Z. Foster.
In 1928 and 1929, acting under Comintern instructions, the Communist
Party conducted its first big “purges,” the mass expulsion of large
groups of members. In 1928 James P. Cannon, an old-time communist leader,
was expelled from the Party for possessing Trotskyite tendencies, a
reflection of the Stalin-Trotsky fight in Russia. The Cannonites later
formed a new party, the Socialist Workers Party, loyal to Trotsky. In
1929 the purge was even more severe. Jay Lovestone, Executive Secretary
of the Party, and Benjamin Gitlow, a high-ranking charter member, were
expelled.
Stalin took a personal interest in the American situation. Speaking in
May, 1929, to the American Commission of the Presidium of the Executive
Committee of the Communist International, he started the line that the
communists were to revive after World War II, and asserted that the
United States was heading toward a depression that would develop a
revolutionary situation.
I think the moment is not far off when a revolutionary crisis
will develop in America.... It is essential that the American
Communist Party should be capable of meeting that historical
moment fully prepared and of assuming the leadership of the
impending class struggle in America. Every effort and every
means must be employed in preparing for that, comrades. For
that end the American Communist Party must be improved and
bolshevized. For that end we must work for the complete
liquidation of factionalism and deviations in the Party. For
that end we must work for the reestablishment of unity in the
Communist Party of America.
The Russians, by disciplinary purges, were hammering out a Party “of a
new type,” or, in the words of Stalin, bolshevizing it.
In the 1930’s, with the beginnings of the depression, the Communist Party
broadened its propaganda-agitation work. Economic disorder was exploited.
The Party organized parades, hunger marches, petition campaigns, mass
demonstrations. It plunged with vigor into strikes such as the San
Francisco general strike of 1934 and the textile and bituminous coal
strikes of 1934-35. In November, 1935, the Congress of Industrial
Organizations (CIO) was launched, and communists attempted to burrow
themselves in its member unions. In addition, they attempted to convert
members of other labor unions, minority groups, especially Negroes and
individuals recently arrived in the country.
The Party increased in numbers. By 1930, after the great “purges,”
membership stood at 7500. By 1935 it had jumped to 30,000, and to 80,000
in 1944. The Young Communist League, the youth organization of the Party,
reached 20,000 by 1938. Communist “cells” were being formed in industrial
plants, and Party members had infiltrated governmental positions, some
even carrying out espionage. Intra-Party struggles had ceased, with Earl
Browder, a native of Kansas, being elected in 1930 as General Secretary.
He was to remain “in power” until 1945. Step by step the Party was
becoming stabilized, developing its agitation and propaganda functions.
Disciplinary machinery maintained “unity” and “correctness of views.”
This was a period of accepting new members, broadening struggles, and
strengthening organizational structure.
In 1935 the Seventh World Congress of the Comintern, meeting in Moscow,
initiated the “united-front” policy, which provided that communists
should work with other groups against fascism. Since 1933 Hitler had
become the principal target of Soviet Russia. The Bolsheviks, fearing
German military power, desperately attempted to enlist the support of the
noncommunist world against the Nazis. Russia joined the League of Nations
and became a strong supporter of the “collective security” program aimed
at holding Hitler in check. Fascism, the communists shouted, represented
a danger to everybody, communist and noncommunist. All must work
together.
The “united front” is an old Leninist tactic designed to prepare for
revolutionary situations. Internationally, the aim is to protect
the Soviet fatherland. On a local level it gives the communists an
opportunity to infiltrate, manipulate, and take over organizations.
Noncommunists are encouraged to participate in communist campaigns with
the Party, which always keeps in mind the best way to advance its own
interests. If a united-front tactic does not promote communism, it is
dropped. A new approach is then developed.
The prewar period was the time of great communist fronts in which so
many innocent victims were caught. Literally hundreds of organizations,
such as the American Youth Congress, American League Against War and
Fascism (later known as the American League for Peace and Democracy),
the American Peace Mobilization, and the National Negro Congress sprang
into existence. They were created or captured by the communists. All
were tailored, through high-sounding names, to attract as many people
as possible; the communists had something to offer everybody. The Party
during these years moved literally thousands of Americans, causing
them, in some way or other, to support the communist cause. Their
thought-control nets were busy at work, as will be shown later.
In 1936 the Spanish Civil War erupted, and the communists in the United
States, amid great fanfare, sent about 3000 “volunteers,” commonly known
as the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, to aid the Spanish Loyalists. Front
groups of many types were formed to collect money, supplies, and medical
aid. Those Americans who were the leaders in the movement to send other
Americans, of whom some 50 per cent never returned, had no interest as
such in either the Franco group or the opposing Loyalist government. They
were acting, along with international communism, to advance the Bolshevik
cause.
American communists used glittering promises, under-handed tricks, and
downright fraud to coax young men to go to Spain. An enlistee might
be promised a lucrative position in Spain, cash rewards, or travel
accommodations. A young girl would entice unsuspecting men; in return
for her favors they would promise to enlist. If necessary, fictitious
passports were obtained or enlistees were stowed away on boats. An
elaborate “convoy” system was established, individuals being taken from
the United States, usually through France, to Spain. Any tactic was used
to gain fighting manpower for the communist cause.
The events of World War II were to demonstrate clearly the loyalty of a
now disciplined Communist Party to Soviet Russia. In August, 1939, the
entire world was shocked: Hitler and Stalin had signed a “nonaggression”
pact! Here was Moscow making an agreement with that “Fascist beast,”
Hitler, whom it had denounced in bitter terms.
In a few days the pact’s full meaning became clear. Hitler had made a
“deal.” German forces invaded Poland. The Russians, much more quietly,
moved from the east. Poland was partitioned and Russia annexed a large
slice of Polish territory. Hitler now turned toward the west, his “back”
secure.
The Soviets were now in the role of “defenders of the peace” and everyone
else was an “imperialist warmonger.” If Stalin did it, well, it was
right. Hitler, the former enemy, now became a friend and ally. The war
between Germany and the Western Allies was termed an “imperialist” war,
with no support for the Allies. There was opposition to lend-lease, the
draft and military production, support of strikes, circulation of antiwar
literature. “The Yanks Are Not Coming” was the slogan. Russia’s war on
Finland in 1939-40? That was different. That was not imperialism, said
the communists. Round-the-clock marchers picketed the White House, urging
that the United States stay out of the European war. The pickets were
suddenly disbanded on June 21, 1941. A change in tactics seemed imminent.
The next day, June 22, 1941, the Germans attacked Soviet Russia. The
European conflict now became a “patriotic war,” a “people’s war.” The
United States must lend support: war matériel, money, and manpower.
Russia was being overrun. The revolution was in danger. A virtual
nightmare gripped the communists. Employ anything to help the land
of Stalin: lend-lease, a second front, immediately. Strikes must be
stopped. Send relief to Russia.
All these moves and countermoves are not just history. They stand as an
everlasting warning of the way in which communists in America, whatever
their claims, serve only one master: Moscow.
Other events in Russia had repercussions in the Communist Party, USA,
as they still do today. In 1943 Moscow dissolved the Comintern. One
purpose was to mollify Western fear and distrust of communism. Russia,
the communists claimed, wanted to be a genuine friend. In 1944, following
the new line, the Communist Party, USA, under Browder’s leadership,
“dissolved”; actually it merely changed its name to the Communist
Political Association (CPA), a “political-educational association.”
Here again the idea was to “soften” opposition to communism, make it
sound a “little better” to Americans. This was the period when Russia
was a military ally and the communists were trying to extract as much
as they could from this country. The best tactic, of course, was to be
“friendly.” The Communist Political Association did not have the harsh,
bugaboo connotations of the “Communist Party,” but it was the same
faithful lackey of Moscow.
In 1945 the war was over. Hitler was defeated. Moscow reverted to its
former hostile “line”; she denounced the Allies and claimed full credit
for destroying Hitler, and Japan too. Communist Parties, including the
one in America, were told to be more defiant.
This meant another change for the communists in the United States.
In April, 1945, an article was published in a French communist
journal, _Cahiers du Communisme_, by Jacques Duclos, then Secretary
of the Communist Party of France. Duclos condemned “Browderism,” the
so-called policy of “collaboration” with American capitalism as shown
in the CPA. This was “revisionism,” “opportunism,” and a betrayal of
Marxism-Leninism. What was needed, according to Duclos, was a militant
attack on “capitalism,” not cooperation with it.
The Duclos article initiated a purge in the Party, the greatest since the
days of Lovestone and Gitlow. Browder became the scapegoat. An emergency
convention of the Communist Political Association was hastily called
and by “unanimous vote,” except Browder’s, re-established the Communist
Party. Browder was suspended from office and later expelled. This man
from Kansas, twenty-five years a faithful servant of the Kremlin, had
served his purpose. Foster became Chairman.
“Browderism” was regarded by communists as a direct outgrowth of the
Lovestone-Gitlow period. Lovestone had been accused of espousing
“American exceptionalism.” By this the communists meant that he viewed
American capitalism as something “exceptional,” not obeying the
Marxist-Leninist laws, which teach that capitalism, because of internal
contradictions, will decay. Lovestone believed that American capitalism
was too strong to follow these Marxist rules.
Browder, according to his communist critics, also fell into a similar
error. He overestimated the power of American capital and believed that,
through planning, America could overcome for some time its economic
problems. This theory of “organized capitalism,” these opponents said,
was wrong. It revised Marxist principles, weakened the communist
movement, and betrayed the “socialist future.”
After 1945 the Communist Party, using Browderism as a weapon, entered
into a new period of consolidation and loyalty to Soviet Russia. The
Party apparatus was tightened and discipline strengthened. Security
commissions, with almost unlimited powers, tested the “loyalty” of
members and many were expelled. Increased restrictions on the admittance
of new members were set up. The Party press, following the Moscow tack,
inveighed against American “imperialism” and heaped abuse on the Marshall
Plan, the Greece-Turkey Aid program, and the organization of a West
European defense organization. The old-time Stalinist, William Z. Foster,
was welding the Party into an anti-American weapon of the cold war.
In 1948, for the first time since the 1920’s, the Party found itself
on the defensive when the Department of Justice initiated prosecution
against its leaders. The twelve members of the Party’s National Board
were indicted under the Smith Act (enacted in 1940), which prohibits any
conspiracy that advocates the overthrow of the United States government
by force and violence. Previously, in 1941, the government had instituted
prosecutions against members of the Socialist Workers Party (Trotskyites)
under this statute. Other statutes since used by the government in the
attack on the Party include the Internal Security Act of 1950 and the
Communist Control Act of 1954.
In a long trial, running through most of 1949, eleven members were
convicted, the twelfth, William Z. Foster, having been severed from the
trial because of illness. In June, 1951, the Supreme Court upheld these
convictions, and the government subsequently took prosecutive action
against additional Party leaders.
This government prosecution was a strong disabling blow against the
Party. Many of its top leaders were arrested and convicted. Others
lived in fear of arrest. As a result the Party to a large extent went
underground in the first large-scale underground operation since the
early 1920’s. Party offices were closed, top Party leaders went into
hiding, records were destroyed. Courier systems were instituted and clubs
broken up into small units, if not completely disbanded. For about four
years, from mid-1951 to mid-1955, the Party in protecting itself spent
energy, time, and money that otherwise would have gone into agitation and
propaganda.
Again, as in previous years, events in Russia determined communist policy
in America. The death of Stalin in 1953 and the advent of Malenkov
brought the “Big Smile” policy from the Soviet bear, which was continued
by Bulganin and Khrushchev. The Communist Party, USA, weakened and
largely immobilized in its underground haunts, welcomed the new line.
Then, in the summer of 1955, came the Geneva Conference. The Party,
sensing a new “political climate,” began to come above ground. Quietly
communist leaders reappeared in public, many courier systems were
discontinued, and most underground hideaways abolished. By the spring
of 1956 most of the Party’s underground had been curtailed and even
the communist leaders who had become fugitives from justice began to
surrender. This experiment in underground strategy had cost the Party
severely.
Now, however, the Party was faced with severe problems of internal
disorganization and factionalism. Many Party members had left the
movement. Administrative affairs were in a state of chaos. Invaluable
records had been destroyed. Party leaders, returning from underground
assignments, found that they were often ignored by the ruling hierarchy.
Money was scarce. Footholds in noncommunist organizations, such as labor
unions, had largely been lost.
Then came Khrushchev’s denunciation of Stalin and charges of
anti-Semitism in Russia. In the fall of 1956 came the bloody Soviet
intervention in Hungary. No events since the German-Russian nonaggression
pact of 1939 had so gravely shaken the Party. Stalin, the man the
comrades had revered so long, was proved to be a murderer, thief, and
liar. Communist leaders in the United States were stunned and aghast.
Immediately, different opinions developed as to the Party’s future
policy—opinions that gave rise to severe leadership differences.
One group, headed by William Z. Foster, although accepting Khrushchev’s
denunciations, emphasized what “good” Stalin had done for the communist
movement. These were the so-called Stalinists, who wanted as few changes
as possible in the Party organization. Opposing Foster was a faction
headed by John Gates, editor of the _Daily Worker_, who openly advocated
disbandment of the Party and establishment of a political association.
This action, he argued, would make the Party more palatable to the
general public in light of the severe criticisms. In between, many
middle-of-the-roaders, led by Eugene Dennis, were not sure just what the
Party should do in this, one of its most severe crises.
In February, 1957, the Party assembled in its Sixteenth National
Convention, the first since 1950. The convention was under the
dictatorial control of a few Party leaders. Much deceitful publicity was
released to demonstrate that the Party had declared its “independence”
of Moscow, that a new leadership had been installed, and that the Party
was entirely American in character. However, Foster and his associates
so effectively manipulated the sessions that the same old Stalinist line
prevailed.
The Party retained its same old name, continued the majority of its
old leadership; it reaffirmed its adherence to the basic tenets
of Marxism-Leninism; it reaffirmed its acceptance of “proletarian
internationalism”; it refused to condemn or even take a stand on the
Soviet rape of Hungary; it refused to condemn the tyranny and proven
anti-Semitism of the Soviet Union; it did not take a single affirmative
step to declare its independence of the Soviet Union; and, in fact, the
Soviet-controlled press hailed the Communist Party, USA, for remaining
loyal “to the principles of Marxism-Leninism.”
The Communist Party is a highly disciplined tool of the Soviet Union in
the United States. In the thirty-eight years since it came into being,
it has developed a trained and potentially effective leadership that
overnight, should the situation become favorable, could expand into a
mass organization of great potential power. No longer does it need to
send its promising young leaders to Moscow for training, because its own
educational system is now performing that function.
The present menace of the Communist Party in the United States grows
in direct ratio to the rising feeling that it is a small, dissident
element and need not be feared. As we relax our protection and ease up on
security measures, we move closer and closer to a “fool’s paradise.”
Through the Communist Party, the mentality of the Russian Bolsheviks is
being transmitted to America, together with the belief that man can be
completely redesigned from a child of God into a soulless social cog. The
Party member, whether he be a farmer in Missouri, an automobile worker in
Michigan, or a lawyer in California, must be made to think, act, and be
like other Party members. Many techniques, such as discipline, education,
the Party press, recreation, literature, organizational structure,
the arts, are used to fashion the “communist man,” the terror of the
twentieth century. This is the “man” the Kremlin hopes will place the
hammer and sickle above the White House and establish a Soviet America as
part of a world empire, with Soviet Russia as the master of all. This is
the “man” who, in a recent secret Party meeting, admonished the comrades
present that a search of history would show that there has never been
a revolution without force and violence and when the time comes, “We
will hang and shoot those responsible for the type of government we have
today.”
_Part III_
THE COMMUNIST APPEAL IN THE UNITED STATES
6.
_Who Are the Communists?_
The Communist Party, USA, works day and night to further the communist
plot in America. Virtually invisible to the noncommunist eye, unhampered
by time, distance, and legality, this bolshevik transmission is in
progress. The Communist Party, USA, is bolshevizing its membership and
creating communist puppets throughout the country. The American Party, in
the Kremlin’s eyes, has for its objective the ultimate seizure of power
in America and, to accomplish this purpose, it seeks to “educate” in the
ways of communism all who will listen.
To appreciate the deadly seriousness of this process, the American
citizen must see how the Communist Party, USA, by its every act, often
without fanfare or newspaper headlines, is creating a corps of dedicated
Party members, supported in many ways by United States citizens who have
been infected or misled in one way or another.
Millions of Americans have wondered how the communists gain support.
Frequently they seem to wield influence entirely out of proportion to
their actual numbers.
Party influence is exerted through the communist device of thought
control (controlling, in various degrees, the thinking of many
Americans). The communists quickly accuse anybody who disagrees with
them of being guilty of thought control; it is a favorite communist
expression. Yet this same technique, applied in varying degrees to
different groups of our population, is the key to communist strength in
America today.
The Party’s objective is to drive a wedge, however slight, into as many
minds as possible. That is why, in every conceivable way, communists
try to poison our thinking about the issues of the day: social reforms,
peace, politics, veterans’, women’s, and youth problems. The more people
they can influence, the stronger they will be.
Top Party officials have a definite assignment: to capture positions of
power. They are the Party’s front-line commanders. Communism is at war
with America. The United States is a vast battlefield. A school, a labor
union, a civic group, a government official, a private citizen—all are
important in the never-ending struggle for power.
The whole nation, to the communists, is a gigantic checker-board. The
communist high command is constantly moving, jumping, switching, and
retreating to get communist members in positions of influence. They are
outnumbered; they know that. That is why they must depend on skill,
maneuvering, and deception.
The communist official in our country realizes that his supporters
often form a motley collection, varying greatly in loyalty: some are
fanatically loyal; others are half-timers or “single-nighters.” Many
are “tremblers,” needing constant encouragement, whereas some are just
victims unwittingly caught in the Party net.
But time after time the communists are able to weld these seemingly
ill-assorted supporters into a unified instrument of power. They
have succeeded in creating and dominating different areas of thought
control. Each area contains supporters who, under Party guidance, can
quickly and effectively be mobilized. The result of this manipulation,
as applied to diverse personalities, groups, and issues, is a tribute
to the communists’ deceitful skill. By this technique, using its own
membership as a base, the Party is today influencing literally thousands
of Americans.
There are five principal areas, or circles, of thought control that
should be thoroughly understood. These are the keys to communist
mobilization to achieve control of the United States.
1. _“Open” Party members._ The area of highest thought control, which
is the core of communist strength, is the Party membership. These
individuals, after indoctrination, become full-fledged revolutionaries,
pledged to stick with the Party at all times.
Normally they make no effort to conceal their membership. They may be
high-ranking officials, such as a state chairman, a section organizer, a
club chairman, an educational director, or mere rank-and-file members.
They are enrolled, pay dues, and accept Party discipline.