The Red Conspiracy

by Joseph J. Mereto

THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF AMERICA DEVELOPS A LEFT WING

Some years ago, when the people of the United States were beginning to suspect that the Socialists were plotting a revolution against our Constitutional form of government the hypocritical followers of Eugene V. Debs, fearing that their plot might be nipped in the bud, endeavored to conceal their conspiracy, and succeeded quite well, by assuring the American people that the word "revolution," so often used by them, was a harmless term and was to be taken in a broad sense, without the "r," signifying nothing more than "evolution." "Do not be alarmed," they told us, "we Socialists are striving to bring about reforms in the government, but solely by constitutional means and the use of the ballot."^[B]

Many proofs could be given to show that, even in the early days of the American Socialist Party, revolution, in the strictest sense of the word, was foremost in the minds of many of the Marxian leaders. With the advent of Bolshevism in Russia, and the successful overthrow of European governments by revolutionary Socialists abroad, the "Reds" in our own country became decidedly bolder, both in word and plot, against the Government of our country. The more outspoken, daring and impatient plotters in the Socialist Party of America lined up in a Left Wing faction, whereas the more hypocritical, hesitant, cautious and prudent revolutionists constituted the Right Wing. The former became known as the "Reds," the latter as the "Yellows."

The "Reds" made a specialty of "direct action" or violence, had little confidence in victory through the ballot, and campaigned for a revolution at an early day. The "Yellows," of course, also rely on a final victory through rebellion, but in the meantime, during the period of revolutionary education and organization, insist on political action. The leaders in control of the executive machinery of the Socialist Party, wishing to retain their lucrative positions, and looking forward to the advantage of political office during the years which might elapse before the time would be ripe for rebellion, were nearly all Right Wingers, and have waged a bitter and unscrupulous fight against the Left Wing organization within the party.

The Left Wing of the Socialist Party of America had its origin, probably, in the year 1916. According to the "International Socialist Review," of December of that year, this ultra-revolutionary faction took form in Boston. About the latter part of the year 1917 it began to develop more rapidly, its progress being more or less proportional to the spread of Bolshevism and the Socialist revolutions in Europe. Its success, of course, was at the expense of the political leaders of the Right.

The Left Wing has certainly been more honest than the Right. The "Reds" comprising it favor direct action, that is, strikes and disturbances, rather than the use of the ballot, hoping thus to bring our country into such a critical condition that they may precipitate a rebellion, and then, though in a minority, assume control of the government by a sudden coup d'état, as the Bolsheviki did in Russia. The Left Wingers opposed the "immediate demands" in the Socialist Party platform, preferring to work for dictatorship rather than for social reforms. They despised the politicians of the Right Wing, calling them yellow, reactionary, hypocritical, capitalistic Socialists, and telling them that their place was with the newly formed Labor Party, which had already praised the Socialists and invited them to join its ranks. The Lefts expressed a fear that the leaders of the Right would, if our Government were overthrown, turn against them just as the Scheidemann-Ebert group turned against the German Spartacides. The fight between the two factions became severe about the beginning of the year 1919.

"The Revolutionary Age," Boston, February 15, 1919, speaking of the disturbance in the Socialist Party, and explaining the fundamental principles of the Left Wing said:

"The American Socialist Party is in a condition of feverish theoretical activity. Pressing problems are being met in a spirit of self-criticism. New forms of action in the social struggle are being accepted. Old methods, old tactics, old ideas, which in the test of war have proven incapable of furthering the revolutionary struggle of the proletariat, are being seriously analyzed and repudiated.

"The membership of the Socialist Party, the majority, is instinctively class conscious and revolutionary. It was this membership that compelled our officials to acquiesce in the adoption of a radical declaration against war--which most of the officials sabotaged or converted into an innocuous policy of bourgeois pacificism. When the Bolsheviki conquered, the majority of our officials were either hostile or silent; some weeks before, the 'New York Call' had stigmatized the Bolsheviki as 'anarchists.' But the membership responded; they forced the hands of the officials, who became 'me too' Bolsheviki, but who did not draw the revolutionary implications of the Bolshevik policy. These officials and their machinery baffled the will of the membership; more, the membership baffled itself because it did not clearly understand the theory and the practice implied in its instinctive class consciousness and revolutionary spirit.

"While our National Executive Committee accepts the Berne Congress and refuses to call an emergency National Convention, locals of the party are actively engaged in the great struggle, turning to the left, to revolutionary Socialism. Groups within the party are organizing and issuing proclamations, determined that the party shall conquer the party for revolutionary Socialism. Two of these proclamations were published in the last issue of 'The Revolutionary Age.' They deserve serious consideration and discussion.

"The manifesto of the Communist Propaganda League of Chicago is a concise document. Its criticism of the party is summarized:

"'The Party proceeds on too narrow an understanding of political action for a party of revolution, its programs and platforms have been reformist and petty bourgeois in character, instead of being definitely directed toward the goal of social revolution; the party has failed to achieve unity with the revolutionary movement on the industrial field.'

"Its proposals for democratizing the party--mass action in the party--are excellent; it repudiates the old international and the Berne Congress, and asks:

"'Identification of the Socialist Party with class conscious industrial unionism, unity of all kinds of proletarian action and protest forming part of the revolutionary class struggle; political action to include political strikes and demonstrations, no compromising with any groups not inherently committed to the revolutionary class struggle, such as Labor parties, People's Councils, Non-Partisan Leagues, Municipal Ownership Leagues and the like.'"

In order clearly to understand the big fight that has disrupted the Socialist Party, further explanations of the principles of the Left Wing are necessary. "The Revolutionary Age," from which the above quotation was taken, was first published in Boston, its editor being Louis C. Fraina. In the summer of 1919 it combined with "The Communist," of New York City, and, still maintaining its former name, became the national organ of the Left Wing of the Socialist Party.

In the article just quoted reference was made to "mass action." This, according to "The Revolutionary Age," is to be the main weapon used by the rebels in precipitating rebellion. The July 12, 1919, issue of the same paper explains mass action and shows how it is to be used. The article, written by Louis C. Fraina, reads in part as follows:

"Socialism in its early activity as a general organized movement was compelled to emphasize the action of politics because of the immaturity of the proletariat....

"All propaganda, all electoral and parliamentary activity are insufficient for the overthrow of Capitalism, impotent when the ultimate test of the class struggle turns into a test of power. The power for the social revolution issues out of the actual struggles of the proletariat, out of its strikes, its industrial unions and mass action."

Industrial unions of course means the union system of the I. W. W., and not the craft unions of the American Federation of Labor.

The article continues:

"The peaceful parliamentary conquest of the state is either sheer utopia or reaction....

"The revolution is an act of a minority, at first; of the most class conscious section of the industrial proletariat, which in a test of electoral strength, would be a minority, but which, being a solid, industrially indispensable class, can disperse and defeat all other classes through the annihilation of the fraudulent democracy of the parliamentary system implied in the dictatorship of the proletariat, imposed upon society by means of revolutionary mass action....

"Mass action is not a form of action as much as it is a process and synthesis of action. It is the unity of all forms of proletarian action, a means of throwing the proletariat, organized and unorganized, in a general struggle against Capitalism and the capitalist state....

"The great expressions of mass action in recent years, the New Zealand general strike, the Lawrence strike, the great strike of the British miners under which capitalist society reeled on the verge of collapse--all were mass actions organized and carried through in spite of the passive and active hostility of the dominant Socialist and labor organization. Under the impulse of mass action, the industrial proletariat senses its own power and acquires the force to act equally against capitalism and the conservatism of organizations. Indeed, a vital feature of mass action is precisely that it places in the hands of the proletariat the power to overcome the fetters of these organizations, to act in spite of their conservatism, and through proletarian mass action emphasize antagonisms between workers and capitalists, and conquer power. A determining phase of the proletarian revolution in Russia was its acting against the dominant Socialist organizations, sweeping these aside through its mass action before it could seize social supremacy....

"Mass action is the proletariat itself in action, dispensing with bureaucrats and intellectuals, acting through its own initiative; and it is precisely this circumstance that horrifies the soul of petty bourgeois Socialism. The masses are to act upon their own initiative and the impulse of their own struggles....

"Mass action organizes and develops into the political strike and demonstration, in which a general political issue is the source of the action....

"The class power of the proletariat arises out of the intensity of its struggles and revolutionary energy. It consists, moreover, of undermining the bases of the morale of the capitalist state, a process that requires extra parliamentary activity through mass action. Capitalism trembles when it meets the impact of a strike in a basic industry; Capitalism will more than tremble, it will actually verge on a collapse, when it meets the impact of a general mass action involving a number of correlated industries, and developing into revolutionary mass action against the whole capitalist regime. The value of this mass action is that it shows the proletariat its power, weakens capitalism, and compels the state largely to depend on the use of brute force in the struggle, either the physical force of the military or the force of legal terrorism; this emphasizes antagonisms between proletarian and capitalist, widening the scope and deepening the intensity of the proletarian struggle against capitalism....

"Mass action, being the proletariat itself in action, loosens its energy, develops enthusiasm, and unifies the action of the workers to its utmost measure....

"Moreover, mass action means the repudiation of bourgeois democracy. Socialism will come not through the peaceful, democratic parliamentary conquest of the state, but through the determined and revolutionary mass action of a proletarian minority. The fetish of democracy is a fetter upon the proletarian revolution; mass action smashes the fetish, emphasizing that the proletarian recognizes no limits to its action except the limits of its own power. The proletariat will never conquer unless it proceeds to struggle after struggle; its power is developed and its energy let loose only through action. Parliamentarism, in and of itself, fetters proletarian action; organizations are often equally fetters upon action; the proletariat must act and always act; through action it conquers....

"The great war has objectively brought Europe to the verge of revolution. Capitalist society at any moment may be thrust into the air by an upheaval of the proletariat--as in Russia. Whence will the impulse for the revolutionary struggle come? Surely not from the moderate Socialism and unionism, which are united solidly in favor of an imperialistic war; surely not from futile parliamentary rhetoric, even should it be revolutionary rhetoric. The impulse will come out of the mass action of the proletariat....

"Mass action is equally a process of revolution and the revolution itself in operation."

The March 22, 1919, issue of "The Revolutionary Age" published the Manifesto of the Left Wing section of the Socialist Party of New York, from which several important quotations are hereby taken:

"We are a very active and growing section of the Socialist Party who are attempting to reach the rank and file with our urgent message over the heads that be, who, through inertia or a lack of vision, cannot see the necessity for a critical analysis of the party's policies and tactics....

"In the latter part of the nineteenth century the Social-Democracies of Europe set out to 'legislate capitalism out of office.' The class struggle was to be won in the capitalist legislatures. Step by step concessions were to be wrested from the state; the working class and the Socialist parties were to be strengthened by means of 'constructive' reform and social legislation; each concession would act as a rung in the ladder of Social Revolution, upon which the workers could climb step by step, until finally, some bright sunny morning, the peoples would awaken to find the Cooperative Commonwealth functioning without disorder, confusion or hitch on the ruins of the capitalist state.

"And what happened? When a few legislative seats had been secured, the thunderous denunciations of the Socialist legislators suddenly ceased. No more were the parliaments used as platforms from which the challenge of revolutionary Socialism was flung to all the corners of Europe. Another era had set in, the era of 'constructive' social reform legislation. Dominant Moderate Socialism accepted the bourgeois state as the basis of its action and strengthened that state. All power to shape the policies and tactics of the Socialist parties was entrusted to the parliamentary leaders. And these lost sight of Socialism's original purpose; their goal became 'constructive reforms' and cabinet portfolios--the 'cooperation of classes,' the policy of openly or tacitly declaring that the coming of Socialism was a concern 'of all the classes,' instead of emphasizing the Marxian policy that the construction of the Socialist system is the task of the revolutionary proletariat alone....

"The 'Moderates' emphasized petty-bourgeois reformism in order to attract tradesmen, shop-keepers and members of the professions, and, of course, the latter flocked to the Socialist movement in great numbers, seeking relief from the constant grinding between corporate capital and awakening labor....

"Dominant 'Moderate Socialism' forgot the teachings of the founders of scientific Socialism, forgot its function as a proletarian movement--'the most resolute and advanced section of the working class parties'--and permitted the bourgeois and self-seeking trade union elements to shape its policies and tactics. This was the condition in which the Social-Democracies of Europe found themselves at the outbreak of the war in 1914. Demoralized and confused by the cross-currents within their own parties, vacillating and compromising with the bourgeois state, they fell a prey to social-patriotism and nationalism.

"But revolutionary Socialism was not destined to lie inert for long. In Germany, Karl Liebknecht, Franz Mehring, Rosa Luxemburg and Otto Rhule organized the Spartacus group. But their voices were drowned in the roar of cannon and the shriek of the dying and maimed.

"Russia, however, was to be the first battle-ground where the 'moderate' and revolutionary Socialism should come to grips for the mastery of the state. The break-down of the corrupt, bureaucratic Czarist regime opened the floodgates of Revolution....

"'Moderate Socialism' was not prepared to seize the power for the workers during a revolution. 'Moderate Socialism' had a rigid formula--'constructive social reform legislation within the capitalist state,' and to that formula it clung....

"Revolutionary Socialists hold, with the founders of Scientific Socialism, that there are two dominant classes in society--the bourgeoisie and the proletariat; that between these two classes a struggle must go on, until the working class, through the seizure of the instruments of production and distribution, the abolition of the capitalist state, and the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat, creates a Socialist system. Revolutionary Socialists do not believe that they can be voted into power. They struggle for the conquest of power by the revolutionary proletariat....

"The 'moderate Socialist' proposes to use the bourgeois state with its fraudulent democracy, its illusory theory of 'unity of all the classes,' its standing army, police and bureaucracy oppressing and baffling the masses; the revolutionary Socialist maintains that the bourgeois state must be completely destroyed, and proposes the organization of a new state--the state of the organized producers--of the Federated Soviets--on the basis of which alone can Socialism be introduced.

"Industrial Unionism, the organization of the proletariat in accordance with the integration of industry and for the overthrow of Capitalism, is a necessary phase of revolutionary Socialist agitation. Potentially, industrial unionism constructs the basis and develops the ideology of the industrial state of Socialism; but industrial unionism alone cannot perform the revolutionary act of seizure of the power of the state, since under the conditions of Capitalism it is impossible to organize the whole working class, or an overwhelming majority into industrial unionism.

"It is the task of a revolutionary Socialist party to direct the struggles of the proletariat and provide a program for the culminating crisis."

Julius Hammer, in a letter published in "The Call," April 4, 1919, speaking of the Left Wing, says:

"Aside from the discussions as to the principles and tactics identifying the 'Left Wing' there is a great deal of acrimonious discussion and opposition to those in the 'Left Wing' organization. They are called 'separatists,' 'secessionists,' 'splitters of the party,' and this in spite of vehement denials that there is intention or desire to split the party. 'It is unnecessary,' say they, 'and superfluous; the party machinery is ample for the purpose now; organization within organization is injurious and wrong.' Some seem to go even further and fling epithets of 'disrupters,' 'traitors,' 'direct actionists,' 'anti-politicalists,' 'anarchists,' etc. And there seems to be quite a number who consider that the menace should be met with stern measures--nothing less than expulsion."

In the Left Wing statements of principles and tactics the reader will observe a constant emphasis upon "direct action," or violence, and in favor of "industrial unionism" and the "identification of the Socialist Party with class conscious industrial unionism." Chapters VIII and IX of this work, which describe the principles and tactics of the I. W. W., will make the significance of the Left Wing movement perfectly apparent as an effort to combine Socialist Partyism and I. W. W.'ism or to place the latter under the political leadership of the former. In the Left Wing we see an enthusiastic consecration of the major part of the American Socialist Party to revolutionary violence--the direct application of anarchistic tactics to the overthrow of the Government and institutions of the United States. As we follow the Left Wing movement we shall see the principles and tactics of the I. W. W., as carried out in Russia, adopted as a program by the major part of the American Socialist party, which also finally succeeded in committing the minor part, the Right Wing, to the same principles.

Needless to say, this movement was helped on by the various communications received from the Lenine dictatorship, and notably by the call for an international communist congress to meet at Moscow in March, 1919. The text of this call began to appear in the American radical publications in late March and April, and is here reproduced from "The One Big Union Monthly" for the latter month:

"First Section

"AIMS AND TACTICS

"In our estimation, the acceptance of the following principles shall serve as a working program for the International:

"1. The actual period is the period of the dissolution and collapse of the whole capitalist system;

"2. The first task of the proletariat consists to-day of the immediate seizure of government power by the proletariat;

"3. This new governmental apparatus must incorporate the dictatorship of the working class, and in some places, also, that of the poorer peasantry, together with hired farm labor, this dictatorship constituting the instrument of the systematic overthrow of the exploiting classes;

"4. The dictatorship of the proletariat shall complete the immediate expropriation of Capitalism and the suppression of private property in the means of production, which includes, under Socialism, the suppression of private property and its transfer to a proletarian state under the Socialist administration of the working class, the abolition of capitalist agricultural production, the nationalization of the great business firms and financial trusts;

"5. In order to insure the Social Revolution, the disarming of the bourgeoisie and its agents, and the general arming of the proletariat, is a prime necessity.

"Second Section

"ATTITUDE REGARDING SOCIALIST PARTIES

"7. The fundamental condition of the struggle is the mass action of the proletariat, developing into open armed attack on the governmental powers of Capitalism;

"8. The old International has broken into three principal groups: the avowed social-patriots, who, during the entire duration of the imperialistic war between the years 1914 and 1918, have supported their own bourgeoisie; the minority Socialists of the 'Center,' represented by leaders of the type of Karl Kautsky, and who constitute a group composed of ever-hesitating elements, unable to settle on any determined direction and who up to date have always acted as traitors; and the Revolutionary Left Wing.

"9. As far as the social-patriots are concerned, who stood up everywhere in arms, in the most critical moments, against the revolution, a merciless fight is the alternative; in regard to the 'Center,' the tactics consist in separating from it the revolutionary elements, in criticizing pitilessly its leaders and in dividing systematically among them the number of their followers; these tactics are absolutely necessary when we reach a certain degree of development;

"10. On the other hand it is necessary to proceed in a common movement with the revolutionary elements of the working class who, though hitherto not belonging to the party, yet adopt to-day in its entirety, the point of view of dictatorship of the proletariat, under the form of Soviet government, including the syndicalist elements of the labor movements;

"11. It is also necessary to rally the groups and proletarian organizations, who, though not in the wake as yet of the revolutionary trend of the Left Wing, nevertheless have manifested and developed a tendency leading in that direction;

"12. We propose that the representatives of parties and groups following these tendencies shall take part in the Congress as plenipotentiary members of the Workers' International and should belong to the following parties:

"1. The Spartacus group (Germany); 2. The Bolsheviki or Communist Party (Russia); 3. Other Communist groups of; 3. German-Austria; 4. Hungary; 5. Finland; 6. Poland; 7. Esthonia; 8. Lettonia; 9. Lithuania; 10. White Russia; 11. Ukraine; 12. The Revolutionary elements of Czecho-Slovakia; 13. The Bulgarian Social-Democratic Party; 14. The Roumanian Social-Democrats; 15. The Left Wing of the Servian Social-Democracy; 16. The Left Wing of the Swedish Social-Democratic Party; 17. The Norwegian Social-Democratic Party; 18. The Danish groups of the class struggle; 19. The Dutch Communist Party; 20. The revolutionary elements of the Belgian Labor Party; 21-22. The groups and organizations in the midst of the French Socialist and syndicalist movements who are in solidarity with our aims; 23. The Left Wing of the Swiss Social-Democratic Party; 24. The Italian Socialist Party; 25. The left elements of the Spanish Socialist Party; 26. The left elements of the Portuguese Socialist Party; 27. The British Socialist Party (those nearer to us are the elements represented by MacLean); 28. I. S. P. R. (Great Britain); 29. S. L. P. (England); 30. I. W. W. (Great Britain); 31. The revolutionary elements of Shop-Stewards (Great Britain); 33. The S. L. P. (U. S. A.); 34. The elements of the Left Wings of American Socialist Propaganda (tendency represented by E. V. Debs and the Socialist Propaganda League); 35. I. W. W. (Industrial Workers of the World), America; 36. The Workers' International Industrial Union (U. S. A.); 37. I. W. W. of Australia; 38. The Socialist groups of Tokio and Samon, represented by Sen Katayama; 39. The Young Peoples' Socialist International Leagues.

"Third Section

"THE ORGANIZATION AND NAME OF THE PARTY

"13. The Congress must be transformed into a common organ of combat in view of the permanent struggle and systematic direction of the movement, into a center of International Communism which will subordinate the Interests of the Revolution from an international point of view.

"The concrete forms of organization, representation, etc., will be elaborated by the Congress."

The testimony of Morris Hillquit in the Socialist case before the Assembly Judiciary Committee gave the preceding document an added interest which the reader will better appreciate further on. As will appear later in our narrative, on September 4, 1919, the Socialist Party adopted a manifesto strongly favoring the "industrial" unionizing of American labor for the purpose of reinforcing the political "demands" of the Socialist Party with "industrial action."

On the stand at Albany, on February 19, 1920, Hillquit acknowledged the authorship of at least 90 per cent of the "industrial action" manifesto of his party, but declared that he had never read the Moscow manifesto when he wrote his, and so was not influenced by the Moscow recommendation of industrial action to bring about a revolution by violence. But the above "call" to the Moscow Conference urged "a common movement" with "syndicalist elements," or "industrial union" revolutionaries, as much as the Moscow manifesto did, and the reader will find at the end of our next chapter evidence that Morris Hillquit was familiar with and criticized the above Moscow "call" at least as early as July, 1919.