Yet the Right Wing papers, on the whole, are much more reserved than those of the Left. As an example of the openness with which the Left Wing or Communist papers instigate rebellion, a quotation from "The Communist," Chicago, April 1, 1919, will interest the reader:
"The Communist Propaganda League of Chicago came into existence on November 7, 1918, first anniversary of the Russian Soviet Socialist Republic, and the very day of the German Revolution.
"A group of Socialist Party officials and active party members came together for consultation as to ways and means for giving the American Socialist movement a revolutionary character in harmony with all the significance of November 7th, the most glorious date in all history. At the hour of that little meeting bedlam reigned in the streets of Chicago by premature celebration of peace. The calling of this meeting during the mass tumult of November 7th is prophetic of the revolutionary vision which brought these Comrades together. On that day the seething proletariat ruled Chicago by sheer force of numbers. One thing alone was needed to give this mass expression identity with the proletarian uprisings of Europe--one thing: the revolutionary idea!
"The Communist Propaganda League is an organization for the propagation of the revolutionary idea. The civilization of tomorrow is with unorganized masses who greeted the news of peace and revolution in Germany with what may be safely described as the greatest spontaneous expression of mass sentiment ever witnessed in America. To give direction and inspiration to the advancing and irresistible army of the preletariat is the mission to which this League is dedicated."
This League, with the millionaire Socialist, William Bross Lloyd, at its head, became part of the Communist Labor Party.
The indications are that the Communist Labor Party, had it been left undisturbed by our Government, would soon have surpassed in numbers the remnant left in the old Socialist Party, whose dues-paying membership dwindled from 109,589 in January, 1919, to 39,750 by July of the same year. Evidently, when the Left Wing secession occurred, a few real rebels came out of the Socialist Party, which used to boast in election campaigns that it was merely a party of evolution, not of revolution. Those who still remain in the old party are rebels, too, but the rank and file is restrained by seasoned leaders, who are more prudent but less honest than the hot-headed Communists.
The Socialists now have in the country four revolutionary organizations: the Socialist Party, the Socialist Labor Party, the Communist Party and the Communist Labor Party. The scum of the land, the wrecks and wreckers of civilization, deluded ignoramuses, thus find ample opportunity for selecting an organization of rebellion in which there is "no political corruption." The members of these parties find fault with everything under the Stars and Stripes, and yet hesitate to pass over to Russia and live under the bloody standard of Lenine and Trotzky. If these four rebel parties do not suffice for some of the rebels, there still remains the I. W. W. All are pretty much the same, their principal differences being the varying degrees of hypocrisy, boldness and lust for power of their leaders.
The open and pronounced revolutionary character of the I. W. W., Communist Party and Communist Labor Party, evidenced in their inflammatory utterances and tactics, had established their criminal status with our National and State police and legal departments, while startling wholesale arrests, deportations and indictments of these three classes of law-breakers soon impressed a recognition of their criminal status upon the public mind. It is important to establish the further fact, if it be one, that the only difference between the rank and file of these organizations and the rank and file of the remnant still attached to the Socialist Party of America is the difference between tweedledee and tweedledum.
The late inquiry into the qualifications of five suspended Socialists to sit as law-makers in the New York Assembly created an astonishing furore, disclosing amazing ignorance concerning American Socialism among our most intelligent citizens. The confusion of the public mind was still further increased by the Attorney-General of the United States, whose convincing characterization of the two Communist parties, given out on January 23, 1920, contained the following sentence:
"Certainly such an organization as the Communist Party of America and also the Communist Labor Party cannot be construed to fall within the same category as the Socialist Party of America, which latter organization is pledged to the accomplishment of changes of the Government by lawful and rightful means."
But can the facts so far brought out in this book "be construed" as indicating any substantial difference between the 39,000 or 40,000 Socialists who have kept their old party name and the 70,000 or 72,000 who separated from them in September, 1919? Up to the moment of separation were not all alike under the same "pledge" to use "lawful and rightful means?" But if this public profession of lawfulness meant nothing to 70,000 of them, why think it means more to the rest?
We have the further striking evidence, shown above, that the leaders who had compromised their attitude toward Bolshevism felt compelled, in order to hold any of the rank and file, to argue that "the National Executive Committee and the party in general" had "supported the Russian Comrades at the head of the Soviet power." Yet in spite of this defense the old National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party was rebuked and kicked out of office during the Emergency Convention, even by delegates who were friendly to the compromised leaders. The "Call," September 5, 1919, gives some of the details: