Of course, that brings up a subject which may be unpleasant to reflect upon, and I suspect that the average member of the Communist Party is quite unaware of the similarity of his position as a member of the Communist Party to that of a person who is a member of the Armed Forces. He is under discipline. His directions come from above. He has to obey or suffer the consequences.
Mr. Tavenner. Mr. Chairman, this is a very unusual document. I wish the committee had time right now to go into every phase of Communist Party organization that is referred to in it.
I think all that we can do now is to offer it as an exhibit and have it made a part of the record with the view of giving it more detailed study later. So I offer it in evidence and ask that it be marked “Dennett Exhibit No. 1,” and that it be incorporated in the transcript of the record.
Mr. Moulder. The exhibit offered in evidence, marked “Dennett Exhibit No. 1” for identification, will be admitted as a part of the record.
Dennett Exhibit No. 1
How the Communist International Formulates at Present the Problem of Organization
(By B. Vassiliev)The Enlarged Presidium of the E. C. C. I. (February 1930), summing up the international situation, called upon all Communist Parties to fundamentally change the methods and pace of their work by concentrating their chief attention on the problems of the preparation and the carrying out of mass REVOLUTIONARY ACTIONS OF THE PROLETARIAT—strikes, demonstrations, etc., while at the same time continuing as far as possible to promote their agitational and propaganda work. Consequently, in the present conditions, the Party apparatus, in response to the demands which the direction of the Comintern puts forward, should in the first place be fitted for the organization of demonstrations, strikes and other mass actions of the proletariat. Party leaders who are not capable of organizing demonstrations and strikes do not answer to the demands which the circumstances of the class struggle are now placing before the Communist Parties, and therefore should be replaced by others who have shown these qualities in the course of the class battles of the most recent period.
Why did the Enlarged Presidium put the question in this way? The political resolution of the Enlarged Presidium states that the growing new economic crisis is hastening the process of upsetting capitalist stabilization (it has already led to the beginning of the collapse of capitalist stabilization) and the growth of class contradictions, thus accelerating the rise of a new revolutionary wave. The resolution further states that the working class movement in the period since the 10th Plenum of the E. C. C. I. had been raised to a higher stage. The revolutionary activity of the proletarian masses has grown stronger, the fighting capabilities of the Communist Parties have been heightened. The whole position of the class struggle has placed before the Communist Parties and the Communist International as a whole, a number of new fighting tasks. In the process of the growth of a new revolutionary upsurge there are present already in certain capitalist countries elements of a gathering political crisis and of a revolutionary situation, as for example, in Poland, Italy, Spain, partly in Rumania, in Yugoslavia, and in Greece. A deep political crisis is present in China and India, being the starting point of a revolutionary situation. In Germany the process of the radicalization of the masses of the working class is proceeding at a swift pace. In France, another country of powerful capitalism, the number of strikers grew from 222,000 in 1928 to 431,000 in 1929, whilst these strikes assumed a more and more clearly expressed political character and were characterized by the growing tenacity of the workers. In England, in spite of extraordinary difficult conditions for the growth of a revolutionary movement, in spite of the extraordinary weakness of the Communist Party (on the 1st January 1930, 2,800 Party members and 120 members in the Y. C. L.), the number of strikers in 1929 compared with 1928 grew from 124,000 to 534,000 comprising the most important sections of industry, such as mining and textiles.
At the same time, the gigantic successes of socialist construction in the U. S. S. R. are sharpening in the most extreme way the contradictions between U. S. S. R. and the entire capitalist world and are forcing the leaders of the capitalist world to strengthen and hasten to the highest degree their military preparations of a new armed attack on the U. S. S. R. The 10th Plenum of the E. C. C. I. showed that the danger of new Imperialist wars and of new attacks of the imperialists on the U. S. S. R. never was so imminent from the time of the imperialist war of 1914-18 as it was at the moment of the 10th Plenum. By March 1930 that danger had increased still more.
In these conditions of growing economic crisis and heightened threat of war against the U. S. S. R. all measures will be taken by the ruling classes of the capitalist countries to guarantee their rear before declaring war, that is, everything will be done by them to weaken, disorganize and, as far as possible, liquidate completely all revolutionary proletarian organizations, and in the first place the Communist Parties.
Moreover, the elections themselves in illegal Parties must, as a rule, take place in such a way that even the members of the conference do not know who is elected on to the Party Committee. At the present time two methods of electing leading organs in illegal Parties are practised. The first method. The Party Conference elects a special commission for counting the votes cast for candidates for members of the Party Committee. Then the candidates are named and the election of the Party Committee proceeds by secret vote. The commission checks the results of the voting, whilst it does not report to the conference as to the personnel elected. Another method of election. The conference elects a narrow commission in which a representative of the higher Party Committee takes part and this narrow committee elects the new Party Committee. In strictly illegal Parties, as for example, the Italiana Communist Party, the latter method of election is the only one which more or less guarantees strict conspirative conditions.
Self-criticism of the mistakes of the Party direction in illegal Parties must also be organized through narrow conferences and must take place in such a way that the names of the Party leaders and the functioning of the Party apparatus, do not lose their conspirative character.
15. QUESTIONS OF COMMUNICATIONS
The most important element of successful working of the Party Committee—the one on which during the checking of its work the most serious attention must be concentrated—is the question of connections of the Party Committee with the higher and lower Party organizations, especially with the factory cells and the fractions of the mass non-Party organizations. This question now has a decisive importance, especially in the legal and semi-legal Communist Parties. The illegal Communist Parties have already worked out a whole number of measures and methods in order to keep their communications with the lower organizations and with separate members of the Party, in spite of the severest police repression. But with the legal and semi-legal Parties there is bad work all the time along this line. In Austria during the last Fascist rising, the C. C. lost connection with the Vienna Committee, and the Vienna Committee lost connection with the enterprises. In Paris on the 6th March 1930, the C. C. lost connection with the Paris organization for six days. Such a state of affairs is absolutely impossible and the most important task of each of our Party organizers, of every instructor going to the locals to check the work of the Party Committee is above all to check how the connections between the Party Committee and other Party organizations are organized, and especially these with the lower Party organizations, and the factory cells. It is perfectly clear that the Communist Parties will not be in a position to organize any mass actions of the Proletariat or mass strikes, or mass street demonstrations, if the Party Committees at sharp moments of struggle lose connection with the factory cells and mass non-Party organizations.
Which are the most important methods of communication it is essential to foresee? It is essentially important to have a well-laid out live communication. Live communication is kept going by the help of the system of so-called appearing or reporting places. What is a reporting point. A reporting point is this: the Party Committee establishes special addresses of flats or other places where on certain days and at certain times representatives of the cells and fractions of the mass organizations must appear. There also representatives of the Party Committees appear. The representative of the cells and fractions makes reports on what has happened in the factory, what the cell has done, what it proposes to do and so on, and the representatives of the Party Committee, having received the report, advises the cell how it should act, passes on to it the directions of the higher Party organs and so on. This system of appearing places must without fail be established in all Parties without exception, legal and illegal whilst in the legal Parties a double system of reporting places must without fail be established—a system of legal and illegal appearing points. Legal reporting places in the legal premises of the Party Committee and illegal appearing places in case the legal premises of the Party Committee are closed, or a police ambush is sitting there, in order quickly to re-establish connection with the lower Party cell in another way through the illegal reporting place. For the latter, appearing points should therefore be prepared beforehand. In Germany, in Belgium, in France, Party meetings in cafes were at one time very widespread. This is a very bad habit because there are always spies in cafes in countless numbers and it is difficult to get rid of them. It is necessary to go over more quickly to the establishment of appearing places in safer localities. If the Party has already more or less seriously and fundamentally gone over to underground positions, and the shadowing of leading active Party members has begun, and Party members are being arrested in the streets, then it is very important that special signals should be established for the appearing flats, showing; in the first place, the safety of the flat, second, showing that exactly those people have come who were expected and that these comrades who have come are talking with exactly those comrades whom the observer is coming to see. In order to show that the reporting places are in working order, in Russian conditions, for example, a flowerpot was placed in the window, the comrade came, saw that the flowers are there, knew that it is safe, and entered. It is necessary to say that these reception signals were very quickly learned by the police and that they therefore, when visiting any flat, carefully searched for signals before fixing an ambush. If they saw that flowers are in the window and the person whom they have come to arrest has tried by all means possible to take these flowers away, the police insisted on putting them back in the place where they were. So, when arranging safety signals for reporting places, it is necessary to arrange them in such a way that they don’t strike the eyes of the police and that they can be taken away without being noticed by the police.
For verifying those who come to the reporting places, a system of passwords is established. The comrade comes to the reporting place, and he says some agreed-upon sentence. They answer to that agreed-on sentence by some other agreed-on sentence. So both comrades check each other. In Russian underground conditions very complicated passwords were sometimes used in the central appearing places. This was called forth by the circumstances that different workers passed through such reporting places; rank and file workers from the cells, district and Central Party workers. Accordingly, one password was fixed for the rank and file worker, a more complicated one for the district worker and still more complicated one for the central worker. Why was this necessary? It was necessary for conspirative reasons, since only certain things could be said to the rank and file worker while perhaps other things could be said to the district worker, whilst you could speak with full frankness about the whole work of the illegal organization to the representative of the Central Committee. Therefore, passwords were, as they used to say at that time of “three degrees of trust.” This was done in this way. The first degree of trust: a comrade comes and says an agreed-upon sentence and is replied to by an agreed-upon sentence. The second stage: the comrade who has come in reply to the agreed-upon sentence spoken to him, says another agreed-upon sentence, in reply to which yet another agreed-upon sentence is spoken to him. The third stage of trust: to the second agreed-upon sentence the comrade replies by a third agreed-upon sentence. Then the keeper of the appearing place also replies to the third agreed-upon sentence.
Besides flats for reporting points, connecting link flats are also needed for communication by letter, and these flats must in no case coincide. And finally, there must be flats for the sheltering of illegal comrades, comrades whom the police are looking for; comrades who have escaped from prison, etc., etc. For all our legal Communist Parties the question of addresses and flats now plays a role of the first importance. Last year, on the eve of the 1st August, when it was clear that the leading workers would be arrested in a number of countries, comrades did not know where to go, there were no flats. In any case, when it was necessary to shelter comrades hiding from the police in Germany, Czechoslovakia and France very great difficulties occurred, especially in the provinces. It is essential for all Parties to occupy themselves now in the most serious way with the solution of the “housing” problem.
Concerning communications by letter. It is also necessary to give the most serious attention to the problem of the organization of letter communications. In checking the work of the Party Committee it is necessary to consider this question specially: Does the Party Committee have addresses for communicating by letter with the higher and lower Party organizations, and how are these communications put into practice? Now, even for the legal Parties, the firmest rule must be established that all correspondence concerning the functioning of the Party apparatus, must without fail go by special routes guaranteeing letters from being copied in the post. All kinds of general circulars, general information reports on the condition of the Party in legal parties can go through the ordinary post to legal Party addresses, but everything concerning the functioning of the Party Committee even in legal Parties, most now without fail go by special routes. In the first place, the use of special couriers must be foreseen, who will personally carry letters, not trusting these letters to the State post. Here the Parties must make use of the connections which they have with post and telegraph and railway servants, connections with all kinds of commercial travellers for trading firms and so on. All these connections must be used in order that without extra expense responsible Party documents can be transported. Further, every Party should take care that every letter, apart from whether it goes through the State post or by courier should be written in such a way that in case it falls into the hands of the police it should not give the police a basis for any kind of arrest or repression against the Party organization.
This makes the following three requisites. The first requisite: the letter must be in code, i. e., all aspects of illegal work are referred to by some special phrase or other. For example, the illegal printing press is called “auntie”; “type” is called “sugar” and so on. A comrade writes: “auntie asks you without fail to send her 20-lbs. of sugar;” that will mean that the press is in need of 20-lbs. of type or a comrade writes: “we are experiencing great difficulty in finding a suitable flat for our aunt.” That means that it is a question of finding a flat for the illegal printing press.
Second requisite: besides a code, as above, ciphers are used, illegal parts of letters being put not only into code but also into cipher. There are many different systems of cipher. The simplest and at the same time most reliable system of cipher is the system of cipher by the help of a book. Some book or other is agreed upon beforehand and then the cipher is made in this way: simple fractions or decimals are ciphered. The first figure of the first fraction shows the page of the book. Then further comes the actual cipher. For the numerator of the fraction we must take a line counting from above or below; for the denominator that counting from the left or from the right which it is necessary to put into cipher. For example, we need to put into cipher the letter “A”. We look in the book and we see that this letter is in the third line from the top, the fourth letter from the left to the right. Then we cipher 3 over 4 (¾), that is the third line from the top, fourth letter from left to right. You can agree also on this method; for example, counting the line not from above but from below, then the 3 will not be the third line from above but the third line from below. You can agree to count the letter in the line not from left to right but from right to left. Finally, for greater complexity in order to keep the sense from the police, you can also add to the fraction some figure or other. Let us say the numerator is increased by 3 and the denominator by 4. In this case in order to decipher, it will be necessary first to subtract in the numerator and denominator of every fraction. A whole number of similar complications can be thought out in order to complicate the cipher. The advantage of such a cipher is that it is not only very simple but also that each letter can be designated by a great number of different signs and in such a way that the cipher designation of the letters are not repeated. The book cipher can be used without a book. In place of a book some poem or other can be chosen, learned by heart and the ciphering done according to it. When it is necessary to cipher or decipher, the poem must be written out in verses and then the ciphering or deciphering done and the poem destroyed.
The third requisite which is also recommended should be observed in correspondence, is writing in chemical inks, that is, with such inks that it is impossible to read them without special adaptations. If a secret Party letter falls into the hands of the police written in invisible ink they must first of all guess that it is written in invisible ink; the open text of such letters must be made perfectly blameless, for example, a son is writing to his mother that he is alive and well and of the good things he wishes her. Not a word about revolution. The police must guess first of all that under this apparent innocent text there is a hidden text. Having discovered this secret the police tumble against the cipher. If they succeed in deciphering the cipher, they stumble up against a code and they have still to decipher that code. But all this takes time in the course of which the police can do nothing. If the police succeed in reading it in the course of two or three weeks, then by that time the Party organization has been able to cover up all the consequences of the question which was written about in the letter.
What kind of invisible ink should be used? Invisible inks exist in a very great number. They can be bought in any chemist’s shop. Finally, comrades must use the latest inventions of chemistry in this direction. The simplest invisible ink which can be recommended and which can be found everywhere, is, for example, onion juice and pure water.
16. PLAN OF WORK OF THE PARTY COMMITTEE
Every Party Committee must have a definite plan of work for the period immediately ahead. In the conditions of the capitalist countries Party Committees cannot work out the same complicated calendar plans as the Party organizations of the C. P. S. U. The C. P. S. U. is a Party in power, the plans of the C. P. S. U. regulate the whole social and political life of the country. In capitalist countries the Communist Parties are the parties of an oppressed class. The bourgeoisie in power uses the whole apparatus of the State power and the full help of the Social-Fascist and other reactionary organizations in order to smash the plans of the Communist Parties. In these conditions the committees of the Communist Parties must systematically reconsider and reconstruct the plans of their work; accordingly, these plans must be very pliable. But plans there must be, without fail. Every Party Committee must have an approximate plan of its work for the period immediately ahead and must group the forces of the Party organization according to that plan, fit the forms of the Party structure to it and also the methods of Party work. The essence of the plan of work of the Party Committee is the adequate catering for the needs of the masses in the largest enterprises, playing a more important role in the territory of the given Party organization. The structure of the local Party organization must be such that the organizations can above all serve these big enterprises. That is to say, that in the first place the Party Committee must interest itself in questions of the work of the factory cells at these big enterprises, must help in the work of these factory cells, seeking to attain that these Party cells should become really strong political and organizational organs of the Party, that they should be in practice connecting organs between the Party and the masses of workers at these enterprises. This idea can best of all be made clear by a concrete example, say as follows: in a town there are two or three big enterprises; railway workshops, a metal factory, a textile factory. Besides these three big enterprises there are two or three dozen small enterprises, and in addition scattered Party members, individual workers, artisans, representatives of the so-called liberal professions,—lawyers, writers, a doctor and so on, as well as a few students. The Party Committee of this town should interest itself above all in what is happening in the big enterprises—in the railway workshops, in the metal factory and the textile factory, how the factory cells are working there and in the first place help the factory cells of these enterprises by all and every means possible, concentrating all their attention and all their forces on this task. In the lawyer’s office and the doctor’s surgery there are no masses which the Party must win over and organize for revolutionary struggle. It is another matter with the big enterprises. Therefore the central question in the work of every Party Committee is the question of systematically coming to the assistance of the factory cells in the big enterprises. A Party Committee which cannot provide serious daily help to such factory cells, a Party Committee which cannot organize factory cells capable of working in the enterprises, is a bad Party Committee and the leading organs of the Party and the mass of Party members should hasten to draw from this state of affairs the necessary conclusions and as quickly as possible make a change so far as such a Party Committee is concerned.
17. MOBILIZATION OF THE FORCES OF FACTORY CELLS
We must bear in mind with regard to the internal organization of the work of factory cells that in all countries some members of the Party working in the enterprises, do not wish to be members of factory cells and do not wish to carry on Party work in the factory. For example, in the documents of the Central Committee of the Czechoslovakian Party on the preparation for the campaign for the 6th March 1930 there is information from all districts that when practical questions of the preparation for the demonstration for the 6th March were put before the meetings of factory cells, in many factory cells voices were raised to the effect that it was impossible to do any work in the factory, and at a place called Laza in Moravia, one responsible worker of a factory cell even put the question in this way: “If the Party will guarantee material help after I have been thrown out of the factory for taking part in the demonstration, but if the Party cannot guarantee my family and myself then I will not carry on Party work in the factory.” Such moods among Communists working in the factory are to be observed on all sides. There are Party members who agree to pay membership dues, agree to come to a meeting once every fortnight or once a month, in order to hear a report on the world proletarian revolution, and vote for the platform of the Comintern against the liquidators, the Trotskyists and all other renegades, but are not willing to carry on recruiting work among the workers of their enterprise, do not wish to prepare strikes in their own enterprises, do not wish to call out the workers of their enterprises to demonstrations, and so on. Every Party Committee has to fight with such Party members in their enterprises. What should we do with them? The most important task of the Party committee consists in organizing all Party members working in enterprises into factory cells and drawing them into the day to day work of the factory. With regard to Party members who do not wish to take part in the work of factory cells, the most attentive and stubborn explanatory work must be carried out. But if somebody or other all the same, categorically refuses to work in a factory cell, that comrade must be told that nobody is keeping him in the party. (The Communist Party is a voluntary organization, but every worker who voluntarily joins the ranks of the Communist Party accepts iron party discipline. If that discipline seems very hard to him, even unbearable, then the Party should not shut its doors upon him.) In this regard we must bear in mind that Party members who do not wish to work in factory cells are not necessarily traitors to the working class. In some organizations Party workers, proletarians, who have refused to carry out difficult tasks in their enterprises, have been cleaned out of the Party as alien elements. There are alien elements in the ranks of the Communist Party, including direct provocators, agents of the police and the employers, who specially creep into the Party for the purpose of carrying on disruptive work in the ranks of the Party. The Party must strictly observe each one of its members, verify in the most careful way every suspicious Party member, and if it is established that he is an alien element and even more a provocative agent, then of course, there is absolutely no reason to beat about the bush with him. But in the ranks of the Communist Parties there are a large number of proletarians who sincerely sympathize with Communism but who at the same time are not strong enough to fulfill all the demands of Communist discipline. With regard to such proletarians, if they are not capable of being members of the Communist Party there is no need to keep them in the Communist Party, but at the same time there is no need to throw them out of the Party like a dirty rag; they must be organized round the Party as sympathizers as members of non-Party mass organizations, in the Red Trade Unions, in the I. L. D., the W. I. R. and so on. In these organizations no such discipline is demanded as in the ranks of the Communist Party and they can work here in a suitable manner. At the present stage of development of the Communist movement, when the Communist Parties are ceasing to be organizations for propaganda and agitation of the Communist idea, and are turning into fighting organizations, preparing and leading revolutionary actions of the proletarian masses against the organized forces of the employers, police, State and Social-Fascists, some members of the Party are showing themselves incapable of fulfilling the new fighting tasks of the Communist Party. But without doubt such Party members can be useful to the Party as sympathetic elements, and even as leading active elements in different mass organizations, as for example, in the ILD, Tenants’ Organizations, W. I. R., and so on. Factory cells must be composed of proletarians who are really the advance guard of the workers of a given enterprise, devoted to the cause of Communism, ready to carry out the directions of the Party, grudging neither health nor strength, nor life, not being afraid if Party interests demand it to carry out such work in the enterprise as may cause the employer to throw them out of the factory, perhaps the police to arrest them, and the courts to condemn them to heavy punishment. In fact, only factory cells composed of such proletarians can do great revolutionary work even though they be very small. In one of the mining districts of Czechoslovakia in 1930 there was such a case. The Social-Democrats organized a meeting of miners. Only one Communist took part in the meeting. Different questions which the Social Democrats brought forward were considered. After a discussion in which the Party member present at the meeting took the most active part, the meeting decided to join up in the Red Trade Union. The Czechoslovakian comrades will remember another case which took place in 1930 in Prague. When the famous social traitor Vandervelde came there, the Social-Democrats organized a big meeting at which about 30 active Party members were present. Vandervelde delivered a long speech pouring dirty water on the Communist International, the U. S. S. R., and the Czechoslovakian Communist Party, nevertheless, not one of the 30 Party members present at the meeting and there were members of the C. C. amongst them, opened his mouth in protest against the counter-revolutionary speech of the Social-Fascist leader. It is perfectly clear that with activists like the “activists” of the Prague organization, who were present at Vandervelde’s meeting, the Czechoslovakian proletariat will not win power but the Communist Party will be a shameful laughing stock in the eyes of the proletariat and the proletariat, quite rightly, will not listen to such “activists” and will not support Party organizations which keep such “activists” in leading Party work.
18. STREET CELLS
The organization of a factory cell in a big enterprise in the present conditions is a very difficult affair, demanding very long and stubborn work by the Party members, both those working in the enterprise as well as those who are employed elsewhere. It is the business of the Party Committee to secure the essential co-ordination of the work of the Communists who are working inside the enterprise, with that of the Communists who are outside the boundaries of the enterprise. And here a very important question presents itself with regard to the form of organization of Party members who are not workers in enterprises; artisans, housewives, etc. According to the decisions of the International Organizational Consultations, and according to the constitution of the Communist Parties, such Party members are organized in street cells. But how should these street cells be organized? The practice of the Parties of the different countries shows that the street cells are often organized without any plan. Street cells are organized according to place of residence, those Party members who live in the territory of a definite district or around some street or other, being brought into the street cells. But what should these street cells do? The practice of street cells in many countries shows that as a rule they meet from time to time, discuss various general questions, but do not carry on any practical day to day work. Street cells as a rule come to life only during big campaigns at the time of various elections, etc., when they are called upon to distribute leaflets, collect signatures, canvass flats, etc.
In future Party Committees must see to it that street cells are constructed so that in their day to day work they should help the Party Committee to strengthen its connection with the workers in big enterprises, strengthen the work of factory cells and so on. This should be the fundamental practical rule for the organization and work of street cells. At the same time it must be firmly borne in mind that along with the development of the class struggle Party Committees must not fail to carry out changes in the composition and structure of the street cells which may become necessary, make a re-grouping of the forces of the members of street cells, in order at a given moment to have a concentration of forces on the most important sectors of the front of the class struggle. For example, if some unrest should arise in a textile factory, the Party Committee must at once consider the possibility of developing that unrest into a strike inside the factory. But a strike can only be organized provided good preparatory work has been carried out. Who must carry it out? In the first place Party members and sympathizers working in the textile factory, but on the other hand, the Party Committee must organize the maximum assistance for these comrades, drawing on Party members working in other factories, and also members of street cells. There can be all kinds of combinations here. For example, it might be advisable and practicable that a Party member working as a fitter in a metal factory, a member of the factory cell of the metal factory should apply for a job in the textile factory where a fitter may be needed. Everything must be done in order by such means to strengthen the cell of the textile factory from within. Further, let us suppose that near the textile factory a street cell is working and that in this street cell there are, let us say, five more or less weak comrades living in the district. It is essential to strengthen this street cell by including in it a number of other comrades who live nearby, or even at the other end of the town, in order with the help of this street cell to strengthen the agitation among the workers of the textile factory on their way to and from work, to strengthen through this street cell the distribution among the workers of a textile factory paper, leaflets, and other literature which may be issued by the Party with the aim of preparing and organizing a strike, in this textile factory. Let us suppose that after the strike is finished a movement begins in another factory; the Party Committee must at once regroup its forces in order to concentrate them again on another fighting sector of the Party work. And so all the time. It is impossible to regard the Party structure or any local organization as something unshakably firm and not liable to undergo changes. The Party Committee must systematically check the distribution of members between different cells, check the expediency of the organization of the cell, carry out regrouping of the members of the cell in order in each separate case and at each concrete moment, to concentrate the best forces of the Party round the most important sectors of the front of the class struggle. In this lies the fundamental art of the Party organizer. His general task consists in seeing that every Party member as well as sympathizer should be constantly drawn into day to day work, attention being concentrated upon the most important sectors of the class struggle.
19. SHOCK GROUPS
The practice of the Y. C. L. has recently given rise to the method of so-called shock groups or brigades. This method of shock brigades could be usefully carried over into the practice of the Party. The term “shock brigade” is not in itself very good. Shock brigades are organized in the factories in the U. S. S. R., the Communists working in the factories organizing shock groups around which non-Party workers are gathered. But the Communist Party is the advance guard of the working class, i. e., it is in itself the shock group of the working class; to create within this shock advance guard of the working class yet other shock brigades is of course at bottom not correct. But this is what IS correct. In the Party organizations of capitalist countries, numbers of Party members are not drawn into the everyday work. Every Party member belongs to a cell, which meets once a fortnight or once a month, and in between these meetings Party members do not perform much Party work, in many cases, in fact, have no Party tasks at all. This happens because in the given cells at the given time, there is not much internal work, while other sectors of Party work may at the same moment have important militant tasks before them. It is for the Party Committee to keep on combining Party members into different groups for the concentration of forces upon the most important sectors. Having performed a given task such groups or brigades are broken up or reconstructed into other groups for taking up new work. The general aim in creating such groups should be the strengthening of Party work in the big enterprises of the most important sections of industry. Here, on this problem the full attention of the leading Party organs must be sharply directed in the near future.
20. WORK OF THE FACTORY CELLS IN THE ENTERPRISES
When we approach the study of the work of the factory cells in capitalist countries we are often struck by the great passivity of the members of the cell. A further examination of the reasons for this passivity will reveal, as a rule, a complete ignorance on the part of the Party members as to what they should do in the factory in their everyday work. The task of the Party organizer, his most important task, consists in teaching every Party member working in the factory what he should do every day. Every Party member working in the factory should begin with the workshop in which he is working, organizing the Party work there. He should first of all find out who his fellow workers in the shop are. That is his first Party duty. He should establish who is the Fascist agent in order to know whom to avoid, and in his presence not talk about Party affairs or carry on Communist agitation; next he should find out which workers are so narrow-minded that they are not interested in politics at all, either Communist or Social-Democratic; he should know which of his neighbors in the shop is a member of the Social Democratic Party, but still an honest proletarian, capable of fighting for the interests of the working class even though against his Party leaders. Finally, what is specially important, every member of a factory cell should know which of his neighbors at the bench is revolutionary minded even though non-Party, and ready to take or has already taken, active part in strikes and revolutionary demonstrations. When a Party member working in a workshop has a clear picture of what each worker there represents, it will be much easier for him to carry on his everyday work. He will then know whom he is to avoid, whom he will have to fight, with whom to become acquainted and establish closer relations with the aim of bringing them into active revolutionary work. As to the latter, he must have systematic chats with them in the intervals of work, preferably during working hours, also on the way to and from work, or arrange special walks with them in the town on holidays; he must patiently, unceasingly, from day to day, using every hour, every minute, agitate them into the spirit of Communism, of course not in a general abstract way, but on questions of everyday struggle in the given enterprise and in the given workshop, organizing them around himself and thus creating a revolutionary kernel in the shop, and in consequence a workshop factory cell. Next, the most important everyday task of the comrade in the workshop is to carry on discussions with the Social-Democratic workers, winning over the Social-Democratic workers to his side, bringing the more revolutionary minded of them and members of reformist trade unions into every kind of action against the employer, against the Social-Democratic and reformist leaders. His third task should consist of getting the Fascist agents, police spies, etc., driven out of the shop and factory. This last task is forgotten most often of all. However, it is evident that so long as there are among the workers in the shop police agents who are following every movement of the revolutionary minded workers, and informing the boss about their actions every day, it will be very difficult to organize work in that shop. But if by pressure of the workers he should succeed in ridding the shop of these agents, Party work will be greatly facilitated. Among those who should be thrown out it will now be necessary to include individual Social-Democrats who show themselves Fascist police agents, but the general line in relation to Social-Democratic workers must remain, i. e., they must be drawn into the general class channel of the revolutionary struggle of the proletariat by means of the organization of the united front from below.
Thus the foundation of the factory cell must definitely be the workshop of dept. cell. The general factory cell can work well only when it has strong support points in the workshops and separate departments.
21. THE SHOP CELL
The most important task of the shop cell is to concentrate the non-Party active workers in the shop compactly around itself. To organize the shop, the dept.—this is the task of the shop cell, so that every shop of a factory may act as an organized force. How can this be done? It can be done only provided the shop cell works on the foundation of the defense of the everyday interests of the working class, that every Communist in every shop organizes the mass of the workers of that shop around every question of everyday struggle of the working class. For example, there is a foreman in the shop who behaves very roughly to the workers. The cell must organize the whole mass of the workers around the demand that this foreman should be dismissed. The cell should create a committee of action, organize elections of shop stewards who should be delegate-representatives of all the workers in the shop, in order to effect the driving out of the foreman. Active Communists among these shop stewards should form the leading core, but non-Party workers who are respected by the mass of the workers, should also be drawn in, including even individual Social-Democratic workers who have declared their readiness to fight for the removal of this foreman, in spite of all orders and threats from their leaders. If the shop cell succeeds in creating such a directing center around concrete tasks affecting the interests of all the workers of the factory, then we can say that this shop cell has worked well: it has become the revolutionary leader of the workers of a given shop. A cell which is every day closely bound up with the working masses on questions of the defense of their closest interests and which enjoys the full confidence of the workers in the cause of the defense of their interest, will retain that confidence in the future, in more responsible actions and at most responsible moments of the struggle for power.
The question of the creation of such support points for revolutionary class struggle in the shops and also on a general factory scale is the most important question in the work of our factory cells. In the first place the question of the so-called revolutionary shop stewards is bound up with this. This slogan was issued by the Communist Party of Germany in 1929. At present it is extremely real for all capitalist countries. Revolutionary shop stewards—that means those workers elected by the revolutionary section of the workers of the factory at their workshop of general factory meetings, who are the organizers of the united front from below in the struggle for the defense of the closest interests of the workers of the given factory against the attacks of the employers and against the leaders of the Social Democratic and reformist trade unions.
So the factory cell can only become a strong Party organization capable of acting efficiently, and connected with the masses, when it operates on the basis of strong shop cells. Therefore the strong shop cell is the most important organizational guarantee for the good working of the general factory cell. The shop cell in its turn will only work well when it is able to organize the whole mass of the workers of its shop around the issues of the class struggle, which are near to and understood by all the workers of the shop, including non-Party workers and members of the reformist unions and members of the Social-Democratic Party. Shop cells should carry on their mass work within the shop on the basis of the tactic of the united front from below through revolutionary shop stewards. Revolutionary shop stewards in their turn most include among their number the most active Communists, members of the shop cells, but in addition individual revolutionary-minded Social-Democratic workers and non-Party advanced workers must be drawn into this work who are ready not to listen to their leaders in the struggle against the employers and their agents. When the shop cell succeeds in creating the institution of revolutionary shop stewards leading their everyday struggle, then no police can drive the Party organization from the factory, then, in order to drive the Party organization out of the factory it will be necessary to shut the factory down, to dismiss all the workers and recruit a new staff of workers.
22. ON WORK IN THE MASS ORGANIZATIONS
Mass organizations must be divided into two large groups: mass organizations supporting the Communist parties and other mass organizations fighting the Communist Parties. To the first category belong the revolutionary trade unions. ILD, WIR, etc. Organizations of the second kind are in their turn divided into two groups: 1) formerly non-Party mass organizations like reformist christian and other reactionary trade unions, sport organizations, etc. and 2) all kinds of organizations politically hostile to us, such as the Social-Democratic Party, various Fascist political unions, etc.
In all non-Party mass proletarian organizations, such as trade unions, sport organizations, tenants’ organizations, etc. the Party should form fractions embracing all Communists and sympathizers. There are thousands of decisions about fractions in mass organizations, but up to now the position in all Parties with regard to fractions is bad. In the first place fractions are far from being organized everywhere. In the second place, organized fractions in the majority of cases work without the direction of the Party Committee. So, the Party Committees should before all find out whether fractions exist everywhere, where they should be established, and in the second place it is essential that Party Committees should direct the work of the fractions and that the fractions should in the strictist way carry out all the directions of the corresponding Party Committees. In the constitution of the Communist Party it is laid down that a fraction has the right to appeal against the decision of a Party Committee. A Party Committee is bound to examine the protest of a fraction against its decision in the presence of a representative of a fraction. The decision of a Party Committee is binding on a fraction and there is no appeal against it: it should be accepted without argument and put into the life without delay. At present in practice directions of the Party Committee are frequently not carried out by fractions. The task of the Party is to see that every fraction carries out these directions in the strictest way. With regard to fraction members who avoid carrying out directions, the most serious explanatory work must essentially be undertaken and in case of necessity, the strictest Party measures should be taken even up to expulsion from the Party, for otherwise the Party will be completely unable to direct the work of a fraction. There may be cases when swift interference of the Party Committee is called for, while it may be impossible to convene a full meeting of the Party Committee to give out such a new direction. For example, some trade union Congress or other is being held. Before the congress the fraction meets, called together by the Party Committee and jointly works out instructions. But during the Congress questions may come up which have not been foreseen in the directions of the Party Committee. What is to be done? Should the committee meet immediately? And how can this be arranged, when questions may arise at any moment which are absolutely unexpected and which must be reacted to at once? For such cases the Party Committee must nominate a special group of three comrades or a plenipotentiary representative, who could decide in the name of the Party Committee. At the meeting of the fraction it should be explained that for the leadership of the work of the fraction the Party Committee has nominated a group of three comrades consisting of such and such comrades, or such a plenipotentiary, and that the intervention of these comrades, their propositions, should be looked upon by all fraction members as official directions of the Party Committee and carried out without any argument. In this way uninterrupted guidance of the Party Committee is guaranteed in the work of the fraction.
Mr. Dennett. I would only say that the existence of a document of that kind probably was more responsible for Mr. Browder’s insisting that the central committee disavow all previous documents which had been issued prior to, I think, 1938. That one was issued much earlier. This was issued in the period just as the depression was starting. In fact, the depression had not reached its maximum at the time that document came out, and it anticipated the depression was coming, and laid out plans how to take advantage of the depression for revolutionary purposes.
Mr. Tavenner. I notice under section 17 of this document a reference to the voluntary character of the person’s membership in the Communist Party. This reference reads:
The Communist Party is a voluntary organization, but every worker who voluntarily joins the ranks of the Communist Party accepts iron party discipline. If that discipline seems very hard to him, even unbearable, then the party should not shut its doors upon him.
Mr. Dennett. At the time I first came into the Communist Party the most common expression I heard in that connection was that you couldn’t leave the Communist Party voluntarily. And I think that document intends to convey that impression because individuals who become members of the Communist Party become privileged to knowledge and information about their associates which, if they leave the Communist Party, may fall into the hands of persons who are unsympathetic to the Communist Party. And they were fearful that whenever anything like that would occur it would hurt the working class. As a matter of fact, most people in the Communist Party are probably just blaspheming me up one side and down the other for testifying here to you on these matters for that very same reason.
It is my own feeling, however, that the average member of the party is completely unaware of the nature of the discipline. They only come in contact with surface scratches of it.