WfJRNERS ''1N(JIJI1RIJ 251 No. 25 .. :~~~ X·523 20 July 1973 Labor Tops SellOut to Nixon as ... oom eaos owar ust Coming in the midst of the Water­ dying social order already at an ad­ ficial of the HarriS Bank and Trust of form of money and debt claims-neither gate scandal which is daily exposing the vanced s tag e of decomposition, the Chicago as saying, "This is the un­ of which are very secure these days, slime of capitalist politics for all to bourgeoisie requires not scientific happiest boom I've ever lived through." Faced with the disaster of economic see, Nixon's "Phase Four" is one more analysis, but illUSions. The economic Indeed, the boom has generated the "normalization" in Phase Three, the proof of the bankruptcy of bourgeois "analysis" of the bourgeoisie is mere highest peacetime inflation since the Nixon administration has a g a i n re­ rule. Following a wave of price in­ wishful thinking-alternating with panic nineteenth century, while unemploy­ sorted to a hard line in state wage /price creases which have raised food costs when the facade of prosperity begins to ment remains high at 5 percent, and controls. Whatever the temporary ef­ by 47 percent in the last year, Nixon's crumble. that figure is sure to get worse. De­ fect on Nixon's sagging popularity rat­ 60-day price freeze (announced on 13 spite inflation and the high profit levels, ings, Phase Four will not provide a June) will simply be the prelude to a From Idiot Optimism to Despair the capitalists seem to find profit rates long-run solution to galloping inflation new round of inflation. This phony price unsatisfactory since they are devaluing and, moreover, it has the effect of mak­ freeze is merely an attempt to mask the In recent months the bourgeoisie has the capital stock (i.e., the stock market ing the division of income between labor onset of the inevitable economic crisis graphically de m 0 n s t I' ate d that its slide) and amaSSing their wealth in the and capital a direct political confronta- which follows every boom, "analysis" is mere impressionism. continued on page 10 There is only one group in the According to the Financial and Business whole country that believes the gov­ Editor of the New York Times, writing ernment will hold the lid on inflation: at the beginning of this year, "The the labor bureaucracy. Nixon's own momentum developed since the cyclical Generlll Strike Clllletl ON ... officials are already announcing the contraction of 1969-70 has become so failure of Phase Four to control price broad and balanced that an upturn increases-even before it has been reaChing toward the next decade is a implemented! But recent contracts call distinct possibility" (New York Times, for pitiful wage increases which don't 7 January 1973), But a mere five months even come close to matching the cur­ later we read, "A growing number of CP Hands Victory to rent rate of inflation. The powerful business forecasters see a recession Teamsters' union settled for a mere next year as a result of the breakneck 6.1 percent, while prices rose at the economic expansion" (New York Times, rate of 9 percent in the last quarter. 20 May 1973), Such is the ease and ra­ Military in Uruguay "Experts are frankly puzzled at why pidity with which the prophets of the unions and their rank and file should capitalist class go from idiot optimism be so unmilitant about wage increases to despair when faced with the contra­ The Communist Party-led National Workers Confederation (CNT), in the at a time when the purchasing power dictions and uncontrollable anarchy of leadership of a general strike which held Uruguay virtually paralyzed for more of their dollar is being eroded, " wrote their economi.c systenJ. than two weeks :wd created" rl'e-revoluUcE1arv Si t1J"tion, hlncied nv:;1' power on . - . . ~.~~~ \Tt:~y.: ~ -:;;"l: TL,"ncs (12 .}ui), l·:}':~;rc.- r.:./(,.~ Ji:': ... -~i;'- :~':'~y ;:;: ,:--;,:.:~ :.-;~'"t...;~ ",~ . .'.'~ .., _~:. ;. , ::... ~ - A_ -~ ~ _.:i.~'>J J. ::'Liv t!:::~!:; ,.'::c:J. '<" rill: tJl'~ ".: :~::.... ,_-'j. "' '"L.: ... l ... cently. The lack of rank-and-file mili­ American ruling class these days. The President Juan Bordaberry. Following secret negotiations with the military tancy is a myth-the Akron rubber New York Times (27 May 1973) caught governr:, ent, the CNT called off the general strike and although the fin,ll settle­ workers rejected the rubber contract the spirit of the times, quoting an of- ment has not yet been announced, its meaning is clear: liquidation of the workers in May; New York postal workers turn­ movement in Uruguay. Among other ed down their contract last month; things, the CNT has apparently agreed discontent in Teamster ranks over to its own destruction-the Bordaberry Fitzsimmons' sellout pact has been Boston SL/RCY Demonstrate government outlawed the labor organ­ reported throughout the country. ization in June, arrested mal)' of its What is lacking is an alternative, leaders during the strike and has revolutionary leadership for the labor in Defense of Ligue Communiste driven the rest underground. Interior m 0 ve ill c n t. The pre sen t Meany­ Minister Colonel I\' estor Bolentini told Woo d c 0 c k bureaucracy accepts the newsme:1 July 12 that the dissolution of framework of capitalism, as do the the CNT was "irreversible" and an­ leaders of most of the "rank-and-file -- nounced a new labor policy to l'lake the oppositions" who oppose them, It is unio;1s non-political, implYll1,!, creation necessary to bring to the broad mass of a new labor organization that "will of workers the understanding that in not be permitted to intervene in politi­ the present epoch the struggle to pro­ cal questions that distort the t rlle se;lse tect the workers' living standards re­ of union association" (Sen'l"or!; Times, quires not a fight for reforms, which 13 July 1973)0 will only be illusory, but a fight to FOFl When the stri.ke ended, hundreds had overthro'N the capitalist system, To been arrested and the military was free mobilize the workers against capital­ WORkERS to consolidate its rule. Bordaberryan­ ism it is necessary to go beyond the MILITIAS nounced he would replace Congress business unionism embodied in the 1 with an appointed Council of state, and slogan "more" and build a revolution­ the government announced on June 28 it ary opposition in the unions which can FASCIST planned a major new craCkdown on the broaden the economic struggle into the TERROR Tupamaros [urban guerrilla group). political struggle for socialism. The The eXT c,llled for the general achievement of this task requires the Ii strike on June 27 when Bordaberry, most accurate, scientific appraisal of backed by the military chiefs, dissolved reality. - the two houses of Congress and all mu­ For the capitalist class the opposite nicipal councils; announced he would is the case. As the representatives of a henceforth rule by decree: ordered rig­ id censorship of the press: closed down all the SChools for a month and out­ lawed the C~T. Bordaberry said the r-~~eART SERIES mea sur e s were necessary due to "criminal acts of conspiracy against the country" referring to the activities of The Lessons of the Tupamaros. Historical Experience: The calling off of the strike shocked and disoriented Uruguayan workers, because at the time of the decision half a million workers were out: work­ TROTSKYIST ers occupied the major export indus­ tries such as tires and textiles: the state oil refinen.ies had been shut down WORK IN THE as well as the ports: and banking had almost completely stopped, shutting TRADE UNIONS down government functioning. Attempts by the army to clear workers from the WV PHOTO factories they held had been defeated: Page,S all the major industries remained shut SEE ARTICLE PAGE 2 continued on page 9 Repelll tile Blln on tile Frentll Ligue Communiste On 28 June the French government only be assured by linking the struggle outlawed the "Trotskyist" Ligue Com­ against the fascist bandS and in defense muniste and jailed several of its leading of democratic liberties to the call for members following a violent melee in a workers government committed to the which leftist demonstrators clashed reconstruction of society on a socialist with Paris police defending a meeting basis. New popular fronts, such as the called by the fascist Ordre Nouveau "Union of the Left" composed of Com­ LE KOUVEL OBSERVATEUR (New Order) as part of its racist cam­ munists, Socialists and bourgeois Radi­ paign against immigrant workers, The cals, are an obstacle to the political Spartacist League calls on all working­ independence of the workers movement. Top, Paris class organizations to unite in defense police regrouping of the Ligue against government re­ The L igue Takes On the Cops after recent pression and fascist attack, anti-fascist Attempting to appear "even-handed" According to the 23 June Le Monde demonstration. in the dispensing of bourgeois justice, account of the confrontation: Left, meeting of the Gaullist Pompidou regime also "Three police vans were burned during Ordre Nouveau, banned Ordre Nouveau. But the fact that the confrontations as well as several French fascist the French government chose to grant pri vate vehicles. Store windows were organization. the fascists a permit for a public meet­ broken. The most violent confrontation took place about 8 p.m ...• when strong ing may mark the beginning of a cam­ police forces ..• cordoned off the area paign against the left. In the past the around Maubert Square rarea of the government has either refused permits meeting 1. The thousand counter­ to Ordre Nouveau, or ordered the police demonstrators, helmeted, armed with to stand aside during the inevitable con­ lead pipes, balls and chains, and Molo­ frontation between the left and the fas­ tov cocktails, surprised the forces of cists, Eve n the French Communist order by their organization and espe­ Party, which in the past has centered cially by their use of Molotov cock­ tails. The police, bombarded with in­ its attacks on the "gauchistes" (anyone cendiaries (some of the demonstrators to the left of the CP), was forced to had climbed to the rooftops), obviously comment that "by authorizing and gi ving had not expected to deal with such a police protection to the fascists of substantial aggressor (small vans re­ Ordre Nouveau, the government set up supplied the demonstrators with fire­ a deliberate provocation" (Humanite, bombs) and at first were forced to re­ 23 June). treat in disorder ... These repressive measures occur in "At several pOints in Paris, starting at L'EXPRESS 10:30 on the rue Lacepede, small groups nouncing this action, Pierre Messmer, The Spartacist League mobilized 40-50 the potentially explosive coat ext of re­ tried to put up street barricades which cent strikes by workers at Renault were immediately torn down by special Pompidou's prime minister, remarked: of the total of apprOximately 150 dem­ against pay discrimination for semi­ squads of police. An anti-barricade "After having made a rapid analysis onstrators at the French consulate in skilled (particularly foreign) workers tractor was burned. After the first and of the situation, you plunge headlong New York City. Predictably, theSWP's and of students demonstrating against most serious confrontation, the into a definitive action without worrying defense of the Ligue has concentrated the militarization of youth expressed by counter-demonstrators had dispersed about what will happen. You'll see well solely on bourgeois democratic de­ the French government's new draft law in small and extremely mobile groups. enough." While the NapoleoniC preten­ mands such as "Defend Civil Liberties (see WVNo. 21, 25May 1973), Theprov­ Until about 1 a.m., the forces of order sions of this statement are absurd in France, End the Ban" and "For Free in motorcycles, jeeps and trucks pa­ enough, considering the narrow support Speech in France," completely ignoring ocations and attempts to smash the "far trolled the capital from the boulevard left" serve to underscore the fundamen­ St-Germain to the place de 1a Con­ for the Pompidou regime, it reveals a the need for a class defense of the left tal instability of the French govern­ corde, from the Opera to the Pa1ais dan g e r 0 us bonapartist appetite to against fascism and government re­ ment. Even after the recent March Royale in long columns of vehicles with smash the left. pression. On the picket lines SL/RCY­ elections, in which the Pompidou re­ their sirens screaming, to the aston­ ers chanted such slogans as "Smash the gime split the vote evenly with the ishment of tourists and passers-by." United Defense of the Left Fascist Movement, For Armed Work­ "Union of the Left," the question of a As is obvious from this account the ers Self-Defense" and "End the Ban on workers government continues to be Ligue Communiste organized the dem­ Regardless of the errors of the the Left, For a Workers Government." posed as an immediate task for the onstration with full expectation of a Ligue, the working-Class movement French working class. As the French military confrontation with the pOlice. must defend the right of the Ligue to Workers Militias government dispenses with the norms The Trotskyist movement has a long continue to function and vigorously de­ of bourgeois democracy, the defense of history of reSistance to fascist groups, fend it against government persecution. or Urban Guerrillaism the interests of the working class can including attaCking and dispersing fas­ The Minister of Interior Marcellin has cist meetings, as French leftists have threatened that the government "will The slogan of "Workers Self­ done to public meetings of Ordre Nou­ draw the consequences at every level" Defense" figures prominently in the veau in the past. In this case, however, from the incident (Le Mande, 27 June). Ligue Communiste's agitation against WfJ1lltE1I1 the presence of massive police force This attempt to escalate the red scare­ fascist terror attacks on left groups and made the relation offorces unfavorable mongering of the Gaullist election cam­ striking workers. While this formula­ to the left. It would appear that the Ligue paign into wholesale anti-communist tion seems to coincide with the Trotsky­ Communiste recklessly entered into an repression must be met with united op­ ist call for "Workers Self-Defense ""''''111) adventurist confrontation by attempting position by the left. Guards" and "Workers Militias," it Marxist Working-Class Hi-weekly to take on the armed power of the state Fearing isolation from a new wave leaves ambiguous the question of pre­ under circumstances which could lead of militancy which might loosen its cisely who will carry out the armed of the Spartacist League only to the defeat of the left. The correct stranglehold on the workers movement, defense of the workers. The Ligue's tactic, given the government's authori­ the Communist Party has for the first formulation allows for the interpreta­ Editorial Board: zation of the meeting, was to mount a time been forced to depart from its tion that small bodies of vanguard for­ Liz Gordon (chairman) campaign calling on the mass workers usual practice of denouncing all groups ces can carry out exemplary acts of Jan Norden (managing editor) organizations, particularly the CP and to its left as "ultra-left," and refUSing terror which will spark the imagination Chris Knox (labor editor) the CGT labor federation, to mobilize to acknowledge and defend "Trotsky­ of the masses and inspire them to pre­ Karen Allen (production manager) tens of thousands of their members to ists" as part of the workers movement. pare for the armed proletarian insur­ Joseph Seymour prevent the fascist meeting. In their It is significant that the Stalinist CP, rection. As the Ligue explained in Rouge of 18 March 1972: Circulation Manager: Anne Kelley absence, the Ligue could certainly have along with the Socialist Party and the organized a mass protest demonstra­ trade-union confederations, has issued .. A terrorist action is only the 'con­ West Coast Editor: Mark Small tion. This is not the same thing, how­ statements denouncing the government tinuation by other means' of the 'nor­ New England Editor: George Foster ever, as a futile attempt to overwhelm and participated in a 4 July demonstra­ mal,' daily activity of revolutionaries. Southern Editor: Joe Vetter Its value derives from its ability to gal­ the police with 1,000 youths. tion in defense of the Ligue's demo­ vanize the combativity of the masses, This confrontation, which the Ligue cratic rights. The limitations of the Published by the Spartacist strengthen their hatred for the existing characterized as an "error" in a sub­ CP's understanding of "democratic order, bring to light the weakness of Publishing Company, Box 1377, sequent leaflet, allowed the French rights" and the need for working-class this order (cf. the actions of the Tupa­ G. P. 0., New York, N. Y. 10001. bourgeoisie to begin a campaign of re­ unity in the face of attack were, how­ maros, like the mass liberation of Telephone: 925-8234. pression against the Ligue which could ever, demonstrated by its refusal to prisoners conceived to demoralize and easily spread to other left groups. On allow the Ligue a speaker at a rally for ridicule in the eyes of the masses the Opinions expressed in signed the night follOwing the demonstrations its own defense! Institution, the public powers, the army, articles or letters do not neces­ the cops ••• ). It is 'an action which un­ police occupied Ligue headquarters and New York, Boston, Los Angeles rolls a step ahead of the masses' de­ sarily express the editorial arrested 25 Ligue supporters. One week and San Francisco SL/RCY locals par­ viewpoint. termination, but which can be under­ later the Pompidou government out­ tiCipated in defense demonstrations stood, approved, reflected by broad lay­ lawed the Ligue Communiste. In an- called by the Socialist Workers Party. ers of the exploited."

2 WORKERS VANGUARD The workers, rather than "understand­ ing, approving and reflecting" such ac­ tions, are only convinced of the futility of isolated, voluntarist confrontations between a few courageous individuals and the armed might of the bourgeois state. Trotsky was quite clear on the dif­ ference between the violence of a few SWP and the violence of the masses. In response to the question of whether the vanguard party should create the groups Confronts for workers defense out of its own mem­ bers, Trotsky replied: Nazis "The slogans of the party must be placed in quarters where we have sympathiz­ ers and workers who will defend us. But a party cannot create an independent in 1930's defense organization. The task is to create such a body in the trade unions." - ~iscussion on the Transitional Program," June 1938 SL criticism of the Ligue Com­ muniste's r e cent confrontation The Transitional Program itself is with Paris police in no way im­ quite explicit: plies opposition to the use of "Only armed workers' detachments, organized violence against fascists who feel the support of tens of millions by the workers movement. In fact of toilers behind them, can successful­ Trotskyists recognize the preven­ Socialist Workers Party demonstrates against Nazi meeting in Los ly prevail against the fascist l>ands. The tion of the growth of fasCism, Angeles, February 1939. struggle against fascism does not start politically and organizationally, as in the liberal editorial office but in the a necessary task of the proletar­ sion for several massive rallies about 1800 of New York's "finest," factory-and ends in the street. Scabs who freely attacked the picketers, and private gunmen in factory plants are iat. Every attempted activity of the of the American fascist movement, the basic nuclei of the fascist army. fascists to build a movement to the largest of which was held in swinging clubs and trampling the Strike pickets are the basic nuclei of spread their poi son 0 u s anti­ Madison Square Garden. The meet­ crowd with charges of mounted the proletarian army. This is our point working-class ideology deserves ing drew 18,000 including the patrols. The demonstrators re­ of departure. In connection with every to be smashed by indignant work­ German-American Bund, Pelley's sponded without heSitation, broke strike and street demonstratIOn, it is ers; proletarian democracy does Silver Shirts, Father Coughlin's through the police lines and re­ imperative to propagate the necessity of not extend to the reactionary scum "Social Justice" gang and Hague's turned blow for blow. Clashes creating wo,"keys' gY(J((PS foy self­ of society whose purpose is to notorious goons out of Jersey City. between police and workers con­ defense. It is necessary to write this slogan into the program of the revolu­ serve as the ultimate weapon of the The Trotskyist Socialist Work­ tinued for five hours, until the tionary wing of the trade unions ... It ruling class to liquidate the labor ers Party, together with its youth meeting finally ended. is necessary to give organized expres­ movement. The focus of such a group the YPSL (Young People's Similar demonstrations were sion to the valid hatred of the workers campaign must be to mobilize Socialist League), launched acam­ held in other cities, notably Los towards scabs and bands of gangsters labor as a whole through the for­ paign calling on the workers of Angeles and Oakland. The SWP was and fascists. It is necessary to advance mation of workers self-defense New York City to "let the fascists able to take full political advantage the slogan of a workers militia as the groups and ultimately workers mi­ feel the anger and the might of of its role in these militant mass one serious guarantee for the inviola­ the working class ... " and warn­ counter-demonstrations. CP and bility of workers' organizations, meet­ litias, based on the unions. De­ L 0 v est 0 n e it e accusations of ings and press." pending on the correlation of for­ ing, "we must not let this filthy, ces, the revolutionary party might creeping slime get a foothold in "Trotskyite" -Fascist collabora­ The Ligue' s consistent omission of itself initiate a mass mobilization New York!" Despite the fact that tion were thoroughly discredited, the slogan "For a Workers Militia" in to attack and disrupt fascist meet­ the Communist Party, the Social­ and the S WP was able to establish a its propaganda and agitation around the ings. This however has nothing to ist Party and the International nucleus of sympathizers within the resurgence of activity by the fascist do with "exemplary vanguard vio- Labor League (Lovestoneites) all CP on the baSis of this work. In

groupings only highlights its consistent lence." C.O refused to partiCipate, the demon­ addition, the demonstrations were departure from the Trotskyist strategy One instructive example of an stration drew 50,000 anti-Nazis, used to highlight the central thrust of struggling for revolutionary leader­ effective anti-fascist mobilization including many rank-and-file of the SWP's anti-fascist agitation: ship within the existing mass organiza­ took place on George Washington's members of the CPo the call for armed workers defense tions of the working class. Instead, the Birthday 1939. This was the occa- Protecting the fascists were guards. workers will be shown the efficacy of armed struggle from the outside: "In what concerns us, we have nothes­ guard" forged out of the upnsmgs of against "sectarians" who insisted, at reached the point where the Argentine itated to resort to actions of minority May 1968. This abstract and amorphous the time of the May 1968 worker­ section of the USec, the PRT (and its violence, when these activities were category of "new vanguard" assumes a student upriSing, that the proletariat urban guerrilla detachment, the Revo­ linked with mass activity •... For us, hom 0 g e n e 0 us layer of radicalized must be the leading force in revolu­ lutionary People's Army, the ERP) on revolutionaries need not wait for the youth, obscuring the real differences in tionary struggle. A -prominent Ligue the one hand embraces Maoism and uprising of the masses before opposing class outlook, political aspiration and spokesman wrote: Castroism while at the same time uni­ the daily violence of capital with their revolutionary commitment. This cate­ laterally declaring a truce with the new own violence. In strikes, we propose "The dialectical interaction between the to the workers taught by the assassina­ gory is used by the Ligue to justify class struggle of the proletariat and the Peronist government which had vowed tion of Overney, of Labroche, threat­ the adaptation of its politics to appeal struggle of other classes or social to "crush" Trotskyist and guerrilla ened by the CRS, to organize workers to high school and university youth. layers is alien to the sectarians. In groups (see "Guevarism vs. Social self-defense. To prove that it is pos­ Rather than transforming these new their eyes, so far as the peasants or Democracy in the USec, n WV No. 23, Sible, we set an example to the extent recruits into Bolshevik cadre by break­ petty-bourgeoisie is concerned, there 22 June 1973)! of our possibilities." ing them from tendencies toward petty­ can be no socialist revolution unless The voluntarist adventurism of the -D. BensaiCl, Ruuge, 10 June 1972 bourgeois radicalism and confronta­ the workers stand at its head." Ligue and USec majority will undoubt­ tionism the Ligue has capitulated poli­ -Pierre Frank, "French Crisis edly provide fresh ammunition for the Rather than face the arduous task of Tests Revolutionary Vanguard," tically to the youth milieu in which it Revolt in France, 1968 minority led by the Socialist Workers long-term implantation into the trade functions. Party (the U.S. sympathizer section). unions dominated by the ref 0 r m i s t How sectarian, indeed, to insist that However, the SWP's pretenSions to social-democratic and Stalinist bu­ While generally paying lip service to the working class must lead the social­ Trotskyist orthodoxy against petty­ reaucracies, the Ligue seeks a short­ formal Marxist orthodoxy, the real ist revolution! What "sectarians" must bourgeois guerrillaism serve only to cut to the workers movement by gaining positions of the Ligue slip through .OC­ Marx, Lenin and Trotsky have been to mask its own wretched betrayals of hegemony within the "new mass van- casionally, as in a polemic directed devote their entire lives to fighting for Marxism. No, the ultra-respectable precisely this principle! S WP will not risk its cadre on such Thus the Ligue Communiste reveals futile displays of impotence and frus­ Spartacist Local Directory the political disorientation underlying tration. Instead of exemplary terrorism its tactical "errors" and anti-Marxist it prefers unadulterated pacifism and ATLANTA DETROIT •••.•••••••. (313) 862-4920 espousal of exemplary, minority vio­ grovelling at the feet of the liberal Box 7686, Atlanta, GA 30309 Box 663A, General P.O. lence. On the other hand, the Ligue's Detrqit, MI 48232 wing of the imperialist bourgeoisie (ex­ BERKELEY- opportunist appetites (simply the re­ emJ)lified by the alliance with Senator LOS ANGELES •...... (213) 467 -6855 OAKLAND ..•.•..... (415) 653-4668 verse of its military adventurism) Vance Hartke in the popular-front Box 38053, W'ilcox Sta. Box 852, Main P.O. were revealed by its call during the re­ National Peace Action Coalition). Los Angeles, CA 90038 Berkeley, CA 94701 cent Yrench elections for a vote for the The recent adventure by the Ligue MILWAUKEE popular-front "Union of the Left," a Communiste demands that honest revo­ BOSTON •.•••••••...• (617) 492-3928 Box 5144, Harbor Sta. coalition of workers parties with sec­ lutionists within both wings of the Box 188, M.I.T. Sta. Milwaukee, WI 53204 tions of the bourgeoisie. crumbling USec break with both the Cambridge, MA 02139 NEW ORLEANS .••...• (504) 866-8384 In the international dispute currently adventurist centrism of the European Box 51634, Main P.O. raging in the fake-Trotskyist "United majority and the social-democratic BUFFALO ••.•.•••••.. (716) 881-3064 New Orleans, LA 70151 Secretariat," the European majority in­ reformism of the SWP, to return to the Box 412, Station C revolutionary Trotskyist program of Buffalo, NY 14209 NEW YORK ...... •..•. (212) 925-2426 clUding the Ligue (its French section) Box 1377, G.P.O. sees the strategy for Latin American intranSigent struggle for the political CHICAGO .•...••..... (312) 548-2934 New York, NY 10001 revolution as one of guerrilla warfare, independence of the working class. Box 6471, Main P.O. SAN DIEGO •..•.•...•. (714) 272-228fj based on military detachments isolated For a United Defense of the Ligue Chicago, IL 60680 Box 22052, Univ. City Sta. from the organized workers movement. Communiste! San Diego, CA 92122 At the same time the USec majority For Workers Armed Self-Defense CLEVELAND .....•.•. (216) 696-4943 wishes to distinguish itself from Against Fascism-Towards Workers Cleveland WV Committee SAN FRANCISCO ....•. (415) 863-1459 Guevarism-Maoism which is the natu­ Militias Based on the Unions! Box 2492 Box 40574 Cleveland, OH 44112 San FranciSCO, CA 94140 ral ideological expression of guerrilla For the Reb i r t h of the Fcrurth strategy. ThiS dangerous game has International! _

20 JULY 1973 3 Blacks, Women and Job-Trust Unionism Preferential Hiring Is Not the Answer The recent government offensive craft jobs. Women, who comprise 60 the company over seniority; that the where AT&T is drastically cutting back to impose preferential treatment of percent of the total work force, are quotas are not iarge enough; and that on jobs through automation, "affirma­ minorities and women in the telephone 99.8 percent of the system's secreta­ the union is not sitting on the placement tive action" programs without a fight company is part and parcel of a broad ries, 99.9 percent of the operators, bureau. It does not oppose in prinCiple for jobs will simply set one group of attack on the independence ofthe trade­ 98.9 percent of the service repre­ government interference into union af­ workers against another. union movement. Government" Affirm­ sentatives and only 1.1 percent of the fairs, nor does it oppose preferential ative Action" programs for hiring, craft workers. Nationwide in 1971, hiring per se. During the entire period transfers and promotions-just like 79 percent of all black employees were of the court suit, the Beirne bureauc­ MAC Opposes state wage controls, compulsory ar­ female, concentrated in the lowest job racy refused to take any action against "Affirmative Action" bitration and court actions to overturn categories, with five-and-a-half times the proposed guidlines, saying it would union elections-are weapons in the greater chance of remaining in un­ "wait and see" how the government The various opposition groups in handS of the capitalist gov'ernment to skilled positions than white employ­ dealt with the company. CWA is now the CWA have'taken sharply different weaken the unions and directly or ul­ ees. EEOC won the court case and de­ fighting only through the courts and will positions on the question of "affirm­ timately drive down, wages. The work­ manded that AT&T write up a program file only individual grievances against ati ve action." In the Bay Area, the ers movement must present a united to increase the number of minority the program. Bell Wringer and Yellow Pages cau­ , front against these union-busting at­ and women workers in the higher­ The question of seniority is one of cuses originally criticized "affirm­ tacks. Instead of acquiescing to the paid categories. the most sensitive aspects of the pref­ ative action" only because the quotas class enemy's stratagems, working The AT&T settlement was in four erential hiring question. In part sen­ we ren 't large enough. In a j oint April is­ people must wage a real struggle to parts: AT&T would give lump-sum iority systems are a form of union sue, they called the program tokenist eliminate racial and sexual discrim­ payments of $15 million to 13,000 control of advancement, as well as being because there were no new hirees and ination within the unions using labor's women and 2,000 male minority group protection against arbitrary or victim­ called for establishing a "real affirm­ own methods (including strikes) to wipe members who had been discriminated izing layoffs by the company. A gov­ ative action program." Their position out discriminatory practices of the against in the past; it would give ernment attack on seniority systems, was in direct counterposition to the employers. raises of $23 million to 36,000 work­ for whatever reasons, is a threat to class stand of the Militant Action Whatever gains individual minority ers whose advances and pay increases the partial gains won by labor and must Caucus of CWA Local 9415 (Oakland, and women workers might obtain by were judged to be possibly hindered the government opening up a few jobs by discrimination with additional pay .... for them will in the long run be more raises in the next five years; it would than offset by the losses suffered by roughly double the com pan y 's "ul­ the entire working class as a result timate goals" for hiring male opera­ of state control of the labor movement. tors and clerical workers and female It is notable that Nixon, the author of craft workers; but AT&T would not the Philadelphia Plan for preferential have to formally admit any instances of hiring of blacks in the construction discrimination. trades, openly woos southern racists AT&T President Robert D. Lilley and does not ev-en pay lip service to said at the conclusion of the settlement, eivil rights-except where the unions "the big job for management is to are the target. Likewise, the liberal convince those employees who are Kennedys' campaign against "corrup­ watching women and minorities pass tion in the unions" (in reality an effort them by that nothing unjust has been to oust Jimmy Hoffa from the power­ done" (New York Times Magazine, ful Teamsters union) was combined with 20 May 1973). This will be a diffi­ support for vicious anti-strike laws cult task indeed: With no provisions and wage controls. for more jobs, the only way to in­ "Preferential hiring" has the added crease the proportional representation effect of discriminating against white of minorities and women is to sys­ male workers supposedly in order to tematically discriminate against whites make up for centuries of oppression and men in hiring, transferring and suffered by minorities and women as a upgrading. result of capitalism. The intended re­ The New York Times Magazine sult of such poliCies is to increase (20 May 1973), which lauded the set­ racial and sexual antagonisms within tlement as a breakthrough for women, the working class. To these divisive mentioned in conclusion a hitch to the schemes, which only serve the cap­ program: italists (and are actively supported by "The traditional solution to conflict­ them), revolutionaries must counter­ ing demands in the American political pose a program which will promote system has been to divide an ever­ working-Class un i t Y across raCial, increaSing pie, But in the short run, national and sexual lines. Categoric­ the size of the employment pie is ally opposing state interference in the fixed and if minorities and women want a piece of it, it has got to come from unions, we must call for the end of ra­ the share held by white males," cial and sexual discrimination and job­ trusting, and implementing a policy For minorities and women, the ac­ CHALLENGE of increaSing equalization of wages, tual settlement is pure tokenism. The Demonstration for preferential hiring in Pittsburgh, 1969, organized by Black non-discriminatory training programs lump-sum payments average out to a Construction Coalition. Led by black middle class, BCC received government for skilled-craft jobs, hiring on a paltry $100-to-$400 for the first group grants, made white workers the enemy. first-come, first-serve basis and a of women and minority group males struggle for a sliding scale of wages who transfer into craft jobs and hold be opposed on principle as one more Calif.), which correctly pointed out and hours which would provide jobs for them for at least six months-not union-busting tactic. Almost all gov­ that the affirmative action program all. As long as workers are pitted much compensation for any individual ernment and company-sponsored -"af_ was merely a ruse to enable the gov­ against each other ill competition for a kept out of a particular job category firmative action" schemes have the ernment to intervene in the unions: limited pool of jobs, the necessary con­ for any length of time. The pay raises effect of weakening, bypassing or elim­ are equally insignificant. As for the inating negotiated seniority systems. "The phone company and the U.S. sequence will be a divided and weakened gOlernment use the guise of 'racial labor movement. job quotas, doubling the "u 1 tim ate However, to oppose government justice' as a club to weaken the union goals" in Pacific Telephone in the cat­ meddling in the unions on the question a:1CI to divide the working class by "Affirmative Action" egory of semi-skilled inside jobs, for of seniority is not the same thing ting blacks against whites, mt'n a~ainst as defending the existing s y s t e m 5, wGmen, unemployed against employed at Bell Tel example, would raise the percentage of black women to only 2.8 percent: which are frequently blatantly discrim­ wCJl'kers, 'Affirmative Action' appliE;s The most recent government pref­ These percentages in no way reflect inatory. In the phone company, for quota systellls o'} ~liring and tra_1sfe rs, erential hiring scheme is the" Affirm­ the proportions of women and minority instance, the C WA opposes .that part giving the com1'any another excuse? to ative Action" program cunently being group members in the population, but of the EEOC settlement which rules igllol't' the seniority systelll .. "InstE;ad of calling for stripe'S against implemented in telephone. This Jan­ instead only those with acquired skills. that craft jobs above entry level will layoffs and forced transfers, and for uary American Telephone and Tele­ With little access to speCialized train­ be made competitive based on the a union hiring hall so workers can graph agreed to set up a "soft" quota ing, the majority of minority and women length of emfJloyment with the company. control hiring on a first-collll', flrst­ system (guidelines rather than fixed workers remain permanently barred The bureaucracy is standing on the old serve basis, the Bell \\iringer merely percentages) after the Equal Employ­ from the higher-paying skilled c:;tt­ system of seniority based on time in the criticizes the pho:1e company for not ment 0 p p 0 r tun i tie s CommiSSion egories. (In addition, most telephone job category immediately beneath the living up to government percentage (EEOC) sued the company for having company skilled craft jobs are based vacancy level. This system will keep quotas. This position objectively supports government interference in discriminatory hiring and transfer pol­ on the company's 0 w n training pro­ women and minorities from entering the unions. In light of this their de­ icies. Subsequently the EEOC has filed grams, thus making the whole skill the higher-paying skilled crafts for mand for 30 For 40 is a contradic­ discrimination suits against many other criterion perfectly ludicrous.) many years, even if they have years of tion, a militant cover for a class corporations and trade unions, includ­ service in the Bell System. collaborationist position. " ing Philip MorriS, General Motors, CWA Tops Temporize Instead, it is necessary to oppose - "Militant Action Report," General Electric and the United Auto the discriminatory seniority system 7 November 1972 Workers. The CWA International has asked with a program of struggle for jobs The EEOC based its arguments of the federal courts to delay implement­ for all. Seniority by its very nature discrimination in the telephone com­ ing the program on the grounds that is a system of dividing up scarce jobs "Black Monday" pany on Bell System figures which the agreement interferes with the un­ and inevitably discriminates against show extreme underrepresentation of ion's job-posting and bidding proce­ younger ana newer workers even when The most blatant anti-union drive minorities and women in higher-paying dures as well as rights to bargain with it is not blatantly biased. In a situation using the issue of discrimination oc- 4 WORKERS VANGUARD curred in the construction trades in Neuro-Psychiatric Institute (NPI). A Sparrows Point, Md. last January: equal access to training and apprentice­ the late 1960's. Unemployed blacks committee was set up to be merely an ship programs, open admissions with organized demonstrations and moved advisory body to the NPI administrator, "The apparatus of many unions, includ­ stipends to colleges and u{1iversities, ing the 1BT [Teamsters] and the UM W on construction sites in a number of who was to make sure that the propor­ [Mineworkers] (under Boyle's regime) the elimination of restrictive educa­ cities across the country to shut them tions of minorities and women in the NPI have been transformed into monstrous tional requirements for jobs that do not down, demanding jobs. The anti-black, work force corresponded to the propor­ bureaucratic structures which use both need them, so that minorities and wom­ anti-labor Nixon administration quick­ tion in the Los Angeles population. Since gangster methods and alliances with en will not be systematically segregated ly moved to capitalize on black work­ UCL A is dOing very little hiring, the state to suppress virtually any into the lowest-paid sections of the ers' legitimate resentment at being the program could be accomplished possibility of rank and file reform working class. But we do not support shut out of the construction industry. only by preferential hiring, prefer­ through the processes of the union it­ "solutions" that result in the systematic (In Pittsburgh in 1969, for example, ential promotions, etc. at the ex­ self••• Under these conditions, rank discrimination against w hit e male only 1.4 percent of journeymen in craft and file groups and OPPOSitionists may pense of white males who were have no choice but to use the courts workers. building trades unions were black.) t h rea ten e d with loss of their as one arena in the struggle against In a period of Significant unemploy­ The government, trying to whip up jobs. the bureaucracy." ment, preferential hiring programs are public opinion against the unions, raised The key question faCing Local 2070 - Workers' Power, simply that: more jobs for blacks means hue and cry about "exorbitant" wage of AFSCME was whether or not to 16 Februai"y-1 March 1973 fewer jobs for whites. Insteadofpitting demands of w 0 r k e r s on federally­ partiCipate in the elections to the different groups of workers against funded construction projects robbing Affirmative Action Committee (AAC). Thus in the IS' view, the unions each other, a real struggle for the the urban poor of good housing. -Black At first, in early 1972, the union set should be supported against the cap­ integration of minorities and women in­ Mondays Are Good for Us" ran an up its own rival Affirmative Action italist state sometimes (when they do to the work force on an equal basis October 1969 editorial in Fortune mag­ COmmittee and voted against parti­ popular things) in the same way that requires a fight for organizing the un­ azine, the monthly organ of U.S. cap­ Cipation in the ,employers' AAC. When the deformed workers states should organized, for a sliding scale of wages italism, approving demonstrations of the issue was revived this year, this be defended sometimes (as in Vietnam, and hours to provide jobs for all, for blacks against construction workers position was reversed: the local lead­ due to the popularity of the Vietnam­ an end to all sexual and racial dis­ in Chicago and Pittsburgh. Fortune ership managed to Swing the vote in ese Stalinist leaders among petty­ crimination, for a union hiring hall, said that the demonstrations of blacks favor of partiCipation, thus sanction­ bourgeois radicals)! For Trotskyists, and a political struggle against the for more jobs were "channelled in the ing direct state intervention into union however, defense of the unions against capitalist parties and the capitalist right direction" and quoted John Doar, affairs and voluntarily abandoning the the bourgeoisie is a question of prin­ s y s t e m which fosters racism and then president of the Bedford­ right to control hiring and promotions. ciple, just as is the defense of the sexism. Stuyvesant Development and Service The question of participation in the Soviet Union against imperialism de­ In recent years the bourgeois press Corporation (dedicated to restoring NPl's Affirmative Action Committee spite the sellout policies of its Stalinist has mounted a systematic effort to slums through black capitalism): has also been a divisive issue between leaders. foster antagonisms between minority "Union con c e p t s of security and tendencies within Local 2070. In the PrOving once again its complete and white workers. A high point in seniority were formulated in a per­ Local's vote on joining the employers' abandonment of Trotskyism, the Soc­ this campaign was the 1968 New York ialist Workers Party's Militant (9 Feb­ iod of struggle between company and AAC, supporters of the reformist teachers strike, in which the Ocean union. Now the struggle is between Communist Party voted to partiCipate. ruary 1973) called the steel settlement Hill-Brownsville School Board ("com­ the Negro and the unions. It is our Earlier, when the issue first came a victory for black workers and railed munity control") was pitted against the position that a basic conflict exists that because the government did not set between labor-union con c e p t sand up in 1972, IS supporters in typical United Federation of Teachers. The fashion proposed to reform the employ­ up enforcement machinery, "the raCist fundamental issue of the strike was the civil-rights concepts. Something has company and union officials will, at to give." ers' AAC by giving it real powers, right of teaclLers to job security and best, make only a token effort to en­ Doar's recommendations included the increaSing the proportion of employee due process for hiring, transferring and force the government order." Support­ elimination of the union hiring hall: representatives, etc. The Militant Cau­ firings, despite the business-union con­ ing government intervention in the un­ "Unions still control an estimated two cus has opposed union partiCipation in servatism of the Shanker leaderShip of ions, no wonder the SWP can see noth­ million jobs through s u c h arrange­ the AAC. However, at the March 1973 the UFT which enabled the strike to be ments. Employers should be free to meeting of Local 2070 the caucus ing wrong with joining with bourgeois turned into a black-white racial war. liberals in the National Peace Action hire any qualified worker." incorrectly voted to reverse its pre­ This strike lined up almost every left The sharp rise of anti-union senti­ vious stand and participate in AAC Coalition. group, with the exception ofthe Sparta­ ment among blacks was due primarily elections. In a subsequent leaflet en­ Where Is the Class Line? cist League and the NCLC, behind the to the "new ideology"-that organized titled "Workers Action, Not Affirm­ school board and its cynical Ford labor is the main barrier to black ative Action!" (7 April 1973) the Mil­ The sharp polarization within the Foundation backers. liberation. Through conscious propa­ itant Caucus announced, U,S, left over the question of prefer­ The SL took a clear class stand ganda and direct financial aid, the ential hiring arises from the conflict against the union-busting drive, in de­ capitalists cleverly manipulate the phO­ "Upon reconsideration, the MC repu­ between two prinCipled positions: that fense of the strike, at a time when this diates this vote and reaffirms our long­ ny "community control" issue-"blacks blacks and women must be integrated was a very unpopular position. (Later, standing and prinCipled opposition to into all sections of the work force and should have the jobs in the ghetto" -for in 1970, most left groups supported the entry into the AACo , . that no worker should be discriminated the conscious purpose of breaking the Newark Teachers Union in its strike " •.. the AAC is a weapon for direct against, Proponents of preferential hir­ state intervention into the unions for against the local school board. The unions. ing argue that since black and women "B 1 a c k construction coalitions"­ the purpose of destroying them. only Significant difference between the "Rather than entering the AAC, we workers have historically carried the two situations was that in 1968 blacks blocs between the government, ghetto burden of inequality, white men must residents and big business-were set propose a union boycott of the elec­ were "in" among petty-bourgeois radi­ tions and counterpose iruiependent ac­ now be will in g to give up their up to skirt the unionsc In Pittsburgh cals, while by 1970 it was labor's turn.) tion by the union. The main point "privileges. " "Operation Dig" received $485,000 of Beyond the question of preferential of this action must be a mas s i v e Such bourgeois moralizing must be hiring, the crucial issue in the case of Labor Department funds to set up its organizing drive and the struggle for rej ected out of hand, It is crucial to "Affirmative Action" is the independ­ own one-year training program for union recognition, a statewide contract, recognize that the single most impor­ and collective bargaining. Affirmative ence of the trade unions from the state, blacks, in counterposition to the tra­ tant cause of political backwardness in ditional three-to-five-year union ap­ Action is a diversion and threat to The unions, despite their reactionary our goals. We seek to gain full em­ the American working class is the and corrupt leaderships, represent the prentice program, and demanded 40 manipulation by the ruling class of pro­ percent black memberShip in each af­ ployment and working class unity, not by first step in the organization of the exac erbating existing tensions among found ethnic consciousness and con­ working class against its capitalist op­ fected craft union in two years. Chi­ workers, but by advancing demands flicts ariSing out of a nation created cago's Coalition for United Community pressors. Minority and women workers which unite all workers, such as: for through immigration. The rise of right­ more than any other group need the Action was directly financed by Chi­ a union hiring hall, mass hiring and wing populist demagogy, which blames protection of unions (as the difference cago banks and the Ford Foundation training of the unemployed, a shorter the economic troubles of white workers work week at no loss in pay (30 for between wages in the North and the to the tune of $1,150,000. In return on the "inflated ambitions" of blacks its leaders-C,T. Vivian and Jesse 40). , . In order to obtain our goals a right-to-work South clearly shows). struggle for unity against the capital­ and their establishment-liberal sup­ The labor bureaucracy's collusion with Jackson-promised to limit their fire porters, has heightened hostilities be­ to the unions and the contractors, cov­ ists and for our own political party-a the bosses' discriminatory practices is labor party based on the trade unions­ tween black and white workers. It is an abomination which must be fought ering up for the banks and big busi­ is required. We seek not to better ad­ therefore crucial to demonstrate that ness which were responsible for large out within the w 0 r k e r s movement mi:lister capitalism, but to struggle for the fight against racial oppression will through struggle against the bureau­ cutbacks in jobs in the construction a workers government!" not take place at the expense of white industry. crats, not by reliance on the "benevo­ workers, but instead at the expense of lence" of the class enemy. Whoever At the same time the government the capitalists. sought to push its "Philadelphia Plan" fails to understand this cannot hope to The Record of the Left Protecting jobs of white male work­ which set quotas for minority hiring lead the workers in the class struggle ers in no way means sanctioning discri­ for socialism. _ on federal construction, The Plan also Almost every tendency claiming to minatory practices against minorities included provisions for a government­ have a revolutionary strategy for the and women. The Spartacist League de­ industry-union commission to inter­ working class has actively supported, mands replacement of discriminatory cede in strikes and compulsory cooling­ or at least apologized for, government seniority systems and job trusting by Corrections off periods. The Plan was implemented preferential hiring and advancement The" Defend Chilean Miners' Strike" successfully only in Philadelphia but programs in the unions. Looking to with the desired results. Racial an­ article in WV No. 23 of 22 June 1973 the state as a neutral body that can erroneously claims that the suspension tagonisms intensified sharply; the col­ aid the unions in their struggles for lective bargaining power of the unions Class-Struggle of Chilean copper shipments to Europe democracy and equal rights is the was weakened, during the recent Chilean copper min­ essence of reformism. In contrast, Alternative for ers' strike caused "losses of $50 mil­ the Spartacist League recognizes the lion per day in foreign exchange." In "Affirmative Action" at UCLA state to be an instrument of class the Trade Unions actuality total losses since the be­ oppreSSion whose interest in interven­ ginning of the strike in April were Recent attempts to implement an af­ ing in the unions is in order to paralyze Guest Speaker: approximately $50 million by mid-June. firmative action program at the Univer­ the working class. Consequently we KATHLEEN BURNHAM The subjects of the page 5 photo­ sity of California coincide with an all­ oppose government interference in the Militan,t Action Caucus, CWA graph in WV No, 24 of 6 July 1973 out drive by the State of California unions on principled grounds. Speaker: are Hector Campora and Juan Per6n's to smash the American Federation of The International Socialists (IS), MARK SMALL wife Isabel. The caption incorrectly State, County and Municipal Employees which supports the Bell Wringer and SL Central Committee states, "Per6n and wife with picture of (AFSCME) through anti-labor legisla­ Yellow Pages groups in Bay Area Eva .•.. " tion such as the Morretti Bill (com­ telephone, gave its justification for Sunday, 22 July, 7:30 p.m. Also in WV No. 24 the article on pulsory arbitration), red clauses and appealing to the bosses' state against YWCA-1515 Webster, Oakland, Ca. "Socialism in One Country" refers on sweetheart contracts, the unions in a comment on a Labor For further information: 653-4668 page 6 to the "May 1924 Party confer­ Department ruling on discrimination ence." It should have read "May 1924 On the UCLA campus, "affirmative Auspices: Spartacist League action" was first implemented at the at the Bet hIe hem Steel plant in party congress. n

20 JULY 1973 5 Reply to the Guardian

BLACK STAR

f "- ..

3/ THE "THIRD PERIOD" (EcUtor's Note: The recent wave of virulent anti-Trotskyism being spread by varimls Maoist groups relies on the standard Stalinist weapons of lies and dis­ tortion, and above all on ignorance about the true history of the communist move­ ment. The present series, replying to the articles on "Trotsky's Heritage" in the New Left/Maoist Guardian, serves as an introduction to this history and a brief summary of the principal political issues separating Trotskyism from Stalinism.)

Stalin's consistent rightist course essary hardships caused by bureau­ during 1926-27 led him to capitulate to cratic planning, he praised: the kulaks (rich peasants) at home, to "The success of the Soviet Union in the trade-union bureaucrats during the industrial development is acquiring i stormtroopers march on Karl Liebknecht Haus, headquarters of German British general strike, to Chiang Kai­ global historical significance, •.• That shek in China, He backed up this policy tempo is neither stable nor secure ••. Communist Party. On Stalin's orders, CP refused to call for united front with by a bloc in the Politburo with Bukharin, but it provides practical proof of the Social Democrats, paving way for Hitler's seizure of power. who had called on the peasants to immense possibilities inherent in so­ "enrich yourselves" and projected the cialist economic methods," iod" policies was the practice of setting saying, as did Stalin, that the Social building of socialism "at a snail's -L.D. Trotsky, "Economic Reck­ up small "revolutionary unions," coun­ Democracy was only the "left wing of pace," The Left Opposition led by lessness and its Perils," 1930 terposed to the reformist-led mass fascism," This philistine statement ig­ Trotsky opposed this line, warning that Both the collectivization and indus­ organizations. Com m u n i s t s favor nored the fact that the organizations of it not only meant the massacre of trialization fully vindicated the policies trade-union unity, but do not oppose Social Democracy and the unions them­ thousands of foreign Communists but of the Opposition. To represent a return every split. It may be necessary to selves would be destroyed as the result ultimately threatened the very founda­ to Leninism, however, they required the break with the restrictive craft unions of a fascist victory. As Trotsky wrote: complement of re-establishment of So­ tions of the Soviet state itself. Stalin in order to organize mass-production "Fascism is not merely a system of "answered" at the 15th party congress viet and party democracy. The bank­ workers. Also, when a left-wing up­ reprisals, of brutal force, andofpolice (December 1927) by summarily ex­ ruptcy of his previous poliCies sharply surge is prevented from taking power terror. Fascism is a particular gov­ pelling the Opposition and formally de­ revealed by the criSiS, Stalin took the solely by bureaucratic and gangster ernmental system based on the up­ claring that "adherence to the opposi­ opposite course, reinforCing his bu­ methods, a break with the old organi­ rooting of all elements of proletarian tion and propaganda of its views [is] reaucratic dictatorship and expelling zation may be the only alternative to democracy within bourgeois society, incompatible with membership in the Trotsky from the Soviet Union. defeat. The key is support of the over­ The task of fascism lies not only in party. " whelming majority of the workers, destroying the Communist vanguard. ••. It is also necessary to smash all Trotsky's predictions were dra­ Stalin Discovers a enabling the union to survive as a mass independent and voluntary organiza­ matically confirmed by the kulak re­ "Third Period" organization. tions, to demolish all the defensive bellion of 1927 -28. The state granaries The "Third Period" dual unionism, bulwarks of the proletariat, and to were half empty and starvation threat­ Stalin's pOlicies in the Communist considered a matter of principle, was uproot whatever has been achieved ened the cities; grain collections pro­ International (CI) were a duplicate of quite different, It led to the formation during three-quarters of a century by duced riots in the villages, as the his domestic zigzags. After the disas­ of separate trade-union federations the Social Democracy and the trade peasants (who could obtain little in the ter of the Shanghai insurrection of (the Trade Un~on Unity League [TUUL] unions. " way of manufactured goods in return for 1927, in which he ordered the Chinese in the U,S. and the Revolutionary Trade -"What Next," January 1932 the inflated currency) refused to sell Communists to lay down their arms to Union Opposition [RGO] in Germany), Here was a situation that cried out for at state-regulated prices. Suddenly in the butcher Chiang Kai-shek, he sharply and countless tiny "red unions" with the policy of the united fronL The January 1928 Stalin switched to a reversed course and ordered the ad­ a few score members, which never leaders did not want to fight but to tougher line, ordering armed expedi­ ve n t uri s tic Canton Commune which had any chance of success. The "red retreat. The rank and file, however, tions to requisition grain stocks, But ended in a similar massacre of the union" policy is directly opposed to could not retreat~they had to fight even this was not enough. In May he workers. In the summer of 1928 Stalin the Leninist policy of struggling for or face annihilation. Call on the social­ was still declaring that "expropriation generalized this pattern of reckless Communist leadership of the existing democratic leadership to mount a united of kulaks would be folly" (Problems of ultra~leftism into the doctrine of a mass workers' organizations, and with offensive against the Nazis! If they Leninism, p. 221), but by the end ofthe "third period" of imperialism. the exception of a few isolated situa­ accept, the fascist menace could be year he argued: "Can we permit the According to this "theory" there was tions it was doomed to defeat. destroyed and the road opened to revo­ expropriation of kulaks •.• ? A ridicu­ a post~war revolutionary wave ending lution, If they refuse, their treachery lous question•.•. We must break down in 1923, a period of stabilization until "Social-Fascism" is clearly exposed before the workers the resistance of that class in open bat­ 1928 and then a new period of the im­ and the revolutionary mobilization of tle" (Problems of Leninism, p. 325). minent and final collapse of capitalism, A generalization of this policy was the working class is aided by demon­ Such dramatic reversals of policy were Like the catastrophists of today, Stalin Stalin's discovery that the reformist strating in struggle that the communists a constant for Stalin. reasoned that economic crisis would social-democratic parties were "so­ are the only consistent proletarian Since 1924 Trotsky had been cam­ automatically create a revolutionary cial-fascist," i.e" "socialist in words, leadership. In Trotsky's words: situation. In fact the early stages of a fascist in deeds. " Since they were paigning for industrialization and col­ • Worker-Communists, you are hun­ lectivization and was branded by Stalin CrlS1S are frequently accompanied by therefore no longer part of the workers dreds of thousands, millions; you can­ as an "enemy of the peasant" and sharp demoralization in the working movement (like the social-democratic­ not leave for anyplace; there are not "superindustrializer." But faced with class. And it is noteworthy that at no led unions!), the tactic of united front enough passports for you. Should fas­ an anti-Soviet peasant revolt in 1928, time during 1928-32 did any Commu­ was not applicable and Communists cism come to power, it will ride over Stalin recoiled in utter paniC, switching nist party in the world attempt to seize could at most offer a "united front your skulls and spines like a terrific from blind conservatism to blind ad­ power! (Subsequently S tal i n quietly from below," that is simply calling on tank, Your salvation lies in merciless venturism. In the 1927 Platform of the abandoned his bombastic theory as he rank-and-file Social Democrats and struggle. And only a fighting unity with made a sharp turn to the right,) trade unionists to desert their leaders. the Social Democratic workers can Joint Opposition, Trotsky and Zinoviev bring victory." called for doubling the growth rate of The onset of the depression and the The social-democratic leaders pre­ _"For a Workers' United the first five-year plan; Stalin now Comintern's ultra-left policies pared the way for fascism-about this Front Against Fascism," tripled it, at the price of tremendous wreaked havoc in the Communist par­ there can be no doubt, In January 1919 December 1931 suffering for the workers. The Oppo­ ties. In the key country of Western the Social Democrat Noske personally sition called for voluntary collectivi­ Europe, Germany, a combination of organized the massacre of hundreds zation aided by state credits for co­ mass layoffs and the CP's policy of of German revolutionary workers in operatives and a struggle against the abandoning the trade unions resulted in repressing the "Spartacus Uprising" "After Hitler-Us" influence of the kulak; Stalin now ac­ the percentage of factory workers in in Berlin; among the martyrs were complished the forced collectivization the party falling from 62 percent in Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, Right up to Hitler's seizure of pow­ of half of all farms in the Soviet Union 1928 to only 20 percent in 1931, effec­ the top leaders of the German CP, In er Stalin continued to follow out the in the space of four months! The peas­ tively turning the Communists into the 1929 the Social Democrat Zoergiebel sectarian-defeatist logic of the "Third ants responded by sabotage, killing off vanguard of the unemployed rather drowned the CP May Day march in Period." After the September 1930 more than 50 percent of the horses than the workers, Typical for the pa­ blood. At every step on Hitler's road elections, in which the Nazis' vote in the country, and a civil war which thetic results of "Third Period" adven­ to power the reformists capitulated jumped from 800,000 to more than during the next several years cost turism were the May Day demonstra­ rather than fight. And even after Hitler six million, the head ofthe German CP, more than three million lives. tions of 1929 which had been prohibited had already taken power, instead of Ernest Thaelmann, told the Comintern Trotsky opposed thecollectiviza­ by the capitalist governments: In Paris organizing the massive resistance they Executive, " ••• 14 September was in a tion-at-machine-gun-point as a mon­ the police simply arrested all active had promised, social-democratic lead­ sense Hitler's best day after which strOSity. Marxists had always called CP members on 30 April (releasing ers offered to support the Nazi govern­ there would be no better but only worse for the gradual winning over of the them three days later). In Berlin the ment's foreign policy in the vain hope days." The CI endorsed this view and petty bourgeoisie by persuasion and a social-democratic police chief Zoer­ of thereby saving their party from called on the CP to "concentrate fire voluntary t ran sit ion to socialism giebel brutally attacked the Commu­ destruction! They never fought until on the Soci

6 WORKERS VANGUARD and the Nazis. In other words, they some groups, such as the Progressive o were entirely indifferent whether the Labor Party (PL), to reject the tactic 8 ~ workers' organizations existed or not: of united front altogether: w ~ Remmele, a CP leader, declared in the ::> "As we have repeatedly pOinted out, co Reichstag (parliament), "Let Hitler z we reject the concept of a united front ." take office-he will soon go bankrupt, with bosses. We rej ect the concept of a and then it will be our day." Consistent united front with Trotskyists and the with this criminal and utterly cowardly herd of various fakes on the left, ... policy, the CP joined together with the "We believe in a united front from Nazis in an (unsuccessful) attempt to below that takes the form of a left­ unseat the social-democratic Prussian center coalition." state government (the "Red Plebiscite" - "Road to Revolution III," PL, November 1973 of 1931): German CP In response to the wide support The united front from below, i.e, calling leader Ernst Trotsky's call for a united front found on the ranks to desert the reformist Thaelmann among Germa:1 workers, Thaelmann leaders, is always in order. But we (I eft) rejected replied in September 1932: cannot simply ignore these misleaders Trotsky's "In his pamphlet on how National So­ without reSigning the vanguard to ster­ calJ for united cialism is to be defeated, Trotsky ile isolation. Replying to opponents of working-class gives one answer only, and it is this: the united front during the early years front against the German Communist Party must of the Communist International, Trot­ fascists as join hands with the Social Democratic sky wrote: "counter­ Party .... Either, says he, theCommu­ "Does the united front extend only to revolutionary" nist party makes common cause with the working masses or doesn't it also the Social Democrats, or the German include the opportunist leaders? and announced working class is lost for ten or twenty "The very posing of this question is a in September yearso This is the theory of an utterly product of misunderstanding. 1932 that bankrupt Fascist and counter-revolu­ "If we were able simply to unite the tionary ..• , Germany will of course not "Germany will working masses around our own bann!"r of course not go fascist-our electoral victories are or around our practical immediate a guarantee of this. [! J" slogans, and skip over reformist or­ go fascist." ganizations, whether party or trade Nine months ~ Nine months later Thaelmann was sit­ ~, union, that would of course be the best later he was ~ ting in Hitler's jails. He was later thing in the world•.•• in a Nazi jail. executed by the NaziS, as were thou­ ", •• in order not to lose their influence sands of Communist and Social-Demo­ over the workers reformists are com­ cratic militants, and the workers par­ pelled, against the innermost desires '" ties and trade unions were crushed by the General Secretary. The Bolshevik the iron heel of fascism. Trotsky'~ party was a creature of the bureauc­ analyses and policies were fully con­ racy, with the entire leaderShip of firmed-and the German proletariat paid the price of Stalin's criminal 1917 expelled or in disfavor, with the blindness. sole exception of Stalin. Given the But this did not put an end to Stalin's events of recent years-the expulsions, betrayals. Trotsky had earlier warned, the arrests and exiling of every oppo­ "We must tell the advanced workers as sitionist-it was criminallightminded­ loudly as we can: after the 'third period' ness to believe that this parasitic of recklessness and boasting the fourth bureaucracy could be eliminated with­ period of paniC and capitulation has out revolution. This would not be a set in" ("Germany, The Key to the social revolution, resulting in new International Situation," November property forms, but a political revolu­ 1931). The tragedy continued to unfold tion. The USSR was a degenerated with clockwork preCision, Following workers state: . Hitler's assumption of power, the Com­ ", •. the privileges of the bureaucracy intern, seized with paniC, forbade any by themselves do not change the bases discussion of the German events in the of the Soviet society, because the bu­ Communist parties and dropped all reaucracy derives its privileges not mention of social-fascism. Instead, in from any special property relations a manifesto "To the Workers of All peculiar to it as a 'class,' but from those property relations that have been Countries" (5 March 1933) the Execu­ created by the October Revolution and tive called for a united front with the that are fundamentally adequate for the social-democratic leaders (which they dictatorship of the proletariat, had rejected for the past five years), "To put it plainly, insofar as the bu­ reaucracy robs the people (and this and for the CPs to "abandon all attacks Russian peasants demonstrating in 1929, calling for "liquidation of the kulaks." is done in various ways by every against the Social Democratic organi­ Stalin first opposed Trotsky's calJ for gradual collectivization; later, after 1928 zations during the joint action"! bureaucracy), we have to deal not with kulak revolt, ordered forced collectivization of half of al I farms in four months. c lass exploitation, in the SCientific sense of the word, but with social The United Front of their own leaders, to support the necessary even during action, the right parasitism, although on a very large partial movements of the exploited and possibility of expressing their scale ••.• Carl Davidson's series on "Trot­ against the exploiters ••• , opinion on the policy of all working­ "Finally, we may add for the sake of sky's Heritage" in the Guardian is a ". , • we are, apart from all other con­ class organizations without exception. complete clarity: if in the USSR today conSistent whitewash of stalin's crimes siderations, interested in dragging the The rejection of this condition is not the Marxist party were in power, it against the workers movement in an reformists from their asylums and permissible under any circumstances." would renovate the entire political placing them alongside ourselves be­ - "Theses on the United Front, " 1922 attempt to make a case for the Stalinist regime; it would shuffle and purge the fore the eyes of the struggling masses." bureaucracy and place it under the poliCies of "socialism in one country," -"On the United Front," 1922 The Soviet Union-A Degenerated control of the masses; it would trans­ "peaceful coexistence, " "two-stage Workers State form all of the administrative prac­ revolution," etc. In dealing with the These theses were approved by the tices and inaugurate a series of capi­ events around Hitler's rise to power Politburo of the Communist Party of the The definitive betrayal by Stalin in tal reforms in the management of Davidson claims "the Trotskyists cover Soviet Union and by the Executive Germany, and the necessary conclusion 'economy; but in no case would it have up for the political force that actually Committee of the CI. In his polemiC of calling for new communist parties to undertake an overturn in the property relations, i.e., a new social revolution." paved the way to power for the fas­ against the ultra-lefts (Left- Wing Com­ and a new international, led to the munism, An Infantile Disorder) Lenin -"The Class Nature of the cists-the German Social-Democrats" question of a new party inside the Soviet State," October 1933 (Guardian, 9 May 1973). The reader called for using "every opportunity to Soviet Union itself. ThiS, in turn, can judge for himself from the above gain a mass ally, no matter how tem­ brought up again the question of the The Stalinists i m m e d i ate 1 y just who paved the way for fascism! porary, vaCillating, unreliable, and ad­ class character of the Soviet state screamed "counter-revolution." Trot­ Davidson goes on to remark, "This ventitious. Whoever hasn't been able to and the nature of the Stalinist bu­ sky was an agent of Chamberlain, Hit­ is not to say that the German Com­ get that into his head doesn't under­ reaucracy which ruled it. Trotsky re­ ler, the Mikado, etc., and was out to munist party made no mistakes or stand an iota of Marxism, and of con­ fused to consider the USSR "state re-establish capitalism, they claimed. that their errors were inSignificant. temporary scientific socialism in capitalist" as did many former Com­ But the Stalinists were never able to ••• They also made a number of ultra­ general." munists who had been expelled by point to a single instance in which 'left' errors, including a one-sided After refUSing for five years to unite Stalin. To do so would imply that Trotsky refused to support the USSR emphasis on the 'united front from with the social-democratic leaders, there could be a peaceful counter­ against imperialism or called for aban­ below,' rather than a more persistent Stalin in March 1933 flip-flopped com­ revolution, "running the film of re­ doning the socialist property forms. In effort at unity with the Social-Demo­ pletely and agreed to a "united front" formism in reverse," so to speak. 1939 on the eve of the Second World cratic leaders as well, even if this which prohibited the freedom of criti­ Fundamentally the state is based on War he led a bitter struggle against a was turned down." Davidson neglects cism. This meant the Communists the property forms, which represent group in the American Socialist Work­ to point out that at every point the pledged themselves in advance to re­ the interests of particular classes. The ers Party, led by Max Shachtman, policy of the German CP was dictated main silent in the face of the inevitable socialist property relations in the So­ which refused to defend Russia against by Stalin himself. and repeatedly con­ betrayals by the reformists, just as viet Union remained intact, and this Hitler. Trotsky repeatedly emphasized firmed by Comintern meetings! Stalin refused to criticize and break colossal conquest of the October Revo­ that as long as the Soviet Union re­ The Stalinists conSistently try to with the British trade-union leaders lution must not be lightly abandoned. mained a workers state, however badly blur the working-class content of when they smashed the 1926 general While opposing the bureaucratic Sta­ degenerated, it was a matter ofprinci­ Lenin's united-front policy (whose main strike. How little this has to do with linist leadership, Bolshevik-Leninists pIe to defend it. In the hour of need slogan was "class against class") in Bolshevism can be appreCiated by read­ must unconditionally defend the USSR the Bolshevik-Leninists would stand order to confuse it with Stalin's "popu­ ing the original Comintern resolution from imperialist attack. ready at their battle posts. lar front" with the "democratic" bour­ on the united front: At the same time, this was no In the early 1960's Mao Tse-tung geoisie. They seek to portray the united "Imposing on themselves a discipline healthy workers state. The proletariat ann 0 un c e d that the Khrushchev­ front as a tactic of class collaboration of action, it is obligatory that Commu­ had been politically expropriated. The Brezhnev leadership of the Soviet Un­ and capitulation to the social­ nists should preserve for themselves, soviets were simply .administrative ion since 1956 was "social-imperial- democratic leadership. This has led not only up to and after action, but if bodies to rubber-stamp the decisions of continued on page 11 20 JULY 1973 7 The Trotskyist movement has a proud tradition of struggle for the principles of Leninism, under difficult conditions and against heavy odds. In the United States, the core of the lead­ ership which built the original Trotsky­ ist organization (Com­ unist League of Ameri­ Trotskyist Work PART 1 ca 1928-34) kept up the OF 4 struggle for over three decades, before the vi­ cissitudes of the Cold War anti­ communist witchhunt finally caught up in the with them and caused their political de­ generation and departure from Bol­ shevism in the early 1960's. The Spar­ tacist League was born in the fight against the degeneration of the Trotsky­ ist movement-in the Socialist Workers Trade Unions Party-and claims the tradition as its own. This tradition includes the struggle racy, the document tended to slip into of the Left Opposition against the bu­ struggle against the Stalinist degenera­ stances which grew out of the previous reaucratic degeneration of the USSR, tion of the party in the twenties. This line. In addition, the turn of 1928 was the fallaciOUS third period "united front from below" conception: the campaign for a workers united front degeneration had hopelessly corrupted a plot to outflank the Left Opposition: first to expel Trotsky, then to appear to against fascism in Germany, and the the bulk of the leadership and cadre of "The C.1. line against the United Front adopt his slogans. Many members of the battle to build a new, Fourth Interna­ the CP and demoralized~ tamed or from the top with reactionary trade opposition fell into the trap and capitu­ tional to provide an alternative prole­ driven away most of the members. union, liberal and S.P. leaders, and for The leadership of the party was lated to Stalin. united front with the workers against tarian leagership to the bankrupt Social them, applies with special emphasis Democrats and Stalinists. firmly in the hands of Jay Lovestone, a hated, distrusted and cynical faction­ "The Right Danger," later reprinted in America. " As in the course of every preceding in the Trotskyists' paper, the Militant, -Militant, 15 December 1928 phase of the struggle for revolutionary alist, who controlled the party through organizational manipulation and un­ on which the Trotskyists continued to While the "Right Danger" thus con­ socialism, however, it was inevitable principled pol i tic a I adaptationism. stand after their expulsion, reflected tained some errors reflecting the de­ that the Trotskyists would make mis­ the Signals being sent out from Moscow veloping new S t a Ii n i s t zigzag (and takes. Correction of earlier mistakes, Identified with the Bukharinite right win g internationally, the Lovestone before the Sixth Congress, indicating was furthermore limited solely to the while in no way repudiating the earlier the approach of the new "Third Period" consideration of American questions), struggles and tradition, has been inte­ clique was steering the party in the turn. It attempted to use against Love­ it was in the main correct. It was gral to the growth and political and direction of un b rid led opportunism based on peSSimism. In the trade stone letters from the CI complaining principled, from Cannon's point of theoretical armament of the movement. about this and that, and pressure from View, on the need to form new unions If one holds the early Lenin, for in­ unions, Lovestone's policy was to rely heavily on maneuvers at the top in the the Red International of Labor Unions in places where the AFL was decrepit stance, up to the mirror of the whole (RILU-CI trade-union arm) for more or non-existent. While Foster was the body of Leninism-which incorporates trade-union bureaucracy, coupled with work to organize the unorganized into extreme AFL-fetishist, the partisan the experience of the Russian Revolu­ political overtures to liberals in the new unions. While correctly attacking of "boring from within," Cannon had tion and struggle to build the Communist form of pacifism~ etc. Given the sharp the grossly opportunist and capitula­ broken with Foster in 1926 over the International-one finds many errors decline of the AFL, this policy meant concentration on the privileged skilled tory blocs of Lovestone with various Passaic strike, which he felt was an and shortcomings, As James P. Cannon, example in which a new union should communist leader and pioneer Ameri­ trades, the small minority ofthe work­ elements of the trade-union bureauc- can Trotskyist, put it, discussing the de­ ers who were organized, and virtually velopment of the democratic-centralist no orientation to the masses of unskilled vanguard party conception in 1944: workers. In the Stalinized Communist Interna­ "If our party stands today on far higher tional (CI) of the late twenties, leader­ ground that that occupied by the amor­ ship of the national sections depended phous rebel workers' movement prior on being able to sense the winds of to the First World War-and that is indubitably the case-it is not due solely political change in Moscow and change to the superiority of our program, but one's line in time. The rampant fac­ also to the consistent application in tionalism, soon to be replaced by mono­ practice of the principles and methods lithism, had become completely un­ of Bolshevik organization. The exper­ principled. Thus w hi I e Lovestone's ience of a quarter of a century has right-wing opportunism fit his natural convinced us over and over again that predilections and organizational meth­ this is the right way, the only way, to ods, his faction was no more or less build a revolutionary party .... "In pOlitiCS nothing is more stupid, identified with any particular political more infantile than to retrace ground program than was that of his chief op­ that had already been covered, to go ponent, William Z. Foster. Both sought back and start all over again as if power through adapting to the Comin­ nothing had happened and nothing has tern breezes, which had been blowing been learned." distinctly to the right since 1926, when - Letters from Prison Stalin blocked with Bukharin against Cops attacking strikers Just as Lenin had early shortcom­ Trotsky, Zinoviev and the ultra-lefts. in 1926 Passaic textile ings which ref Ie c ted the social­ Cannon, although he too was influ­ strike. The Communist democratic movement he was strug­ enced by the degeneration of the Com­ Party led the bitter bat­ gling to transcend, so the American munist International, as early as 1925 tle, but Cp's Ruthenberg Trotskyists made mistakes which re­ formed a third faction, the purpose of leadership capitulated to the AFL rather than form new union. flected, in part, the arena of the degen­ which was to fight for the liquidation Below, 1933 coal strike in southern Illinois, led by Progress­ erating Communist Party from which of the programless factions and the ive Miners of America. While opposing dual unionism, Trot­ they emerged, and in part the national building of a collective leadership. It skyists supported PMA and called for formation of new unions political environment in which they was a somewhat demoralized Cannon functioned. The history of Trotskyist who reluctantly attended the Sixth Con­ where craft restrictions or bureaucratic domination strangled work in the trade unions in the U.S. gress of the CI in 1928, at which he old unions. The key is support from overwhelming majority of was in the main exemplary and in­ accidently discovered a copy of Trot­ workers. cludes such high pOints as the Minnea­ sky's-critique of the draft program, and polis Teamster strike 01 1934, which became convinced of Trotsky's analysiS was a model of mass mobilization as of the degeneration of the International well as the first instance of organizing as based on the interests of the national­ of trucking on the lines of industrial bureaucratic elite in the USSR. unionism; and the SWP's struggles against the no-strike pledge and the War "The Right Danger Labor Board in WorldWarIL However, it also reveals consistent errors which in the American Party" must be studied and corrected by revol­ utionists today if the movement is to At the time of the Sixth CI Congress be armed against new dangers. While Cannon had formed a bloc (a temporary this history has yet to be fully re­ alliance, not a fusion of groups) with searched and recorded, its main out­ Foster's group on the basis of the lines can be critically examined. document, "The Right Danger in the American Party." This document, like the bloc that produced it, was contra­ CP Degeneration in the Twenties dictory: it was both a principled con­ Cannon, Shachtman, Abern and the demnation of the gross opportunist other founders of American Trotskyism errors of Lovestone~ and a platform for were recruited to Trotsky's Opposition an unprincipled attempt by the Foster­ suddenly, in 1928, after the issue of ites to get control ofthe CP on the basis "Trotskyism" was considered closed of what they sensed was a new left turn in the American CP, and without having in the making in the Comintern. undergone the experienc,e of a conscious Stalin was indeed preparing a new left turn, though he was not ready to break openly with Bukharin at the time of the Sixth Congress. As usual, the by Chris Knox f • turn was forced on Stalin by circum- " WORKERS VANGUARD have been formed under Communist case of mIllIng and needle trades, but The "Platform" of 1929 then goes on anything other than a vehicle for such leadership. then increasingly too precipitously, to condemn both the abandonment of blocs or united fronts. This left him After their summary expulsion from wit h 0 u t preparation. Strikes were united-front tactics with the onset of with no conception of an organized pole the CP, which occurred on the basis called in the same manner, as an the third period and earlier failures for the recruitment of militants to the of their views alone as soon as they adventure on the part of a small hand­ of both a left and right character: fail­ full party program for the trade unions, solidarized with Trotsky, the Trot­ ful, rather than on the basis of con­ ure to build broad united-front move­ Le., what the TUEL had been during skyists attempted to make the most of scious preparation of the mass of the ments where possible and failure to . its period of greatest success (and Stalin's adoption of their slogans and workers. Furthermore, the CP's policy struggle for a leading role of the party before the Stalinist degener:ation of continued to expose Lovestone, who was was a betrayal, because it made a prin­ within such blocs and movements (in­ the CI set in). It is not surpriSing, belatedly jumping on the third period ciple for the whole movement out of cluding warning that "progressive" bloc then, that the Trotskyists never at­ bandwagon. The Trotskyists claimed what should have been merely a tactic partners will betray, etc.). tempted to create anything like the Moscow's new slogans, "Against the for particular circumstances. While the The error which was buried in this TUEL, such as caucuses based on the Kulak! Against the Nepmen! Against CP claimed throughout to be for con­ polemiC was that the TUEL was de­ Trotskyist Transitional Program, in the Bureaucrats!" as their own and took tinued opposition inside the old unions, signed precisely to be the vehicle to the course of their trade-union work. credit for the pressure leading to the the core of third period sectarianism bring the main outlines of the Commu­ What caucuses they did create had the CP's formation of new unions in mining, made this impossible. The AFL leader­ nist program directly into the unions. It character of temporary blocs, usually textiles and needle trades. These were ship, as well as the Socialist Party, was a membership organization based based on immediate, trade-union is­ the areas which the Trotskyists had Trotskyists, Musteites, and all other on a program, not a bloc or united sues. This meant that the party itself, felt were most ripe for the open forma­ tendenCies, were denounced as "social­ front. It carried out united fronts with able to function openly only outside the tion of new unions, in conjunction with fascists" and otherwise not part of the other forces. Since these other forces, unions, was the only organized pole for continued oppositional work in what was workers movement in any sense. This and much of the TUEL membership recruitment to the full program. left of the old AFL unions. Initial Trot­ made the united front, in which com­ itself, had melted away or been driven That the problems with this ap­ skyist trade-union work centered on m u n i s t s bloc with non-communist out of the unions by 1924, the increased proach didn't become manifest until these unions, particularly mining in working-class leaders in order to ex­ identification between the TUEL and much later, after the rise of the CIO, southern Illinois. pose them and advance the struggle at the Communist Party engineered by was due primarily to the nature of the This position for new unions in the same time-an essential part of Ruthenberg/Lovestone seemed to Can­ period, which called above all for a areas abandoned and betrayed by the communist work in the trade unions­ non to be a sectarian error: rather, united front for the organization of the AFL bureaucrats was soon to be dis­ impossible. While destroying its hand­ the party should be using the TUEL to unorganized into industrial unions. This torted by the Stalinists into a position ful of new unions through sectarianism seek new allies. Yet Cannon advocated called for capable revolutionary trade­ of dual unions on principle, and op­ and adventurism, the Stalinists thus the same watering down of the TUEL's union organizing, which the Trotsky­ position to work in the old unions. abandoned and sabotaged work in the political nature as did the degenerating ists, particularly the experienced mil­ As consistently presented by the Trot­ old unions, which left the reactionary Comintern in the late twenties. This itants of Minneapolis and Cannon him­ skyist Opposition (both before and after bureaucrats in control. This not only watering down gave rise to a policy of self, were prepared to conduct. This it became "Trotskyist"), however, the delayed the final introduction of in­ blocs as a permanent strategy (the perspective led the Trotskyists into "new unions" line conformed to both dustrial unions on a m,ass scale, but "left-center coalition") from 1927 on some of the Stalinist dual uniOns, the the objective situation and the CP's ensured that when such unions were (see WV No. 22, 8 June 1973). progressives' PMA, and leadership of ability to intervene in the situation. formed, reactionaries would lead them. Cannon's position on trade-union the historic Minneapolis truck drivers' The AFL unions had been on a ram­ From the moment at which the "new work, then, called for principled united strikes of 1934. page of class collaborationism, des­ unions" position of the CP began to fronts and blocs around the immediate The Minneapolis strikes stand to this truction of militancy and expulsion of mushroom into the full-scale sectar­ burning issues, together with vigorous day as a model of revolutionary trade­ "reds" throughout most of the twenties. ianism of the third period, the Trotsky­ party-building and maintenance of the union organizing. Together with the San The thrust of this reactionary drive by ists fought to expose these errors and party as an independent force, free to FranciSCO and Toledo general strikes of the bureaucracy was explicitly against warn of the dangers. With tremendous criticize its bloc partners, and always the same year, the Minneapolis strikes the organization of the masses of prescience, they warned: striving to playa leading role. Rather were an important precursor to the or­ unskilled workers into industrial un­ "The new 'theories' are attempting to than being confused on the nature ofthe ganization of all mass production work­ ions, which alone could overcome craft rationalize the AFL out of existence united front, which he was not, Cannon ers along industrial lines. myopia and accomplish the organiza­ as a federation of unions and abstractly simply dismissed the TUEL, or the tion of the bulk of the working class. preclude the possibility of its future need for anything like the TUEL, as [TO BE CONTINUED] The result was that the AFL unions expansion and growth in an organiza­ tional sense .... not only refused to organize new work­ "The abandonment of ... struggle [in the ers, but they shrank drastically, driv­ AFL 1now taking place under the cover ing away new workers and anyone who of high-sounding 'radicalism' will only wanted to organize them in the process. prevent the crystallization of an insur­ half of the members and cadres had By the end of the twenties, the cr'isis gent movement within the old unions Continued from page 1 been lost, most of the hiding places of proletarian leadership took the form and free the hands of the bureaucrats discovered, and the leadership chopped of the lack of leadership to organize for more effective sabotage of the new unions, for these two processes are off including the shooting and arrest of the unorganized. bound together. The result will be to founder Raul Sendic. The duty of revolutionary leadership ... Uruguay strengthen the effectiveness of the AFL Opposition to the military drive was was, in fact, to fill this gap, and smash bureaucracy as a part of the capitalist centered in the Frente Amplio. In addi­ the AFL bureaucracy in the process. war machine." down despite arrests of a number of union leaders and proclamations by the tion to the main parties it also included This con d i t ion continued into the - "Platform of the Communist the PRT (Partido Revolucionario de los thirties, until finally a section of the Opposition," Militant, government that all striking govern­ 15 February 1929 ment workers would be fired and non­ Trabajadores), a grouping linked to the AFL bureaucracy moved to organize Argentinian PST which in turn is sup­ Trotskyist opposition to the sectar­ government workers who were fired the mass production industries pre­ ported by the U.S. Socialist Workers ianism and adventurism of the third would receive no compensation. The Cisely out of fear that if the AFL Party, and the POR (Partido Obrero period, like the opposition to Love­ stUdents had taken over Montevideo leadership didn't do it, the reds would. Revolucionario) of Juan Posadas, with stone's opportunism, was consciously University; tear gas and shootings had This resulted in the setting up of the support from the Tupamaros. The Tu­ linked to Cannon's earlier pOSitions in failed to crush a giant demonstration CIO which, while it entailed a bitter pamaros, despite all their spectacular rivalry with the old AFL leadership, the CP. As such, it carried forth cer­ in downtown Montevideo. Even the Daily and individually her 0 i c adventures, tain errors which contributed to the World said on July 6, "The military's was primarily a matter of the for­ managed to playa totally insignificant mistakes of the later work of the Trot­ strikebreaking efforts have had almost mation of new unions for the unorgan­ role in the recent criSis, due to their ized industries rather than a case of skyists in the trade unions. no effect ... " The New York Times re­ ported an interview with a construction divorce from the mass organizations of rivals directly competing for the same In addition to condemning Love­ the working class. workers with the old unions. stone's opportunism in the late twen­ worker July 13 who said he could not ties, the opposition groups (Foster and understand why the union leadership When Congress was dissolved and The Trots·kyists proceeded from the had given in: "At first some of OUr com­ concrete situation in each case, and Cannon) condemned as sectarian his the CNT outlawed, the Frente Amplio panions went hungry, but we were get­ advocated new unions only where the tendency to work exclusively through made an additional bloc, the Resistance ting organized and were ready to hold struggle to take over the old unions party fractions in the trade unions rath­ Front, with dissident sections of Borda­ er than building sections of the Trade out." berry's own Colorado party and with had clearly exhausted itself against In tragic confirmation of the coun­ the stone wall of bur e au c rat ism. Union Educational League (TUEL), the the other major bourgeois party, the party's trade-union organization. This terrevolutionary nature of Stalinism, Blancos. The ReSistance FJ,'Ont was a Mining was such a case. The rank as if further proof were required,the and file in areas such as southern tendency on the part of the Lovestone political bloc on a bourgeois program C P had all through the strike called not Illinois were so disgusted with the group dated back to the 1924-25 left around two demands: ousting Borda­ for a workers revolution, not even for betrayals and utter disregard for de­ turn in the CI. In the U.S., the Ruth­ berry and the restoration of democratic consistent democracy, but instead for a mocracy of the Lewis machine that enberg/Lovestone faction (Ruthenberg rights. Thus the CP, unsatisfied with its coalition with not-so-reactionary sec­ the baSis for a new union really dis­ died in 1927) used this turn for fac­ leftist popular front, formed an even tors of the military! When the general placing the old shell existed. Oppo­ tional advantage against Foster, by broader "Broad Front," strike threatened to turn into a real sition leaders in the C P before 1928 substituting direct party work in the contest for power, rendering the CP's Naturally the Stalinists maintained had to fight Lovestone policies which unions for building the TUE L, which was feeble bourgeois allies irrelevant, the that the primary question was that of were a capitulation not only to the Foster's main organizational bas e. Stalinists chose to liquidat9 the resist­ union of all forces against faSCism. slow moving "progressives" (Brophy, While Cannon had always been for a ance rather than form factory commit­ They were about as successful in apply­ Hapgood, etc.) but to the Lewis ma­ flexible policy on work in the unions, tees and a national strike committee ing the strategy of the popular front in chine itself! The formation of the including building new unions when Uruguay in 1973 as they had been in National Miners Union (NMU) by the called for, he was also against the to wage class struggle against the military. Spain in 1936-39-which is to say they CP, in conjunction with anti-Lewis "narrow" conception of the TUEL, were very successful since the whole leaders, came too late and was fur­ which was developed at this time, in purpose of the class-collaborationist ther sabotaged by other CP errors which the latter was closely identified Mil itary SJowly Consolidates bloc is to prevent revolution. of an adventurist character. Rank­ with the party. Instead, he was for In late 1971 an Allende-type popular­ and-file pressure caused the progres­ broad united-front blocs, while main­ There is only one policy for revolu­ front coalition including the CP and the sives to try again in 1932, however, taining the independence and freedom tion in Uruguay, as throughout the Christian Democrats and called the and the CP went along reluctantly with to criticize of the party: world-permanent revolution. Fa c e d Frente Amplio (Broad Front) ran a gen­ with the massive mobilization of the setting up the Progressive Miners of "In 1925 the present Opposition con­ America. eral for president but lost in the elec­ working class, the Castroite Tupamaro ducted a struggle against the narrowing tions to Bordaberry's Colorado party. g u err i 11 a s faded into irrelevancy. of the TUEL into a purely C.ommunist Despite the objective conditions fa­ The military had been gaining strength Faced with the massive mobilization voring new unions, the C P' s third period body with a CommunIst program and for broadening it into a united front organ­ in the past few years through the suc­ of the working class, the CP aban­ red unions were a disastrous betrayal. ization. This was one of the most pro­ cess of its campaign against the Tupa­ doned the struggle for fear of the con­ They were disasters because of the gressive struggles in the history of maros. Le Monde 11-12 February 1973 sequences. The battle for Trotskyism manner in which the CP attempted the party." reported that within six months of the is the battle of life and death for the to form them: too late at first, in the -"Platform of the Opposition" campaign against the Tupamaros, over revolution. _

20 JULY 1973 9 With the cooperation of the union certain that the value of output will de­ Continued from page 1 bureaucracy, Nixon's wage price con­ cline by late this year and that the phy­ trol was essentially successful from sical volume of output will decline in the standpoint of the ruling class. The the early and middle months of 1974. strike wave was broken as the number However the "unhappiest" aspect of Boom Heads Toward Bust of man-days on strike fell from more the boom, particularly for workers, is than 66 million in 1970 to 26 million in unquestionably the near-runaway infla­ tion. something which does not augur fell slightly, which should have thrown 1972 (Monthly Labor Review, February tion in the first part of this year. This well for the capitalists. the economy into a downturn, In fact, 1973). The union bureaucracy kept to has a number of causes. Undoubtedly, national output did decline in the first Nixon's game plan by holding wage in­ the capitalists took Nixon's "back-to­ The Slumping 50's quarter of 1967. However, a recession creases to an acceptable 5-1/2 percent. normal" Phase Three as a signal to and the Booming 60's was averted by the expansion of the With wage increases down and the in­ engage in competitive price increases. Vietnam war, which increased the mili­ creased productivity always associated The one-sidedness of the investment The present economic situation is tary budget by 17 percent in 1967 alone. with the early phase of a boom, the in­ boom is itself a cause of inflation since organically linked to earlier cycles and Thus the U.S, had entered into a partial flation was moderated at about 3-1/2 it increases total payrolls much faster can only be understood by looking at war economy. percent in 1972. than consumer goods, particularly food. capital accumulation over the past few The February dollar devaluation also decades. This is because capitalist pro­ War Inflation, Strike Wave "The Unhappy Boom" contributed by raiSing the price of im­ duction cycles are primarily generated and State Wage Control ports (mainly manufactured consumer by the changing quantitative relation be­ The wage price controls roughly goods and raw materials, notably petro­ tween the amount of profit and the value Because of the unpopularity of the coincided with, and partly contributed leum) and shifting certain products, of capital (in other words, the rate of Vietnam war, Johnson decided not to to, a capital investment boom which took notably agricultural, out of domestic profit). raise taxes or impose direct wage­ off in the middle of 1971. It has been, and into foreign markets. According to the fairy tale concocted price controls or rationing. Instead he however, a strange boom. Whatever the specific weight of the by Gerry Healy's Socialist Labour chose the con-man's way of paying for One of the most unusual and im­ various factors contributing to the cur­ League (SLL), and his American camp his armaments and soldiers by simply portant aspects of this boom has been rent inflation, it is clear that the United follower the vVorkers League (WL), States (along with the other advanced there was apost- World War II economic (1947-49 =100) capitalist countries) now faces a struc­ boom which only ended in the early turally higher rate of inflation which 1960's (or in recent versions, in 1971). feeds on itself. This has two objective In reality, however, the end of the Kore­ 140 bases. One is the inability of the na­ an War brought in a prolonged period of tionally organized ruling classes, in the economic stagnation. In fact, 1953-61 absence of the external, "natural" dis­ marked the second worst period for 120 cipline of the gold standard, to control American capitalism in this century. 110 the international money supply. To do so The period contained three downturns would require a genuinely international and had an average unemployment rate 100 political unit and this the bourgeOisie of over 5 percent, Moreover, between 90 is incapable of prOviding, tied as it is to 1953 and 1961 the national output per the archaic national-state system. The person increased by a total of only 8 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 second reason is that trade unions in percent! At the same time, the rate of Index of U.S. manufacturing production, 1947-58. While bourgeois econo­ the advanced capitalist countries are so profit, which had averaged 13 percent mists, Healy/Wohlforth talk of "1950's boom," statistics show post-Korean well-entrenched that it requires ex­ during the late 1940's and the Korean War period was one of relative stagnation. traordinary measures to replace or­ War fell to 10 percent during 1954-61. ganized workers with the unemployed. (All statistics are from the1973 Econ­ printing money (in this case by borrow­ its small impact on employment. The omic Report of the President. The ing from the central bank). With an ex­ unemployment rate has only dropped Back to the Ha rd Line Marxist concept of the rate of profit, panding payroll and smaller proportion from 6 percent in mid-1971 to 5 percent based on the labor theory of value, is of consumer goods, the U,S, suffered a in the first quarter of this year, and it If the trade unions have the objective sharply different from the formula used classic war-generated inflation which will certainly not drop any further, power to defend the workers' living in capitalist statistics; however chang­ pushed consumer prices up about 6 per­ While from 1971 to the first quarter standards even in the face of substantial es in the two are usually parallel.) cent a year between 1967 and 1970. Wage of 1973 national output increased by 11 unemployment, the union bureaucracy This stagnation of the U.S, economy increases had been geared to an earlier, percent and investment in plant and can sabotage the use of that power. And during the middle and late 1950's was slower rate of inflation and many unions eqUipment went up by 19 percent, total one would have to look far and wide for a cause of major concern to the ruling (such as the UA W) had actually bar­ man-hours employed only increased by a better example of such sabotage than class, particularly when contrasted gained away full cost-of-living adjust­ 6 percent (Current Business Develop­ the bureaucracies' pol i c i e s during with the dynamism of the Soviet econ­ ments in the early 1960's, With the un­ ments, May 1973), This means that in­ Phase Three. In order to prepare for the omy during the same period, A key slo­ ions trapped by existing contracts and a vestment has been of a highly capital­ steel contract, Abel Signed a no-strike gan in Kennedy's 1960 campaign was to pro-capitalist bureaucracy, real take­ in ten s i v e, labor-saving type-what pledge. In order to prepare for the "get this country moving again." The home pay fell in the period from 1967 Marx called accumulation with a sharp­ t r u c kin g negotiations, Fitzsimmons belief that the statism of the liberal to 1970. ly riSing organiC composition of capital, forced the Chicago Teamsters local to Democrats~compared wit h the do­ Nixon came to power committed to This means that the value of capital is agree not to wildcat against the national nothingism of the Eisenhower admin­ the right-wing bourgeois reCipe for increaSing faster than the value of the contract. And the Rubber Workers and istration~could stimulate the economy fighting inflation: deflate the economy output it generates, leading to a falling electrical unions signed contracts that was probably the most important cause so that riSing unemployment will check rate of profit. everyone knew would mean a decline in of substantial ruling-class support for wage increases and falling demand will The highly capital-intensive nature the living standards of the workers, Kennedy. depress prices. By cutting back the fed­ of recent investment accounts for an­ From the standpoint ofthe ruling class, The Kennedy administration was as­ eral budget (the only dynamic aspect of other seemingly strange aspect of the the only good news on the inflation front sociated with an economic boom, partly the economy) by 6 percent in 1969, Nixon current boom-the fall in stock market is that wages are riSing less than prices. As the Wall (11 caused by state investment subsidies in got his desired recession. But the re­ prices. Despite the rapid inflation and Street Journal the form of corporate tax dodges and sults were not to his liking. On the one healthy profit levels, the market value May) commented, "The chief cost they government pressure to keep down hand the monopoly power of the huge of the capital stock has declined steadily are watching is labor cost, and so far wages (the "wage-price guidelines"), corporations made prices relatively since January, The decline in stock the signs have been encouraging. Last However, the 1962-66 capital invest­ res i s tan t to government monetary prices is not because of Watergate or month, for instance, the Rubber Work­ ment boom was primarily the product measures, and inflation continued, On even the monetary criSiS, but is a nor­ ers signed with Goodyear for increases of market forces unrelated to govern­ the other, trade -unions were too en­ mal phenomenon during business cy­ amounting to about 6 per cent a year. n With wage settlements like this, ment policy. After years of minimal trenched to be cowed by anything short cles, As the Wall StreetJournal's lead­ investment which resulted in obsolete of massive unemployment, while the ing financial analyst, Alfred Malabre, production facilities in wide sectors of workers were more concerned with correctly observed, "Stock prices nor­ the economy by the early 1960's, the new catching up with the inflation than afraid mally begin to drop long before a re­ plant and equipment during the Kennedy of priCing themselves out of a job. cession sets in and to rise long before yea r s embodied exceptionally high In the face of rising unemployment business~ recovers" (Wall Street Jour­ rates of technological improvement. the working class undertook a massive nal, 18 June 1973), .. Thus during 1962~66 the output per strike wave during 1969-71. This was At a certain point during a boom the s man-hour increased 3.8 percent a year highlighted by the General Electric owners of the capital stock discover that compared with 2,7 percent a year in the strike in the fall of 1969, the postal the return on their investment (profit) is 1954-61 period, This dramatic rise in workers' wildcat in the spring of 1970, unsatisfactory given its riSing value. In productivity~increasing investment led the Midwest Teamster wildcat in the Marx's words, capital has blocked its bourgeois ideologues, and some sup­ spring and the long General Motors own growth. The first manifestation of s[ribe posed Marxists (such as Ernest Mandel) strike in the fall of that year. Although the falling rate of profit is the devalua­ as well, to fantasize about a "third they were not uniformly victories for tion of the capital stock' and the flight i nd us t ria 1 revolution" and a fully the workers, due to the treachery of the from ownership of the means of pro­ automated economy. labor bureaucracy, these strikes en­ duction into money and debt claims, The By 1967 however, the facts demon­ abled the organized working class to second manifestation is a cutback in strated once again that capitalist ex­ keep its real wages roughly stable. the actual production of capital (a drop inCludR~"(IS1$ 3 pansion contains its own negation. A The bourgeoisie, however, required in investment) causing a general decline SP~ fully automated economy is only possi­ a cut in the workers' real wages to off­ in economic activity. 24 ISSUES ble under socialism, In the period up to set the inflation. The money wage in­ It is clear that the boom has peaked Name ______1966 the expanded production had hal ved creases of 7 to 10 percent were in­ and that a new downturn is less than a Address ______the unemployment rate and the resulting tolerable for the U.S. ruling class given year away. The key element in a capital tight labor market had strengthened its weakened international competitive investment boom, new orders for plant City ______workers' bargaining power. As a result, position. Following the steel settlement and eqUipment, peaked last January (the State Zi,l"p'__ __ wages rose sharply in 1966, leading to under threat of an expected strike, the same month as stock prices) and has a jump in unit labor costs of 2,8 percent Nixon administration was faced with the bee n declining steadily since. The Make checks payable/mail to: compared to an increase of only. 7 per­ choice of either trying to further de­ workweek shortened slightly in May, SPARTACIST PUBLISHING CO. cent the year before, Rising labor costs press the economy, hoping that riSing Retail sales in April grew at the slow­ Box 1377, GPO, New York, NY 10001 combined with the high rate of capital unemployment would finally break the est rate since June 1972. And for the 25 investment drove down the rate of prof­ spirit of the unions, or else imposing first time in a year inventories grew it. Investment, which had been in­ direct state wage control. Nixon chose faster than sales, always a clear sign W"IERS 'ANC/j,ff~1 creaSing at 13 percent a year, actually the latter course. that a boom has peaked. It is fairly 10 WORKERS VANGUARD ion offices were pretty evenly divided earlier company attacks, the Brother­ Continued from page 12 with the incumbent Unity Team keeping hood stalled for months before holding Continued from page 7 12 out of 19 of the committeemen. In a small rally on 10 May which was short, the vote was a minor protest attended by only a small fraction of the vote, with a recognition that there was Brotherhood's claimed membership. ... UAW really no significant difference between Moreover, they sought to use opposition THE "THIRD the two slates. to the firings for purely factional ad­ Responding to the call for "people vantage, announcing an NLRB suit Elections power" like a school of sea lions to a against GM' s "attempt to obstruct the PERIOD" barrel of fish, all the phony "revolu­ Brotherhood. " Their answer to the order to get elected, while the Brother­ tionary" groups in California barked the company's recent attacks was another ist," and that the USSR is no longer hood Caucus leaders are career bu­ praises of the Brotherhood Caucus. impotent rally on 20 June. Fremont a workers state but a new imperialism reaucrats pretending to be some kind Predictably the CP characterized the workers must reject this each-caucus­ presided over by a "red bourgeoisie." of radicals in order to get elected. As Brotherhood victory as "a significant for-itself defense policy and unite in a In a recent attack on Trotskyism from Workers Vangnard pointed out before victory for the rank and file" (Peoples major campaign to force the company a Maoist viewpoint, the pamphlet en­ the elections (see lVV No. 21, 25 May World, 23 June). Andjust as the Chinese to rehire all the victimized workers, titled "From Trotskyism to Social­ 1973), the Brotherhood was really a bureaucracy vies with Moscow for the utilizing the full power of the organized Imperialism" by Michael Miller of vehicle for the old Blue Slate, the pre­ favors of U.S. imperialism, so the working class including the power to the League for Proletarian Revolu­ vious union leadership before the He .. - American Maoists vie with the CP in halt production. tion, this pOSition stands in contrast rera clique (which in turn was just embracing trade-union opportunism. The defense of the union also re­ to Trotsky's position: ousted by the Brotherhood). The Broth­ Thus both the Revolutionary Union and quires the fullest freedom of discus­ "In 1956 Khrushchev came on the scene, erhood slate contained a large number the October League give uncritical sup­ Sion, that is workers democracy, to launching an attack on the dictatorship of Blue Slate operators, including Denny port to the Brotherhood Caucus. Not to arrive at the proper course of action. of the proletariat and spreading petty­ Lemmond, who ran for financial secre­ be outdone by the Stalinists, the Work­ We therefore call on the Brotherhood bourgeois ideology and culture every­ tary and is so infamous that he was ers League added its own characteristic Caucus to live up to its democratic where. 0.0 defeated by an unknown independent. touch of political banditry by first hail­ pretenSions and drop the ban on selling "Trotskyism has never understood in The election campaign also revealed ing the establishment of the Brother­ left-wing literature in front of the un­ theory and never learned from prac­ that behind the New Left populist rhet­ hood (Bulletin, 11 December 1972), ion hall, a ban earlier imposed by the tice the class character of the Soviet and Chinese states. During the period oric-which can be purchased cheaply later withdrawing its endorsement in Herrera gang. We also call on the of Soviet history when the economic in California-of Brotherhood leader or de r top us hits own barely­ Brotherhood and all other forces in the base was being transformed from pri­ Earlie Mays lies a past history as a distinguishable reformist auto program union to condemn the gangster tactics vate to social ownership of the means full-time functionary for the Reuther­ (centering on a 20 percent wage in­ of the Maoist Revolutionary Union which of production, the Trotskyites always Woodcock bureaucracy. Thus despite crease), and now again hailing the has on several occasions physically stressed the political structure-the vague talk of "people power," the Brotherhood victory with the headline threatened Workers Vanguard sales­ superstructure •••• The economic base Brotherhood victory was simply the ex­ "Brotherhood Sweeps Fremont" (Bulle­ men at the Fremont plant. The October can never by considered apart from the change of one bureaucratic clique for tin, 25 June)-this time covering itself League, another Maoist group which political structure. In the Soviet Union, by noting deficiencies in the caucus' the Communist Party, which is the heart another in a game of musical chairs in enthuses over the Brotherhood, has of the political structure, was taken which the membership always loses. program. Similarly threatened WV salesmen in over by a clique of bourgeois-type This was accurately reflected in the In keeping with the petty cliquism other locations. politicians and transformed into a var­ campaign itself, which was totally dom­ which characterized both slates in the iant of a big bourgeois political party. inated by mutual personal exposes and Fremont elections, neither side has For a Nationwide Class­ Now they are busy implementing eco­ recriminations (probably mostly true mobilized the ranks for a united class Struggle Opposition in the UAW nomic policies which reverse the so­ on both sides). The net effect should defense of victimized workers who have cialist economic base, which restore have been to discredit both sides in the been sacked by GM. The two latest The election of diverse "left" op­ private ownership, private production for the market, and which reproduce eyes of any honest militant. And in fact incidents are the firing of night com­ pOSitionists in locals throughout the on an enormous scale all the corre­ only about half the membership voted mitteeman Gregg Mello and the dis­ country demonstrates the felt need for sponding cap ita 1 i s t social rela­ at all. Although Mays won the key shop Ciplinary layoff of John Scrempos, a a militant, class-struggle alternative to tionships. " committee chairmanship, the other un- Brotherhood leader. In response to the Woodcock bureaucracy. Such an op­ position must be based not on cheap This passage demonstrates the Mao­ (and meaningless) "serve the people" ists' rejection of elementary Marxism. If, as they hold, a peaceful social coun­ Nixon's exemption of wages from the period of stagnation and decline, and or "fight the bosses" rhetoric. Instead terrevolution took place in RUSSia, then 60-day freeze is not generosity toward that the fundamental character of the it must have a sharply defined and com­ logically a peaceful socialist revolution labor, but smart politics. With the bu­ post-war period is formed by the boom prehensive program for working-class against capitalism is also possible­ reaucrats shoving rot ten contracts and prosperity of capitalism based on power, uniting the proletariat around a down the throats of the ranks, while the rebuilding and development of Eu­ series of transitional demands which, a classic social-democratic position rope and that the period since the end which Lenin refuted in State and Revolu­ prices and profits are soaring, for of tile 50's Izas been one of decline and gOing beyond the limits of the capitalist Nixon to have applied the freeze to system itself, lead directly to the only tion. Further,·to maintain that such a stagnation." four emphaSis 1 revolution was accomplished by the ap­ wages would have been a totally un­ - ftConversations with Wohlforth," real answer to workers' needs, social­ necessary provocation to labor. As it ist revolution•• pearance of a ruling group with "petty­ Marxist Bulletin No.3, Part 4, bourgeois ideology" is idealism, com­ is, the bureaucracy will certainly claim Seventh Session that the price freeze has stiffened man­ pletely counterposed to the Marxist agement reSistance, thereby preventing Here we have it-the fifteen-year"ever­ materialist understanding that a social the unions from winning better terms. deepening final crisis" of capitalism. 5L/R[Y revolution can be accomplished only by The breakdown of the "normaliza­ In the next issue of Workers Van­ an overturn in property relations. tion" Phase Three and the reassertion guard we intend to deal with the Workers Most important of all are the prac­ of a hard line in direct controls demon­ League/Healyite theory of "The Crisis" PubliE OlliE!S tical consequences of this policy. Since strates that state wage control is a fun­ in some detail. At this point we will the USSR is an "imperialist" state damental requirement of contemporary limit ourselves to two observations. according to Mao, it is not necessary c;lpitalism, regardless of the personal First, capitalist production is inher­ NEW YORK to defend it against other capitalist preferences of whatever politicians are states. In fact, Mao has gone so far ently cyclical and a continual decline Monday} in office. The implication for union in production is impossible. And sec­ as to press for a Sino-Japanese alli­ through 3:00-7:30 p.mo ance against the Soviet Union and to militants is clear: it is not possible ond, both the WL and NCLC use "the Friday to revert to "independent" unions sim­ final crisis" to justify the propOSition encourage the retention of NATO as a ply acting as bargaining agents for that traditional economic reformism is Saturday 1:00-6:00 porn. bulwark against "Soviet imperialism" their members in a free market. In now revolutionary, since capitalism can in Europe! These are the counterrevo­ 260 West Broadway lutionary implications of the "state this era, the unions are either agenCies no longer grant reforms. Their crisis­ Room 522 by which the ruling class diSCiplines mongering is Simply a justification for capitalist" position put into practice. New York, New York They raise the specter of an inter­ the workers or they must be the or­ their economism. Phone 925-5665 ganizational bases for the overthrow Not only do catastrophic theories imperialist war with the USSR and "- China aligned with opposing capitalist of capitalism. discredit Marxism and disorient would­ 'I be revolUtionists, but they also distract powers-an eventUality which would the working class from the actual ex­ BAY AREA place the socialist property forms ploitation, oppression and class con­ wedneSday} of the deformed workers states in flict they face in daily life. Thus in or­ and 3:00-8:00 porno immediate danger. Though the Brezh­ der to make a case that now the final Friday nev clique in Moscow is not so expliCit Catastrophism vs. in blOCking with capitalist states against depression is at hand, the WL is forced Saturday 12:00-6:00 p.m. to create the complete fiction of the China, its willingness to abandon the Marxist Economics prosperous Eisenhower years, aperiod 330-4Oth Street defense of the workers states in the which 0 c cur r e d-oh happy coinci­ (near Broadway) hopes of aChieving an alliance with For some time Lyn Marcus' National dence-before the emergence of the Oakland, California U.S. imperialism was clearly revealed Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC) Wohlforth tendency. (Had Wohlforlhled Phone 653-4668 last year when Nixon was invited to sign a declaration of "peaceful co­ and Tim Wohlforth's Workers League an organization during the mid-1950's "- (WL) have been proclaiming that the we have no doubt that the ultimate cri­ existence" in Moscow at the very mo­ final economic crisis of capitalism is sis of capitalism would have surfaced ment that American planes were car­ at hand and that the next few years will then.) BOSTON rying out saturation bombing over North bring either communist revolution or Communists do not need to project Tuesday }. . Vietnam! fascism. People new to the Marxist the imminence of a catastrophiC eco­ Wednesday 1.00-5.00 p.m. The Trotskyists, in contrast, call movement may believe that this is sim­ nomic crisis and fascist rule to justify Friday . 7:00-9:00 p.mo for Sino-Soviet unity against imperial­ ply an over-reaction to the 1971 de­ ism, for unconditional defense of the the need for socialist revolution. The Saturday valuation of the dollar and the onset of highest inflation in twenty years, a 5 11 :00 a.m.-3:oo deformed workers states. At the same international financial anarchy. Far percent rate of officially acknowledged 639 Massachusetts Avenue time we mercilessly criticize the para­ from it. Wohlforth and Marcus have unemployment and a venal and moribund Room 335 sitic bureaucracies who are sabotaging been Singing the "final, ever-deepening union bureaucracy actively collaborat­ that defense. The advanced workers Cambridge, Massachusetts will recognize the justice of this prin­ crisis" song ever since the early ing with a reactionary government to Phone 492-3928 1960's! In 1965 Wohlforth, with Marcus hold down wages-these conditions are a j cipled, class pOSition, and reject those acting as his economic adviser, quite sufficient precondition for build­ such as the Maoists and pro-Moscow asserted: ing the vanguard communist party and OO~W@[lJ1!JU~ @~&OO\1 Stalinists who criminally abandon the ftOur pOSition is that essentially capi­ a class-struggle opposition in the defense of the workers' conquests. talism as a world system is in a unions .• [L~lr~OO&lr[}1) OO~ [TO BE CONTINUED] 20 JULY 1973 11 the present labor bureaucracy, which above all refuses to challenge capitalist rule. Syndicalists Sucked Reformists Gain in into Business Unionism An important radical group in Mel­ rose Harvester is the Workers Voice Committee, a syndicalist group, or­ iginating from the Revolutionary Youth Movement wing of the old SDS. vVorkers UAW Elections Voice believes that trade unions are organically reformist and discredited In recent local elections at four key voting rights). Beset by organizational replied that the RFC also favored unity, and that the class struggle must flow plants of the United Auto Workers incompetence and rampant warlordism, but that "unity must be based on strug­ through new shop-floor organizations. (UA W) in different sections of the coun­ the UNC appears to have self­ gle for the rights of the membership" Despite its formal anti-unionism, which try, incumbent bureaucrats have been destructed (the last issue of its paper, (Daily World, 6 July 1973). What union includes opposition to participation in ousted by the ranks and replaced by the UNC, was in December). If true, bureaucrat, even the most reactionary, union affairs, vVorkers VOice revealed more militant-talking oppositionists. this would mean one less obstacle for would ever openly oppose the "rights its fundamentally reformist appetites At the Tarrytown, N.Y. General Motors auto workers and the rest of the prole­ of the membership" in the abstract? by succumbing to Roth's popularity and plant and the International Harvester tariat in the struggle for independent On the basis of such protestations giving him backhanded support: Work­ complex in Chicago the winners were organization as a class around revo­ Meany himself could unite with the ers Voice, Vol. 4, No.5 observed that supporters of the Communist Party lutionary objectives. RFC! This farce clearly demonstrates Roth "is closer to the real issues con­ (CP) and its labor sympathizer group, Sims' election is clearly a personal the key importance of program. Faced cerning workers in the shop than the the Trade Unionists for Action and victory and not a strengthening of the with successful insurgency, the wilier other candidates." Mike Goldfield, a Democracy (TUAD). In Detroit a leader UNC. While Sims was elected presi- bureaucrats will move to co-opt the leader of Workers VOice, went even of the largest oppositional group in the opposition, temporarily embraCing as further by putting out a personal leaflet union, the United National Caucus their own the more militant program as attacking only Egan and saying, n We (UNC), was elected president of Chrys­ long as it remains within the framework hope that if Norm Roth is electedpres­ ler;s Eldon Gear and Axle plant, while of traditional business unionism. ident, he will not play the same divisive the Brotherhood Caucus won at Fremont Another important victory for the CP role, thus, making it easier to achieve GM on the West Coast. What these was the election of Norman Roth as unity among all workers in the shop." various oppositionists have in common president of the Melrose Park, Illinois Another leader of Workers VOice, is a lack of a clearly-defined class­ UA W local at the International Harvest­ Murray Dillard, ran for re-election on struggle program, relying instead on er plant. Roth is a prominent spokes­ the union executive board as a trustee. simple trade-union militancy and vague man for the CP-backed TUAD and (Since Workers VOice has a formal anti-establishment rhetoric. "Labor for Peace," a loose coalition of position against running for union of­ Since the 1969-71 strike wave, the liberal bureaucrats. Roth won against fice, its members instead run as inde­ ancient and rigidly conservative a campaign of red-baiting in a three­ pendents when they want to.) Dillard's Meanyite bureaucracy has become fun­ sided race against a corrupt, racist campaign leaflet of 27 June had a piC­ damentally alienated from the ranks and incumbent, Egan, who put out a leaflet ture of the American flag and the cap­ a target for hostility, particularly from calling blacks "fugitives from t h'e tion, "Be a Good American": the younger, black and Latin workers. watermelon patch" and "burr heads." Dillard's flag-waving is not some That bureaucracy can now be shattered. Roth's election, like Sims' in De­ aberration or cynical maneuver un­ But the decisive question is whether the troit, was essentially a personal vic­ related to his past association with Meany- Woodcock leadership will be re­ tory although he heads a small op­ Workers Voice. At heart syndicalists placed by a Slicker, more left version pOSition group, the Solidarity Caucus. long to be at one with the great Amer­ of the same, drawn in part from the Roth was the only Solidarity candidate ican working class and are contemp­ cadre of the reformist left organiza­ elected, with the remaining local of­ tuous of revolutionary Marxism, pre­ tions, or by forces representing revo­ fices divided between the Egan group ferring instead native shop-floor mili­ lutionary class-struggle policies. Thus and a similar bureaucratic clique. The tancy. A group which defers to the far the International bureaucracy of the goals of the Solidarity Caucus are sum­ existing consciousness of the workers UA W has not been effectively challenged marized by its virtually meaningless will necessarily become infected soon­ by a "left" opposition, but in the past slogan of "the unity of all labor behind er or later with the reactionary ideology few years a number of "militant" op­ DAILY WORLD a program which can win." Despite its that the ruling class inculcates in the positionists have achieved a certain Bill Scott, leader of Rank and File talk about "all labor" the caucus is a masses. National chaUVinism, just as localized group which doesn't even much as raCism, is a prinCipal weapon power base at the local level. Committee at Tarrytown GM. The two major currents in the pres­ bother to call for the ouster of the vVood­ of the ruling class in fighting against dent, every other office was retained ent upsurge of rank-and-file labor re­ cock bureaucracy. In the present cam­ the independent organization of the by the incumbent bureaucracy. Sims formism are on the one hand the Com­ paign, its two most radical demands workers as a class. The Dillard inci­ apparently did not associate himself munist Party, with its experienced were "open the books" and an end to dent is simply one more demonstration with the UNC, even on the basis of its trade-union machine, and on the other labor participation on Nixon's Pro­ that a workerist rejection ofthe Lenin­ lowes t -common-denominator "bar­ a diverse conglomeration of groups and ductivity Board. While opposition to ist vanguard party means abandoning gaining program, n running insteadpri­ individuals emerging from the New state wage control is a vital agitational the historic tasks of the working class, marily on a reputation for militancy Left/black nationalist movement and demand in this period, to limit labor's instead capitulating to the present atti­ arising from past victimization by supported by various Maoist, syndical­ economic program to that single de­ tudes of particular groups of workers Chrysler and the local bureaucracy. In ist and social-democratic organiza­ mand implies tolerance for "normal" and ultimately leads to reaction. a glowing article on the Eldon election, tions, notably the International Social­ free-market capitalism. Although Roth Dillard's campaign, in addition to the IS' Workers' Power (June 1973) ists (IS). One of the key arenas in this does a lot of talking about the Vietnam embarraSSing Workers VOice, also em­ restricted itself entirely to the heroic war outside the union, his campaign was barrassed-you g u e sse cI it-the IS, struggle is the UA W, which was built saga of Jordan Sims' personal history by supporters of several avowedly almost totally devoid of concern for any whose supporters had been sporting (rather like the B lack Panther coverage socialist parties and where today, with broader political issues. He does not Dillard campaign buttons, The IS just of Huey Newton), not once mentioning the brutal working conditions andheav­ say how labor should oppose the war can't seem to resist those "honest, the program he ran on. This is not sure ily young and black membership, dis­ (write your congressman?). He refused rank-and-file" opportunists. prising conSidering that he didn't run content with the pro-capitalist Wood­ to call on the workers to break from on any program. cock regime is rife. the capitalist parties to form a labor Out-Bureaucrats party based on the trade unions, and Don New Left Clothing The Huey Newton of in. fact he, together with TUAD and­ The CP Achieves Respectability Eldon Gear and Axle in practice-the CP, supported Mc­ The victory of the Brotherhood Cau­ Meanwhile at Tarrytown GM, the Govern in the last elections. By not call­ cus at the Fremont, California General Jordan Sims, who recently won the Rank and FUe Committee won an im­ ing for labor action against U.S. im­ Motors plant differs from the elections presidency of the Chrysler Eldon plant portant victory, sweeping the bargain­ perialism in Southeast Asia and a of Sims, Scott and Roth in that the in DetrOit, is a prominent spokesman ing committee elections. Among those working-Class alternative to the boss­ latter are reformist "socialists" pre­ for the apparently moribund United elected was Bill Scott, a prominent es' parties, Roth's campaign did not tending to be simple union militants in National Caucus. The UNC is an un­ supporter of the reformist politics of fundamentally break with the policies of continu2d on page 11 stable amalgam of aspiring local bu­ the CPo The program of the victorious reaucrats ranging from the politically RFC (which ran in a bloc with some conservative, business unionist Mike independents) was the typical menu of Singer to reformist "socialists" like bread-and-butter "economism" one ex­ EDUCA lIONAL-REC REA llONAl SL/RCY Sims and the ex~Trotskyist Art Fox, pects of a CP-supported caucus. Ac­ with the IS thrown in for added flavor. cording to the Daily World (6 July Like many such groupings, the UNC 1973), "Their program [was] to fight features a two-tier, maximum­ speedup, clean up unsafe working con­ Saturday, August 11 minimum program. The maximum pro­ ditions, fight for the hundredS of pend­ Summer gram includes such demands as im­ ing grievances and organize the shop through mediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from behind contract negotiations." Vietnam, opposition to state wage con­ Faced with a successful upsurge Sunday, August 19 trol and support for a labor party. from the ranks, the incumbent bureauc­ Camp These demands would be an important racy moved to co-opt the RFC by "unify­ part of an authentic class-struggle pro­ ing" with it. The current Local 664lead­ gram, although in themselves they do ers, Calore and Sheridan, announced RATES: $6.00 per day for the whole eight days; $7.00 per day for not go beyond the bounds of capitalist that they wanted to join with the Rank and lesser periOds. The classes are scheduled to benefit those who society. However, in practice the UNC File Committee against the company can only attend for either half of the eight days. completely ignores them in favor of and that they supported the caucus' concentrating on safer issues such as program. They probably did, too, for For further information and reservations: Contact your SL or the referendum election of the Inter­ there is nothing in it that has not RCY Local (see local directory), or write Spartacist: Box 1377, national preSident, and crosses the been raised by every bureaucrat on G.P.O., New York, N.Y. 10001. class line to sue the union in the capi­ the outs who is trying to get into office talist courts (to deprive pensioners of without upsetting the system. Scott 12 WORK:::RSVANGUARD