Factional Struggle And Party Leadership By James P. Cannon • Social Relations in U.S. Today By Arne Swabech 25c FOltRTH INT,ERNATIONAL Two N,w Pamphlets Vol. XIV - No. 6 Nov.-Dec. 1953 (Total No. 125) Published Bi1JZonthly by the America's Road FOurth Interndtional Publishing Association 116 Universlty Pl., New York 3, N. Y. Te1epJtone: All'ODlluin &-74:60. Subscription rates: U.S.A. and Latin AJDeriea $1.26·~ 6 .sue; b1,lJ1dles, 30c for 5 c(lldes a.nd up.FoJ:,etgn and canada: $1.60 tor To Socialism , fAuN: 'bundles 2lc for ,; oopies and up. 'iReente~d 88 =second o.La88 matter April 4. 1960... ttlbe·P .. t by James P. Cannon OUIee at New Y'ork. N.T.. 'II1l6er ~ A. of Karch I. 11'1t. Managing Editor: WILLlAMF. WAJWE I: America Under Eisenhower Business Manager: JOSEPH HANSEN 2: The International Prospects of Capita.Iism .,: a.nd Sodacrism CONTENTS 3: Prospects of CapitaHsmand Socialism in America Factional Struggle and Party 4: The Coming Struggle for PoWer Leadership .......... By James P. Call1wIt .I 15 5: America Under the Workers' Rule Social Relations in the U.S. Today By Arne Swabeck ........ ................. 122 6: \Vhat America WiaI Look Like Under Socialism Index for Vois. XIII and XIV, 1952-1953 .... 127 80 pages 35 cents THE CASE OF THE McCARTHYISM: LEGLESS VETERAN American Fascism by JAMES KUTCHER On the March Contents 178 pages $1.00 The Grave Danger of the Fascis.t Menace - State­ Order now from ment by the PoHtical Committee of the Socialist Workers Party Pioneer Publishers What About the "Communist Menace"? 116 University Place New York 3, N.Y. Box Score of the McCarthyite Witch 'Hunt. Fascists See Their Biggest Chance Since the 30's Life-aDd·Death Struggle for Negroes and Minority Peoples Fourth International 116 University Place 'l'hel\fen Behind McCal't.hy, by Art Preis New York 8, N. Y. McCarthy's U~e of the IlitJer Big-Lie Technique, I want to subscribe to Fourth International. Enclosed by Mura'Y Weiss is 0 $1.25 for six issues; 0 $2.50 for 12 issues. )6 pages )0 cents Name ................................................................................................ Street ............................................................................................. Order fl'om City ............................................... ;........ .................. Zone ................. Pioneer Publishers State ....................... ;........................................................................... .. 116 University Place New York 3, N.Y. FOURTH INTERNATIONAL VOLUME XIV NOVEMBER-DECEMBER, 1953 ~267 NUMBER 6 Factional Struggle And Party Leadership By JAMES P. CANNON (Speecb by jantes P. Cannon at tbe Open Plenum of the That's a profoundly true remark, as experience has shown. National Committee 01 the Socialist Workers Party, Nov­ The party which led the Russian Revolution to victory ember 1953, New York, N. Y:) wa's the ,prodlllct of theSiplit with the Mensheviks in 1903, * * * several unifications and splits along the road, and the We all recognize, comrades, that we have come to final unification with Trotsky in 1917. The combination the end of the long faction fight in the party. Nothing of the ·splits and the unifications made possible the' party of victory ,in the Russian Revolution. remains no~ but to sum up the results. We have seen, in our own experience, the same prin­ This has been a long faction fight, and it w~s not brought to a definitive conclusion until it was fully ciple working out. We began with a split from the Stalin­ ripe. The Cochranite minodty were given a. whole year ists. Uni,fication with the Musteites in 1934 and later to carryon underground factional work and organization with the ;Jeft-wing of the Socialist Party were "great mile­ in the party. A' whole year. Then we finaHy dragged them stones in the building of our organization. But these out into the open, and we had intensified discussion for unifications were of no more importance, land stand five" mbnths, with more Internall Bulletins' publi,shed even rather on an equal plane, with the split of the leftist than in the great fight of 19~9-40. Then we' had the May sectarians in 1935 and of the revisionist Burnhamites in Plenum ,and ·,t'he truce, which the Cochranitessigned but 1940, and with ,the split of the new revisionists today. did not keep. AliI these actions have been part of the process of build­ Then five more mJonths of struggle during which· the ing the r'evolutionary party. Cochranites developed their positions ,to their logical ~ This law enunciated by Trotsky, that both unifica­ conclusion land showed themselves inaction as an anti-­ tions and splits are alike methods of building the party, party, anti-Trotskyist tendency. They organized a cam... is true however, only on the condition that both the paign of sabotage. of party activities and party funds, unification and the split in each case is properly motiv­ culminating in the organized boycott of our 25th An­ 'ated. I f they are not properly prepared and properly niversary meeting. Then we came to this November motivated they can have a disrupting and cisorganizing Plenum where the Cochranite leaders were indicted for effect. I can give you examples of that. treachery and suspended from the party. And that's the The unification of the Left Opposition under Nin in end of ,the faction fight in the SWP. Spain with the opportunitst Maurin group, out of which In the face of the record nobody can justly say that \vas formed the PbUM, was one of the d~cisive factors we \vere impatient; that anything was done hastily; that in the defeat of' the Spariish Revolution. The dilution there wasn't'a free and ample discussion; that there were of the program of Trotskyism for the sake of unification not' abundant proofs of disloyalty before discipline was with -an opport,unist group 'Tobbed the Spanish proh::tariat inv6ked. And above all, nobody can say that the .Ieader­ of that clear program and resolute leadership \vhich coulJ ship hJesitakd to bring down the ax when the t:im'e came have made the difference in the Spanish Revolution in for it. That was their duty. The rights"of a minority in 1936. our democratic party have never included, and wi.JI never Conversely, the splits in the French Trotskyist Of­ include, the right. to be disloyal. The SWP has no.. place ganization before WorUd \Var II, several of them, none and no room for strike-breakers. of which were properly motivated - contributed to the 'demoralization of the party. It has been our good fortune * * * ,that we have malde no f~lIIse u'l1ifi:cations and no false Unifications and Splits splits. Never have we had a split in which the party did Trotsky once remarked that unificaqons and splits not bound forward the day after, precisely because the areaIike methods of building the revolutional'Y party. split was properly prepared and properly motivated. Page 116 rOURTII INTERNATIONAL N ()1Je111 ber-December, J () 5.1 The party was not ready for a split when our Plenum more definitive.' There is not a single member of this convened last May. The minority iat that time had by Plenum who contemlplates any later relations in' the same no means extended their revisionist conceptions into ac­ p'arty with the strike-breakers of the Pablo-Cochran gang. tion in such a manner as to convince every single mem­ Any doubt on this .score is excluded. It is an absolute ber of th~ party that they were alien to us. For that certainty that from yesterday morning at eleven o'clock, reason we made big concess.ions to avoid a split. By the when they left the hall --- not with a hang but a giggle--,­ same reasoning, because everything was clear and every- that they 1eft for good. The most that can be contem­ 1hing was ripe in November, we made the split here - plated is 'that individua·l members who have been caught without theS1lightest hesitation. And if, in the remlnis­ in the under-currents may drift back ·to the party one cenc~sof the fight, you give the party leadership credit by one, and of course they will be received. But as far for their . patience and forbearance in the long struggle! as the main core of the minority faction is concerned, don't forget to add that they deserve just as much credit they have broken forever with us. The day they were for the decisive, resolute action taken at this Plenum to suspended from the party, and r'eleased fro~ further bring things to a conclusion: obligations to it, was' probably the happiest day of their lives. * * ~: The Split of 1940 The Shachtmanites, on the othe·r hand,' continued to protest for a long time that they would like to have unity. I think it would be usefull for us to make a comparison And even six-seven years a.f.ter the spUt, in 1946 and 1947, of this split, which' we consider to he progressive and a we actually conducted unity negotiations with the Shacht­ contribution to the development of the revolutionary manites. At one time jn early 1947 we had a unification party in America, with the split of 1940. There are points agreement with them,' illustrating the point I make that of similarity and of difference. They are similar insofar the split of 1940 was by no means as definitive and final as the basic issue in each case was revisionism. But the as is the split today. We are finished and done with revisionism of 1940 was by no means as deep and defin­ Pablo and Pabloism forever, not ,.oJllly here but on the itive as the r'evisionism that we have, split with today.