CAPITALISM UNCHALLENGED : A SKETCH OF CANADIAN COMMUNISM, 1939 - 1949 Donald William Muldoon B.A., Simon Fraser University, 1974 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in the Department of History @ DONALD WILLIAM MULDOON 1977 SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY February 1977 All rights reserved. This thesis may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopy or other means, without permission of the author. APPROVAL Name: Donald William Muldoon Degree: Master of Arts Title of Thesis: Capitalism Unchallenged : A Sketch of Canadian Communism, 1939 - 1949. Examining Committee8 ., Chair~ergan: .. * ,,. Mike Fellman I Dr. J. Martin Kitchen senid; Supervisor . - Dr.- --in Fisher - &r. Ivan Avakumovic Professor of History University of British Columbia PARTIAL COPYRIGHT LICENSE I hereby grant to Simon Fraser University the right to lend my thesis or dissertation (the title of which is shown below) to users of the Simon Fraser University Library, and to make partial or single copies only for such users or in response to a request from the library of any other university, or other educational institution, on its own behalf or for one of its users. I further agree that permission for mu1 tiple copying of this thesis for scholarly purposes may be granted by me or the Dean of Graduate Studies. It is understood that copying or publication of this thesis for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Title of Thesi s/Di ssertation : Author : (signature) (name) (date) ABSTRACT The decade following the outbreak of war in September 1939 was a remarkable one for the Communist Party of Canada and its successor the Labor Progressive Party. It was a period dur- ing which the party experienced both unprecedented achievements and equally pronounced defeats. Although the party had been outlawed and forced underground as a result of its initial re- fusal to support the war, by the middle of the decade it had succeeded in establishing itself as a legitimate and influential political party. Prominent citizens and communists worked to- gether in organizations like the National Council for Canadian- Soviet Friendship. Party members were elected to provincial governments in Ontario and Manitoba, the first communist member of parliament was elected when Fred Rose defeated David Lewis in a 1943 federal by-election and the party's strength in munic- ipal governments in Toronto, Montreal and Winnipeg was formid- able. Moreover, the party's authority within the trade union movement was substantial. Yet these successes proved to be fleeting. By 1949 leading members had deserted the party, its influence within the trade unions had been sharply reduced, its electoral standing had been damaged, the size of both its membership and press had severely diminished and Fred Rose had been arrested and convicted of espionage activity. This thesis contends that the party throughout the de- cade, during the periods of prestige and those when it lacked iii influence, concerned itself with issues and demands which left capitalism unchallenged. The party's principal concerns included its devotion to the defeat of fascism, its enthusiasm for unity among the allies, its proposed alliances with other parties, its post-war commitment to peace and Canadian independence and the performance of its elected politicians. The task of promoting a socialist transformation in Canada was ignored. The party's pursuit of non-revolutionary goals was linked to its inability to distinguish between the interests of the in- ternational socialist movement, as embodied by the Soviet Union, and the particular requirements of the Canadian movement. This flawed conception of internationalism led to contortions and ex- cesses which discredited the party and demoralized its supporters. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am particularly grateful to Dr. Martin Kitchen who read and commented on the draft. Throughout my graduate work I profited from his advice and assistance. I should also like to thank Dr. Martin Robin and Dr. Ivan Avakumovic, both of whom made valuable suggestions as I began my research. My thanks are also due to Mr. Robert Kenny, Mr. David Lewis, and Mr. Jack Scott, all of whom provided information. TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Title. ...................................................... i APPROVAL. ................................................... ii ABSTRACT .................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................ v TABLE OF CONTENTS.................... ...................... vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.......................... ............. vii INTRODUCTION .............................................. 1 Chapter One SKETCH OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF CANADA PRIOR TO 1940 ................................. 9 Chapter Two FROM THE WAR TO THE LABOR PROGRESSIVE PARTY ....................................... 36 Chapter Three FROM THE BIRTH OF THE LABOR PROGRESSIVE PARTY TO BROWDERISM. .......................... 66 Chapter Four THE POST WAR: CRISIS AND DECLINE............. 115 CONCLUSION .................................................. 169 BIBLIOGRAPHY................................................ 174 LIST OF- ABBREVIATIONS -- A.C.C.L. All-Canadian Congress of Labour A.F.L. American Federation of Labor C.C.F. Co-operative Commonwealth Federation C.C.L. Canadian Congress of Labour C.I. Communist International C.I.O. Committee for Industrial Organization C.P.A. Communist Political Association C.P.C. Communist Party of Canada C.P.S.U. Communist Party of the Soviet Union L.P.P. Labor Progressive Party O.B.U. One Big Union R.C.M.P. Royal Canadian Mounted Police R.I.L.U. Red International of Labour Unions T.L.C. Trades and Labor Congress T.U.E.L. Trade Union Educational League U.L.F.T.A. Ukrainian Labor-Farmer Temple Association W.P.C. Workers' Party of Canada W.U.L. Workers' Unity League vii INTRODUCTION This study attempts to sketch the development and the role of the Communist Party of Canada and its successor the Labor Progressive Party. Established in 1943 by leaders of the outlawed Communist Party, the L.P.P. soon grew to be the larg- est and most influential socialist organization, with the ex- ception of the social democratic Co-operative Commonwealth Fed- eration, in Canadian history. Confident and popular during the latter half of the second world war, by 1950 the L.P.P. had been reduced to an isolated sect, demoralized and confused. Despite its fleeting influence and a decade of intense activity no last- ing gains were recorded for the socialist movement. Yet schol- ars have largely ignored both the party's remarkable rise and decline and the party's failure to create an enduring movement committed to a socialist transformation in Canada. Moreover, the few studies which do exist often approach the party with assumptions which tend to obscure rather than illuminate some of the party's principal features. Three basic interpretations have dominated the discus- sion of Canadian communism. One view categorizes it as an alien philosophy inherently incompatible with Canadian society. This is the opinion for example of William Rodney who explains in his study of the party's first decade, Soldiers of the International, that fundamentally the failure of the C.P.C., "must be attributed to Marxist ideology which, based as it is upon class relationships, proved to be an obsolete, ineff ectiv 01. ltL Similarly, Gad Horowitz in Canadian Labour in Politics explains that, "Cana- dians do not speak the same language" as "other wordly" ~arxists.~No less an authority than Donald Creighton has ob- served that, "Canadian history was a sadly imperfect vehicle for the exemplifications of the Marxian verities. If 3 Others rely on a conspiracy thesis. Among the more pop- ular exponents of this theme is Pat Sullivan who assures his readers in Red Sails on the Great Lakes that: The Labor Progressive Party is not a political party in the popular acceptance of that term. It is not like the Liberal Party, the Conserva- tive Party or the C.C.F., all of whose acti- vities are limited to constitutional political endeavors. The Labor Progressive Party is com- posed of a group of people well trained in the science of preparing for revolution, who form part of a world wide intrigue to abolish free government. .4 '~illiam Rodney, Soldiers of the International, (Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1968) p. v. 2~adHorowitz, Canadian Labour in Politics, (Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1968) p. 24; cited by Jessie Lemisch, On Active Service in War and Peace, (Toronto, New Hogtown Press, 1975) p. 12. 3~onaldCreighton, "Presidential Address," Canadian Historical Association Annual Report, 1957, p. 7, cited Lemisch p. 12. 4~atSullivan, Red Sails on the Great Lakes, (Toronto, MacMillan, 1955) p. vii. Watson Kirkconnell repeats this charge in his, Seven Pillars of Freedom. More significantly, Professor Avakumovic's study, -The Communist Party in Canada, implicitly shares this view. In- dispensible as the pioneering history of the party from its in- ception to the present, his treatment of the L.P.P.,particularly his account of the Gouzenko spy trials in 1946, confirms his suggestion that communists are "unscrupulous schemers." In his view the espionage trials proved that, "What anti-Communists had always claimed that the Communists were doing and getting paid for, had actually taken place. #I 6 A third view of the party is provided by histories and memoirs written by party functionaries. These "official"