"Do you know how the Russian Federation is being ruled? Do you know that a "firing squad" is constantly on the job expelling members and branches from the Federation who dare to disagree on anything with the would-be bosses of the Russian Federation?...
"Do you know that a regular secret service system is being employed by these "bosses" to hunt down the undesirables?
"Do you know that a worse than military censorship is being maintained in the domain of Stocklitzky (the Northwestern States), where it is prohibited to the branches to communicate with each other or to send out or receive any correspondence otherwise than through the hands of the censors, the Executive Committee, and that this censorship committee, like the imperialists in the world"s war, are holding up the mail of these branches and do not deliver at all the "undesirable" mail?"
August 30, 1919, the day for the a.s.sembling of the National Emergency Convention of the Socialist Party, at last arrived. Delegates of the Right Wing, and many of the Left, including John Reed, I. E. Ferguson and Rose Pastor Stokes, were present. The Left Wing delegates, to the number of about 84, arrived early at the place of meeting, Machinists"
Hall, 113 South Ashland Boulevard, Chicago. Trouble immediately began, for the seats being occupied by the Left Wingers, the members of the Right were crowded out.
Germer and Gerber of the Right seem to have lost their heads. "The Chicago Herald and Examiner," of August 31, 1919, informs us that Adolph Germer, National Secretary of the Socialist Party and one of the leading members of the Right Wing, called in the police, who cleared the hall.
"The Chicago Tribune" of the same day tells us that everybody was exchanging fisticuffs when the police arrived. Detective Sergeant Lawrence McDonough, head of the anarchist squad, with the aid of a dozen uniformed policemen, seems to have saved the day for the Right Wingers.
John Reed, of the Left Wing, was furious, and "The Call," New York, August 31, 1919, tells us that he issued a statement which he addressed to the delegates of the Emergency Convention:
"We address you to inform you of occurrences this morning which every Revolutionary Socialist on the floor of this convention will protest against.
"Delegates from Illinois, Minnesota, Washington, Oregon, Ohio, Nebraska, California and other states entered the convention floor and took their seats in readiness for the opening of the convention.
"At nearly 10 o"clock Gerber of New York and Goebel of New Jersey, who were at the door and attempted to refuse the above named delegates admission, called the police and these delegations were ejected from the hall by police power, many of them being roughly handled."
Press reports inform us that after the belligerents had calmed down the meeting was again convened, and that Victor Berger, in referring to the Lefts, said: "They"re just a lot of anarchists; we are the party."
Berger did not say whether or not by the word "we" he meant the old National Executive Committee, which should have gone out of office in July,[G] but seemed to have given itself a "mandate" to run the National Emergency Convention.
On August 31, 1919, the hot-heads and sore-heads again a.s.sembled, and a dispute arose as to who called the "cops." As a result the Left Wingers next met by themselves downstairs, on the first floor of the hall, while the Right Wingers remained higher up on the second floor. On the same day the Minnesota group was seated by the Convention, but was denied a vote.
On September 1st the high climbers of the Right Wing purged the party still more by unseating the Washington State delegation and expelled Katterfield "for the good of the party." The California delegates then threw a bomb into the Right Wing Convention by announcing that they would not take their seats until all of the contested delegations were seated and the police were withdrawn from the hall. These delegates finally went down to the first floor and joined ranks with the Left Wingers there, this section henceforth being known as the Communist Labor Party.
On the same day the Convention of the Communist Party a.s.sembled at Smolny Inst.i.tute, 1221 Blue Island Avenue, Chicago. Red flags were displayed and Bolshevist songs were sung until the police of the anarchist squad finally demanded the removal of the blood-colored standards of revolt.
"The Call" informs us that on the next day, September 2nd, the Communist Party, composed of the Michigan crowd, the Russian Federation and the former Left Wing National Council, nearly split in two when, at a concerted signal, there resigned from the emergency committee of the convention, Louis C. Fraina, C. E. Ruthenberg, I. E. Ferguson, Maximilian Cohen, S. Elbaum and A. Selakowich, and, from other offices, A. Paul of Queens and Fannie Horowitz. It seems that these members were anxious to have the Communist Party amalgamate with the Communist Labor Party, but that the foreign federations, fearing that they would be outnumbered by the English-speaking members, were very much opposed to the union.
On this same day Dennis Batt, one of the princ.i.p.al leaders of the Communist Party, was jailed.
Moreover, on the 2nd of September the Communist Labor Party--the group that had first met with the Right Wing, and, later on, down stairs on the first floor of the hall on South Ashland Boulevard--a.s.sembled at the I. W. W. Hall at 119 Throop street. This party, heart and soul, is in favor of the propagation of Bolshevism and I. W. W."ism in the United States, and if not completely broken up by the Government, seems destined to become more numerous than either the rapidly disintegrating Socialist Party or the Communist Party, which is princ.i.p.ally made up of foreigners who speak the various Russian languages. The princ.i.p.al leaders of the Communist Labor Party are John Reed, William Bross Lloyd, formerly known as the millionaire Socialist, and Benjamin Gitlow.[H] It seemed likely, too, that Fraina, Ferguson, Ruthenberg and Cohen, prominent "Reds," who resigned from the emergency committee of the Communist Party, would soon be found among the leaders of the Communist Labor Party. At the time of the convention no national organ of the Communist Labor Party had yet begun publication, but "The Voice of Labor," edited by Reed and Gitlow, and "Truth," formerly the Socialist paper of Duluth, were local organs.
Both the Communist Party and the Communist Labor Party are strongly Bolshevist. The Communist Labor Party is decidedly more in favor of the I. W. W. than the Communist Party; but the main differences between these two parties seems to be a matter of race, language, and especially of personal jealousy and dislike among the leaders.
For years the Socialist Party and the Socialist Labor Party have remained separated from each other, so that now, with the two new parties, the Communist Party and the Communist Labor Party, there are four parties of rebels, all plotting a revolution against our National Government, while the great body of the American people sleep and dream.
Quite a number of educated people in the United States, including the editors of some of our leading dailies, seem to think that the remnant of the Socialist Party is not at all a Bolshevist organization and not at all revolutionary in character. They are very much deceived, having let the crafty, deceptive, hypocritical leaders of the Right Wing fool them badly. The Left Wingers have indeed been much more open in admitting their intentions to overthrow our government by force of arms.
They are dangerous, but perhaps not nearly so much so as the slippery "Yellows," cunning weasels of the imported Russian Hillquit type, who, though they do not talk as openly as the "Reds," are spreading their subversive principles on every side, and especially among the less educated cla.s.ses of our people, into whose minds they instil the spirit of hatred between employers and employees, while at the same time encouraging strikes, wherever they can, with the hope of overthrowing our Government when conditions become sufficiently critical. Both parties of the Socialists and both parties of the Communists, along with the I. W. W., are all revolutionary in the strictest sense, and the sooner the American people wake up to the fact and take some intelligent action to stamp them out, the better it will be. It is not yet too late, but soon may be.
The Bolshevist Socialists of Russia and the two new parties of Socialists that at Chicago in September, 1919, seceded from the mother party, have all adopted the name, "Communist," which "The Call," New York, July 24, 1919, informs us was used by Marx and Engels, the founders of modern Socialism, adding that though the name is somewhat confusing, inasmuch as the word has another and a distinct meaning in English, still, "wherever it is used it means revolutionary Socialists as distinguished from Social patriots and mere parliamentary Socialists." Is this definition an alibi for Hillquit and Berger?
Many persons have hastily a.s.sumed that the main reason why the Left and Right Wings of the Socialists fought each other like cats and dogs was that the Right Wing members of the party are opposed to Bolshevism. This is nonsense. The Socialist papers of the country, Right and Left, with the possible exception of the once powerful "Appeal to Reason," which in recent years has fallen into great discredit among Socialists because it favored our entrance into the World War--have been and still are advocating Bolshevism every day. If anyone has any doubt, let him read any of the rebel sheets.
The Socialist Party of St. Louis, in its appeal for party unity, published in "The Call," July 19, 1919, informs us that the Socialist Party is whole-heartedly with the Russian Bolshevists and their cause:
"Promptly, and notwithstanding all obstacles and persecution, the Socialist party hurried to the front in defense of the cause of our Russian Comrades. Ma.s.s meetings were held, demonstrations in behalf of Soviet Russia were arranged, our Socialist press gave all possible support to counteract the sinister work of the American capitalist press."
Eugene V. Debs, many times the presidential candidate of the Socialists and the idol of "Reds" and "Yellows" alike, has all along been an ardent Bolshevist. Listen to these words of his in his article, "The Day of the People," published in many Socialist papers in the early part of 1919, and taken by us from the March number of "Party News," the official organ of the Socialist Party of Philadelphia:
"In Russia and Germany our valiant Comrades are leading the proletarian revolution, which knows no race, no color, no s.e.x and no boundary lines. They are setting the heroic example for world-wide emulation. Let us, like them, scorn and repudiate the cowardly compromisers within our ranks, challenge and defy the robber-cla.s.s power, and fight it out on that line to victory or death!
"From the crown of my head to the soles of my feet I am Bolshevik, and am proud of it."
The report of the Right Wing majority of the old National Executive Committee of the Socialist Party, made to the National Emergency Convention, and here quoted from "The Call," September 3, 1919, contains the following defense of their Bolshevism, against the aspersions of the Left Wing leaders who had challenged the committee"s att.i.tude toward Russia:
"Ever since the revolution in Russia, the party has hailed it as the first great gift of the International. At every meeting of the National Executive Committee held since the second revolution in Russia [the revolution which put Lenine and Trotzky in power] the committee has issued some ringing declaration in favor of the workers" and peasants" government in Russia....
"Rarely has a meeting been held under party auspices that our speakers have not taken advantage of it to present the claims and achievements of the Russian revolution. The party"s position may be easily ascertained by consulting the party bulletins and the party press."
The Executive Committeemen who signed this defense of the committee"s Bolshevist complexion were Victor L. Berger, Seymour Stedman, James Oneal, A. Shiplacoff, Dan Hogan, John M. Work, Frederick Krafft and George H. Goebel. These, with Morris Hillquit, were the men who had violently expelled or suspended tens of thousands of members of the party without warrant of the party Const.i.tution and without granting a trial or the right of self-defense to those thus dealt with; who had maintained themselves in office after July 1, 1919, in express violation of the party Const.i.tution, having suppressed announcement of the result of the referendum vote by the rank and file to elect executive committeemen, by which vote Left Wing committeemen had been elected, as the report to the National Emergency Convention of the Right Wing committee appointed to investigate this referendum had to acknowledge; and who, by these devices and a similar high-handedness committed by themselves and friendly delegates had seized control of the National Emergency Convention and organized it in their own interest.
In their report to the convention they further defended themselves against the Left Wing charge that this majority of the Executive Committee had allied itself with the Berne Conference. Under this head the above-mentioned committeemen say:
"While no definite date may be set for the beginning of the present party dissension, it is certain that they began to be generally noticeable in January of this year [1919], when the National Executive Committee elected delegates to the Berne Conference owing to the fact that the delegates elected by referendum could not serve, and the a.s.sembling of the Berne Conference in March made necessary the election of delegates by the National Executive Committee.
"The so-called Left Wing members of the National Executive Committee partic.i.p.ated in the election, nominating and voting for candidates. None of their nominees were elected, and shortly after the election an organized attack was made against the international delegates by the Left Wing....
"The National Executive Committee, in session, decided that if our delegates arrived at Berne in time and the conference failed to take the position of the party on war and imperialism, we were to withdraw with any other elements favoring a genuine working-cla.s.s International. It was agreed that we would not affiliate with any International that excluded the Russian Comrades, who were fighting world imperialism, or the Comrades opposed to the Ebert-Scheidemann regime in Germany.
"Before our delegates could leave the country, the National Executive Committee learned that the Berne Conference had failed to respond to its opportunity.... Learning this, the National Executive Committee decided to send one delegate abroad to impart information to the Comrades in Europe, informing them of our att.i.tude on international questions."[I]....
"Yet, despite all this, a systematic campaign of falsehood has been waged against the party by a faction within the party. This faction has falsely claimed that the party is allied with the Berne Conference.... They have denounced the party and its officials as an organization of "Scheidemanns" and "Noskes," a.s.serting that if the party were intrusted with public power it would murder our own Comrades with machine guns and hand grenades....
"These slanders have been accompanied with a similar propaganda regarding Russia. The party and its officials, especially the members of the National Executive Committee, have been charged with being "Kolchaks" and "counter-revolutionists," the implication being that the party has been committed to counter-revolution in Russia, allied intervention, and support of Kolchak in Siberia.
"As in the case of Germany, so in the case of Russia, the National Executive Committee and the party in general have opposed intervention in Russia or support of Kolchak and have supported the Russian Comrades at the head of the Soviet power against a campaign of international lying.
"There has never been a single utterance of the National Executive Committee quoted by the Left Wing to support these slanders. The Comrades may rest a.s.sured that this faction would quote the National Executive Committee if it could."
It is technically true that the Left Wing writers were not able to quote the Executive Committee as such; but they could and did quote the dominating leaders of the Right Wing majority of the Executive Committee, Hillquit and Berger, through their organs, the "Call" and "Leader"--"The Call" as characterizing the Bolsheviki as "anarchists"
and Berger as proclaiming his solidarity with the Mensheviki--and we have nowhere seen any evidence that these leaders could purge the record of these charges. That these leaders _were_ the Executive Committee, to all intents and purposes, seems abundantly shown by their ruthless use of it to smash the party, going so far as to cast out nearly two-thirds of the entire party membership to get rid of their accusers, the Left Wing leaders.
This scandal and disaster to a cause they pretended to serve are logical outcomes of a double hypocrisy--an effort to fool the voting public and our Government officials by a pretense of moderation in papers and electioneering speeches, while at the same time fooling the dues-paying rank and file of their party with expressions of loyalty to radicalism.
The significant facts in estimating the revolutionary character of the American Socialist Party, as recruited and indoctrinated by its double-faced leaders are two: the fact that as lately as September, 1919, some 70,000 of their pupils graduated into the open course of revolutionary violence adopted by the Communist Party of America and the Communist Labor Party, and the fact that the more manageable 40,000 remaining with these leaders were so much like their seceding Comrades that their leaders were compelled to defend their own radicalism in the fashion above shown, and were also compelled, as we shall soon see, to take an open stand for revolution and I. W. W."ism in order to keep even the remnant of the party from deserting them.
Thus a serious mistake has been made by the many who fancy that the "Yellow" Socialists--Hillquit"s Right Wing which still const.i.tutes the Socialist Party of America--are not plotters who work for a revolution to overthrow our Government. Of course they are, and any one who has read the Socialist papers and publications, even to a very limited degree, may easily see that these alleged "moderates" appear such only in contrast with the more rabid "Red" rebels of the Left; and that the one object of Right and Left alike is to stir up discontent and foment hatred of cla.s.s against cla.s.s precisely in order that a rebellion may some day break out.
True it is that the crafty leaders of the Right do not act as imprudently as the hot-headed leaders of the Left, for they fear lest rashness should precipitate them in a premature and unsuccessful outbreak; yet they are sowing the seed of revolution as certainly as are the Communists, and perhaps with much more success, because they proceed more prudently. Once in a while, when they are off their guard, the "cat escapes from the bag." As an example we quote from an article that appeared in the May Day, 1919, issue of "The Call," the paper founded and controlled by Hillquit, the foxy leader of the Rights:
"The world revolution, dreamed of as a thing of the distant future, has become a live reality, rising from the graves of the murdered millions and the misery and suffering of the surviving millions. It has taken form, it strikes forward, borne on by the despair of the ma.s.ses and the shining example of the martyrs. Its spread is irrepressible. The bridges are burnt behind the old capitalist society and its path is forever cut off. Capitalist society is bankrupt, and the only salvation of humanity lies in the uprising of the ma.s.ses, in the victory of the Socialist revolution, in the revolutionary forces of Socialism.
"The World War, which is now about to be officially closed, has slid into a condition neither war nor peace. However the war of nations has been followed by the war of the cla.s.ses. The cla.s.s struggle is no longer fought by resolutions and demonstrations.
Threateningly it marches through the streets of the great cities for life or death."
Yet the Right Wing papers, on the whole, are much more reserved than those of the Left. As an example of the openness with which the Left Wing or Communist papers instigate rebellion, a quotation from "The Communist," Chicago, April 1, 1919, will interest the reader:
"The Communist Propaganda League of Chicago came into existence on November 7, 1918, first anniversary of the Russian Soviet Socialist Republic, and the very day of the German Revolution.