Norwich bulletin., 1921-06-27
DICTATORSHIP DISCUSSED
 AT SOCIALIST CONVENTION

Detroit June 26-Seized with what Morris Hillquit described as a ''homicidal mania the socialist national conven- tion today killed three resolutions which sought in varying terms to define "dic- tatorship by the proletariat'' as part of socialist policy and then overwhelmed TWO others which asserted the dictator ship is not at this time an issue. A ses- sion which lasted for three and half hours in a sweltering hall ended with all reference to working class dictation barred from the party policy.
 The fight against inclusion of the dic- tatorship was waged by Morris Hillquit. Victor Berger. Algernon Lee and Cam l eron King of California They branded 1t as inseparably linked in American minds with the red terror in Russia. and declared it was useless to fix policy which never would be called into play | unless. in some distant future, a socialist revolution takes place.
 "Why dictate in 1921 what our grand | children shall do in 19S0," Berger ask l ker, while King declared. The terror is | inseparable from dictatorship of the pro letariat. You have got to have the ter TOT to put 1t over"
 | J. Louis Engdahl and William F. Kruse, left wing communists from Chi- 1 cago, offered two resolutions asserting | the rights of the working classes to sci up a dictatorship to insure the success | of a socialist revolution and the duty not to permit anything to stand in the way of their being the ruling class" Ono resolution received only four votes and | the second eight.
 Hilluuit offered a substitute which de fined the dictatorship as 'the politica rule of the working class in the perioC transition from the capitalist system to the socialist order" and added:
 Tt is not necessarily associated witt
 restraint of the political rights rs @
 porents or Yifh violence or terror"
 The New York delegation split an,
 Delegates Orr and Solomon both urge
 the death of all the proposals. We hay
 tried to pour holy water over the tern
 dictatorship of the proletariat " Or
 said We have tried to make t kosher
 The soviets will laugh at us fl we adop
 this resolution. The communists vii
 laugh. We will be the laughing stocl of the world"
 The Hlllquit plan was defeated IS t
 2c
 The fight was eniivened when victo Berger attacked the communists withi the party and both Kruse and Engdaf 1 replied.
 The communists issued circulars |
 Milwaukee las April advising the work ? CTS not to vote because the revoiutio l was coming May l." Berger said. "The were going to rise in all their grandeu l and overthrow the existing order. An
 on May it rained SO they postpone
 their revolution and set the date fo I May (. And on May a policeman al
 rested two Of them for throwing hand l bills on the street in violation 5f a cit
 ordinance. The revolution never ha
 taken placer
 "Engdahl and Kruse. the opponents s communist. do not belong to the prol' = tarist. They are in the 'salarIat' Twin of the money received from the sociali { party. Engdahl has fastened himself c
 our party. where he doesn't belong
 am willing for him to have a comuluni . party and write all the nice red articl, t he wants to. but do not want him s sabotage our party from within. and thi T is what he is trying to do" ,. Tn an impassioned reply Engdahl d
 clared the two and a half" information l. al of Vienna which had been ''held up , e model of conservative socialism hs s adopted the dictatorship of the prol > tariat as part of its policy.
 "As for the communists" he said ~
 will fight for our rights. we will fig n for working class rule. we will fight f '1 the freedom of our prisoners but V t vii not fight for them. as 100 per cer > Americans We will fight for them on
 under the red flag of international s n ciallsm."