The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1924-12-29
By J. c. oBoLoNsKY

- Ato h1OAAbOAshAP mas " uOSAuS
whittier it is to go-right, or left;
that is, whether it is to work for the
creation of farmerlabor party, OF
whether it is to get busy roofing the
Workers Party into the fertile soil
Of class-struggle on the basis Of the
united front and the immediate burn
ing needs Of the workers. Some
"minorities" propose to work for the
organization of the class-farmer-labor
party. So said Comrade Ruthenberg
in an article entitled els America ripe
for a Labor Party" in the Mod
ern Quarterly: "At this est. Paul
J. o. convention the foundation was
laid (?i) for a class farmer-labor par
ty" and further, 1.-THE building of a
classify political party is not a
matter of few months or even Of a
few years. It may be matter Of an
other five years before there is Great
ed in this country a mass political
party representing the two producing
groups in capitalist society, BUT
SUCH A PARTY is BOUND TO
COME" leaps mine ]. o..
Where is the foundation laid at st.
Paul? If we drop the policy of bluff
and face hard facts then we are bound
to get a different picture of the st.
Paul convention, in the words Of Com
rade Foster:
1.-THE situation at st. Paul was this:
The elections were approaching and
it was absolutely necessary to crys-
tallize the farmer-labor party in order
to make or try to make, cam
paign under its banner. The situation
was difficult, WITH THE LAFOL-
LETTE FORCES SUCKING THE
LIFE OUT OF THE FARMER LA
Dor MOVEMENT. Consequently the
&c. E. c. made extreme efforts to hang
on to the disappearing masses. In
some respects it's policy verged into
IOPPORTUNISM. THIS MUST BE
ADMITTED" In true Marxian-Lenin-
ist light THIS is a correct analysis of
what occurred at st. Paul. Foresee-
ing such foundation" the Comm
tern was thousand times correct, as
against the minority of three on the
&c. E. C. when it instructed our weak
party to drop the dead ballast AND
go ITS WAY. 1t takes courage to
admit mistakes, but Lenin always had
it and its high time that our young
leadership become also in this sense
fully Leninists. So much for st. Paul.
Now as to the building of "class"
farmer-labor party; the logical infer
ence to be drawn from Comrade
Ruthenberg's statement that farmer
labor party is bound to come, in other
words-it is inevitable, and more than
that-in FIVE years or so. The in
ference is-get on the job and start
organizing it. Five years is very
small interval of time and if we don't
get busy at once it may be too late.
This is another fundamental mis-
conception of the forces operating in
the class-struggle in America. 1t is
rather bold to assert at this time that
a farmer-labor party will be created
in five years, as 1t is in general in
correct to assert that the coming in
to being of the labor party in America
is inevitable. At least such utterances
need unmistakeable proof and such is
still Forthcoming from the minority
quarters.
AS angry as we may be at that pet
ty-bourgeois Messiah LaFollette, yet 1t
is only common sense and frankness
to admit that the farmer-labor move
ment-whateve there was of it that
counted-has been most effectively
and completely swallowed up by the
LaFollette movement.
Most of the wild fights of the minor
ity abstract and pure theorists rotate
about their inability to root" their
thinking in the objective conditions Of
our present activities as a Communist
Party. Simon pure stubbornness is dis.
guised as virtue and desire is mis-.
taken for conditions.
They swing in a truly pendulum
style. They jump from extreme to ex-
IRENE. The group that was so left
sick" and paralyzed in 1920 that when
it issued leaflet to the Brooklyn car
strikers it issued to them a slogan
ito arms" now swung so far to the
!. right that it makes a cut-and-dry d.
vision between economic and political
activities OF the working-class
Identifies political activities OF the
working-class with the farmer.
labor party ALONE, considers
the farmer-labor party the ONLY ex-
preston of the united front tactic on
the political arena and let's the Work
ers Party appear as bystander and
not as an active participant in the
struggle.
The minority conception calls back
to life the feebleness developed in our
movement thru the necessity to work
underground Cts negative phase and
expressiOn). Contact with workers