The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1924-12-10


serve for a political advantage OF
some comrades, but it certainly will
not serve our party, which must find
it's mistakes, if there are any, state
them clearly and openly and try to
avoid them in the future
Now the question arises: What hap
pened with the sentiment and the
movement for independent political
action? The majority answers blunt
ly: Mr.. LaFollette came along and
swallowed II up or absorbed IT," The
majority goes even further and as
sures us that "the masses Of the work
ers and the poor farmers follow the
lead of the LaFollette movement
Well, and what must we do about it?
The majority practically says: Let
them 90. We say: No!
We say to these masses: The La
Toilette movement is not movement
in the interests of your class. You
must organize yourself as a class po-
litically into your own class mass
party which will fight your battles.
But the majority is not SO foolish
as to say to the LaFollette movement
openly and directly: I'VE wish you
good luck! Grow and prospect" No,
they propose to put up against the
LaFollette party the Workers Party
And they think that here they have
discovered and proposed something
entirely new, something unheard Of.
We always thought that it is our
Communist duty to put up always and
everywhere the Workers Party
against all other political parties, in
Guiding labor parties, farmer-labor
parties, or socialist parties, ETC., but
it seems that the majority did not
think that way. They thought that IL
we raise the slogan "for a farmer-la-
Dor party" we must forget about the
Workers Party. 1t seems that they
had been working under this wrong
and dangerous conception when they
stood and worked for the farmer-labor
party during last summer.
No, there is nothing new in their
proposal to put up the Workers
Party against the LaFollette party.
This is our Communist duty, which
we must not forget for a single mo-
ment, if we want to remain Commu-
nists. There are certain fundamen-
tails in the Communist movement
which we must learn by heart, remem-
Der them and fight for them always.
We cannot make any compromises on
them, and one Of these fundamentals
is, that for us the Communist Party
is first, last and all the time" An
other: revolution versus reformism. .
Third: "Soviets versus parliaments."
Fourth: Communism versus capital
ISM" These fundamentals are as old
as the Communist movement itself.
We do not have to repeat them in
our theses every two or three months.
The majority, by repeating this long
ago accepted duty of every comrade.
only tries to avoid the real question
of the controversy and wants to APP
pear before the membership as the
only real patriots and protectors of
our party. you see, we are putting
forth the Workers Party, and they
are proposing something else, so they
are not Communists at ALL" Such
tactics in the Communist Party will
not work.
The real controversial question is
not "the Workers Party versus the
LaFollette party" 1t is a question, by
what means and slogans can we
strengthen the Workers Party, bring
it into contact with the widest mass
es of workers, so that we would be
in position to propagate to them
the Communist ideas and lead them
forward towards the proletarian revo-
luton.
The comrades of the majority them
selves admit that the masses Of the
workers and poor farmers are not yet
ready to accept the leadership of and
to give their support to the Workers
Party" that they follow the lead of
the LaFollette movement" Now the
question arises: How and by what
slogans can we get these masses
away from the leadership Of the La
Toilette movement and bring them
nearer to the Workers Party? The
saying that we propose to them the
acceptance Of the Workers Party and,
further, that we will invite them to
join the Workers Party is no answer
to this question. The authors Of the
majority theses themselves admit
that the masses "are not yet ready to
accept the leadership of the Work
ers Party" BY raising the slogan
for farmer-labor party" whion is
much easier for the masses to digest
at the present time, we, the Workers
Party, and under the name Of the
Workers Party Immediately advance
to them and acquaint them with the
leadership Of the Workers Party.
They will Immediately see that we
are trying to approach them and
point out to them a way. Not pro-
posing to them any practical slogan