The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1924-12-06
VARIOUS FORMS OF THE UNITED FRONT

have no slogans Of For a Farmer-La-
Dor Party" they have therefore "aban-
doned the united 'front.'?
Our Own United Front Experience.
But it is not necessary to go across
the ocean to see various forms of the
united front without trace OF farmer
labor party. In our own experience
we have them. Our great defense
campaign after the Michigan raids was
very successful application of the
united front tactic, it was a political
united 'front.'. and it was not only sue
cessful in it's immediate aims but it
also brought great political advantages
to our party. Our campaign for relief
Of the Russian famine was another
united front that modified great
masses under our leadership, accom-
plished specific aims, and brought un-
measured political gains, with a sue
cess that was almost spectacular. Our
campaign for the protection of the
foreign-born workers was another
very successful united front effort,
adding greatly to the prestige of our
party, widening our contacts, and
bringing new circles Of workers under
our influence. In all of these, the
most successful of our efforts in the
line of the united front, there was
nothing Of a farmer-labor party, yet
all were political in nature.
The campaigns above mentioned
were successful. They achieved some
measure of practical success, and all
the gains that came out of them were
gains for the working class and for
the Workers Party Our farmer-labor
campaign, however, altho we succeed
cd by great effort in drawing political
gains from it, was not such an I'M
qualified success. The farmer-labor
parties that we were instrumental in
building, so we soon found in July,
1924, we had been building for La
toilette and not for the class strug.
gle.
Why should that particular appli-
cation of the united front, the labor
party phase of it, which was the least
'uccessful in its practical and organ
,zational aspects, be taken by. the mi
1ority as the only form Of the united
'front.' on the political field? Why
10 they ignore and belittle our other
experiences in applying the political
Inited front? 1t is because their case
S so weak, their effort to breathe life
into dead slogan is so hopeless, they
are so completely without concrete
evidence OF actual conditions that
Justify their slogan Of For a Farmer
Labor Party" that they are forced to
muster as their only weapons the gen
eral arguments and authority for the
united front and then, arbitrarily, as
sert that every argument for the unit
ed front is an argument for the labor
party.
The minority is wrong. Their at
tempts to revise the theory Of the
united front are doomed to failure.
The labor party movement as distinct
from both the w. P. on the one hand
and the LaFollette movement on, the
other, is dead, but the united front
tactic lives in all it's multitude and
variety Of forms, all Of them rich in
political opportunity for the Commu-
nists Of America once we have welded
our party into a firm, homogeneous.
monolithic party, realistically apprais-
ing the actual conditions OF the class
struggle. and participating in every
battle of the workers on the basis of
their immediate burning issues.