The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1924-07-30

exception Of quite rare moments of
direct civil war, when it may be
necessary to fight with arms against
workers on the counter-revolutionar
side; although l may say, from the ex-
perience of the Russian Revolution,
that even at such extreme moments
we succeeded in carrying out the
united front from the bottom. At the
moment when Kerensky was marching
on Petrograd, we mobilised the masses
from the ranks of the social-revolu-
tionary party, against the orders of
their own government, and got them
to fight shoulder to shoulder with us.
The united front from the bottom is
always appropriate, because it gives
the facility for the actual mobilization
of all the really revolutionary work
ers.
United front from the bottom as
well as from the top. This is another
matter, and it arises fairly frequently;
not always, but fairly frequently, in
those countries where we are in the
minority. l believe that no one even
of the extreme left" will deny that
in countries like England, Austria,
Belgium, where we have a small
minority, the tactics of the united
front from the top and from the
bottom should be applied, of course,
with all the safeguards and guarantees
against it being appried opportunist-
ically, and to apply them as a method
of agitation and mobilization of tie
masses, and not as method of poll
teal coalition with the social democ-
racy.
The third case is that of the united
front from the top only. Here, / be-
lieve, we must say: Never!
Unfortunately, this method was all
too frequently applied in practice. 1t
was SO easy to write an open letter to
the social democrats to conduct long
and protracted negotiations with the
leaders over the question of pro-
gramme. This was the line of least
resistance.
Consequently, this question we may
sum up as follows: United front from
the bottom-nearly always; united
front from the top-fairly frequently,
and with all the necessary guarantees
as to the tactics of mobilization that
would facilitate the revolutionising of
the masses; united front from the top
alone-neVer!
(Radek Hear! HearD
Even Radek says; Hear, hear. Now
what were the actual developments?
At the Fourth Congress the resolution
of the Workers Government was
adopted. Here again l must frankly
admit-and revolutionary comrades
should always admit mistakes-that
some mistakes we're made in the draft
ing of this resolution, too many con-
cessions were made to the right,
which were Immediately taken ad-
vantage of by the right" as meaning
political concession. l allude to the
following sentence in the resolution
of the Fourth Congress on the Work
ers' Government which l drew up:
'In opposition to both open or
masked bourgeois-social democratic
coalition, the Communists may put
up the united front of all the toiling
masses, and coalition of all labour
parties both in the economic and
political field, for the fight against
the power of the bourgeoisie, and
for it's final overthrow. AS a result
of the combined fight of all the
workers against the bourgeoisie,
the whole machinery of State must
pass into the hands of the Workers
Government and by this the domi-
nation and power of the working
class must be consolidated"
On "compromises."
/ remember how the commission
worked. l will not say that all the
good paragraphs come from me, and