The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1927-07-30
By KAETHE DUNCKER
(Berlin)

the war enthusiasts of the Central Committee of the
Party took it out Of her hands. She led the wo-
mems conferences which from 1900 on bannually
preceded the Congress of the Social Democratic Par
ty The pamphlets which she wrote during this pc
Rod, have mostly had their origin from speeches
made at such women's conferences.
But, with all this, we have only touched upon a
part of her work Clara ZetElin was not only the
leader of the proetarian womens movement, but
she took prominent part in the general Party
struggle From 1892 EDWARDS she attended the Party
congresses first delegate and then from 1873
on as a member of the highest Party body, the Con-
troll Commission And, has already been men
toned she belonged from the beginning to the rev.
dictionary Marxist wing of the Party
In the nineties of the last century the develop
ment began in the social democratic party which
was completed by the world war. The party of the
proletarian revolution became petty-bourgeois par
ty of refornism the theology Of the class struggle
was pressed to side by the iddeology OF indus
trial peace coalition and industrial democracy. The
international social democracy exposed itself as the
national party for the defense of the fatherland.
But this radical change of front took place slowly
and at first mperceptbly. The right wing, Volmar,
Bernstein, David, Heine Schippel, attempted to al
ter the attitude of the Party to the bourgeois state
Thus the criticism of militarism weakened, the
colonial policy ratified, the ratification of the
budget justified etc. In short, the way was being
prepared for the coalition policy to follow later.
Unfortunately the Party did not realize how dan
gerous these beginnings were. At the end of the
nineties Bernstein still opposed by the whole
Party. At that time even Kautsky fought against
the man who was trying to undermine revolutionary
Marxism. But ten years later the reformist wing
of the Party had grown tremendously in power.
The worst thing of all that the previous critics
under the leadership of Kautsky took up mandatory
"centrist" policy. During the whole period Clara
Zetkin fought tireessly upon the extreme left wing
of the Party She opposed Bernstein in 1898, she
condemned the deviation in the debate upon mlitar-
ism, she attacked those who had voted for the bud
get, and declared herself in favor of the strike
as revolutionary weapon. When Kautsky became
"tame," Clara Zetkin belonged together with Rosa
Luxembourg and Mehrng to the little group of Gin
corrigible" lefts who did not even hesitate on the
4th of August, 1914.
After the outbreak of the world war, Comrade
Clara Zetkn the first to attempt to restore the
broken connections with the comrades in other coun
Conference in Berne at which she unfortunately
could not be present as she was given no passport
and was watched closely in her home in Stuttgart
The distribution of the manifesto of Berne cost her
several months Of preventative detention Together
with Rosa Luxembourg and Franz Mehring she is
sued the first and only number of the international"
which was able to appear in Germany during the
Bund to the Communist Party and the Third Inter
national.
We glad that the brave old fighter has had
the good fortune to be witness and collaboration
in the work of building up Socialism in the Soviet
Union. May she be witness of the victory of
Communism in Germany!