The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1931-07-14
PARTY LIFE
mittee, Communist Party, U. S. A.
Does the Party Go on Ice in
the Summer!
BY t. YAKovLEv New York;

OUR Party press devoted sufficient space to
" the justified criticism of the Party men,
bers who become active after p. IN. But our
Party press has neglected completely another
quite numerous group of Party members who
consider that summer is not the appropriate
time for doing Party work. I do not have in
view those who are leaving the city to work in
the country during the summer. Nor do I have
in mind the women who, under the pretext
that their more or less aged children need the
air of the seashore or mountains and take leave
of absence for two three months. Some of
them take transfers, which, in the end, is
nothing more but a summer rest from Party
work.
1 have in view those who remain in the city
but lay down on the job, especially on week
ends. Then the lure of the country is so great
that nothing can compel them to resist the
temptation. While such an attitude is i'm
permissible on the part of the so-called rank
and file members, more severe condemnation is
deserved by those members who are in the
leadership.
OF late, in our Section 5, we had two glar-
ing examples when the "cau of nature greatly
interfered with our Party work. In accordance
with instructions from the district, we called
conference to discuss the achievements and
shortcomings (mostly of the latter of the last
three months plan. AS our section has 80 units
and we could expect an attendance Of $50 func
tionaries, the Section Committee decided to
call the Plenum for Sunday, June 81. We fig
ured that if we would call the meeting for an
evening there would not be sufficient time left
for discussion.
To our great surprise, regardless of the fact
that the conference was well announced, less
than half of the functionaries showed up. One
unit (No. 23( did not have single buro mem
Der present Six organizers Gid not show up.
Less than half of the organization secretaries,
agitprops and T. u U. L. directors of the units
attended This was in the morning. After the
recess, the attendance dropped considerably and
out of the $50 functionaries that should have
attended only 40 we're present.
The other example is the meeting of organ
ization secretaries which is held once a month
and where at the last meeting half of the Or
ganization Secretaries did not show up
This demonstrates that the Organization Sec
retaries do not understand their functions
They are the ones that are to check up
on the activities Of the members of their
respective units, attendance at meetings of such
q nature included How they present
charges against members of their units for non
attendance when they themselves are guilty on
the same charges2 Besides by their failure to
show up, they miss an opportunity to adjust all
the minor shortcomings the Understanding
from, and there are plenty of them.
With the advance of summer the attendance
dropped. 1t is remarkable that the attendance
of the units dropped to lesser extent than the
attendance of the different meetings Of unit
functionaries called by the respective heads of
the section departments: agitprop, TU.UL,
women, etc. The call of nature is so great
that it suppresses the call of the Party. II
seems this is an acquired habit. And no matter
what good plans the Section Committee works
out, what excellent weekly letters we send out,
without the personal contact with the unit func-
tionaries these plans will remain on paper For
this reason the Party press should start cam
paign for carrying on Party work all year long,
II months during the year, and not lie down
all activities for May-September