The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1934-09-29
DESCRIBES BIRTH
OF PARTY DURING
TIME OF REVOLT
Communist Candidate for Governor of New York
Writes About Palmer Raids-Stresses Need
Of UprOoting Left Sectarianism

/ lean workers, was another point OF
dispute. These were only symptoms
Of the infantile sickness from which
our Party suffered, as discussed by
Lenin in his famous pamphlet.
When as a result of the Palmer
raids in January, 1920, the Com
munists were driven underground,
this sickness manifested itself in a
more fundamental form. AS a re-
suit of the raids the membership of
the two Communist parties dropped
to about one-fifth Of their original
number. Deportation Of a large
number of foreign-born comrades;
the dropping away of many more;
the disconnection of large numbers
from the organizing centers, owing
to the illegality Of the party, caused
deep cut in the membership of
the Party.
Isolated Membership
The membership that remained
had in the main little contact with
the basic mass organizations of the
American working class. A certain
section Of the membership and lead
ership theorized this sectarianisn
into a revolutionary policy" The
masses of the workers at that time
were, and still are, organized into
the American Federation of Labor
and other reformist unions. Not
understand the necessity of CLOSE
contact with the workers in the
shops and the refornist unions"
the two Communist parties. and
particularly the Communist Party,
advocated smashing the A 2. CT
L." and supporting the L w. w.
This was a serious deviation of a
cleft" character, since the reformist
unions had the bulk of the organ
lied workers, and the theology of
the I.W.W. in this respect was
similar to that of the Communist
Party-that of sectarianism, but in
herited in this case from Daniel De
Leon.
The decision of the Party con-
vention at Bridgeman in 1921 was
quickly rectifled by the Communist
International. But decisions do not
Immediately change theology. The
young Communist Party and its
leadership were filled with such
hatred of the refornist leaders
Gompers, Lewis g. Co-that they
could not distinguish the rank and
file of the A. F. of L. from the
treacherous leaders, who during the
war had given full support to the
Wilson war policies. The hatred of
the young Communists for the lead
ership of the Socialist Party-Hill-
quit, Berger, etc.-waS on par
with that for the A. F. of L. lead
ers. Therefore it came as a matter
Of revolutionary logic" that sup
port should be given to the building
of the I. w. w. and it's militant
policy as against the A. F. of l..
Left sickness
The Socialist party is party
chiefly for parliamentary action,
and even today expects to go into
power on the crest of a wave of
votes. 1t hopes and proposes to es-
tablish Socialism as a result of
majority vote and the peaceful sur
render of power by the capitalists.
The revulsion to this anti-revolu-
tionary policy was an anti-parlia-
mentarian tendency with the Com
munist Party Only the revolution
airy overthrow Of capitalism and
the capitalist state and the estab-
lishment of the Proletarisn Dicta-
torship will lay the basis for build
ing Socialism. The young Com
munist Party could not understand
the role o revolutionary parliament
erism-the election campaign, the
election of candidates, the function
of these elected Communists in ex-
posing capitalism within the legisla-
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