proof of the incorrectness of the tactics that we regard as correct! It is only a matter of their being revolutionary parties there like the Bolsheviki or the German Spartacides. If there is such a party then everything can become quite different. It is particularly necessary: (1) That the deciding center of the struggle lies outside Parliament (strikes, uprisings and other kinds of mass action); (2) that the activities in Parliament be combined with this struggle: (3) that the deputies also perform illegal work: (4) that they act for the Central Committee and subject to its orders: (5) that they do not heed the parliamen tary forms in their acts (have no fear of direct clashes with the bourgeois majority, "talk past it," etc.) The matter of taking part in the election at a given time, during a given electoral campaign, depends upon a whole string of concrete circumstances which, in each country, must be particularly considered at each given time. The Russian Bolsheviki were for boycotting the elections for the first Imperial Duma in 1906. And these same persons were for taking part in the elections of the second Imperial Duma, when it had been shown that the bourgeois agrarian power would still rule in Russia for many a year. In the year 1918, before the election for the German National Assembly, one section of the Spartacides was for taking part in the elections, the other section was against it. But the party of the Spartacides remained a unified Communist Party. In principle we cannot renounce the utilization of the parliamentarism. The party of the Russian Bolshevik declared, in the spring of 1918, at its seventh congress, when it was already in power, in a special resolution, that the Russian Communists, in case the bourgeois democracy in Russia, through a peculiar combination of circumstances, should once more get the upper hand, could be compelled to return to the utilization of bourgeois parliamentarism. Room for manoeuvring is also to be allowed in this respect. The comrades' principle efforts are to consist in the work of mobilizing the masses; establishing the party, organizing their own groups in the unions and capturing them; organizing Soviets in the course of the struggle; leading the mass struggle; agitation for the revolution among the masses all this is of first line importance; parliamentary action and participation in electoral campaigns only as one of the helps in this work no more. Insists Upon Unity of Communists - If this is so and it undoubtedly is so then it is a matter of course that it doesn't pay to split into those factions that are of different opinions only about this, now secondary, question. The practice of parliamentary prostitution was so disgusting that even the best comrades have prejudices in this question. These ought to be overcome in the course of the revolutionary struggle. Therefore, we urgently appeal to all groups and organizations, which are carrying on a real struggle for the Soviets, and call upon them to unite firmly, even despite the lack of agreement on this question. All those who are for the Soviets and the proletarian dictatorship wish to unite as soon as possible and form a unified Communist Party. With Communist greetings President of the Executive Committee of the Communist International September 1, 1919. Printed in German Communist papers, reprinted in the Socialist paper the "New Yorker Volkszeitung" of January 4th. See New York "Times" of January 25. SECRET INTERNATIONAL COMMUNIST CONGRESS AT AMSTERDAM In February it was disclosed in the paper "Algemeen Handelsbad" that there had recently been at Amsterdam a secret meeting of the International Communist Congress which is arranging for revolutionary Communist action all over the world. Holland was selected by Lenin for the gathering because in that country reaction was weak and communication with other countries casy. The expenses were to be met by contributions by each country, but the Soviet government at once placed at the disposal of the Congress diamonds, pearls and other precious stones to the value of 20,000,000 rubles. A resolution was carried to the effect that revolutionary action was necessary to compel capital to make peace with Russia and so have the Soviet regime and hasten the world revolution. Com munists should, therefore, take advantage of every strike movement and every mass demonstration to promote their objects. An international strike should be organized in opposition to intervention in Russia; this demonstration to be supplemented by coercive strikes. It was expressly resolved that it was the duty of the Bureau to support every strike and revolutionary movement and that the 20,000,000 rubles be devoted to this object. The Dutch chairman of the Netherlands Federation of Transport Workers, Bouwman, who, with Sneevliet, both of them Syndicalists, is leading the dock strike at Amsterdam and Rotterdam, declared that the independent trade unionists did not want intensive production, which would only help to maintain capitalism. It was resolved that the Bureau be instructed to see (1) to the dissemination of literature, (2) to propaganda, (3) to the financing of all movements and strikes of a revolutionary character, and that branches be established in North America and Eastern Asia, the latter to carry on operations in British India and in the Dutch East Indies. Miss Pankhurst and Mr. John Thomas Murphy were among those who represented England at the Congress, the latter insisted that trusted men should be sent among the trade unions in order to install revolutionary sentiments and detach the men from their leaders. (Reported in "Political Review," March 5, 1920.) The secret meetings were mostly held in the house of the leader of the Dutch Communists, Wijnkcop. Beside the representatives of England there were delegates from America, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, India, Russia and Hungary. A number of foreigners were arrested and expelled. The manifesto that was issued speaks of the spring offense of the Soviet government against Poland, with a view to breaking through to Germany and also forecasts the revolutionary outbreak in Germany itself, which had long been planned in co-operation with Russia. “The Red army," it says, "is coming to free the proletariat of Poland and as the army approaches Holland workmen must join in like brethren further they must force capitalism to make peace with the Soviets and thus hasten the world revolution. . If the revolution breaks out in Russia or elsewhere the international proletariat must be ready for a general strike, especially transport workers in America, England, France and Italy. Every three months the countries where sub-bureaus are established, including Mexico and Spain, are to send a representative to Holland. This attempt to establish a base for the Third International outside of Russia is said to be placed by Lenin, in charge of an agent named Rutgers, sent from Russia to Holland. An elaborate service is being established of spies, press agents, financial agents, courier service, reports, propagandisers among trade unions and in the army, a bureau for false passports, etc. MANIFESTO OF THE THIRD (Moscow) COMMUNIST INTERNA TIONAL To the Proletariat of All Lands: Seventy-two years have gone by since the Communist Party of the World proclaimed its program in form of the manifesto written by the greatest teachers of the proletarian revolution, Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. Even at that early time, when Communism had scarcely come into the arena of conflict, it was hounded by the lies, hatred and calumny of the possessing classes, who rightly suspected in it their mortal enemy. During these seven decades Communism has traveled a hard road; storms of ascent followed by periods of sharp decline; successes, but also severe defeats. In spite of all, the development at bottom went the way forecast by the Manifesto of the Communist Party. The epoch of the last decisive battle came later than the apostles of the social revolution expected and wished. But it has come. We Communists, representatives of the revolutionary proletariat of the different countries of Europe, America and Asia, assembled in Soviet Moscow, feel and consider ourselves followers and fulfillers of the program proclaimed seventy-two years ago. It is our task now to sum up the practical revolutionary expense of the working class, to cleanse the movement of its admixtures of opportunism and social patriotism, and to gather together the forces of all the true revolutionary proletarian parties in order to further and hasten the complete victory of the communist revolution. I For a long span of years Socialism predicted the inevitableness of the imperialistic war; it perceived the essential cause of this war in the insatiable greed of the possessing classes in both camps of capitalist nations. Two years before the outbreak of the war, at the Congress of Basle, the responsible Socialist leaders of all countries branded Imperialism as the instigator of the coming war, and menaced the bourgeoisie with the threat of the Socialist revolution the retaliation of the proletariat for the crimes of militarism. Now, after the experience of five years, after history has disclosed the predatory lust of Germany, and has unmasked the no less criminal deeds on the part of the Allies, the State Socialists of the Entente nations, together with their governments, again and again unmask the deposed German kaiser. And the German social patriots, who in August, 1914, proclaimed the diplomatic White Book of the Hohenzollern as the holiest gospel of the people, today, in vulgar sycophancy, join themselves with the Socialists of the Entente lands to accuse as arch-criminal the deposed German monarchy which they formerly served as slaves. In this way they hope to erase the memory of their own guilt and to gain the good will of the victors. But alongside the dethroned dynasties of the Romanoffs, Hohenzollerns, and Hapsburgs, and the capitalistic cliques of these lands, the rulers of France, England, Italy and the United States stand revealed in the light of unfolding events and diplomatic disclosures in their immeasurable vileness. The contradictions of the capitalist system were converted by the war into beastly torments of hunger and cold, epidemics and moral savagery, for all mankind. Hereby also the academic quarrel in Socialism over the theory of increasing misery, and also of the undermining of capitalism through Socialism, is now finally determined. Statisticians and teachers of the theory of reconciliation of these contradictions have endeavored for decades. to gather together from all corners of the earth real and apparent facts which evidence the increasing well-being of the working class. To-day abyssmal misery is before our eyes, social as well as physiological, in all its shocking reality. Finance-capital, which threw mankind into the abyss of war, has itself suffered catastrophic changes during the course of the war. The dependence of paper money upon the material basis of production was completely destroyed. More and more losing its significance as a medium and regulator of capitalistic commodity circulation, paper money becomes merely a means of exploitation, robbery, of military-economic oppression. The complete deterioration of paper money now reflects the general deadly crisis of capitalist commodity exchange. |