Chapter III: Part 3

I think we have to get at the facts as they exist. And my own feeling and the thing that I was impressed with was, again, the teachings of Lenin wherein he proclaimed that never did any autocracy willingly yield up its power. Never did any tyranny willingly yield up its power, and that necessarily any group who sought to obtain political power under those circumstances would be confronted with solving a problem of force and violence. They would be met with force and they would have to answer it with force.

Mr. VELDE. That substantiates the testimony that Barbara Hartle gave us here last June. I am satisfied.

Mr. DENNETT. I think that is fundamental teaching of the Communist Party, and anyone who reads Lenin’s works very carefully will find that is there.

The point that is germane to us is: Does the United States come in the category that Lenin was speaking of?

Now the Communist Party went through a terrific amount of theoretical argument on this question, and some resolved the question as meaning, yes; the United States comes in that category.

Some questioned whether that were true, and I think that is why you will find a divergence of testimony from different Communists.

Mr. VELDE. I take it then you feel that the methods used in the United States were different than the methods used by the Comintern in other parts of the world, in countries that are now Communist countries.

Mr. DENNETT. I was referring in what I was discussing to the difference between the form of government in the United States and the form of government as exists in other countries, particularly comparing it with old Czarist Russia.

Something most people don’t realize is the extent of the oppression which existed under the old Czar. And it was only natural that people who sought to accomplish a change, after finding that no amount of effort could bring about a rational or reasonable change, finally came to the conclusion the only thing they could do was to eliminate the Czarist regime. That was an autocracy.

Now the question theoretically arises: Does such a situation obtain in the United States? Or is it possible for the people, by legitimate political organization, to bring about the changes that they consider to be desirable?

There was a great dispute raging in the ranks of the Communist Party over that question.

Mr. Jay Lovestone fell by the ax over it. He taught that America was an exceptional situation and that exceptional tactics had to be used in the United States. Because of that he suffered expulsion.

Mr. VELDE. Do you happen to know Jay Lovestone?

Mr. DENNETT. I did not know him. I have read some of his works. Not very much; only what the party said he said.

Mr. VELDE. Of course, Mr. Dennett, you realize that we have had, I think about 100 convictions under the Smith Act whereby various Communist Party leaders were convicted of advocating communism.

Mr. DENNETT. I didn’t know how many.

Mr. VELDE. It may be less or more than that.

Do you know, Mr. Tavenner?

Mr. TAVENNER. 86 or 87, according to my recollection.

Mr. VELDE. And, of course, those trials were held under our American system of jurisprudence.

I am inclined to agree with all the juries involved and all the judges involved that the Communist Party here in the United States of America did advocate the overthrow of our form of government by force and violence, if necessary. I don’t want to appear to be arguing with you.

Mr. DENNETT. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this question with you because I think any general rule is a dangerous thing to lay down. I think that it has to be on the merits of each individual case. That is my own feeling. And I think that that is consistent with our American tradition of jurisprudence, too.

Mr. VELDE. I certainly agree with you on that.

Mr. DENNETT. I have a feeling that it is unwise to make sweeping, uniform applications of the rule. I think they have to be judged on the merits of each particular case. I think that is one of the things that we must fight with all our might and main to preserve.

Mr. TAVENNER. Did you state, with respect to Jay Lovestone, that you thought his group insisted on viewing the aspects of this problem under special circumstances?

Mr. DENNETT. It was known as the theory of exceptionalism.

Mr. TAVENNER. Will you state very briefly what the theory of exceptionalism is?

Mr. DENNETT. The Communist Party taught that the theory and tactics which Lenin taught were universally applicable, that they applied to all countries, they applied to all situations.

Lovestone said, “Yes; except in the United States. Here we have got to do something different.”

Mr. TAVENNER. I was discussing with you the purposes of the Communist Party in infiltrating the unemployment councils which you have described. I handed you, just a few moments ago, a document which was one of those you turned over to the staff. That document discusses the importance of Communist Party cell organizations. I believe it discusses it in very much the same way that you have.

Mr. DENNETT. I think that is where I learned it.

Mr. TAVENNER. What was the source of that document?

Mr. DENNETT. Well, the title of it is: “How the Communist International Formulates at Present the Problem of Organization.” And the title or the subject was written by a person by the name of B. Vassiliev. He was a high official in the Comintern and was responsible for one of the committees in the executive committee of the Communist International. I do not recall much else about him. And this document doesn’t establish much more. But I believe that the document originally came into my possession while I was an agitprop director, and it was in a mimeographed form. It came from the central committee.

Mr. TAVENNER. Of the Communist Party?

Mr. DENNETT. Of the Communist Party.

It was sending forth to the districts direct information as to the policy which had been laid down by the executive committee of the Communist International, and it was detailed information because many people had been complaining that nowhere was there anything in a detailed form describing organizational methods and practices.

Vassiliev came forth with a document which outlines it, spells it out in every detail. It spells out how to work under illegal conditions, it spells out how to work under legal conditions. It also spells out how to combine legal and illegal work.

This, by the way, for those who have been in the Army, you can readily recognize a similarity of military training with party organization because there is the method of the emphasis upon maintaining communication lines between various parts of the organization at all times, the necessity of having secondary lines of communication in case the primary lines are destroyed. And there is also the question of use of passwords. It is all described. The description of how to use code is also contained here. And I think that some people attach more significance to it than I do for the reason that I saw military organization practice virtually the same things.

Of course, that brings up a subject which may be unpleasant to reflect upon, and I suspect that the average member of the Communist Party is quite unaware of the similarity of his position as a member of the Communist Party to that of a person who is a member of the Armed Forces. He is under discipline. His directions come from above. He has to obey or suffer the consequences.

Mr. TAVENNER. Mr. Chairman, this is a very unusual document. I wish the committee had time right now to go into every phase of Communist Party organization that is referred to in it.

I think all that we can do now is to offer it as an exhibit and have it made a part of the record with the view of giving it more detailed study later. So I offer it in evidence and ask that it be marked “Dennett Exhibit No. 1,” and that it be incorporated in the transcript of the record.

Mr. MOULDER. The exhibit offered in evidence, marked “Dennett Exhibit No. 1” for identification, will be admitted as a part of the record.

DENNETT EXHIBIT NO. 1

HOW THE COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL FORMULATES AT PRESENT THE
PROBLEM OF ORGANIZATION

(By B. Vassiliev)

The Enlarged Presidium of the E. C. C. I. (February 1930), summing
up the international situation, called upon all Communist Parties
to fundamentally change the methods and pace of their work by
concentrating their chief attention on the problems of the
preparation and the carrying out of mass REVOLUTIONARY ACTIONS OF
THE PROLETARIAT--strikes, demonstrations, etc., while at the same
time continuing as far as possible to promote their agitational
and propaganda work. Consequently, in the present conditions, the
Party apparatus, in response to the demands which the direction of
the Comintern puts forward, should in the first place be fitted
for the organization of demonstrations, strikes and other mass
actions of the proletariat. Party leaders who are not capable of
organizing demonstrations and strikes do not answer to the demands
which the circumstances of the class struggle are now placing
before the Communist Parties, and therefore should be replaced by
others who have shown these qualities in the course of the class
battles of the most recent period.

Why did the Enlarged Presidium put the question in this way? The
political resolution of the Enlarged Presidium states that the
growing new economic crisis is hastening the process of upsetting
capitalist stabilization (it has already led to the beginning of
the collapse of capitalist stabilization) and the growth of class
contradictions, thus accelerating the rise of a new revolutionary
wave. The resolution further states that the working class
movement in the period since the 10th Plenum of the E. C. C. I.
had been raised to a higher stage. The revolutionary activity
of the proletarian masses has grown stronger, the fighting
capabilities of the Communist Parties have been heightened.
The whole position of the class struggle has placed before the
Communist Parties and the Communist International as a whole, a
number of new fighting tasks. In the process of the growth of a
new revolutionary upsurge there are present already in certain
capitalist countries elements of a gathering political crisis
and of a revolutionary situation, as for example, in Poland,
Italy, Spain, partly in Rumania, in Yugoslavia, and in Greece.
A deep political crisis is present in China and India, being
the starting point of a revolutionary situation. In Germany the
process of the radicalization of the masses of the working class
is proceeding at a swift pace. In France, another country of
powerful capitalism, the number of strikers grew from 222,000 in
1928 to 431,000 in 1929, whilst these strikes assumed a more and
more clearly expressed political character and were characterized
by the growing tenacity of the workers. In England, in spite
of extraordinary difficult conditions for the growth of a
revolutionary movement, in spite of the extraordinary weakness of
the Communist Party (on the 1st January 1930, 2,800 Party members
and 120 members in the Y. C. L.), the number of strikers in 1929
compared with 1928 grew from 124,000 to 534,000 comprising the
most important sections of industry, such as mining and textiles.

At the same time, the gigantic successes of socialist construction
in the U. S. S. R. are sharpening in the most extreme way the
contradictions between U. S. S. R. and the entire capitalist world
and are forcing the leaders of the capitalist world to strengthen
and hasten to the highest degree their military preparations of
a new armed attack on the U. S. S. R. The 10th Plenum of the E.
C. C. I. showed that the danger of new Imperialist wars and of
new attacks of the imperialists on the U. S. S. R. never was so
imminent from the time of the imperialist war of 1914-18 as it was
at the moment of the 10th Plenum. By March 1930 that danger had
increased still more.

In these conditions of growing economic crisis and heightened
threat of war against the U. S. S. R. all measures will be taken
by the ruling classes of the capitalist countries to guarantee
their rear before declaring war, that is, everything will be done
by them to weaken, disorganize and, as far as possible, liquidate
completely all revolutionary proletarian organizations, and in the
first place the Communist Parties.

Moreover, the elections themselves in illegal Parties must, as
a rule, take place in such a way that even the members of the
conference do not know who is elected on to the Party Committee.
At the present time two methods of electing leading organs in
illegal Parties are practised. The first method. The Party
Conference elects a special commission for counting the votes
cast for candidates for members of the Party Committee. Then the
candidates are named and the election of the Party Committee
proceeds by secret vote. The commission checks the results of the
voting, whilst it does not report to the conference as to the
personnel elected. Another method of election. The conference
elects a narrow commission in which a representative of the higher
Party Committee takes part and this narrow committee elects the
new Party Committee. In strictly illegal Parties, as for example,
the Italiana Communist Party, the latter method of election is
the only one which more or less guarantees strict conspirative
conditions.

Self-criticism of the mistakes of the Party direction in illegal
Parties must also be organized through narrow conferences and
must take place in such a way that the names of the Party leaders
and the functioning of the Party apparatus, do not lose their
conspirative character.

15. QUESTIONS OF COMMUNICATIONS

The most important element of successful working of the Party
Committee--the one on which during the checking of its work the
most serious attention must be concentrated--is the question of
connections of the Party Committee with the higher and lower
Party organizations, especially with the factory cells and the
fractions of the mass non-Party organizations. This question now
has a decisive importance, especially in the legal and semi-legal
Communist Parties. The illegal Communist Parties have already
worked out a whole number of measures and methods in order to
keep their communications with the lower organizations and with
separate members of the Party, in spite of the severest police
repression. But with the legal and semi-legal Parties there is
bad work all the time along this line. In Austria during the
last Fascist rising, the C. C. lost connection with the Vienna
Committee, and the Vienna Committee lost connection with the
enterprises. In Paris on the 6th March 1930, the C. C. lost
connection with the Paris organization for six days. Such a state
of affairs is absolutely impossible and the most important task
of each of our Party organizers, of every instructor going to the
locals to check the work of the Party Committee is above all to
check how the connections between the Party Committee and other
Party organizations are organized, and especially these with the
lower Party organizations, and the factory cells. It is perfectly
clear that the Communist Parties will not be in a position to
organize any mass actions of the Proletariat or mass strikes,
or mass street demonstrations, if the Party Committees at sharp
moments of struggle lose connection with the factory cells and
mass non-Party organizations.

Which are the most important methods of communication it is
essential to foresee? It is essentially important to have a
well-laid out live communication. Live communication is kept going
by the help of the system of so-called appearing or reporting
places. What is a reporting point. A reporting point is this: the
Party Committee establishes special addresses of flats or other
places where on certain days and at certain times representatives
of the cells and fractions of the mass organizations must appear.
There also representatives of the Party Committees appear. The
representative of the cells and fractions makes reports on what
has happened in the factory, what the cell has done, what it
proposes to do and so on, and the representatives of the Party
Committee, having received the report, advises the cell how it
should act, passes on to it the directions of the higher Party
organs and so on. This system of appearing places must without
fail be established in all Parties without exception, legal and
illegal whilst in the legal Parties a double system of reporting
places must without fail be established--a system of legal and
illegal appearing points. Legal reporting places in the legal
premises of the Party Committee and illegal appearing places in
case the legal premises of the Party Committee are closed, or a
police ambush is sitting there, in order quickly to re-establish
connection with the lower Party cell in another way through the
illegal reporting place. For the latter, appearing points should
therefore be prepared beforehand. In Germany, in Belgium, in
France, Party meetings in cafes were at one time very widespread.
This is a very bad habit because there are always spies in cafes
in countless numbers and it is difficult to get rid of them. It
is necessary to go over more quickly to the establishment of
appearing places in safer localities. If the Party has already
more or less seriously and fundamentally gone over to underground
positions, and the shadowing of leading active Party members has
begun, and Party members are being arrested in the streets, then
it is very important that special signals should be established
for the appearing flats, showing; in the first place, the safety
of the flat, second, showing that exactly those people have
come who were expected and that these comrades who have come
are talking with exactly those comrades whom the observer is
coming to see. In order to show that the reporting places are in
working order, in Russian conditions, for example, a flowerpot
was placed in the window, the comrade came, saw that the flowers
are there, knew that it is safe, and entered. It is necessary to
say that these reception signals were very quickly learned by the
police and that they therefore, when visiting any flat, carefully
searched for signals before fixing an ambush. If they saw that
flowers are in the window and the person whom they have come to
arrest has tried by all means possible to take these flowers away,
the police insisted on putting them back in the place where they
were. So, when arranging safety signals for reporting places, it
is necessary to arrange them in such a way that they don’t strike
the eyes of the police and that they can be taken away without
being noticed by the police.

For verifying those who come to the reporting places, a system
of passwords is established. The comrade comes to the reporting
place, and he says some agreed-upon sentence. They answer to that
agreed-on sentence by some other agreed-on sentence. So both
comrades check each other. In Russian underground conditions
very complicated passwords were sometimes used in the central
appearing places. This was called forth by the circumstances that
different workers passed through such reporting places; rank and
file workers from the cells, district and Central Party workers.
Accordingly, one password was fixed for the rank and file worker,
a more complicated one for the district worker and still more
complicated one for the central worker. Why was this necessary? It
was necessary for conspirative reasons, since only certain things
could be said to the rank and file worker while perhaps other
things could be said to the district worker, whilst you could
speak with full frankness about the whole work of the illegal
organization to the representative of the Central Committee.
Therefore, passwords were, as they used to say at that time of
“three degrees of trust.” This was done in this way. The first
degree of trust: a comrade comes and says an agreed-upon sentence
and is replied to by an agreed-upon sentence. The second stage:
the comrade who has come in reply to the agreed-upon sentence
spoken to him, says another agreed-upon sentence, in reply to
which yet another agreed-upon sentence is spoken to him. The third
stage of trust: to the second agreed-upon sentence the comrade
replies by a third agreed-upon sentence. Then the keeper of the
appearing place also replies to the third agreed-upon sentence.

Besides flats for reporting points, connecting link flats are also
needed for communication by letter, and these flats must in no
case coincide. And finally, there must be flats for the sheltering
of illegal comrades, comrades whom the police are looking for;
comrades who have escaped from prison, etc., etc. For all our
legal Communist Parties the question of addresses and flats now
plays a role of the first importance. Last year, on the eve of
the 1st August, when it was clear that the leading workers would
be arrested in a number of countries, comrades did not know where
to go, there were no flats. In any case, when it was necessary to
shelter comrades hiding from the police in Germany, Czechoslovakia
and France very great difficulties occurred, especially in the
provinces. It is essential for all Parties to occupy themselves
now in the most serious way with the solution of the “housing”
problem.

Concerning communications by letter. It is also necessary to give
the most serious attention to the problem of the organization of
letter communications. In checking the work of the Party Committee
it is necessary to consider this question specially: Does the
Party Committee have addresses for communicating by letter with
the higher and lower Party organizations, and how are these
communications put into practice? Now, even for the legal Parties,
the firmest rule must be established that all correspondence
concerning the functioning of the Party apparatus, must without
fail go by special routes guaranteeing letters from being copied
in the post. All kinds of general circulars, general information
reports on the condition of the Party in legal parties can go
through the ordinary post to legal Party addresses, but everything
concerning the functioning of the Party Committee even in legal
Parties, most now without fail go by special routes. In the first
place, the use of special couriers must be foreseen, who will
personally carry letters, not trusting these letters to the State
post. Here the Parties must make use of the connections which they
have with post and telegraph and railway servants, connections
with all kinds of commercial travellers for trading firms and so
on. All these connections must be used in order that without extra
expense responsible Party documents can be transported. Further,
every Party should take care that every letter, apart from whether
it goes through the State post or by courier should be written
in such a way that in case it falls into the hands of the police
it should not give the police a basis for any kind of arrest or
repression against the Party organization.

This makes the following three requisites. The first requisite:
the letter must be in code, i. e., all aspects of illegal work
are referred to by some special phrase or other. For example,
the illegal printing press is called “auntie”; “type” is called
“sugar” and so on. A comrade writes: “auntie asks you without fail
to send her 20-lbs. of sugar;” that will mean that the press is in
need of 20-lbs. of type or a comrade writes: “we are experiencing
great difficulty in finding a suitable flat for our aunt.” That
means that it is a question of finding a flat for the illegal
printing press.

Second requisite: besides a code, as above, ciphers are used,
illegal parts of letters being put not only into code but also
into cipher. There are many different systems of cipher. The
simplest and at the same time most reliable system of cipher is
the system of cipher by the help of a book. Some book or other is
agreed upon beforehand and then the cipher is made in this way:
simple fractions or decimals are ciphered. The first figure of
the first fraction shows the page of the book. Then further comes
the actual cipher. For the numerator of the fraction we must take
a line counting from above or below; for the denominator that
counting from the left or from the right which it is necessary
to put into cipher. For example, we need to put into cipher the
letter “A”. We look in the book and we see that this letter is in
the third line from the top, the fourth letter from the left to
the right. Then we cipher 3 over 4 (3/4), that is the third line
from the top, fourth letter from left to right. You can agree also
on this method; for example, counting the line not from above but
from below, then the 3 will not be the third line from above but
the third line from below. You can agree to count the letter in
the line not from left to right but from right to left. Finally,
for greater complexity in order to keep the sense from the police,
you can also add to the fraction some figure or other. Let us say
the numerator is increased by 3 and the denominator by 4. In this
case in order to decipher, it will be necessary first to subtract
in the numerator and denominator of every fraction. A whole number
of similar complications can be thought out in order to complicate
the cipher. The advantage of such a cipher is that it is not only
very simple but also that each letter can be designated by a
great number of different signs and in such a way that the cipher
designation of the letters are not repeated. The book cipher can
be used without a book. In place of a book some poem or other can
be chosen, learned by heart and the ciphering done according to
it. When it is necessary to cipher or decipher, the poem must be
written out in verses and then the ciphering or deciphering done
and the poem destroyed.

The third requisite which is also recommended should be observed
in correspondence, is writing in chemical inks, that is, with
such inks that it is impossible to read them without special
adaptations. If a secret Party letter falls into the hands of the
police written in invisible ink they must first of all guess that
it is written in invisible ink; the open text of such letters must
be made perfectly blameless, for example, a son is writing to his
mother that he is alive and well and of the good things he wishes
her. Not a word about revolution. The police must guess first
of all that under this apparent innocent text there is a hidden
text. Having discovered this secret the police tumble against the
cipher. If they succeed in deciphering the cipher, they stumble up
against a code and they have still to decipher that code. But all
this takes time in the course of which the police can do nothing.
If the police succeed in reading it in the course of two or three
weeks, then by that time the Party organization has been able to
cover up all the consequences of the question which was written
about in the letter.

What kind of invisible ink should be used? Invisible inks exist
in a very great number. They can be bought in any chemist’s shop.
Finally, comrades must use the latest inventions of chemistry
in this direction. The simplest invisible ink which can be
recommended and which can be found everywhere, is, for example,
onion juice and pure water.

16. PLAN OF WORK OF THE PARTY COMMITTEE

Every Party Committee must have a definite plan of work for the
period immediately ahead. In the conditions of the capitalist
countries Party Committees cannot work out the same complicated
calendar plans as the Party organizations of the C. P. S. U. The
C. P. S. U. is a Party in power, the plans of the C. P. S. U.
regulate the whole social and political life of the country. In
capitalist countries the Communist Parties are the parties of an
oppressed class. The bourgeoisie in power uses the whole apparatus
of the State power and the full help of the Social-Fascist and
other reactionary organizations in order to smash the plans of
the Communist Parties. In these conditions the committees of the
Communist Parties must systematically reconsider and reconstruct
the plans of their work; accordingly, these plans must be very
pliable. But plans there must be, without fail. Every Party
Committee must have an approximate plan of its work for the
period immediately ahead and must group the forces of the Party
organization according to that plan, fit the forms of the Party
structure to it and also the methods of Party work. The essence
of the plan of work of the Party Committee is the adequate
catering for the needs of the masses in the largest enterprises,
playing a more important role in the territory of the given Party
organization. The structure of the local Party organization must
be such that the organizations can above all serve these big
enterprises. That is to say, that in the first place the Party
Committee must interest itself in questions of the work of the
factory cells at these big enterprises, must help in the work of
these factory cells, seeking to attain that these Party cells
should become really strong political and organizational organs
of the Party, that they should be in practice connecting organs
between the Party and the masses of workers at these enterprises.
This idea can best of all be made clear by a concrete example,
say as follows: in a town there are two or three big enterprises;
railway workshops, a metal factory, a textile factory. Besides
these three big enterprises there are two or three dozen small
enterprises, and in addition scattered Party members, individual
workers, artisans, representatives of the so-called liberal
professions,--lawyers, writers, a doctor and so on, as well as a
few students. The Party Committee of this town should interest
itself above all in what is happening in the big enterprises--in
the railway workshops, in the metal factory and the textile
factory, how the factory cells are working there and in the first
place help the factory cells of these enterprises by all and every
means possible, concentrating all their attention and all their
forces on this task. In the lawyer’s office and the doctor’s
surgery there are no masses which the Party must win over and
organize for revolutionary struggle. It is another matter with
the big enterprises. Therefore the central question in the work
of every Party Committee is the question of systematically coming
to the assistance of the factory cells in the big enterprises. A
Party Committee which cannot provide serious daily help to such
factory cells, a Party Committee which cannot organize factory
cells capable of working in the enterprises, is a bad Party
Committee and the leading organs of the Party and the mass of
Party members should hasten to draw from this state of affairs the
necessary conclusions and as quickly as possible make a change so
far as such a Party Committee is concerned.

17. MOBILIZATION OF THE FORCES OF FACTORY CELLS

We must bear in mind with regard to the internal organization of
the work of factory cells that in all countries some members of
the Party working in the enterprises, do not wish to be members
of factory cells and do not wish to carry on Party work in the
factory. For example, in the documents of the Central Committee of
the Czechoslovakian Party on the preparation for the campaign for
the 6th March 1930 there is information from all districts that
when practical questions of the preparation for the demonstration
for the 6th March were put before the meetings of factory cells,
in many factory cells voices were raised to the effect that it was
impossible to do any work in the factory, and at a place called
Laza in Moravia, one responsible worker of a factory cell even put
the question in this way: “If the Party will guarantee material
help after I have been thrown out of the factory for taking
part in the demonstration, but if the Party cannot guarantee my
family and myself then I will not carry on Party work in the
factory.” Such moods among Communists working in the factory are
to be observed on all sides. There are Party members who agree
to pay membership dues, agree to come to a meeting once every
fortnight or once a month, in order to hear a report on the world
proletarian revolution, and vote for the platform of the Comintern
against the liquidators, the Trotskyists and all other renegades,
but are not willing to carry on recruiting work among the workers
of their enterprise, do not wish to prepare strikes in their
own enterprises, do not wish to call out the workers of their
enterprises to demonstrations, and so on. Every Party Committee
has to fight with such Party members in their enterprises. What
should we do with them? The most important task of the Party
committee consists in organizing all Party members working in
enterprises into factory cells and drawing them into the day to
day work of the factory. With regard to Party members who do not
wish to take part in the work of factory cells, the most attentive
and stubborn explanatory work must be carried out. But if somebody
or other all the same, categorically refuses to work in a factory
cell, that comrade must be told that nobody is keeping him in
the party. (The Communist Party is a voluntary organization, but
every worker who voluntarily joins the ranks of the Communist
Party accepts iron party discipline. If that discipline seems
very hard to him, even unbearable, then the Party should not shut
its doors upon him.) In this regard we must bear in mind that
Party members who do not wish to work in factory cells are not
necessarily traitors to the working class. In some organizations
Party workers, proletarians, who have refused to carry out
difficult tasks in their enterprises, have been cleaned out of
the Party as alien elements. There are alien elements in the ranks
of the Communist Party, including direct provocators, agents of
the police and the employers, who specially creep into the Party
for the purpose of carrying on disruptive work in the ranks of the
Party. The Party must strictly observe each one of its members,
verify in the most careful way every suspicious Party member, and
if it is established that he is an alien element and even more a
provocative agent, then of course, there is absolutely no reason
to beat about the bush with him. But in the ranks of the Communist
Parties there are a large number of proletarians who sincerely
sympathize with Communism but who at the same time are not strong
enough to fulfill all the demands of Communist discipline. With
regard to such proletarians, if they are not capable of being
members of the Communist Party there is no need to keep them
in the Communist Party, but at the same time there is no need
to throw them out of the Party like a dirty rag; they must be
organized round the Party as sympathizers as members of non-Party
mass organizations, in the Red Trade Unions, in the I. L. D., the
W. I. R. and so on. In these organizations no such discipline is
demanded as in the ranks of the Communist Party and they can work
here in a suitable manner. At the present stage of development of
the Communist movement, when the Communist Parties are ceasing to
be organizations for propaganda and agitation of the Communist
idea, and are turning into fighting organizations, preparing
and leading revolutionary actions of the proletarian masses
against the organized forces of the employers, police, State and
Social-Fascists, some members of the Party are showing themselves
incapable of fulfilling the new fighting tasks of the Communist
Party. But without doubt such Party members can be useful to the
Party as sympathetic elements, and even as leading active elements
in different mass organizations, as for example, in the ILD,
Tenants’ Organizations, W. I. R., and so on. Factory cells must be
composed of proletarians who are really the advance guard of the
workers of a given enterprise, devoted to the cause of Communism,
ready to carry out the directions of the Party, grudging neither
health nor strength, nor life, not being afraid if Party
interests demand it to carry out such work in the enterprise as
may cause the employer to throw them out of the factory, perhaps
the police to arrest them, and the courts to condemn them to
heavy punishment. In fact, only factory cells composed of such
proletarians can do great revolutionary work even though they
be very small. In one of the mining districts of Czechoslovakia
in 1930 there was such a case. The Social-Democrats organized a
meeting of miners. Only one Communist took part in the meeting.
Different questions which the Social Democrats brought forward
were considered. After a discussion in which the Party member
present at the meeting took the most active part, the meeting
decided to join up in the Red Trade Union. The Czechoslovakian
comrades will remember another case which took place in 1930 in
Prague. When the famous social traitor Vandervelde came there, the
Social-Democrats organized a big meeting at which about 30 active
Party members were present. Vandervelde delivered a long speech
pouring dirty water on the Communist International, the U. S. S.
R., and the Czechoslovakian Communist Party, nevertheless, not
one of the 30 Party members present at the meeting and there were
members of the C. C. amongst them, opened his mouth in protest
against the counter-revolutionary speech of the Social-Fascist
leader. It is perfectly clear that with activists like the
“activists” of the Prague organization, who were present at
Vandervelde’s meeting, the Czechoslovakian proletariat will not
win power but the Communist Party will be a shameful laughing
stock in the eyes of the proletariat and the proletariat, quite
rightly, will not listen to such “activists” and will not support
Party organizations which keep such “activists” in leading Party
work.

18. STREET CELLS

The organization of a factory cell in a big enterprise in the
present conditions is a very difficult affair, demanding very
long and stubborn work by the Party members, both those working
in the enterprise as well as those who are employed elsewhere. It
is the business of the Party Committee to secure the essential
co-ordination of the work of the Communists who are working inside
the enterprise, with that of the Communists who are outside
the boundaries of the enterprise. And here a very important
question presents itself with regard to the form of organization
of Party members who are not workers in enterprises; artisans,
housewives, etc. According to the decisions of the International
Organizational Consultations, and according to the constitution
of the Communist Parties, such Party members are organized in
street cells. But how should these street cells be organized? The
practice of the Parties of the different countries shows that
the street cells are often organized without any plan. Street
cells are organized according to place of residence, those Party
members who live in the territory of a definite district or around
some street or other, being brought into the street cells. But
what should these street cells do? The practice of street cells
in many countries shows that as a rule they meet from time to
time, discuss various general questions, but do not carry on
any practical day to day work. Street cells as a rule come to
life only during big campaigns at the time of various elections,
etc., when they are called upon to distribute leaflets, collect
signatures, canvass flats, etc.

In future Party Committees must see to it that street cells
are constructed so that in their day to day work they should
help the Party Committee to strengthen its connection with the
workers in big enterprises, strengthen the work of factory cells
and so on. This should be the fundamental practical rule for
the organization and work of street cells. At the same time it
must be firmly borne in mind that along with the development of
the class struggle Party Committees must not fail to carry out
changes in the composition and structure of the street cells
which may become necessary, make a re-grouping of the forces of
the members of street cells, in order at a given moment to have
a concentration of forces on the most important sectors of the
front of the class struggle. For example, if some unrest should
arise in a textile factory, the Party Committee must at once
consider the possibility of developing that unrest into a strike
inside the factory. But a strike can only be organized provided
good preparatory work has been carried out. Who must carry it
out? In the first place Party members and sympathizers working in
the textile factory, but on the other hand, the Party Committee
must organize the maximum assistance for these comrades, drawing
on Party members working in other factories, and also members
of street cells. There can be all kinds of combinations here.
For example, it might be advisable and practicable that a Party
member working as a fitter in a metal factory, a member of the
factory cell of the metal factory should apply for a job in the
textile factory where a fitter may be needed. Everything must be
done in order by such means to strengthen the cell of the textile
factory from within. Further, let us suppose that near the textile
factory a street cell is working and that in this street cell
there are, let us say, five more or less weak comrades living
in the district. It is essential to strengthen this street cell
by including in it a number of other comrades who live nearby,
or even at the other end of the town, in order with the help of
this street cell to strengthen the agitation among the workers of
the textile factory on their way to and from work, to strengthen
through this street cell the distribution among the workers of a
textile factory paper, leaflets, and other literature which may
be issued by the Party with the aim of preparing and organizing
a strike, in this textile factory. Let us suppose that after the
strike is finished a movement begins in another factory; the Party
Committee must at once regroup its forces in order to concentrate
them again on another fighting sector of the Party work. And so
all the time. It is impossible to regard the Party structure or
any local organization as something unshakably firm and not liable
to undergo changes. The Party Committee must systematically check
the distribution of members between different cells, check the
expediency of the organization of the cell, carry out regrouping
of the members of the cell in order in each separate case and
at each concrete moment, to concentrate the best forces of the
Party round the most important sectors of the front of the class
struggle. In this lies the fundamental art of the Party organizer.
His general task consists in seeing that every Party member as
well as sympathizer should be constantly drawn into day to day
work, attention being concentrated upon the most important sectors
of the class struggle.

19. SHOCK GROUPS

The practice of the Y. C. L. has recently given rise to the method
of so-called shock groups or brigades. This method of shock
brigades could be usefully carried over into the practice of the
Party. The term “shock brigade” is not in itself very good. Shock
brigades are organized in the factories in the U. S. S. R., the
Communists working in the factories organizing shock groups around
which non-Party workers are gathered. But the Communist Party is
the advance guard of the working class, i. e., it is in itself
_the_ shock group of the working class; to create within this
shock advance guard of the working class yet other shock brigades
is of course at bottom not correct. But this is what IS correct.
In the Party organizations of capitalist countries, numbers of
Party members are not drawn into the everyday work. Every Party
member belongs to a cell, which meets once a fortnight or once a
month, and in between these meetings Party members do not perform
much Party work, in many cases, in fact, have no Party tasks at
all. This happens because in the given cells at the given time,
there is not much internal work, while other sectors of Party work
may at the same moment have important militant tasks before them.
It is for the Party Committee to keep on combining Party members
into different groups for the concentration of forces upon the
most important sectors. Having performed a given task such groups
or brigades are broken up or reconstructed into other groups
for taking up new work. The general aim in creating such groups
should be the strengthening of Party work in the big enterprises
of the most important sections of industry. Here, on this problem
the full attention of the leading Party organs must be sharply
directed in the near future.

20. WORK OF THE FACTORY CELLS IN THE ENTERPRISES

When we approach the study of the work of the factory cells in
capitalist countries we are often struck by the great passivity
of the members of the cell. A further examination of the reasons
for this passivity will reveal, as a rule, a complete ignorance
on the part of the Party members as to what they should do in the
factory in their everyday work. The task of the Party organizer,
his most important task, consists in teaching every Party member
working in the factory what he should do every day. Every Party
member working in the factory should begin with the workshop in
which he is working, organizing the Party work there. He should
first of all find out who his fellow workers in the shop are.
That is his first Party duty. He should establish who is the
Fascist agent in order to know whom to avoid, and in his presence
not talk about Party affairs or carry on Communist agitation;
next he should find out which workers are so narrow-minded that
they are not interested in politics at all, either Communist or
Social-Democratic; he should know which of his neighbors in the
shop is a member of the Social Democratic Party, but still an
honest proletarian, capable of fighting for the interests of the
working class even though against his Party leaders. Finally, what
is specially important, every member of a factory cell should
know which of his neighbors at the bench is revolutionary minded
even though non-Party, and ready to take or has already taken,
active part in strikes and revolutionary demonstrations. When a
Party member working in a workshop has a clear picture of what
each worker there represents, it will be much easier for him
to carry on his everyday work. He will then know whom he is to
avoid, whom he will have to fight, with whom to become acquainted
and establish closer relations with the aim of bringing them
into active revolutionary work. As to the latter, he must have
systematic chats with them in the intervals of work, preferably
during working hours, also on the way to and from work, or
arrange special walks with them in the town on holidays; he must
patiently, unceasingly, from day to day, using every hour, every
minute, agitate them into the spirit of Communism, of course not
in a general abstract way, but on questions of everyday struggle
in the given enterprise and in the given workshop, organizing
them around himself and thus creating a revolutionary kernel in
the shop, and in consequence a workshop factory cell. Next, the
most important everyday task of the comrade in the workshop is to
carry on discussions with the Social-Democratic workers, winning
over the Social-Democratic workers to his side, bringing the
more revolutionary minded of them and members of reformist trade
unions into every kind of action against the employer, against the
Social-Democratic and reformist leaders. His third task should
consist of getting the Fascist agents, police spies, etc., driven
out of the shop and factory. This last task is forgotten most
often of all. However, it is evident that so long as there are
among the workers in the shop police agents who are following
every movement of the revolutionary minded workers, and informing
the boss about their actions every day, it will be very difficult
to organize work in that shop. But if by pressure of the workers
he should succeed in ridding the shop of these agents, Party work
will be greatly facilitated. Among those who should be thrown out
it will now be necessary to include individual Social-Democrats
who show themselves Fascist police agents, but the general line
in relation to Social-Democratic workers must remain, i. e., they
must be drawn into the general class channel of the revolutionary
struggle of the proletariat by means of the organization of the
united front from below.

Thus the foundation of the factory cell must definitely be the
workshop of dept. cell. The general factory cell can work well
only when it has strong support points in the workshops and
separate departments.

21. THE SHOP CELL

The most important task of the shop cell is to concentrate the
non-Party active workers in the shop compactly around itself. To
organize the shop, the dept.--this is the task of the shop cell,
so that every shop of a factory may act as an organized force. How
can this be done? It can be done only provided the shop cell works
on the foundation of the defense of the everyday interests of the
working class, that every Communist in every shop organizes the
mass of the workers of that shop around every question of everyday
struggle of the working class. For example, there is a foreman in
the shop who behaves very roughly to the workers. The cell must
organize the whole mass of the workers around the demand that this
foreman should be dismissed. The cell should create a committee
of action, organize elections of shop stewards who should be
delegate-representatives of all the workers in the shop, in order
to effect the driving out of the foreman. Active Communists among
these shop stewards should form the leading core, but non-Party
workers who are respected by the mass of the workers, should also
be drawn in, including even individual Social-Democratic workers
who have declared their readiness to fight for the removal of this
foreman, in spite of all orders and threats from their leaders. If
the shop cell succeeds in creating such a directing center around
concrete tasks affecting the interests of all the workers of the
factory, then we can say that this shop cell has worked well: it
has become the revolutionary leader of the workers of a given
shop. A cell which is every day closely bound up with the working
masses on questions of the defense of their closest interests
and which enjoys the full confidence of the workers in the cause
of the defense of their interest, will retain that confidence in
the future, in more responsible actions and at most responsible
moments of the struggle for power.

The question of the creation of such support points for
revolutionary class struggle in the shops and also on a general
factory scale is the most important question in the work of our
factory cells. In the first place the question of the so-called
revolutionary shop stewards is bound up with this. This slogan was
issued by the Communist Party of Germany in 1929. At present it is
extremely real for all capitalist countries. Revolutionary shop
stewards--that means those workers elected by the revolutionary
section of the workers of the factory at their workshop of general
factory meetings, who are the organizers of the united front from
below in the struggle for the defense of the closest interests
of the workers of the given factory against the attacks of the
employers and against the leaders of the Social Democratic and
reformist trade unions.