Max Shachtman
Archive
Marxist Writers’
Archives
Source: New Militant, Vol. II No. 19, 16 May 1936, p. 4.
Transcribed/Marked up: Einde O’Callaghan for the Marxists’ Internet Archive.
Whatever else a critic may say about Mr. Browder, he cannot justly accuse him of the vice popularly known as “author’s pride.” Quite the contrary. If Browder errs to any side in the evaluation of his past writings, it is to the side of humility. What are we saying – humility? No, downright self-effacement. In any case, so it appears.
Three of his works are before us. The earliest one, The Meaning of Social Fascism, we will call No. 1, to simplify all references to it. His book late last year, Communism in the United States, we will call No. II and his latest volume, What Is Communism? – No. III.
If you look through No. III you will find no gratified reference to the ideas so recently developed in No. II, both of which simply fail even to mention No. I. The latest volume shyly notes the fact that “his previous book, Communism in the United States, was a collection of official reports, articles, speeches and pamphlets, brought together over a period of three years. It had all the shortcomings inevitable with such a form. The present book is, in contrast, a single work” (p. vii). Not another word: what was defective in No. II was merely its form – a candid confession which meets the strictest requirements of that “Bolshevik self-criticism” so vehemently insisted on in Browder’s encyclicals to the flock.
A closer comparison of the two, however, reveals that Browder has done more than simply abandoned an old form. Indeed, it requires a high degree of nonchalance to designate what he did abandon as just a “form.” For Browder’s joy with his new book is really of the kind described by the old Restoration playwright, William Wycherley: “Next to the pleasure of making a new mistress is that of being rid of an old one, and of all old debts.” In the brief few months between No. II and No. III Browder has effaced everything he wrote and stood for a year ago. And in putting forward his latest ideas, he places himself essentially upon the discredited platform of the Second International which, fortunately, the best Socialist elements are now abandoning.
What Browder has succeeded in doing in his latest volume is to give up entirely internationalism for the sake of national patriotism, the Leninist position on the struggle against war for the social-patriotic position, the Marxian concept of the class struggle for the reformist concept of class collaboration. In passing, he has dumped overboard a dozen other views which he held virtually until yesterday. Let us compare notes!
The principal stress in the tactics of the Stalinists, especially since the Seventh Congress of the C.I., is now laid on the united front with the Socialist Party, to the point where the C.P. even proposes the fusion of the two organizations into one party. A united front with the S.P. even at the price of completely recasting the American League Against War and Fascism. A united front with the S.P. for the purpose of launching a Farmer-Labor Party. A united front with the S.P. on any and every question.
Now, the united working class front against capitalism is neither a new idea nor a poor one, and we who were not among the last to discover its merits will not be found among its opponents today. But in all the years during which we found it necessary to combat Stalinist opposition to the united front, we never forgot that such a front has meaning and value to the working class only if these questions are answered: with whom? against whom? for what? till when?
Browder doesn’t always say quite clearly just what the united front will really look like and do. But for that he makes it entirely clear that he wants the united front with the S.P. like a dying man wants life. He falls all over himself in his anxiety; he fawns on the S.P.; he praises it and especially its Left wing; he cozens and wheedles it in every key on the scale; he means it no harm but is interested only in its welfare. A few quotations from No. III will suffice to indicate his position.
“The differences between us are growing smaller.” (p. 103)
“Communists, when they propose the united front, do not desire the defeat of the Socialist Party, as the Old Guard claims. Communists do not want a weak Socialist Party which is no asset to the working class. They urge Socialists to join the struggle for the united front because it will strengthen both the S.P. and the C.P. and thus strengthen the working class.” (p. 111)
Can nobler sentiments be found in any contemporary political work? Browder, who, you might imagine, has work enough building his own party, is nevertheless concerned also with building the S.P. Unlike Cain, he not only wants to be his brother’s keeper, but his nurse as well. Weaken the S.P.? Perish the thought! Nothing but a powerful and mighty Socialist Party will satisfy him, and he is determined to help build it despite any reluctance or suspicion it may display. And he not only wants to strengthen the S.P. in general, but its leadership in particular.
“If the militant Socialists come out boldly for the united front, then their party, which deeply desires the united front, will rally around them, and they will be able to multiply the strength of the S.P. many-fold.” (p. 110)
Only the strongest physical effort enables us to overcome the emotions stirred in a reader by this touching sign of unselfishness and prodigality. But the recollection of what Browder said not so long ago is enough to restore the pulse and heartbeat to normal. For Browder not only wrote on the same subject before, but wrote words of a diametrically opposite kind.
“When we speak of the Socialists as Social-Fascists,” he wrote in Work No. I – in No. III, as the reader will surmise, the phrase Social-Fascism simply cannot be found – “we are not merely abusing them [not merely!], we are giving the scientific description, the name of the political role which they are performing ... Socialists in words, Fascists in deeds! That is what Social-Fascism means. It is an accurate, scientific, descriptive term applied to the Socialist Party.” (pp. 14f.)
At that time Browder was not so worried about the S.P. not being strong. In fact, his worries were of a different order altogether, because, thought he, the S.P. was being built up. And by whom?
“The bourgeoisie is definitely building up the Socialist Party because it knows that in the coming great class struggles in America it is going to need the S.P. ... When the S.P. does not exist, the capitalist class has to bring it into existence and that is what is is doing in the United States today ... the building of the S.P. is so directly the business of the capitalists and not of the workers, this is the determining reason why the Socialist Party has such leaders as Norman Thomas. The capitalists, if they are going to build the party, are going to be sure they have a reliable man at the head of it ... Especially will it grow and become a menace in this country if we Communists are not active and well armed in the struggle against it.” (pp. 40f.)
One can only conclude, from comparing Browder’s two positions, that the C.P. decided to pick up the job of building the S.P. where the capitalist class left off. Once, the bourgeoisie knew that “in the coming great class struggles in America it is going to need the S.P.”; now, the C.P. needs it.
Objection may be raised that because in 1933, when Work No. I was presented, the S.P. was different from the S.P. of today, a different analysis was warranted. Granted. But Work No. II was presented in 1935, and a second printing of it appeared as late as September of that year, without a single word or footnote to qualify its contents. That is, it appeared more than a year after the Detroit convention of the S.P. where the Left wing gained control. And here is what No. II has to say about what it calls the “crisis among the social-Fascists.”
“In this crisis,” wrote Browder a brief few months ago, “the social-Fascist leadership finds it necessary to invent new means to keep the workers fooled and under their control. For this purpose, they are beginning, wherever the situation gets too hot for them, to establish a division of labor – one part of them becomes the ‘Right wing,’ which carries through the dirty work of the direct sell-out; the other part becomes a ‘Left wing’ which mildly deplores the necessity of submitting to the sell-out ...” (p. 62)
And again:
“No, it is clear, unity behind these gentlemen [Norman Thomas and S.P. leaders] means a united surrender to the capitalist attacks. That is not the kind of unity the workers need. We need a united fighting front of the workers against the capitalists and all their agents. But that means that unity must be built up, not with these leaders on their present policies, but against them. That means not a united front from the top, but a united front built up by the workers from below in the organization and struggle for their immediate needs.” (p. 52)
Enough has been quoted to indicate that Mr. Browder has slightly modified his views about the Socialist Party. A few months ago, mention of the S.P. was enough to make him rage like Vesuvius on a rampage; now you’d think that butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth. Not so long ago, the bourgeoisie didn’t want a weak S.P.; now Browder doesn’t want one. Not so long ago, the split in the S.P. represented a clever trick, a division of labor among the social-Fascists to facilitate the selling out of the workers; now Browder lies awake nights thinking of how best to help the Left wing strengthen itself with its followers in the S.P. A few months ago, he wanted nothing less than a united front from below against Norman Thomas and the other leaders of the S.P.; now only a united front with them will do.
Why does Browder gush with honey like the rock in Horeb that gushed with water when Moses struck it with his rod? Because he has been instructed to cajole the S.P. into cooperating with the Stalinists to organize the American “People’s Front” which, according to Browder, is to be accomplished by “federating the trade unions and all other mass organizations of the toilers into a wide Farmer-Labor Party representing a coalition of all the people prepared to resist the attacks of capitalism” (p. 114).
“Such a party cannot arise spontaneously. It must be led and organized by a united front coalition of the most advanced sections of the toiling masses.” (pp. 114f.)
The most advanced sections means: S.P. and C.P. And for the Stalinists, as we shall see even more clearly further on, the S.P. is an indispensable ingredient of this “united front coalition” which is to lead and organize the “coalition of all the people.”
“We Communists,” Browder writes, still on the same page, “would be delighted if we could bring millions immediately behind our own program and our party. But we are realists. [Hear, hear!] We know that these masses have as yet not had that necessary experience which will bring them solidly behind our leadership.”
Therefore, the Farmer-Labor Party. Let us dwell a moment on the sense of these few lines.
What experience is, logically, necessary for the masses before they come solidly behind a (presumably) correct program and a (presumably) communist party? An experience that would be tantamount to disillusionment with all other parties and all other programs. What Browder is saying, therefore, is this: We have the correct program and party. The masses don’t yet support our party and won’t for some time to come. They must first find out that the other parties and their programs are worthless. Consequently, let us build a Farmer-Labor party for these inexperienced masses. Its conduct, its record – we know – will be such that it will provide the masses with that “necessary experience” required before they “delight” us with support of the C.P. and its program. To put the matter thus bluntly, would reveal the ludicrousness of any attempt made nowadays by revolutionists to initiate a reformist party. Browder, who cannot put the matter so plainly, is therefore compelled to paint a glowing picture of what his “People’s Front” Farmer-Labor party would be capable of doing. The picture glows because it has so many colors; and all of them clash so harshly that it is impossible to achieve the slightest bit of clarity.
“We Communists have proposed a Farmer-Labor Party, which will fight for all the necessary demands of the toilers.” (p. 107)
“It must be emphasized that only one thing can stop the advance of Fascism in our country, and that is, the building of a powerful people’s anti-Fascist front, given an organized expression in a Farmer-Labor Party.” (pp. 107f.)
“Through the united front of a fighting Farmer-Labor Party, we will protect our rights now and prepare the workers for socialism.” (p. 111)
“It is the only bulwark against economic catastrophe, against political reaction and Fascism, against the growing danger of another war.” (p. 125)
“It [a F.-L.P. government] could fight against the economic chaos of the capitalist system.” (p. 125)
“Our perspective of a united front government is one of an instrument of struggle against capitalism, of the collaboration of all anti-Fascist parties and groups, against reaction and Fascism, and for the interests of the entire working population.” (pp. 126f.) (Our emphasis throughout – M.S.)
Now, it is our contention that any party possessing the properties and virtues that Browder attributed to his Farmer-Labor Party, is good enough for the working class. Its existence would obviate the need of any other working class political organization. Browder does say that the government of this party “will not be able to introduce socialism, which can only be done through a real revolutionary government” (p. 125); but he doesn’t bother to say or show why the F.L.P. government could not meet the final test. According to him, the party of his heart’s desire could fight for “all the necessary demands” of the toilers; it can stop Fascism – the only thing that can stop it; it is the only bulwark against imperialist war; it can contend against the economic chaos of capitalism; it can protect our rights now.
If it can accomplish all these things – and they are hardly trifles – then why in heaven’s name can’t it also usher in socialism itself? Is there one single example in the history of the international labor movement of a political party that was able to defend the daily interests and rights of the masses as successfully as Browder says his Farmer-Labor Party will, that was not equally able to emancipate the masses from all bondage? We know of none and we are ready for enlightenment. We do, however, know something about the British Labour Party ...
Let us try the Browder puzzle from another angle. “Such a [Farmer-Labor] party, while not having the program of the proletarian revolution and of socialism, would necessarily have to fight on the most important issues of the day.” (p. 121) Assuming that it would not be “neutral” in the fight between the two classes in modern society, we conclude that it would fight out these issues on the side of the workers. Yet, Browder points out, “such a party could be neither Socialist nor Communist, but it also could be neither anti-Socialist nor anti-Communist; it could be a genuine [1] anti-capitalist party” (p. 107); and, remember, it “will not be able to introduce socialism.” Well, it will “fight for all the necessary demands of the toilers.”
And when it comes to power and forms a government, as Browder says it should and will? Then the “communists will support such a united front government so long as it really uses its powers to protect and extend the economic and political rights of the masses. We are even prepared under certain conditions [which?] for practical participation in such a government” (p. 125). But a few pages back we are informed that among the other virtues of the F.-L.P. is the fact that it “would bring the masses face to face with the problem of state power, and therefore with all the problems of revolution” (pp. 120f.). Very good, very commendable.
Now picture the situation in the concrete, however distressing this may be for the many-volumed author. The F.-L.P. takes over the government, legally and peacefully. The C.P. supports the government – even enters it “under certain conditions.” The government brings the masses face to face with the problem of state power and all the problems of revolution. It cannot solve any of these problems because Browder forbids it the right or ability to provide the only solution of such a problem: “to introduce socialism.” The problems of state power and revolution can (may we assume?) be solved only by the Communist Party when (may we further assume?) it gains the support of that “majority [who] were preparing themselves for a final decision as between capitalism and socialism” (p. 126). Now, when the C.P. gains this majority and is ready for the revolutionary solution, is the “united people’s front Farmer-Labor Party government” to be overthrown and its place by what Browder calls the “real revolutionary government, a Soviet government of workers and other toilers? If this is the idea, how will the C.P. overthrow a government which “communists will support”? Enlightenment, please!
Or perhaps the Browder idea is a different one. The F.-L.P. government is not Socialist, not Communist, nor can it introduce socialism. A “real revolutionary government” can. Is the latter, then, to come into power without the violent overthrow of the “united front” government? The only other way known to man is to come to power by voting the preceding regime out of power. Consequently, the transference of power from a non-socialist regime to a socialist regime, of the means of production and exchange from the hands of its present possessors into the hands of the proletariat, would occur peacefully and legally. Thus would be realized the most dearly cherished dream of Karl Kautsky, Ramsay MacDonald and Abraham Cahan. But a few pages further, our happiness at the prospect of so entrancing and painless a solution of the class struggle is discourteously shattered by the same Browder:
“History does not show a single example in which state power was transferred from one class to another by peaceful means, whether in the form of voting or some other method of formal democracy.” (pp. 165f.)
Again, enlightenment, please!
Let us try one last time. The “people’s government” would come out of a “coalition movement of all liberals, progressives, Socialists and Communists” (p. 123). But this government “should not be confused with the Soviet government of the victorious proletarian revolution, composed of an alliance of Communists, left-Socialists and other groups which had jointly participated in the overthrow of the capitalists” (p. 126). If the composition of the two governments (the latter would directly follow the former) is compared, the only visible difference seems to be that the “Soviet government” would be identical with the “people’s government” except that it would not contain the “liberals and progressives” – unless (God knows!) they are to be included among the “other groups.” Now, is it the idea of Browder, who does not know a single example of the peaceful transference of power, that a violent revolution will have to be undertaken to get a few liberals and progressives out of the “people’s government” in order to convert it into a “Soviet government”? Isn’t it much more likely that no violence at all would be needed? Then, faced with Browder’s fascinating scheme, all the liberals and progressives and Socialists and Communists would laugh themselves to death, thus leaving the General Secretary in such complete control of state power that he would not even have to shoot off a water pistol?
We can hardly wait to see Browder’s “People’s Front” come to full bloom. But then, we really don’t need to wait. In what essential respect could it differ from the late “Iron Front” in Germany, or the People’s Fronts in France and Spain? In the lands mentioned, they served and serve as dikes against the proletarian revolution. In the United States, it could serve only as a hindrance to the rising class consciousness and class independence of the workers.
Browder has, of course, no illusions about the imminence of a “People’s Front Government” in the United States, however wistfully he may yearn for the role of a respectable statesman. He is interested in more tangible and immediate matters. His “government” may have to wait; the formation of of his “People’s Front Farmer- Labor Party” and the corralling of the Socialist Party into it, cannot wait. And it cannot wait because the Stalinists cannot afford to let the S.P. continue further along the road of revolutionary proletarian socialism which it has begun to tread.
The “People’s Front” is the Stalinist formula for subordinating the working class movement to capitalist democracy in the name of a “struggle against Fascism” and the “defense of the Soviet Union.” It is the formula which sanctifies the most despicable practices of social- patriotism and class-collaboration. Neither of these is fully realizable if any appreciable section of the working class movement retains its class independence and revolutionary integrity. It is for the purpose of eradicating every particle of these qualities in the Socialist Party that Browder woos it so ardently.
What Browder hopes to achieve by his courtship in concrete terms of American working class policies, is clearly enough revealed in other sections of his book. The anxiety to get the support of the S.P., to consummate a “united front” with it, can be fully understood only in connection with Browder’s views on such questions as bourgeois democracy, the contest between Roosevelt and the Liberty League, patriotism, the “defense of the Soviet Union,” and the approaching world war. These questions require the detailed treatment which only another article will allow.
1. Bythe way, what in the name of good common English and good commonsense is a genuine anti-capitalist party which is “neither Socialist norCommunist”
Max Shachtman Archive |
Marxist Writers’ Archives |
Last updated on 4 May 2018