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From Labor Action, Vol. 13 No. 52, 26 December 1949, p. 3.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’ Callaghan for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line (ETOL).
The Conference On Democracy In Education, called for the weekend of December 17–18, has been forcibly postponed. The authorities at New York University where the conference was to be held, reversed themselves and denied the conference use of its facilities the day before the conference was to convene.
This decision, which is in itself a violation of democracy in education was made following a petition by an insignificant reactionary sect called Youth Division of Common Cause. The Common Cause youth have no more than a dozen members on the New York campus (even this is a generous figure); nevertheless, they had a favorable audience in the NYU authorities with their slanderous attacks against the conference.
The day following this setback, the executive committee for the conference met to make future plans. It was unanimously agreed that the conference would be held; that the attempt of campus reactionaries and their friends in the school administration would not be allowed to bring about the disintegration of the movement which began several months ago.
From one important point of view the postponement of the conference can be used to serve a constructive purpose. It will afford the conference the opportunity to go far outside the limited list of clubs and campuses now sponsoring the conference. To date there are no more than eight out of approximately thirty-five New York area campuses represented.
At the executive committee meeting following the postponement of the conference members from the organized anti-Stalinist bloc pressed for the complete reorganization of the conference: organizing new pre-conference planning meetings and electing a new executive committee. This position was motivated by the democratic conviction that, in order to appeal to additional campuses and clubs not represented to date, it would be necessary to start from scratch. The conference has been smeared as being merely a Stalinist front/ it was pointed out, and the only way to destroy this misconception is to offer the campus organizations the chance to reorganize the conference via new pre-conference planning meetings and the election of a new executive committee.
The Stalinists on the present executive committee vigorously opposed this proposal. They were afraid that if there are new elections for an executive committee on the basis of widely representative planning meetings, they would lose much of the influence they now have in the setup. Also, it would mean that the conference would have to be postponed for about a month to six weeks, which would afford the anti-Stalinists a chance to rally their forces before the conference. The Stalinist strategy therefore is to have the same executive committee plan the conference and to hold the conference soon, thereby insuring a sizable if not a major portion of the delegates at the conference voting pro-Stalinist.
This Stalinist strategy should have been obvious to the most naive and inexperienced. But the speakers from the anti-Stalinist caucus had little effect on the non-Stalinists on the executive committee, who succumbed to the demagogic Stalinist argument that for the sake of efficiency the present committee was adequate. The democratic proposal was defeated.
Several days before the scheduled date of the postponed conference a caucus meeting of the anti-Stalinist students was held, attended by approximately 40 student delegates from the New York Student Federation, Students for Democratic Action, AVC, campus political organizations, etc. Agreement was reached on resolutions and strategy.
The caucus was a model of the way liberals and socialists can act together on immediate issues and against the totalitarian Stalinists. A steering committee elected at the caucus has been functioning well. Immediately following the above reported meeting of the executive committee, the anti-Stalinist steering committee met and decided to organize a citywide caucus meeting for December 23.
In preparation for this meeting a statement was drawn up which will be sent to many anti-Stalinist campus organizations who have not as yet joined the list of conference sponsors, asking them to join the conference AND the anti-Stalinist caucus at the same time. It was made clear to these clubs in the statement that they cannot fight the Stalinists by staying put of action in which Stalinists participate, but, on the contrary, they are obligated to fight them from within such conferences. It was further pointed out that all progressive, anti-Stalinists are doubly obligated to make a head-on fight against the Stalinists as there is NOW in existence a democratic caucus which is fighting the Stalinists for control of the conference and Which will be seriously limited if other liberal and socialist clubs do not come to their assistance.
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Last updated: 8 March 2023