Jacques Dudos On The Revision Of Mar»

Ouse again Marxism has proved

working-class movement .and

itself the unfailing “guide to action’ for the
its allies in the struggle for democratic progress.

Jacques’ Duclos: one of the outstanding leaders of the Communist Party of France, has
recently replied to the argument raised in that country that French Communists should
follow the example of the Communists in the United States and dissolve their party.
Published in the monthly magazine of the French Party to inform its readers on the
question of “the dissolution of the Communist Party in the United States,’’ the article
brought forward questions of fundamental importance to the world labor movement.

A substantial number of LPP members have
enquired as to the validity of Comrade Duclos’
criticism .of the American party and the bearing
of his article upon our own party’s work. Some
have mistakenly assumed that everything in the
resolution adopted by the National-Committee of
the Communist Political Association of the Uni-

_ted States as a result of Duclos’ article applies to

Canada also. Because of these facts the National
executive of the Labor-Progressive Party studied
and discussed the questions raised in Comrade
Duclos’ article and subjected our Pparty’s recent
activities to critical re-examination. In this ar-
ticle I shall reply to the various questions ad-
dressed to me on this subject in the light of our
executive discussions and the Opinions at which
we collectively arrived.

Si iB HE conclusion drawn by Comrade Duclos

from his study of the development of the
policy of the Communist movement in the United
States was that the dissolution of the Communist
Party had been a mistake. His conclusions as to
the source of that mistake were:

@ That Comrade Browder had erroneously
interpreted the Teheran Agreement, a document
of a diplomatic character, as a platform of class
peace in the post war period.

@ That Comrade Browder had developed
“a false concept of the ways of social evolution
in general, and in the first place the social evolu-
tion of the United States.” °

@ That Comrade Browder had erroneously
assumed that the class relationships achieved in
the heat of the struggle to defeat Hitlerite Ger-
many could be maintained after the war and that
monopoly-capitalism would voluntarily adopt
policies of class and international cooperation at
home and abroad. .

@ That, as a result of the foregoing, Com-
rade Browder had distorted the postwar perspec-
tive; painting an idyllic picture of class peace and
progress without struggle not in accord with
realities.

@ That Comrade Browder’s analysis and

proposals constitute ‘‘a notorious revision of
Marxism.”

Comrade Duclos noted that no member of
the party in the United States excepting Comrade
Foster had opposed the errors. Comrade Foster’s
criticism, directed against Browder’s first elabora-
tion of “‘the new course” was rejected by the Na-
tional Board and did not become public until
mentioned by Duclos. ;

Study of Comrade Browder’s speeches and
writings in the light of the Duclos article shows
~that he did interpret the Teheran Accord as a
platform of class peace. He anticipated agree-
ment between monopoly capital and labor as to
what constitutes the true national interest—with

P.A.

PEOPLE’S VOICE FOR PROGRESS

“suaees Susunevaeanenyegeaeuccaarcarseecnaniengecarecesgesassacassgasstsessacsaey

PACIFIC ADVOCATE

“Su MATE resus eaasersamismcsirsssrsoenarcassuecsuireeieiiiatsesensay

long term confidence and collaboration between
all classes and their organizations in support of

policies reflecting that agreement. Thus, | by
stating the ideal of postwar unity around cor-
rect definition of national interest” and declaring
that obstacles to such unity are to be found al-
most solely in “‘the persistence of old prejudices
and ways of thinking on both sides of supposedly
controversial questions,’’? Comrade Browder ex-
cluded the fundamental problem of class relation-
ships in a monopoly-capitalist state from his esti-
mate of the policies and action necessary to guar-
antee that the Teheran Accord will be carried
through. _On that basis he elaborated a general
political line which assumed the disappearance
of strikes, independent working class political or-
ganization and open class conflict, in the United
States, with settlement of all problems through
mutual understanding abroad.

Comrade Browder asstimed that the Ameri-
can capitalist class will have enough intelligence
“within itself” to introduce “a maximum of self-
limitation to meet a minimum of governmentally
imposed regulations,’ to support policies of class
and international cooperation and to reject poli-
cies based upon the traditional aim of finance-
capitalist exploitation and imperialist domina-
tion. That was an assumption that finance capi-
talism would voluntarily destroy its own power
——would cease to be imperialistic.. On the basis
of that assumption he proposed that European
labor should accept the re-establishment of fi-
nance-capitalist monopolies, including cartels, in
Europe after the war. Purther, on the basis of
that assumption, Comrade eBrowder proposed
that, unless private business proved able to do it
alone, the problem of postwar reconstruction and
industrialization of the vast undeveloped areas of
the earth should be dealt with as follows: ‘‘Our
Sovernment can create a series of giant industrial
development corporations, each in partnership
with some other government or group of gov-
ermments and set them to work upon large-scale
plans of railroad and highway, building, agricul-
tural and industrial development, and all-round
modernization in all the devastated and unde-
veloped areas of the world.” He adds that the
money thus invested ‘‘would become the best in-
vestments the American capitalist class had ever
made in its whole history.”

The above and other Proposals advanced by
Comrade Browder at various times add up to the
general idea that United States capitalism will
cooperate voluntarily to maintain “high wages’
and maximum purchasing power” at home while,
in the sphere of international] policy, finance-
capitalism will agree to free the colonial peoples
from imperialist dcmination so as to clear the way
for international cooperation in world industrial-
ization. The general idyllic conception, opening
the door as it does to the theory of super-imper-
1alism, is clearly a revision of Marxism. It at-
tributes to the capitalist class the capacity to sub-
ordinate the laws of capitalist development to the
interests of ‘national and international well-being

for all.’’ It contradicts. Lenin’s fun-
damental teaching that Imperialism
is not simply a mood of the capital-
ist class but the organic character of
capitalism in its monopoly state. It
ignores the fact that monopoly cap-
italism is the bearer of reactlon—

Published every Saturday by The People Publishing Com-
pany, Room 104, Shelly Building, 119 West Pender Street,

Vancouver,

that it continually generates fascism
and appeasement of fascism.

Nothing in the Duclos article, or

Printers, 2303 East Hastings Stred, Vancouver, British in the foregoing, challenges the his-
Columbia. Subscription Rates One year $2; six months $1. toric importance of the Teheran Ac-
Editor Plane cord or lessens the need for the_rirm-

Cc. A. SAUNDERS MA rine 5288 est possible national unity around

PAGE 4 — PACIFIC ADVOCATE

x : ia
ESM) By:
policies based upon the perspective a
first time, made possible. It is pei
cessary to repeat and re-emphasize.|
cause there is a danger that some pf
sume that, if Comrade Browder’s int |
the Teheran Accord as-a platform i
, as false. then the fight for nation
a mistake. Any such assumption “|
pletely wrong. Comrade Browder |}
take in emphasizing the vital needs
unity to win the war and to carry this}
policies based upon the Teheran p!

He made no mistake in empha:
cisive importance of long-term colli:
tween the USSR and the leading cap)
tries; he made no mistake in emphas ¢
that*such collaboration, jointly pl
heran, is the essential basis for peac |
wide economic progress. The possibj.
forward by the historic accord reache
remain the hope of democratic people
world.

Duclos’ reference to the Teherz
“a document of a diplomatic charact |
in any way question its validity. The
dent Roosevelt, Prime Minister CG
Marshal Stalin, jointly declared: :

i=?

“We express our determinat |

our nations shall work togethe
war and in the peace that wil, |
And as to the peace, we are sure —&
concord will make it an enduri.
- which will command good w.
the overwhelming masses of the
of the world and bantsh the scou:
terror of war for many generati ¢

In those words are indicated the dc §
of all democratic peoples and the pos |
their hopes will be realized. It is the §
mocracy, the perspective for which :
been fought.-

The character and unique signifi #
Teheran Accord is to be seen, abovi ©
fact that it avas an agreement betwee: b
of the socialist and capitalist partners
coalition. It recognized the politic. §
ship which must exist between the —
just war of national liberation, won E
tion of socialist and capitalist powe £
peace that will follow their victory. | &
an agreement to change the economic §
political institutions in their respectr. 3
but to defeat and destroy the fascist:
common enemy of each, and to unit
cratic peoples “‘as they may choose t
the world family of democratic natic 3
the agreement which expresses thos ©
possibilities is a diplomatic agreem: jk
agreement between representatives :
ments, does not lessen its solemnity. Uf
Soviet Treaty is also a diplomatic ai [@
are a dozen other similar solemn t mt
would be irresponsible to question 1 a
or solemnity of those agreements. af

pe

Integral part of the new conditions em fy
the war.

The new conditions of which t Bee
ments are a part include the socialist: Me
the USSR and they include, also, the
tradictions and class interests and ae
ated by operation of the economic laws }
ism in the capitalist countries. The (i
of the socialist sixth of the earth will 3
those agreements and strive to extend ®
extent to which the governments oO
countries will continue to-live up to A
reflect the extent to which they conside
of the agreements to coincide with th ign
terests—i.e., their aims. It is clean Te
that one of the essential factors in the 2.
tions and possibilities created by the 7F
increased strength and influence of the
forces united in the struggle for sock
tical progress. No Marxist will argu
diplomatic agreements render militant

SATURDAY, ;