es about secession had been chal-
ae In public debate only by. reac-
ae ae, bureaucrats and their support-
We uch denunciations caused many
on St workers to sympathize with the
i: pe oasts. Now, in the convention
- to found a workers’ revolution-
y Party, these entrenched features of
a pee Ditalist movement were chal-
oa from the left. More, they were
Se €mned as harmful to the struggle
Socialism. That condemnation and

€ Consistently Marxist alternative

. mae Was proposed were debated, hotly
<a by the outstanding rep-
paves of. radicalism. And, from
of de ery concrete and elementary point
i ally the debate developed until
one raced the whole of the principal
2 ‘on of what should be the role of
a arxist revolutionary party in Can-

at debate provided convincing evi-
wane of the importance of Lenin’s
hing that “revolutionary tactics
ah t be built on a revolutionary mood
ae” (Vol. 31, p. 63)
ae was a youthful and rapidly
ta Ng capitalist state. The elemen-
ty truths of Marxism, even the his-

tori Recs
tien Missiun of the working class,

lati :
tionship of revolutionary working-

a : :
nite actions to those interests, were
unknown to the overwhelming

maj
Sa of the workers, including a
tive Proportion of those who were ac-

Revolageoreets of the Great October
he 10n and the Soviet Republic.
Bee ect over secession had been
Ohtheo, The General Executive Board
advane ne Big Union had declared in
Vention that its delegation to the con-
the aa Would be prepared to vote for
Working we ofa united front of the
defeat § Class but it would oppose and
that Tiechgeacae which. suggested
“Inte Itant workers should return to
tr ational unions.” On the con-

» Said some spokesmen of the Gen-
x€cutive Board, “the new party

Thus
ye become the political arm of the

At th nion.””

~ the pro © beginning of the convention
fought Rn of the delegates who had

the “Tt ‘ard in an attempt to replace

d to €rnationals” by the OBU seem-

~ the fe 8lve substance to the claims of

§
heir Hea kers concentrated their fire on

“ditional target: the reactionary
rating bureaucrats who

Class-co}] abo:

FRO aaa"
“2M Our FILES: The T

oe
fal interests as a class, and the re-

ribune being read by workers in Toronto in 1953.

controlled the American Federation of
Labor and its “International” unions.

Detestation of Gompersism was unani- ©

mous. Collusion between presidents of
“internationals” and the employers who
exploited their members was castigat-
ed and condemned unanimously. Oth-
ers besides members of its official dele-
gation spoke in favor of close coopera-
tion between the One Big Union and
the new party. Members of the OBU
delegation started to speak confidently
about ‘we and the other comrades in
this convention who have been fighting
shoulder to shoulder in the revolution-
ary struggle since the Western Labor
Conference.”

What the leaders of the One Big
Union failed to understand was the
profound influence of Lenin upon the
very delegates whose support they
counted upon. Only a few of the dele-
gates had read Lenin’s Left-Wing Com-
munism — an Infantile Disorder, but
all of them knew of it and knew one
thing about it; namely that it urged
revolutionaries to work in the union,
including the reactionary ones. They
were hearing that thesis debated for
the first time. The effect of that debate
and the understanding that developed
as it proceeded, provided striking con-
firmation of the correctness of Lenin’s
characterizaiton of such workers in his
theses “On Fundamental Comintern
Tasks,” extensive excerpts from which
had been published in English only a
short time before the convention. For
example:

“The erroneous views held by these
organizations regarding participation in
bourgeois parliaments can be explained,
not so much by the influence of ele-
ments coming from the bourgeoisie,
who bring their essentially petty-bour-
geois views into the movement—views
such as anarchists often hold—as by
the political inexperience of prole-
tarians who are quite revolutionary and
connected with the masses.” (Vol. 31,
p. 200). —

That warning of Lenin’s described
the main weakness, theoretical imma-
turity and political inexperience, that
was common to the majority of the
delegates in our founding convention,
including most of us who were mem-
bers of the illegal Communist Party. As
the debate developed those members
of the Provisional Central Committee
who had carried through the struggle
within the committee to invite mem-
bers and supporters of the One Big
Union and of the Industrial Workers of
the World, in accord with Lenin’s sug-

gestion in his THESES, had cause to
be proud of having followed his leader-
ship. One by one delegates who had
come to the convention as supporters
of either the OBU or the IWW and ad-
vocates of secession and anti-parlia-
mentarianism, turned away from the
belligerent but confused negativism of
the champions of anarcho-syndicalism
to the scientific revolutionary dynam-
ism of Lenin.

The leaders of the OBU moved that
the draft resolution be ‘‘tabled.” Their
motion was defeated. They moved that
questions of the new party’s specific
relations with any part of the trade
union movement be referred to the Cen-
tral Committee that was to be elected
by the convention. That motion also
was defeated. Then they resorted to a
manoeuvre of motion, amendments, and
a confusing “substitute motion to cover
the whole.” Again they were defeated.
Realizing that they could not hope to
win a straight vote, Bob Russell, the
General Secretary, and outstanding

SUUTTEUUTC EEE

JUST OFF THE PRESS

Tim Buck LENIN
AND
CANADA

Che Socialist Party of Canada

LEAFLET No. 4

Issued by Manitoba Provincial Executive Committee,
Socialist Party of Canada, P.O. Box 2025, Winnipeg.

A new Pamphlet, post free, 5 cents.
‘*POLITICAL PARTIES IN RUSSIA’’
-By Nikolai Lenine
For this and other literature on Socialism, apply to
above, or to:—
Alberta Provincial Executive, Socialist Party of
Canada, P.O. Box 585, Edmonton, Alta.

or to
Dominion Executive Committee, Socialist Party of
Canada, Cor. Dunlevy & Pender, Vancouver, B.C.

Read — *““THE WESTERN CLARION’? the only
Scientific Socialist paper published in Canada. _

“IDEAS of
RUSSIA’S REVOLUTION”

By NIKOLAI LENINE

(Translated from the Russian by Robert Crozier Long,
for many years Petrograd correspondent
of the Chicago Examiner.)

Russia’s revolution is not a domestic revolution
but essentially a world revolution. Therein lies not
only its future, but also its present, inasmuch as it
is impossible to understand our parties and _ their
principles unless one realizes the sharp division be-
tween those men who see the revolution as a world-
event and those who see it merely as a loca] and

The difference between the Bolsheviki and all the

leader of the OBU, made an impassion-
ed appeal to the delegates to “prevent
the railroading of this momentous deci-
sion without adequate consideration.”
To ensure “adequate consideration” he
appealed to the delegates to join with
him and his fellow member of the OBU
delegation in what he said would be a
“short recess,” to be brought about by
a “temporary walk-out” in which he
urged all delegates to join.

The convention responded to that
appeal with a spontaneous and almost
unanimous ‘NO!’ Bob Russell and his
fellow members of the OBU delegation
walked out of the convention, appeal-
ing to other delegates by name to join
them, but not one delegate did. The
resolution was adopted unanimously.

Inspired and guided by Lenin, the
founding convention of the Workers’
Party of Canada had turned away from
the sectarianism and defeatism of the
past, confidently to the future with the
aim of proletarian unity in the struggle
for socialism.

Ls

other Russian parties, Socialist or bourgeoisie, lies
therein. The Bolsheviki are the true internationalists.

a

The influence of Lenin’s writings on early Marxism and olitical d
in Canada. A new work to mark the 100th anniversary ok Lenin's A agar

eS sy wit BOOKS, 487 Adelaide St. West, Toronto 13
paper “ cloth— $5.95
CLE GTt tintid

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY) APRIL 24/:1970-—PAGE9

= Russian event.