20.01.2011

Applying Bolshevism

Though the founding congress of the Communist Party of Great Britain revealed political strengths and weaknesses there was a determination to apply the lessons of Bolshevism to Britain

Following comrade Albert Inkpin’s report^[1] on the negotiations leading to the 1st Congress of the CPGB (the Communist Unity Convention, July 31-August 1 1920), fraternal greetings were read from a wide variety of different organisations and prominent individuals. Messages came from the communist parties of Germany, Austria, Holland, Hungary, Lithuania and Switzerland; and from the soon to be communist Norwegian Labour Party and Italian Socialist Party. The left group within the Independent Labour Party also sent a message.^[2] Signatories to this included Helen Crawfurd^[3] and Shapurji Saklatvala.^[4] Among the individuals who sent their best wishes were Clara Zetkin,^[5] Tom Mann^[6] and VI Lenin.

Making a powerful intervention into the controversies that still divided revolutionaries in Britain, Lenin declared his solidarity with the plan to immediately establish the CPGB and his opposition to the impotent sectarianism of Sylvia Pankhurst’s organisation, the Workers’ Socialist Federation. This talented and charismatic leader and her group had (for the moment at least) decided to stand aside from the process of fusion.^[7] Moreover, in the 2nd congress of Comintern (July 19-August 7 1920), Lenin unequivocally declared his support for those communists in Britain who favoured the tactic of affiliation to the Labour Party and communist participation in bourgeois elections.^[8]

Immediately following the fraternal messages, the congress turned to the resolution on general policy, moved by AA Purcell.^[9] The succinct resolution, moved on behalf of the Joint Provisional Committee of the CPGB, read as follows:

The communists in conference assembled declare for the soviet (or workers’ council) system as a means whereby the working class shall achieve power and take control of the forces of production; declare for the dictatorship of the proletariat as a necessary means for combating the counterrevolution during the transition period between capitalism and communism; and stand for the adoption of these means as steps towards the establishment of a system of complete communism, wherein the means of production shall be communally owned and controlled. This conference therefore establishes itself the Communist Party on the foregoing basis.

Interestingly, the official record of Purcell’s speech supporting this declaration reveals fussy, half-baked thinking. There was praise for the Bolsheviks and the Russian Revolution and a recognition of the need for the dictatorship of the proletariat. But communism seems to be equated with nationalisation and workers’ control over industry. Not the full development of democracy and human freedom. His speech was reported thus:

During the last three months, wherever he and some others had gone to Russia they had been confronted with a request as to when England was going to do something with regard to the formation of a strong Communist Party. That was because in Norway, Sweden and elsewhere this work had already been done or, at any rate, communists in these countries had already gathered the forces together for the purpose of being prepared to work on the necessary lines. Anybody who had seen the development that some present had seen could hardly come back to this country without being convinced, if they were members of the working class at all, of the very urgent need that existed for the formation of what he regarded as an important guide to the trade union or industrial movement in this country. We required that guide here just as it was required in the case of Russia.

He believed that in the resolution we had a clear statement that many members of the industrial movement, mainly unattached to any socialist organisation, would be prepared to rally round. A great many trade unionists today used the cry, ‘control of industry’; most of them hardly knew at the moment - because of the want of a guide - where that was taking them to, or what was expected of them in that connection. Here we saw it clearly laid down that the purpose of the Communist Party was to assist and act as a guide to the proletarian movement.

We must make certain that we did not quarrel about mere phraseology; but that we regarded as important the need for urging the working class itself to rally for the purpose of being capable of owning and controlling the means of production in this country. He believed that if we adapted our methods we could rally round us, particularly in the large centres, masses of the working class prepared to fight and give of their best in the interests of such a movement as this.

The resolution declared for the dictatorship of the proletariat as a means of combating the counterrevolution in the transitional period between capitalism and communism. That, again, was a statement of the highest importance, because it urged the working class to come into the ranks of communism, as well as to assist in the work of communist agitation. In declaring ourselves within the four corners of this resolution, we were laying down a plan that the working class of this country could rally to.

Capitalism, he believed, was decaying at its very roots. The industrial organisations might not know that; but so long as they were prepared to revolt, it was our business to go to them and say, ‘While you are prepared to revolt we, at the same time, are prepared to show you the machine that must be used in order to take possession of the means of production and work them in the interests of yourselves and the community generally.’ For the purpose of doing that we had to recognise the hard, concrete facts of industrial organisation. It was useless continually prodding and pinpricking the working class; we were not going to get the best from the working class by doing that, we had to take them in hand and show them the way laid down in this resolution.

He thought we should do our utmost to be unanimous about this resolution in order that it might not merely go forth to the international communist organisations of the world as our definite declaration, but that it could be taken to our people, and they be asked to recognise in this instrument the first step towards success in their own emancipation.

The resolution was formally seconded by William Mellor of the Guild Communist Group.^[10] Discussion was very brief. Obviously delegates had convened precisely on the basis of agreement with these principles. For example, support for the dictatorship of the proletariat in the transitional period was not controversial. Nevertheless - and as is the way sometimes in left meetings - some delegates felt compelled to speak anyway. Harry Webb of the Ashton Communist Group kicked off the debate:

... delegates had come with definite mandates, and nothing that could be said would influence those mandates in the slightest degree; but what was said might be carried back by the delegates to the groups and might affect the actions of those groups in the future. Certain words had been left out of the resolution which would give it much more effectiveness; what was needed was the dictatorship of the proletariat, not only in the form of the soviet council, but also in the form of the man with the gun in his hand. To men who had been used by imperialism in the world war we must point out the historic and revolutionary value of the gun in the hands of the working class. In this classic home of capitalism its downfall would be in the form of a civil struggle which would be consummated in the streets, the workers battling through by the guidance of the Communist Party.

CL Gibbons (Ferndale Socialist Society) said he wanted to make a little clearer the point in the resolution which declared for the soviet or workers’ council, and then went on to state the means whereby the working class should achieve power. Seeing that this was the beginning of the Communist Party, he thought that we should quite definitely state that the achieving of power would come from the soldiers’ councils, and the actual control of the forces of production from the workers’ councils. He thought this should be made clear and put in the resolution.

At this point William Mellor intervened to make a blindingly obvious point:

If they did not agree with the resolution they should go away; if they did agree they should pass it without making long speeches as to its meaning.

But he suggested it was urgent that some reference should be made to the Third International. He had put through to the standing orders committee a suggestion that the Third International should be mentioned in this resolution on general policy, and he hoped that the conference would agree we should not only stand for the dictatorship of the proletariat, agree with the soviet system as the means whereby we could achieve communism and agree that communism was our aim, but, as a Communist Party, we should at this crisis declare our adhesion to the Third International. He asked the chairman to use his influence with the standing orders committee to get them to include in the resolution a certain declaration of our adhesion to the Third International.

AA Watts (BSP, Rochdale) said he rose to voice the opinion of the branch that an effort should be made to include any other body who had not seen their way yet to fall in with this convention. We want one Communist Party here, not more.

R Stewart (Socialist Prohibition Group) said he did not want to be taken as stressing too much the point of the man with the gun. A great many people talked about guns who would run away when they saw one. He did not know whether he could use a gun if he had one, and he did not know much about the dictatorship of the proletariat.

What he knew was that the dictatorship of the proletariat was necessary, and that we should require to do as circumstances determined. He did not suppose the sincerity of those who were not gunmen would be questioned; we should all count it a pleasure and pride to live and die for the communist movement. But he thought the provisional committee would be wise to devote themselves to building up such an organisation as would make it possible for the minimum of violence to achieve the maximum for the Communist Party. Even the capitalist could not use guns upon us, except so far as he could persuade members of our class that somehow or other our policy was detrimental to their interests. Whether the guns came soon or late, or whether they came at all, there might be moments when it was far more revolutionary to refuse to have anything to do with guns. As to the Third International, it did not seem to him necessary to write in explicit terms that we were attached to it; the less we loaded the resolution with phrases, the better.

What we needed to do was to form as soon as possible a party sufficiently strong to bear itself in any manner dictated by the circumstances of the moment.

The chairman, Arthur MacManus, said he recommended that the words “and adhesion to the Third International” should be added to the resolution.^[11] The amended resolution was then carried unanimously as follows:

“The Communists in conference assembled declare for the soviet (or workers’ council) system as a means whereby the working class shall achieve power and take control of the forces of production; declare for the dictatorship of the proletariat as a necessary means for combating the counterrevolution during the transition period between capitalism and communism; and declares its adhesion to the Third International; and stand for the adoption of these means as steps towards the establishment of a system of complete communism wherein the means of production shall be communally owned and controlled. This conference therefore establishes itself the Communist Party on the foregoing basis”.

Notes

1. Weekly Worker December 9.
2. During the period 1919-20, left members of the Independent Labour Party started to organise themselves as a loose network. This put out a newspaper which campaigned for affiliation to the Third International.
3. Scottish comrade Helen Crawfurd was to play a leading role in the CPGB, in particular in her energetic organisation of the party’s work amongst women. She headed the CPGB’s women’s department, set up in January 1922, and was also the women’s representative on the political bureau.
4. Shapurji Saklatvala (1874-1936) was born in Mumbai (then Bombay), India. He came to the UK in 1905. He joined the CPGB in 1921 along with a left faction of the Independent Labour Party. Naturally he also remained a Labour Party member. Standing as a communist, but with the support of the local Labour Party, he won the constituency of Battersea North in the 1922 general election. He lost the seat in the 1923 election, but regained it in the contest of 1924 - despite not having Labour support this time. He finally lost the seat for good in the 1929 general election - unsurprisingly, given the ‘third period’ ultra-left insanity that the CPGB and the world communist movement had then embarked on.
5. Clara Zetkin (1857-1933) was influential on the left of German Marxism from 1878, when she first joined the Socialist Workers Party, which changed its name in 1890 to the Socialist Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). Her principled political stance in World War I led her into the left split from the SPD, the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD) and its left wing, the Spartacist League. In 1919, this finally became the Communist Party of Germany - too late to be a contender in the German revolution, which by then was rapidly ebbing. She represented the KPD in the Reichstag from 1920 to 1933, when the Nazi assumption of power forced her into exile in the USSR.
6. See Weekly Worker August 5.
7. See Weekly Worker October 21.
8. This 2nd Congress of the Third International was already in progress as the Unity Convention met.
9. AA Purcell became a member of the general council of the TUC in 1921, left the CPGB in 1922 and went on as a leftwing member of the Labour Party to play a treacherous role in the 1926 General Strike.
10. William Mellor (1888-1942) resigned from the CPGB in 1924 and two years later became editor of the Daily Herald, taking the reins from George Lansbury. He was the first editor of Tribune, but only lasted a year (1937-38) before being sacked as a result of disagreements with Stafford Cripps over the British popular front against fascism.
11. Arthur MacManus was a member of the Socialist Labour Party. He played an important role in the Unity Committee created in 1919 to facilitate the merger of SLP, British Socialist Party and others. MacManus was the CPGB’s first chairman, a post he held until 1922.