From The Labor History Archives -In The
80th Anniversary Year Of The Great San Francisco, Minneapolis And
Toledo General Strikes- A Lesson In The History Of Class Struggle
COMMUNISTS AND THE GENERAL STRIKE
By Leon Trotsky
The signal for a review of the
international tasks of Communism was given by the March 1921 events in Germany.
You will recall what happened. There were calls for a general strike, there
were sacrifices by the workers, there was a cruel massacre of the Communist Party,
internally there were disagreements on the part of some, and utter treachery
on the part of others. But the Comintern said firmly: In Germany the March
policy of the Communist Party was a mistake. Why? Because the German Party
reckoned that it was directly confronted with the task of conquering power. It
turned out that the task confronting the party was that of conquering not
power, but the working class. What nurtured the psychology of the German
Communist Party in 1921 that drove it into the March action? It was nurtured by
the circumstances and the moods which crystallised in Europe after the war.
In 1919 the German working class
engaged in a number of cruel and bloody battles, the same thing happened in
1920, and during the January and March days of 1920 the German working class
became convinced that heroism alone, that readiness to venture and to die, was
not enough; that somehow the working class was lacking something. It began to
take a more watchful and expectant attitude towards events and facts. It had
banked in its time upon the old Social Democracy to secure the socialist
overturn.
The Social Democracy dragged the
proletariat into the war. When the thunders of the November 1918 revolution
rolled, the old Social Democracy begins to talk the language of social
revolution and even proclaimed, as you recall, the German republic to be a
socialist republic. The proletariat took this seriously, and kept pressing forward.
Colliding with the bourgeois gangs it suffered crushing defeats once, twice and
a third time. Naturally this does not mean that its hatred of the bourgeosie or
its readiness to struggle had lessened, but its brains had meanwhile acquired
many new convolutions of caution and watchfulness. For new battles it already
wants to have guarantees of victory.
And this mood began to grow
increasingly stronger among the European working class in 1920-22 after the
experiences of the initial assault, after the initial semi-victories and minor
conquests and the subsequent major defeats. At that moment, in the days when
the European working class began after the war to understand clearly, or at
least to sense that the business of conquering state power is a very
complicated business and that bare hands cannot cope with the bourgeoisie—at
that moment the most dynamic section of the working class formed itself into
the Communist Party.
But this Communist Party still felt
as if it were a shell shot out of a cannon. It appeared on the scene and it
seemed to it that it needed only shout its battle-cry, dash forward and the
working class would rush out to follow. It turned out otherwise. It turned out
that the working class had, upon suffering a series of disillusions concerning
its primitive revolutionary illusions, assumed a watch-and-wait attitude by the
time the Communist Party took shape in 1920 (and especially in 1921) and rushed
forward. The working class was not accustomed to this party, it had not seen
the party in action. Since the working class had been deceived more than once in
the past, it has every reason to demand that the party win its confidence, or,
to put it differently, the party must still discharge its obligation of
demonstrating to the working class that it should follow and is justified in
following the party into the fires of battle, when the party issues the
summons. During the March days of 1921 in Germany we saw a Communist
Party—devoted, revolutionary, ready for struggle—rushing forward, but not
followed by the working class. Perhaps one-quarter or one-fifth of the German
working class did follow. Because of its revolutionary impatience this most
revolutionary section came into collision with the other four-fifths; and
already tried, so to speak, mechanically and here and there by force to draw
them into the struggle, which is of course completely out of the question.
In general, comrades, the
International is a wonderful institution. And the training one party gives to
another is likewise irreplaceable. But generally speaking, one must say that
each working class tends to repeat all the mistakes at the expense of its own
back and bones. The International can be of assistance only in the sense of
seeing to it that this back receives the minimum number of scars, but in the
nature of things scars are unavoidable.
We saw this almost the other day in
France. In the port of Havre there occurred a strike of 15,000 workers. This
strike of local importance attracted the nation-wide attention of the working
class by its stubbornness, firmness and discipline. It led to rather large contributions
for the benefit of the strikers through our party's central organ, L 'Humanite:
there were agitational tours, and so on. The French government through its
police-chief brought the strike to a bloody clash in which three workers were killed.
(It is quite possible that this happened through some assistance by anarchist
elements inside the French working class who time and again involuntarily abet
reaction.) These killings were of course bound to produce great repercussions
among the French working class.
You will recall that the March 1921
events in Germany also started when in Central Germany the chief of police, a
Social Democrat, sent military-police gangs to crush the strikers. This fact
was at the bottom of our German party's call for a general strike. In France we
observe an analogous course of events: a stubborn strike, which catches the
interest of the entire working class, followed by bloody clashes. Three
strikers are killed. The murders occurred, say, on Friday and by Saturday there
already convened a conference of the so-called unitarian unions, i.e., the
revolutionary trade unions, which maintain close relations with the Communist
Party; and at this conference it is decided to call the working class to a
general strike on the next day. But no general strike came out of it. In
Germany during the (so-called) general strike in March there participated
one-quarter, one-fifth or one-sixth of the working class. In France even a
smaller fraction of the French proletariat participated in the general strike.
If one follows the French press to see how this whole affair was carried out,
then, comrades, one has to scratch one's head ten times in recognising how
young and inexperienced are the Communist parties of Western Europe. The Comintern
had accused the French Communists of passivity. This was correct. And the
German Communist Party, too, had been accused prior to March of passivity.
Demanded of the party was activity,
initiative, aggressive agitation, intervention into the day-to-day struggles
of the working class. But the party attempted in March to recoup its
yesterday's passivity by the heroic action of a general strike, almost an
uprising. On a lesser scale, this was repeated the other day in France. In
order to emerge from passivity they proclaimed a general strike for a working
class which was just beginning to emerge from passivity under the conditions of
an incipient revival and improvement in the conjuncture. How did they motivate
this? They motivated it by this, that the news of the murder of the three
workers had produced a shocking impression on the party's Central Committee and
on the Confederation of Labour. How could it have failed to produce such an
impression? Of course, it was shocking! And so the slogan of the general strike
was raised. If the Communist Party were so strong as to need only issue a call
for a general strike then everything would be fine. But a general strike is a
component and a dynamic part of the proletarian revolution itself.
Out of the general strike there
arise clashes with the troops and the question is posed of who is master in the
country. Who controls the army—the bourgeoisie or the proletariat? It is
possible to speak of a protest general strike, but this is a question of utmost
importance. When a dispatch comes over the wires that three workers have been
killed at Havre and when it is known that there is no revolution in France
but, instead, a stagnant situation, that the working class is just beginning to
stir slightly out of a condition of passivity engendered by events during the
war and post-war period—in such a situation to launch the slogan for a general
strike is to commit the geatest and crudest blunder which can only undermine
for a long time, for many months to come, the confidence of the working masses
in a party which behaves in such a manner.
True enough, the direct
responsibility in this case was not borne by the party; the slogan was issued
by the so-called unitarian, that is, revolutionary trade unions. But in reality
what should the party and the trade unions have done? They should have
mobilised every party and trade union worker who was qualified and sent them
out to read this news from one end of the country to the other. The first thing
was to tell the story as it should have been told. We have a daily paper,
L'ffumanite, our central organ. It has a circulation of approximately 200,000—a
rather large circulation, but France has a population of not less than 40
million. In the provinces there is virtually no circulation of the daily
newspaper, consequently, the task was to inform the workers, to tell them the
story agitationally, and to touch them to the quick with this story. The
-second thing needed was to turn to the Socialist Party, the party of Longuet
and Renaudel with a few questions—no occasion could have been more
propitious—and say: "In Havre three worker strikers have been killed; we
take it for granted that this cannot be permitted to go unpunished. We are
prepared to employ the most resolute measures. We ask, what do you
propose?"
The very posing of these questions
would have attracted a great attention. It was necessary to turn to Jouhaux's
reformist trade unions which are much closer to the strikers. Jouhaux feigned
sympathy for this strike and gave it material aid. It was necessary to put to
him the following question: "You of the reformist trade unions, what do
you propose? We, the Communist Party, propose to hold tomorrow not a general
strike but a conference of the Communist Party, of the unitarian revolutionary
trade unions and of the reformist trade unions in order to discuss how this
aggression of capitalism ought to be answered."
It was necessary to swing the
working masses into motion. Perhaps a general strike might have come into it. I
do not know; maybe a protest strike, maybe not. In any case it was far too
little simply to announce, to cry out that my indignation had been aroused,
when I learned over the wires that three workers had been killed. It was
instead necessary to touch to the quick the hearts of the working masses. After
such an activity the whole working class might not perhaps have gone out on a
demonstrative strike but we could, of course, have reached a very considerable
section. However, instead there was a mistake, let me repeat, on a smaller
scale than the March events. It was a mistake on a two by four scale. With this
difference that in France there were no assaults, no sweeping actions, no new
bloody clashes, but simply a failure; the general strike was a fiasco and by
this token—a minus on the Communist Party's card, not a plus but a minus.
(From the Report on the Fifth
Anniversary of the October Revolution and the Fourth World Congress of the
Communist International. Moscow, October 20th 1922)
1934 Minneapolis Teamster StrikesVarious sources
American City by Charles R. Walker
First hand narration and interviews with the major participants of the Strike. This book tells the story of Minneapolis as it became a union town under the impact of the organizing drive of Teamsters Local 574. It includes interviews with participants from all sides in the strike and gives a blow-by-blow account of the three strikes that year.
Periodicals covering the strike
The Organizer Strike bulletin of Local 574 published only published during 1934. It was pubished daily and weekly depending on the intensity of the strike actions. Edited by Trotskyist leader James P. Cannon it provided a voice the striking drivers and a tribune of the labor movement that year.
Writings on the strike by Daily Strike Bulletin Editor James P. Cannon:
The Strike Call by Teamsters Local 574 July 16, 1934 From the Daily Strike Bulletins of the 1934 Truckers Strike
“ . . . If It Takes All Summer” July 29, 1934 From the Daily Strike Bulletins of the 1934 Truckers Strike
Eternal Vigilance August 6, 1934 From the Daily Strike Bulletins of the 1934 Truckers Strike
Spilling the Dirt—a Bughouse Fable August 8, 1934 From the Daily Strike Bulletins of the 1934 Truckers Strike
Drivers’ Strike Reveals Workers’ Great Resources August 11, 1934 From the Daily Strike Bulletins of the 1934 Truckers Strike
Thanks to Pine County Farmers August 13, 1934 From the Daily Strike Bulletins of the 1934 Truckers Strike
The Secret of Local 574 August 18, 1934 From the Daily Strike Bulletins of the 1934 Truckers Strike
What the Union Means August 23, 1934 From the Daily Strike Bulletins of the 1934 Truckers Strike
From various eyewitness reports in newspapers of the time; headlines from the pages of Minneapolis Labor Review magazine
[organ of the Minneapolis Central Labor Union]:
“Citizens Alliance Tactics Bring Strike Recommendation For Monday Meet” Two Thousand Drivers Hold Gigantic Meeting
“Unionists Report For Picket : Duty To 1900 Chicago Ave” ALL UNIONISTS URGED TO JOIN IN PICKETING
From various participants in the Strike, from the pages of Revolutionary History magazine:
How the Strike was organized From a Striker
At the Minneapolis City Market ‘The Battle of Deputy Run’ From a Striker
A Lesson in ‘Law and Order’ William Kitt
Women Active on firing line From a Women’s Auxiliary Member
Role of the League in Strike (Communist League) From a Striker
The Story of Minneapolis Carl Skoglund
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