Only after a long delay —not until September 5 — did I see the text of Comrade Cannon's speech at the Majority Caucus Meeting in New York on the subject of "Internationalism and the SWP."
This document, it seems, has been circulated by effort of both the majority and the minority, among all the members of the SWP. I hope that this reply, now unavoidable, will have the same fortune.
Comrade Cannon did not deem it necessary to send a copy of his speech immediately to the IS. Naturally he had strong reasons for this procedure: his speech is actually an all-out attack against the international leadership and the very principles of our International and its present reality, before any political differences were formulated with the line of the International and its present leadership. That is the worst method of initiating a struggle. The International does not employ it and will never employ it.
The attack is all the more unspeakable in that it starts out from preventive considerations, even on the organizational plane —since up to the date of May 18 there was no fact to prove that the International had instigated the factional struggle in the American organization. Comrade Cannon himself acknowledges this, in black and white: "We have no tangible evidence to prove that there is any conspiracy against us, or any actions against us, on the international field."
The aim of this attack, I say, is two-fold: to discredit the international leadership, and thereby the very concept of the International as defined by the statutes unanimously adopted at the Second World Congress and by the very life of the International.
In a tone half-serious, half-humorous, sometimes threatening, but always paternalistic and imbued with the primordial importance of the United States, the American revolution, the SWP, its present leadership (its present majority), and especially and above all himself, Comrade Cannon tears apart the "few people in Paris" and, with them, the entire International in its present structure and functioning. For the "few people in Paris" exist and function as a product of the collective will, duly expressed in the International Congresses and the IEC Plenums, of the overwhelming majority of the organized Trotskyist movement.
[p. 90]
Comrade Cannon's conception of the International is one of the most extraordinary and most revolting projections of a complex which is now exploding with unprecedented brutishness. He pounds his fist, puts the cards, as he says, on the table, and tells us: "You are making a mistake, young men of Paris; you forget that what you call the International is in reality the SWP as a center around which gravitate various groups and individuals with whom the center (the SWP) maintains relations of 'collaboration, advice, counsel.'"
The conception Comrade Cannon has of "collaborating" and "cooperating" is itself very strange and disturbing. He envisages this in terms of relations of power to power, of one strong position to another strong position, rather than as collaboration and cooperation, on a strictly ideological and political plane, of political ideas and political line.
Comrade Cannon's Conception
But first we must make the necessary introductions, both of the International and, if it is permitted, just a very few words to introduce these "few people in Paris." Comrade Cannon does not seem to be acquainted, or wish to be sufficiently acquainted, with either.
Our International, we believe, is a World Party with a centralized international leadership, not only according to its statutes but as life has formed it. It has become such through a process of real fusion of our movement into a world party, a process marked by regular and very representative congresses and by the unanimous election at these congresses of a centralized international leadership — the IEC. In this IEC the best representatives of the international Trotskyist movement participate; it has met 13 times to now; it has had a most intense political life; all the important political and organizational questions of the International have been dealt with in and through the IEC, as well as through the IS nominated and elected by the IEC and which, has hitherto enjoyed the confidence of the overwhelming majority of the Congresses of the International and the Plenums of the IEC.
On the IS there were never only the three comrades of the IS Bureau to whom Comrade Cannon alludes and who have maintained the continuity for several years now, but also other comrades and among these—except for brief intervals — representatives of the US. According to the hitherto almost unanimous opinion, the IS has always acquitted itself of its enormous tasks to the very best, despite the extreme poverty of technical and financial resources, and naturally within the framework of our individual political and organizational capacities, of which we are the first to recognize the exact and in any case, modest limits. Witness to this, moreover, is Comrade Cannon's own letter to the "few people in Paris" in praise of their "great work," which he sent them on the occasion of his sixtieth birthday.
We have never believed that the International is comprised in actuality of a sort of "Paris-New York axis," and that all the rest—the other members of the IS, the IEC and its Plenums, the World Congresses — are really only a fiction, mere forms. On the contrary, we have worked with all our strength— and I believe with a certain success — to create a collective international leadership, which we respect and to the decisions of which we submit unconditionally.
If we are still on the IS, that is because this has been the hitherto almost unanimous will of our international movement, which has been able to express its will freely and openly at gatherings which have been more representative than ever before of its consciousness and its will, that is, the World Congresses and the Plenums of the IEC.
If all this is a fiction, if not a comedy, then we have committed unpardonable bureaucratic crimes.
We have made political and organizational decisions in the World Congresses, the Plenums, the sessions of the IS, and we have demanded and insisted that all the sections respect them and carry them out.
In the name of this conception of the International — as a world party with a centralized international leadership, with its congresses and statutes, with a political line and a common discipline —we have broken with individuals, groups and even majorities of entire sections, who have refused to carry out this line and this discipline. And this always with the full agreement of Comrade Cannon and the American leadership.
We have not at all conceived of internationalism as Comrade Cannon does: mere collaboration, consultation, etc., with the national leadership of each section ultimately and practically the sole master of its decisions, of its political line, and of the way to conduct itself toward other political tendencies in its organization.
Nor have we conceived internationalism as the emblazoning— right out in the open, no minced words, crudely (and frankly, Comrade Cannon will say) —of the incontestable and uncontested primacy of one country, one section, one leadership over all the others. No, all that is nothing but a wretched caricature of internationalism and the International, a conception which might be explained by national environment and other similar considerations but which in any case is alien to proletarian internationalism as conceived by revolutionary Marxism.
On the organizational plane of the organized proletarian international vanguard, internationalism consists in the complete voluntary subordination of an organization, of any national leadership whatever —be it among the most important (and precisely then)—to the duly expressed line and discipline of the majority of the international working-class movement to which the organization belongs.
Internationalism, on the part of each organization and each leadership, does not consist in pounding one's fist, spreading on the table the cards of the international importance of one's country, one's revolution, one's numerical forces, etc., in order to demand special privileges and dispensations; but rather, in relying with full confidence on the line, the judgment and the discipline of the international movement taken as a whole—a whole which is organized and, in the last analysis, alone decisive.
Such a conception of internationalism and the International does not at all mean that the international movement and its leadership do not take into consideration the special importance of one or another section or national leadership. The political importance of each section and leadership (its number of years, its seriousness, responsibility, capacities, etc.) is not imposed on the International by pounding the table, but in a normal way, naturally, voluntarily, free from all pressure.
[p. 91]
In a healthy international movement like ours, this is how things proceed, and not otherwise.
No one, for example, has hitherto minimized the considerable importance, the special merits, the qualities, etc., of the American organization and its leadership. We in our international movement were very proud of it and its leadership. This is especially true of the "few people in Paris." They have missed no opportunity to defend the American organization and its leadership against any attack, any violent criticism, any direct or indirect attempt at denigration. Our own criticisms on certain aspects of its general and organizational policy (criticism of one another is absolutely inevitable and necessary in any living movement which is not immobilized in a paradisaic perfection and which always has room for improvement) have been kept for ourselves and for our fraternal discussions with the leading comrades of the American organization.
As for myself personally, I should say that I have openly defended the American organization up to and including the recent 13th Plenum of the IEC, and have not allowed myself to be moved by any other consideration. All this is the strict truth, and the leading comrades of the International know it well.
Now Comrade Cannon will perhaps say that he is not in disagreement with anything I say about true internationalism and its caricature, but that, as he emphasized in his speech, he is making this other objection: "We are a part of the international movement, and we are going to have something to say about what the international movement decides on the American question, and every other. . . . etc."
Naturally the American organization always has been and is an integral, intimate part of the international movement and its leadership. They are not like a beauty-spot on the body of the International, but an essential part of this body.
But precisely in the sense of an organic, not mechanical, totality. They are not superadded to the other sections and leaderships, but are fused in the international movement considered as a world party with a centralized international leadership. It is in this sense that they have participated and participate in the World Congresses, the Plenums of the IEC, the IS.
They cannot be an organic part of this organic whole which is the International, with its Congresses, its IEC Plenums and its leading organisms—and at the same time mere collaborators who come or go according as they please, according as they accept or reject some decision of the international movement.
No, that is not our conception of the international movement.
Again Comrade Cannon will perhaps say: "Yes, I agree; but I only recognize as the International the base of its sections" —to whom he is now preparing to address himself if Paris intervenes in what he considers the affairs of his organization.
Once more, we are absolutely opposed to such a conception of the International. This has a strong resemblance to the "united front" of the Stalinists who would like to recognize the existence of socialist workers but not the socialist organizations to which these workers belong and whose decisions they follow.
No, the International is structural, organized — it is not an amorphous doughy mass of an international movement.
The International manifests itself as a world party through its congresses and its leading organisms, the IEC and the IS. Whoever goes outside of these, in reality goes outside the International, which is neither a vague idea nor an undefined movement but an organization governed by statutes and rules, with a line, a discipline and a leadership, just like each national section.
Comrade Cannon is most scrupulous in regard to these concepts when it is a matter of his own organization. In this field he is constantly bringing up the statutes, rules, line, discipline, leadership, and shows himself ruthless against those who are disloyal and all others who venture to ignore these things.
Exactly the same holds true for the International.
Comrade Cannon will perhaps object that it is one thing to speak of the leadership of his organization, which has "thrown up a cadre of indigenous leaders, who have grown up out of its struggles, who are known to its members and trusted by them"; but quite another thing to speak of the leadership of the International, or at least its present leadership.
Now what is the present leadership of the International? First of all, it is the IEC elected at the Third World Congress, the most representative congress in the entire history of the international Trotskyist movement; and next, the IS named by the IEC. These organisms were duly elected, with almost unanimous agreement. They have a mandate to see that the line of the Third Congress, adopted by an overwhelming majority of the International, is carried out, and that the statutes of the International, unanimously adopted at the Second Congress, are conformed with.
A few words now regarding the IS, and more particularly, the "few people in Paris." On the present IS —which is larger than just these "few people" — there are leading comrades from some of the most important sections of the International: the English, German, French, Italian. The American comrades have been unable to send a comrade, as in the past, but we hope to include one at the first opportunity.
As for the "few people in Paris," allow me to introduce them, since Comrade Cannon has given them the brush-off. They are three; they have assumed the continuity of the daily work of the IS for eight years. Except for one—Comrade Germain — they are unfortunately no longer "young men."
Comrade Cannon correctly says that they were unknown in your party in 1945, and that he did everything to build up their prestige. We do not dispute him, and we take this opportunity to once more and publicly thank Comrade Cannon for this.
They were not, however, so unknown in the working-class movement, and particularly in the Trotskyist movement of their respective countries and the European Trotskyist movement. One of them, Comrade Pierre Frank, has been active in the French working-class movement for over 30 years, and in the Trotskyist movement since its beginnings. He is one of the senior members of the international Trotskyist movement, a former collaborator of Leon Trotsky. During the war he was interned in a concentration camp in England.
[p. 92]
Another, Comrade Germain, has been active in our movement for thirteen years. He played a very active role in the Belgian Trotskyist organization during the war, helping enormously to rebuild it before he fell into the hands of the Gestapo who imprisoned him for two years in a dungeon in Germany.
For myself, I have been active in the Trotskyist movement since 1928. I was deported, imprisoned and finally exiled from my country. I attended the Founding Congress of the Fourth International. From its beginning I had been a part of the European Secretariat which was reconstructed in the midst of the war under the Nazi occupation in 1943, and I became its secretary in the fall of 1943 after the arrest of Comrade M. Hic. Since 1945 I have been secretary of the IS, which in a quite natural way had become grafted to the European Secretariat, the latter having functioned during the war as the sole international organism outside the United States.
Comrade Cannon makes no mention of the role played during the war by the Trotskyist organizations outside the United States, speaks of the "suppression of our movement in most parts of Europe by the war," and makes no allusion to the European Secretariat, three of whose leading members perished before the end of hostilities.
At all events, these "few people in Paris," unknown in 1945 in New York, were a little better known in the European Trotskyist movement which just at that time had written one of the most glorious pages of our international movement.
Again Comrade Cannon will perhaps say: "Good, good. But what about this method of yours of giving 'orders,' your tendency to 'set up the International as a highly centralized body, on the order of the early Comintern, which could make decisions, enforce orders and so forth, in the old Comintern fashion'" — a method, it seems, to which he has always been opposed. The question, Comrade Cannon will finally say, is not one of recognizing no international discipline whatever, but what kind of discipline.
In fact, throughout his entire speech Comrade Cannon pictures the "few people in Paris" as having constantly tried to intervene in the affairs of sections (despite his opposition), to impose "orders" and decisions bureaucratically, in a word, as having acted stupidly, inexperienced as they probably are in "organizational and tactical" questions.
This is wrong from beginning to end.
All interventions and decisions were and are made not by the "few people in Paris," but by the IS and the IEC, organisms in which the Australian representatives also participate.
There has never been any opposition on their part in these matters, not even any protests. I will speak later of the Bleibtreu case, which Comrade Cannon is now trying to exploit so much. It may be that Comrade Cannon himself had disagreements—"fairly serious ones," as he now says —with the IS manner of acting. The fact is that his representatives never formulated these disagreements here, that they always supported and voted with the rest of us, and that in eight years we have not received a single letter from Comrade Cannon formulating any opinion whatever.
The "orders" and interventions of the IEC and the IS were and are of two kinds: first of all, political; and only secondarily, organizational, in the sense of defending or seeing that the statutes of the International are carried out.
The "few people in Paris," that is, the three comrades of the IS Bureau, have never decided and imposed anything whatever on any section whatever, politically or still less organizationally. In constant contact with the sections, they have always given political and organizational advice, often at the request of the sections themselves, as it is their right and above all their duty to do. All important political and organizational decisions have been made by the IS (which has always been a larger body than the Paris Bureau) and particularly by the IEC.
The interventions, if one wishes to use the term, have been primarily political. The series of Internal Bulletins of the IS and its dossiers of correspondence with the sections offer ample testimony of this. We will run through rapidly the most important instances, which Comrade Cannon seems to be completely unaware of:
The French situation immediately after the war; the meaning of the Transitional Program and the way of fighting Stalinophilia; the postwar situation in England and its perspectives, the Labor Party question, entrism, and the question of the Soviet buffer zone which Haston raised; the postwar situation and our tasks in Greece; Morrow's political concepts; the political concepts of Shachtman, and of Johnson; the Yugoslav revolution, and the question of the class character of the buffer zone; the Chinese revolution and the ideas, among others, held by our Chinese section; the political concepts of the Bleibtreu group; the necessity of entrism in Germany, and in Holland; the political problems of the Latin American movement in general and several of our sections there in particular; the situation and our tasks in Ceylon and in India; the Bolivian revolution, etc.
Nevertheless, Comrade Cannon has some concrete examples of bad organizational intervention on the part of the IS: the cases of the right-wing group in France, Haston in England, and the Bleibtreu group. What is actually involved here? Let us take up the first case.
If we understand him correctly, Comrade Cannon now reproaches us a posteriori, for our "soft" attitude toward the right-wingers in France after the Second World War. He would have had quicker action taken against them; that is, they should probably have been expelled sooner from the section and from the International.
He makes the same remark regarding Haston in England, where the hesitations and delays of the IS caused the loss of at least "one year of precious time" for constructive work in the Labor Party by the English minority—as he says in his June 4 letter to Tom which you are acquainted with.
In both France and England we should have gone ahead much more firmly and quickly. That is Comrade Cannon's opinion. In the name of what? In the name, probably, of the line and discipline of the International which had been violated by the right-wingers and Haston.
[p. 93]
Because there is no other principle that can be invoked to justify intervention and measures. Because, also, both the right-wingers and Haston, considered from a national point of view, represented at that time a very large majority of their respective sections and a leadership which had been naturally and normally selected during the hard war years of these sections.
Taking precisely these facts into account, and far from wanting to intervene organizationally with "orders," bureaucratically, and drive toward split and expulsion, the IS did everything possible to encourage above all a political struggle and clarification in these sections, excluding any idea of split and expulsion.
Moreover, we have never expelled, and will never expel anyone from the International for political opinions divergent from ours. Actually, the right-wingers, Haston and the Bleibtreu group all left us.
This political struggle in the French and English sections after the war was led primarily by the IS. The political support of the American organization naturally was precious to us in this struggle.
But Comrade Cannon makes an error when he speaks of "a big wave of Stalinophobia" here during that period. The opposite is true. Both in France and in England between 1945 and 1948 we had to struggle against primarily Stalinophile, not Stalinophobe tendencies, since the pressure of Stalinism was dominant during that entire period in Europe.
Finally, there is the Bleibtreu case, which is now Comrade Cannon's trump card. He says: "A few months after the World Congress, where the French party had supposedly accepted the Congress decision, we suddenly heard that there was a split-or a partial split-in the PCI." (My emphasis.)
The political struggle against the Bleibtreu group began at the time of the 9th Plenum of the IEC and continued to the Third Congress and beyond. The American representatives here were thoroughly acquainted with the innumerable events and details of the struggle, the behavior and actions of the group. They became more and more indignant over these actions and were in full accord with us on the character of the group and the line to follow toward it. It is astonishing, to say the least, that Comrade Cannon did not know what the attitude of this group was at the Third Congress and immediately after the Congress, when it pronounced itself completely against the line and the discipline of the International. It is astonishing, to say the least, that what occurred at the end of January 1952 — that is, about five months after the Congress — made him "hit the ceiling."
Comrade Cannon still does not seem to be completely convinced that the Bleibtreu group was not simply fooling around with the line of the Third Congress and the discipline of the International, but was squarely opposed to it and ignored both the IEC and the IS. He says: "I believe (the French majority) was fooling around with the World Congress decisions."
As for the famous measure of "the International Secretariat having intervened and placed a representative of the IS as impartial chairman over a parity committee" — what is really involved here? It was a measure of temporary suspension from their posts of the majority members of the Central Committee of the PCI, who had once more refused, at the CC meeting in January 1952, to respect the political discipline of the International which was defended by the IEC and the IS.
They were neither removed nor expelled. They were temporarily suspended from their posts, until the IEC Plenum could make the responsible decision in their case. This measure, of course an extreme one, came after a long series of efforts — all of them in vain — to bring the leaders of the group to an elementary behavior in conformity with the statutes, rules and decisions of the International. It was a measure that the statutes of the International grant to the IS in case of grave necessity. It was taken after everything else had failed, and after three successive meetings of the IS — attended by the U.S.A. representative — in order that all the IS members could have sufficient time for consideration before the measure was taken. It was then voted for unanimously.
But even in the case of the Bleibtreu group, it was never a question with the IS of provoking a split or expulsion. Every time that we seemed to arrive at agreement, with the Bleibtreu group pledging to respect the line and discipline of the International, we were ready to defend the normal functioning of the section, with no exclusion of the Bleibtreu representatives. It was they who shamelessly played with the International and who —like all the others — finally left it. Their conduct since then has very clearly stamped the political character of this group, sectarian and adventuristic, and making a mockery of Trotskyism insofar as they present themselves in its name.
Actually, the difference in Comrade Cannon's attitude, on the one hand, toward the right-wingers and Haston — whom we treated, it seems, with "softness"—and on the other hand, toward the Bleibtreu group —whom we treated with "hardness" — can be explained by the unquestionable affinity of his thinking with certain ideas and accusations formulated by Bleibtreu against the policy of the International and its leadership. That is the explanation of the astonishing political silence of Comrade Cannon during the entire political struggle in France, which was of very great importance for the line to be adopted at the Third Congress — as well as his hesitations and torments of conscience in connection with Renard's letter.
I now find a supplementary proof in the way Comrade Cannon reports his other "fairly serious" disagreement with us, one which concerns me especially: "When Pablo wrote his article about 'centuries of degenerated workers states,' we again had the most violent disagreement." (My emphasis.) Further on, he attributes to me the opinion of "centuries of Stalinism after the revolution." I rubbed my eyes in reading the text of his speech: Was this Comrade Cannon or Bleibtreu speaking?
I never spoke of "degenerated workers states" which will last for centuries after the world victory of the revolution, nor, of course, of Stalinism surviving for centuries. It is monstrous and inadmissible that such methods should be used among responsible comrades in so-called "ideological" discussion.
It was Bleibtreu who, shamefully distorting the letter and spirit of my first writings on this subject, attributed to me the idea of "a bureaucracy in the USSR surviving the world revolution." I replied to him on this question in my article "The Unavowed Objectives of an Attack," and also the article "On the Duration and the Nature of the Period of Transition from Capitalism to Socialism," which I hope all members of the SWP have read and understood. (Internal Bulletin of the IS, No. 8, July 1951.)
[p. 94]
But, Comrade Cannon, if the secretary of the International — in whom, moreover, you still recognize certain merits, and about whom you spoke and wrote not so long ago (in any case, since his writings on the "centuries of Stalinism") that he had contributed greatly to clarify precisely the question of Stalinism and its perspectives in the postwar world — if he had written what you now attribute to him, it would have been necessary with no hesitation whatever to combat him vigorously and even to demand his removal from the post he occupies.
For how could you keep in the post of secretary of the Trotskyist International a man who defends the survival for centuries, after the world victory of the revolution, of Stalinism?
There is, in fact, no worse accusation than this — or rather, no worse calumny. For not only do the writings to which Comrade Cannon refers (has he really read them?) contain nothing of the sort, as can easily be verified by just glancing briefly at the incriminated texts; but they take great care, where special mention is made of the problem of Stalinism — that is, the grip of the Soviet bureaucracy on the USSR and the international working-class movement — to differentiate it very clearly from the other ideas brought up there.
These ideas have to do with the probability for an entire historic period of several centuries of transition between the capitalist system and the completed world socialist system: the primarily economic and not political causes of the phenomenon of bureaucratic deformation (not degeneration) of the proletarian power, which will not completely disappear (though relatively disappearing, as I emphasized, to the extent that the revolution conquers in the developed countries and that the level of the productive forces attains and surpasses the level of the most advanced capitalist country) until a very high level of the productive forces throughout the world has been attained, with the corresponding cultural development.
As for the fall of Stalinism, that is, of the rule of the Soviet bureaucracy in the USSR and over a part of the international working-class movement, I have written a hundred times that this will come about in the course of the decisive struggle between imperialism and the revolution.
In all my writings, moreover, I have been among the first, I believe, to analyze the idea that the postwar expansion of Stalinism was, in reality, at the same time the beginning of its break-up, through the resultant objective destruction of its former bases of equilibrium, and through the introduction into its system of new factors of fermentation, crisis and decomposition.
Furthermore, it is not I who in any way whatever have avoided a discussion on the "centuries." I wrote on the subject not once but three times, despite the hesitations, uneasiness and criticisms the subject aroused among certain people, which I well recognized. My thinking on the subject was clear and firm, and I had nothing to retract, nothing to hide or to have forgotten.
It is a great pity that, on the advice of Comrade Morris, who feared for my "prestige" if Comrade Cannon were to attack me publicly — advice which was unquestionably well-intentioned toward me, and which I appreciate—Comrade Cannon did nothing, said nothing, wrote nothing.
I want to take this occasion to say this very clearly: Our International would not be a serious political organization if such considerations of "prestige," etc., led to keeping people in the leadership who preach "centuries of Stalinism."
On the plane of fundamental political and programmatic ideas, there is no question of "prestige" but simply the most complete and most rigorous political clarity. In cases like this, each one has the duty to take up his pen and write fully. Of course it is wise to first take the trouble to read and understand what someone else has written, not only in the interest of one's own seriousness but for the honesty of the discussion.
Let us move on.
Comrade Cannon ended his speech with a concept which seems to me to be the key to his other ideas about internationalism, our International, the "few people in Paris," etc. Here is what he says: "This party, comrades, is the most important party in the whole world. Not because we say so, not because we are braggarts, as Cochran says whenever anyone puts in a good word for the party. It is because we are operating in that section of the capitalist world which is not collapsing. We are operating in that section of the world which is a concentration of all the power of capitalism — the United States. The revolutions which are taking place in other parts of the world, in China, Korea and other areas of the colonial world — those revolutions cannot be definitive. They can only be provisional — so long as capitalism rules the United States."
I do not propose to reply here in extenso to this conception. It offers material for a full discussion, and I hope that we will have it. But I believe certain remarks are necessary now:
There is no question of underestimating in any way the capital importance of the American revolution, the American proletariat, and its revolutionary party, for the achievement, stabilization and eventual rapid progress toward the genuine socialist society, of the world revolution.
But it is necessary to understand, on the other hand, that the relation of forces between the rising world revolution in all its forms and American capitalism has changed enormously since the Second World War (in relation to the pre-war situation), and is evolving more and more to the disadvantage of the latter; that even the relation of forces between U.S. capitalism and the coalition of anti-capitalist states (which enter as a part of the global forces of the revolution) has changed and is steadily changing to its disadvantage; that the victory of the American revolution will now in all likelihood be determined and facilitated more and more by the progress of the revolution in other parts of the world; that the power of capitalism is concentrated in the United States as a last fortress, more and more closely besieged on every side by the forces of the rising world revolution; that from this point of view, the importance of the revolutionary working-class movement and the revolution in other parts of the world, far from lessening in relation to the importance of the American working-class movement and the American revolution, and far from being strictly dependent on the latter, on the contrary strengthen and more and more determine the victory of the latter; that Stalinism will very probably collapse completely in this process, and even before the victory of the American revolution is assured.
[p. 95]
A final word: The entire International is indebted to the American organization; among other things, for the example of the ideological struggle, so enormously educational, that it gave in 1939-40. Comrade Cannon himself wrote at that time some very valuable things on the character and functioning of the proletarian party, on a remarkably high and clear ideological level. One can see him through his writings of that time —calm, confident, principled and completely master of himself. The presence of Leon Trotsky, his active participation in the struggle, of which in reality he led the entire political aspect, properly speaking, naturally counted for a great deal in this.
We wish that Comrade Cannon would not now forget his important and worthy contribution of those years in the ideological and organizational education of our movement.
We no longer have Leon Trotsky. We are only ourselves. Despite our unquestionable progress during these last years, we are still a weak movement, subject to terrible class pressures that increase as we move closer to the final and decisive storm.
We must raise to the highest level the understanding of our responsibilities, the clarity of our ideas, the truly Bolshevik methods of discussion in our movement, worthy of our traditions.
It is up to the leaders and the cadres to be the first to give the example.
September 9, 1953
Note: I have left aside several other ideas in Comrade Cannon's speech so as not to overburden this reply and to concentrate on what seemed to me the essential for the moment.