Our General Meeting held every four months took place on Saturday, May 30, and Sunday, May 31; it was the 155th such meeting since the split of November 1973. It was a particularly important meeting, as several young people from various countries and continents participated as full-fledged comrades for the first time, alongside a fair number of highly dedicated sympathizers.

The proceedings followed the usual party method, with the exception of, due to the online participation of comrades from various continents, the schedule being adjusted to allow the greatest number of comrades to participate without undue inconvenience. During the first meeting on Saturday, the comrades responsible for collective activities reported on their progress; subsequently, following the Center’s general report, the comrades were briefed on the features of the revamped website, social media engagement, the reading group’s activities, ongoing and proposed studies, and the organization’s financial situation.

In the second part of the day, work concerning the military question and part of the study on the Italian Railway Workers’ Union (SFI) during the 1920s were presented.

During the first part of Sunday’s meeting, three highly interesting papers on the history of the workers’ movement were presented, each focusing on a specific period and a different country: the United States, France, and Russia. The second part of the day featured the customary presentation on the state of the global capitalist economy, and the work regarding the SFI (Railway Workers Union) in the‘20s of the last century was finally concluded. All of these reports document the progress of studies that have been ongoing for many years and that the party continues to carry out as its primary task; they are then periodically published in our press. The quality of the presentations was, as usual, outstanding.

This issue of The International Communist marks the start of the publication of these summaries.

History of the French trade union movement, Part four

In previous reports, we described the various forms of economic organization within the European labor movement between the late 19th and early 20th centuries. We then presented the characteristics of the French labor movement, the revolutionary alliance between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat up until February 1848, the importance of the petty bourgeoisie as a breeding ground for anarchism, parasitic financial capitalism, French imperialism, and the conquest of colonies as a source of corruption for a segment of the proletariat.

We have described the emergence of labor unions before 1871, as well as France’s economic rise, which was accompanied by the rise of the labor union movement and the socialist movement following the Paris Commune.

In 1884, following legal recognition, the trade union movement developed rapidly. The various schools of thought that emerged included, first and foremost, the school of thought of Proudhon, the father of anarchism, who was opposed by Marx and who would inspire Pelloutier’s revolutionary syndicalism. Revolutionary syndicalism, of which Sorel would become the principal theorist, would shape French trade unionism until 1905.

In 1886, a National Federation of Trade Union Chambers (FNS) was founded, bringing together craft unions; it was initially dominated by reformists and later by the French Workers’ Party (POF), which had been established on Marxist principles in 1880.

As early as the 1890s, the French trade union movement became fertile ground for anarchism in the form of revolutionary syndicalism. The country experienced slower capitalist development than Great Britain and Germany; in 1900, nine-tenths of French enterprises employed fewer than ten workers, with a large number of artisans in the workforce, thereby creating fertile ground for the petty bourgeoisie and anarchism. Revolutionary syndicalism extolled direct action and the general strike, as well as confrontation with the bourgeoisie, but rejected parliamentary and political action. The father of revolutionary syndicalism was Pelloutier, who inspired the creation of Bourses du travail (Labor Exchanges) as early as 1887; these served as employment agencies but, above all, as hubs for all workers’ trade unions and mutual aid societies, organizing workers on a territorial basis rather than by trade. In 1892, the Bourses du Travail united to form the Federation of Labour Exchanges (FNB) which was dominated by revolutionary syndicalists.

The socialist movement developed along various currents. The Marxist faction, led by Jules Guesde and Paul Lafargue, Marx’s son-in-law, founded the French Workers’ Party (POF) in 1880. It would later become influential in major industries, such as the textile industry in the north and the iron and steel industry in the center. The other currents were the reformist faction known as the « Possibilists », to which Jaurès would later belong, and the so-called « revolutionaries » who advocated insurrection, comprising Édouard Vaillant’s Blanquist party and Allemane’s party. The Workers’ Party, while asserting the party’s authority over the trade unions, eventually had to break with the trade union movement dominated by revolutionary syndicalism.

The Dreyfus Affair crisis (1894–1906), which divided France, caused the Workers’ Party to veer toward opportunism and parliamentarism as early as 1898, joining forces with the reformists to « save the homeland » from an unlikely monarchist coup d’état.

The birth of the revolutionary syndicalist CGT in 1895 and the weakness of the Workers’ Party

The supremacy of revolutionary syndicalism over the POF (1888-1895)

Under the influence of the anarcho-syndicalists, the third congress of the FNS (National Federation of Syndicates and Workers’ Corporative Groups of France), held in Bordeaux in October 1888, revisited the issue of the general strike and concluded: « Only the general strike, that is, the complete cessation of all work, or the Revolution can lead workers toward their emancipation.”  This congress also concluded, against the views of the Guesdists, that it was necessary to make a clean break from the political movement and to build a solid organization for the trade union chambers: the « one great army of social demands »! The emancipation of the workers had to be the work of the workers themselves! The Guesdists represented a step backward. 

Guesde represented the POF at the international congress in Paris on July 14, 1889, which gave rise to the Second International (or Workers’ International), of which he was a leading figure, and in 1890 he served on the organizing committee for the May Day demonstrations and on the delegation tasked with presenting workers’ demands to the President of the Chamber. On November 14, 1890, he attended the German Social Democratic congress in Halle and drew fierce attacks from the French nationalist press for shouting, « Long live working-class Germany! »

In February 1892, at the Saint-Étienne congress of the Bourses du Travail (of which there were then 14 sections in France), and on the initiative of the Paris Bourse and Pelloutier, a National Federation of Bourses du Travail of France and the colonies (FNB) was established. Its aim was to distinguish itself from the tendency of the Guesdist workers’ party, which, much like the German and Belgian sections of the Socialist International, sought to control the trade unions and favored parliamentary action. Pelloutier had to abandon part of his anarchist theories to foster the centralization of the workers’ forces, dreaming of a revolution without dictatorship, without the State, and without centralization! Alongside the anarchists there were socialists and reformists, but the anarchists led by Pelloutier would take on an increasingly important role and would oppose their competitor, the POF-controlled FNS, whose influence was now very weak. This *Bourses du Travail* movement would prevail over that of the FNS trade union chambers. One of the resolutions in favor of the general strike proposed by Pelloutier was adopted as a « peaceful and legal means… (to) accelerate economic transformation and ensure, without the possibility of a counter-reaction, the success of the Fourth Estate [workers’ associations] » (cited in *Programme Communiste* No. 25, 1963), basing itself, as the Second International had done, on the evident failure of an insurrectionary movement.

For its part, in September 1892, the Federation of Trade Union Chambers FNS (industry-specific trade unions) held its fifth congress in Marseille, attended by delegates from the Labor Exchanges, including the one in Paris. Guesde and Lafargue also participated as delegates. On that occasion, just as at the *Bourses du Travail* congress, a resolution championed by the independent socialist Aristide Briand was adopted in favor of the principle of the general strike (defined as a « simultaneous, universal suspension of work »); however, the task of determining the specific modalities of action was left to the Third International Congress of Socialist Workers (the Second International) in Zurich. The argument put forward was that the unions, having unsuccessfully employed the partial strike, had subsequently adopted it successfully and were therefore agreeing to « engage in politics. » During the POF congress in Marseille in September 1892, the proposal in favor of the general strike was once again rejected. While in 1879 and 1886 the Guesdists might have thought they had secured a grip on the labor movement, they were forced to take a step back during the final decade of the century and beyond.

At the Third Congress of the Second International, held in Zurich in August 1893 and attended by Engels, the anarchists led by Gustav Landauer were expelled with the split being formalized in 1906. Trade unions were officially admitted (the Guesdists and Vaillant were opposed to this, advocating for a trade union organization separate from the socialist parties), and the topic of the general strike was touched upon briefly, without even reaching a conclusion!

Following a period of spectacular attacks (1892–94), the most famous and final instance of which was the 1894 assassination of French President Sadi Carnot in Lyon, described as a « sublimated expression of the exasperation and powerlessness of the exploited classes » (Programme No. 25), anarchism in France moved away from terrorism and turned toward trade union activity, albeit independent of any political party; it was through this union-based action that the movement believed it could bring about the reorganization of society. It was in particular the Bourses du Travail, which brought together various trade unions, that witnessed the rise of revolutionary syndicalism, a movement rooted in anarchism; this movement defined the period from 1892 to 1906, a time dominated by the ideological rivalry between socialism and syndicalism, whereas the years from 1906 to 1914 saw the decline of revolutionary syndicalists and an intensification of the conflict between union and party, a rivalry fueled by the party’s reformist and opportunistic stances, particularly regarding socialist participation in government.

In fact, the separation between the trade unions and the party only intensified. Numerous political battles, such as the clash between monarchists and republicans, the rise of bourgeois radicalism, and political and financial scandals (the Panama scandal, the Dreyfus affair), distracted socialist parties from their task of waging struggle within economic organizations.

In 1893, the FNB declared the absolute independence of the trade union from the State and political parties. The FNB’s federalism also opposed the centralization of the POF. At the FNS congress in Nantes (September 1894), which until then had been sponsored by the Workers’ Party, the majority approved a motion in favor of the general strike. What was at stake in the dispute between socialists and syndicalists (Programme Communiste 24/1963) « was precisely a question of program: the replacement of the socialist slogan, the seizure of power by the proletariat and the dictatorship of the victorious revolutionary class over the expropriated classes, with the anarcho-syndicalist slogan of the ‘expropriatory general strike’. » In other words, it was a continuation of the long-standing debate between Marxism and anarchism. At first, Guesde’s party, while not committing any serious violations of the principles of the revolutionary proletarian movement, failed to understand the pressing needs of the labor movement and, largely for this reason, lost control of it. At that time, the trade union organization had achieved a remarkable degree of cohesion and effectiveness and was resolutely taking the lead in the workers’ struggles. The Guesdists thus suffered a defeat within the Federation of Trade Union Chambers: they had failed to persuade the Federation to once again reject a motion in favor of a general strike, and they resigned because they believed the Federation was nothing more than a caricature of the Marxist conception of the proletarian revolution.

The year 1895 thus marked a turning point between two periods: the first, in which the party still embodied the revolutionary principles of Marxism and the unions had no influence, and the second, in which the unions were expanding while the party was sliding toward opportunism.

The founding of the CGT in Limoges in September 1895

The question of trade union unity between the two federations, the FNS and the FNB, quickly arose after the defeat of the Guesdists at the FNS convention in Nantes in September 1894. The FNS decided to invite all trade union organizations, representatives of trade union chambers, trade groups, craft federations, unions, and labor exchanges, as well as the FNB, to its upcoming congress in Limoges in September 1895; the FNB accepted the offer.

A national committee, composed of representatives from the two federations along with other activists, was tasked with preparing the congress, which was held in Limoges from September 23 to 28, 1895, and which gave rise to the Confédération Générale du Travail (General Confederation of Labor, CGT), with 75 delegates from 26 industrial or sectoral federations, 18 labor exchanges, and 126 independent labor chambers. Sent by a wide variety of labor unions, the delegates—including three women—discussed a very packed agenda. However, it was the creation of a national organization that dominated most of the debates and led to the founding of the CGT. Some had wanted to name the new central body the « National » or « French » Confederation of Labor, but this proposal was ultimately rejected based on the following argument: labor organization must be not only national but also international! It was organized around trade federations and Bourses du Travail.

But above all: an amendment specified that “CGT members must remain outside any political faction.” From its very inception, eleven years before the congress at which the “Amiens Charter” would be adopted in 1906, the CGT had shown extreme distrust toward any political organization. They would maintain this stance until the First World War, and although they would later reaffirm it, the CGT’s relationship with the party would change.

The French Workers’ Party and the Trade Union Question: From Marxism to Opportunism

In  Programme Communiste 24/1963, p. 62 we wrote:

“While the formation of the Workers Party, the first Marxist proletarian organization in France, at the end of the long period of depression caused by the crushing of the Paris Commune, represented a political achievement of the highest order, one would look in vain for its equivalent in the trade union sphere.

To realize that the rift between socialists and syndicalists was based, at least at the start of the conflict, merely on a struggle for leadership of the trade union movement rather than on the superiority or utility of a specific form of action, one need only note that the famous « general strike » advocated by French syndicalism never actually materialized in France.

When general strikes broke out in Russia at the beginning of the following century, they by no means confirmed the models held by French (and foreign) anarcho-syndicalists; yet, on the other hand, the socialists, corrupted by long parliamentary experience, had become incapable of grasping the significance of these events, let alone assuming leadership of them, should this form of struggle happen to spread from Tsarist Russia to ultra-bourgeois France.

This does not change the nature of the initial divergence in any way.

Until that turning point at the beginning of the 20th century, the replacement of the slogan “expropriatory general strike” with that of “seizure of political power” was, and could only be, a rejection of the party and of political action, even though, in the minds of its supporters, it was a means of averting a shift toward parliamentarism. The conflict that broke out around 1890 between the Guesdists and the syndicalists could not be quickly resolved by the shifting balance of class power in France; but this conflict nonetheless reflected the irreconcilable opposition between two conceptions of the workers’ revolution: Marxism, according to which there can be no socialism without the destruction of the bourgeois state and the use of a repressive instrument such as the proletarian state; syndicalism, which, despite having formally broken with anarchism, remained an enemy of “any” state and opposed “any” form of coercion.

The fundamental importance of the issue raised amply justifies Guesde’s intransigence.” And further on, on p. 66:

“Guesde rightly sought a break with those who treated the general strike as an end in itself and fostered the belief that it was possible to put an end to Capital without confronting the capitalist state, overthrowing bourgeois power, and establishing the revolutionary dictatorship; it was also right for him to try to prevent the nascent trade union movement from falling into the hands of a faction steeped in anarchist utopianism at a time when the only existing federation [FNS] was controlled by the Socialist Party [POF]. The indignation of working-class democrats at Guesde’s “authoritarian” attempts to maintain the Party’s influence within the trade union was all the more petty, and their invocations of the alleged general will supposedly being “trampled upon” all the more futile, precisely because the struggle played out within very narrow circles and the majority of the proletariat remained entirely separated at the time. The union itself was still merely in its infancy, and the only question was whether it would fall under the influence of Marxist socialists or that of the anarchists.

Guesde’s great mistake was to mechanically transplant, given the immaturity of the French labor movement, a formula of strict party control over the trade union; such a formula was feasible only in countries with far more advanced industrial development and concentration, such as Germany and Belgium, the two heartlands of social democracy. In these countries, and until the opportunistic degeneration of the Second International, the centralization of the two bodies had made it possible to combine trade union demands with the socialist struggle in Parliament. In France, however, the failed attempt to clumsily imitate German social democracy regarding trade unions had the effect of further polarizing the party’s activity toward electoral propaganda, alienating militants who were already hostile due to their background, exacerbating the trade union leaders’ desire for autonomy, and elevating a nebulous formula, which initially expressed only the ideology of a minority, to the status of a sacred, eternal principle for safeguarding the trade union organization.

Indeed, Guesde, who unreservedly championed the striking workers, took an uncompromising stance against the direct action advocated by revolutionary syndicalists, maintaining instead the effectiveness of parliamentary struggle.

Let us continue with *Programme Communiste* No. 24, p. 67:

“Another, even more serious consequence of Guesde’s intransigent attitude was that, in the long run, it rendered the party hostile on principle to the general strike, even when viewed merely as a means of action in the workers’ struggle. What was merely an academic distortion in Guesde’s case was to become, with the help of circumstances, a truly opportunistic argument. A praiseworthy concern to move away from adventurist notions was turned into a rejection of the struggle and objective complicity with the bourgeoisie. Thus, since the anarchists sought to imbue trade union activity with a romantic revolutionary perspective, Guesde soon adopted the very attitude that, twenty years later in Germany, showed the total sclerosis of Social Democracy: that of leaving economic demands to the unions while entrusting the reforms to be enacted in Parliament to the party.

An attitude truly inspired by Marxism would have been different. The importance, scope, and form of the struggles to be waged are not a matter of principle, but merely of assessing the balance of forces; indeed, within the revolutionary perspective of seizing power, the very concept of a general strike is perfectly orthodox. It is regarding political objectives, the nature and form of power, and the acceptance of the dictatorship of the proletariat that questions of principle arise. Despite their militant rhetoric, anarchists, and the trade unionists inspired by their principles, hold a democratic conception of revolution; unable to conceive of the iron dictatorship necessary to destroy capitalist relations of production, their liberalism contents itself with a coalition of the most disparate classes and parties. It is precisely through the latter that they were defeated by the counter-revolution, as they demonstrated half a century after the events in question here: during their « general strikes » in Spain, the Republicans and anti-fascists betrayed the proletarian uprisings of 1936 and handed them over to Franco. It is therefore necessary for Marxism to combat the anarchist conception of the general strike, and Guesde, from this perspective, was fully justified in doing so during the early days of the French trade union movement. However, this defining and safeguarding of the principles gained by the proletarian movement did not at all require the party to reject, even during a period of capitalist expansion, a powerful means of action valid for the demands of the entire class. It is on this terrain, and not in the unhealthy antechambers of parliamentary activity, that the workers’ party can act in support of the proletariat’s immediate demands during periods when the prospect of a revolutionary assault on power is closed to it. In other words, faced with the slogan that the anarchists had elevated to the ‘nec plus ultra’ of the social revolution, it would have been appropriate for Guesde’s party to distinguish its ideological aspect, which needed to be combated as it was tainted by utopianism and apoliticism, from its content of social militancy, which instead deserved to be encouraged and developed.

By adopting an opposing stance, Guesde’s trade-union faction demonstrated that the party already harbored the seeds of an opportunist evolution, one that, by focusing on elections and the capture of municipal governments, sparked a fierce « anti-party » tradition within the trade-union movement and left trade unionists with a monopoly on agitation for goals that were nonetheless closely aligned with the party’s own tasks: specifically, denouncing the looming imperialist war, as well as anti-militarism and anti-colonialism, causes that would, in subsequent decades, become the hallmarks of revolutionary syndicalism.

If we now place the emergence of the anarcho-syndicalist tendency within the context of the era, we can understand why the ideology of the general strike enabled its proponents to respond more effectively than the Socialist Party to the workers’ aspirations. And this entitles us to separate the undeniable practical effectiveness of the trade unionists, over a specific period, from a social vision that is just as conformist and deviant with respect to the proletariat’s initial program as that of the avowed reformists. Therefore, without detracting from the individual merits of the trade unionists, often upstanding, devoted, and self-sacrificing militants, one cannot subscribe to the laudatory view held by their historians when the latter assert in a doctrinaire tone that this form of trade unionism represented the definitive and future shape of the proletarian revolutionary movement. If the proponents of trade union independence and the general strike found themselves leading the first mass grouping of workers, it was by no means as representatives of the industrial proletariat of the future; on the contrary, it was as a historical remnant, because the low level of development and concentration of productive forces had left the leadership of the trade union movement to the victors of a sort of closed-door competition in which, between the two organized minorities present, the majority sided with the anachronistic perpetuation of the past.

The fact that the struggle for union leadership took place within a minority of the working class is confirmed by data regarding CGT membership in 1902: « At that time, » writes Edouard Dolléans, a historian of the French labor movement, « barely 17% of the total industrial workforce was unionized; it was both a minority of workers and a minority of union members that formed the confederation. » Why, then, did the majority of the militants in this workers’ vanguard opt for syndicalism, the general strike, and direct action? Because the party, already mired in parliamentarism, could offer them nothing but elections; because they were weary of the disappointing parliamentary activity of the workers’ delegates; because their class tradition instilled in them the deep and justified mistrust of a plebs that had always been deceived by petty-bourgeois representatives; because, for the preceding two or three generations, politics had always meant impotent chatter in parliament and betrayal in the streets. Why were so many staunch supporters of trade union independence? For even before Millerand’s « government socialists » sought to annex the trade union movement, « worker militants had suffered so greatly from the political divisions within their organizations that, in their eyes, trade union autonomy was the prerequisite for working-class unity » (Dolléans). For the anarcho-syndicalists, who produced highly prominent militants, were the only ones within the entire movement to escape the party’s stifling, essentially electoral activity and to be able to devote themselves to the immediate issues surrounding workers’ demands; consequently, they were the only ones who knew how to resolve these issues and who tackled them tenaciously through the most appropriate bodies.” (Programme Communiste No. 24).

THE RAILWAY WORKERS’ UNION: THE WRETCHED END OF A GLORIOUS « RED » UNION

Given its length, due in particular to the extensive use of quotations from PCd’I press outlets, this report was presented in two separate parts: on Saturday and Sunday.

At the time we’ll have a substantial number of railway workers in our party and they devoting all their efforts to the reborn class-based union, then we will need to write, from the beginning, the history of the Italian Railway Workers’ Union, the glorious “red” union, founded in 1907 and which met a miserable end in 1925.

In the series of reports already presented, we examined only the ignominious end of what were once formidable class-based organizations, and we sought to highlight the causes of their degeneration, which, as Marxists, we do not attribute solely to the responsibility of traitorous leaders, but rather to material, social, and historical conditions that far transcend the will of individuals. Even though those individuals do, of course, bear their own share of responsibility.

We are not scandalized to acknowledge that the bourgeoisie aims to imprison the proletariat within trade unions transformed into state organs; we are equally well aware that the plan to hollow out the workers’ movement, characteristic of reformist revisionism, substantially coincides with fascist trade unionism, with the corporatism of Mussolini.

What we wish to reiterate and emphasize through these reports is that our Left Communist current has never spoken of traumatic breakups; for us, the degeneration of trade union bodies involves no break in continuity: as early as their support for the First World War, the trade union confederations had placed themselves entirely at the service of the State, subordinating the immediate interests of the working class to the bourgeois class’s overriding interest in preserving the social order and its own regime. Therefore, unless there is a strong resurgence of the class struggle, led by a communist party rooted in the proletariat and its class organizations, trade unions will, on an international level, be reduced to mere appendages of the bourgeois state apparatus.

After helping to pave the way for Fascism’s rise to power, the CGdL was certainly not the only trade union that sought to jump on the winner’s bandwagon. The Italian Railway Workers’ Union (SFI) also followed the same ignoble path even though throughout its history and class-based activism, it had rightly earned the title of « Red union. »

But let’s take things one step at a time.

In the five months following its founding, the Communist Party of Italy established a solid and widespread structure within the so-called “class-based” trade unions, and, through its own action and recruitment groups, the Party steadily gained support among the proletarian masses.

The response from all the other political factions represented in the SFI was swift and unanimous. An anti-communist “united front” immediately formed among anarchists, syndicalists, socialists, republicans, and the “non-aligned”: only 22 delegates voted for the communist motion, whereas the syndicalist-anarchist resolution secured 58 votes.

It should be noted that at previous congresses, Socialist delegates had consistently proposed the SFI’s affiliation with the CGdL, partly in keeping with the 1907 Florence “Pact of Action.” Thus, even at the 10th SFI Congress, the socialist delegates had been mandated by their rank and file to support affiliation with the CGdL, yet, on party orders, they were compelled to vote against the communist motion.

For their part, anarchists and syndicalists had declared that, should the Communist motion pass, they would leave the organization. Thus, the “revolutionary” leaders of the glorious railway workers’ class-based union were apparently willing to shatter its unity just to preserve their privileges and positions of power. Just like the Social Democrats, with whom they in fact formed a very close united front against the Communists.

The anti-communist offensive continued during the appointment of the five General Councilors; while every political faction, even the Republicans, was given the opportunity to choose its own representative, the intention was to deny this right to the Communists.

Just like the social-democratic bigwigs of the CGdL, the “revolutionaries” aimed to force the communists to leave the union. This, however, was merely wishful thinking, because the Party would never have withdrawn its members from a trade union. Ultimately, these were the directives of the Communist International, which had decreed in December 1922: « It is absurd for individual communists and revolutionary workers to be withdrawn from reformist trade unions in order to be placed in revolutionary trade unions. No reformist trade union should be deprived of the ferment represented by the communists. Efficient and vigorous activity by the Communists in both organizations is the prerequisite for restoring the destroyed unity.”

What, then, remained for the piecards of both factions to do? Proceed with the expulsion of the Communists! Thus, our comrades Azzario and Berruti, tireless organizers of the Milan and Turin railway divisions respectively, were expelled for “indiscipline.” This is an accusation that true communists have always, even recently, faced. Meanwhile, the Fascist reaction was intensifying and spreading its most brutal violence throughout Italy, violence to which workers in Piedmont and Lombardy responded on July 19, 1922, with a united general strike.

Under strict orders from the central leadership of the SFI, who incidentally also constituted the Secretariat of the Alleanza del Lavoro, railway workers in Lombardy and Piedmont were forbidden from joining the action, thereby giving the Fascist forces freedom of movement and the ability to concentrate rapidly.

At the same time, however, a faction, whose most direct and prominent representatives sat within the leadership bodies, was openly attempting to steer the union toward a path of collaboration and national syndicalism, under the auspices of D’Annunzio.

When the Labour Alliance called a general strike on August 1, 1922, to protest against Fascism, which had just sacked Ravenna in its latest exploit, Communist railway worker groups were everywhere at the forefront; in many railway hubs, the strike’s success was due entirely to the activity, spirit of sacrifice, and initiative they demonstrated.

As we have repeatedly pointed out, despite the heroic resistance put up by the proletariat in many localities, the strike came to a disorganized end, a failure both politically and from a trade-union perspective. Once again, the proletarians had been led to disaster, both by the defeatist tactics of the reformists and by the ineptitude of syndicalists and anarchists.

Once the strike had ended, the Fascists once again had the opportunity to gather at pre-arranged locations and launch their terrorist attacks against the working class from there.

Railway workers were particularly hard hit by the unleashing of the reaction, both illegal and legal, starting with those militants who had always distinguished themselves in every episode of the class struggle. But the most serious aspect was that this reaction was compounded by a violent internal crisis within the union, instigated by nationalist and *D’Annunzian* elements, who bore primary responsibility for the expulsion of comrades Azzario and Berruti on the grounds that they were Communists.

On August 18, 1922, the Executive Committee of the SFI, by an arbitrary act, resolved to immediately withdraw the Italian Railway Workers’ Union from the Labour Alliance. A most serious act that shattered proletarian unity precisely at the moment when the adversary’s violence was raging most fiercely.

In the course of the report, we focused on the measures amounting to genuine class terrorism adopted by the State against the railway workers who had actively participated in the strike, matters we cannot revisit here and now. 

Thousands of railway workers were dismissed; over 75,000 were penalized, including many temporary workers who were denied any right to permanent employment and were immediately fired.

Meantime the Prime Minister, the Democrat Facta, had assured the « socialists Turati and Modigliani, who were acting as peace mediators between the Alleanza del Lavoro and the government, that there would be no reprisals on the part of the State.

While the Communists were pushing for the implementation of a genuine proletarian united front through the grassroots revival of the Alleanza del Lavoro, a proposal was gaining increasing traction within the SFI leadership to dissolve the union and establish various « independent, » small, trade-specific unions.

While the Communists urged the masses to confront the blows of legal and illegal reaction with class-based action, the union bosses appealed to the Minister of Public Works, calling for an end to the threats and violence directed against the railway workers organized in the SFI.

But, seeing that a minister’s assurances yielded no results, the treacherous union bosses decided to go higher up to plead for mercy. Yes, they too, just like the CGdL bosses, knelt before Mussolini.

Well, on January 17 1923 Mussolini granted an audience to the cowardly representatives of the SFI Central Committee, who presented a supplicatory memorandum to the Duce of Fascism. Less than three months after the so-called “March on Rome,” the SFI declared its submission to the new regime in an official document addressed to Mussolini.

Despite the servility shown toward those in power, Mussolini’s response was that of a master who accepts nothing less than explicit, unconditional surrender:

Yet the leaders of the railway workers’ union did not give up; exactly two months later (on March 17), they submitted a second memorandum to Mussolini, even more abject than the first, containing expressions such as: « The Italian Railway Workers’ Union flatters itself that Your Excellency, as the embodiment of sound justice… » Clearly, the union was declaring its complete submission to the Fascist regime; yet once again, Mussolini’s response was that of a victor unleashing his full thirst for vengeance upon the vanquished, even one ready to place himself at his service. Mussolini’s response could not be clearer: « Let the Railway Workers’ Union make a formal and solemn act of submission to the State, dissolving itself and joining the Fascist corporations. »

In Il Sindacato Rosso, we commented: « The man from Predappio, who knows the soul of railway workers through and through, rightly expects more than the servile bowing and mere verbal declarations offered by those who currently believe they represent and lead the Italian Railway Workers’ Union. » He, the straw dictator, wants deeds; words do not count, and naturally, he cannot take seriously those three wretched figures who grovel before him. Behind those three, he certainly does not see the bulk of the army of the red railway proletariat.”

On October 21 and 22, 1923, an SFI conference, grandiosely termed a « Congress », was held in Rome. The event was notable for a « historic decision »: the SFI’s affiliation with the CGdL.

We have already seen just how fierce the opposition from all political factions within the union proved to be regarding the Communist proposal to affiliate with the CGdL. Naturally, this sudden change in attitude could only confirm certainties, rather than mere suspicions, regarding the true, genuine motivations. When people lacking political conscience suddenly change their minds, there is usually something discreditable underlying it.

« Who does not remember, » wrote Il Sindacato Rosso, « the shameful and abject attempts at collaborationism they made when the roar of the March on Rome still filled Italy’s squares with shouts of *alalà*, and the fallen of Turin, including railway workers, lay yet unburied following the ‘brilliant and heroic’ fascist days of December? » Comrades, be vigilant! Once again, an attempt is being made to drag your militant red union, bound hand and foot, beneath the heel of the fascist dictator. We seriously fear that the deliberate decision to join the CGdL has no other purpose or meaning. Prepare yourselves, then, to defend against the traitors to the class struggle, against those unworthy individuals who, through ambiguity and cunning, attempt to perpetrate the ultimate deception and an unspeakable disgrace to your detriment and that of all workers: defecting to the enemy.

And, on another occasion: « The railway workers’ union must, more than ever, clearly reaffirm its revolutionary directives; only by upholding its honor as a class-based organization today will it be possible tomorrow to rally the great masses struck by the reaction and lead them to battle and victory. Long live the red railway workers’ union! Long live proletarian unity!”

Having weathered the Matteotti crisis, Fascism consolidated its power. Upon the reopening of the Chamber on January 3, 1925, Mussolini, in a speech in which he assumed full political responsibility for the crimes that had been committed, initiated the decidedly dictatorial phase of his government. Instructions were issued to the prefects to close down all political clubs and parties that might jeopardize public order.

On this basis, on April 9, 1925, the Prefect of Bologna issued a decree dissolving the SFI, on the grounds that its activities had « shifted from the trade union sphere to the political arena, involving propaganda and a course of action hostile to the institutions and the government, thereby posing a threat to public order. »

This is how state power always rewards its foolish servants, the traitors to their own class.

For its part, the Communist Party did not leave the effort to reorganize the scattered forces of communist railway workers and sympathizers underground. An example is found in a PCdI circular dated July 14, addressed to interregional secretaries, provincial federations, and the National Communist Trade Union Committee, which issued directives for the establishment of the National Communist Railway Workers’ Trade Union Committee; this body was tasked with arranging, as soon as possible, « the call for a national conference of railway workers for the necessary coordination of communist railway trade union forces. »

We do not yet know what the results of this reorganization, which had to be carried out in absolute secrecy, were. In any case, police reports indicated that some railway personnel still on duty continued « to keep subversive propaganda alive in a subtle yet effective manner. »

The early stages of the labor movement in Russia

The theme of the historical development of the Russian workers’ movement on its path to the victory of October 1917 has been addressed by many. Why, then, revisit the subject? Not out of academic interest, but to prepare ourselves for a historical situation that evokes a sense of déjà vu: an isolated authoritarian state, devoid of concrete workers’ organizations, whether opportunistic or otherwise.

Although the agrarian question has long been forgotten, no longer acting as a constraint on capitalist production, its nature within the Russian context continues to make itself felt to this day. Indeed, we will show how repression is an established tradition of the Russian bourgeoisie: throughout the evolution from peasants to industrial workers, initially unfree and akin to serfs, and later full-fledged proletarians, the State, acting as the capitalists’ watchdog, was there to brutally repress the workers. It was through these struggles that the evolution of socialist thought, the ideology of the working class, also dialectically unfolded: first the Narodnik movement, then the disparate socialist groups, and finally the Marxists, culminating in the subsequent founding of the RSDLP (Russian Social Democratic Labour Party).

The first part, “The Pre-Marxist Workers’ Movement,” deals precisely with these foundations, with the material and political basis of Russia at the beginning of the 19th century (the century of global capitalist development) and how that development entered the Tsarist Empire. The primary consequence of the Russian system’s underdeveloped nature was the introduction of capitalism into a deeply feudal mode of production, giving rise to the figure of the « industrial serf »: a worker employed in a capitalist enterprise yet serving a feudal lord, in some cases, without receiving any wages. But the tide of capital is strong, and so Russian feudalism began to disintegrate, a process we intend to demonstrate through economic statistics, accounts of the working class’s reactions, and the dire general conditions of a country undergoing industrialization. We will then move on to the subsequent development of historical revolutionary doctrine, first in the writings of Herzen and Chernyshevsky, the Russian utopian socialists and early social democrats, and finally by turning to the writings of Lenin and Plekhanov, one of the first true Russian Marxists.

The Labor Movement in the United States of America. Chapter 20

Introduction

After a long hiatus, we are resuming this party work, driven by the need to carry the study of the American labor movement forward to the present day. This is not an academic requirement. We are not historians. The party does not write for the sake of abstract knowledge. Our knowledge is a weapon in the class struggle, which we must hone through study so that we can strike more effectively in practice.

Chapter 20 focuses primarily on the economic situation, while Chapter 21 will cover the political one, although these are dialectically connected and should not be viewed as independent stories. This format is designed to facilitate understanding and is partly chronological, since most political events only fully unfolded in 1920, even though they had taken shape in 1919. Therefore, the Red Scare and the events associated with it will be covered only partially in Chapter 20.

The post-war labor movement

The proletariat emerged from the war expecting the promises made by the bourgeoisie during the conflict to be kept. That was not to be the case. As soon as there was no longer a need to placate the workers with handouts, all benefits were withdrawn, and violent clashes with the unions resumed.

The workers were denied their post-war expectations, and employers sought to dismantle what the workers had achieved during the war. The government immediately abandoned the workers as soon as there was no longer an urgent need to keep them docile. This sense of betrayal remained etched in the minds of the workers. The workers’ strong appeals for the War Labor Board to be retained were to no avail. The workers realized that if they wanted to maintain wartime standards, they had to rely on their own strength.

While Black workers suffered disproportionately from post-war unemployment, all agencies involved in providing them with jobs were abolished to prevent their unionization in the South. Even white unions often hindered Black workers and enforced segregation.

The women distinguished themselves as the most militant and went on strike alongside the men. Many played important roles in the wave of strikes of 1919.

The Seattle General Strike

Seattle was the focal point of the 1919 unrest, which culminated in a general strike in which workers took control of production.

The city had a long history of a radical and militant labor movement. Many workers held both IWW and AFL membership cards. The former was a matter of principle, the latter of practicality, since Seattle was a “closed shop” city; consequently, a worker without an AFL card could not find employment.

The militancy of Seattle’s workers was inspired by the Bolshevik Revolution. No American labor organization was more consistent in defending the Bolshevik Revolution than the Seattle Central Labor Council.

The strike began in the shipyards, which had become the main employer during the war. After a meager wage increase, well below expectations, and in some cases even a reduction, shipyard workers went on strike. The Seattle Central Labor Council soon declared a general strike in solidarity.

The strike was not limited to withholding labor. The workers took charge of production to ensure the maintenance of essential services.

The strike committee meticulously planned the strike so that healthcare, security, and other essential services could operate with their authorization. They also formed an unarmed workers’ guard composed of veterans to maintain order.

Even in a “perfect” strike like this one, which made every effort to remain within the bounds of legality, the State employed all the violence at its disposal to force the workers back to their initial conditions. The State intervened militarily, and the strike ended after just five days.

The Seattle general strike failed quickly and ignominiously, despite the strong union militancy and experience backing it. According to syndicalist and economist ideologies, these were the perfect conditions for a revolution. The impulse was there, the moment was right, and the economic organizations were ready to fight; yet, without the consciousness of the class party to transform this impulse into action, it was doomed to failure. The Seattle general strike is a clear confirmation of our doctrine that the revolutionary class action is impossible without the class party.

The Red Summer

The report also addressed the race riots and lynchings of 1919, known as the Red Summer. We focused in particular on the Elaine massacre, where Black sharecroppers attempted to unionize by withholding their cotton until their demands were met. They were still living in conditions of slavery, even though it had been abolished, the only difference being that they were now paid for the exploitation to which they were subjected. A crowd of white people opened fire on a union meeting in a church in Hoopspur, Arkansas. The workers, who had prepared for this violent reprisal, returned fire, killing one white man and wounding another. The union immediately reported that the whites had fired first and that they had merely returned fire, but a crowd of whites quickly formed. The mob from Helena arrived in Elaine and began searching and looting Black homes, arresting men and women indiscriminately. The armed Black men returned fire, and there were deaths on both sides. The fighting spread from Elaine to the southern part of the county as white men from Arkansas, Tennessee, and Mississippi arrived to take part in the massacre.

Once again, troops were sent against the workers. A secret committee of local white leaders appointed by the governor, including two plantation owners, investigated the uprising and published a false report claiming that the union had planned an insurrection with the aim of killing a number of white men.

Every Black person near Elaine was arrested and released only at the request of a white citizen. During this period, the men were tortured by their captors while a mob outside attempted to lynch them. The local court sided with the white mob, sentencing 12 of the Black workers to death and dozens of others to prison. Thanks to the NAACP, the verdict was ultimately challenged before the U.S. Supreme Court, which dismissed the case, but the damage had already been done. The exact number is undetermined, but at least 100 Black farmers were killed and many were forced to spend years in prison because of this massacre.

The Elaine Massacre was a campaign of violence and terror against Black workers who had dared to oppose their meager agreements. Their admirable self-defense against this campaign provoked a hypocritical reaction from the bourgeois state, which provided all the military and legal means to aid the racist murderers.

The wave of strikes of 1919

The report also covered a number of other significant strikes that took place in 1919, including the telephone operators’ strike (April 15–21, 1919), the Boston police strike (September 9, 1919), the steelworkers’ strike (September 22, 1919 – January 8, 1920), and the miners’ strike (November 1 – December 10, 1919). Each strike followed a similar pattern: militancy born of precarious conditions and inspired by the example of the Bolsheviks, along with popular support and worker solidarity, followed by betrayal by the AFL and interference by the State, often involving the military. Of these strikes, only the one by telephone operators was successful. Not all of these defeats can be attributed to the military defeat. The AFL leadership seized every opportunity to betray the hundreds of thousands of striking workers, especially in the key coal and steel sectors.

Industrial conference

The report concluded with an account of President Wilson’s Industrial Conference, which attempted to put an end to labor unrest through a form of class collaboration indistinguishable from future fascism. The conference was composed of the most collaborationist members of the AFL and the railway unions that “represented” the workers, a number of entrepreneurs representing the business world, and a nebulous “public” group made up of “neutral” figures such as Rockefeller. The State did not even try to hide the fact that the “public” interest meant bourgeois interest.

Despite the efforts of the State and the labor aristocracy, the Industrial Conference failed. The employers’ group rejected any agreement with the unions and announced its intention to establish « open shops » across all industrial sectors as part of its « American Plan. » While the AFL desperately tried to argue that without them, employers would face the « Bolsheviks, » the bosses countered that the unions posed a greater danger than a handful of Reds.