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The Workers Communist League or Gitlowites were a Right Opposition Communist group that split from the main group of the American Right Opposition, the Communist Party of the USA (Opposition) in 1933. It was the only split from that organization which created a new group.

Origins

The origin of the group goes back to a resolution Benjamin Gitlow submitted to the Second National Conference of the Lovestone group September 2-3 1932. He wished that the group would adopt a new resolution on the general line of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. While endorsing the first Five Year Plan, and defending the Soviet Union as a whole, it wished to criticize "factional" use of the plan for the benefit of the Stalin leadership in the USSR and the Comintern, as well as the mistakes with regard to the collectivization of agriculture and the creation of light industry. While the conference re-adopted its previous spring 1931 resolution on the issue, it opened up the pages of its organ, Workers Age, to debate on the issue and asked it members to contribute their opinions beginning with the November 15 issue [1].

Editorials supporting the old resolution were submitted by Jay Lovestone[2], Will Herberg[3], Herbert Zam[4] and others, while an article against the current resolution by Lazar Becker was broken up and published over three issues. [5]. Portions of Gitlows own contribution, "The Russian Question critically considered" were published in two issues, but not the conclusion [6]. The majority argued that the general line of the CPSU was correct, and the opposition was offering "constructive criticism" of the Stalin leaderships "mistakes" in its application domestically within the Soviet Union and with regards to the relationship between the CPSU and the other parties in the Comintern. Furthermore, the "Russian question" was not a defining issue for the group. Gitlow and Becker argued that a correct understanding of the "Russian question" was of decisive importance to the group and the position taken on it determined whether the group had a justification for being. Gitlow argued that though the CPSUs official line as determined by the 15th congress was correct, the Stalin leadership had veered so far away from it that the Partys general line was no longer correct and was going in the direction of Trotskyism.

After the National Bureau of the group upheld its support for the current position on the Russian question at a New York mass meeting on Febuary 2, 1933 Gitlow resigned[7][8]. At the next plenum of the CPOs National Committee, February 11-13, Becker presented an appeal with the signatures of 13 members which criticized the Lovestone leadership on the "Russian question" and on a number of other issues related to the groups work within the labor movement and relationship to the official Communist Party. The appeal was rejected unanimously by the National Committee[9].

Activism

After leaving the Lovestoneites, Gitlow tried to form a "bloc" of the opposition Communist movements against Stalinism[10]. To that end he addressed a letter on April 4 to the Lovestonites, the Trotskyist Communist League of America and Albert Weisbord's Communist League of Struggle outlining his plans for a conference to unite the Communist Opposition groups with the ultimate aim of reconstituting the Communist Party USA on a non-Stalinist basis. He was rebuffed by Weisbords group, who would only unite with him on the basis of the program of the Left Opposition[11], but got a more sympathetic hearing from the Trotskyists. In September he attended a conference sponsored by the League for Independent Political Action that was attempting to build a movement for a Farmer–Labor Party, but nothing came of it[12].


Publications

The organization published a newspaper Voice of Labor from Vol. I #1 June 1933 to Vol. II #4 April 1934.[13]

References

  1. ^ Workers Age Vol. 2 #3 Nov 15, 1932 p.6
  2. ^ Workers Age Vol. 2 #4 Dec. 1, 1932 pp.4,7
  3. ^ ibid. p.5
  4. ^ Workers Age Vol. 2 #5 Dec. 15, 1932 p.4
  5. ^ "Historically inevitable and correct..." ibid. p.5, Workers Age Vol. 2 #6 Jan. 1, 1933 p.4, and Workers Age Vol. 2 #7 Jan. 15, 1933 pp.5,7
  6. ^ ibid. p.5 Workers Age Vol. 2 #8 Feb. 1, 1933 pp.4,7
  7. ^ Workers Age Vol. 2 #9 Feb. 15, 1933 p.8
  8. ^ COMMUNISTS FORM FOURTH FACTION HERE :Extreme Right Group, Headed by Gitlow, Lays Russian Crisis to Stalin Policy.. (1933, February 4). New York Times (1923-Current file),6. Retrieved December 18, 2010, from ProQuest Historical Newspapers The New York Times (1851 - 2007). (Document ID: 99290798).
  9. ^ Workers Age Vol. 2 #10 Mar. 1, 1933 p.6
  10. ^ Benjamin Gitlow I confess; the truth about American communism New York, E. P. Dutton 1939 p.577
  11. ^ Class Struggle Vol. 3 #6
  12. ^ Class Struggle Vol. 3 #9
  13. ^ Goldwater, Walter Radical periodicals in America 1890-1950 New Haven, Yale University Library 1964 p.27

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