Felix Morrow with a two-parter contrasting the Communist Party’s Popular Front-era approach to the fight against fascism with that of the Socialist Workers Party based on the experiences of the mass rally of 20,000 German American Bund fascists at New York City’s Madison Square Garden on February 20, 1939. Echoes of these same debates; the role of the state, who our allies are, physical violence, etc. are to been found in nearly every anti-fascist movement since the 1930s.

“The Way to Fight Fascism Is…” by Felix Morrow from Socialist Appeal. Vol. 3 Nos. 14 & 15. March 10 & 14, 1939.

I. ‘The Way to Fight Against Fascism Is to Lie Down and Make Believe You Are Dead’

The Daily Worker Finally Breaks Its Silence and Explains That It Sabotaged the Anti-Nazi Rally Because of Its Line Against Doing Anything to Displease the Professional Capitalist Politicians

In the Daily Worker, Friday, Mar. 3 – nearly two weeks after the anti-Nazi counter-demonstration of February 20 – V.J. Jerome lengthily answers, in Questions from the People, why “the Communist party did not see fit to take any measures to stop the Monday night Nazi Bund meeting or at least call for picket lines around it.”

The widespread indignation within its own ranks and followers against its cowardly refusal to meet the Nazi challenge has thus finally forced the Stalinist leadership to a public justification of its opposition to the anti-Nazi demonstration.

Jerome’s answer is an important document, one which every anti-fascist should read, for it reveals that the Stalinist boycott of the anti-Nazi fight of February 20 was not an isolated incident, not a blunder, but was an integral part of a basic policy opposed to militant methods of fighting against fascism. Under the pressure of the questioners, the Communist party, in Jerome’s article, was compelled to state more openly than ever before its opposition to class-struggle methods of smashing fascism.

Explains C.P. Rejection of Anti-Fascist Struggle

The Communist party’s Popular Front policy – re-christened the “Democratic Front” here because of the fiascos of the Popular Front in France and Spain – involves the rejection of anti-Nazi struggles such as that of Feb. 20. Jerome states this plainly enough:

“For what would have been the result of an attempt to ‘stop the meeting’ after the progressive LaGuardia Administration had granted permission for it to be held? One could certainly have differed with the LaGuardia Administration for granting permission, not merely on the question of free speech, but on whether the interests of democracy could best be served by one course or another. But certainly the Communists could not undertake to forcibly prevent such a meeting once the City Administration had allowed it.

“In the given circumstances, such a course would have played directly into the hands of the Nazi conspirators themselves; it would have incited a direct collision not only with the Bund, but with the city administration and the police who were present to enforce the decision of the city administration …

“And if it is said that there should have been strong picket lines around the Garden not to close down the meeting but only as a protest gesture. A simple realistic view of the facts make it obvious that such peaceful picketing would be an immediate target for the combined provocations of the Trotskyites and their companions in arms, the Bundists. The net result would be the same danger as before, feeding the Nazi objective of collisions between the Bund and the vanguard of the democratic forces.” (Daily Worker, Mar. 3, p. 6)

Wont Act When Bosses Disapprove

Every anti-fascist, we repeat, should study this statement of the Communist party, for it reveals that the Communist party is preparing to repeat here the debacles of Spain and France, is preparing to carry out to the end here the suicidal policy of the Social Democracy in Germany. For here is what Jerome’s article means:

1. No action could be taken by the Communist party against the Nazi meeting once the “progressive LaGuardia Administration had granted permission for it to be held.” (Jerome’s reference to “forcibly” preventing the meeting is of course a dishonest subterfuge; the issue involved was that of a counter-demonstration, of mass picketing of the meeting.) The Communist party will undertake nothing of which its bourgeois allies disapprove: this is the meaning of Popular Frontism.

The bourgeois “progressives” In Spain were against the factory committees, against dividing the land among the peasantry, against giving freedom to Morocco, against rousing the proletariat to international solidarity, against the use of revolutionary methods in the anti-fascist struggle – and in the name of unity with these “progressives” within the Popular Front, the Stalinists agreed to this policy which led to Franco’s victories. The “anti-fascist” capitalists, loyal first of all to their property, were against dynamiting of munitions and other factories, preferring upon retreat to leave them intact to Franco – and the Stalinists agreed.

Do Anything the “Anti-Fascists” Ask

The “anti-fascist” capitalists in France wanted an end to the June 1936 strikes, wanted an end to the struggles for independence in the colonies, wanted the workers to be docile and obedient, wanted an end to the forty-hour week – and the Stalinists agreed.

The “anti-fascist” LaGuardia administration demanded an end to the building maintenance strike and to the taxi strike – to mention no others – and the Stalinists told the workers they had to submit, because “you can’t fight the progressive LaGuardia administration.” The “anti-fascist” city administration says it wants no demonstration against the Nazis – and the Stalinists agree.

Just this is the meaning of the “Democratic front”: that in it there is no democracy whatsoever. In it the “progressive” capitalists, of the stripe of LaGuardia, have a veto power, no matter what the vast majority of the workers say. In spite of the appeals of the city administration, of the Jewish press, of the Stalinists, of the labor lieutenants of capitalism generally, the tremendous turnout of the workers on Feb. 20 is proof that, had the workers been consulted democratically, they would have overwhelmingly declared for the anti-Nazi demonstration. But at the heart of the “Democratic front” is the anti-democratic principle that, in the name of unity, all the millions of workers are outvoted or vetoed by the handful of “progressive” capitalists.

Capitalists Are Loyal to…Capitalism

2. The “progressive” capitalists are always opposed to militant methods of fighting against fascism. This is proven by their conduct in Italy, Germany, Spain, France.

Nor is this due in any way to personal cowardice. It is due to something much more fundamental, namely the loyalty of the capitalists to the capitalist system. And the capitalist system, whether in the form of monarchy, democracy, fascism or military dictatorship, rests primarily not on the free consent of the working class but on the ability of the capitalist class to keep the workers down. All sections of the capitalist class, no matter how democratic, are therefore hostile to the working class developing militant methods of winning working class demands.

That is why, for instance, such great heroes of the Communist party as LaGuardia, Roosevelt, Attorney General Murphy, etc., are irreconcilably opposed to sit-down strikes. So, too, they are opposed to mass struggle against fascism, because in mass struggle the workers learn to stand together without depending on any “progressive” friends; in counter-demonstrations like that of Feb. 20, the workers learn, not only how to fight fascists, but how to fight the capitalist class too. Precisely for this reason, the LaGuardias want no such demonstrations – and by the logic of the “Democratic front” their veto of such demonstrations is unquestioningly accepted by the Communist party leaders.

II. ‘The Only Way to Fight Against Fascism Is to Organize Workers’ Defense Guards.’

The Daily Worker’s Cries About “Provocation” and “Trotskyite-Fascists”; Will Not Go Over with Those Members of the C.P. Who Joined in the Demonstration and Realized How Fascism Must Be Fought

In our first article dealing with the Communist party’s explanation, in the Daily Worker, March 3, of why it boycotted the anti-Nazi demonstration of Feb. 20, we dealt with two important points: 1. That the Popular or Democratic Front policy of the Stalinists always gives the “progressive” capitalist-democrat the final say in what the workers do or do not do, and 2. That the “progressive” capitalists have always, everywhere, and continue now in America, to oppose the use of militant methods of fighting fascism. A number of other points are equally important:

Evidence Punctures Alibi for Cops

3. The workers who demonstrated on Feb. 20 had it proved on their heads and backs that the “progressive” capitalists are opposed to anti-fascist demonstrations. LaGuardia’s police, not losing their heads but coolly and deliberately attacked the demonstration. Why? The Stalinists, ready to defend their “Democratic front” alliance with LaGuardia and his cops, foully accuse the workers of “provocations.” The workers, we are told to believe, insisted on running their heads into the cops’ clubs, and on rolling themselves under the horses hooves. The Trotskyists, presumably, hypnotized fifty thousand workers to a point where they enjoyed being beaten and kicked.

The Stalinist alibi for the cops, however, is punctured by authoritative testimony from many quarters that the cops assaulted the picket lines. Even the Jewish Morning Journal and the Jewish Daily Forward were constrained to report the police’s unprovoked assaults on the demonstrators.

Even the New Republic felt impelled to publish James T. Farrell’s letter to LaGuardia, testifying as an eyewitness to the police brutality. The Nation, consistently hostile to the Trotskyist movement, nevertheless declared editorially:

“But the sinister aspect of the Bund affair is that the city police not only protected the Nazis in their right of free speech: they interfered with the rights of the demonstrators outside and inside to voice their opposition to the Nazi doctrine.

“We are all too familiar with the actions of the police bent on ‘law and order’; the alarming thing in this case is that the city administration, for all Its anti-fascist convictions, gave sanction to the police in what has become their occupational antagonism to all picket lines. Newbold Morris, acting mayor, issued a statement asking the public to show their support of democratic institutions by shunning the assemblage as ‘one would a pestilence.’ A pestilence is not overcome by shunning it; the only effective popular answer to such meetings as that of the Bund is counter-demonstration. The two left groups, the Socialist Workers Party and the Young People’s Socialist League, who insisted on exercising their right to picket, discovered that they and not the Nazis were the ‘enemy.’ They were dispersed by force – and the police become the heroes of the newspapers, of Mayor LaGuardia, and unquestionably of the German-American bund.” (The Nation, Mar. 4, 1939)

As a matter of fact, Jerome unconsciously reveals that he takes for granted such behavior of the police, when he says that a Communist party demonstration – which would presumably not be led by provacateurs – “would have incited a direct collision not only with the Bund, but with the city administration and the police who were present to enforce the decision of the city administration.”

The Police Always Against the Workers

Jerome and the Communist party leadership know that everywhere – in Italy, Germany, Spain, France – the police, no matter who is at the head of the capitalist government, always concentrate their fight on the workers instead of the fascists. The police’s “occupational antagonism to all picket lines”, and the fundamental loyalty of “progressives” to capitalism lead them inevitably to side in action – no matter what they say – with the fascists against the workers.

4. “Every result since the meeting confirms the wisdom of the Communist position,” says Jerome.

“The Bund is far more exposed now after the meeting than before it; even notorious reactionaries and pro-fascists are frying for the moment to disassociate themselves from its activity. This will make it more difficult for the Bund to organize such meetings in the future. Exactly the opposite would have been the result had the Communist party ignored the welfare of the whole democratic camp and mobilized its tens of thousands of members and friends around the Garden on Monday night.”

By this Stalinist logic, therefore, the way to end the fascist movement is for the fascists to hold more meetings at which they “expose themselves” and for the workers not to mobilize against the fascists. The same conclusion was drawn by the yellow Social-Democratic Jewish Forward and the Jewish bourgeois press.

Stalinist Road Leads to Concentration Camps

But this is a lie! The whole development of fascism in Europe warns us that the road pointed out by the Stalinists ends up in the concentration camps.

The only way to fight the fascists is by mass struggle, by bringing the workers out into the streets and the neighborhoods where the fascists rally, by thus organizing the power of the working class in direct conflict with the fascists. Once this is understood, the best of the workers must be organized into Workers Defense Guards, prepared and trained to smash the fascist gangs. There is no other way. The fascist gangs do not believe in abiding by the results of the ballot-box, or by any other peaceful procedure. On the contrary, the fascists plan to come to power by physical violence against the labor movement and anti-fascists generally. To appeal to “democracy” against the fascists is like trying to stop bullets with the biblical edict that “Thou Shalt Not Kill.”

But the road of struggle is barred to the members and sympathizers of the Communist party by their leaders. Tied hand and foot to the LaGuardias and Roosevelts, they prefer unity with these fake “progressives” to uniting the workers against the fascists.

Dare Not Bare Their Full Line

The Stalinist leaders do not, however, dare to bare their full line, for it is so alien to the militant instincts of the workers that the Communist party would be stripped of every real anti-fascist if the meaning of this “Democratic front” became fully clear. Hence the Stalinists seek to confuse the issue by impugning the motives of those who called the anti-Nazi demonstration. “It is a literal fact,” says Jerome – and that use of “literal” reveals that what he is going to say is so preposterous that he cannot just say, “It is a fact,” but must add “literal” as underpinning – “that the Trotskyite ‘pickets’ were part and parcel of the Bund plan for provocation; the Trotskyite ‘pickets’ were the outside auxiliary of the Bund within the Garden.” Who believes such vile nonsense? Certainly not the cynical hireling, Jerome, who writes it.

Let the C.P. Members Discuss the Demonstration!

The cry of “Trotskyists-fascists” will certainly not go far with the thousands of Communist party members and sympathizers who, defying their party’s orders, joined us in the Feb. 20 demonstration, and side by side with us stood up against the cops and the Nazis. But they must also learn to understand why the Stalinist leadership uses name-calling: to cover up its inability to answer our indictment of the cowardly and anti-working class course of the Communist party. We were driven out of the Communist party because the lackeys of Stalin could not debate the issues with us, and they will drive out of the Communist party every sincere worker who raises these vital questions.

We do not ask the Communist party members to take our word for it. Let them open a discussion of the Feb. 20 demonstration in their party units, let them fight for a militant policy in the struggle against fascism, let them demand an end to the policy of servile obedience to the LaGuardias – and they will learn in the course of the discussion that they belong with us in the Socialist Workers Party.

There have been a number of periodicals named Socialist Appeal in our history, this Socialist Appeal was edited in New York City by the “Left Wing Branches of the Socialist Party”. After the Workers Party (International Left Opposition) entered the Socialist Party in 1936, the Trotskyists did not have an independent publication. However, Albert Goldman began publishing a monthly Socialist Appeal in Chicago in February 1935 before the bulk of Trotskyist entered the SP. When there, they began publishing Socialist Appeal in August 1937 as the weekly paper of the “Left Wing Branches of the Socialist Party” but in reality edited by Cannon and other leaders. Goldman’s Chicago Socialist Appeal would fold into the New York paper and this Socialist Appeal would replace New Militant as the main voice of Fourth Internationalist in the US. After the expulsion of the Trotskyists from the the Socialist Party, Socialist Appeal became the weekly organ of the newly constituted Socialist Workers Party in early 1938. Edited by James Cannon and Max Shachtman, Felix Morrow, and Albert Goldman. In 1941 Socialist Appeal became The Militant again.

PDF of issue 1: https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/themilitant/socialist-appeal-1939/v3n14-mar-10-1939.pdf

PDF of issue 2: https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/themilitant/socialist-appeal-1939/v3n15-mar-14-1939.pdf