Alberto Moreau reports for the Daily Worker from the Communist Party of Cuba’s 1934 Congress, the first after the events of 1933 in which a revolt brought down the rule of the dictator Machado, and brought to power Fulgencio Batista.

‘Preparing for Soviet Power in Cuba’ by Alberto Moreau from the Daily Worker. Vol. 11 Nos. 126-8. May 26, 28, 29, 1934.

Communist Party of Cuba Holds Its 2nd Congress
Program Is Outlined for Agrarian Anti-Imperialist Revolution

The Communist Party of Cuba held its historic Second Congress on April 20 to 22 at a time of great development of and perspective for the agrarian-anti-imperialist revolution in Cuba.

In spite of the ferocious terror unleashed by the national concentration government of Mendieta, in spite of the savagery of Col. Batista, army head, who attempted to prevent the congress with bayonets, 67 delegates from the provinces, representing the lower organizations of the Party, militant workers steeled in the struggle against Machado and the lackey governments which succeeded him, gathered at the Congress.

This meeting marked a great step toward the clarification of the basic tasks which confront the revolutionary movement in Cuba, for the preparation for and organization of Soviet power.

Called at the moment when the Mendieta government was confronted with a wave of mass protest against his fascist decrees evidenced in a series of militant strikes against the decrees, the Second Congress drew up a balance sheet of the period of development of the Cuban Party since the First Congress. It made a critical analysis of its experiences through the revolutionary battles of the Cuban masses headed by their leader, the Communist Party, toward opening up the road toward the agrarian anti-imperialist revolution.

Struggle for Soviet Power

Comrade Martinez, general secretary of the Communist Party, in his penetrating analysis, pointed out as the central perspective the rapid sharpening of developments leading to decisive struggles for Soviet power in Cuba, calling upon all the Party through the delegates to forge a Bolshevik Party as the only force capable of leading the proletariat in alliance with the peasantry and Negro masses to the overthrow of the power of the exploiters and the yoke of yankee imperialism, to the only way out of the crisis – the revolutionary way. The development of strikes during the Congress confirms the perspective given by the report of the Central Committee in the National Congress.

The strike of the telephone workers accompanied by tremendous mass sympathy and violent disputes with the armed forces of Mendieta-Batista; the occupation of the Austria mill; the militant strike of the workers and employees of Sarra in Havana; the preparations for a general strike of the railroad workers; spontaneous uprisings of the peasants, especially in Oriente; the battles of the omnibus workers of Havana, demonstrate the inability of the Mendieta government successfully to apply its anti-strike decrees. All this, together with the wave of popular sympathy for the hunger strikers, first victims of the decrees, proved the appreciation of the Congress of a greater revolutionary upsurge for which the Party must multiply its forces in order to give political and organizational direction to the decisive battles which are developing.

The report of the Central Committee was very informative on the tremendous advances made by the Party since its first constituent congress in 1925. During a profound silence marked by the concentrated attention of the delegates, they listened for two and a half hours to a report of all the stages of development of their Party.

Since its beginning the Communist Party of Cuba, which was then only a sectarian group, isolated from the masses, has forced itself through the struggles of the proletariat and under the leadership of the Communist International, applying in Cuba the great experience of the world proletariat and especially the experiences of the Russian Bolsheviks, into a Party with mass influence which is now entering on the road toward the winning of the majority of the working class.

The political thesis presented by the Central Committee underlined the fact that the development of the Party has been possible only through the heroic struggle carried on against the dictatorship of Machado and Yankee imperialism, and through a ruthless struggle against all the tendencies foreign to Communism.

The Party has achieved great results in its efforts to clarify the application of the line of the Communist International in Cuba, purifying its ranks of opportunist elements of the right or left. The implacable struggle against the Trotskyism which sprang up in Cuba a little before the fall of Machado and which held the counter-revolutionary theory of the impossibility of a revolution in Cuba without a proletarian revolution in the United States. This has worked out in practice as a constant collaboration of the Trotzkyites with the governments which followed Machado, in their carrying out a role of strikebreaking.

What Are the Revolutionary Tasks in Cuba?

2nd Congress of Cuban Communist Party Outlines Program
Criticize Failures in Work Among Negroes and Peasantry

The Congress emphasizes the correct strategy the Party followed in rooting itself in the basic proletariat of the country, particularly in the sugar industry.

At the beginning of 1932, the Party commenced seriously to apply its plan of concentration in the plantations and mills of the sugar industry, leading militant strikes which produced constant armed struggles against the rural guards of Machado. This helped the Party very greatly to head struggles against the feudal remnants on the land, struggles which culminated in the general strike of August, which overthrew Machado, thus opening the way to the agrarian anti-imperialist revolution in Cuba.

The delegation of the Second Congress demonstrated in large part the orientation of the Party toward the basic industries of the country, although it reflected at the same time all the weaknesses of the Party among certain other sections of the basic proletariat, especially the railroad workers. Of the 67 delegates, 43 were workers. Of these, three were sugar workers, nine tobacco workers, six transport workers, two metal workers, and the rest were from light industries. There were only three peasant delegates which demonstrates the serious weakness of the work of the Party in the countryside.

Although insufficient, the presence of 14 Negro delegates indicated a more effective understanding of the Negro question in the ranks of the Party.

The Second Congress severely criticized the weaknesses of the Party, especially of the grave mistakes of August, 1933, which would have been disastrous for the revolutionary movement without rapid correction. In the report of the Central Committee, as well as in the political theses, these mistakes were underlined and characterized as social-democratic theory of the “lesser evil.” The mistakes consisted in calling upon the workers during the general strike of August to go back to work because “it was necessary to choose between Yankee intervention and a weakened Machado.”

The Congress pointed out the necessity of an implacable struggle against the remnants of this theory, which still persists, as well as against the vestiges of anarcho-syndicalism, which is an obstacle to the winning of the masses for decisive struggles. We must point out the weakness of the Congress reflected in the lack of a serious analysis of the causes for the lack of consolidation of the Soviets in the places where the high level of the struggles of the workers and peasants culminated in the taking over of local power (Mabay, Jaronu). We must also emphasize the weakness of the struggle against Yankee intervention, which reflects not only the organizational deficiency of the Party, but particularly the lack of a revolutionary perspective.

The Second Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba in taking a balance of the economic and political situation of the country which becomes more aggravated every day. In analyzing the period since the overthrow of Machado placed very sharply the question of realizing transitory slogans: worker control, confiscation and distribution of the land of the Yankee and native landlords, as a lever for higher struggles toward taking over power and the establishment of a workers’ and peasants’ government. Discussion around this question was very weak in the Congress.

The great weaknesses of the Party in the face of the problems of revolution were laid bare. The danger of a setback in the struggles of the peasants, because of the slowness with which the Party organizes the agrarian struggles and the winning over of the peasants as the most revolutionary ally of the proletariat was sharply pointed out.

The central slogan launched by the Central Committee and confirmed by the Congress, was that of the preparation for and organization of taking over the land and its distribution among the peasants, agricultural workers and soldiers; the organization of Peasant committees as well as the strengthening of the Party organization among them.

No less sharply placed was the question of winning over the Negro masses. The Congress severely criticized the tendency to hide the face of the Party before the Negro masses and the resistance to bringing into the Party Negro workers and peasants who showed a desire to enter the Party (Oriente). Other concrete acts of white chauvinism, open expression of right opportunism, were exposed, which consisted in resisting struggle against discrimination of Negroes, their segregation in the parks and main streets as in the South of the United States. Especially did the Congress point out the necessity of a greater classification of the Negro question as a national rather than a “racial” question, typified in the slogan for self-determination of the Negroes in the Black Belt of Oriente province.

Cuban Communists Discuss Work in Unions, Army

Mistakes Criticized By Second Convention of Cuban Party

The general report of the Central Committee and the special emphasis on the military work of the Party revealed serious weakness in activity among the armed forces. In the armed struggles which developed during the military occupation of the mills in the last zafra (sugar harvest), the agitation among the soldiers resulted in fraternization, including the refusal on the part of many of the soldiers to fire on the strikers. In spite of this favorable situation, the Party, as pointed out by the Congress, has made only the barest beginnings of work among the army. Organization of committees of soldiers and the recruiting of soldiers into the Party was taken up as an urgent task.

The delegates gave their serious attention to the trade union report. The tremendous extension of the C.N.O.C. (Cuban National Confederation of Labor) during the course of the last three months had resulted in an increase of workers organized in revolutionary trade unions from 12,009 to 431,000. A large part of the discussion centers around the consolidation of the unions in the C.N.O.C., especially among the tobacco workers, the greatest number of whom had gone over to forma part of the C.N.O.C..

The victory achieved by the Party by the extension of the C.N.O.C. and its historic Fourth Congress held in January 1934, placed in the forefront the slogan and practical realization of the winning of the majority of the working class.

The great political and organizational weakness of the unions was also brought forward, as was the pressing need of strengthening Communist fractions in the unions. The Congress raised the slogan of the preparation and organization of mass political strikes.

On the basis of a concrete and correct analysis of the present situation in Cuba, the Congress called the attention of the whole Party to the danger confronting the revolutionary movement in the growing influence of Grau San Martin and Guiteras among the working class and peasantry, especially in the interior of the island, as well as the influence of the reformist leaders (railroad). The urgent necessity of unmasking them and carrying on a struggle against their influence, counterposing to the “leftism” of Grau and Company the program of a workers’ and peasants’ government, was stressed.

Among the immediate tasks set by the Congress were: The concentration of the Party in the reformist railroad unions where an increasing revolutionary opposition can be found, and concentration among the port, workers as well as among the workers of certain strategic enterprises such as telephone, electricity, etc., where the work of the Party has had only a weak beginning.

The strengthening of our influence among the petty bourgeoisie and especially among the students, who are going more and more to the left, was pointed out as an immediate necessary task.

One of the best reports was that given on the youth work of the Party which showed the influence of the Party among the masses of working youth. The weaknesses of the Young Communist League were singled out and were almost entirely reflections of the weaknesses of the Party.

An important task undertaken by the Second Congress was the decision unanimously adopted for the creation of a mass daily newspaper capable of agitation and propaganda on the program of the Party, guiding and organizing the Cuban toiling masses in their daily struggles, raising their political level and winning them for the agrarian anti-imperialist revolution, for Soviet power.

For the realization of the numerous tasks outlined by the Congress, the most important subjective factor was dwelt upon, the consolidation and extension of the Communist Party of Cuba and its transformation into a mass party, strengthening its iron discipline and breaking with all the deviations which can obstruct the march toward the victory of the revolution.

Before the closing of the Congress, the delegates heard the greeting of the delegate from the Communist Party of the United States, Robert Minor. Comrade Minor declared that the Communist Party of the United States had much to learn from the rich experiences of its brother party and that its most important task was, therefore, not only fraternal inspiration from their struggles, but the realization in practice of the revolutionary duty of the Communist Party of the metropolis with the people oppressed by the imperialism of its own country, concretized in the mobilization and organisation of the proletariat of the United States for a powerful movement of solidarity with and help to the struggles of the Communist Party of Cuba, for the overthrow of the common enemy, Yankee imperialism.

The Second Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba before electing a new central committee unanimously adopted the political resolution and sent its greetings to the following brother parties: The Communist Party of the U. S. S. R., and to Comrade Stalin; to the heroic German Party and its leader Comrade Thaelmann; to the Communist Party of China and the Chinese Red Army; to the Communist Parties of South America, and the Caribbean and to the Communist Party of the United States

The Daily Worker began in 1924 and was published in New York City by the Communist Party US and its predecessor organizations. Among the most long-lasting and important left publications in US history, it had a circulation of 35,000 at its peak. The Daily Worker came from The Ohio Socialist, published by the Left Wing-dominated Socialist Party of Ohio in Cleveland from 1917 to November 1919, when it became became The Toiler, paper of the Communist Labor Party. In December 1921 the above-ground Workers Party of America merged the Toiler with the paper Workers Council to found The Worker, which became The Daily Worker beginning January 13, 1924.

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