Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas was founded on November 7, 1930 with the merger of the Partido Obrero de Filipinas and the Proletarian Labor Congress of the Philippines (KAP) trade union federation. After a banned 1931 May Day demonstration was broken up many party leaders were arrested and in September, 1931 the Party and its union affiliates were banned in the Islands. Here, the Communist Party U.S.A. writes to the new Party offering their support and declaring their responsibility in fighting U.S. imperialism and for Philippine independence.

‘To The Communist Party of the Philippine Islands from the Central Committee, Communist Party of U.S.A.’ from the Daily Worker. Vol. 8 No. 255. October 23, 1931.

New York, Oct. 20. To the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands. Dear Comrades:

As comrades in the fight against a common foe, American imperialism, and as the only leader of the toiling masses of the oppressed Filippino nation which is loyal to those masses in their struggle for complete separation from and independence of American imperialist domination, the Communist Party of the United States of America, by direction of the Thirteenth Plenary Session of its Central Committee, sends it warmest fraternal greetings to the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands and through you to the brave and unconquered Filippino workers and peasants.

The birth of the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands was a tremendous historical event in the history of the Far East, an event of deep importance and great encouragement to the revolutionary proletariat of the whole world and to the fight for national liberation of all peoples who are robbed and oppressed by imperialism.

The revolutionary workers and farmers of the United States were overjoyed to learn, even though inadequately because of the lamentable lack of other means of information than the imperialist press, that the toiling masses of the Philippines themselves recognized the importance and necessity of establishing their own Communist Party, and by repeated mass actions have demonstrated their devotion to its program of national liberation and class emancipation.

With the same anger as that of the Filipino masses, the revolutionary toilers of the U.S.A. have seen the acts of persecution and terror against the heroic peasants of Tayug and the brave leaders of the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands, ordered and supervised by American imperialist tyranny and carried out by its vile servants, the Filipino bourgeoisie and landlords.

Superior to all Obstacles

In spite of the brutal repressions of imperialist rulers and the treachery of their native agents, in spite of the barbarous terms of imprisonment and exile given the leaders of the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands, (a czarist procedure that should dispel any remaining illusion of the sort of “demagogy” insured by American rule!), in spite of the deceitful demagogy of such bourgeois tricksters as Roxas who insults the name of the great proletarian Andreas Bonifacio in forming, under the honorable name of the Katipunan, a fascist movement against the toiling masses covered by false promises aimed at diverting the masses from following their own leader and guide–the Communist Party; in spite of all this and many other dangers and difficulties, we are confident that the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands, rooting itself ever deeper in the hearts of the masses by bold and wise leadership of their daily struggles, will remain indestructible! More, we are sure that it will grow and develop as the unifying and guiding force that will lead the toilers of the Philippines to the destruction of their enemies and the establishment of their own Worker and Peasant Soviet Government. The role of the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands is of especially grave importance in view of the intense rivalries of the imperialist powers over the loot and division of China, rivalries which are even now on the point of breaking out into a new and terrible world war, in view of the revolutionary rise of the Chinese masses under leadership of the Communist Party of China, the establishment of Soviet rule in great areas of China, and the combined efforts of all imperialisms, mutually rivals though they are, to crush the Chinese Soviets and to launch a murderous attack against the Soviet Union in the Far East (and in Europe also!) in an attempt to destroy the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics, the inspiring example to all the oppressed and exploited!.

Lessons of China

The experiences of China, especially the treacherous role of the bourgeois “nationalists,” the butcheries of workers and peasants by the Kuomintang and the servility of its factions to one or the other of the imperialist bandits that has opened the way for the present seizure of Manchuria and prepared the ground for complete dismemberment of the nation, all have lessons of vital importance to the toiling masses of the Philippines and their leader, the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands.

Above all else the lessons of China should teach the Filipino masses the danger of following the leadership of the national bourgeoisie which chatters of “opposition to imperialism” only to betray the anti-imperialist struggles of the masses and invariably to unite with the imperialists and feudal latifundists in savage and bloody suppression of the workers and toiling peasants. Above all else the example of China should prove to the Filipino workers and peasants the imperative need of their own revolutionary mass movement, organizationally and politically independent of and opposed to the vacillating and compromising leadership of the national bourgeoisie, their own movement which is possible of success only when led by the proletariat whose guide and leader in the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands.

The dangers that beset any other course in the Philippines are already apparent in the manoeuvers of certain Filipino bourgeois leaders to intrigue with Japanese imperialism as against American imperialism as though escape for the Filipino masses from imperialist oppression were possible by changing imperialist oppressors, in spite of the bloody lessons of thirty years ago when America with fire and sword massacred your fathers whom it “liberated from Spain” only to enslave to itself and subject you as colonial serfs until today! The sole guarantee against such treachery, such reptiles as Aguialdo who sold out the struggle against American imperialism for the right to rob the peasants of their land and a fat “pension,” is today the independent revolutionary action of the wide masses led by the Filipino proletariat and its political party, the Communist Party of the Philippine Islands.

In the U.S.A.

On our part, the Communist Party of the U.S.A. will do everything physically within our power to aid the Filipino masses in their struggle for complete, immediate and unconditional independence. The same world economic crisis, the burden of which American imperialism tries to unload alike on the toilers of the Philippines and the toilers of the United States itself, is preparing vast upheavals of the masses within the very heart of American imperialism; upheavals which by the conscious guidance of the Communist Party of the United States of America can but weaken the power to rob and op- press the toiling masses of both the U.S.A. and the Philippines and advance the common struggle.

With other 11,000,000 unemployed workers and their approximately 30,000,000 dependents starving, with the capitalists making repeated general attacks on wages, with millions of small proprietors and tenant farmers suffering unheard of misery and real starvation, with 12,000,000 Negroes stirring against a barbarous national oppression within the boundaries of continental United States, the Communist Party of the United States of America faces tasks which tax it to the utmost limit of its capacity: Hardly a day passes in which the American workers and small farmers do not engage in mass physical collisions with the capitalist police; hardly a day in which American “democracy” does not spill the blood of American toilers!

The American masses are moving into battle against American imperialism, against the insane system of capitalist rule which dooms them to starve amid mountains of food, to go unsheltered amid countless palaces they have built, to go ragged although they make wool, cotton and silk enough to clothe the world!

In this battle the Communist Party of the United States of America faces not only the openly repressive forces of the bourgeoisie, but the treacherous misleaders of the toilers, the servants of the bourgeoisie in the ranks of the workers, the social-fascist “socialist” party and the leadership of the American Federation of Labor. These scoundrels, together with such capitalist politicians as Congressman Hawes, who recently paraded his demagogy before the Filipino people, although they occasionally utter some empty words about Philippine independence, in practice do everything in their power to strengthen imperialism at its base in the United States, in practice aid imperialism by betraying and repressing the fight of American toilers against it.

The American Federation of Labor has just repeated its hypocritical gesture of “endorsing” Philippine independence, but it demands the exclusion of Filipino workers from immigration into the United States and encourages the brutal and bloody chauvinist outrages against Filipino workers in California which are incited in the interests of capitalists and rich plantation owners to divide the American-born and the Filipino immigrant workers and prevent united proletarian strike action against their exploiters. The Communist Party of the United States of America asserts the proletarian right of these Filipino workers to immigrate to the United States. It has found them ready and brave to unite in struggle with other workers for common class interests. It has endeavored to defend them against chauvinist attack and to develop them as fighters for their class and the freedom of their people from American imperialism.

The Communist Party of the United States of America acknowledges its weaknesses and short-comings in arousing the American masses for concrete aid to the struggles of the Filipino masses. What we have done is not enough. The greatest handicap is the lack of continuous, regular and intimate interchange of information and advice. We urge that special attention be given to sending us such material, and on our part we pledge to do all in our power to make effective use of it.

Against War! Defend the U.S.S.R.! Comrades of the Philippines! War clouds hover over the Far East, over the whole world! The Japanese imperialist bandits are making war on the Chinese people. The Philippines, as well as Manchuria, are a war base of imperialism against the Soviet Union, against Soviet China! Imperialism, torn by its inner antagonisms, is dying, but seeks to sustain itself by drinking the blood of countless millions of toilers! By starvation and slaughter of the exploited in the imperialist metropolis and slavery and massacre of the colonial oppressed! By destruction and mass murder of the victorious builders of socialism in the Soviet Union! All together against imperialism! Moro slave, Let Viscayan peasant and Luzon proletarian! us unite! Let us unite with the victorious workers and peasants of the Soviet Union and go forward to emancipation under the banner of Lenin, under the guidance of the Communist International!

With Communist greetings, Central Committee, Communist Party of U.S.A.

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. National and City (New York and environs) editions exist.

PDF of original issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1931/v08-n255-NY-oct-23-1931-DW-LOC.pdf