Cannon, writing as Secretary of the I.L.D. on the eve of the judicial murder of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, on the stakes of the case and the lessons observed in years of dogged campaigning.

‘Class Against Class in the Sacco and Vanzetti Case’ by James P. Cannon from Labor Defender. Vol. 2 No. 9. September, 1927.

AS THIS NUMBER of the Labor Defender goes to press (August 16, 1927) the final issue in the Sacco-Vanzetti case is impending. The danger appears greater than ever before and the lives of the heroic labor fighters hang in the balance. This warning against false hopes and illusions and a call to new work and struggles must be the keynote of every word addressed to the masses in these fateful days.

There is nothing in the new developments, in the short respite, to warrant their being taken as anything but a maneuver to quiet the protest movement and, by taking advantage of the paralysis in the movement created by false hopes and groundless illusions, to carry out the murderous designs of the enemies of the two fighters. The workers who have fought so well for Sacco and Vanzetti must understand the danger and guard against it.

The most important thing now is to examine the situation and to draw the necessary conclusions. Unless this is done, the movement will not be able to steer clearly between the rocks of illusions and passivity.

The eleventh hour reprieve for Sacco and Vanzetti was brought about by the thunderous clamor of the laboring masses of the world who demonstrated their international working class solidarity in an imposing manner. It did not for a moment mean, as some naive people believe, that the Massachusetts Bourbons whose whole energy is bent on continuing their horrible torture of Sacco and Vanzetti until they can safely destroy them in the electric chair, have experienced any change of heart. On the contrary, the reprieve only enabled them to create most dangerous illusions and to gain for themselves some relief from the aroused world’s millions.

To believe otherwise is to fall victim to just those illusions that the reactionaries are anxious to spread. Not to realize that this latest action is a maneuver to gain time, during which to demoralize and split and weaken the protest movement is to fail to see the fundamental question involved. Those who from the beginning had seen the class issue in the case, and based their activities and confidence on the mass movement of the workers were entirely correct, and all events have proved this.

The strike movement, in which millions everywhere participated, has opened a new page in the development of the American working class. Even the sporadic beginnings made in the use of this great weapon in its political cause, in spite of and against the opposition or indifference of the official labor leaders in most cases, is fraught with profound significance. It demonstrates the irresistible power that lies in the organized working class, spurred on by the spirit of solidarity.

The case has always been an issue of the class struggle and not merely one of an exceptional miscarriage of so-called justice. The Massachusetts Bourbons know this well, and they recognize the magnificent protest movement as a distinctly class movement against which there must be, and is being, organized a counter campaign.

First there is a new delay of a few days ostensibly for the purpose of providing for further legal deliberations (after seven years!) but in reality to instill the masses with the illusion of hopes from the courts that have prejudged the case. It is a delay calculated to sap the strength of the protest movement and make it more easy for the executioners to carry out their plans of death.

Then there is the worn-out trick of “bomb” plants, which of course never hurt anyone, and which gives Governor Fuller the opportunity to express “indignation” and “regret” at such “horrible deeds”—the same Governor Fuller who coldly and deliberately already put the seal of approval on the burning alive of Sacco and Vanzetti. This old game of “plants” is well known in the labor movement. It is being played now with the aim of discrediting the movement for Sacco and Vanzetti by creating the impression that the friends of the two rebels are irresponsible terrorists. More cunningly, it is hoped to isolate the militant elements of the movement in this manner, and leave the field to those groups ha put all their cards on the illusion of Sacco and Vanzetti’s chance of obtaining justice from the courts.

The mass movement of the workers, which relies upon its organized strength, has no use for the methods of individual terror, and does not agree with them. Moreover, the history of the labor movement in this country is rich with incidents of the work of provocateurs, and we know how to correctly estimate such transparent fakes.

Together with this are the attempts everywhere to suppress protest meetings in order to prevent the expression of the demand of the workers for the liberation of Sacco and Vanzetti. Thousands of police, armed with clubs, riot and machine guns, and tear bombs, were mobilized for these meetings, and hundreds of workers were arrested throughout the country. In Chicago alone, a score of meetings was broken up in one evening. The capitalists fear the protest of the workers for they realize that therein lies the strength of Sacco and Vanzetti.

If we add to these developments the attempt of a number of the capitalist-liberal elements who joined the movement only to betray it at the critical moment, shown by the suppression of Heywood Broun’s articles in the New York World and the change of tone in other capitalist papers; and the threats of Congressman Johnson and Secretary of Labor Davis against all foreign-born workers for participation in the Sacco and Vanzetti movement, we can see that the whole machinery of reaction is being mobilized for the counter-campaign which is a combination of trickery and force, illusion and coercion. The new developments bring out with crystal clearness the class issue in the case, the fact that the exploiters are launching all their forces against the movement of the workers which alone stands between Sacco and Vanzetti and the chair of death.

We have no grounds for the belief that there has been the slightest change of plan by the executioners. On the contrary they are conspiring against our comrades with the same malice and working with feverish speed to consummate the assassination. It is true that the case is now before the judges of the Supreme Court. But this gives us no hopes for it has been there before and we know what to expect from that source.

The working masses have a deep conviction of solidarity toward Sacco and Vanzetti, and they know that even the illusory respite was granted only because of the menacing protest of the workers. We must therefore confidently proceed at all costs to still further arouse and organize the anger of the working men and women against the slaughter of the two labor fighters and assist it to take the form of huge mass demonstrations and effective strikes.

That is the great task in the coming days: to put all our energy, militancy and courage up to the last minute into the strike movement and the mass demonstrations. We depend for this on the work of the men in the ranks, those class conscious militants who have been working steadily and quietly, often in the face of calumny, to organize and build the magnificent protest movement. We must work swiftly. All brakes on the movement must be regarded as the greatest danger. All illusions which paralyze the movement must be overcome. All agents of the bosses who try to sabotage and discredit the protest and strike movement must be given their proper name and exposed.

Only a few fateful days remain. But there is still time, if we are able to disperse the illusions that have been created, to mobilize the power of the workers which is for us the court of last resort to which our appeal must be made. Only to the extent that we understand this elementary fact will our work in the remaining days have the possibility of success.

No faith in capitalist justice and institutions! That is the lesson of history confirmed by every development in the Sacco and Vanzetti case.

Organize the protest movement on a wider scale and with more determined spirit!

Remember the Haymarket martyrs! Remember Mooney and Billings! Remember the other class war prisoners!

Demonstrate for Sacco and Vanzetti! Strike a blow for freedom!

Labor Defender was published monthly from 1926 until 1937 by the International Labor Defense (ILD), a Workers Party of America, and later Communist Party-led, non-partisan defense organization founded by James Cannon and William Haywood while in Moscow, 1925 to support prisoners of the class war, victims of racism and imperialism, and the struggle against fascism. It included, poetry, letters from prisoners, and was heavily illustrated with photos, images, and cartoons. Labor Defender was the central organ of the Scottsboro and Sacco and Vanzetti defense campaigns. Not only were these among the most successful campaigns by Communists, they were among the most important of the period and the urgency and activity is duly reflected in its pages. Editors included T. J. O’ Flaherty, Max Shactman, Karl Reeve, J. Louis Engdahl, William L. Patterson, Sasha Small, and Sender Garlin.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1927/v02n09-sep-1927-LD.pdf