Treint, a partisan of the French Left, on the crisis in the Party over the Right’s victory at January, 1922’s Marseilles Congress and the ensuing battles internationally as the Party’s Center and Left would untie to oust the Frossard leadership at the following year’s convention.

‘The Minority in the National Council of the French Communist Party’ by Albert Treint from International Press Correspondence. Vol. 2 No. 43. May 30, 1922.

For the first time the opposition in the French Communist Party appeared in its true light at the National Council of April 23rd, participated in by those comrades who are in full accord with the Third International and by those who seek to veil their discord with it.

The crisis latent since the Third World Congress, is developing irresistibly in the French Party. In order to understand it we must for a moment examine the past.

At Tours, the movement that carried the masses from the old party towards the Third International was so powerful that even those who were opposed to adhesion felt themselves overpowered, and they rallied to Communism by virtue of their political opportunism.

For several months, the reorganization of the party and the fight against the dissidents occupied first place in the activity of the party, and it is clear that this work required all its energy.

This period of struggle, engendered in the partyimasses, which are too little penetrated by doctrine, a simple ideology: Communism displaced by Anti-dissidence.

The Third Congress, decided in accord with the French delegation to give the French Party a firm direction, as it did to all the others, and to lend it life and capacity for rapid initiative; in short, to give it direction enabling it not only to steer the Party but also to conduct the struggles of the French proletariat.

At this point the crisis began, at first very mildly. The Left Communist wing flew first towards the opportunistic Right, then towards the extreme Anarchist Left. These two elements were carrying on a common fight against the Presidium, against the control of the press, and against democratic centralization which was labeled by them “oligarchical centralization”. Instead they propagated federalism, which was baptized by them, “democratic centralization.”

This campaign found open expression in the organ, the Journal du Peuple. The Center of the party, in control of responsible posts, acquiesced in this campaign.

Thus it was that at Marseilles, the masses of the party, cunningly deceived as they were, elected a Central Committee in which the Communist Left received a blow in the person of Souvarine, and which also contained some masked but resolute opponents of the International.

For fear of shaking the young party too rudely and in the hope that the crisis would subside and in favor of Communism the Left was too slow in seizing the Party.

At Marseilles it was necessary to sound the alarm. That was the meaning of the resignations of Loriot, Treint, Vaillant-Couturier, and Dunois.

The Third International called upon the delegates of the party and upon those that resigned to come and air their disagreement before the Moscow Congress.

The Trotzky motion explicitly condemned the anti-Communistic campaign carried on within the party, and also explicitly condemned the complaisance of the Center towards these campaigns.

Under the moral pressure of the International the Central Committee of the party soon set to work, expelled Fabre, the editor of the Journal du Peuple, and urged its members to contribute to this organ during the trial period.

Those who had handed in their resignation then agreed to enter into the Central Committee to accomplish their assigned tasks without discord.

The Trotzky motion aimed at the displacement of the bloc consisting of the Center and the Right against the Left, by a bloc of the Center and the Left against the Right.

It constituted a pact concluded between the Center and the Left, based upon the struggle against the Right, and upon the carrying into effect of the International’s decisions.

At Marseilles and since Marseilles, the masked adversaries of the International took advantage of the united front and turned it into a weapon against the Communist Left and against the International.

In our own press, the united front was represented as the equivalent of a Left bloc and characterized as the surrender of our organic independence and as a poor tactical move for the workers of the West; but they declared that such a move was necessary for the safety of the Russian Revolution. The united front was also characterized as the loosening of the principles of Communism and as the rebirth of opportunism and reformism. The nature of the Workers’ Government that was planned for Germany was identified with parliamentary cooperation of Communists and the bourgeoisie.

The comrades of the Center participated more or less in this work of deformation. The Communist Left was rarely given the opportunity of voicing its opinion in our papers. The more negative, sterile and sentimental constituents of the anti-dissident ideology were artificially retained, tended and encouraged to grow. The united front was represented as the fraternization of the Communist chiefs with Noske, the assassin of so many Communist workers.

In spite of the promise made by Cachin before the Moscow Congress, according to which the French party was to carry out the decisions of the Enlarged Executive Committee, the campaign against the united front went on until the National Council met. There was there erected in the drawing up of the motions as well as in the voting a bloc of the Center and the Right against the Left. In the Resolutions Committee, the discussion between the Center and the Right turned on the question whether the words “brotherly cooperation with the International“, should be retained or not. The Right accepted the retention of this expression as a polite formality. This is something like the fortnightly post-card of the Italian Socialist Party to Moscow, of which Modigliani spoke before Livorno.

The Party should not be deceived by the verbal assurances of fidelity to the International, and the Center should choose between the anti-Communist Right and Moscow.

Of course the Communist Left does not lose sight of the difficulty of applying the united front in France. Due to the reformists, the French proletariat suffered great defeats in 1919 and in April and May 1920, as well as in the textile strike of 1921. The political split of Tours and the recent Syndicalist split have created among organized workers, a psychology hostile to the united front, in the political as well as in the economic field. In France the capitalist offensive is not yet strong enough to necessitate a united front of the working class and the tactical wisdom of such a move therefore does not yet appear in all its clearness.

But these difficulties should not be taken advantage of to turn the united front into a weapon of attack against the International. Anti-dissidence is a negative virtue. It cannot take the place of Communism. It works well when the main question is one of pointing to the errors and weaknesses of the past, and of guarding against possible errors and weaknesses in the future.

On the other hand, it is fatal if it hinders proletarian unity of action, that unity of action which is beneficial to Communism, not by any mediocre combination of naive Macchiavellism, but because it constitutes an historical truth.

For the Second and 2% Internationals for Amsterdam, there is a trap in the united front. It is that trap which history lays for those parties who attempt to proceed against historical truth.

The difficulties in applying the united front to France should be better defined in order that they be better overcome. We must ask:

Is the capitalist offensive in France growing, as is the case in the rest of the world?

Is it or is it not true that Communism speaks the truth about the development of the class struggle, and should it or should it not therefore appear to the fighting working class as the only doctrine capable of leading the proletariat towards complete liberation?

Are there or are there not still some workers behind the reformist C.G.T. and behind the dissenting parties?

Again, is it or is it not possible through mere propaganda to separate these deceived workers from their bad chiefs?

Is the experience of the struggle against capital going to be favorable or detrimental to this separation?

Do the unorganized masses comprehend our doctrinal divisions or not?

Is the independent action of the organizations an obstacle to the entrance of the hesitating and backward workers into the struggle, or not?

Are agreements between the various organizations for a definite action favorable or detrimental to the action of the great proletarian masses?

Is it of greater advantage to Communism to find itself facing an inert mass or a fighting mass?

Is the C.G.T.U. for or against the united front? Have the French Communists in the last year done everything they could for the maintenance, consolidation and extension of Communist influence in the unions, or not?

Have they or have they not permitted the Anarcho-Syndicalists to dominate the unions?

Should the French Communists take advantage of their rights as labor unionists to propagandize the doctrines of the International within their unions, or not?

Should or should not the Communist Party permit itself to be towed by the other organizations even when the latter are in the wrong?

Should or should not the Communist Party be the guide of the proletariat?

Should it or should it not, for the purpose of fulfilling its mission and directing the struggle of the proletariat towards the revolution, inspire confidence by always seizing the initiative in actions of the working class?

To put these questions is to answer them.

Besides, we know that the French proletariat is not the only one in the world, and that it solidarizes with the workers of all countries.

A great world battle is being carried on under the slogan of the united front. Everywhere, particularly in Germany. which is so near to its revolution, such a battle is beneficial to Communism, and the rival Internationals openly or secretly sabotage the united proletarian front.

In rejecting the united front, would the French party be willing to furnish the Second International with a pretext for shifting the responsibility for the sabotage upon the Communist International which is responsible for its French section?

This is the significance of the minority motion of the National Council.

Will it be said of us that we have hurt the French Party? Above the Party, there is Communism, and the Party is worth something in our eyes only if it is a living and active instrument of Communism.

And Communism is void of all meaning if it leads a party action. It acquires meaning only when it carries on a class action. Communism, when served by the Party, cannot but be a doctrine animating and coordinating the efforts of the entire working class arrayed in battlefront against capitalism.

International Press Correspondence, widely known as”Inprecorr” was published by the Executive Committee of the Communist International (ECCI) regularly in German and English, occasionally in many other languages, beginning in 1921 and lasting in English until 1938. Inprecorr’s role was to supply translated articles to the English-speaking press of the International from the Comintern’s different sections, as well as news and statements from the ECCI. Many ‘Daily Worker’ and ‘Communist’ articles originated in Inprecorr, and it also published articles by American comrades for use in other countries. It was published at least weekly, and often thrice weekly.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/inprecor/1922/v02n043-may-30-1922-Inprecor.pdf