The CPUSA is today the largest organization in the US claiming to be a Marxist-Leninist party. The party claims to number around 12-15,000 members although over half of these are inactive owing to their advanced age.
Since 1957 there have been very few struggles in the CPUSA because all real sources of opposition to the party’s policies have long since left it. An exception was during the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia when the west coast editor of the People’s World, a CP Weekly, wrote and printed articles which were highly critical of the invasion and the Soviet Union. He was relieved of his post and left the party within the next couple of years. Another exception was the resistance of some members of the National Committee to endorsing their own party’s candidate for President and their suggestion that McGovern deserved Party support in 1972. This never became widespread knowledge outside the CP itself and should not be considered to have been a very crucial struggle. Within the revisionist problematic of the CPUSA this difference should probably be seen as a non-antagonistic contradiction.
The line and practices of the CPUSA today are the logical outcome of the processes we have been studying for the last several months. They are not only the reflection of the historical legacy and practices of the party but a concrete expression of the effects of the class struggle in theory, society and the party. As such they are of a far more complex origin than many current notions would posit to the contrary. As we begin to study more precisely classes and the struggles they engage in, our understanding of how the CPUSA reached its present state of development will not only be enhanced but raised to a fundamentally higher level. It is hoped that our historical and theoretical studies will thus complement each other, bringing out the political significance of what we must know, so as to guide our practice in appropriate ways.
I. What is the relationship between the Democratic Party, the CPUSA and the working class? What does the CPUSA see as its role within this “coalition?” How is this related to the CP’s election strategy of the 1930’s and 4O’s and that of the present day Euro-Communist Parties? Is the CP Euro-Communist?
II. What was the CPUSA’s position on the Viet Nam war? What were some of the reasons that the CP could not play a leading role within the anti-war movement at that time?
III. Describe the CP’s current conception of the party. Is this in line with their past conceptions of the party? Contrast the views of the TMLC and the CP on party membership and the role of party members.
IV. “In many ways the question of detente is the most basic and central issue facing the people of the US.” –Gus Hall. Why has the CP taken up the “struggle for detente” as their most crucial task?
The Truth about the CP Election Campaign, Fred Feldman (A Young Socialist Alliance Publication), pps. 1-10.
The Big Stakes of Detente, Gus Hall, pps. 1-19, 35-48.