Browder’s proposal, In Teheran–Our Path in War in Peace, that the party be dissolved was carried out in May 1944. A year later, in the light of the French Communist critique of Browder’s views, the Party was reconstiuted under the leadership of William Z. Foster and Eugene Dennis. The aftermath of the struggle against Browder’s views was not a genuine rectification and struggle against Browderism throughout the party, but the simple return to party leadership of all of Browder’s supporters and followers. The real struggle was conducted not against Browderism and the right, but against the left opposition which demanded a full struggle against revisionism and opportunism.
This struggle lasted only a short while, most of the left was expelled from the party and shortly thereafter the cold war, McCarthyism and the legal repression against the party absorbed much of its energy (this will be examined next week).
I. Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of Duclos’ and Foster’s critiques of Browder’s views. How did they fail to get at the root of the Party’s errors? To what degree is the strategy and line of the Party proposed by Foster a qualitative break with Browderism?
II. Discuss the major weaknesses and errors of the expelled movement. How do they reflect problems which still exist within our own movement? Would you say that the basic character of the expelled movement was ultra-leftism, as Foster charged, or did it basically represent a genuine Marxist-Leninist left?
III. In what lines and practices did the Turning Point group represent the best line of struggle against ultra-leftism and sectarianism in the expelled movement? How does its Declaration reflect its own orientation, as opposed to the left-sectarian elements in the expelled movement?
IV. What lessons can we learn from Sutta’s critique of the CP trade union work for our own intervention in the labor movement? According to Sutta, how did the CPUSA distort the concept of the united front?
Path to Peace Progress and Prosperity, Communist Political Association, pps. 43-44.
“On the Dissolution of the Communist Party of the U.S.A,” Jacques Duclos, pps. 19-33.
“The Struggle Against Revisionism,” William Z. Foster, pps. 56-69.
Declaration of Turning Point, Turning Point.
“The Fight Against Revisionism in the US Communist Party,” Burt Sutta, pps. 24-33.
“Anti-Revisionist Struggles in the US, 1945-1950, Paul Costello, Theoretical Review #11.