(b) Expropriation and nationalization of the banks, as a necessary preliminary measure for the complete expropriation of capital.

(c) Expropriation and nationalization of the large (trust) organizations of capital. Expropriation proceeds without compensation, as "buying out" the capitalists is a repudiation of the tasks of the revolution.

(d) Repudiation of all national debts and the financial obligations of the old system.

(e) The nationalization of foreign trade.

(f) Measures for the socialization of agriculture.

These measures centralize the basic means of production in the proletarian state, nationalizing industry; and their partial cheracter ceases as reconstruction proceeds. Socialization of industry becomes actual and complete only after the dictatorship of the proletariat has accomplished its task of suppressing the bourgeoisie.

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The state of proletarian dictatorship is political in character, since it represents a ruling class, the proletariat, which is now supreme; and it uses coercion against the old bourgeois class. But the task of this dictatorship is to render itself unnecessary; and it becomes unnecessary the moment the full conditions of Communist Socialism materialize. While the dictatorship of the proletariat performs its negative task of crushing the old order, it performs the positive task of constructing the new. Together with the government of the proletarian dictatorship, there is developed a new government," which is no longer government in the old sense, since it concerns itself with the management of production and not with the government of persons. Out of workers' control of industry, introduced by the proletarian dictatorship, there develops the complete structure of Communist Socialism industrial self-government of the communistically organized producers. When this structure is completed, which implies the complete expropriation of the bourgeoisie economically and politically. the dictatorship of the proletariat ends, in its place coming the full and free social and individual autonomy of the Communist order.

THE COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL

The Communist International, issuing directly out of the proletarian revolution in action and in process of development, is the organ of the international revolutionary proletariat; just as the

League of Nations is the organ of the joint aggression and resistance of the dominant Imperialism.

The attempt to resurrect the Second International, at Berne, was a ghastly failure. It rallied the counter-revolutionary forces of Europe, which were actually struggling against the proletarian revolution. In this "International" are united all the elements. treasonable to Socialism, and the wavering "center" elements whose policy of miserable compromise is more dangerous than open treason. It represents the old dominant moderate Socialism; it based affiliation on acceptance of "labor" parliamentary action, admitting trades unions accepting "political action." The old International abandoned the earlier conception of Socialism as the politics of the Social Revolution -- the politics of the class struggle in its revolutionary implications -- admitting directly reactionary implications, admitting directly reactionary organizations of Laborism, such as the British Labor Party.

The Communist International, on the contrary, represents a Socialism in complete accord with the revolutionary character of the class struggle. It unites all the consciously revolutionary forces. It wages war equally against the dominant moderate Socialism and Imperialism, each of which has demonstrated its complete incompetence on the problems that now press down upon the world. The Communist International issues its challenge to the conscious, virile elements of the proletariat, calling them to the final struggle against Capitalism on the basis of the revolutionary epoch of Imperialism. The acceptance of the Communist International means accepting the fundamentals of revolutionary Socialism as decisive in our activity.

The Communist International, moreover, issues its call to the subject peoples of the world, crushed under the murderous mastery of imperialism. The revolt of these colonial and subject peoples is a necessary phase of the world struggle against capitalist Imperialism; their revolt must unite itself with the struggle of the conscious proletariat in the imperialistic nations. The Communist International, accordingly, offers an organization and a policy that may unify all the revolutionary forces of the world for the conquest of power, and for Socialism.

It is not a problem of immediate revolution. It is a problem of the immediate revolutionary struggle. The revolutionary epoch of the final struggle against Capitalism may last for years and tens of years; but the Communist International offers a policy

and program immediate and ultimate in scope, that provides for the immediate class struggle against Capitalism, in its revolutionary implications, and for the final act of the conquest of power.

The old order is in decay. Civilization is in collapse. The proletarian revolution and the Communist reconstruction of society-the struggle for these is now indispensable. This is the message of the Communist International to the workers of the world.

The Communist International calls the proletariat of the world to the final struggle!

CHAPTER V

The Communist Party of America

In the previous chapter dealing with the development of the Left Wing movement in the Socialist Party, mention was made of a divergence of opinion which manifested itself in the First National Conference of the Left Wing, which was held in New York on the 25th day of June, 1919.

At that conference the delegates representing the Russian Socialist Federation and the Michigan delegates, together with some others, numbering thirty-one in all, insisted that the conference should take immediate action looking toward the formation of a Communist Party in the United States. The majority of that conference, as we have already shown, still believed there was a prospect of gaining control of the machinery of the Socialist Party, and was reluctant to abandon the organization at that time. The minority immediately withdrew from the conference, and formed a National Organization Committee to issue a call for a convention with the object of organizing a Communist Party. This move had the full support of the Russian Socialist Federation.

This organization committee, which consisted of Dennis E. Batt, D. Elbaum, O. C. Johnson, John Keracher, S. Kopnagel, I. Stilson, and Alexander Stoklitsky, opened offices at 1221 Blue Island Avenue, Chicago, Ill. The call issued by this committec was printed in the "Novy Mir" in the issue of July 7, 1919, a translation of which is as follows:

"CALL FOR A NATIONAL CONVENTION FOR THE PURPOSE OF ORGANIZING A COMMUNIST PARTY IN AMERICA

"In this, the most momentous period of the world's history, capitalism is tottering to its ruin. The proletariat is straining at the chains which bind it. A revolutionary spirit is spreading throughout the world. The workers are rising to answer the clarion call of the Third International.

"Only one Socialism is possible in this crisis. A Socialism based upon understanding. A Socialism that will express in action the needs of the proletariat. The time has passed for temporizing and hesitating. We must act. The Communist call of the Third International, the echo of the Communist Manifesto of 1848, must be answered.

* See Addendum, Part I.

"The National Executive Committee of the Socialist. Party of America has evidenced by its expulsion of nearly half of the membership that they will not hesitate at wrecking the organization in order to maintain control. A deadlock has been precipitated in the ranks of revolutionary Socialism by the wholesale expulsion or suspension of the membership comprising the Socialist Party of Michigan, locals and branches throughout the country, together with seven Language Federations. This has created a condition in our movement that makes it manifestly impossible to longer delay the calling of a convention to organize a new party. Those who realize that the capturing of the Socialist Party as such is but an empty victory will not hesitate to respond to this call and leave the 'Right' and 'Center' to sink together with their 'revolutionary' leaders.

"The majority of the delegates to the Left Wing Conference in New York meekly neglected to sever their connections with the reactionary National Executive Committee. Rendered impotent by the conflicting emotions and lack of understanding present they continued to mark time as Centrists in the wake of the Right. Their policy is one of endeavor to capture the old party machinery and the stagnant elements who have been struggling for a false unity and who are only ready to abandon the ship when it sinks beneath the waves of reaction.

"This condition confronting the minority delegates representing the following organizations - Socialist Party of Michigan; Left Wing State Convention of Minnesota; Locals, Buffalo; Chicago; Union Local, N. J.; Cudahy, Wis.; Rochester, N. Y.; Rockford, Ill.; Kenosha, Wis.; New York; Providence; Nanticoke, Pa.; Milwaukee, Wis.; Boston, Mass.; Polish, Lettish, Russian, Jewish, Lithuanian, Esthonian Federations at the Left Wing Conference has been met by this call for the organization of a Communist Party in America.

"No other course is possible, therefore, we, the minority delegates at the Left Wing Conference, call a convention to meet in the city of Chicago on September 1, 1919, for the purpose of organizing a Communist Party in America. "This party will be founded upon the following principles:

"1. The present is the period of the dissolution ..nd collapse of the whole capitalist world system; which will