Away back in those Hungry Thirties there was a sub-committee of the United States Senate, headed by Senator Robert La Follette, that investigated what was popularly known as the labor spy racket. A great deal of evidence was gathered that proved conclusively the employment by industries in the United States of provocateurs to infiltrate labor unions for the purpose of stirring up policies that could lead to violence during proposed strike actions. The motive of some of these was, of course, the smashing of the fast-growing labor union movement through use of weapons of violence against striking workers; and industries such as steel, auto and rubber had stockpiled veritable arsenals of weaponry within their gates. The La Follette Committee also disclosed the fact that other industries, those that manufactured tear gas. barbed-wire fences and so forth, had their agents, too, hard at work to instigate the conditions that would lead to more sales of their commodities.
More recently, in the Fifties, there was a burst of activity on the part of the F.B.I. In the business of infiltrating radical political parties, such as the Communist Party, with its agents. It has been said that there were, at one time, at least as many F.B.I. agents as genuine members within the ranks of that organisation and if such an estimate was made in jest it must be remembered that many a true word is spoken in jest.
In fact, the interested researcher can find—with little effort—evidence of the employment of such tactics by law enforcement agencies from the federal level down to city police departments all through the years of American democracy. And one would have to be naive, indeed, to believe that the planting of agents provocateur by the capitalist state does not still exist, even more highly developed than ever before: right here in this land of liberty.
But we are trying to make an important point. Any organization that can make it possible for police spies to influence its policies is an organization that ought to be shunned by working people. When a political group, for example, advocates the abolition of capitalism; states that it would prefer that the socialist revolution be consummated peacefully; but argues that all evidence points to the so-called “fact" that the capitalists would not permit such an event to happen and that, therefore. the working class must prepare itself to meet capitalist violence with their own; such a group lays itself open for infiltration by police spies. And such a group should be avoided by workers as they would avoid the plague.
For it should be apparent that there are no weapons possible of accumulation by working people that cannot be outmatched a thousand fold by the capitalist class. And it should also be apparent, even from recent history, that the capitalists will not squirm at laying waste whole sections of cities—or whole cities—if necessary, when threatened by violent overthrow by rivals of whatever persuasion. If you think that sort of thing couldn’t happen in America, then think again!
The World Socialist Party is not afraid of infiltration by police spies. Our principles, around which we are organized, make such an eventuality implausible, if not impossible. The provocateur would be wasting his time. We are, and we have always been since our beginnings, organized on a basis of above-ground legality We address ourselves to fellow-workers, urging them to unite on the political field in order that a majority of socialists may be elected to control the central organs of power. Only in this way can a situation be brought about wherein the armed forces of the nation, the states, and the municipalities cannot be used against us, while a majority introduce a brand new way of life. A socialist majority has no need for violence. Let us undermine capitalism by spreading socialist information and using the legal machinery of capitalism, itself. If you think such a policy is a utopian dream, take another look at the scene and think again!
No comments:
Post a Comment