Letters: The Socialist Attitude to Reforms. (1932)

Letters to the Editors from the July 1932 issue of the Socialist Standard

Two correspondents (A. T. Delman, Los Angeles, and a reader in London, E.C.1) ask us to explain our attitude and Marx’s attitude towards reforms. The two letters and our reply arc given below.

Los Angeles, Calif.

Dear Comrades :

The following is Marx’s introduction to the French Labour Party Programme of 1880. This appeared in the Proletarian Opposition Bulletin of Chicago, Illinois, Number 3, January, 1932, and is a translation from the “Elementarbuecher des Kommunismus”—Wage. Labour and Capital—Berlin, 1930, page 67, and “Marx-Engels Program Critiques”—same series as before, pages (69 and 70. These works are published by the German Communist Party.

Whereas :—

The emancipation of the productive classes is that of all mankind, regardless of differences of sex ;

The producers can be free only to the degree in which they control the means of production ;

There are only two forms under which they can possess the means of production ;

1. The individual form which never existed as a general condition and is being more and more eliminated by the advance of industry ;

2. The collective form, whose material and intellectual elements are being perfected by capitalist society’s own evolution ;

Whereas :—-

Collective appropriation can be achieved only through the revolutionary action of the class of producers, or the proletariat organised as a separate political party ;

Such organisation must be effected with all the means at the disposal of the proletariat, inclusive of the right of universal suffrage, so that the ballot may be changed from the means of deception it has been until now into an instrument of emancipation.

The French socialist workers, proclaiming the aim of regaining all means of production to collective ownership have decided, as a means of organisation and of conflict, to enter the election campaign with the following demands :

(A) Political Demands.

1. Abolition of all laws against the press, associations and unions, and particularly of the law against the international association of the workers. Abolition of the work book, this degrading insignia of the working class, as well as the laws which place the worker in relation to the employer and woman in relation to man in a subordinate position.

2. Elimination of all budget appropriations to the church and return of the property (known as the “dead Hand”) to the state of all mobile and immobile property belonging to the religious societies (decree of the Commune of April 2nd, 1871), including all industrial and commercial properties of these societies.

3. Abolition of the state debt.

4. Abolition of the standing army and general military conscription.

5. The Communes shall be granted home rule, and their own police.

(B) Economic Demands.

1. A weekly day of rest, or a law that will prohibit employers to operate more than six days out of seven. Legal limitation of daily hours of labour to eight for adults. Abolition of the employment of children under fourteen years of age in private places of employment and a reduction of the hours of labour to six for those between the ages of fourteen to eighteen.

2. Protection of apprentices in the form of control through the labour unions.

3. A definite minimum wage which shall be determined annually through a statistical labour commission in accordance with the prices of necessities prevailing in the given communities.

4. A law which shall prohibit the employers to hire foreign workers at wages lower than those demanded by French workers.

5. Equal wages for both sexes performing the same work.

6. Education and vocational training of all children who shall be supported by the community through the state and the commune.

7. Support of the aged and those unable to work by the community.

8. Prohibition of all interference by employers in the administration of labour mutual aid banks, insurance, etc., which shall be entrusted to the exclusive directions of the workers.

9. Responsibility of employers in case of accident through deposit of a bond which the employer has to pay to the labour banks and which shall be adjusted in accordance with the number of workers employed in an enterprise, and to the degree of danger connected with activity in such enterprise.

10. The right of objection by workers to the special labour rules in the various places of work, prohibition of the privilege assumed by employers to penalise their workers in the form of fines or wage reductions (decree of the Commune, April 27th, 1871).

11. Abolition of all contracts in which public property is entrusted to others (such as banks, railroads, mines, etc.) and transfer of all state places of employment to the workers employed therein.

12. Abolition of all indirect taxes and change of direct taxes into a progressive income tax on all incomes over 3,000 francs, prohibition of inheritance in the indirect line, and of all direct inheritances amounting to more than 20,000 francs.

Taken In its broad aspect the revolutionary method as held by the S.P.G.B. is unalterably opposed to reforms or palliatives as confusing and obscuring the class conflict.

The S.P.G.B. maintains that —

1. Reforms deal with effects.

2. Further entrench capitalism.

3. Lead to compromise and bargaining with capitalist parties and candidates.

4. Nothing short of Socialism can cure existing evils.

How does the S.P.G.B. reconcile its revolutionary method to Marx’s advocation of these Political and Economic demands “as a means of organisation and of conflict, to enter the election campaign”?

Yours fraternally,

A. T. Delman

* * *

The second letter reads as follows : —

Dear Comrade,

I see in the ”Communist Manifesto” that Engels, in his preface, writes :—

As I write these lines, the proletariat of Europe and America is holding a review of its forces ; it is mobilised for the first time as One army, marching forward and fighting for One immediate aim : — Eight-hour working day, established by legal enactment (as was demanded by the Geneva Congress of the International Working men’s Association, and again by the International Socialist Congress held at Paris in 1889).

(“Communist Manifesto,” Engels’ Preface. written in 1890. E. & C. Paul’s translation. Published, Modern Books, Ltd.. 1929.)

The S.P.G.B. is opposed to fighting for reforms on the political field, yet here we see Engel’s advocating an “eight-hour day.”

Do not the above quotations show that the S.P.G.B. is at variance with Marx & Engels.

Yours, etc.,

London, E.C.1.

Reply.

The translation of the programme adopted in 1880 by the French organisation “Le Parti ouvrier” does not fully agree with the original, doubtless due to its having been translated first into German and then into English. The original is reproduced on page 261 of Paul Louis’ “Histoire du Socialisme en France” {published in 1925 by Marcel Riviere, Paris). While the version quoted by our correspondent is substantially accurate, several phrases are omitted, some words are mistranslated, and in some passages the English wording is not clear. For reasons of space we cannot reproduce the whole programme here, but one or two mistakes are worth correcting.

In the opening sentence the original reads “productive class” not “productive classes,” and “differences of sex” should read “differences of sex or race.” The original gives a list of kinds of means of production (“land, factories, ships, banks, credit, etc.”). The sentence immediately preceding ”A. Political Demands” should read “with the following immediate demands,” not “with the following demands.”

Clause 4 under “Political Demands” should read “general arming of the people,” not “genera! military conscription.”

The precise part played by Marx and Engels in drafting it is not clear, although it is evident that they did have a hand in it. Paul Louis, in the work referred to above, says (page 261, “The programme was the result of ihe collaboration of Guesde and Lafargue with Marx and Engels.” In a letter dated 7th May, 1932, Louis writes, “It is impossible to fix exactly the part that Marx took in drawing up the manifesto of the Parti Ouvrier in 1880. One knows only that he collaborated with Engels, Guesde and Lafargue.”

B. G. De Montgomery, in his “British and Continental Labour Policy” (Kegan Paul, London, 1922, page 12) says that Guesde came to London to confer with Marx and Engels. Montgomery says that, this programme was “worked out after the so-called Gotha programme, which was adopted in 1875 by the German Social Democracy.”

Ryazanov, in his “Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels” (Martin Lawrence, London, 1927), says (p. 211) that Marx “was taking an active part in the working out of the programme.” Ryazanov also says that this 1880 programme of the French Party served as the pattern for the subsequent programmes of the Russians and the Austrians, and as a pattern for the later German “Erfurt Programme,” and that a book in which it was elaborated (“What the Social Democrats Want”) exercised a great influence on the Russian Movement.

One thing that has to be remembered is that Marx and Engels were prepared on occasion to compromise in order to secure agreement which they thought would help on the Socialist movement. They accepted statements with which they disagreed in order to secure general agreement on a programme of whose main points they approved. Ryazanov, in his “Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels” tells how this happened in connection with the constitution of the International Working Men’s Association (See Chapter VIII). Consequently the knowledge that Marx and Engels were consulted about the programme of the French Party m 1880 does not necessarily mean that they approved of all of it.

Having now cleared the ground we can come to the point which our correspondents raise. They find that the S.P.G.B., which claims to be a Marxist organisation, does not issue a programme of immediate demands and does not fight for reforms on the political field. Yet Marx and Engels associated themselves with programmes of immediate demands.

The first point to notice is that the S.P.G.B. holds precisely the same view as Marx and Engels on the need to abolish Capitalism and establish Socialism. In the preamble to the French Party’s programme the statement that the French Socialist workers “have decided as a means of organisation and of struggle to enter the elections with the following immediate demands,” is preceded by the declaration that “the object of their efforts” was “the political and economic expropriation of the capitalist class and ihe restoration of all the means of production to collective ownership” {Louis, page 263). It is important to notice that this attitude is not that of the various reformist parties which wish to retain capitalism while improving it with reforms. These parties are not seeking power to expropriate the capitalist class and institute social ownership of the means of production. They make reforms the object of their activities, while the drafters of the French programme were entering the elections with the programme of immediate demands “as a means of organisation and of struggle.”

That was the view in 1880 of those who drafted the programme in question. It is not the view of the S.P.G.B. Experience has taught the lesson that programmes of immediate demands do not serve as a means of organising socialist parties. They serve as a sure means of destroying socialist unity, of thrusting the socialist objective into the background, and of attracting into the organisation non-socialist elements which drag it into the mire of compromise and bargaining with capitalist parties. Every one of the capitalist countries provides its examples of parties whose original socialist aims have been submerged and their organisation disrupted in this way. The French 1880 programme is a case in point. The party which adopted it did not last for a year. Within 12 months one wing, which wanted to work through the existing political groups, broke away and formed the “Alliance Socialiste Republicaine.” Another wing, composed of Anarchists, renounced Socialism entirely. The third group, the majority, formed the “Parti Ouvrier Socialiste Revolutionnaire.”

And within another year this latter party broke up further into “possiblists” and “impossiblists.” (See Bliss, “A Handbook of Socialism.” Swan Sonnenschein, 1907, p. 76.)

So much for the immediate demands which were intended to be a means of “organisation.” Other countries provide similar examples. Reference was made above to Ryazanov’s statement about the 1880 French programme having served as a pattern for parties in Germany, Austria and Russia. Where now are these parties which were to fight for Socialism on this programme? With the exception of the Bolshevist wing of the Russian Party, and minorities in the German and Austrian parties, they all of them developed before 1914 into parties of reform and nothing else, parties of political bargaining, parties of war supporters. History has proved the danger of building a party on such a basis.

The S.P.G.B., in declining to put forward a programme of immediate demands, does not take up the untenable position that the position of the workers under Capitalism is such that they could not be worse off if they gave up the struggle to defend their wages and working conditions; nor do we maintain that reforms are valueless. What we do maintain is that reform programmes inevitably attract reformists, and produce reformist organisations incapable of working for Socialism; that only by working directly for Socialism will it be achieved ; that parties lacking solid socialist support and depending on reformists cannot achieve Socialism even if they obtain control of the political machinery ; that reforms cannot end the subject-position of the working class although they may be of small temporary or sectional benefit; that the small value of the reforms obtainable by reformist political action is In no way commensurate with the years of work and the volume of effort required to achieve them ; and that incidentally the capitalists will give concessions more readily in an endeavour to keep the workers away from a growing socialist movement than they will in response to the appeals of bodies based on programmes of reforms.

Does it follow from this that we believe Marx and Engels to have been wrong? The answer is that Marx and Engels, even after discovering the main laws of social development, still had to learn by experience how best to apply their knowledge to the practical tasks of working-class organisation. They never ceased to clarify their views and change them whenever experience showed the need for a change. As Engels states in his 1891 preface to “Wage-Labour and Capital,” all of Marx’s writings which were published before the first part of his Critique of Political Economy differ from those published afterwards, and “contain expressions and even entire sentences, which from the point of view of his later writing, appear rather ambiguous and even untrue.” (See “The Essentials of Marx,” published by the Vanguard Press, New York, 1926, p. 71.) This was because Marx had studied further and learned more. Among the early ideas which Marx and Engels abandoned in later life was the idea of armed revolt. Experience taught them the futility of “barricades.”

We have learned from the endeavours of Marx and Engels, and are only proceeding in accordance with their fundamental ideas when we point out that experience has also shown the danger and uselessness of programmes of immediate demands.

Editorial Committee

Blogger's Note:

The Proletarian Opposition Bulletin of Chicago mentioned in A. T. Delman's letter was a journal that was produced by a dissident faction of the Proletarian Party, which had broken from the Proletarian Party's longstanding opposition to reformism (hence the bulletin's emphasis on the immediate demands of the Le Parti Ouvrier and Karl Marx's input on the matter.) There's little or no mention of them on the net but I did find this article by the American Trotskyist leader, James P. Cannon, from a 1932 issue of Militant, where he comments at length on the split/expulsions, and indulges in a few funny digs at Keracher and the politics of the Proletarian Party. (To be honest, Cannon's sticking the boot into the PP's 'impossibilism' so, in his own way, he's also criticising the politics of the SPGB.)