Communist Party of U.S.A. (1973)

From issue number 1 (1973) of The Western Socialist

Gus Hall's Objective: Reorganize Exploitation 

Gus Hall, Secretary of the Communist Party of the United States of America, and the Party’s 1972 Presidential candidate, claims the CP-U.S.A. is again surging to the fore following the trying times it experienced in the 50s under the now repudiated Smith Act. So reports newspaper columnist Philip Nobile who interviewed Mr. Hall (Utica Observer - Dispatch, Oct. 22. 1972).

Mr. Hall credits the alleged surge of new blood in the Party to the fact that the hysteria of the McCarthy period has disappeared and that people choose to have their curiosity about communism satisfied by declared Communists rather than by anti-Communists.

Dues-paying membership is, according to Mr. Hall, someplace between 15 and 16 thousand. Mr. Hall, however, contends there are approximately 100,000 Communists who. for reasons of fear (social, economic, etc.) cannot openly declare themselves as such. The total Communist vote in the coming Presidential election should in large measure confirm or refute this claim since one’s vote is cast in secrecy and there need be no fear of recrimination.

One of the questions put to Secretary Hall by Mr. Nobile was this:

Q. — Have you stopped advocating the violent overthrow of the American Government? 

A. — We never did. We are, and have always been, for the overthrow of the capitalist system. We want to take the country' out of the hands of the big monopoly corporations. Socialism, therefore, is our aim. Naturally, there would be some fundamental changes in the existing government under socialism.

Note that Mr. Hall speaks here of "socialism” rather than "communism." There is a separation of the two. This cleavage is a Leninistic invention, with an unintentional assist from Marx. In the Critique of the Gotha Program Marx speaks of two phases of communism — “lower” and “higher” — though he does not fix them terminologically as “socialism” and "communism.” And in the same source he writes that “between capitalist and communist society” there is a "transition period in which the state can be nothing but the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat.” Now according to Lenin, the period between the transformation of capitalism into communism is called "socialism.”

In 1917 Lenin proposed that the Bolsheviks call themselves the Communist Party. And in support of this proposal he broached the idea that socialism differed from communism. It was the “lower” and “higher” phases of communism and the ”dictatorshlp of the proletariat” which Lenin made central in his The State and Revolution and to which his followers have ever since adhered.

This skilled piece of surgery, this dichotomy of socialism/communism by Lenin perplexed most of all who called themselves Marxists. For they, like Marx and Engels, conceived “socialism” and "communism” as one and the same, used the terms interchangeably. They were correct in doing so.

Keeping in mind the comparatively backward economic conditions at the time of Marx, he reasoned that the transition period from capitalist to socialist society would require the existence of a political state, with the state being utilized solely in the interest of the working class during the transition and existing for only a brief span of time. There would come then that degree of socialism wherein the state no longer existed and distribution of wealth would follow the principle of work performed. Following this phase, there would come into being “higher” socialism wherein all would have free access to the goods produced. No matter how you cut the cake, It is still socialism/communism notwithstanding the stage or phase.

Reading the Critique of the Gotha Program, one easily gets the impression that Marx distinguished between "lower” and “higher” communism in terms of the ruling principle of distribution — with the “lower” phase, as mentioned above, ascribed to work performed, and the “higher” phase acrlbed to needs: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs ” But in the same source Marx, anticipating that he might be misunderstood, expressly cautions that it is “a mistake to make a fuss about so-called distribution and put the principal stress on it” and that “any distribution whatever of the means of consumption is only a consequence of the distribution of the conditions of production themselves.”

To Marx socialism encompassed far, far more than the economical improvement of the working class. His criticism of capitalism was not merely centered around the injustice of the distribution of wealth but also entailed the transformation of man under capitalism into a “crippled monstrosity.” In his German Ideology it is pointed out that the aim of socialism is that of developing the total, universal man; that is, the elevation of man above his present crippling specialization.

Marx scoffs at higher wages and hence unmistakably scoffs at the wage system in general. He writes in his Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts (translated by T. B. Bottomore):

“An enforced increase in wages . . . would be nothing more than a better remuneration of slaves. and would not restore. either to the worker or to the work, their human significance and worth.

"Even the equality of incomes which Proudhon demands would only change the relation of the present day worker to his work into a relation of all men to work. Society would then be conceived as an abstract capitalist."

The use of the phrase "dictatorship of the proletariat” by Marx was an ill chosen one even in the passing sense he used it and despite its connotative difference as compared to today. But as all know who have studied the writings of Marx, he was a stalwart believer in democracy and personal liberty and most certainly did not mean by this phrase an excuse for the suspension of human rights during the so-called transition or at any other time such as the “Communists” and their followers around the world would have it.

It is Mr Hall’s conviction that a basic difference exists between government by monopoly corporations and government by an elite of the Communist Party, supposedly acting in the interests of the workers through the medium of the State. Mr Hall misses the whole point; to wit, the transformation of meaningless, alienated labor into free, productive labor. Weighing the difference between exploitation by monopoly corporations and exploitation by the State, with the hierarchy of the Communist Party holding the reins, is but a game for statisticians to play. Actually, the crux of the issue is not who or what exploits you or to what degree, but the very existence of exploitation itself.

On the heels of the above question put to Mr. Hall, this one followed:

Q. — But do you countenance violence?

A. — Yes. We have said right along we will seek the least violent path. But there should be no illusions about this question. History and life has taught us that it is an exceptional case where a change in class rule can be totally peaceful. Our Party will take part in violent struggles when the time comes.

And so it is admitted that Mr Hall’s Party countenances violence, though along “the least violent path.” Apparently ever on-going history and life has not taught Mr. Hall that working class violence in a highly industrialized stage of human life is passé, is a suicidal ticket for the rank and file participants. Mr. Hall seems to have subscribed to a postulate which may have been correct under certain conditions but which under changed conditions no longer exists.

Whereas the Communist Party sets Itself up as the vanguard, as the leaders. of the working class and condones violence, albeit along the least violent path, the World Socialist Party attuned to historical reality holds that there can be no socialism without socialists; that the working class cannot be led into socialism, that working class emancipation can only be achieved through conscious (knowing what socialism truly is and hence not leaving the thinking and decision-making to a small, self-appointed elite) and political (securing control of the seat of power, the State, via democratic means and thereupon abolishing it) organizational endeavor. With the vast majority of the workers, which would include all those presently engaged in suppressive endeavors, cognizant of the basic meaning of socialism and actively engaged In promoting it, who would there be to vent violence upon? At the most there might be a handful of reactionaries who would simply be obliviated by the march of events.

Before closing, let us touch briefly on one more question and answer:

Q. — Would American Communism Jail "subversive" writers as Russian Communism does? (Note with dismay and commiseration with the exorcised spirit of Karl Marx that we have "American." "Russian." "Chinese," "Yugoslav." "Cuban," "Italian." etc., communism.)

A. — I don't think so. I have publicly stated here and in the Soviet Union that I would handle these writers differently. Instead of making a criminal case out of it, I would suggest we publish these books and then arrange for competent reviewers to expose them on television in the presence of the author.

We can conclude from Mr. Hall’s answer that he would have extrajudicial trials for writers and other who proved offensive to the ideas of "American Communism.” Isn’t this frightening to contemplate Suppose the author refused to concede the errors of his ways and declined contriteness, what then? Why, off to an insane asylum for corrective treatment or worse. Under international socialism/communism as advocated by the WSP, one may write and have published whatever he damn well pleases without one iota of fear of any authoritative recrimination. Socialism as expounded by Marx is free of authoritative coercion, is completely foreign to government over people. The people, armed with socialist knowledge, will not need "competent reviewers” to instruct them as to what is or is not worthy of their consideration.