TIMELY TOPICS

...We have been together too long to divide now on a question of how to say what in their hearts most Socialists agree ought to be said...

...It was a body of upstanding and earnest delegates, many of whom came early for pre-convention conference...

...On this matter of illegality, I am reminded of the old story of the Boston woman who left her five children, warning them not to put beans up their noses...

...I am having all this material sent-on to* me from the National Office and will give space to it from time to time...

...In « Socialist soeiety tha young, the old, sad tho wlU bo provided for regularly out of the national budget...

...This runs is general to the effect that we may have to do thesi things but we oughtn't to talk about them...

...2. The argument of illegality...

...The Leader will bo a clearing house for news of those activities so that wo may profit by them...

...The question simply is whether to state clearly what we would do in certain contingencies makes us illegal4iow...

...Roosevelt on Social Insurance /%NCE more even tho capitalist ^ order through a capitalist .President has to admit that Socialists wore right...

...But as Boon as they started talking: Socialism, the .unemployed began drifting away] and the organisation broke up...

...In the event of war, no one who knows the history of- the last war and the nature of various court dicisions can doubt that the Socialist Party would become illegal or cease to be Socialist...

...In the light of all this, is not the Declaration of Principles a sound Socialist document...

...I think there will be no more intemperate discussion of the declaration in the capitalist press...

...ha puts it, to protect person and property...

...That* really what it pretty much boiled itself down to, for practically everyone was eqtially ferventsome perhaps mora melHfluously vocal than others—In their protestation of revolutionary ardor and seal...

...But to state our position now is not only in line with Socialist principles throughout the world but is likely to avoid' those particular wars which may turn the world back into new Dark Ages, Let me ask you, then, to read the Declaration of Principles calmly...

...This document has been called both Communist and Anarchist...

...Some of our comrades are suggesting to prosecutors the very thing they say they want to avoid...

...Of course, we era not for any kind of social Insuranee as a final care...

...I am quite sure that whatever it is that keeps us from >eing a mass movement, it!.has lothing to do with tho questions debated at our convention...

...Remember while you read it the First World War and all that has happened since...

...The Spanish-American War and the World War were not the result of attacks on us, but of our aggressive actiom In both of them idealism was capitalized and betrayed by commercial interests and national hysteria...

...I only want to recount some problems presented...

...It is the opinion of the Civil Liberties Union, which has had much familiarity with criminal syndicalist cases, that it does not...

...on the marvelous spirit of their convention at Chicago...

...What I find it hard to understand is the nature of some of the arguments that have been advanced against the present declaration...

...It point* to a raise in the subway faro and is in Itself a bad form of aalea tax bearing most on th* poor...

...a. Tha demand for a two-cent tax on subway lines io dangerous...

...Another group organised a child study club and got along swimmingly for a while doing gentle propaganda work in moderate closes...

...Seven women came, just the seven party members who had started the group...

...namely, a refusal of young men to be dragooned into the support of capitalist war, and a general strike if end when labor can be organised and edueatedto it...

...What Socialist would say less...

...The same sort of congratulatioas go to the millinery workers, whose banquet at Chicago was one of the finest I ever attended...

...Remember oven what tho British Labor Patty's parliamentary group had to say about a strike against war...

...Does not this declaration of what Socialists would do give more vitality to its present use of democratic methods...

...In the event of a revival of persecution, almost any kind of a Socialist speech can be used against the Socialists by a prosecutor...

...What do you.say ? THE KANTOKOVITCH ARTICLES— Tht writ* af ill articUs fey Hatat K*j»t««r!tck, wkleh wm to havi bt.n started la this lataa, will b« btsan iwit wMk...

...In the event of a new World ¦ War like the last, we shall offer mass resistance to •it...

...As the days blistered on, amidst bitter wrangles on questions of the policy to be pursued "in the event of...

...Nevertheless, I believe we are more likely to get an organization and a movement by meeting plainly questions that are asked us in almost every meeting than by trying to sidestep them...

...Remember the declaration of tha German Socialists from Prague, of the Austrian Socialists through Otto Bauer, and of tho New Beginning Gronp in Germany...

...Meanwhile, the Declaration of Principles, the Congressional Platform, and the Agricultural Platform, together with statements on NRA and on labor, make a comprehensive program of which any Socialist may well be proud...

...How it can be either I can't understand—not if the English language means what I think it does...

...Well, Comrades, isn't that what you would do...

...What was tabled, not rejected, was a proposal to print the plan after editing and with certain explanatory votes as an official document...

...Our declaration deals with the kind of war that our analysis of facts leads us to expect If by some miracle there, is a wholly different type of war, there will be plenty.of time in the light of Socialist principles to change our position...

...There Must Be No Split...

...However, it was not a parliamentary jam but a motion by the opponents of the Declaration of Principles which brought it to pass that the vote was on the Declaration of Principles as a whole and not on each paragraph...

...In Detroit some of the women had about 300 unemployed workers organised...

...A document supported by the Wisconsin delegation and President Graham of the Montana Federation oi Labor cannot be too strong for American workers...

...Now, it is precisely this sort of unrealistic talk which has always been the cover and cloak for militarists...

...The leaders who will dislike the declaration aren't at all likely to be converted to the Socialist Party in a hurry, anyhow...

...Camrade Kantara< With did aal hart thtm ready la tint* far this lata...

...How can we command confidence in the sincerity of our opposition to imperialist and capitalist war unless we say what we have said...

...Next we say that if after Socialism captures a majority the ruling class refuses to give up power, "we shsll not hesitate to crush" by our labor solidarity the reckless forces of reaction and to consolidate the Socialist state...

...What do we know about this working class we talk so much about...

...They begin to ask: What If Japan or Hitler should invade the United States...

...Only the women present at the convention seemed to believe that the problems of building an organisation were equal in importance to the problem of how wo shall say we are goisg to fight war and fascism...

...There were a few parliamentary jams that a better knowledge of parliamentary law might have avoided...

...The final declaration which is attacked as "Communism" and God knows what else, simply asserts thst in the event of a complete collapse which "cannot permit of orderly procedure, the Socialist Party, whetheri or not in such case it is a majority, will not shrink from the responsibility of organising and maintaining a government under the workers' rule...

...The International | WANT to offer my belated but * very sincere congratulations to the I.L.G.W.U...

...Aa for the special argument that this will antagonize labor, I can't see why...

...Remember the kind of questions Socialists are asked abotit the road to power...

...They had a good idea where they were going and they were anxious to get there...

...It waa tho women, insignificant, tolerated and patronized, who in their round table discussion, it seemed to mo, provided an interlude of reality and substance...

...it is going to be printed a* a regular unofficial party pamphlet after the N.E.C...

...What is the approach that will gain their understanding and support...

...But social insurance or social indemnification of the unemployed and of the aged is a principle that must be adopted in adequate shape...

...And if not, why not...

...When she got back, all of them had beans up their noses...

...Let us hear your alternatives...

...Then what is it that does influence them...

...They seem to me to fall under certain heads...

...I began to fool that I was trapped by a lot of mad phantoms shadowboxing in a tortured hell...

...It will work real hardship, among others, upon high school boys and girls who have to travel ; to- their alaiaaa * --------- ^ ™ In Seeking Our Goal, Let Us Know Geography By Gertrade Well Klein I WAS just a rank and file mem" her at the party convention, representing, perhaps, t the feelings of the average party member, baffled by pur failure to make any' appreciable headway among the workers and looking for leadership on our road to power...

...By vote of the N.E.C...

...Some of oui Socialist friends have discovered unexpected beauties in American democracy and even in American wars...

...If what we say is illegal, then what Harry Emerson Fosdick said he would do in the next war is illegal...

...In a collapse where you can't count noses, would you wait until you could count noses before you would try to restore order and create conditions which would make true democracy possible...

...The declarations on labor, on a farm policy, on NRA, and the like, were thoroughly worth the time and attention given them...

...They got through a great deal of business in spite of the heat...

...Hero women from different parti of the - country reported their successes and failures in organising unemployed workers, farm women, mothers, housewives, Sunday schools, and so on...

...3. The argument of expediency...

...Paul Porter's Commonwealth Plan was not rejected by the, delegates...

...On the other hand, he haa not given evidence that ha will deal severely with police who are brutal in dealing with strikers, tho unemployed, and others...

...Who can say less and be anything other than a "pink tea Socialist...

...And in New York AT least two things in New York require the vigorous attentiea of eitizena: 1. Police Commissisoner O'Rytf has given dangerous evidence bSm by word and deed that he intends to deal severely with police was do not use force, aa...

...Nowhere does the Declaration of Principles in words or by implication support any kind of dictatorship, On the contrary, it pledges thenparty to true democracy...

...They supplied them with food clothes and a place to stay...

...it is not a binding declaration of what under all circunw stances they will do...

...S\))E of.the gratifying things about the discuesion of the Declaration of Principles here in New York is that already sober second thought is asserting itself and that group after group in the party is declaring itself explicitly against wild rumors of split which unfortunately were being circulated and -reached the ears of capitalist reporters...

...Honest Differences |\ESPITE my own approval of the new Declara" tkm of Principlea, I/can understand how good Socialists might wish for a different declaration or for a different way of wording it...

...Then they ran a lecture with a prominent Socialist speaker...

...And while I am about it, congratulations are in order to some of our Socialist lawyers for the way in which they have defended labor and civil rights in recent cases...

...And it is not the Declaration of Principles itself which will, perhaps, be quoted against the Socialists, but rather what some Socialists have said about the declaration, contrary to the opinion of those whe proposed it...

...I say with Plechanov: "Not all those among the crusaders who shouted 'Jerusalem, Jerusalem!' reached the holy land, but those who knew geography...

...Am I terribly naive in imagining that these questions are at least as worthy of discussion as the more abstract theories...

...It is the kind of plan that illustrates whst Socialists today might dp...

...Generally speaking, the people to whom our active propagandists must direct their appeal, tho workers whom we all agree we"must have with ua in our fight against capitalism, are not influenced by our decisions on international policy or on questions of proletarian dictatorship...

...Comrades and friends, I want to study geography...

...President Roosevelt's endorsement of social insurance is nothing mora than a belated and rather vague endorsement of principloi that Socialists have fought for during many years...

...1. Misrepresentation...

...There it no threat that we will abandon our present tactics for sabotage...

...4. The argument of Americanism...

...Why Is it that after all these years of unprecedented suffering, our labor movement and our revolutionary political movements are still pitifully weak...

...Heretofore, whatever immediate demands of Socialism the Democratic Party has sought to use, it has adopted in shockingly inadequate form...

...Now, 1 believe as much as the next man that it is out present job to get an organization and a movement, not to decide what we are going to do by and by under conditions that we cannot anticipate...

...Alack, they were all is Milwaukee^ Tho report fat regard to the.farm women was the most gripping...

...Whatever happens to this particular Declaration of Principles, the Socialist Party is going to stick together in order to assert leadership in a* mighty movement of city: workers and farmers in these critical days of struggle against fascism...

...Without attacking anyone's -subjective sincerity or courage, I do want to deal with some of the arguments' that have been advanced in opposition...

...Obviously it can't be both at once...

...This applies to unemployment relief, to housing, and to public works in general...

...can approve of certain revisions and of an explanatory preface setting forth the way in which this pamphlet is to be used...

...One thing more...

...There are certain conditional declarations which I have thought were in line with historic Socialist policy...

...It was not a disorderly body nor a body hopelessly divided into groups...

...Not oven one aession was devoted to such a discussion...

...Several groups announcing themselves openly as Son cialist clubs seemed to bo the moat successful...

...In calling our present democracy bogus, it voices the criticism that Socialists have made times without number...

...The declaration makes it clear | that the nature of the resistance will depend upon ' our strength, that it includes fundamentally what Socialists here and abroad have long advocated...

...I realized that we were dashing ourselves to pieces on these theoretical rocks without charting any course for people like myself who wanted to know how we must change our tactics now, today, in order to eain adherents...

...The rank and file, on whom we must depend, are likely to b« favorably impressed with the vigor of Socialist principles, and they will judge us not by this document alone but by our admirable expression on laboi issues and our desire to cooperate with the A. F. of L. in organizing the unorganized...

...This declaration will not make persecution more likely and it may serve as s warning to those men and forces who work for war and fascism...

...Can we learn anything from all this...