Letter to a Party Member in the League, October 31, 1927

Add a subpage to this text

Read the help page for usage.

 

How They Corrupt the Communist League of Youth

NOTE: Trotsky's contention that the Central Committee had been setting an example for the rest of the party in the brutality it had shown the Opposition was rapidly substantiated. Opposition speakers were whistled and shouted down at party meetings, prevented from taking the floor, and physically attacked.

The Oppositionists continued collecting signatures on the Platform and also began to turn to secret meetings of workers and students, usually held in workers* homes, to reach an audience the Stalinists were determined to prevent them from reaching. Frequently these meetings were broken up by Stalinist thugs as well. The gangsterism was readily extended to the Communist League of Youth. At a meeting of the Moscow youth organization on October 26, Kamenev and Rakovsky were hooted down when they tried to speak.

By permission of the Harvard College Library.

You belong to the official tendency, although apparently you are wavering on certain questions. You write me that “the Opposition is apparently right on some questions, but then it resorts to anti-party methods of struggle, such as illegal print-shops, etc.”

What first catches my attention are your words that the Opposition is “apparently” right on a number of questions. How could you have found that out? From the articles of Bukharin, Slepkov, and Maretsky, who systematically distort the Opposition’s views beyond all recognition? Obviously you have read some documents published by the Opposition itself. That is the only way you could have learned that the Opposition is correct on a number of questions. But do you have the right to accuse of us of publishing “illegally” if that is the only way you had a chance to learn the views of the Opposition and to realize that these views are correct?

I accidentally overheard the speeches being broadcast at the anniversary meeting of the Moscow Communist League of Youth several days ago. I will not dwell on the greetings in official jargon and the obsequiously grateful responses. Here there was not one living thought! Comrade Ter-Vaganyan tried to make a few extremely modest and cautious observations in his speech. Pointing to the tremendous historic work accomplished by the League, Comrade Ter emphasized the insufficiency of the international aspect of education for the proletarian youth. He pointed in particular to the fact that Komsomolskaya Pravda devotes too little space to international topics. At these words they angrily began to interrupt him. Comrade Ter’s attempts to continue were met with bitter obstruction. Even from the transmission by loudspeaker one could tell that the minority participating in this sabotage was not large. The majority at the meeting was simply intimidated by the jeerers and loudmouths. The person who was chairing, Comrade Kosarev it seems, stated afterwards that Comrade Ter had gone into things in his speech which he shouldn’t have. “He’d do better to go off to one of the conspiratorial meetings of the Opposition.”

Comrade Ter’s speech, as I have said, was in the highest degree peaceful, soft-spoken, comradely, and calm. His critical observations were filled with a spirit of profound commitment to the Communist League of Youth. Nevertheless, the apparatus could not restrain itself. Comrade Kosarev declared in effect that the shortcomings of Komsomolskaya Pravda — in particular the scarcity of articles on international topics — could be discussed only at a conspiratorial meeting. This approach of the young apparatchik constitutes a definitive explanation of why Oppositionists are compelled to gather at so-called “conspiratorial” meetings, i.e., at meetings where the whistle-blowers and thugs in general will not interrupt speeches with noise, commotion, whistling, banging, and stamping.

At the meeting of the Moscow active membership on October 26, the whistle-blowers were organized in strictly military fashion under the command of Spunde. The latter directed them sitting with his back to the speaker’s platform. During the speeches of Comrades Kamenev and Rakovsky, the saboteurs raised a furious and obscene uproar. What was this? This is precisely the kind of regime which, according to the December 5, 1923, resolution, drives even the most conscientious and restrained party members onto the road of closed groupings and factionalism.

If you are to speak seriously about a discussion, it is necessary to ensure the most minimal rights for all participants in the discussion. Thugs who throw books and glasses, who whistle and create an uproar and in general deprive party members of the chance to exchange views on the fundamental questions of the revolution, must be called to order. Participants report that the two thousand party members at the Hall of Columns made strenuous efforts to hear what Comrades Kamenev and Rakovsky were saying; they stood up, cupped their hands to their ears, etc. But the disrupters were doggedly determined not to let the audience hear the speeches of Opposition representatives. Essentially the same thing was done with the Platform of the Opposition. Only those who fear the party are capably of banning the Platform or creating an uproar during speeches by Comrades Kamenev and Rakovsky; that is, those who fear that the party will listen and understand. If you have no arguments, you have to throw books and stir up an unbridled commotion. That is the most essential cause of factionalism and withdrawal into closed circles.

Every honest party member should help to isolate the fascists, thugs, and disrupters. This is a phenomenon alien to the proletarian party. An end must be put to this at all costs. If you will help to do this, you will thereby help the Opposition abandon factional methods of struggle.

With Communist greetings,

L. Trotsky

P.S. — I am including the text of my speech at the joint plenum with the request that it be printed in the Discussion Bulletin.