Letter: Don't forget Daniel De Leon

Scan page 8

diminished his contribution to failing on your part, perhaps if the movement, but nevertheless you publish this letter it will go for many years he was a lone some way to correcting the voice and without him the balance and bring to light the American movement would work of this important 'and Lenin South Yorkshire Doc. 1978 Dear Comrades, While recognising the necessity for condensing such a broad topic as the "Birth of American Marxism' , (Socialist Press No. 127) and recognising that in such circumstances ommissions are inevitable, Graham Bond nevertheless makes a glaring orror in his article. One of the most important of the early American socialists if not the most important, did not even warrant a passing mention. ! refer to the head of the Socialist Labour Party, Daniel De Leon. This omission is all the more glaring when you also print a painting by Diego Rivera, which features as it's two most central figures-Eugene V. Debbs and De Leon.

Of the two, it is De Leon who contributed most to the ongoing socialist movement, not only in the USA but in other parts of the world as well.

As the leading figure of the Conolly though the SLP, certainly after 1908, if not before, was an isolated, tiny sect.

He was, amongst other things, one of the first Marxists to break the hold of Lassalleanism on major sections of the labour and socialist movement in the USA, and fuse the proballot box' and 'pro-trade union" factions of the early SLP into a coherent organisational and political unity.

De Leon joined the SLP in 1889 and he was also the first Marxist to take to heart and implement Engels' observations on the necessity to 'Americanise the movement' (then dominated by German-Americans).

Over the years De Leon attempted to forge the SLP into a revolutionary party, although he did not succeed, he did approach, in a much earlier period, the Leninist conceptions of party organisation, democratic centralism, party control of its publications and party discipline. again bear a resemblance to some of the later writings of Lenin-his theorv of the laboul Lenin-his theory of the labor aristocracy as expounded in Pages from Roman History" and the functioning and role of the Revolutionary Party (See "Reform and Revolution") pre-empt, albeit in a crude way, the later theories of Lenin.

Syndicalism

Around 1905, the year in which he participated in the founding conference of the IWW, De Leon began to embrace the philosophy of syndicalism (which he probably originally borrowed from the American syndicalists, Haggerty and Trautman and from contacts in France). It is probably for this that De Leon is best known. His advocacy, development and popularisation of industrial unionism struck a chord in many parts of the world including Britain, Ireland, Italy and Australia.

Eugene Debs. Frainer), a former NEC member of the SLP, was a protege of De Leon's, and as you quite rightly point out a, leading early US J.T. Murphy of, the Shop Stewards Movement, James Conolly, Gramsci and others were all influenced by De Leon in one way or another (which doesn't rule out negative influences).

Lenin is reputed by a number of observers (e.g. John Reed) to have praised De Leon, though the remark that Lenin though De Leon was the only Marxist to add anything since Marx is (as far as | can see) based only on hearsay.

Also in the international sphere, De Leon was well in advance of his contemporaries in his analysis of the growing routinism and accomodationism of the Second International. As early as 1903 De Leon criticised the German Social Democracý, the mainstay of the Second International, as having "..• ceased to be a pace-setter for the socialist movement of the world" ("Review of the Dresden Congress"). In the same article he also describes Kautsky as one to "run with the hare and bark with the hounds"-a farsighted observation when one considered Lenin broke definitively with Kautsky only some 11 years later, Sectarian attitude There is much more that could be said of De Leon. Faults he most certainly had, but without a doubt he was a great pre-1917 revolutionary. Probably his greatest single fault was a sectarian and aloof attitude to the rank and file of the American Federation of This errors and other

INDUS:

DE THE WORO have developed differently.

That you do not even mention such a figure is a gross often neglected revolutionary.

Comradely greetings John Cunningham

Scan page 9

great ballot betrayal never argued against . the meeting held during the lay off. mrinninlo of rainnrate harnain. The daricion Innk intn arrnint quickly Throughout this struggle we majority. as only part of the overall war Robinson then called off the in defence of workers' independetermined fight at once.

This ad-hoc body then produced a series of leaflets and held further meetings in which the strength of the fight in Cowley was used in a bid to persuade members in other piants to demand their convenors submit plant claims. -The leaflets also publicised the demands of the Cowley clair battle on the Leyland Dalue Combine Committee had meanwhile led to a reluctant acceptance of the Cowley position, and an agreement that plant claims would be submitted:

Resisting moves And in Cowley itself Leyland management in the Assembly Plant climbed down and undertook to reply to the £27 claim at plant level.

This in turn rebounded inside the Body Plant, where the stewards changed the previous position, and submitted similar plant claim.

But at the same time the right wingers and Communist, Party members on the National Joint Negotiating Committee (which is made up of seven national officials and a clear: majority of non-elected "delegates") were resisting the moves for plant bargaining.

So reluctant were they to submit plant level claims that in CP-led Longbridge the claim itself was only submitted seven days before the Novemper 1 settlement date; at Rovers and Jaguars claims actually went in after the review date; and other plants' never even submitted a claim!

The company gave plant-level replies to claims on 31 October. In each case the offer was 5%, conditional on all plants accepting it.

Strike action

That afternoon a mass meeting was called at the Drews Lane Tractors and Transmissions plant, and a vote for immediate strike action was taken.

The militancy in this plant was intensified because their traditional October review date had been put back a month, while in Cowley, for instance, it had actually been brought forward from February.

This strike stemmed directly and solely from the principled fight for plant bargaining led from Cowley. • Its effect was immediate. Drews Lane supplies the whole of Leyland Cars and the following day sections of workers at Cowley were already being laid off.

But the weakness of the strike was that the plant leadership had not prepared the members for the kind of fight involved.

Convenor Arthur Harper LIST PRESS, Wednesday 7 January, ing, or presented any challenge to the company's routine argument that big wage increases would drive the firm into bankruptcy.

Indeed Harper himself had been for years up to his neck in the 'participation' set-up, and had accepted all the other plans of the company, thus confusing the workforce.

This. weakness of leadership meant that after 2½ weeks of solid and devastating action, the strike was lost.

At: Cowley, on the other hand, the leadership had planned and prepared a serious fight. A stewards meeting had been called foilowing the company reply, and a mass meeting scheduled for the next week (the reply came on a Thursday).

But the immediate layoffs caused by the Drews Lane strike made an immediate strike call impossible-since the plant was already closed and most workers receiving 80% lay-off pay at the company's expense.

The correct position taken by the leadership in these circumstances was to make a clear verbal statement of support for the Drews Lane strikers, and to meet on return to work.

This was passed at the mass PHOTO: John Sturrock, Report Robinson three possible outcomes at Drews Lane:

*The strike might have been victorious, paving the way for almost automatic action in Cowley.

*There might have been a quick return to work as a result of weak leadership, after which a strike vote in Cowley would still be possible.

*Drew Lane might be defeated after a long period of strike action closing the whole of Leyland. This would have brought a difficult period.

Another decision at the Cowley mass meeting was to put the plant claim trougn procedure. This was on the insistence of the AUEW, which threatened to split the membership if this did not take place.

Back-stabbing

But at Longbridge the backstabbing by the Communist Party, in the form of Derek Robinson, was taking shape.

At a mass meeting, held on Friday November 1, before any lay offs began, Robinson put a resolution not for strike action but to give the company until December 1 to come up with a better offer.

This was no more than a conscious move to isolate the REGRADING Drews Lane strike. • When that strike came to an end the problem of proceding with the Cowley claim was a difficult one.

WSL members and supporters in the Assembly Plant favoured the completion of a procedural meeting with management scheduled for two days after the return to work, in order to prevent a split with the AUEW, and for this to be followed by a mass meeting.

Determined

In approaching such a mass meeting it would be important to take into account the impact on the membership of seeing the Drews Lane strikers-the most powerful section in LeylandA perspective going beyond simply a strike in a single plant in Cowley had to be presented if action was to take place.

We favoured combining this with putting Robinson on the spot at his December 1 mass meeting, by calling strike action in Cowley for that date and romancina I onnhrirna comi out with us.

But the union bureaucracy and the Communist Party were determined to use the Drews Lane defeat to force through the company's original plans.

Immediately following the return to work an NJNC meeting was called, at which a grading struçture was agreed as well as a 5% national pay offer and a deal offering parity payments financed by increased productivity and the axing of 7,000 jobs.

The speed-up and job cuts were also to pay for the nationally agreed increases in premium rates, substantially increasing night-shift allowances, which Leyland had been withholding.

The NJNC agreed to put this 'package' to a national ballot. A meeting of convenors, was called, and also endorsed the plan by a 3-1 AUEW leader Duffy December 1 mass meeting at Longbridge, facing TGWU stewards in the Cowley Assembly Plant with prospect of total isolation.

Leaflet

The next-door Body Plant would not even join the Assembly Plant in a boycott of the ballot. There was no choice but to go into the ballot and campaign for a 'no' vote.

Once more the lead to Leyland workers came through a "leaflet from the 'Leyland Stewards for the 1978 Review'.

This leaflet focyssed on the way the package had been foisted on the workforce.

It showed how all seven national officials on the NJNC -none of whom work in Leyland-had cast their vote in favour of a 'yes' vote, thus tipping the balance to 13-12 in favour.

And it showed how this recommendation had been rubber-stamped by a hopelessly unrepresentative convenors' meeting at which each convenor -whether elected by thousands or a handful of members-had one vote.

as Marxists have seen each battle Evans TIM dent interests.

We recognised that there was a strong chance of a 'yes' vote in the ballot. And even while campaigning for a 'no' vote we began to prepare to fight the results of a possible acceptance -particularly the loss of jobs and the contentious grading structure.

Even before the ballot in the Cowley Assembly plant a mass meeting was held to urge a 'no' vote.

Mass meetings

TGWU convenor Bobby Fryer declared that he would support any section defending its manning standards, and would oppose the grading structure-a policy. the WSL supports.

In the Body Plant mass meetings of production workers and forklift truck drivers were held to oppose the grading structure, and most sections have fought any speed-up. • As a result in Cowley only a handful of the required number of job losses have been achieved.

Conclusion

In short the fight against corporate bargaining in which we played a leading role created the conditions in which the Drews Lane workforce engaged in a 2½ week strike.

The defeat of that strike did not simply restore the company's position.

20,000 abstentions in the ensuing ballot, and a 2-1 majority of those voting showed that growing numbers of workers have become wary of the corporate bargaining package, creating fertile conditions a fight against attacks on jobs. ' Workers' attention has also been drawn to the way in which the 5% pay deal was railroaded through by officials and convenors while in Fords and elsewhere settlements of up to 15% have been won.

The crisis now faced by the company in implementing the parity plan means that workers are increasingly aware that they will in reality get only the bare 5% increase. Militancy on the shop floor is rising once again. -But most important of all, the struggle against corporate bargaining and speed-up has smoked out not only the right wing reformist union bureaucrats and convenors but also the Derek Robinson's television interview welcoming the result of the ballot spells out the practical role of Stalinism to the entire Leyland workforce.

The real lesson of the ballot betrayal is the urgent necessity to build a revolutionary leader.ship in Leyland in opposition to all shades of 'participators' and collaborators.

This is the task undertaken by the Workers Socialist League.

Scan page 10

MDUST RAL Last Monday saw a

----- pull-quotes -----

SLP until his death in 1914, De Leon wielded much influence,

AIL argued-we should carry

PHOTO: Laurence Sparham IFL sparnam