The Revolutionary Crisis of 1918-1921 in Germany, England, Italy and France/Chapter 1

by William Z. Foster

CHAPTER I

THE GERMAN REVOLUTION

The German workers began their supreme try for emancipation in November, 1918, just before the end of the world war. The military and political position of the old regime was desperate. The Austrian army had been hopelessly crushed and the German army was in general retreat. The soldiers, deeply infected with radical propaganda and convinced that the war was lost, were ready for revolt. The Allied Governments were declaring that the Kaiser must be overthrown before peace could be had.

It was a most critical situation. Only a spark was needed to cause an explosion. And the spark came on November 2nd when the sailors at Kiel refused to participate in a suicidal attack on the British navy. They overcame their officers and set up a soviet. Like a flash the uprising spread, and in a few days the old authorities had been overthrown and soviets of workers and soldiers established in Hamburg, Lubeck, Hannover, Braunschweig, Magdeburg, Leipzig, Dresden, and many other cities. The revolutionary movement swept all over Germany swift as a prairie fire. The old regime was utterly powerless before it.

The climax came in Berlin on November 9th. The Government, headed by Prince Max of Baden, had seen for a month past what was coming and tried to forestall it by throwing the aroused workers a few sops in the way of political reforms. In this they were aided by the Majority Socialists,^[1] several of whom accepted portfolios in Prince Max’s cabinet. But the efforts of Prince Max and his pseudo-Socialist allies to preserve the old regime were unsuccessful. The masses, deeply stirred by the Independents and Communists, demanded drastic action: the workers set up soviets everywhere, while the soldiers deposed and disarmed their officers and elected new ones from their own ranks. The eventual result was that the Majority Socialists, to maintain their leadership, were compelled to join in the general demand for the immediate resignation of the Kaiser. But the latter equivocated, reluctant to surrender the rich political privileges that his family had enjoyed for centuries. Therefore the workers, on the historic 9th of November, 1918, declared a general strike and in the midst of it sent a committee, headed by Ebert, to the old Government and forced it to resign. Then the Kaiser, seeing that the army had gone over to the revolutionists and that the game was up, quickly abdicated and fled the country. Thus, with hardly a semblance of resistance, the Imperialist regime collapsed and the power passed into the hands of the victorious workers. A paean of joy surged through the whole labor movement—the long-looked-for revolution seemed a fact accomplished.

 

The German Soviets

In place of the deposed Government, the workers set up a Council of People's Commissars, consisting of six members, including Ebert, Scheidemann, and Landsberg, of the Majority Socialists, and Haase, Dittmann, and Barth of the Independents. Karl Liebknecht flatly declined to become part of the council because the Majority group were allowed to sit in it. The Council was given full power to act until the convocation of the National Congress of Soviets, which was recognized from the beginning as the supreme legislative body of Germany.

The National Congress of Workers' and Soldiers' Soviets met in Berlin on December 16th, five weeks after the overthrow of the Kaiser. It consisted of 442 delegates from all over Germany. Its fundamental task was to decide what kind of government the new society should have. Immediately it assembled the sharpest differences of opinion manifested themselves among the three factions of the movement. The Communists stood flat-footed for soviets and the dictatorship of the proletariat. They demanded that the Congress, then actually practicing working-class dictatorship, should continue on as the sole Government of Germany. Their slogan was, "All power to the Soviets." The Independents accepted the soviet idea in principle, but were against trying to realize it through the dictatorship of the proletariat. In general they favored the plan of a two-department government, with a general democratic Assembly on one side with jurisdiction over political matters, and a national Soviet on the other side to have control of the industrial situation. They felt that the industrial Soviet, so established, would gradually oust the democratic Assembly and take over its function, thus avoiding the civil war that was to be expected if the dictatorship was constituted forthwith. The Majority Socialists, notwithstanding their wordy camouflage, were dead against the soviet plan. They took a bourgeois democratic position and stood for the immediate calling of a National Constituent Assembly, to be elected by all classes of the people and to serve as the future ruling body. They proposed, in effect, that the purely working-class soviets commit suicide to make room for an all-class government.

Between these widely divergent and irreconcilable conceptions no compromise was possible, and the three factions, realizing that the fate of the revolution depended upon the outcome of the issue, fought desperately to make their respective points of view prevail. On the radicals' side the struggle was greatly embittered by the Majority Socialists' shameful support of the old regime during the war and their constant blocking of every revolutionary move of the workers since the overthrow of the Kaiser. To impress the Congress with their strength, the Communists staged a great general strike and mass demonstration in Berlin. But to no purpose: from the earliest votes taken in the Congress it was quite evident that they were in a hopeless minority and without a chance to put through their program. Nor were the Independents much better off. Despite their best efforts, they were literally snowed under when the test came. The Majority Socialists, grace to their prestige as the leaders of the famous old Social-Democratic Party and to their almost complete control of the working-class press and the trade unions, were masters of the situation by a ratio of about eight votes to one of the combined opposition. They did as they wished with the Soviet Congress.

The principal battle of the Congress raged around the question of setting a date for the convocation of the Constituent Assembly—the Communist plan of, "Down with the Constituent Assembly and all power to the Soviets," having been hopelessly beaten from the start. The Independents fought for delay: they wanted to give the revolution a chance to develop. First they proposed that the national election be held on March 16th, 1919, and when this was defeated, on February 16th. But the reformist Majority Socialists were taking no chances on the uprising becoming a real proletarian revolution: they were for doing away with the dangerous soviets at once. So they set January 19th as the election date and arranged things in such fashion that the Soviet Congress should abdicate its power on February 6th to the Constituent Assembly. In other words, they accomplished their basic plan of having the soviets commit suicide as quickly as possible.

 

Socialists Versus Socialists

The hard feeling between the three Socialist factions had been greatly intensified by the general course of events since the downfall of the Kaiser. The Communists were in open revolt against the Majority Socialists and advocated that the workers rise and drive them out of the Government. And the Independents were forced on to a similar break with the Majority Socialists by the latter's great haste to abolish the Soviets. The first definite signs of the final split between these two factions came in the Soviet Congress right after the fixing of the election date. It was over a question as to which body should wield the power after the Congress adjourned, the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets or the Council of People's Commissars. The Majority Socialists, eager to choke the Soviets in every manner, settled the question in favor of the Council of People's Commissars. Then the Independents refused to serve on the weakened Central Executive Committee, which was thereupon composed entirely of Majority Socialists. As the Central Executive Committee was nominally the controlling body over the Council of People’s Commissars, this withdrawal made impossible the position of the three Independent Commissars, and a few days later, upon the occasion of the shooting down of demonstrating workers by the troops, they resigned in a body. This left the Government entirely in the hands of the Majority Socialists. The break between the right and left wings of the movement was complete.

A very acute situation at once developed, which soon led to a fatal clash. The immediate cause therefor was an attempt by the Majority Socialists on January 4th to still further consolidate their power by removing from office Eichhorn, the Independent chief-of-police of Berlin. Aroused by this incident and despairing of saving the revolution except by drastic action, the Independents and Communists joined hands and set about to overthrow the reformist Government. On January 6th, both factions held an enormous demonstration in Berlin, which culminated in the selection of a revolutionary committee, headed by Ledebour and Liebknecht, whose duty it was to organize a new Government. Their armed followers occupied the offices of many newspapers and publishing houses, including the "Vorwaerts," official organ of the Majority Socialists.

Meanwhile the old Government was not idle. It delegated the military control to Noske, a Majority Socialist, who quickly adopted drastic measures to quell the dangerous uprising. Noske smashed the Soldiers' Soviets and placed old Imperialist officers at the head of the troops;^[2] he also demobilized the revolutionary military units and replaced them by volunteer organizations recruited from among reactionary elements of all sorts. Then, refusing all overtures for arbitration, he proceeded to drown the rebellion in blood.

The ensuing street fighting in Berlin was marked with extreme bitterness and intensity. It lasted just a week, and many hundreds lost their lives. On the rebels' side the burden of the struggle fell upon the Communists, as many of the Independents' leaders found that they had much more important business elsewhere. Little by little the Government, backed by the united capitalist class and also by a large share of the workers, got the upper hand. Its troops recaptured the unoccupied newspaper offices and other buildings, one after the other. The Government military officers, mostly Imperialists called back into the service by Noske, treated the worker prisoners with ferocity. They executed large numbers where captured. Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxembourg managed to escape, but were arrested soon afterward and brutally assassinated by their captors. Thus was the revolutionary left wing of the Socialist movement crushed only a week before the election to the Constituent Assembly took place.

The coming together of the Constituent Assembly was a great disillusionment to the workers, for they found themselves a minority therein, even as the revolutionaries had foretold. Their two parties mustered only 185 representatives (of which the Majority Socialists had 163 and the Independents 22), whereas the combined opposition parties had 236. Thus political power passed out of the hands of the workers and into the hands of the reactionary classes.

The ruinous policy of the Majority Socialists had borne its natural fruit. Right after November 9th the workers had been in complete control of the armed forces and the political government of Germany. They were masters of the situation. But the Majority Socialists soon destroyed this mastery. First they relinquished the control over the army by putting the Imperialist officers again in command of it. Then they threw away the political control by summoning a Constituent Assembly. The German revolution was dead: killed by the Majority Socialists.^[3]

 

The Meaning Of It All

The German workers are bitterly disappointed at the failure of their great movement. They smile sadly when anyone speaks of the German revolution. For all they got out of it were a few minor industrial and political reforms. These did not affect the fundamental institutions of private property in the social means of production and distribution. The profound transformation of society from an individualist to a collectivist basis, so ardently preached for a generation by revolutionaries, did not materialize. Capitalism weathered the great storm intact.

And now the disillusioned workers are demanding to know how this can be; how it was that they were in complete control of society and yet did not accomplish the revolution. Nor are answers to their queries lacking. The current explanation, the one most widely accepted by all classes, is that the revolution failed because of lack of unity among the Socialist forces. The story goes that while they were wasting their strength and opportunity fighting each other, the capitalist class succeeded in reorganizing its scattered forces and in working its way back to power. Especial condemnation is visited upon the Communists, who are accused, because of their militant tactics, of having driven the terrified Majority Socialists into an alliance with the capitalist forces.

It is a plausible theory, but it does not fit the facts. The truth is that the revolution was not a failure in the accepted sense of the term. It went through without a hitch, just as the Majority Socialists planned it, including the passage of the reform laws, the relinquishment of army control, the calling of the Constituent Assembly, and all the rest. Its niggardly results represent the realization of their program. During the revolutionary period, from November, 1918, to February, 1919, it was they who held the power and determined the course of events. In the fateful National Congress of Soviets they had eight votes to the opposition's one. They also controlled four-fifths of the workers' press, and when the general election came along they showed their domination of labor ranks by electing almost eight times as many delegates as their competitors, the Independent Socialists. At no time during the turbulent revolutionary period was their supremacy in the workers' organizations seriously threatened by the rebellious left wing. They had strong control at all times. The quarrels between the three factions had little or no decisive effect on the general course of the labor movement in the crisis. In blaming the left-wing opposition for the failure of the revolution, the Majority Socialists are merely striving to escape the wrath of the disappointed and disillusioned workers by evading responsibility for the petty achievements of the great revolutionary movement.

Not only did the Majority Socialist program go through without a break, but what is vitally significant, it was carried out in definite agreement with the capitalist class. This agreement took place in broad daylight, right in the heat of the revolutionary outbreak. It expressed itself in a trade union contract, the most important and far-reaching document of the kind in the world's labor history. It will pay us to examine in some detail this very remarkable contract, the circumstances leading up to its formulation, and the consequences flowing from it.

 

The "Settling" Of The Revolution

For a month before it actually happened, the fall of the Kaiser was manifestly inevitable. The wide-awake employers, foreseeing the approaching revolutionary storm, realized that if they were to escape its terrific force, they would have to make substantial concessions to the workers. They were exceedingly anxious for a "settlement" that would save them their economic rulership. And the workers' political and industrial leaders, nearly all bred-in-the-bone Majority Socialist reformers, were equally anxious to avert the breakdown of capitalism. Although they propagated radical phrases, they did not believe in the revolution. They had no faith that the workers were capable of running society even if they could seize control of it. Their position was that Socialism had to come by evolution, not by revolution.^[4] They saw in the vast upheaval merely a good opportunity to wrest important reforms from the employers.

With the employers and the dominant workers' leaders all standing upon the common ground of the necessity to shield capitalism from the menacing danger of revolution, an agreement between the two interests was not difficult of achievement. This agreement was brought about, naturally enough, on the industrial field, the two groups reasoning rightly that if the organized capitalist class and the organized working class could come to an understanding in the realms of industry such political struggles as might develop later on would not have much meaning. With this end in view, the deliberate prevention of the revolution, a conference was opened in Berlin the first of November, just a few days before the Kaiser fell. It was the most extensive and inclusive gathering of its type ever held anywhere. On the one side were the representatives of all the great employers' associations, headed by Hugo Stinnes, and on the other side the leaders of all the big trade unions, headed by Karl Legien.^[5] It was the whole capitalist class of Germany dealing collectively with the whole working class. Never had any country seen a similar situation before.

The conference lasted until November 15th. As the two great forces worked together, consciously deciding the terms on which capitalism should be allowed to live, political turmoil raged all over the country. The revolution broke out at Kiel and stormed across many cities. Soviets were set up, first in the single towns, then for all Germany. The old regime was destroyed, the conference in Berlin even being interrupted by the sound of the workers' machine guns finishing off the last defenders of the Kaiser. On November 15th, only six days after the downfall of the monarchy, the conference completed its work and gave to the world the following, the most important labor document ever written. We quote it in full:

 

The Agreement Between The Employers' And
Workers' Organizations, November 15th, 1918

The large employers' organizations and the trade unions agree to the following:

1. The trade unions are recognized a as the industrial representatives of the working class.

2. Any limitation of the workers' right to organize is not permissible.

3. The employers and employers' organizations will give up fully the "yellow" unions (organized strikebreakers), and will not support them directly or indirectly.

4. All returning worker-soldiers will have the right, after due notification, to enter into the positions they held before the war. The participating employers' and workers' organizations will so strive, through the production of raw materials, etc., that this obligation may be entirely fulfilled.

5. Joint management and control of the employment of all labor.

6. Labor conditions for all workers will be established, according to the conditions of the various industries, by collective agreements, with employers' organizations. The negotiations will be undertaken and completed as quickly as possible.

7. In every plant with a working force of at least 50 employees there will be a workers' committee established, whose duty it will be, in cooperation with the employer, to see to it that the working conditions of the plant are kept in conformity with the collective agreements.

8. In the collective agreements provision will be made for arbitration committees, consisting of an equal number of worker and employer representatives.

9. For all industries the maximum daily working time will be eight hours. No wage reductions are permitted because of this decrease in working hours.

10. For the purpose of carrying out these agreements and the future measures to be adopted regarding demobilization of the army, the maintenance of industrial life, the assurance of an existence to the workers, and especially regarding the war-wounded, the participating employers' and workers' organizations will organize a central committee, based upon joint representation and with proper industrial branches.

11. The central committee will also decide fundamental questions, in so far as such arise out of the collective regulation of wage and working conditions. It will also arbitrate disputes which affect several industrial groups. Its decisions will be binding upon both employers and workers, unless they are contested within a week by one of the organizations involved.

12. These agreements enter into force the date of their signing and will remain as the legal regulation until a three months' notification of a desire to change has been given by either side.

This agreement shall also apply strictly to the relations between the employers' organizations and the office workers' (Angestellten) unions.

 

This agreement "settled" the German revolution.^[6] It determined just what the workers should get from the revolutionary upheaval upon exactly the same principles as an ordinary trade union contract establishes what they get from a minor industrial disturbance. For their part, the employers conceded universal recognition of the trade unions as the sole representatives of the workers' economic interests, the right of the workers in all trades and callings to freely organize, the establishment of working conditions in all industries by trade union agreement, the abolition of the "yellow" unions, the setting up of arbitration committees in every industry, the universal eight-hour day, half control of the national employment service, formation of the "Arbeitsgemeindschaft," or industrial parliament, shop committees, etc. And in return the workers' leaders agreed, by the very fact that they helped draw up the document, that the capitalist system should continue in Germany. No, more than that, they actually agreed that the capitalist class should be reestablished in power; because, when the contract was signed, the revolution was an accomplished fact, the Government and the army being entirely in the hands of the workers.

The Stinnes-Legien trade union agreement was drawn up intentionally, by both sides, to stop the revolution. The employers frankly admit this, even though the Majority Socialists and the other conservatives who handled the trade union side of it do not. Dr. F. Reichert, business manager of the Association of German Iron and Steel Manufacturers, in explaining to his constituents the meaning of the agreement, said:

"Even in the early October days the real situation was clear. The question was this: how could we save industry? How could we protect the employing class from the sweeping socialization of all branches of industry, from nationalization, and the threatening revolution?"^[7]

The answer, of employers and trade union leaders alike, to the menacing problem of revolution, was the Stinnes-Legien agreement. And events proved it an effective solution. After the 15th of November, when it was signed, the task confronting the two groups of capitalists and workers was to confine the great upheaval to the terms and stipulations of this agreement. And both co-operated together successfully to that end. In the industrial field, the union officials and employers, acting jointly, established the shop committees, the "Arbeitsgemeindschaft," and other reforms, and then stopped dead; while in the political field, the "revolutionary" government, dominated by the Majority Socialists, obediently enacted the provisions of the trade union agreement into law, one after the other, with rubber-stamp precision, and there it, too, halted, giving the workers nothing more in legislative way except equal suffrage and one or two other political rattles and tin whistles.

Nor could all the stormy opposition of the Independents and the Communists force either the trade unions or the Socialist Government one step further than this agreed-upon program. Thousands of militant workers died trying to break the infamous trade union pact and to force the situation into real revolution! But all in vain: the agreement prevailed even to its minor details. When, during the tumultous days of January, 1919, it seemed that the radical elements might succeed in their purpose and upset it, Noske, by building up volunteer regiments of reactionaries and by reinstating the Imperialist officers in the army command, simply called in the other party to the agreement to help him enforce it. Then both contracting parties, the exploiters and the Majority Socialist trade union leaders acting unitedly, mowed down the rebellious workers with machine guns.

 

The Betrayal Of The Revolution

In view of all these circumstances, it is futile for the Majority Socialists to blame the paltry results of the revolution upon the quarrels between the various groups in the labor movement. These, we repeat emphatically, had next to nothing to do with the outcome. What happened was that the program of the Majority Socialists prevailed. The limits of the upheaval were definitely set by the Stinnes-Legien trade union agreement. And when it was signed the revolution was only six days old and still in the "hurrah stage." In spite of their wartime quarrels the two great Socialist parties were still co-operating together. They did not finally break until much later. And their subsequent political struggles were but so much froth boiling around the central, decisive fact of the great trade union agreement, even though few German writers seem yet to have realized this cardinal proposition. The doom of the German revolution was sealed by the Majority Socialist leaders when they drafted the Stinnes-Legien agreement. Knowingly, intentionally, in signed contract with the exploiters, they sold out the already-accomplished revolution for a mess of pottage—a handful of reforms—and re-established the rule of the capitalist class.

This great treachery, besides ruining the German revolution, seriously if not fatally, compromised the cause of the world revolution itself. If Germany had gone into real revolution—and it surely would have done so had it not been for the attitude of the Majority Socialists—all the countries in Eastern Europe must have followed suit. In all likelihood the great movement would have swept across the Continent and put an end to the capitalist system generally.

In any event, even if no other countries had joined Germany and Russia in revolution, these two would have formed a great proletarian economic and social block that must have succeeded in establishing a new type of society. Germany, with its splendid industrial equipment, and Russia, with its boundless natural resources, would have made up an enormous unit that would have been able to live independently of the rest of the world. Capitalism's blockade would have been powerless against it, likewise its military attacks.

But as it was Russia was deserted and left to make the fight single-handed against the most terrific odds. Her weak industrial development threw her helpless before the capitalistic blockade, and her isolation exposed her gravely to constant assaults from counter-revolutionary armies sent against her by world capitalism. The general result is that, because of Germany’s defection, the great revolutionary experiment is being made under incomparably more unfavorable circumstances. This is of the most vital importance, for all nations have their eyes on the Russian revolution and are pinning their hopes and fears upon it. If it succeeds it will eventually provoke world revolution. But if it fails, not only will labor everywhere suffer over-whelming defeat, but a mighty blow will have been dealt at the very concept of revolution itself. The position of those pseudo-Socialists who deny the capacity of the workers to control society successfully and who preach the necessity of the guiding hand of the capitalist class will be enormously strengthened. The tendency towards reformism will be greatly encouraged, and the next big revolutionary attempt of the workers indefinitely postponed. The betrayal of the German revolution by the Majority Socialists was the greatest crime ever committed against Labor by false leaders.

 

The Aftermath

Considering the deplorable weakness of our American trade unions and the little control we have over industry, we in this country might be inclined to believe that a movement which brought with it, as the German revolution did, the almost complete organization of the working class, the universal eight-hour day, and the other propositions of the Stinnes-Legien agreement represented a great victory. But not so the German workers. They look upon it as a big defeat; for they want to do away with capitalism, not to patch it up. Consequently depression and discouragement reigns among them, coupled with a feeling of bitter resentment on the part of the more militant elements. The latter realize that their leaders have betrayed them, even if the masses do not yet know it, and they are organizing to get rid of them. A general struggle for control rages everywhere in the German movement between the revolutionary and conservative elements.

In the political field this strife is an open battle, the Majority Socialists, Independents, and Communists,^[8] with their respective parties, each striving to win the support of the masses. In the industrial field the struggle for mastery takes place chiefly in the old trade unions. The Majority Socialists still hold most of the offiical machinery, but the Independents and Communists, through their system of minority committees, independent labor journals, etc., inside of the old unions, are gradually breaking their grip. At present the proportion of control, by rank and file votes, is about as follows: Majority Socialists 50%, Independents 25%, Communists 25%. As the struggle sharpens, however, with the Communists driving on irresistibly, there is a strong tendency for the Majority Socialists and Independents to combine their forces, politically and industrially, against them. Eventually the German Socialist movement will probably resolve itself into two clearly defined currents, one distinctly conservative and the other sharply revolutionary.

At first the Communists thought that the best way to fight the conservatives on the industrial field would be to withdraw from the old trade unions and to start new ones based upon purely Communist lines. The chief exponent of this dualistic program was one Wolfheim, a member of the American I. W. W.^[9] But the keener leaders were quick to see the folly of this policy, which more than anything else, has paralysed the American labor movement. They perceived in a few months' time (though our militants cannot see it even after thirty years' bitter experience) that it operated only to pull the militants away from the masses and to isolate them into little sterile outside groups, thus leaving the conservatives in undisputed control of the old unions. Then they began their present campaign of organizing within the trade unions. It is true that the Communist Labor Party still adheres to the dualistic policy, but it is by far the smaller of the two Communist Parties in Germany, and very much the weaker in influence. At the 1921 Congress of the III International at Moscow, its general program was condemned, and it was ordered, on pain of expulsion, to amalgamate with the United Communist Party. Such an amalgamation would, of course, necessitate the giving up of its Utopian policy of dual unionism.

Naturally the old conservative leaders do not take kindly to the Communists' organized efforts to win over the trade unions. They have expelled thousands of revolutionaries—the figure is said to be as high as 80,000.^[10] All of which convinces the Communists that their proper place is in the trade unions, and makes them redouble their efforts to stay there and work. And in spite of all hindrances they are succeeding. They now have the support of at least 2,500,000 members of the big German Socialist unions. They condemn as counter-revolutionary the cry "Heraus aus der Gewerkschaften!" (Out of the trade unions!), raised by the dual unionists, as it corresponds with the interests and wishes of the old conservative leaders.

The Communists, and the left wing of the Independents, are determined to have done with the type of leadership that betrayed them in the revolution. They are putting at the head of their organizations men of spirit and courage, who, when the next great crisis comes, will break entirely with capitalism and establish a Soviet Republic.

1. At that time the German Socialist political movement consisted of two general organizations, the Social-Democratic Party (called the Majority Socialists) and the Independent Social-Democratic Party (called the Independent Socialists). Originally both factions had been in one organization, the Social-Democratic Party; but because of the traitorous conduct of the latter’s leaders in backing the Kaiser's war plans, the left-wing elements seceded in 1917 and formed the Independent Social-Democratic Party. This body later developed a left-wing group known as the Spartacans, led by Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxembourg. In December, 1918, the Spartacans broke with the Independents and formed themselves into the Communist Party of Germany. The programs of the three groups were as follows: Social-Democratic Party, reformist; Independent Social-Democratic Party, radical reformist; Communist Party, revolutionary.
2. It was these same officers who engineered the "Kapp-putsch" of March 12th, 1920, when the Imperialists drove the Government out of Berlin and seized the power themselves, only to be in turn defeated by a general strike of the trade unions.
3. Since the foundation of the Constituent Assembly the left-wing elements have made many desperate efforts to undo the treachery of the Majority Socialists by upsetting the bourgeois Government. In March, 1919, when the Assembly was newly in session, determined uprisings occurred in Berlin and other cities. In Munchen, during April of the same year, a soviet was established. But the general movement was crushed by an armed repression. The latest attempt was in March of this year, when a great revolt—the "March action"—took place in Central Germany. But it, too, was ruthlessly stamped out. The capitalist class and its Government, by the assistance of the Majority Socialists has has definitely gained the ascendancy in Germany.
4. Most of the Independents were also afflicted with this essentially pro-capitalistic opinion, hence their conditional support of the Constituent Assembly, rather than a straight-out dictatorship of the proletariat, as proposed by the Communists. They were merely more radical in their reformism than the Majority Socialists.
5. The Hirsch-Duncker, and the Christian trade unions were represented, as well as the Socialist unions. The small Syndicalist unions, however, took no part in the conference.`
6. A striking fact is that German writers on the revolution, and I have read many of them, such as Bernstein, Stroebel, ete., attach no decisive importance to the Stinnes-Legien agreement. Their attention being diverted by the spectacular events on the political field, the writers have altogether overlooked the tremendous and deciding effect of this peace-pact between the employers and the trade unions on the industrial field.
7. "Enstchung, Bedeutung, und Ziel der Arbeitsgemeindschaft," P. 6.
8. There are two Communist Parties in Germany: one called the Communist Labor Party, and the other the United Communist Party. The latter is many times the larger organization.
9. "Die Gewerkschaft! Die Betriebsorganisation!" P. 15.
10. These expelled members do not form dual unions. On the contrary such a policy is rigidly eschewed. They make an issue of their case with the rank and file of the old unions and seek to force their way back into these bodies. The leaders of the Metal Workers' Union have recently been compelled to take back into their organization a big faction of revolutionaries in Halle that had been expelled.