Page:Bertram David Wolfe, Jay Lovestone, William Francis Dunne - Our Heritage from 1776 (1926).pdf/17

 Rh forefathers stack up in the light of the estimates of these experiences given by our bourgeoisie. More than that, what is most valuable for us is to compare the tactics, the practices and activities of the American masses and their leaders in 1776 with the advice now being given to the American workers by those whom they still, unfortunately in the main, recognize as leaders to-day.

Much ink is being spilled by the robed, untitled and well-paid defenders of the present system in their attacks on the opponents of the capitalist order. These apologists of the exploiting class are shouting against the revolutionists. They are yelling against a dictatorship by the proletariat. They are ranting against the use of force. The say that is foreign, that is un-American. They are yelling from the housetops against the American workers having anything to do with other workers from the different countries in their struggles against the bosses. The official historians and editors of our ruling class are working overtime propagating the idea that the present form of the American government is eternal, and that it affords the workers of this country an opportunity in pursuit of life, liberty and happiness.

Let us examine these "eternal truths" that are hurled so gratuitously by the exploiters at the workingman.

It ill becomes the defenders of the bourgeois class which is a small minority of our population to speak of the sanctity, of the inviolability of majority rule. American democracy to-day is the most crass, tho in spots well camouflaged, expression of minority rule in the interests of a minority, at the costly expense of the vast majority of the population, in the world.

The American workers can very well draw inspiration on the question of majority and minority from the experiences of the first American Revolution. The workers and exploited farmers of this country are the overwhelming majority of this country. But in view of the fact that the capitalists who are a small minority are speaking so much against the Communist Party because it frankly says that the proletarian revolution at the outset may be initiated by a minority in the interests of the great majority, it is worth while to analyze the background of the first American Revolution for extremely valuable lessons.