Page:Samuel Gompers - Out of Their Own Mouths (1921).djvu/205

 Rh from the denial of the necessity of a political party—to the recognition of the necessity of the inseverable connection between the party and the unions, on a single platform. It was still more difficult to reconcile the point of view of the Russian trade unionists on the supremacy of the party over the unions with the various views explained above. The discussion showed one thing, and that was that those elements of the labor movement which denied the political struggle, which denied the necessity of a political party of the proletariat, and the closest bond between the Communist Party and the trade unions could not enter the new international trade union centre, because the whole idea of international organization of the revolutionary unions lay in gathering all the economic and political organizations of the working class into one body—the Third International—for defensive and offensive operations against the capitalist class.

Pestana [of the National Confederation of Labor of Spain] said that he could not imagine such a relation between the party and the unions as existed in Russia, in Spain, for the reason that in Spain the unions are a great force, while the Communist Party is only in its embryonic stage. He opposed the subordination of the unions to the party, but was in favor of the closest contact between the party and the unions on a national and international scale. Neither the representatives of the British Shop Stewards' or the American I. W. W. objected to co-operating with the Communist Party, but the German syndicalists and the representatives of the industrial Labor Unions were categorically opposed to any co-operation.

These comrades also raised doubts concerning the Soviet system. They asserted that the Soviet system is not applicable to Western Europe, and that the industrial unions and the shop stewards' committees will perform the function of the Soviets there.