Page:Samuel Gompers - Out of Their Own Mouths (1921).djvu/220

 194 Perhaps the most complete and authoritative statement of the attitude of European labor towards the Soviets and their Communist Internationale is to be found in the open letter of the International Federation of Trades Unions dated March 23, 1921. This letter is signed by the Executive Committee of the International Federation of Trades Unions as follows: Jouhaux (France), Martens (Belgium), Fimmen and Oudegeest (Holland). Only the name of the President of the organization, J. H. Thomas, of Great Britain, is lacking.

This letter was in reply to a very insulting epistle sent by Zinoviev, as President of the Communist Internationale, in which all the leaders of the International Federation of Trades Unions were declared to be "scabs" and traitors to the working class.

The Executive Committee of the International Federation of Trades Unions declares in its reply that it is ready to support the Russian people and the Russian revolution to the full extent of its powers, but it demands in return from the representatives of the Russian people that "they shall pursue a similar line of conduct towards the Internationale of Labor Unions." We see from this statement that the International Trades Union Bureau recognizes the Bolshevist Government as representing the Russian people in spite of the absolutely contradictory evidence it furnishes later in the same letter. Of the Soviet regime it demands only a friendly attitude to the Trades Union Internationale; in exchange for this, it is ready to give Bolshevism an absolutely free hand in Russia to continue the despotic rule over labor described in the remainder of the letter! However, since this introductory statement shows that the International