Page:Solomon Abramovich Lozovsky - The World's Trade Union Movement (1924).pdf/91

 Rh question of the Factory and Shop Committees created legally in Germany and Austria, etc.; thirdly, the question of the functions of Factory and Shop Committees. Our attitude toward the Factory and Shop Committees was dictated by the role they played.

We considered and still consider that, during the time of and after the social revolution, the Factory and Shop Committees play an exceedingly important role. In the second question, about our attitude toward the existing Factory and Shop Committees created by law, we had differences of opinion among ourselves. That part of revolutionary workers affiliated with us, in whom revolutionary instinct served in place of tactical clarity and persistence, considered that we could not go into these Factory and Shop Committees, because they were elected according to law; participating in these Committees, we, to a certain degree, give influence to these organizations, which we should destroy because they are against us.

We did not agree with these comrades, for we cannot adopt a formal revolutionary point of view. Our aim is to develop the functions of the Factory and Shop Committees, to urge them on in overstepping the legal bounds, to revolutionize them and thus to make of them a basis for revolutionary action. The First Congress expressed itself in that sense, rejecting the tactics of boycott against the legal Factory and Shop Committees which, in fact, are inherently the organs for unity of the working class.

We have, especially in Germany, among workers of one and the same factory, members of different unions; for instance, in any big German factory, we have members of the "Free Union," members of the "Catholic Union," members of the "Hirsch-Dunker Union," and the "Union of Hand and Brain Workers." It is natural that even a pure economic struggle in this factory meets great organizational obstructions. It was necessary to find such an organ as would directly represent all the workers of the given factory, but here we met with great interference, thanks to the reformists.

We took the position that all the workers should fully participate in the elections of the Factory and Shop Committees. The reformists were opposed, They insisted that only members of the "Free Unions" should be elected to these Committees, but no members of the Catholic, Hirsch-Dunkers, or workers who are members of any anti-class units. Externally it appeared that revolutionary logic was on their side. We wanted to create a class organ and to it would be elected not only members of class unions, but also members of the Catholic unions who are absolutely not interested in the problems of the working class.

But, in reality, in this seemingly class purity there is, on one hand, misunderstanding of the problems of the Factory Committees, and, on