Page:William Z. Foster - The Revolutionary Crisis of 1918-1921 (1921).djvu/63

 were fired by the national unions of agricultural workers and clerks. Together they excluded five of their locals for affiliation with the C. S. R. Immediately thereupon, the revolutionists made a big issue of the matter. They started a great agitation throughout the whole movement, denouncing the outrage to the workers. As a result they gained large additions to their strength and struck terror to their opponents, who stopped the exclusion policy at once. The situation suddenly got so bad for the latter that, to prevent the whole labor movement from falling into the hands of the militants, they summoned the C. G. T. convention two months in advance of the regular date. In the period just past these worthies had publicly deplored the fact that they had not split the trade unions the year before at Orleans; and now they advised all and sundry that the same mistake would not be repeated at Lille.

But the Lille Convention, held in July, 1921, was a great blow to the reformists. When the votes cast on the vital issue were finally counted, the revolutionaries polled almost half of them—1348 against 1556 for the reformists. This represented an increase of over 100% in the rebels' strength during one year. Their showing was especially significant inasmuch as their votes were drawn entirely from live, aggressive organizations, while the conservatives got a large portion of theirs from "paper unions," which were kept in existence by the bureaucratic officialdom. The Lille Convention demonstrated clearly that the militants, by their policy of noyautage in the old unions, had secured the support of the masses of organized workers.

The Convention struggle, which was very bitter, surged mostly around general tactical questions. The militants' aims, briefly stated, were, "(1) To frustrate the confederal leaders' program of splitting the labor movement, (2) to bring the C. G. T. back again to the principles of the class struggle, (3) to break with the (League of Nations) bureau of Albert Thomas, (4) to affiliate with the trade union International of the revolution." The reformists