MB3PI-10

Marxist Bulletin No. 3 – Part I

1962 Split in the SWP Revolutionary Tendency


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Call for the Reorganization of the Minority Tendency

1. The tendency expresses its general political agreement with the tendency of the International Committee which has agreement around the 1961 International Perspectives Resolution presented by the Socialist Labour League. It must, therefore, begin from the standpoint of its responsibilities towards the political struggle of this tendency in relation to the construction of the revolutionary party in the United States.

The tendency recognizes that the building of the SWP as a revolutionary party depends on and derives from its adherence to the revolutionary international perspective and approach.

2. The tendency must pay particular attention to the development of [a] perspective for work in the United States in relation to the trade unions and the Negro movement. The main political work of the tendency within the party will be to patiently explain the nature of Pabloite revisionism and liquidationism as a method, and its relation to the problem of developing a concretely revolutionary perspective for work in the trade union and Negro movement.

3. The tendency must recognize that the SWP is the main instrument for the realization of socialism in the U.S. There is no other organization outside the party which can decisively aid the struggle for socialism at the present time. Our comrades must therefore work as loyal party members; contribute to all aspects of the work, literary and practical, taking part in all the party’s electoral activity and subdrives and accepting the administrative decisions of the leadership even though we might be very much against them.

Members of the tendency must recognize that the SWP is their party and they must speak as people who are responsible for their party. The difficulties of the party must not be exploited in a factional way. These must be seen as the overhead price for lack of political clarification. Since the responsibility for this clarification now rest[s] squarely on the shoulders of the tendency, to make factional capital out of the party’s difficulties would be nothing more than shelving that task which is the main purpose for the existence of the tendency.

The tendency must not make premature characterizations of the leadership of the SWP, except for those, such as Weiss and Swabeck, who have clearly revealed their Pabloism in theory and practise.

The center group, which is, of course, the majority cannot be described as a finished tendency in the same way as the Pabloites. To be sure there are elements of centrism in its thinking and activity, but these do not predominate. To characterize the SWP majority as a finished centrist tendency is to give up the political battle before it has begun.

We must believe that by common work and by political discussion it will be possible to win a majority of the party to adopt a correct line on Pabloism and for the building of the revolutionary party in the United States.

4. The present tendency shall dissolve and shall re-establish itself on the basis of the preceding points.

5. Only those comrades who accept this outlook can be considered a part of the tendency.

Jack Arnold (New York)
Margaret Gates (Philadelphia)
Martha Curti(New York)
Fred Mazelis (New York)
J. Doyle (Philadelphia)
Sylvia Mazelis (New York)
Danny F. (Seattle)
Albert Philips (Detroit)
Edith F. (Detroit)
Tim Wohlforth (New York)
Steve F. (Detroit)

November 13, 1962

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