The task of the revolutionary has always been the same. That task is emancipate the thinking of our class so they can play their historical role in the emancipation of humanity. The only changeable thing is how the revolutionary carries out that task.
Conventions are serious business. They are the moment when the organization of revolutionaries comes together to deliberate on where they are in history, what are the features of the stage they are in, and how they are going to use that knowledge to carry out their role.
This Convention marks over 45 years of struggle for a revolutionary party that would be a continuation of the best in American history – a party worthy of the American people, one that could participate in the struggle to reconstruct America, that would be of, by and for the people.
During those years many organizations have come into, and gone out, of existence. Ours has remained stable, preparing for this moment in history. This Convention, like those before it, will reaffirm our commitment to our foundations, our strategy, and tactics. These are the indispensable elements that stabilized us while others withered and died.
What are the elements that make the League different from other organizations? What has allowed us to remain stable and on track?
The fundamental differences between organizations arises from their different bases and their different goals. One type of organization arises from the mass movement. They are guided by theory that arises from practice. Their actual goal becomes the goal of the spontaneous movement, which can be nothing but reform.
The other type of organization arises from an intellectual grasp of the significance of the contradiction between society’s productive forces and its productive relations. This group is necessarily guided by philosophy – which is the study of the processes governing all thought, principles, and laws.
The organizational predecessors of the League were formed during the great upsurges of the national liberation movement. We did not base ourselves on that movement; rather we tried to use that upsurge and transformation to expose and exacerbate the contradiction between productive forces and relations.
We understood that this was the only force that could create the conditions for a transfer of political power from the capitalists to the working class. This is why we did not collapse with the relative completion of the national liberation movement.
Later, our philosophical approach allowed us to understand the revolutionary significance of the electronic revolution in production, the emergence of a new revolutionary sector of the working class, and the beginnings of an objective communist movement.
What do we mean by an objective communist movement? Such a movement arises when there is such an intense antagonism between private ownership of the necessaries of life and the social character of distribution and consumption that the entire social order begins to collapse.
Communism – society’s ownership of socially necessary means of life – is no longer an ideological question. It is the only means by which the actual, practical demands of society can be resolved.
This historic leap in the economy presents us with a huge and difficult problem. The social face of fascism is gaining ground as the ruling class takes the tactical offensive in an attempt to shore up its strategic weakness.
Historically, the objective communist movement is on the offensive, but subjectively – that is intellectually – anticommunist. It has not the slightest chance of success unless it comes to understand that communism is the solution.
Clearly, nothing can be done except through the process of changing peoples’ minds as they struggle for the basics of life. This is the task of an organization of propagandists.
We can proudly point to our accomplishments in building the organization history calls for. We have a solid cadre core. We have, and are attracting, the next generation of young revolutionary leaders. We have our own theoretical and political line. We have an excellent press.
The next stage – the stage this Convention must grapple with – is the outward motion of the League. To accomplish what we need to accomplish, we must grow. But we must grow in such a way that we carry out our mission.
That mission calls for us to unite the revolutionaries on the basis of the demands of the new class and to educate and win them over to a cooperative communist resolution of the problem.
Our primary task this weekend is to discuss, debate, and then unify around the final Convention documents. These documents are more than an exceptional analysis of current conditions. They rest on some fifty years of organizational continuity, and the long history of the world communist movement of which we are a part. They sum up the study, experience and conclusions of the entire organization.
They are, most importantly, a battle plan. The draft documents outline the League’s goal, and where we are in the possibility of accomplishing that goal.
They map out the terrain and the forces at play. They point us in the direction we must go and the ways to organize ourselves to accomplish our tasks.
The League’s outward motion can be accomplished only if the League is clear as to its mission. Each member must have a mission. Every member in some way must contribute to our propaganda effort.
We must become an army on the march – with purpose, discipline and clarity.
Comrades, the class is beginning to move. It is striving toward its historical mission. We must be there. The moment we prepared for is upon us. Let this Convention again raise the International’s battle cry, ” “To the forge, Comrades! Strike where the iron is hot!”
