(Published originally in Le Patriot Rouge, journal of the Communist Party of Quebec (Marxist-Leninist) – Reprinted in People’s Canada Daily News Release, February 8, 1972.)
At the end of the summer of 1971 a profound division in Party ranks became public. The struggle between two different political lines crystalized and it manifested itself in two different methods of work, two different strategic lines on the national liberation struggle and the role of the Marxist-Leninist Party – two different lines in the fields of ideology, politics and organisation.
A whole gang of counter-revolutionaries in Montreal crowed that “the Maoists are splitting” and that “the Maoists will disappear.” These reactionaries, ignorant as they are, did not understand that One Divides Into Two Is A Universal Law of Marxist-Leninist Dialectics and Communists have no fear of ideological and political struggle against the bourgeoisie, whether they are internal or external to the proletarian organisation. Marx, Lenin and Chairman Mao have shown us that the victory of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought is achieved through struggle against a|| bourgeois and petty bourgeois trends and it will go on through a whole historical epoch of class society and the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
A group of Nazis, liberals and communalists have been running around slandering and rumour mongering against the Communist Party of Quebec (Marxist-Leninist). As a result hundreds of people have come forward since July 1971 to have discussions with the Party members and supporters on the profound differences of principle that led to a group of renegades splitting from the Party last year. The following report on these questions was developed in the Marxist-Leninist Study Group of jeunesse Revolutionnaire Quebecois-St. Jacques and submitted to Patriote Rouge for publication. Patriote Rouge publishes it to answer the rumours and slanders being spread against the Party and hopes it will unleash wide scale discussion among the left circles on the necessity of adhering to revolutionary principles and of using these principles to build the unity of our people and our revolutionary party.
On July 31, 1971, a hidden anti-Party clique which had been attacking the political line and the leadership of the Communist Party of Quebec (Marxist-Leninist) for well over one year, became an open anti-party clique sprouting virulent anti-communism and racism and practising national socialism. Through bourgeois fraud they seized control of our bookshop (built by the Communist revolutionaries[1]) and they began using it as a centre for anti-party propaganda. They deceived some new supporters who did not know the history of the Party and finally the leading Nazi formed “his own” organisation to attack communism and the Party members.
Let us examine some historical facts. During the summer of 1971 the leading Nazi had very long discussions with the Party leadership and he made some definite agreements as to future work. At all times he attempted to keep his anti-Party line well hidden and at no time did he honestly speak his mind because his ideas were the ideas of the big bourgeoisie and he was terrified of open ideological struggle. No sooner were the discussions over and various decisions taken, than he refused to put them into practice, seized control of the bookshop and began rumour campaigns and anti-communist slanders against the Party and the leadership.
The leadership organised a special meeting in Montreal on July 31, 1971. The leading Nazi was asked to come and present his position. Under the hoax that “I have not yet worked out my line. When I work it out I will discuss it!” he refused to come and tried to split the organisation.
Without any discussion among comrades, without openly developing his political line, the anti-communist clique removed Volume 3, Number 48 of Mass Line, Journal of the Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) from the bookshop. They began a rumour and slander campaign against our sister party and labelled the newspaper as “anti-communist”. The communist revolutionaries personally went to the bookshop, met with the leading Nazi and suggested that an open mass democracy meeting of all concerned should be held to struggle over differences on the basis of Marxism-Leninism. Once again the leading Nazi refused to discuss, to openly present a principled political line and he became even more vicious in his lies and slanders. He frantically put out five publications to “prove” he was “doing something” and he organised a meeting of chance individuals in which he attacked the leadership as being “bureaucratic”, “fascist”, “not integrated with the people”, “anti-people”, etc. etc. All kinds of internal information was given out and on 12 occasions between July 31st and mid-October, our ordinary members and supporters went to the bookshop where the Nazi and his wife gave out information, not even knowing who they were talking to nor why these questions were being asked – thus proving themselves to be diehard accomplices of the bourgeois state machine.
On September 4, 1971, the leading Nazi and his coterie were formally invited by the Party to attend an internal mass democracy meeting on the subject The True History of the Communist Party of Quebec (Marxist-Leninist). Once again they refused to come and openly present their views and they continued their splitting and disruptive activities. Thus: 1. The leadership of the Party was denounced and the political line was changed by a clique which refused to have any discussion within any of the Party units. 2. When approached by the leadership on July 31st, the anti-communist clique refused to come and have discussion. 3. When approached on two occasions for mass democracy meetings to struggle out the important questions the clique refused to come. 4. All kinds of internal information was openly imparted through the bookshop.
Various members and supporters throughout Quebec became extremely furious at this counter-revolutionary, fraudulent activity. Let us look at some more facts. The Party unit in Quebec City denounced the fraudulent Nazi character right from the beginning upon which he broke off contact with them and, using his control of the bookshop, stopped the dissemination of Chairman Mao’s works to Quebec City. He then toured Quebec and attempted to push his anti-party line on the responsible comrade in Saguenay Lac St. Jean. This comrade upheld principle and on two occasions suggested that a party conference be called so that the differences could be struggled out in a mass democratic fashion, based on Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought. On both occasions the leading Nazi refused and even went so far as to hide a formal written statement from Saguenay-Lac St. Jean asking for such a Party conference.
It is clear to all that with utmost patience the members of the Party developed the struggle on a principled basis, upholding the Marxist-Leninist method of mass democracy, struggle-criticism-transformation. This, however, was taken to be a sign of weakness by the anti-communists who became even more degenerate in their personal slanders and attacks. They labelled Party members as “police agents”, they threatened Party members with assassination on at least two occasions and the Nazi’s wife actually threatened a Party member wielding an iron bar in their anti-communist den, the bookshop. What kind of activity is this? Is this the way revolutionaries, communists, act or is it the way the fascist compradors act? Communist revolutionaries have been threatened with this type of attack before, ever since 1968 when they first stood up to disseminate Mao Tsetung Thought in Quebec, and they have never once shirked from their revolutionary tasks, never once set aside principles or hidden the truth. The anti-communist clique, which refused to engage in open democratic discussion degenerated into slander and threats of physical violence thus showing their true character for all to see, to take heed and to organise against.
“In reply to the mention of peace the enemy opened fire with all batteries, including even the Council. Shells rained on my head. Autocrat, Schweitzer, bureaucrat, formalist, super-centre, one-sided, stiff-necked, obstinate, narrow-minded, suspicious, quarrelsome... Very well, my friends! Have you finished? You have nothing more in reserve? Poor ammunition, I must say...” (Lenin, One Step Forward, Two Steps Back)
In its publications the renegade clique makes a lot of noise about being “scientific”, about “scientific theory”, and “scientific organisation.” Let us examine some of their “science.”
1. On the Party of the Proletariat and the Party’s line. In a fraudulent “Patriote Rouge” illegally published after they had left the Party in September 1971, they have written: “These two lines (proletarian and reactionary – ed.) become antagonistic contradictions over the question of Party building. The two lines cannot co-exist, if the Party is to develop they become the principle contradiction inside the Party. One of the two lines must disappear in order for the Party to move forward. In order that the Party move forward and become a large mass movement the Proletarian Revolutionary line must triumph.” (translation – PCDNR) Let us examine this rhetoric.
Chairman Mao writes in On Practice: “In class society everyone lives as a member of a particular class, and every kind of thinking, without exception, is stamped with the brand of a class.” All members of an organisation are there as the members of a definite class and class struggle goes on in any organisation throughout a whole historical epoch and it is unceasing till class society is finally abolished. Chairman Mao said: “Correct political and military lines do not emerge and develop spontaneously and tranquilly, but only in the course of struggle.” This shows that struggle between what is correct and what is incorrect is vital for the development of what is correct and revolutionary. This is the history of Marxism, of Leninism and of Mao Tsetung Thought. To shout that “one line must disappear” is to shout that the representatives of a class must disappear, that we must throw away Chairman Mao’s theory of the Party and Party building and that we must adopt the theories pushed by all the historical renegades from Marxism-Leninism, the theories of “inner Party peace”, of the “dying out of class struggle” and of “Party of the whole people.” What has this got to do with Marxism-Leninism? It is an out and out revisionist, renegade theory which is used as a justification for the suppression of communist revolutionaries.
Who is a bourgeois reactionary? Who is an upholder of Marxism-Leninism? On these points the renegade clique confounds right and wrong. They label the communist revolutionaries as “bourgeois reactionaries” just like Richard Nixon labels the Vietnamese people’s struggle a “War of Aggression.” When Richard Nixon talks about “eliminating aggression in Vietnam” what does he mean? When the renegade clique talks of the “reactionary line must disappear”, what do they mean? They mean the same thing as Nixon: They give themselves all the rights to be unprincipled, arbitrary, refuse to engage in open democratic discussion to uphold their position in front of the people and Party members and then threaten reactionary violence against the communist revolutionaries while the communist revolutionaries have no right to resist! This is called the “reactionary line must disappear” and this shows very clearly how the renegade clique has abandoned all pretenses of following Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought.
Let us go on. Leninism teaches us that the Party of the Proletariat must be composed of the advanced elements of the proletariat, it must not be a “mass movement” but a tightly organised, well disciplined party, not very extensive but very closely linked to the masses throughout the whole society, capable of leading and developing the mass movement on a correct revolutionary basis. He pointed out that such a Party is built from the “top downward, starting from the Party congress and the bodies set up by it” (One Step Forward, Two Steps Back) and he vigorously opposed the tendency of opportunism to build the Party “from the bottom upwards, allowing every professor, every high school student and ’every striker’ to declare himself a member of the Party.” The role of the Party is to lead, to raise the political level of the masses up to the political level of the proletarian revolutionaries, organise into the Party the most advanced elements and then build the material conditions for the mobilisation of the middle and backward elements. Lenin writes; “...the organisation of revolutionaries must consist first and foremost of people who make revolutionary activity their profession (for which reason I speak of the organisation of revolutionaries, meaning revolutionary Social Democrats). In view of this common characteristic of the members of such an organisation, all distinctions as between workers and intellectuals, not to speak of distinctions of trade and profession, in both categories must be effaced. Such an organisation must perforce not be very extensive and must be as secret as possible.” (What Is To Be Done?). Lenin opposed all those who equated the Party with “mass movement”, those who debased revolutionary activity to a mere organising of strikes and demonstrations, of bowing to spontaneity and giving up proletarian leadership. He vigorously upheld the proletarian organisation as the general staff of the proletariat in its class war against the bourgeoisie, a headquarters which must mobilise the whole working class in its historic mission of emancipating all of struggling mankind. The renegade clique opposes all this. They write: “In order that the Party move forward and become a large mass movement the Proletarian Revolutionary line must triumph.” Every historical renegade from Marxism-Leninism who came up to oppose the proletarian party, who advocated building reformist parties, tailist after the bourgeoisie’s politics, with no revolutionary discipline and no principled political line gave this exact same line. To develop a “mass party”, a “party not turning off the masses”, “at the level of the masses”, etc., etc., every revisionist and reformist will abandon Marxism-Leninism and will convert the development of a political line into some hodge-podge of liberal bourgeois consensus democracy. The level of the organisation is brought to the level of the most backward elements and everyone bends the political line to “his line” and throws Marxism-Leninism out the window.
In August 1971, the renegade clique was openly espousing bourgeois organisation and consensus democracy. They wrote: “Montreal Rouge is a journal of proletarian politics which aims at grouping all the Montreal workers together around a political line conceived, elaborated and desired democratically by all the workers.” (translated – PCDNR) What workers are you talking about? The advanced communist workers? The workers who took up self-defence in October 1969 at Murray Hill? The workers who still are anti-communist, racist or who follow the Creditistes? Are not these all part of “all the Montreal workers”? A political line “conceived, elaborated and desired democratically by all the workers” is a bourgeois political line because it does not unite on the basis of principle. Is it an excuse to throw Marxism-Leninism away and to trail behind every backward force that comes along and chatters that “demonstrations develop ideology”, “the people are at the level of bourgeois nationalism”, “the workers do not support China and Chairman Mao.”
What is the practice of this line? On July first, Confederation Day, its advocates participated in a demonstration where they tailed behind the holy alliance of the left. They produced a leaflet (which was denounced by Party supporters and quickly withdrawn) which did not even mention the principle contradiction in Quebec, U.S. imperialism, and they converted the demonstration into an “anti-Trudeau day” farce. In the demonstration they did not oppose racist and chauvinist slogans (the broad masses did) and some of the clique’s “leaders” abandoned the red flag of the Quebec proletariat to clutch on to the flag of the nationalist petit-bourgeoisie. Their concept of “leading” the people is to abandon principle, allow bourgeois ideology and trotskyite counter-revolution to run wild and betray the vital interests of the people. No wonder they were vigorously applauded by the trotskyists after July 1st as the Holy Alliance set to work in the beginning of August to prepare their reactionary October 16th language demonstration.
In St. Denis, Quebec, the renegade clique marched once again behind the Holy Alliance of Reggie Chartrand, Raymond Lemieux. They even begged to participate in the activities upon which they were unceremoniously booted out! They then stated they were “confused” on the nature of these fascist groups and to justify their participation shouted that “Even Mao made an alliance with Chiang Kai-shek!” This is out and out anti-communism, a justification for national chauvinism and it would win rounds of warm applause from every trotskyite and Nazi. Chiang Kai-shek was forced, on the threat of death at Sian, to sign an agreement with the Chinese Communist Party that he would fight the principle enemy of the Chinese people, Japanese imperialism. The principle enemy of the Quebecois people is U.S. imperialism. Its agents in Quebec preparing conditions for a reactionary civil war based on the language question are Trudeau, Bourassa, Levesque, Reggie Chartrand, Raymond Lemieux and every reactionary chauvinist force. Where does the question of alliance come from? Is this what your “party equals mass movement by democratically conceiving a political line” found out, renegades, that the Quebec people loved racism and tailing behind the Holy Alliance of Quebec fascists whom you now support? While you pay lip service to the fact that they want a racist war, you tail behind them, participate in their functions and even proclaim that “In words they want what is good for the people...!” (October 16th leaflet. Translated – PCDNR) Did you not hear Reggie Chartrand state that after the independence of Quebec, the first thing is to get rid of the Jews? Did you not hear Raymond Lemieux state in St. Leonard that “every immigrant who learns English is our enemy”? Is this what you call “in words they want what is good for the people”? Everything you say and do only reveals more clearly your class nature for all to see: and what we see are the classic lines of the Quebec counter-revolution.
Seeing their failure they tried to split the Party in August-September 1971. Failing again they ran away to make new alliances.[2]
2. Deliberate and arrogant falsification of Quebec history to “prove” that the renegades are the only “true” revolutionaries.
For the renegade clique the history of Quebec started with their denunciation of the Party and the establishment of “their own” organisation! For those who think this is too incredible, here is what they wrote on November 1st:
“This demonstration (Oct. 16th) is but a link in the big chain which represents our national liberation struggle; the stones that were thrown and the barricades that were put up for the first time in Quebec clearly show the rising sentiment of the people.” (Translation – PCDNR)
Was this the first time barricades went up in Quebec? What happened to Cabano, to Mont-Laurier, to Lachute, to Quebec City of 1918, to the barricades of 1837? This is to slander the revolutionary tradition of our people and it indicates total isolation from the Quebec working class, its struggles, its aspirations. It is utmost ego-centrism and falsehood to suggest that revolutionary activity in Quebec began in July 1971! On October 16th a group of people were led away into a dead alley and the anarchists who led them there were the first to run away when the Montreal Riot Squad came on the scene. To cover up their cowardice they now have to shout that this was the “historic day of the first barricades in Quebec.”
Ten days is a long time to correct a stupidity like this. But was it a mistake? On November 10th the renegade clique writes that the October 29th demonstration “Is the first time that united workers face the fascist forces of the Montreal police”! What happened to the MLT struggle of 1968? What happened to the heroic battles waged by tens of thousands of workers against the Montreal police along St. Lawrence St. in the 1930’s? To “forget” all this is to slander the working class and the Quebec people and it cannot be taken lightly. No one who lights for the interest of the Quebec working class can forget for one minute the history written in the blood of the Quebec people. It is only the bourgeoisie which “;forgets” these things. It is only the bourgeoisie which falsifies our history in this way in order to serve its own class interests. St is only the bourgeoisie which so arrogantly slanders the Quebec working class and people!
3. Hatching new “theories” to justify anti-party activities. “It is clear, I think, that the cries about this celebrated bureaucracy are just a screen for dissatisfaction with the personal composition of the central bodies, a fig leaf. ...You are a bureaucrat because you were appointed by the congress not by my will, but against it} you are a formalist because you rely on the formal decisions of the congress, and not on my consent; you are acting in a grossly mechanical way because you plead the ’mechanical’ majority at the Party Congress and pay no heed to my wish to be co-opted; you are an autocrat because you refuse to hand over the power of the old gang.” (V.I. Lenin, Vol. VI, pp. 310)
Having been unable to secretly foist his political line onto the Party, the leading nazi began hatching a theory of “ultra-centralism”. He began the propaganda that “every time I am in the presence of the communist revolutionaries I feel oppressed!” (An innocent confession again) Then, when his erroneous lines were opposed he raised the banner of “freedom of criticism” by complaining “If one does not allow others to speak, correct ideas cannot find expression...” (Translated by PCDNR) Were there any scientific opinions that were opposed by the Party leadership? Has the Party leadership ever opposed open and scientific discussion? No. What the Party leadership has openly criticised are unscientific, bourgeois ideas and practices because the leadership encourages every member to combat the influences of imperialist society and to move forward. To accuse us of opposing unscientific ideas is to accuse us of being Marxist-Leninist. To this we proudly plead guilty. But what are our accusers in that case? They are bourgeois opportunists who want to push their own anti-communist line in opposition to the Party’s line and who want to change the nature of the Party from red to white.
Having failed, the leading Nazi began his tirades: “Bureaucrat”, “despot”, “Social fascists”, etc., etc. He proclaimed that he was the new “proletarian centre” and he raised the banner of “strengthening democratic centralism”, i.e. his own clique and putschist activities. Both the leadership and the membership upheld the Party’s line and called for a mass democratic meeting to sort out differences. When the leadership upheld the Party line in opposition to the renegade clique, the leading nazi attacked the leadership as “ultra-centralist”. When the membership upheld the Party line and refused to obey orders given by the leading nazi they were attacked as “ultra-democratic”. Thus those who did not submit to the whims of bourgeois reaction were labelled “ultra-centralist”, or “ultra-democratic” depending on his whims of the moment. We ask these renegades: If you are the champions of “strengthening democratic centralism” then why did you not openly develop your line in the party units? Why did you refuse to discuss on July 31st? Why did you refuse to come to an open mass democracy meeting on Mass Line? Why did you not present your views openly on September 4, 1971? Why did you on two occasions refuse the suggestion from Lac St. Jean that there should be a Party conference? This exposes your hoax of “strengthening democratic centralism” as nothing more than a bogus theory to consolidate your own bourgeois dictatorship.
Our Party is never afraid to open principled discussions. That is what has distinguished us from the Holy Alliance of the Left in Montreal right from 1968. We will never give up this principle. Marx said: “The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims.” The leading Nazi, right from 1970, concealed his true views and began making open attacks on the Party. In August 1970 he attacked the Party leadership as “fascist” because he did not want to abide by Party discipline. He gathered together a handful of chauvinists, liberals, Zionists and even one paid police agent and he promoted “his” work in opposition to the Party work. While he shouted for unity he was the greatest promoter for disunity and he actively promoted bourgeois competition between area committees. For this reason he was never a Party member but only a member of one of the Party’s organisations which he attempted to use to build a fiefdom and unprincipled alliances.
“What do we mean by unity? Of course we mean unity on the basis of Marxism-Leninism and not unprincipled unity.” (Chairman Mao) The reactionary Holy Alliance of the Left tried to defeat the Party by 1. practising revisionism, 2. Splitting, 3. intriguing and compromising. We can defeat them if we follow Chairman Mao’s instructions: “Practice Marxism not revisionism; unite, don’t split; be open and aboveboard and don’t intrigue and conspire.”
To these enemies of the Quebec revolution who were hoping gleefully that “the Maoists will disappear”: This is a wishful dream of the bourgeois counter-revolution. The Party purged itself of a handful of counterrevolutionary elements who practiced dogmatism, sectarianism, terrorism, ultra-leftism and conspiratorial activities and who were doing utmost damage to the Party’s work among the masses. The victory of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought is achieved only through struggle against all anti-communist trends. Summing up our experience in internal and external class struggle and vigorously making this summing up a discipline for future work, the Communist Party of Quebec (Marxist-Leninist) can only go forward to organise the victory of the national liberation struggle of the people of Quebec, to the building of socialism and the consolidation of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
“We are marching in a compact group along a precipitous and difficult path, firmly holding each other by the hand. We are surrounded on all sides by enemies, and we have to advance almost constantly under their fire. We have combined, by a freely-adopted decision, for the purpose of fighting the enemy, and not of retreating into the neighbouring marsh, the inhabitants of which, from the very outset, have reproached us with having separated ourselves into an exclusive group and with having chosen the path of struggle instead of the path of conciliation. And now some among us begin to cry out: Let us go into the marsh! And when we begin to shame them, they retort: What backward people you are! Are you not ashamed to deny us the liberty to invite you to take a better road! Oh, yea, gentlemen! You are free not only to invite us, but to go yourselves wherever you will, even into the marsh. In fact, we think that the marsh is your proper place, and we are prepared to render you every assistance to get there. Only let go of our hands, don’t clutch at us and don’t besmirch the grand word freedom, for we too are ’free’ to go where we please, free to fight not only against the marsh, but also against those who are turning towards the marsh!” (V. I. Lenin, What is to be Done?, Vol. 1, p. 10)
[1] The revolutionary bookshop was built by the Communist revolutionaries in January 7969 and it served the Party and its mass work well. When he left, the Nazi did propaganda that it was “his” bookshop because, due to an error on our part, he was named as secretary of the bookshop, meanwhile the responsible individual in charge vacillated under the hoax that “I simply don’t understand what is going on.”
[2] After leaving the Party the renegade clique formed “its own” organisation: The Revolutionary Workers Movement. Their statement of purpose is copied word for word from the Party statement (of the Quebec Workers Movement) omitting the clauses referring to mass democracy as the method of sorting out contradictions and the parts denouncing the CNTU and the QFL as capitalist unions which goes to show their ardent desire to join the Holy Alliance of the “left”.