History is demanding that we North American Marxist-Leninists move rapidly to build a multi-national Communist Party. The history of the CPUSA has clearly confirmed that without consistent revolutionary theory and practice with regard to the national colonial question there cannot be such a Party. This itself demands tireless struggle against all deviations and opportunist lines on the national question. Therefore, when we examined the particulars of the complex Southwest question, we found we had to first restate the basic general political principles of the national question.
It is the duty of all communists to resolutely oppose all imperialist territorial annexations. We must wage a struggle against the petty-bourgeois deviation that seeks to question whether or not peoples have the right to demand political secession from an oppressor state. We must be clear that this is outright chauvinism, a line in defense of imperialist aggression. The right to secession is not up for debate. It can never be said or implied by the Communists that peoples or nations do not have the right to secede. That is precisely the position we would take if we were to weigh out how advanced the capitalist development of a people is and reach the conclusion that certain peoples constitute nations while others do not, and therefore the latter do not deserve the right to secede. We must not allow discussion of the characteristics of nationhood to prevent us from basing ourselves in the unqualified proposition Stalin laid out, i.e., the duty of the “recognition of the right of peoples to secession,” (J.V. Stalin, “Report on the National Question”) The above mentioned deviation and others spring from a tendency to proceed from the national question as an abstraction. We must see the right of secession or separation as an urgent demand of the Anglo-American working classes key to uniting the class and to fight for the democratic rights and equalities for the national minorities.
To clarify these general points on regional autonomy we refer to Stalin’s statement on the four different degrees of regional autonomy which states, ”Soviet autonomy is net a rigid thing, fixed once and for all time; it permits the most varied forms and degrees of development. Three years of Soviet policy in the sphere of the national question in Russia have shown that in applying Soviet autonomy in its varied forms the Soviet government is on the right path, for this policy alone made it possible to lay a road to the remotest corners of Russia, to arouse to political life the most backward and nationally diverse masses and to connect these masses with the center by the most varied ties – a problem which not a single government in the world was solving or even attempting to solve, being afraid to do so.” (J.V. Stalin, “The Policy of Soviet Government on the National Question”)
Therefore, it is not to fragment the working class that we call for the right to secession but because the true condition for the unity of the class is maximum democracy, that is, the right to choose between oppression and freedom.
Finally, we must briefly restate the Leninist position on the national colonial question: that the work of resolving the national question, in this case the Southwest question, must be the job of a multi-national Communist Party and that it cannot be finally resolved apart from the question of the emancipation from the power of capital and the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
It is in light of these basic political principles that we discuss the two positions presented at the Conference: 1) the call for regional autonomy for the Southwest and 2) the call for the independence of the Chicano Nation within the Southwest. Although lacking full knowledge of all the particularities, we recognize that the issues brought forth are clearly in the realm of national questions. We also recognize that in both positions the approaches are in line with Marxist-Leninist principles on the national question.
The Southwest Region (including the area that has been described as the Chicano Nation) is an annexed territory of USNA imperialism. It was annexed by the USNA during the colonial war of 1846, With the consolidation of USNA imperialism, beginning in 1880, the economy of the region was made to serve the needs of the USNA imperialists. In the era of imperialism, nations and not individuals or groups of individuals, are enslaved. At the same time, imperialism, in its oppression, welds people together resulting in nations which are needed in order to capture markets, raw materials and cheap labor. This kind of oppression is further justified and re-enforced by the ideology of white chauvinism (e.g.,the Negro and Puerto Rican nations). Under such circumstances the unity of the class in opposition to imperialism can only be realized with our full support for the demand of the right to secession of the peoples of the Southwest.
In the position put forth calling for an autonomous region as the general solution to the Southwest, there is a clear recognition of the existence of uneven historical development within the region and that particular national peculiarities exist. Therefore, there is an urgent need for further study and research on these particular aspects. It is precisely in this light that we see the position on the Chicano Nation presented by the Communist Collective of the Chicane Nation as the first real Marxist-Leninist attempt to further our understanding on this subject. This is a real contribution to the unity of the class struggle in the USNA and to the building of a multi-national Communist Party.
As previously stated, the special oppression of the Mexican national minority in the Southwest region is a product of the war of aggression against Mexico in 1846. USNA capitalist expansionism and imperialism has oppressed and dominated this region as a foreign invader, forcefully occupying the land of another people. The robbery of the territory of the Southwest and its resources, the brutal exploitation of the Mexican national minority workers on the railroads, mines and fields, has given the imperialists a gigantic reserve in the Southwest. This imperialist subjugation of the Southwest is an integral part of the system of USNA imperialist oppression of subject peoples all over the world.
However, as in other places where it is attacking oppressed peoples, USNA imperialism has brought into existence in the Southwest the class which will destroy it - the proletariat. The long and heroic struggle of the Mexican national minority against imperialist oppression is reaching a new stage of development. The emerging leadership of the proletariat and the struggle to build a multinational Communist Party are the real steps necessary to unite the working class and broad masses of the people to end this imperialist oppression forever.
Faced with a rising struggle among the Mexican national minority masses, USNA imperialism is increasing its attacks on all fronts throughout the Southwest. Its central strategy in expanding its oppression is to divide the working class. One of its key tactics is the policy of deportations. These fascist deportations of so-called “illegal aliens” are being stepped up everywhere in the Southwest. These deportations are a direct attack against the entire working class. Their aim is to turn one section of the class against another and to spur one part of the working class to fight to protect its privilege over another and thus to keep the entire class from attacking its real enemy – USNA imperialism. In the interest of proletarian internationalism it is the duty of the entire proletariat in the USNA to fight this national privilege, particularly in the form of fascist deportations of Mexican so-called ’aliens’. We must vigilantly expose those imperialist agents like the CPUSA revisionists who are actively pushing this fascist poison on the working class.
As one of the instruments for carrying out these increased deportations, the fascist border patrol has expanded its harassment and violent attacks on Mexicans crossing the border. In our opposition to all national oppression we must demand an immediate abolition of this imperialist force and call for free circulation across the border.
Another burning democratic question which the proletariat must take up is the struggle for complete equality for the Spanish language. For years the imperialists have suppressed the Spanish language in the Southwest and forced the Mexican national minority to adopt the tongue of the oppressor people. Only a determined struggle to fight for the complete equality of the Spanish language will fulfill this basic demand of proletarian internationalism.
Finally, let it be stressed that all struggles for democratic rights of the oppressed Mexican national minority in the Southwest means nothing if the central demand-the question of land - the cutting edge of the struggle, is not taken to the working class. The Mexican national minority is concentrated in a particular region of the USNA state – the Southwest. We must expose the revisionist line of cultural national autonomy that denies this key right of control over definite land and territory. Without doubt the specific features of the land question vary in different sections of the Southwest. It is also clear that the degree of national development is uneven in this specially oppressed region. A comprehensive analysis of this question remains to be carried out although important steps have already been made to bring clarity (as is obvious from this Conference). However, the general line on the land question is already clear: unity of the working class and the broad masses to overthrow USNA imperialism is inconceivable without unity of the proletariat and the peasantry. The proletariat must wage a determined struggle to overcome all imperialist fostered divisions (between the urban and rural proletariat, the “legal” and “illegal”, men and women, etc. Only with a consistent fight to carry out the democratic tasks can the proletariat see the struggle through to victory of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
It is precisely because the demands for the right to secession is the only solution to the problem of democracy for the oppressed peoples of the South west that the building of a multi-national Communist Party, firmly rooted in the most exploited and oppressed section of the proletariat is the step toward that solution. Furthermore, this demand must come from the Anglo-American working class as part of their strategy for proletarian revolution.
Keeping in mind that the Party’s goal is to establish the dictatorship of the proletariat, we raise the following demands with the intent to use them to build the Party and fight for democracy and socialism:
1, An end to the border patrol.
2, Full equality for the Spanish language.
3, An end to US military installations in the Southwest region.
4, An end to the fascist immigration laws and exposure of the CPUSA’s support of these immigration laws.
5, Return control of the land to the respective peoples in the Southwest.
6, Unity between the industrial proletariat, the rural proletariat and the peasantry.
Finally, to sum up, let us quote Comrade Stalin: “Thus our views on the national question reduce themselves to the following propositions:
a, the recognition of the right of peoples to secession,
b, regional autonomy for peoples which remain within the given state,
c, specific laws guaranteeing freedom of development for national minorities,
d, a single, indivisible proletarian collective body, a single party for the proletarians of all the nationalities in the given state”. (J.V. Stalin, Report on the National Question)
AUTONOMY FOR THE SOUTHWEST REGION
BUILD A MULTI-NATIONAL COMMUNIST PARTY
WORKERS AND OPPRESSED PEOPLES OF THE WORLD UNITE!