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5, French imperialists have not allowed even their social- chauvinists to go and converse with the German social-chau- vinists - this means that the war is a predatory one also on the part of England and France, consequently, there is no salvation except through a break with all the govern- ments, with all the social-chauvinists, without any reser- vations" - instead of saying this, the Novaya Zhizn con- soles the workers with illusions: "In Stockholm - it says - preparations are being made to reach a Peace agreement and collectively to work out a gen- eral plan of struggle: refusal to vote for war credits, a break with "national unity", recall of Ministers from the Cabinets etc. "All it can do to substantiate this absolutely false phrase is to set up the word "struggle" in bold type. Fine proof, indeed! "After three years of war, they still feed the workers with the most empty promises: "Preparations are being made at Stockholm" to break with national unity... "...All this is one great deception. All this means con- soling and pacifying the workers in a reactionary way, im- buing them with confidence in the social-chauvinists. But the truth is that the Socialists who "fight for peace" not in words, not to deceive themselves, not to deceive the workers, have long since started such a struggle, without waiting for international conferences; they have started such a struggle by breaking up national unity in the very same way as was done by MacLean in England, by Karl Lieb- knecht in Germany, by the Bolsheviks in Russia.....We Bol- sheviks, on the other hand, in our propaganda against Stockholm, tell the masses the whole truth; we continue to expose the social-chauvinists and the policy of agreements with them; we lead the masses towards a complete rupture with them... "...We, on the other hand, taking into account all the vicissitudes and the details of politics, remain consist- ent internationalists, preaching the brotherly union of all the workers, a break with the social-chauvinists, and work for the proletarian revolution." - 8th September 1917. Collected Works, Vol. XXI, Book I, pp. 120-126.

6. THE ZIMMERWALD LEFT AND ITS BRITISH SUPPORTERS "The third, real internationalist trend is most nearly represented by the "Zimmerwald Left"15.....It is charact- erised by the complete break with social-chauvinism and "centrism", a relentless war against the imperialist home government and the imperialist home bourgeoisie. Its principle is "Our greatest enemy is at home". A ruthless struggle against nauseatingly sentimental social-pacifist phrases (a social-pacifist is a socialist in words, and a bourgeois pacifist in deeds; bourgeois pacifists dream of an everlasting peace without the overthrow of the yoke and domination of capital) and against all sophistry employed to demonstrate the impossibility, the inappropriateness, the untimeliness of a proletarian revolutionary struggle, of a proletarian socialist revolution in connection with the present war.....Closest to real internationalists are: in England, the paper, 'Trade Unionist'16, and some of the members of the British Socialist Party17 and of the Indep- endent Labour Party18 (for instance, Russell Williams19, who has openly called for a break with the leaders who have betrayed socialism), the Scottish elementary school teacher and Socialist, MacLean, who has been sentenced to hard labour by the bourgeois government of England for his revolutionary activity against the war; hundreds of Eng- lish Socialists who are in jail for the same offence. They, only, they, are internationalists in deed". - 10th April 1917. Collected Works, Vol. XX, Book I, pp. 147-149. THE MASSES MOVE AGAINST THE WAR "There is no doubt that the beginning of October has brought us to the greatest turning point in the history of the Russian and, to all appearances, also of the world revolution. "The world workers' revolution started with the actions of individuals who, by their unswerving courage, represen- ted everything honest that has survived the decay of off- icial "socialism", which is in reality social-chauvinism. Liebknecht in Germany, Adler20 in Austria, MacLean in England - these are the best known names of those indivi- dual heroes who took upon themselves the difficult role of forerunners of the world revolution.

e S t a f nd a - 7. "A second stage in the historic preparation for this revolution was a broad mass ferment which assumed the form of a split in the official parties, the form of illegal publications and of street demonstrations. The protest against the war grew - and the number of victims of govern- mental persecutions also grew. The prisons of countries famed for their lawfulness and even for their freedom, Ger- many, France, Italy, England, began to be filled with scores and hundreds of internationalists, opponents of the war, advocates of a workers' revolution". - 20th October 1917. Collected Works, Vol. XXI, Book I, p. 271. ne コー D is of ns 1 - of JOHN MACLEAN - SOVIET CONSUL "In 1914, the International collapsed because the work- ers of all countries united with the bourgeoisie of their respective countries and split among themselves, but now this split is becoming healed. Perhaps you have read rec- ently that in England the Scottish school teacher and trade unionist MacLean, has been sentenced a second time to im- prisonment for five years - the first time he was sentenced to eighteen months - because he exposed the real objects of the war and spoke about the criminal nature of British imp- erialism. When he was released there was already a repres- entative of the Soviet government in England, Litvinov21, who immediately appointed MacLean Consul, a representative of the Soviet Russian Federative Republic in England, and the Scottish workers greeted this appointment with enthus- iasm. The British government has for the second time comm- enced to persecute MacLean and this time not only as a Scottish school teacher, but also as Consul of the Federat- ive Soviet Republic. MacLean is in prison because he came out openly as the representative of our government, but we have never seen this man, he has never belonged to our Party, he is the beloved leader of the Scottish workers, but we joined with him, the Russian and Scottish workers united against the British government in spite of the fact that the latter buys Czecho-Slovakians22 and is pursuing a furious policy to drag the Russian republic into the war". - 28th June 1918. Concluding Speech at 4th Congress of Trades Unions, Collected Works, Vol. XXIII. (in fact 3 years hard labour of which he served 15 months)

8. J.V. STALIN'S TRIBUTE TO JOHN MACLEAN L "Whereas at that time, three years ago, we had only small groups of sympathisers in the west - the groups of Loriot23 in France, of MacLean in Britain, of Liebknecht, who was murdered by the capitalist scoundrels, in Germ- any - now, three years later, a grand organisation of the international revolutionary movement has sprung up - the Third Communist International, which has won the ad- herence of the major European parties, the German, the French, the Italian. In the Communist International, which has shattered the Second International, we now have the main core of the international socialist move- ment". - 6th November 1920. 'Three Years of Proletarian Dictatorship', Report Delivered at a Celebration Meeting of the Baku Soviet, Works, Vol. 4, p. 405. i re ma - la t ia L W ra t r Wa O e e i h b S. d W i 4 C **** Appendix - Lenin and MacLean. (by D. Toms, WPS Secretary) These extracts on John MacLean from the works of V.I. Lenin are the tributes of the great leader of the Bolsh- eviks and the international working class to "the belov- ed leader of the Scottish workers". What united Lenin and MacLean was thicker than blood - a steel-like loyal- ty to the working class and to the revolutionary princ- iples of Marxism - brought into sharp focus by their common opposition to the 'great' imperialist slaughter of 1914-18 and to the spineless treachery of the opport- unist 'socialists' who supported their own ruling class- es in that war for which the workers paid with their lives. MacLean's line on the war was not as consistently revolutionary as Lenin's. Whereas Lenin said "A revolu- tionary class cannot but wish for the defeat of its gov- ernment in a reactionary war, cannot fail to see that its military reverses facilitate its overthrow" (from 'Socialism and War', 1915), MacLean said at his trial in May 1918, "We, as representatives of the workers of the world, do not wish one side or the other to be the vict- ors. We wish the status quo prior to the war to be re- established". In practice, though, he concentrated his fire on British imperialism saying, "Our first business S n h a i u a g k a

LENIN ON MACLEAN - SUPPLEMENT. "HANDS OFF RUSSIA!" "Even though the British and French papers hide the truth it seems to be making some headway. The workers sense and realise that the revolution in Russia is theirs, a working man's, socialist revolution. Even in France and Britain the labour movement is now carrying such slogans as "Withdraw the forces from Russia!" and "He who makes war against Russ- ia is a criminal!". A socialist rally was recently held in London's Albert Hall and according to information received, which the British government tried hard to repress, the rally demanded "Withdraw the forces from Russia!" and all the workers' leaders condemned the government policy as robbery and violence. We also have news that MacLean, who was a Scottish schoolmaster at one time, called the workers out on strike in the principal industrial districts, cond- emning the war as a war of plunder. He had been in prison earlier. Then he was put in again. But when the revolut- ionary movement flared up in Europe, MacLean was let out and he put up as parliamentary candidate in Glasgow, one of the biggest cities in the North of England and Scotland. This shows that the British labour movement and its revolutionary demands are having a bigger impact. The British Government was forced to set MacLean free, its rabid enemy, a man who is proud to call himself a British Bolshevik". - 4th December 1918. 'Speech at Presnya Workers' Conference', Collected Works, Vol. 28, p. 356. A GREAT WORLD LEADER. "The differences you have had from the outset about pre- serving the 'independence' of the co-operative movement are nothing but vain efforts which must peter out without any hope of a positive solution. This struggle is not serious and it clashes with the principles of democracy..... ".....the resolutions daily adopted by the strongest class in the world - the kind our own Congress is sure to adopt unanimously - greet only the dictatorship of the proletariat all over the world. By adopting such a resolution our Con- gress takes the road which does not and cannot lead to the kind of 'independence' being discussed here today. You are aware that Karl Liebknecht has shown some opposition not only

2. to the petty-bourgeois peasants, but also to the co-operat- ive movement. You know that just for this Scheidemanna and company consider him a dreamer and fanatic, yet you adress- ed a message of greetings to him, just as you sent greet- ings to MacLean. By voicing solidarity on these matters with the great world leaders you have burnt your boats. You must keep a firm stand because at the moment you are standing up not only for yourselves, not only for your own rights, but also for the rights of Liebknecht and MacLean. "...There is only one way out: a merger of the co-opera- tive movement with the Soviet government. You know that Britain, France, America and Spain regarded our actions as experiments; they have now changed their tune: they now have to look to their own affairs at home. Of course, physically, materially and financially they are consider- ably stronger than we are, but in spite of their outward polish we know they are rotten inside; they are stronger than we are at present with the strength that was Germany's when the Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty was concluded. But what do we see now? Everyone recoiled from us then. Now, every month we spend in strengthening the Soviet Republic, we spend in defending not only ourselves, but also the cause started by Liebknecht and MacLean, and we already see that Britain, France, America and Spain have been infected with the same disease and are fired with the same flame as Germany, the flame of the universal and world-wide struggle of the working class against imperialism". - 10th December 1918. 'Speech to the Third Workers' Co-oper- ative Congress', Collected Works, Vol. 28, pp. 335-7. THE COMMUNIST PATH. "Beside the craven, half-hearted 'socialists' who are thoroughly imbued with the prejudices of bourgeois democ- racy, who yesterday defended 'their' imperialist govern- ments and today limit themselves to platonic 'protests' against military intervention in Russia - beside these there is a growing number of people in the Allied countries who have taken the communist path, the path of MacLean, Debs b, Loriot, Lazzari c and Serrati d. These are men who have realised that if imperialism is to be crushed and the victory of socialism and lasting peace ensured, the bour- geoisie must be overthrown, bourgeois parliaments abolished, ar es 'I Wo No a. th Re go wh re b. is 5 ja ja wa af un Se sa on te in th re c. Wo al ed 19 pr wh d. is Co 3r th in un

3. t- nd S- and Soviet power and the dictatorship of the proletariat established". - 21st January 1919. 'Letter to the Workers of Europe and America', Collected Works, Vol. 29, pp. 430-1. ** Notes. m a. Scheidemann - leader of the extreme chauvinist wing of a- the German Social-Democratic Party; vice-president of the Reichstag, the German parliament. Head of the bourgeois government after the German revolution of November 1918 which he, in conjunction with the German militarists, supp- ressed, shooting down thousands of workers. S b. Eugene Victor Debs - (1855-1926) founder of the Social- ist Party of America in 1897 and its Presidential candidate 5 times, the last time in 1920 as Convict 9653 in Atlanta 's jail. Also founded the American Railway Union in 1893 and jailed for 6 months in 1895 for union activity. Opposed the 9 war as a "proletarian revolutionist" from the start and, after the U.S.A.'s entry into the war in 1917, was arrested under the new 'Espionage' Law for anti-war speeches. In ; September 1918 he made a magnificent speech from the dock saying "I am not on trial here.....American institutions are ee on trial before a Court of American citizens". Started his ten year sentence aged 64 and suffering from heart disease S in April 1919. MacLean was among those who campaigned for le the release of Debs and other political prisoners. Debs was - released in December 1921. c. Constantino Lazzari - veteran revolutionary leader of Workers' Party of Italy which became Socialist Party of It- aly in 1893. Lazzari, a self-educated printer, was appoint- ed secretary of the Party directorate in 1914 and in August 1917 circulated all the socialist mayors in Italy with a es proposal to resign en masse in protest against the war for which he was arrested. e d. Serrati - leader of the left wing of the Italian Social- ist Party; editor of 'Avanti'; delegate at the Zimmerwald ed, Conference; joined the Communist International. After the 3rd Congress of the Comintern he refused to carry out, at the Congress of the Socialist Party, the demands of the Com- intern Executive to break off all relations with the opport- unists and was expelled from the Party. A split occurred in

4. the Party over this question and the left wing majority transformed itself into the Communist Party of Italy which Serrati joined in 1924. He died in 1926. **** Publisher's Note References to Lenin's Collected Works are to the 3rd Russ- ian edition in the pamphlet, and to the 1965 English edit- ion in the supplement. The quotes in the pamphlet can be found in the English edition by referring to the dates on which they were written. We are grateful to Nan Milton for information relating to Friedrich Adler and Constantino Lazzari for the notes to the extracts. Other writings of Lenin available from Vanguard Books. What Is To Be Done? (1902) 25P; One Step Forward, Two Steps Back (1904) 31P; Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution (1905) 17P; Materialism and Empirio-Criricism (1908) 30P; The 3 Sources and 3 Compon- ent Parts of Marxism (1913) 4P; Karl Marx (1914) 8P; On Marx and Engels 10P; Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1916) 17P; 3 Articles on the National & Colon- ial Questions 6P; 4 Articles on National Self-Determin- ation 25P; 3 Articles on War and Peace 13P; The State and Revolution (1917) 17P; The Proletarian Revolution and the Renegade Kautsky (1918) 17P; The State (1919) 6P; Econom- ics and Politics in the Era of the Dictatorship of the Pro- letariat (1919) 5P; 'Left-Wing' Communism, an Infantile Disorder (1920) 15P; Prediction on the Revolutionary Storms in the East (1921) 5P. Other titles forthcoming. Prices subject to revision. Please add 20% for post orders. Works by John MacLean. The War After the War (1917) 20P; Condemned From the Dock (1918) 15P; The Irish Tragedy: Scotland's Disgrace (1920) 20P. Forthcoming titles include Plea for a Labour College for Scotland (1916); All Hail, the Scottish Workers' Republic! (1920). Other titles include Communist Manifesto (1848), Marx and Engels; British General Strike (1926), J.V. Stalin, 10P; Selected Works Vol. V (1949-57), Mao, £2; the National Ques- tion in Britain (1964), McCreery, 5P; Chairman Mao's Marxist -Leninist 3 Worlds Theory (People's Daily, 1.11.77) 10P. is 19 ion Tr rig na ter Com cis Mac com pre Cel fro Iri Sco rac up Oct and cho All Com Rus the spe vil pla iat not gin Len ty res ssi ist ion Mar lea

9. is to hate the British capitalist system" ('Justice' 17 Sept 1914) and "the working class, if they are going to take act- ion, must not only go for peace but for revolution" (1918 Trial speech). Both Lenin and MacLean were forthright champions of the right to self-determination and independence for oppressed nations as shown, for example, by their support for the Eas- ter Rising in Ireland in 1916 and their defence of James Connolly's participation in it against the 'superior' criti- cisms of the doctrinaire 'socialists'. Sometimes, though, MacLean, in his impassioned defence of the subject nations, confuses the national question with race - "My desire is to prevent Scotsmen being used to smash our sister race, the Celts of Ireland, for English capitalists who are descended from the Germans. Scotsmen have been taught to hate the Irish as a different race. They are not. The Welsh, the Scots and the Irish are all of Celtic origin, so that from a racial point of view the Welsh and the Scots ought to line up with the Irish" ('Vanguard' July 1920)24 MacLean immediately rallied to the support of the Great October Socialist Revolution in Russia in 1917 led by Lenin and the Bolsheviks and, along with Karl Liebknecht, had been chosen as an honorary member of the presidium of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets. He was appointed Soviet Consul in Glasgow and took a leading part in the "Hands off Russia!" campaign when the imperialist powers tried to over- throw the young Soviet regime. Prior to this in his trial speech of May 1918 while praising the conduct of the Bolshe- viks MacLean had stated that "at Brest Litovsk then Trotsky played a very, very bold game" referring to the peace negot- iations between the Soviets and German imperialism. It was. not generally realised at that time that, as well as prolon- ging the negotiations as agreed with Lenin, Trotsky, against Lenin's advice, refused in the last resort to sign the trea- ty thus providing the German imperialists with an excuse for resuming their attack and necessitating even greater conce- ssions to them, which "actually helped the German imperial- ists and hindered the growth and development of the revolut- ion in Germany" (see Lenin's speech to the 7th Congress, March 1918, and his Reply to the Debate). As well as supporting the Russian Revolution, MacLean learnt from it - in particular of the need for a revolution-

10. ary proletarian party of a new type, for "armed effort" and the "wage-earners' dictatorship". At his 1916 trial MacLean had stated "I have always been against the use of arms for the purpose of securing redress. I have pointed out again and again that that type of thing might be good enough for men in Dublin, but that it was no good whatever for the Clyde workers who, even if they had the inclina- tion to use guns, have not got them". After 1917 he no longer opposes armed effort, criticising Helen Crawford 25 of the Independent Labour Party for doing so in his "Open Letter to Lenin" of 1921, but he appears to play down the question unlike Lenin who praised Marx and Engels for "their proud and open proclamation of the inevitability of a violent revolution.....the necessity of systematically imbuing the masses with this and precisely this view of violent revolution lies at the root of all the teachings of Marx and Engels" (from the State and Revolution'). While courageously and openly defying the emergency war regulations of the British bourgeoisie ('Defence of the Realm Act' or DORA) he does not seem to have considered "the need for an illegal organisation and press, i.e. an organisation and press free from the surveillance of the police and the censorship" (Lenin). He also refused to travel to Russia illegally when the British government refused him a passport so he and Lenin never met. On the question of Party leadership, even after 1917 MacLean does not emphasise as much as Lenin the role of consciously provided practical as well as theoretical lea- dership of the working class struggle, e.g. "I only gave out these suggestions so that they (the workers) might work out plans of their own if they thought fit to take action to bring about peace" (1918 Trial Speech) and later in 'Vanguard' of May 1920, in referring to the need for a revolutionary programme "that in a crisis might so rouse them (the workers) that by effective spontaneous effort they will sweep the capitalists out of power". MacLean also supported the formation of the Third Comm- unist International but he opposed the foundation of the Communist Party of Great Britain in 1921 on the grounds that Lenin had been misled by its leaders about the revol- utionary possibilities of the situation in Britain and that a separate Scottish Communist Party was called for. 26 1 m o p 4 i r t o e o r t f 2 p in S S Sc ou as Sc wo me la gr th is se in th bo ic me le er a in ti wa