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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

1 JC ed od Jer 25 en ne T of Jar a- er a m- 1- 26 11. This line was based on much the same considerations which led Lenin and the Bolsheviks to realise that "the develop- ment of capitalism proceeds extremely unevenly in the vari- ous countries. It cannot be otherwise under the commodity production system. From this it flows irrefutably that soc- ialism cannot achieve victory simultaneously in all count- ries. It will achieve victory first in one or several coun- tries, while the others will remain bourgeois or pre-bourge-- ois for some time" (Lenin in "the War Programme of the Prol- etarian Revolution", 1916) - as opposed to Trotsky's nebul- ous and counter-revolutionary theory of so-called "permanent revolution" which claimed that "it would be hopeless to think...that...a revolutionary Russia could hold out in the face of a conservative Europe" (Trotsky "The Year 1917"). Thus MacLean stated in his Gorbals election address of 23 November 1923 just before his death, "Russia could not produce the World Revolution. Neither can we in the Gorbals, in Scotland, in Great Britain. Before England is ready I am sure the next war will be on us. I therefore consider that Scotland's wisest policy is to declare for a Republic in Scotland, so that the youths of Scotland will not be forced out to die for England's markets. I accordingly stand out as a Scottish Republican candidate, feeling sure that if Scotland had to elect a Parliament to sit in Glasgow it would vote for a working class parliament. Such a Parlia- ment would have to use the might of the workers to force the land and the means of production in Scotland out of the grasp of the brutal few who control them, and place them at the full disposal of the community. The Social Revolution is possible sooner in Scotland than in England...Scottish separation is part of the process of England's imperial dis- integration and is a help towards the ultimate triumph of the workers of the world". MacLean, like the Bolsheviks made tactical use of the bourgeois elections but, like the Irish revolutionary nat- ionalists, said that if elected to the Westminster parlia- ment he would not go there but would stay in Scotland to lead the workers in establishing their own independent gov- ernment. Lenin's advice at the time was to support Labour "as the rope supports a hanged man". Similarly MacLean said in his Kinning Park election address of 1921 - "The Revolu- tion can be helped by Labour voting itself into power". He was not a parliamentarian but favoured the soviet form of

12. government - "We must have a rank and file dictatorship through delegates directly representative of the various workshops and industries" (from 'All Hail, the Scottish Workers' Republic!!'). He also warned against fascism, pointing out just before his death that "when the moment arrives...propertied class politicians will...send parlia- ment about its business". 27 The Communist Party of Great Britain also pursued a revolutionary Marxist-Leninist line until the 1950's when, along with a number of other parties including that of the Soviet Union after Stalin's death, it rejected the funda- mental teachings of Marxism on the need for violent revol- ution and proletarian dictatorship in favour of the trea- cherous parliamentary or "British Road to Socialism" and degenerated into a bourgeois party. At the same time the Soviet leadership embarked on a course of capitalist rest- oration and imperialist expansion under Kruschev and then Brezhnev. They have thus come full circle from rejecting Marxism including its teaching on the inevitability of wars between capitalist states upheld by Lenin, MacLean and other Marxists, to becoming the worst of war-mongers and violators of national rights themselves, under a vici- ous mask of 'detente' and 'internationalism'.28 Lenin and MacLean were revolutionary working class lea- ders, i.e. not the self-seeking misleaders who have sold out to the bourgeoisie for a few crumbs from their colon- ial super-profits, but "the most authoritative, influent- ial and experienced" representatives of their class, "the most advanced and resolute", tirelessly seeking to educate and organise the masses. Lenin's high opinion of MacLean is important because Lenin was the most outstanding inter- national revolutionary working class leader tempered in the particularly acute conditions of the struggle in Russia. MacLean's high opinion of Lenin is important because it shows how the fiercely independent and self-re- liant "beloved leader of the Scottish workers" recognised that the basic Marxist principles of the Great October Socialist Revolution apply in Scotland as elsewhere - "I stand in the Gorbals and before the world as a bolshevik, alias a communist, alias a revolutionist, alias a Marxist. My symbol is the Red Flag, and it I shall always keep floa- ting on high" (Gorbals Parliamentary Election Address, 1922) No 1. ci wa Ge Le be li Lu 2. de su th Bo 3. ai wi IV re sh on om Pa re in ag in SL wa io th 4. nm 5. J. 6. the Bo soc du 7. the

13. Notes. 1. Karl Liebknecht - son of the founder of the German So- cial-Democratic Party. Sentenced to 18 months before the war and to 4½ years hard labour during the war for opposing German imperialism. One of the founders of the Spartacus League and the German Communist Party. Supported the Octo- ber Revolution, called for German soviets and led the Ber- lin workers' uprising in January 1919. Together with Rosa Luxemburg murdered by German officers. 2. "I am not at all opposed to wars waged in defence of democracy or against national oppression, nor do I fear such words as 'defence of the fatherland' in reference to these wars or to insurrections" (Lenin, 'An Open Letter to Boris Souvarine', Works Vol. 23). 3. Although like many others Lenin often confuses 'Brit- ain' with 'England', he was aware of the different nations within the British state (see his 'State & Revolution', ch. IV pt. 4, where he refers to Engels support for a federal republic, and his later observations on the spread of Bol- shevism - "Of the three socialist parties in England, only one, the independent Socialist Labour Party, is openly bec- oming an ally of the Bolsheviks, while the Socialist Labour Party in Scotland definitely declares itself to be an adhe- rent of the Bolsheviks. Bolshevism is beginning to spread in England also", Works, Vol. XXIV. MacLean, incidentally, agreed with this analysis, initially trying to make the SLP in Scotland the nucleus of a Scottish Communist Party. The SLP founded by James Connolly and based mainly in Scotland was well known for its theoretical proficiency and reject- ion of trades union positions. Most of its members joined the C.P.G.B.). 4. Lenin is referring to the bourgeois Provisional Gover- nment which had replaced the Tsar in February 1917. 5. Pravda (Truth) - organ of the Bolsheviks edited by J.V. Stalin. 6. G. Plekhanov - one of the first Russian Marxists. When the Russian Marxists split in 1903, he first sided with the Bolsheviks but later went over to the Mensheviks, was a social-chauvinist (socialist in words, chauvinist in deeds) during the war and opposed the Soviet government. 7. 'Centrists' like Kautsky, Trotsky and Martov opposed the war in words but supported it in deeds by rejecting the

14. policy of turning the imperialist war into a revolutionary civil war, and calling for unity with the chauvinists. 8. David -- follower of Bernstein, the German revisionist of Marx. Social-chauvinist and member of the first bourge- ois republican government which suppressed the revolution in Germany in 1918. 9. Stockholm Conference - international socialist 'peace' conference proposed by the opportunist socialists in Germ- any and Russia in the interests of their own bourgeoisies who were not doing so well in the war, but rejected by the French opportunists at the behest of their bourgeoisie. The British Labour Party supported the conference, in the belief that their government would respond to the German feelers for peace, but they were not allowed to go leading to the resignation of one of their leaders, Arthur Hender- son, from the war cabinet. On the basis of the above anal- ysis the Bolsheviks opposed the conference. 10. MacDonald J. Ramsay - Labour Party leader; later first Labour prime minister and prime minister of the National Government. The passport was for the Stockholm Conference. 11. See V.I. Lenin, 'The Revolution of 1917', Works, Vol. XX, Book II, p.405. 12. Socialist-Revolutionary Party - Russian petty-bourge- ois party representing the rich peasants. Practised indi- vidual terrorism against Tsarism, supported the war and joined the foreign intervention against the Soviets. One of them shot Lenin, wounding him seriously. 13. Mensheviks -- ('minority'), opportunist Russian 'Marx- ists' who split with the Bolsheviks ('majority') on every decisive question such as Party organisation, revolutionary strategy and tactics, attitude to the poor peasantry and the liberal bourgeoisie, attitude to the war and the Prov- isional Government etc. After October 1917 joined the foreign intervention against the Soviets. 14. Novaya Zhizn (New Life) - paper of the International- ist Social-Democrats, a small group of intellectuals incl- uding Maxim Gorky, some of whom became Mensheviks and oth- ers (including Gorky) Bolsheviks. 15. Zimmerwald Conference - internationalist socialists' conference, Switzerland, Sept. 1915. Split between the Kautskyite majority and the revolutionary internationalists or 'Zimmerwald Left' headed by Lenin. The conference iss- ued a manifesto calling for opposition to imperialist war. 16. tra 17. Soc tis ice man Par unt sai the 18. ie; (Le er the ati Int liv ind dre 19. trac 20. cra Opp min. bri tion 21. Bri 22. figh Aust Sov Tran ant 23. mun ress acqu 24. stat

15. 16. 'Trade Unionist' - the publishers have been unable to trace this reference and would welcome any information. 17. British Socialist Party - formed in 1911 mainly from the Social-Democratic Party (formerly Federation - the first Bri- tish Marxist organisation founded in 1883). Its paper 'Just- ice' was the property of its extreme chauvinist leader Hynd- man and was replaced by 'the Call' when he split from the Party during the war. MacLean was a member of the SDF/BSP until 1920 when it initiated the formation of the CPGB. Lenin said the BSP was "not opportunist, and really independent of the Liberals". 18. Independent Labour Party - founded in 1893 by Keir Hard- ie; "independent of Socialism, but dependent upon liberalism" (Lenin). Opposed the war to begin with but later, under cov- er of pacifist phrases, supported the social-chauvinism of the Entente socialists. After Communist International's form- ation rank & file pressure forced it to withdraw from the 2nd International to which it returned after joining the short- lived 2½ International. It declined after the introduction of individual membership of the Labour Party from which it with- drew in 1932. 19. Russell Williams - the publishers have been unable to trace this reference and would welcome any information. 20. Friedrich Adler - secretary of the Austrian Social-Demo- cratic Party and son of its Kautskyist leader Victor Adler. Opposed the war and in 1916 assassinated the Austrian foreign minister Stuerck. Death sentence commuted to 17 years after a brilliant speech from the dock. Released in the 1918 Revolu- tion. Remained a social-democrat and fled Austria in 1934. 21. Maxim Litvinov - Bolshevik, first Soviet ambassador to Britain, later Soviet People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs. 22. This refers to the Czechoslovakian soldiers who had been fighting alongside the Russian army from 1914-17 against the Austro-Hungarian empire which ruled over their country. The Soviets allowed them to return to western Europe via the Trans-Siberian Railway but they were used on the way by the anti-Soviet foreign interventionists. 23. Loriot - member of Zimmerwald Left and later of the Com- munist Party of France; on presidium of Comintern 3rd Cong- ress; tried for high treason by French government in 1920 but acquitted; later deserted communism. 24. The impact of the war here too is shown by his pre-war statement - "It appears that these 'Dog Days' have afforded

16. young Scots an opportunity of airing their pet designs for a separate Parliament for Scotland. I should fancy that the sole aspirants to such a glorious ideal are the enthusiasts just indicated and those curious cranks whimsically styled 'the Scottish Patriots'. The rest of us are calmly indiff- erent...The means of communication, together with the means for the transport of commodities, enable all races to learn the latest ideas and use the most up-to-date commodities and machinery drawn from all ends of the earth, and the growth of international trusts is tending to bind even closer the races of mankind..." (Justice 27.7.12). 25. Helen Crawford - suffragette, member of the ILP and later foundation member of the CPGB. 26. He also objected to the lack of practical and theoret- ical self-reliance of the CPGB, and, while calling for a separate Scottish Party, wanted "Scottish workers to be joi- ned in ONE BIG INDUSTRIAL UNION with their British comrades" (Gorbals Parliamentary election address, 1922). 27. On another controversial question of the time - whether to affiliate to the Labour Party - MacLean, while a member of the SDF/BSP, was, like Lenin, in favour of affiliation while maintaining the independence of the Marxist party; and he stood as an official Labour candidate at the end of the war saying "it is better to send them to power and so test them in the light of experience" (& as he said of the Liber- als in 1910, "Our every experience proves that they do not step aside, that they fight us more immorally - with more contemptible lies - than even the Tories"). After his break with the BSP in 1920 and in view of his stand on Scottish independence as well as the changed attitude and constitut- ion of the Labour Party itself he must have regarded the issue as being a dead letter. 28. "Marxian words have in our day become a cover for the absolute renunciation of Marxism"..."socialism in words, imperialism in deeds, the growth of opportunism into imper- ialism" (Lenin). ** Printed and Published by :- THE WORKERS' PARTY OF SCOTLAND Marxist - Leninist. 270, Paisley Rd, Glasgow, G.5.