Marx and Engels on Revolution in America/Chapter 1
Marx and Engels
on
Revolution in America
By Heinz Neumann.
IN the imperialist epoch the United States assumed the role of the economically and politically predominating country of the bourgeoisie which England had played in the period of the capitalism of free competition. America is the most powerful mainstay of imperialism. The European revolution cannot be successful without the help of the masses of the American working class.
Leninism always combatted the theory of the Second International, according to which the course of the revolution in the various capitalist countries was dependent upon the "stage of development of the forces of production." Lenin demonstrated theoretically and practically that the proletariat is not first victorious in those countries where the productive forces are most highly developed, but in those countries where the world system of imperialism is weakest and the revolutionary forces of the proletariat and of its allied peasant masses are strongest.
But Lenin's theory of the proletarian revolution means more than this. In his polemic against Trotsky's theory of the permanent revolution, which maintained that the victory of the proletarian dictatorship in Russia was only possible "with the state aid of the working class in the more highly developed countries," Lenin pointed out repeatedly that the proletariat of the highly developed capitalist countries already become the strongest allies of the victorious proletariat in the backward countries even before the establishment of their own dictatorship. Not only the "state aid" but the very revolutionary struggle for the seizure of power in the capitalist countries renders the consolidation of the proletarian dictatorship possible and the development of socialism in the existing Soviet Republics.
When applied to the perspective of the European, especially of the Central European and primarily the German revolution, the Leninist theory requires the correct estimate of the role of the American proletariat and consequently the establishment of a revolutionary mass Party in America as a decisive factor in gaining and defending the dictatorship of the proletariat in Germany. The development of imperialism after the first world war made America the metropolis of the capitalist world. Germany and a constantly increasing number of other European states which formerly were amongst the older and dominant capitalist countries, sink to the level of economically and politically backward countries, to industrial colonies of American finance capital. Although these countries had already accomplished the bourgeois revolution a long time ago, they play a role with respect to American finance capital similar to that which Russia played with regard to West European capital.
The Dawes regime lends this development not only historical, but immediate political significance for Germany. The German proletariat can only then conquer in its fight against American Dawes' rule, if it be supported by an extensive revolutionary mass movement in America. As long as the rule of American finance capital does not meet with resistance in the metropolis itself, as long as the Communist Party of America remains a small sectarian party, as long as the great organizations of the American working class remain unchallenged in the hands of the representatives of the most reactionary labor aristocracy—in short, as long as no revolutionary mass Party exists in America—the strength of the German bourgeoisie, supported by American finance capital, and the difficulties of the German revolution, are increased ten-fold.
To deny this fact signifies the rejection of the Leninist viewpoint of the direct support of the revolution in comparatively backward countries, by the class struggle of the proletariat in the imperialist metropolis. It signifies renouncing the revolutionary estimate of the role of the American proletariat in the present stage of the European revolution, and the recognition of the Trotskyist theory of "state aid," which, as an inseparable component of the theory of the "permanent revolution," in this case ends in nothing else but Kautsky's "doctrine of productive forces."
Marx and Engels clearly realized the future role of America in the class strugle of the proletariat. In his third preface to the "Communist Manifesto" in 1883, Engels stated: "The limited extent of the spread of the proletarian movement at the time the Manifesto was first published (January, 1848), is best demonstrated by the last chapter: 'The Attitude of the Communists of the Various Opposition Parties.' First of all, Russia and the United States are missing in this chapter…" Engels calls both countries "the great reserve of European reaction." He recalls the period "in which emigration to the United States absorbed the surplus of the European proletariat." The United States, like Russia, supplied "Europe with raw materials, and at the same time served as a market for the sale of the latter's industrial products." Engles then continues:
"How all this has changed today! European emigration has rendered possible the colossal development of North American agriculture, Which, through its competition, is shaking the foundations of large as well as small land ownership in Europe. At the same time it enabled the United States to begin with the exploitation of its rich industrial resources with such energy and upon such a scale THAT WITHIN A SHORT PERIOD THE INDUSTRIAL MONOPOLY OF WESTERN EUROPE MUST BE BROKEN. (Emphasis here, as well as in all following quotations, mine—H. N.)
"And both these circumstances REACT UPON AMERICA IN A REVOLUTIONARY DIRECTION. The small and medium property of the farmer working for himself, the foundation of America's whole political system, fails more and more victim to the competition of the giant farms, while at the same time, is formed for the first time a NUMEROUS PROLETARIAT in the industrial districts together with a FABULOUS CONCENTRATION OF CAPITAL."
This utterance immediately precedes the famous prophecy that "the Russian revolution will be the signal for a workers' revolution in the West." Both of these statements fall in that period of Engels' work, in which he had already recognized the decisive changes characterizing the transformation from the capitalism of free competition to imperialism. With the Paris Commune, the period of the First International had to all intents concluded, although it continued to exist formally. Marx and Engels continue to view the problems of the labor movement from the standpoint of the basic principles of the International Working Men's Association. However, at the same time, they seek a new form of labor movement which, corresponding with the changed historical form of development of capitalism itself, rises above the level of the past. In "The Civil War in France" and in the "Letters to Kugelmann," the Marxian theory of the State is developed to its utmost issue; at the same time the leading role of the Communist Party in the struggle of the proletariat is definitely expressed. Lenin always refers to these works in his own writings; he looked to them for guidance upon the most important problems of the proletarian revolution. There is no doubt that the passages in the correspondence of Marx and Engels dealing with the American labor movement ought to come under this head. These letters cover the historical content of an entire generation—from 1868 to 1895.
Leninism is not, as several opportunists maintain, only a sub-division of Marxism. It is neither the Marxism of the "early period" nor the Marxism of the "mature period." Leninism is the whole of Marxism in the epoch of imperialism and of the proletarian revolution. But no Chinese wall separates the epoch of imperialism from the epoch of the capitalism of free competition. Between the epoch of the bourgeois-democratic revolution and the epoch of the proletarian world revolution there lie no insuperable barriers. Between them there lies a period of transition. In the ranks of revolutionary Marxism this period of transition in its broadest sense is embodied in the left, revolutionary wing of the Second International. In a narrow sense it is expressed in the work of Marx's and Engels' concluding years, which historically already tower over the period prior to the Paris Commune and almost directly intertwine with the foundations of Leninism.
For this reason it is not admissable to consider the statements of Marx and Engels upon the problems of the American labor movement as "quotations from a bygone period." They belong rather, to the tactical doctrines of Marx and Engels, which on all essentials of method agree with the tactics of Lenin and which in the main still apply today to the problems of our tactics.