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political party. But really there is no contradiction, for non-party does not mean non-political and to the extent that a trade union participates in a political struggle—and it cannot do anything else but participate—it must march under the banner and accept the platform of some political party, and as the political struggle is a class struggle, and the trade unions embracing millions of the proletariat cannot remain outside of the class struggle, particularly in the period of social revolution and the direct struggle of the working class for power—the Russian trade unions not only took part in the political struggle, but repeatedly declared their solidarity with that party which more than any expressed the interests of the working class—the bolshevik party.
Relations with the Communist Party.
Neither the congresses nor conferences demanded, of course, that the trade unions should accept the programme of the Russian communist party, but they worked out a definite programme of revolutionary action which every union as a member of the social family was obliged to carry out if it desired to remain within the trade union movement. Non-party organisation does not mean indefiniteness, still less indifference to passing events. For that reason the second congress in one of its resolutions declares: "uniting workers and employees in unions independently of their political or religious convictions, the Russian trade union movement while standing on the ground of international class struggle resolutely condemns the idea of 'neutrality' and considers it is a necessary condition for every union joining an All-Russian organisation to 'recognise the revolutionary class struggle for the realisation of socialism by means of the dictatorship of the proletariat.'"
The second Congress formally confirmed what was already a fact that in the period of acute class struggle there cannot but be organic connection between the trade unions and the dictatorship of the proletariat whose main support they are. This decision was attached to the rules of trade union discipline which are the normal obligations for all the unions. The first item in these rules states: "Organising and attracting the labour masses in the work of socialist construction the trade union. … has for its aim the realisation of socialism by means of the dictatorship of the proletariat." The intellectual hegemony of the programme and the tactics of the Russian communist party could not be more clearly expressed.
Unity of the Political and Industrial Movement.
We saw that the first two congresses adopted the point of view of the Bolsheviks, but the organised connection between the trade unions and the communist party made it particularly self-evident at the third trade union congress. The third congress began with the recognition of the hegemony of the Russian communist party and in its first resolution asserted that "the trade unions as a whole, standing on the platform of the realisation of communism through the dictatorship of the proletariat, are indivertibly guided in their activity in the proletarian revolution by the Russian Communist Party."
