Date: Sat, 17 Feb 1996 09:31:42 -0800
From: James Miller <jamiller-AT-igc.apc.org>
Subject: SWP


ON THE SWP

   Recently Lisa Rogers posted a message asserting that
SWP members were required to choose companions or marriage
partners from within the SWP or YS. This is not true. There
are many SWP members who have wives, husbands, companions
or partners who are not in the SWP.
   People who disagree with the SWP would make a better
case if they avoided slander of this type. It only reflects
on the slanderer.
   The SWP is a democratic centralist organization. It is
democratic in the sense that its program is decided by
majority vote of democratically-elected delegates at a
convention held every two years. Its leadership is also
elected by the convention delegates. It is centralist in
the sense that all members are required to abide by the
decisions of the convention.
   Other groups on the left, such as the Committees of
Correspondence, do not adhere to centralist principles.
They do not attempt to train their members as disciplined
members of a Leninist combat party. As such, they are
primarily discussion groups.
   There is certainly nothing wrong with a discussion
group, and I would not dissuade anyone from joining one.
At the same time, however, I think it would be unfair to
criticize the SWP for attempting to organize a party on
Leninist principles.

ON TROTSKY

   The SWP was formed by a group of Communists expelled
from the Communist Party in 1928. They were expelled as
a result of their support of Trotsky's fight to reverse
the rightward course of the Comintern and Soviet CP
leadership. The SWP politically collaborated with Trotsky
until his murder by a Kremlin agent in 1940.
   In an article entitled "Their Trotsky and Ours," by
Jack Barnes, printed in New International, No. 1, in 1983,
an assessment is made of Trotsky's contributions to the
revolutionary movement. The article argues that Trotsky's
opposition to Lenin before 1917 was mistaken. However,
once Trotsky joined the Bolsheviks in April, 1917, he
overcame his errors, and remained a Bolshevik-Leninist
from that time until his death.
   The article also explains what is meant by the theory
of permanent revolution, and characterizes it as, in
certain respects, ultraleft. Trotsky's explanation of
the Stalinist degeneration of the Russian revolution,
however, as laid out in _The Revolution Betrayed_, stands
today as the best Marxist source for the explanation of
this development.
   Further, Trotsky's _History of the Russian Revolution_
remains unsurpassed, both in the theoretical insights
provided, as well as in its captivating style. There is
no substitute for this book.

Jim Miller
Seattle


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