William Z. Foster

“ Their policy of excluding Negroes from the unions, of barring their advance to better jobs in industry, and of generally feeding the race prejudices of the whites, dovetails exactly with the aim of the employers to drive the Negro worker into scabbery.
This program of the employers, the strike strategist must relentlessly combat. At all costs the Negro workers must be united with the whites to make common cause against the exploiters. But this can only be accomplished by complete suppression of race antagonism in the trade unions and by a loyal defense of the Negro workers' interests. ”

“ A prime objective of ours is to clarify the aims of the present scattered, blind strikes of the workers, to raise them above purely economic ends, and to unite them all into a broad political attack against the entire capitalist system. Consequently, we must fight for a break with the old capitalist parties and utilize every strike to further the movement for the creation of a mass political party of the workers, the labor party. ”

“ In the old days when an employer proceeded to cut labor costs radically he did it openly and brusquely, usually in the form of a sweeping wage cut going into effect on a certain date. Result, always a universal protest and indignation on the part of the workers and often a bitter strike. But now the employers cut their labor costs in much more and subtle ways. Often they accomplish the same ends as a wage cut by speeding up their workers, which is easy for them to do in present-day industry. ”

“ The essence of good leadership in strike situations is to conduct a successful fight to establish and maintain the unity of the strikers in the face of innumerable splitting and disintegrating tendencies. The fighting policy of the employers aganst the workers is well-expressed by the time-honored axiom of all strategists, "Divide and Conquer." And their ways to divide and weaken the workers are many, devious, and difficult to defeat. ”

“ They strike enthusiastically in a body. In the early stages of great struggles (such as those of the railroad shopmen, Lawrence and Passaic textile workers, etc.) , something of this same burning wave of solidarity sweeps through vast categories of workers not directly in the fight. The dramatic struggles going on in their industry inspires them with a sense of their own wrongs, fires them to fight to redress their own grievances and those of their class brothers already in the fight. It is a strike contagion, a spreading revolt of the workers. ”

“ When dealing with such open ruptures, the left-wing must stir the whole labor movement to its depths to lend its maximum support, moral, financial, industrial, and political to the attacked workers. If this is done the capitalists will often find the game not worth the candle, to provoke a costly upheaval among the broad masses for the sake of brutally oppressing one small section. ”

“ In a situation demanding the quick building of a skeleton of a union and the early launching of a strike they waste their efforts trying to perfect an organization in detail before beginning the wage struggle. They overstress mere organization and understress the thing that labor organization is built for, the fight to defend the workers' interests. To quote from my pamphlet, "Organize the Unorganized:"
The future trade unions of the great unorganized industries will be born in the heat of the struggle against the employers over the demands of the workers. ”

“ It must study carefully every mass strike or other movement of the workers and learn their lessons. It must be courageous, militant, and flexible in its policies. It must know how to struggle for power in the unions, before, during, and after strikes. It must work consistently for the building up of an energetic and capable trade union leadership, defeating on the one hand, tendencies towards a merely opportunistic scramble for union office, and on the other hand, the ultra-leftism which looks upon all office holders in trade unions, whether good or bad, as parasites and grafters. ”

“ When partial settlements serve the general strategical aim of splitting the ranks of the employers and enable the workers to play off one section of them against the others they are tactically advisable. Then it is a case of making one group of capitalists scab on the rest. But when these settlements weaken or divide the workers' ranks, or compromise the political purposes of a great strike they must be rigidly avoided. ”

“ American capitalism is strong but the workers can thwart it with correct policies and proletarian determination. The pressure of capitalist exploitation forces the workers to unite regardless of all obstacles. They tend to forget their differences and to see clearly the powerful enemy, who can be defeated only by united action. It is our task to speed up these unifying tendencies, to help the workers to rise superior to every difference and weakness among them. ”

“ Craft unionism and craft strikes can no longer cope with American capitalism. The workers' fighting front must be broadened out to cover an industry or whole group of industries. Such a situation as that in the railroad shop mechanics' strike of 1922 when nine of the sixteen railroad craft unions stayed at work and helped to break the strike of the seven which struck, is a crime against the working class. ”

“ While realizing that a favorable public opinion is a valuable asset and while maneuvering skilfully to create it, the left wing must never forget that the strike can only be won by a successful fighting policy. ”

“ There are some left wingers who, victims of this illusion, claim that "the workers cannot fight on two fronts at the same time;" that is against the employers and the right wing simultaneously. Hence, when they fight the employers they refuse to struggle against the reactionary bureaucracy, and vice versa.
These workers make the serious mistake of not realizing that the employers and the right wing constitute pretty much one front against the rebellious masses of workers and the organized left wing. If there are two fronts, they are two fronts of the employers’ forces. ”

“ When the workers of a given country in a deep crisis, as in Great Britain, declare a general strike in all the key and basic industries it constitutes a direct challenge to the ruling class and its state. ”

“ The workers are always confronted with the practical question, "Are we in a position to strike successfully, or must we settle?" This vital question can be answered correctly only if they penetrate the employers' elaborate system of bluff, get a line on their real position, and thus base their policy upon actualities. A correct grasp of the forces at play is the foundation of strategy, no less at the conference table than in actual strikes. ”

“ These reformists, who are opposed on principle to directly attacking capitalism, have always rejected such a drastic weapon as the general strike and are only too eager to seize the slightest pretext to discredit it. In reality, the general strike is one of the most powerful of the workers’ weapons. ”

“ The degree to which the employers use this great instrument of legalized violence against the workers depends upon the urgency of their need.
If the strike is a small one they may confine their violence to the thuggery of their private plug-uglies and local police. If the strike is more important they will call in the courts, with their train of injunctions, jails, and the rest of it. And if the strike is a great one of far-reaching political significance they will use the troops if need be to crush it. Ever and always when they need it they use the state against the workers. ”

“ THE most fundamental phases of our strike strategy relate to the mass of workers now unorganized. Great battles will be waged by these workers in the future, and in the process of which they will be mobilized into labor unions. This will have the most profound effects upon the trade union movement. It will proletarianize and revolutionize it. It will shift its leadership radically to the left. It will transfer the center of gravity of the movement from the skilled trades and light industries to the unskilled and semi-skilled in the key and basic industries. ”

“ On their side, the workers have as their great weapon the cutting off of the employer's supply of labor-power. They seek to keep his plants shut down until his greed for profits, or the pressure from other capitalists who need his products, compels him to come to terms. But in order to do this they must be able to maintain an unbroken solidarity in the face of all the employer's many attacks, open and insidious. This is the chief objective of strike strategy during the heat of the open struggle. ”

“ Ample experience teaches us that by depending on money alone we cannot win, except in the case of a few highly skilled and thoroly organized trades, especially in these days of an enormously enriched and strengthened capitalism. It is altogether impossible to win through strike funds when great masses of the unorganized are on strike. Take for example, the strike of 400,000 steel workers. What chance was there to pay benefits in such a situation? Millions would have had to be poured into the strike weekly. Or, consider a national strike of coal miners or railroad workers. ”

“ In military strategy it is a basic principle to follow up the victory by pursuing and destroying the defeated and disorganized enemy. All great generals of history have been masters of this strategy of the militant offensive. Working class strike strategists, patterning after the brilliant Lenin, must also learn to apply its general principles in the class struggle. It will be by the supreme application of this strategy some day against a weakened and demoralized employing class that the American workers will take their first great step toward emancipation, by abolishing the capitalist system. ”

“ In organizing campaigns and strikes the workers should make demands not only upon the employers but also upon the reactionary bureaucrats where these control the unions. This is a very important consideration for the strike strategist to bear in mind. When unions are about to plunge into a great struggle or are already in the midst of it, their weaknesses are apparent and demands for the strengthening of the organization by amalgamation, by taking in the unskilled, by democratization, or by the elimination of corruption, are especially forceful. ”

“ THE class war between employers and workers over the product of Labor goes on without letup. "Settlements" in wage movements, whether these are accompanied by strikes or not, are at best only truces in the ceaseless struggle, only turning points where the struggle takes on new forms. ”

“ They are skirmishes in the great class war, foreshadowings of the final struggle which will abolish capitalism.
During strikes, workers are in an especially militant and rebellious mood. They are then highly receptive of revolutionary ideas. It is then above all that they can and must be taught the full implications of their struggle. To rouse the class consciousness of the workers and to educate them to understand the class struggle and the historic mission of the working class is always a first consideration in strike strategy. ”

“ Hence, in all strikes our strike strategy must aim at enlisting the co-operation and active participation of the women. They must be inducted into the strike machinery and the general strike activities; they, must be organized into housewives' unions. Thoroly aroused women possess an indomitable spirit. They make strikers unconquerable. Innumerable strikes among the miners and textile workers testify to their splendid fighting qualities. No strike can afford to dispense with this important reserve. ”

“ For the building of a strong strike morale we must base our strike strategy on the theory of fighting upon the offensive. We must attack always, or at the worst be preparing to attack. This theory applies as well to the class war in industry as to military war on the battlefield. The workers, like soldiers, (and they are the same human beings and subject to the same psychological laws) fight best on the offensive. They are then fired with a sense of power and victory; defensive fighting demoralizes them and fills them with defeatism. ”