Mastering Communist Work

#PUBLICATION NOTE

This edition of Mastering Communist Work has been prepared and revised for digital publication by the Institute of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism under the Central Committee of the Communist Party in Switzerland on the basis of the edition published in the pamphlet Mastering Bolshevism, Workers' Library Publishers, New York City, 1937.

#INTRODUCTION NOTE

This is a speech delivered by Comrade I.B. Stalin at the Tenth Plenary Session of the 17th Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Council Union (Majority) in reply to the discussion of his report, Defects in Party Work and Measures for Liquidating Trotskijite and Other Double-Dealers.

#Workers and oppressed people of the world, unite!

#MASTERING COMMUNIST WORK

#REPLY TO THE DISCUSSION AT THE TENTH PLENARY SESSION OF THE 17TH CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF THE COUNCIL UNION (MAJORITY)

#I.B. Stalin

#5th of March, 1937

#★

Comrades:

I spoke in my report about the fundamental questions of the matter under discussion. The discussion has shown that we now have complete clarity, have an understanding of our tasks, and that there is a readiness to liquidate the shortcomings of our work. But the discussion has also shown that there are some concrete questions of our organizational and political practice on which we have not as yet a completely clear understanding. Of these questions, I have counted seven.

Allow me to say a few words on these questions.

#1. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO STRENGTHEN THE PARTY'S POLITICAL WORK?

It is to be supposed that all have now understood and have realized that to become excessively engrossed in economic campaigns and economic successes while underestimating and forgetting Party political problems leads up a blind alley. Consequently, it is necessary to turn the attention of our workers toward Party political questions, so that economic successes will be combined with and accompany successes in Party political work.

How in practice is the task of strengthening the Party political work, the task of freeing the Party organizations from economic details, to be carried out? As can be seen from the discussion, some comrades are prone to draw the incorrect conclusions that we should now get away altogether from economic work. At any rate, there were voices sounding this note: «Well, now, thank God, we shall be rid of economic matters, now we can busy ourselves with Party political work.»

Is this conclusion correct? No, it is not. When our Party comrades, carried away with economic successes, moved away from politics, this was an extreme which cost us big sacrifices. If some of our comrades, taking up the task of strengthening Party political work, now think of moving away from economy, this will be the other extreme, which will cost us no fewer sacrifices. You must not jump from one extreme to another. You must not separate politics from economy, just as we cannot move away from politics.

For convenience in study, people usually separate the methodological questions of economy from the questions of politics. But this is done merely from the standpoint of method, artificially, only for the convenience of study. But in life, on the contrary, politics and economy are in practice inseparable. They exist together. And anyone who thinks to separate economy from politics in our practical policy, to strengthen economic work at the cost of belittling political work or, contrariwise, to strengthen political work at the cost of belittling economic work, will inevitably find themself up a blind alley.

The particular point in the draft resolution on the freeing of Party organizations from economic details and the strengthening of Party political work does not mean moving away from economic work and economic leadership. It means, simply, no longer to permit the practice of supplanting and usurping economic bodies, among them especially agricultural bodies, by our Party organizations. Consequently, it is necessary to master the method of Majoritarian leadership of economic bodies, which lies in systematically helping these bodies, systematically strengthening them, and guiding economy, not over the heads of these bodies, but through them. The economic bodies, and, in the first place, the agricultural bodies, must be given the best people.

These bodies must receive fresh staffs, consisting of the best workers capable of carrying out the tasks assigned to them. Only after this work has been done will it be possible to count on the Party organizations being completely freed from economic details. This is a serious matter, of course, and requires a certain length of time. But until it is done, the Party organizations, for a definite short period, will still have to occupy themselves closely with agricultural affairs, with all their details: plowing, sowing, harvesting, and so on.

#2. A FEW WORDS ABOUT WRECKERS, DIVERSIONISTS, AND SPIES

It is now clear for all, I think, that the present-day wreckers and diversionists, no matter what flag they use to cover themselves, the Trotskijite or the Buharinite flag, have long since ceased to be a political trend in the working-class movement, that they have turned into a gang of professional wreckers, diversionists, spies, and murderers, devoid of principles and ideas. Of course, these «excellencies» will have to be smashed and ruthlessly uprooted as enemies of the working class, as traitors to our country. This is clear and does not require further explanation.

But here is the question — how to carry out in practice the task of smashing and uprooting the German-Japanese agents of Trotskijism. Does this mean that we should strike and uproot not only the real Trotskijites, but also those who wavered at some time toward Trotskijism, and then long ago came away from Trotskijism; not only those who are really Trotskijite agents for wrecking, but also those who happened once upon a time to go along a street where some Trotskijite or other had once passed? At any rate, such voices were heard here at the Plenary Session. Can we consider such an interpretation of the resolution to be correct? No, we cannot consider it to be correct.

On this question, as on all other questions, there must be an individual, differentiated approach. You must not measure everyone with the same yardstick. Such a sweeping approach can only harm the cause of struggle against the real Trotskijite wreckers and spies.

Among our responsible comrades, there are a certain number of former Trotskijites who left Trotskijism long ago, and now fight against Trotskijism not worse but better than some of our respected comrades who never chanced to waver toward Trotskijism. It would be foolish to vilify such comrades now.

Among our comrades, there are also those who always stood against Trotskijism ideologically, but, in spite of this, kept up personal contacts with individual Trotskijites, which they did not delay in liquidating as soon as the actual visage of Trotskijism became clear to them. It is, of course, not a good thing that they did not break off their personal friendly connections with individual Trotskijites at once, but belatedly. But it would be silly to lump such comrades together with the Trotskijites.

#3. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO SELECT WORKERS CORRECTLY AND TO DISTRIBUTE THEM CORRECTLY AT WORK?

This means to select workers, in the first place, according to a political criterion — that is, are they worthy of political trust? And, in the second place, according to a practical criterion — that is, are they suitable for such and such concrete work?

This does not mean to convert a businesslike approach into a «businessperson's» approach, in which people are interested in the practical qualities of workers, but are not interested in their political physiognomy.

This does not mean to convert a political approach into the single and all-embracing approach. in which people are interested in the political physiognomy of workers, but are not interested in their practical qualifications.

Can it be said that this Majoritarian rule is carried out by our Party comrades? Unfortunately, it cannot be said. It has already been spoken of here at the Plenary Session. But not everything was said. The fact is that this well-tried rule is violated right and left in our practice and, moreover, in the grossest way. Most frequently, workers are selected not according to objective criteria, but according to accidental, subjective, narrow, and provincial criteria. Most frequently so-called acquaintances are chosen, personal friends, fellow townspeople, people who have shown personal devotion, masters of eulogies to their patrons, irrespective of whether they are suitable from a political and a businesslike standpoint.

Naturally, instead of a leading group of responsible workers, a family group, a company, is formed, the members of which try to live peacefully, not to offend each other, not to wash their dirty linen in public, to eulogize each other, and, from time to time, to send inane and nauseating reports to the centre about successes.

It is not difficult to understand that, in such conditions of kinship, there can be no place either for criticism of the shortcomings of the work, or for self-criticism by the directors of the work.

Naturally, such conditions of kinship create a favorable environment for generating bootlickers, people without any sense of dignity, and therefore having nothing in common with Majoritarianism.

Take, for example, Comrades Mirzojan and Vainov. The former is Secretary of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan; the latter is Secretary of the Jaroslav Regional Party Committee. These people are not the most backward workers in our midst. And how do they select workers?

The former dragged along with him from Azerbaijan and the Urals, where he formerly worked, into Kazakhstan 30 or 40 of his «own» people, and placed them in responsible posts in Kazakhstan.

The latter dragged along with him from the Donbas, where he formerly worked, to Jaroslav a dozen or so of his «own» people also, and also placed them in responsible posts. Consequently, Comrade Mirzojan has his own crew. Comrade Vainov also has his.

Was it really impossible to select workers from the local people, being guided by the well-known Majoritarian rule on the selection and placing of people? Of course, it was possible. Why then did they not do so? Because the Majoritarian rule for the selection of workers excludes the possibility of a narrow parochial approach, excludes the possibility of workers being selected according to criteria of kinship and being «one of the gang». In addition, when selecting personally devoted people as workers, these comrades evidently have wanted to create for themselves conditions which give them a certain independence both of the local people and of the Central Committee of the Party.

Let us suppose that Comrades Mirzojan and Vainov, owing to some circumstances or other, are transferred from their present place of work to some other place. How should they act in such a case regarding their «tails»? Will they really have to drag them along once more to their new place of work?

This is the absurdity resulting from the violation of the Majoritarian rule on the correct selection and distribution of workers.

#4. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO VERIFY WORKERS AND TO CHECK UP ON THE FULFILMENT OF TASKS?

To verify workers means to check up, not on their promises and declarations, but on the result of their work.

To verify the fulfilment of tasks means to check up on them, not only in the office and not only according to formal reports, but first and foremost to check up on them at their place of work, according to the actual results of fulfilment.

Do we need such a verification in general? Undoubtedly we do. We need it, in the first place, because only such a check-up will make it possible to know a worker, to determine their real qualities. We need it, in the second place, because only such a verification will make it possible to determine the good qualities and shortcomings of the executive apparatus. We need it, in the third place, because only such a check-up will make it possible to determine the good qualities and shortcomings of the tasks themselves.

Some comrades think that people can only be checked up on from above, when the directors check up on subordinates, on the results of their work. This is not true. Check-up from above is necessary, of course, as one of the effective measures for verifying people and checking up the fulfilment of tasks. But verification from above does not exhaust by far the whole business of verification. There is still another kind of verification, the check-up from below, in which the masses, the subordinates, verify the directors, point out their mistakes, and show the way of correcting them. This kind of verification is one of the most effective methods of checking up on people.

The rank-and-file members verify their directors at meetings of Party militants, at conferences and congresses, by listening to their reports, by criticizing defects, and, finally, by electing or not electing some or other leading comrades to the leading Party bodies. Precise operation of democratic centralism in the Party as demanded by our Party Rules, unconditional election of Party bodies, the right to put forward and to withdraw candidates, the secret ballot, and freedom of criticism and self-criticism — all these and similar measures must be carried into life, in order to facilitate the check-up on, and control over, the directors of the Party by the Party militants.

The non-Party masses check their economic, trade-union, and other directors at meetings of non-Party activists, at all kinds of mass conferences, where they hear reports of their directors, criticize defects, and indicate ways or correcting them. Finally, the people check directors of the country during the elections to the Council Union bodies of power, through universal, equal, direct, and secret ballot.

The task is to link up the check from above with that from below.

#5. WHAT DOES IT MAIN TO TRAIN CADRES ON THE BASIS OF THEIR OWN MISTAKES?

Lenin taught us that one of the surest means of correctly training and educating Party cadres, of correctly training and educating the working class and the masses of the working people, is to disclose conscientiously the mistakes of the Party, to study the causes that have given rise to these mistakes, and to indicate the paths necessary for overcoming these mistakes.

Lenin said:

The attitude of a political party toward its own mistakes is one of the most important and surest ways of judging how earnest the political party is and how it fulfils in practice its obligations toward its class and the working people. Frankly acknowledging a mistake, ascertaining the reasons for it, analysing the conditions that have led up to it, and thrashing out the means of its rectification — that is the hallmark of a serious political party; that is how it should perform its duties, and how it should educate and train its class, and then the masses.¹

This means that the Majoritarians are in duty bound not to gloss over their mistakes, not to dodge the question of their mistakes, as often happens with us, but honestly and openly to admit their mistakes, honestly and openly to indicate the way of correcting these mistakes, honestly and openly to correct them.

I would not say that many of our comrades undertake this business with satisfaction. But, if the Majoritarians really wish to be Majoritarians, they must find sufficient manliness in themselves openly to admit their mistakes, to reveal their causes, to indicate the way of correcting them, and thereby to give the Party cadres correct training and correct political education.

For it is only on this path, only by open and honest self-criticism, that Majoritarian cadres really can be educated, that real Majoritarian directors can be educated.

Two examples will illustrate the correctness of Lenin's thesis.

Let us take, as one example, our mistakes connected with the construction of the collective farms. You remember, I imagine, the year 1930, when our Party comrades thought of solving the very complicated question of transferring the peasantry to the construction of collective farms in some three to four months, and when the Central Committee of the Party found itself compelled to put a check upon comrades who were being carried away. This was one of the most dangerous periods in the life of our Party. The mistake lay in this: that our Party comrades forgot the voluntary character of the construction of collective farms, forgot that the peasants must not be transferred to the collective farm path by administrative pressure, forgot that the construction of collective farms required, not several months, but several years of careful and well-planned work.

They forgot all this, and did not want to admit their mistakes. You remember, I imagine, that the directives of the Central Committee regarding dizziness from success, and that our comrades in the localities should not leap ahead, ignoring the actual state of affairs, were met with hostility. But this did not prevent the Central Committee from going against the tide, and turning our Party comrades onto the right road. Well, then?

It is now clear to everybody that the Party achieved what it wanted by turning our Party comrades onto the right road. We now have tens of thousands of splendid peasant cadres engaged in the construction of collective farms, and, in their leadership, these cadres grew up and were trained on the basis of the mistakes of 1930. But we would not now have had these cadres had not the Party then recognized these mistakes and corrected them in time.

The other example is from the field of industrial construction. I have in mind our mistakes in the Sahty wrecking period. Our mistakes lay in the fact that we did not take into account all the dangers of the technical backwardness of our cadres in industry, that we put up with this backwardness, and thought of developing socialist industrial construction on a wide scale with the inimically inclined specialists, dooming our economic cadres to play the part of poor commissars for the bourgeois specialists.

You remember, I imagine, how unwilling our economic cadres were to recognize their mistakes at that time; how unwilling they were to recognize their own technical backwardness, and with what difficulty they assimilated the slogan: «Master technique!» Well, then, the facts go to show that the slogan «Master technique!» had its effects, and produced its good results. We now have tens and hundreds of thousands of splendid Majoritarian economic cadres, who have already mastered technique and are advancing our industry. But we would not now have these cadres had the Party not risen to the occasion, in the face of the obduracy of the economic executives who did not want to admit their technical backwardness, had not the Party then recognized its mistakes and corrected them in time.

Some comrades say that it is not advisable to speak openly of one's mistakes, since the open admission of one's mistakes may be construed by our enemies as weakness and may be utilized by them.

This is rubbish, comrades, downright rubbish. The open recognition of our mistakes and their honest rectification can, on the contrary, only strengthen our Party, raise its authority in the eyes of the workers, peasants, and working intellectuals, and increase the strength and power of our State. And this is the main thing. As long as we have the workers, peasants and working intellectuals with us, all the rest will settle itself.

Other comrades say that the open admission of our mistakes can lead, not to training and consolidating our cadres, but to weakening and disconcerting them; that we must spare and take care of our cadres; that we must spare their self-esteem and tranquility. To this end, they proposed to slur over the mistakes of our comrades, to weaken the vigour and the criticism, and, still better, to disregard these mistakes. Such a line is not only fundamentally incorrect, but also dangerous in the highest degree — dangerous, first and foremost, for the cadres whom they want to «spare» and «take care of».

To spare and preserve cadres by slurring over their mistakes means certainly to ruin these very cadres. We would surely have ruined our collective-farm Majoritarian cadres had we not revealed the mistakes of the year 1930, and had we not trained them on the basis of these mistakes. We would certainly have ruined our industrial Majoritarian cadres had we not revealed the mistakes of our comrades in the Sahty wrecking period, and had we not trained our industrial cadres on the basis of these mistakes. Anyone who expects to spare the self-esteem of our cadres by slurring over their mistakes ruins both the cadres and their self-esteem, for, by slurring over their mistakes, they facilitate the repetition of new and perhaps more serious mistakes, which, one may presume, will lead to the complete downfall of the cadres, to the detriment of their «self-esteem» and «tranquility».

#6. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO LEARN FROM THE MASSES AND TO LEAD CORRECTLY?

Lenin taught us, not only to teach the masses, but also to learn from them.

What does this mean?

It means, first, that we directors must not become conceited; and we must understand that if we are members of the Central Committee or are people's commissars, this does not mean that we possess all the knowledge for giving correct leadership. An official post by itself does not provide knowledge and experience. This is still more the case in respect to a title.

This means, second, that our experience alone, the experience of directors, is insufficient to give correct leadership; that, consequently, it is necessary that one's experience, the experience of directors, be supplemented by the experience of the masses, by the experience of the Party militants, by the experience of the working class, by the experience of the people.

This means, third, that we must not for one moment weaken, and still less break, our connection with the masses.

This means, fourth, that we must pay careful attention to the voice of the masses, to the voice of the Party militants, to the voice of the so-called «little people», to the voice of the people.

What does it mean — to lead correctly?

This does not at all mean sitting in one's office and compiling directives.

To lead correctly means:

• First, to find a correct solution of the question. But a correct solution cannot be found unless account is taken of the experience of the masses, who test the results of our leadership on their own backs.
• Second, to organize the operation of the correct solution, which, however, cannot be done without direct aid from the masses.
• Third, to organize a check on the fulfilment of this decision, which, again, cannot be done without the direct aid of the masses.

We directors see things, events, and people from one side only; I would say, from above. Our field of vision, consequently, is more or less limited.

The masses, on the contrary, see things, events, and people from another side; I would say, from below. Their field of vision, consequently, is also in a certain degree limited. To receive a correct solution to the question, these two experiences must be united. Only in such a case will the leadership be correct.

This is what it means not only to teach the masses, but also to learn from them.

Two examples to illustrate the correctness of this thesis of Lenin's:

It happened several years ago. We members of the Central Committee had discussed the question of improving the situation in the Don Basin. The draft of measures presented by the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry was clearly unsatisfactory. The draft was returned to the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry three times. Three times, we received different drafts from the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry. And still, they could not be considered satisfactory. Finally we decided to call in several workers and rank-and-file economic and trade-union officials from the Don Basin.

For three days, we conversed with these comrades. And all of us, members of the Central Committee, had to recognize that only they, the rank-and-file workers, these «little people», had succeeded in providing us with a correct solution. You remember, I imagine, the well-known decision of the Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars regarding the measures for increasing the output of coal in the Don Basin. Well, this decision of the Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars, which was admitted by all our comrades to be a correct and even notable decision, was suggested to us by simple people from below.

Another example I have in mind is the example of Comrade Nikolaenko.

Who is Nikolaenko? Nikolaenko is a Party militant. She is an ordinary «little person». For a whole year, she gave warning signals as to the bad situation in the Kyiv Party organization, exposed the prevalence of family favouritism, the narrow and provincial approach to workers, the suppression of self-criticism and the predominance of Trotskijite wreckers. She was shunned as though she were an annoying fly. Finally, in order to rid themselves of her, they expelled her from the Party.

Neither the Kyiv organization nor the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine helped her to achieve the truth. It was only the interference of the Central Committee of the Party that helped to unravel this confused knot. And what emerged after the examination of the affair? It emerged that Nikolaenko was right, while the Kyiv organization was wrong. Neither more nor less. And who is this Nikolaenko? She was not, of course, a member of the Central Committee. She was not a People's Commissar, nor the secretary of the Kyiv Regional Committee. She was not even secretary of some Party branch. She was only a simple Party militant.

As you see, simple people sometimes prove to be far nearer to the truth than some highly placed institutions.

One could give tens and hundreds of such examples.

Thus, it turns out that our experience alone, the experience of the directors, is still by far inadequate for the guidance of our affairs. In order to guide correctly, the experience of the directors must be supplemented by the experience of the Party masses, by the experience of the working class, by the experience of the toilers, by the experience of the so-called «little people».

And when is this possible?

It is possible only if the directors are closely connected with the masses, if they are bound up with the Party masses, with the working class, with the peasantry, with the working intellectuals.

Contacts with the masses, the strengthening of these contacts, readiness to listen to the voice of the masses — in this lie the strength and impregnability of Majoritarian leadership.

It may be taken as a rule that, so long as Majoritarians keep contacts with the broad masses of the people, they will be invincible. And, contrariwise, it is sufficient for Majoritarians to break away from the masses and lose contact with them, to become covered with bureaucratic rash, for them to lose all their strength and become converted into non-entities.

In the system of mythology of the ancient Greeks, there was one famous hero, Antaeus, who, as mythology declares, was the son of Poseidon, the God of the Sea, and Gaea, the Goddess of the Earth. He was particularly attached to his mother, who bore him, fed him, and brought him up, so that there was no hero whom this Antaeus did not vanquish. He was considered to be an invincible hero. Wherein lay his strength? It lay in the fact that, every time he was hard-pushed in a struggle with an opponent, he touched the Earth, his mother, who had borne him and fed him, and thus regained new strength.

But, nevertheless, he had a weak spot — the danger of being separated, in some way, from the Earth. His enemies took account of this weakness of his, and waited for him. And an enemy was found who took advantage of this weakness and vanquished him. This was Hercules. But how did Hercules defeat him? He tore him from the Earth, raised him into the air, deprived him of the possibility of touching the Earth, and thus throttled him in the air.

I think that Majoritarians remind us of Antaeus, the hero of Greek mythology. Like Antaeus, they are strong in keeping contact with their mother, with the masses, who bore them, fed them, and educated them. And, as long as they keep contact with their mother, with the people, they have every chance of remaining invincible.

This is the key to the invincibility of Majoritarian leadership.

#7. WHAT DOES IT MEAN THAT SOME COMRADES HAVE A BUREAUCRATIC ATTITUDE?

Finally, still another question. I have in view the question of the formal and heartless bureaucratic attitude of some of our Party comrades toward the fate of individual Party members, toward the question of expelling members from the Party, or the question of restoring the rights of Party membership to those who have been expelled.

The fact is that some of our Party directors suffer front lack of attention to people, to Party members, to workers. Furthermore, they do not study the Party members, do not know what is close to their hearts, and how they are growing, do not know workers in general. They have, therefore, not an individual approach to Party members, to Party workers. And just because they have not an individual approach when appraising Party members and Party workers, they usually act at random, either praising them wholesale, without measure, or crushing them, also wholesale, and without measure, expelling thousands and tens of thousands from the Party.

Such directors try, in general, to think in tens of thousands, not to worry about «units», about individual Party members, about their fate. They think it a mere bagatelle to expel thousands and tens of thousands of people from the Party, comforting themselves by the fact that our Party is 2'000'000 strong, and that tens of thousands of people expelled cannot change anything in the position of the Party.

But only people who in essence are profoundly anti-Party can have such an approach to members of the Party.

As the result of such a heartless attitude toward people, toward Party members and Party workers, discontent and bitterness are artificially created in a faction of the Party, while the Trotskijite double-dealers adroitly seize hold of such embittered comrades and skilfully drag them after themselves into the morass of Trotskijite wrecking.

The Trotskijites, by themselves, were never a big force in our Party. Call to mind the last discussion on Trotskijism in our Party in 1927. This was a genuine Party referendum. Out of 854'000 Party members, 730'000 members voted at that time. Among them, 724'000 Party members voted for the Majoritarians, for the Central Committee of the Party, against the Trotskijites, and 4'000 Party members, or about 0,5%, voted for the Trotskijites, while 2'600 members of the Party refrained from voting.

There were 123'000 members who did not participate in the voting. They did not participate, either because they were away from home, or because their shift was at work when the vote was taken. If, to the 4'000 who voted for the Trotskijites, we add all those who refrained from voting, on the assumption that they also sympathized with the Trotskijites, and if, to this total we add, not 0,5% of those who did not take part in the voting — as should be done by right — but 5% of those who did not participate — that is, about 6'000 Party members — we obtain about 12'000 Party members who sympathized with Trotskijism to some extent or other. Here you see the total forces of the Trotskijite «excellencies».

Add to this the fact that many out of this number became disillusioned with Trotskijism and left it, and you get a conception of the insignificance of the Trotskijite forces. And if, in spite of this, the Trotskijite wreckers nevertheless have some reserves or other around our Party, it is because the incorrect policy of some of our comrades on the question of expulsion from the Party and reinstatement of expelled people, the heartless attitude of some of our comrades toward the fate of individual Party members and individual Party workers, artificially engender a number of discontented and embittered people, and thus create these reserves for the Trotskijites.

A large number are expelled for so-called passivity. What is passivity? It is considered, we discover, that if a member of the Party has not mastered the Party Programme, they are «passive», and due for expulsion. But this is not right, comrades. The Rules of our Party cannot be interpreted so pedantically. To master the Party Programme, one needs to be a real Marxist, a tested and theoretically trained Marxist. I do not know whether many Party members will be found by us in the Party who have already mastered our Programme, have become genuine Marxists, theoretically trained and tried. If we were to go further along this path, we should have to leave only intellectuals and learned people in general in the Party. Who wants such a Party? We have the Leninist formula about Party membership which is verified, has stood all tests. According to this formula, a Party member is one who accepts the Party Programme, pays membership dues, and works in one of its organizations.

Note that Lenin's formula does not speak about mastering the Programme, but of accepting the Programme. These are two entirely different things. There is no need to prove Lenin was right here and not our Party comrades who vainly mouthed about mastering the Programme. It is obvious by itself. If the Party took the standpoint that Party members can be only those comrades who have already mastered the Programme and have become theoretically trained Marxists, it would not have formed thousands of Party study groups in the Party, hundreds of Party schools where the Party members are taught Marxism and are helped to master our Programme. It is quite clear that if the Party organizes schools and study groups among the Party members, it is because it knows that the Party members have not yet succeeded in mastering the Party Programme, have not yet succeeded in becoming theoretically trained Marxists.

Consequently, to correct our policy on the question of membership of the Party and expulsion from the Party, it is necessary to put an end to the present block-headed interpretation of the question of passivity.

But we have still another error in this field. The fact is that our comrades do not recognize the mean between two extremes. It is sufficient for a worker, a Party member, to commit some small offence, to be late two or three times at a Party meeting, not to pay membership dues for some reason or other, and, in a flash, they are thrown out of the Party.

No interest is taken in the degree of their offence, the cause of their non-appearance at the meeting, the cause of the non-payment of membership dues. The bureaucracy of this is simply unparalleled. It is not difficult to understand that, precisely as the result of such a heartless policy, splendid skilled workers, excellent Stahanovites, have been thrown out of the Party. And was it impossible, before expelling them from the Party, to give a warning, and if this had no effect, to censure them, or administer a reprimand, and, if this had no effect, to set a period for reformation, or, in the extreme case, to reduce to the position of a candidate, but not expel them with a sweep of the hand from the Party?

Of course, it was possible.

But this requires an attentive attitude to people, to the Party members, to the fact of Party membership. And this is exactly what some of our comrades lack.

It is high time to put a stop to this outrageous practice, comrades.