LOOK IN FOR A MINUTE on a typical secret meeting of a communist “club” or cell “somewhere in the United States.” This particular meeting is selected because it is typical of hundreds of such meetings.
The house is frame, painted gray with green shutters. A wire fence runs around the trim yard. The owner works as a draftsman in a downtown company, his wife keeps house. They have lived in the neighborhood for many years.
It is now dark, a little after eight o’clock on a winter evening. The downstairs light is on, the blinds are drawn. A man comes to the front door, raps lightly, and is admitted. Soon another man, walking at a leisurely pace, rounds the corner and enters. He has parked his car on another street.
Ten minutes pass. A third man knocks. He has come by bus from downtown. To make certain nobody was following him, he had ridden two stops past his correct destination, then walked back. Five minutes later a fourth person, a woman in a dark coat, arrives. Everything is quiet: no loud voices, no cars parked in front, no reasons for the neighbors to suspect that a Communist Party meeting is in progress.
Communist Party groups like this are small, containing three, four, or five people—a security precaution. In that way fewer members know each other and detection is less likely. Meeting places are frequently changed: this evening a private home, next time a public library or an automobile. Members have been known to sit on park benches, in bus terminals, even in hospital waiting rooms, hatching their plots in casual, conversational tones.
The third man is the Party organizer, a paid official who serves as the group’s leader. He sits in a chair in the corner; the others form a rough semicircle. He speaks quietly but in a commanding tone, acting the dictator that he actually is.
“Joe,” he says, addressing the first man to arrive, “you remember the last time we met you were given an assignment to collect three to five thousand sheets of paper, a Mimeograph machine, and some ink. How did things go?”
“Fine,” Joe replies. “I bought four thousand sheets of paper. Got them at three different stores.”
“Good,” says the organizer, “that’s using your head.”
“I also bought a Mimeograph machine and plenty of ink. Everything’s safe now in the right place.” (The “right place” refers to an apartment in another section of the city occupied by a concealed communist, which the Party uses as a secret hideout.)
“One thing more,” Joe says. “I’ve made inquiries about a portable printing press. It’s pretty old, but it’ll work.”
“Fine,” the organizer says, obviously pleased. “Follow that through. You took the serial numbers off the Mimeograph, didn’t you?”
“No, I didn’t,” stammers the comrade. “I forgot . . .”
“Forgot!” explodes the organizer. “What’s wrong with you? That’s just plain stupid. Joe, this is serious business. You’ve got to keep alert. Someday this machine may be used to print secret Party instructions. We can’t afford to have it traced. Take off all identification marks at once.”
Then turning to another man, the one who had parked his car around the corner, the organizer says, “Phil, how are things coming at the plant? Making any progress on getting Bill installed as shop steward?”
“No, not much. Things look pretty bad.” The man shifts his legs. He is a big fellow, weighing over two hundred pounds. “Looks like we’re blocked.”
“Nonsense,” snaps the organizer, “we’ve gone over that before. There’s always a way. Communists never give up. You’ve got things good. You’re at home enjoying life. Remember Lenin, exiled from Russia, going from town to town. He didn’t quit, and look what he did. He was a genius. What’s the big problem, Phil?”
“It’s Red, the union president. He knows Bill is a communist and he’s fighting him. Red is smart, he knows the ropes. He’s always been a hard worker for labor unions. He’s got a clean record and he’s liked by the members. As long as Red is president, we’re in a bad fix.”
“That’s the wrong attitude, Phil. If one thing won’t work, try another. Can’t we accuse him of something? Have you gone over his past life? Hasn’t he ever done anything wrong?”
“If he has, we can’t find it. He’s a straight shooter from ‘way back and he really hates communists.”
“Phil, this is your Number One assignment,” the organizer says. “You get something on Red. He’s got to be discredited. Maybe we can make up some letters, mail them in another city, accuse him of working against the union. You figure out the details.”
The organizer goes around the circle to the other members. Are they carrying out their assignments? Ethel, the draftsman’s wife, thinks she will soon be elected an officer in a downtown women’s group.
“Wonderful,” says the organizer. “Don’t rush things too fast but try to get some of the women to write letters to Washington. Let them say the FBI is a Gestapo; that they’re violating civil liberties by arresting Party leaders. That’s good, Ethel.”
“They haven’t the slightest idea I’m a communist.” She laughs. “I’m working hard at it.” The other woman, the last one to arrive, reports her activities as secretary of a communist-front organization.
The organizer, wanting the meeting to be short, speaks a few words about “new things” in the Party: A pamphlet from national headquarters has just been received and should be bought by all; finances are not in good shape; a new Party school is going to be held next month. Ethel should attend.
Shortly after nine o’clock the meeting is over, and as quietly as they have come the members slip out into the night.
This Communist Party club is representative of many hundreds throughout the nation. Night after night, week after week, these men and women are plotting against America, working out smears, seeking to discredit free government, and planning for revolution. They form the base of a gigantic pyramid of treason, stretching from the little gray house with green shutters to the towers of the Kremlin.
At least in theory the Communist Party, USA, is based on a “constitution,” which sets forth the group’s organizational structure. That constitution, being a public document, is filled with typical Aesopian language. The Party member, for example, isn’t fooled when the constitution proclaims, “The Communist Party upholds the achievements of American democracy and defends the United States Constitution and its Bill of Rights . . .” He knows better. His Marxist training enables him to recognize the Party’s real aim:
“The Communist Party seeks to advance the understanding of the working class in its day-to-day struggles for its historic mission, the establishment of socialism. (Preamble)”
Here is the key, “historic mission.” What does it mean? Not something traditional, respectable, or patriotic, but the overthrow of this government by force and violence. Engels talked about the “historic mission” of “the proletariat,” which “can only free itself by doing away once for all with class dominion, subjugation, and exploitation.” That, in communist terminology, means revolution. The Communist International spoke of the Party’s “historic mission of achieving the dictatorship of the proletariat.”
Today’s communists, with deceitful double talk, are attempting to camouflage the true meaning of this old and well-defined revolutionary term. Comrades in the early 1920’s weren’t quite so squeamish about their intentions. The Party’s constitution (1921) proclaimed the communist purpose:
“. . . to destroy the bourgeois state machinery; to establish the Dictatorship of the Proletariat in the form of Soviet power; to abolish the capitalist system and to introduce the Communist Society. (Article I, Section 2)”
Regardless of current communist claims, “historic mission” is the Party’s linguistic description of its revolutionary intent.
The National Convention, according to the constitution, is the highest authority in the Party. This convention, normally held every two years, is composed of delegates “elected” by state or district conventions. The National Convention, after hearing “discussions” of the various issues, is authorized to make decisions binding upon the entire membership.
These affairs have the trappings of big-time conventions. Various committees are chosen, resolutions adopted, and speeches given. Proceedings are secret, although communists say they have nothing to hide. Members of the legitimate press are excluded. Exploiting this blackout of news, the communists often issue slanted press releases in an effort to influence public opinion. Another tactic is to allow the attendance of selected non-communists, persons carefully hand-picked wherever possible, who the Party hopes will later make favorable reports.
Extensive preparations are made for the National Convention. Party officials as a general rule work up a “draft program,” a summary of proposed Party aims on current issues, national and international. This “draft program” is widely circulated, with members being asked to discuss indicated approaches. Then, theoretically, the convention, based on the opinions developed, adopts a final program. Actually, in practice, the draft program represents a technique whereby the leadership “sells” the membership the ideas it wants to stress. Frequently, convention reports, resolutions, and speeches, properly edited, are later published. They serve as policy guides for the membership.
Never forgotten are Soviet trimmings. Proudly read on the floor of the Sixteenth National Convention (February 9-12, 1957) were greetings from the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Other Communist Parties in China, Canada, Italy, Japan, and Czechoslovakia also sent “best wishes.” From these, members gain a sense of communist solidarity, or, in Party language, proletarian internationalism, the feeling that they are integral parts of the world-wide communist movement. This is one of the driving forces of modern-day communism: the Party-promoted idea that no member is alone, that he is part of a vast movement which, in communist eyes, is destined to conquer the world. Singing the “Internationale,” the communist marching song, also engenders this feeling.
The Party’s organizational structure may be likened to layers in a pyramid, one placed on top of the other.
1. The top level centers around national headquarters and contains the Party’s policy-making organs: (1) National Committee; (2) National Executive Committee; and (3) National Administrative Committee. With ruthless hand this echelon rules the Communist Party, USA. The designation given here is the current arrangement, which is always subject to change. The Party never hesitates to reshuffle its top administrative bodies, changing their names and sizes. For many years, for example, it had national officers: National Chairman, William Z. Foster, and General Secretary, Earl Browder and, later, Eugene Dennis. The power remains, however, in the hands of a small minority.
2. The second or middle level contains the many administrative organs that implement the decisions of the inner hierarchy: (1) various commissions and departments; (2) special organizers; and (3) front groups.
3. The bottom or third level is broad and extensive and contains all the subordinate regional and local units in the Party: that is, district organizations, and, in turn, various state, county, city, section, and club setups. This level encompasses the entire nation.
National headquarters is located in a three-story, twenty-foot-wide, brownstone building at 23 West 26th Street, New York City, just off Broadway. A pygmy amid Manhattan’s towering skyscrapers, with iron bars shielding the bottom-floor windows, this American Kremlin is the symbol of communist power in our country. Here meetings are held and important decisions made. The national office occupies the third floor and penthouse; the New York State Communist Party is on the first and second floors. However, the 1957 Party convention authorized shifting national offices to Chicago.
Level 1: The High Command
The real power of the Party rests in the National Committee. This committee, “elected” by the national and state conventions, is responsible for running the Party between conventions as provided by the constitution:
“Between National Conventions, the National Committee is the highest authority of the Party, representing the Party as a whole, and as such has the authority to make decisions and take actions necessary and incidental to the good and welfare of the entire Party, and to act upon all problems and developments occurring between Conventions. (Article V, Section 9)”
This provision covers a multitude of possibilities and forms the basis for the dictatorship of a few leaders, in typical communist style. The National Committee is America’s Politburo, a small group of some sixty individuals directing war against noncommunist institutions.
Minority control is strengthened still more by clever manipulation. The current National Committee elected a twenty-member National Executive Committee, which in turn selected administrative officials. In actual practice, the latter group is the dominant power, making day-to-day decisions. There is no free election of the membership. With members of the National Committee spread throughout the country, “on-the-spot” New York comrades tend to monopolize control of Party affairs.
This atmosphere of almost unlimited authority often produces a repugnant type of person. Many of the top leaders are haughty, swaggering, overbearing. They feel that they are better than “little” comrades. They are the “experts” in Marxism-Leninism. Their job is to teach the “less informed.”
William Z. Foster went to Seattle, Washington, a few years ago to make a speech. “We’re glad you’ve come,” the welcoming local official commented. “Many of our comrades are looking forward to meeting you.”
“Not so fast,” warned Foster. “Pm not going to see any of them. I’m too busy. These little Party people just sit down and pour out their personal problems. It wears me out and you can’t get rid of them.”
“But,” protested the local organizer, “they’ve been busy for weeks, working to make the meeting a success. They want . . .”
“Nonsense,” snapped Foster. “You decide which ones are worth my time and I’ll see them. Make appointments. I can’t solve everybody’s problems.”
Later the local leader told Foster that the comrades wanted to give him a present, perhaps a traveling bag.
“Oh, no,” Foster interrupted. “I’ve already looked at traveling bags, and I didn’t find any costing less than seventy-five dollars which would be suitable. I don’t think the members want to spend that much.”
Right he was. The organizer had probably browbeaten all “volunteers” to collect twenty to thirty dollars.
“What about a watch?” inquired the local leader, intent on pleasing the high-ranking visitor.
“I already have one,” replied Foster. “It cost a hundred and twenty-five dollars. I don’t think it’s advisable to buy a more expensive one, and I wouldn’t wear a cheaper one.”
That settled it. This “proletarian” leader, the “champion of the poor and downtrodden,” acting like a miniature Hitler, was indeed difficult to please.
Level 2: The Special Units
The attack weapons of the Communist Party are contained in the middle layer, the commissions and departments to carry out the decisions of the inner clique.
Communist leaders view American life not as a vast, uniform whole but as a series of different segments, each, in its own way, open to the appeal of communism. There are, for instance, farmers with their special problems, trade-union members, and groups with special interests related to nationality, youth, and race. Communists realize that a single program, slanted to appeal to all groups at once, will not work. To be effective, communist propaganda must be tailored to fit specific problems. What are a group’s dissatisfactions, desires, and aims? How can communism most effectively appeal to this group? The fact that programs designed for different groups are often mutually contradictory makes no difference to communists. The main point is to attract followers and stir up discontent in as many areas as possible.
This is the task of various commissions and departments, each headed by a national Party leader. Merely to list some of them will give an idea of the scope of the Communist Party’s appeal: Veterans’ Commission, Women’s Commission, Education Department, Cultural Commission, Negro Commission, Labor Department, Nationality Groups Commission, Youth Commission.
In addition, there are related organs dealing with the internal administration of the Party. The National Organization Department, for example, handles the placement of Party officials throughout the nation, while the National Review (Control) Commission (also known as the Appeals Commission) is in charge of security and disciplinary matters.
These commissions and departments are little dynamos at-tempting to spark enthusiasm for the communist cause in their special fields. They prepare literature, arrange speaking tours, organize fronts. Their job is to work out the practical details of implementing the Party line.
This task is accomplished largely through the employment of “experts,” men and women trained in special fields. There are experts of all kinds, on both local and national levels: waterfront organizers specializing in seamen’s groups; labor organizers interested in penetrating labor unions; organizers in virtually every other field, such as aircraft, mining, steel, agriculture, youth, nationality groups. Then there are fund raisers, recruiters, Marxist teachers, organizational experts.
If a Party district is planning, let us say, a special organizing drive, an expert from national headquarters or another district may arrive to assume charge. He may deal with top officials or descend to club levels. He may stay a few hours, a week, or even months. John Williamson for many years was considered one of the Party’s top labor experts. Henry Winston was an authority on organizational problems. Both Williamson and Winston were convicted under the Smith Act; Williamson later accepted voluntary deportation to Great Britain and has since been reported to have served as liaison between the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the United States Party.
If the visitor is a high national officer, special arrangements are usually made to receive him with “extreme cordiality.” If his schedule is crowded, a rank-and-filer may be assigned as a chauffeur. Never must the Party be regarded as a “desk-type” organization, operating only through letters, telegrams, and phone calls. It is a fast, hard-hitting, mobile organization, based primarily on personal contacts, with its officials traveling thou-sands of miles a year by auto, train, and air to pursue subversive activities.
Level 3: Regional and Local Units
This layer provides the broad base for the pyramid and includes the remainder of the Party structure. The United States is divided into Communist Party districts, some of which have jurisdiction over more than one state. The Ohio State Communist Party, directed principally from Cleveland, Ohio, for example, includes the states of Ohio and Kentucky and West Virginia’s four northern “panhandle” counties.
Communist membership is strongest in the Northeast section of the United States. The greatest concentration of Communist Party members is in the area of New York City. Other states having large numbers of communists are California, Illinois, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Washington, Connecticut, Michigan, and Massachusetts. Few members, relatively speaking, reside in Southern and Rocky Mountain states.
District (or state) organizations, patterned on the national structure, hold periodic conventions, “elect” state committees, and have officers. Hence there is a Chairman, New York State Communist Party, or Secretary, Ohio State Communist Party. Sometimes state conventions are held in “split sessions”: the first, before the National Convention when selected topics, such as those proposed in the “draft program,” are “discussed”; the second, after the national meeting when the state convention reassembles to ratify the decisions of the national body. State leaders take no chances, they stay on the Party line.
Many states and districts have open headquarters. In recent years most were closed, but the Party realizes that an open head-quarters is essential in carrying out its day-to-day agitational work. These Party offices are usually located downtown in a dingy room or suite in an old building. Battered desks, with typewriter, Mimeograph machine (the good right arm of the Party), and perhaps a literature rack are standard equipment. Here are the offices of the state chairman, state secretary, and other officers. An old-time communist, usually a woman, will “triple” as receptionist, stenographer, and Mimeograph operator. Knowing all the members, she’s a good “lookout” and can answer most questions: Has Oscar come back from vacation? Where does Joyce work? Is Ruth a club chairman?
Normally, headquarters is a busy place, with people going in and out all day long. Here special state, county, and city meetings are held as well as personal conferences. The busiest items in the place are chairs; they seldom have a rest until after midnight.
The local organizational structure, under state (or district) headquarters, varies from area to area. The city (or county) sections in turn are subdivided. Intracity sections may encompass several wards, each, like the county, having its own set of officers. Each section, of course, is rigidly controlled from the top.
The basic unit, at the bottom of the whole structure, is the club, formerly known as the cell, like the one described at the beginning of this chapter. Clubs are of various types: community clubs, comprising members who live in a certain geographical area; shop clubs, composed of members who work at a certain company; industrial clubs, which include members employed in the same basic industry, such as steel, automobile, aluminum, though working for different industrial firms; and specialized clubs, appealing to professions or other natural groupings. In the latter category, for example, there may be a professional section (often called white-collar), comprising clubs of teachers, doctors, or lawyers. A few members, especially the deeply concealed communists, do not belong to any club but are considered as members-at-large, subject to control only from headquarters.
Determining which club a member should join is simple: where can he do the most good for the Party? If he is employed in the aluminum industry, for instance, he would probably be instructed to join an aluminum club (made up of members employed in the aluminum industry). If he is a union officer, he might join a shop or industrial club. Or, again, if his membership should be carefully concealed, he would be a member-at-large. The organizational structure is always in a state of flux, members being frequently shifted from club to club, while headquarters organizes and reorganizes sections and clubs, tearing down one, establishing another, always hoping to gain greater efficiency.
Each club is required to have a chairman, a financial secretary, and an educational director. A well-run club has many more officers: literature director, press chairman, dues secretary, membership chairman, and so on. The same is true of county, city, and section groups; the communists have plenty of officers. Moreover, a definite chain of command is always in effect. Everybody knows his relative position: who are his Party “inferior” and Party “boss.” Instructions are quickly carried out, and in the event of an emergency a commanding officer is always available.
Communist clubs are often named after famous American historical figures such as Tom Paine, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Walt Whitman. Other clubs bear the names of communist “heroes” such as John Reed.
This is a complicated structure, you might say. How does it work? The point is: it does work, efficiently, effectively, and all too often to the detriment of this nation. The whole Party organization, regardless of its structural shape, is based on strict discipline, a rigid hierarchy, and a unified structure.
The cement that holds it together is a principle called democratic centralism. That sounds like a contradiction in terms; it is. But communists like fancy words to fool their opponents and, perhaps, to satisfy themselves. Democratic centralism is the basic principle of communist organizational structure—a term meaning, in actual practice, simple, naked, and unadulterated dictatorship.
According to communists, Party members have a right to participate in formulating policy and electing officers. That is, to them, democracy in action.
An issue has arisen. The city is planning to close a playground. What stand will the Party take? All members are encouraged to express opinions. There may be different points of view.
Then a decision is made—the communists say by an “election,” but actually it is by the leader clique. The city’s action will be opposed. From that moment, “centralism” takes over and “democratic” falls away. All members, regardless of their previous opinions, are required to support the Party’s stand. No minority can exist.
Democratic centralism, communist leaders claim, combines the “strictest discipline with the widest initiative and independent activity of the Party membership.” It is “democratic” because of the preliminary “free discussion of issues” and “right of election”; it is “centralism” because once a decision is made, the discipline of the Party enforces the decision. This is the ideal type of organizational structure, say the communists.
The tyranny and dictatorship that are part and parcel of the Communist Party are laid down by the rule: all lower Party organizations are subordinated to the higher bodies, and the highest of all are the Congresses of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, which are run by the Kremlin.
A practical demonstration of democratic centralism at work recently occurred in New York City. As we have mentioned, a campaign was launched to circulate a petition to put Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, a member of the National Committee, on the ballot as candidate for the New York City Council. Although the 1957 National Convention of the Party emphasized that Party members could dissent from official Party policy, William Weinstone, another member of the National Committee, issued the order that “Those members who may not agree with this campaign should nevertheless understand that it is their duty to participate in signature getting.”
We in the FBI, through confidential sources of information, know what goes on in hundreds of these meetings. We know who the speakers are, what they say (and don’t say), what decisions are made. These “free discussions” would be amusing but for the deadly malady they highlight: a ruthless thought control.
Communist members learn what to think, how to vote, what to say by a process of “automatic osmosis”—the seeping of predigested thoughts along the Party line into all subordinate minds, disciplined to accept. The members become ideological sleepwalkers, drugged into complete obedience by an unconscious discipline.
Sometimes, absurd as it may seem, secret ballots are used. Members go through all the motions of argument, taking a vote, nominating and electing officers. They become excited, waving their arms, pounding desks, shaking their fists. You would think there was open opposition. But that is merely part of the show. Communist thought control, operating through Party ranks, is a terrifying spectacle, freezing into fixed rigidity the mental processes of thousands.
Seen in its true light, democratic centralism is a deceptive cloak dropped over a ruthless dictatorship.
Sometimes a member, somehow or other, does not fathom the Party line. He says something out of step. He is simply “ill-informed” and needs more “education.” A Party school or a conference will probably bring him back to his “right senses.”
Occasionally a stubborn member will persist in criticism. That takes courage. He is made of metal the communist thought-control machine has not yet melted. He carries the fight to higher Party bodies. But he can’t win and out he goes.
In one instance a member was accused of falling down on the job. The section organizer recommended that he be removed from both his Party office and the county executive committee.
“He’s irresponsible,” stormed one old-time comrade, “and in the Soviet Union irresponsibles are not voted out of office—they are shot!”
That’s democratic centralism, the organizational principle that has welded the Communist Party, USA, into a terrible instrument poised and eager to destroy this country if given the opportunity.