[The following appeared as an editorial in the May 15 issue of the U.S. Socialist weekly Militant.]
The United States government has directly intervened to prevent the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) from participating in the next important leadership gathering of the Fourth International-an International Executive Committee (IEC) meeting scheduled for May 7-14 in Europe.
Government lawyers in the trial of the lawsuit brought by the SWP against secret police spying and harassment have subpoenaed central SWP leaders who had planned to attend the IEC meeting and present reports there. Those subpoenaed are legally required to be available to appear in court on twenty-four hours' notice when the government presents its case. They cannot leave the country.
Among the fraternal IEC members subpoenaed are Mary-Alice Waters, Barry Sheppard, Doug Jenness, Larry Seigle, and Pedro Camejo.
SWP National Secretary Jack Barnes, along with Malik Miah, Fred Halstead, Andrew Pulley, and José G. Pérez are important witnesses in the SWP's direct case and are subject to recall to the stand on twenty-four hours' notice.
Points Under Discussion
Waters, a national cochair of the SWP, was planning to give a counterreport at the IEC meeting to the draft resolution on the Cuban revolution and the Castro leadership being presented by a majority of the United Secretariat. (The United Secretariat is an elected executive body of the IEC.)
Sheppard, also a national cochair of the party, intended to present a counterreport to the United Secretariat majority's draft resolution on the world situation and the tasks of the Fourth International.
Jenness, who is assigned by the SWP's National Committee to be resident in Europe to participate in the bureau of the United Secretariat, would have presented a report on Afghanistan, outlining the SWP's views on this disputed question in the International.
Miah, a national cochair of the SWP, had planned to present a counterreport on implementing the turn into industry adopted at the 1979 World Congress.
In addition, SWP leaders would have given counterreports on Poland and Nicaragua.
The IEC is the highest body of the Fourth International between world congresses. The IEC meeting, set for May, is the first since the November 1979 World Congress.
The government knew full well about the May IEC meeting. It knew about the IEC agenda, the issues under dispute, and that SWP leaders were planning to attend and present reports.
In fact, Waters was handed a subpoena by U.S. Attorney Edward G. Williams immediately after a pretrial deposition in which she indicated that she was one of the likely persons to attend the May IEC meeting. She explained that she had been a fraternal member of the IEC since 1969 and had attended many previous IEC meetings and world congresses.
IEC Meeting Raised at Trial
The IEC meeting was again brought up by the government during the trial itself.
During cross examination, Williams asked Barnes when he planned to visit Europe next.
"I hope to go to Europe for the next meeting of the International Executive Committee, which is scheduled for May because of very important political questions being debated there," Barnes replied. "But I don't know if I will be able to because of obligations connected with the trial." Barnes added that he hoped the IEC meeting would be postponed.
At that point, Williams submitted into evidence a December 4, 1980, letter from the United Secretariat Bureau to sections and sympathizing organizations of the Fourth International. The letter pertained to the dates and the proposed agenda of the IEC. It indicated that resolutions were being prepared on important disputed questions. The letter stated that the United Secretariat had "decided to propose the following agenda:
"The international situation and the present stage of building sections of the Fourth International;
"The Cuban revolution and the Castroist current;
"The turn to industry and the political/organizational implications of this;
"Finally, a point dealing with some events of immediate importance, which will be decided later on the basis of four possibilities: Nicaragua and Central America, Poland, Afghanistan or Iran."
Williams particularly drew Barnes's attention to one paragraph in the letter. It reported that the November 1980 United Secretariat meeting had decided to change the dates of the IEC meeting from February to May in order to allow more time for preparations.
The paragraph noted that "an initial proposal of postponing it to April was made by the Bureau; but information we received on the dates of the law suit trial of the SWP against the U.S. government, which must start on the 16th of March, raises another difficulty. Finally, the USec decided on the 6-12th of May. These dates are now definitive; they won't be changed (except for possible minor modifications in case of unforseen technical difficulties), even if the SWP case goes on beyond the date presently foreseen."
And this was not the last time that the government raised the question of the SWP delegation to the IEC meeting. When Andrew Pulley, the SWP's 1980 presidential candidate appeared as a witness for the SWP on April 29, Williams also asked him whether or not he was planning to attend. Then, right after Pulley left the stand, Williams handed out another subpoena, this one to IEC member Larry Seigle.
Voorhis Act
The SWP, one of the founding parties of the Fourth International in 1938, was forced to disaffiliate in December 1940, after Congress adopted the undemocratic Voorhis Act on the initiative of President Franklin Roosevelt.
This disaffiliation means that the SWP is barred from making financial contributions to the International or casting decisive votes. Both Barnes and former SWP national secretary Farrell Dobbs testified at the current trial that the SWP has continued in every other way to politically support the International and actively participate in its meetings. The SWP has continued to serve in a fraternal capacity on leadership bodies such as the IC and United Secretariat.
At the time the Voorhis Act was passed and the SWP disaffiliated, the international center of the Fourth International was functioning out of New York City. It had been moved there in 1939 because of the outbreak of the war in Europe. SWP leader George Breitman testified during the current trial that the international center remained in New York, and SWP leaders continued to collaborate closely with it, until the end of World War II.
Previous Government Interference
For more than forty years, the federal government has sought to intervene in and disrupt the SWP's democratic right to meet and collaborate in this fashion with its cothinkers in other countries.
During the witch-hunt of the early 1950s, the government used its powers to exacerbate difficulties inside the Fourth International. In 1953 and 1954 the struggle over a series of political and organizational issues led to a split in the International and the formation of two public factions.
Speaking about these events in a talk in 1975, Joseph Hansen, a long-time leader of the SWP and the Fourth International, stated, "It is possible that the split could have been avoided. [SWP leader James P.] Cannon was certainly of the opinion that we should try to avoid it. But among other handicaps, it was not possible for the top leaders of the SWP to go abroad. That was during the height of the McCarthyite witch-hunt, and the State Department banned known radicals from leaving the country-unless, of course, they were being deported. Consequently we were unable to argue our case at the congress where the international struggle culminated; and Pablo [Michel Pablo, the central leader of the International Secretariat faction] took factional advantage of this situation." (See James P. Cannon: the Internationalist, by Joseph Hansen, Pathfinder Press, 1980.)
Hansen himself unsuccessfully attempted to obtain a passport to attend this congress.
In 1962, when discussions were far along in reunifying the Fourth International, an article appeared in the Columbus, Ohio, Dispatch that had all the earmarks of a government plant. Released from the Dispatch's Washington Bureau, the May 15, 1962, article was headlined,
"'Fourth International' Revival Being Watched."
"Efforts by the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) to reunify the 'Fourth International' are being watched by high government sources," the article said. Developments that were particularly noted were Hansen's trip to South America in October and November 1961, his trip to Paris in December, and a trip by an unnamed Belgian leader to the United States to discuss with SWP leaders.
Bans on Entering U.S.
The government has also banned many leaders of the Fourth International from legally entering the United States to attend conferences, give public speeches, and meet with SWP members. It has sought to obstruct entry by many other leaders of the International.
Now the government is taking advantage of the trial of the SWP lawsuit to interfere once again in the discussions of the International. This is the latest in the long record of harassment and reprisals by the capitalist rulers against the SWP and the Fourth International.