Leon
Trotsky: An Invitation from the Dies Committee
November
28, 1939
[Writings
of Leon Trotsky, Vol 12, 1939-1940, New York ²1973, p. 110-112]
Dear
Friends:
I
found, not without some surprise, I must confess, in your minutes of
October 17 a motion by Comrade Kelvin [Burnham] concerning the
appearance of "Y" [Trotsky] before the "X" [Dies]
Committee.
(1)
On the purely formal side of the question: I was invited over the
telephone and then by telegram. In order not to place any obstacles
in the way of such an excellent opportunity which I found
exceptionally favorable from a political point of view, I answered
immediately in the affirmative. At the same time I wrote to you
asking for your feelings in regard to the matter. Naturally if a
formal and authoritative decision had been made [by the SWP
leadership] against my appearance, I would have submitted with a
public declaration giving the political reasons for the decision.
Before telegraphing my answer to the committee, I consulted all the
comrades of my household and everyone agreed that we had an
exceptional opportunity which must be utilized.
(2)
The committee can be considered from two points of view: (a) as a
parliamentary investigating committee, (b) as a kind of "tribunal."
Will Comrade Kelvin say that we should boycott parliamentarism or
that we should boycott the bourgeois courts?
(3)
The committee, like the whole parliament, is reactionary and pursues
reactionary aims; but insofar as we participate in parliamentary
activity we do so with the purpose of combatting these reactionary
aims. Why can we not follow the same policy towards one of the organs
of parliament? If we had our own representatives they would insist of
course upon having a member upon the committee in order to counteract
the reactionary maneuvers. Why cannot a witness perform the same
work?
(4)
We ourselves created a committee of bourgeois liberals in order to
investigate the Moscow trials [the Dewey Commission]. Now we have a
parliamentary committee which is obliged by its position to
investigate many things connected with the Moscow trials. The
attorneys for the frame-ups were witnesses before this committee
against us. Why can we not appear before the committee with the
purpose of establishing the truth? The audience of this committee is
thousands of times larger than that of the Dewey Committee.
(5)
Or would Comrade Kelvin say that in the first case we were dealing
with liberals and in the second with reactionaries? I will not enter
into the political evaluation of the members of the two committees,
but we know very well that Dewey himself did everything in order to
compromise Bolshevism in general on the basis of the work of the
Committee [of Inquiry]. We knew this in advance, but we knew also
that the advantages we would gain from the investigation would be
incomparably more important than the disadvantages of Dewey's
political aims.
(6)
Such a sharp cleavage between bourgeois liberals and bourgeois
reactionaries reminds me a little of the cleavage between good pacts
with democracies and bad pacts with fascist countries, but I will not
enter here into this larger field. It is enough to add only that we
took the responsibility for the composition of the Dewey Committee
since we recognized the full authority of their decision, whereas the
"X"' Committee is a state institution which we use only as
a tribune.
(7)
When the "X" Committee began its hearings there were some
negligently written articles in the Socialist
Appeal,
where the depositions of renegades were confounded with appearance
before the committee in general. This negligence in analysis can be
easily explained by the fact that none of us thought at that time
about the possibility of one of us appearing before the committee and
proclaiming a Marxist point of view. But to insist upon some false
formulations and to sacrifice an extraordinary political possibility
would be a crime.
(8)
To avoid temptation and escape the risk of sin by abstaining, not
appearing, not intervening, is a purely negative, passive, and
sterile radicalism. To appear if necessary on foe's territory and to
fight him with his own weapons -that is revolutionary radicalism.
(9)
I am astonished all the more because of the fact that the author of
the motion is Comrade Kelvin who was a protagonist — and with full
right — of our action in favor of the War Referendum initiative, a
purely parliamentary measure.
(10)
Neither can I agree with the position of Comrade Levine that the
appearance of "V before the committee should be put on the same
plane as "T's" [Trotsky's] writing in the bourgeois press
and that in the United States no American comrade should testify
voluntarily before the "X"' Committee. "T's"
writing in the bourgeois press has indeed an "exceptional"
character in view of his past and so on, but appearing before the
committee is by no means exceptional. I believe even that Comrade
"Y"' should name in his deposition several American
comrades as more competent than he himself in this or that question
and so give the committee an occasion to call them. It would be an
excellent expedient for popularizing some of our comrades before a
wide section of the public.
(11)
I ask you to consider this last idea as a practical proposition for
your decision.
Yours
comradely,
Hansen
[Trotsky]