The most important single field of activity of the revolutionary proletarian party is the trade unions. Unless the party is deeply rooted in the basic economic organizations of the working class, and is inseparably associated with them in their daily struggles, it can be, at best, a literary propagandist group but not a living revolutionary political party of the proletariat, able to lead the latter in the decisive struggle for power. The party that is divorced from the trade union movement and its daily work, is doomed to sterility and disintegration. This is especially true in the United States at the present time.

The outstanding characteristics of the working-class movement in the United States in the recent period are the enormous growth of trade union movements, which now embrace millions of workers never organized in the past; the development of the CIO as the movement of the workers in the basic key and mass-production industries, organized in industrial unions, as contrasted with the classic AFL form of craft unions; the violent conflict between the AFL and the CIO, and the recent trend towards the unification of the two bodies; and the expansion of the powers and role of the federal government as "mediator" in the conflict between the workers and the employers....

The party is the leader and guide of all the work of its members in the trade unions. Without party leadership and guidance, all trade union work inevitably degenerates into opportunism and becomes a hindrance to revolutionary progress. In his mass work, the party member must not become a "mere trade unionist," or forget the need of imbuing the trade union movement with a revolutionary political class consciousness. However, in order effectively to pursue his work in the trade union movement the revolutionist must understand keenly the importance of approaching his fellow unionists and their problems not so much on the basis of his own consciousness and experience but rather on the basis of the level of consciousness and the degree of experience of the average trade unionist.

To approach the trade unionist, trade union problems, or even the trade union leadership in exactly the same manner in which one political organization deals with a rival political organization would result in self-isolation. The revolutionist must be conscious of his political role, but at the same time also of the fact that he is dealing, in the first place, with trade union problems and with workers who have not as yet developed beyond a trade union consciousness.

The excellent work which our comrades have already done in various unions shows the vast, untapped possibilities for participation in the class struggle and recruitment to the revolutionary party which are opened up before us by a serious and systematic work in the trade unions. A serious approach to the trade unions and their problems, and not a hypercritical one, is the need; a responsible attitude toward the work of building the trade unions and our influence within them, and not a lightminded, "experimental" one; an attitude of methodical, patient enlightenment of the politically undeveloped worker on the basis of his day-to-day experiences in the unions and in the class struggle, and not a supercilious, "high political" approach to him.  
 
 
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