GRASP THE WEAPON OF

Culture/

by V. J. JEROME

NEW CENTURY PUBLISHERS: 1951

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

V. J. JEROME, the author of this pamphlet, IS the editor of the Marxist theoreu­cal magazine, Political AOairs, and one of the seventeen Communist leaders facingtrial under indictments secured by the government following the Supreme Court'sdecision upholding the pro-fascist Smith Act. He is also author of numerous ar­ticles, pamphlets, and books, including Culture in a Changing World, The Negroin Hollytoood Films, Intellectuals and the War, and The Treatment of DefeatedGermany.

His forthcoming novel, A Lantern for [erem», will appear in Februaryunder the imprint of Masses & Mainstream.

The text of this pamphlet is Mr. jerome's report to the 15th National Con­vention of the Communist Party, held in New York in December, r950' Itappeared originally in the February, r951, issue of Political AOairs, and was usedas the "overt act" upon which the government based its infamous indictment ofthe author.

Published by NEW CENTURY PUBLISHERS, 832 Broadway, New York 3, N. Y.

December, '951 ••• PRINTED INTHE U......

Let Us Grasp the Weapon of Cultureby V. J. Jerome

THE DRAFT RESOLUTION, in its con­cluding words, calls attention to the"shameful degradation of culturenow taking place" in the UnitedStates. This stress must be seen inrelation to our centra l task of to­day, the struggle for peace, as wellas to our major policy of Party con­centration among basic industrialworkers.

As a first step, therefore, let usexamine the capitalist culture thatsurrou nds the American worke r to­day. Let us describe some of hislikely experiences.

The paper he reads on his wayhome from work beats the wardrums and shrieks about the perilof the "Red hordes."

He has a family. He owns a radio.Perhaps he has even bought a tele­vision set on installment payments.Captain Video-Master of Life andH is little boy of seven sits watchingDeath-Super-Scientist, Defender ofthe Good and Enemy of Evil. With

• Reference is made to the Draft Resolutionat the 15th National Convention of the Commu­Din Parrr. held in New York. December, 1950.This article is reprinted from the February, 19H

issue of PolilicM AgMrl.

3

his super-science weapons he fightsEvil wherever it appears. And Evilhas a way of cropping up in China-in the image of the "hordes."There are eight million televisionsets now in use in the United States,and eighty-five million radio sets.

The worker has a girl of twelve.She comes home from junio r highschool troubled . In her class thepupils, in daily rotat ion, are madeto serve as secret "F.B .!." agents­so designated-each in turn secretlyspying on the other pupils and se­cretly reporting to the teacher.

On his birthday, the little boygets a toy atomic gun that lightsup brightly as it shoots the "death­rays." During the day he plays sol­dier. But at nigh t he tosses in fearof the atom bomb from which heand his class-mates hid crouchingunder the desks in "defense" drills.

In the evening the worker sitsdown to read-a Weste rn or a comicbook, in which Bugs Bunn y be­comes the captor of a "spy ring" ;or a homicidal hair-raiser with atough agency dick as hero-slick

thrillers glorifying violence, bru­tality, and war.

He may take his family to themovies. The features are a slapstickcomedy and a murder mystery, ormaybe an underworld melodrama.The children are offered a specialtreat in the animated cartoons, sofull of the fun of torturing DonaldDuck and Pluto the Dog. Or per­haps they see the New York FilmCritics' prize picture, All AboutEve, in which woman is degradatedand the arch-villain of the drama,Eve, is revealed at a certain pointas having a Polish- or Jewish-sound­ing name, by which we are sup­posed to understand her specialbaseness. Or perhaps they see a"good thriller," Asphalt [ungle, inwhich the Police Department is onthe side of the angels and all thevillains somehow bear non-Anglo­Saxon names. The one tall, blondNordic gangster, Dix, emerges asthe hero at the end, dying in hissweetheart's arms, back in the oldhomestead .... In one scene he says:

That squarehead, he is a funny littleguy. I don't get him at all. Maybe it'sbecause he's a foreigner. Those guys,they don't think like us.

If the worker goes to church, hemay listen to messages like the fol­lowing, rendered this morning bythe Rev. George Weymeyer in hisCommunion Sunday sermon:

"God is warning us to return toHim." How is He warning us?The wars, the deprivations, the hightaxes and prices, the militarization

of the vouth, and the threateningatomic havoc should be accepted, ex­horts the minister, as "blessings indisguise." For these are God's warn­ings of retribution for mankind'singratitude, which is evident in "themultitudes" all over the world "whoare leaning toward godless Commu­nism, who didn't appreciate whatthey had, but chose to trust in manrather than in God."

If the worker is a Roman Cath­olic, he mav, in addition, be toldto add to his dogma the Papal an­nouncement of Mary's bodily As­cension. He may hear CardinalSpellman's Pastoral Letter exhort­ing him to "prove our love of Godand Mary," to hate the "paganrobots," to "strengthen ourselves withthe impregnable armor of fearlessfaith and conquer atheistic Commu­nism with godliness and prayer."

Such are the "cultural" impactswhich daily and incessantly bom­bard the worker and his family.

Can we imbue the working classwith understanding of its class re­sponsibility in the fight for peace,can we help to build its class alli­ances and effect its unity with theNegro people, can we hope to de­velop its class consciousness, with­out struggle against this "cultural"environment?

It is from the viewpoint of theseurgent political tasks of our Partythat we must examine some of themain ideological trends in Ameri­can bourgeois culture today. Thisreport will indicate some approaches

that may serve to help us translatethe intent of the Draft Resolutioninto our constant practice.

I. THE "AMERICAN WAY"OF CULTURE

The main features of bourgeoiscultural decadence in the postwarstage were noted by the Party­sponsored conference of Marx ist cul­tura l workers in t947. Today thesefeatures of arrogant world-empirebuilding and Anglo-Saxon racism;of rabid anti-Sovietism and Red-bait­ing; of violence, sadism, and anti­humanism, have become sharperand more open ly geared to the wardrive and the drive to fascism athome. At the same time, they aremore and more camouflaged withdemagogy, which calls war, "peace";imperialism, "democracy"; aggres­sion, "defense of freedom"; and theroad to fascism, the "American wavof life." .

Never in all their shameful careerof subverting science and the artsto the life-destroying policies of im­perialism, have the war lords ofWa ll Street so debauched the cul­tural media, as now in their fiend­ish drive to enslave the world. Whatmatters decency, what matter tru th,integrity, art, so long as the keptpress, the less-than-objective critics.and the rigged prize donors can keepgoing such anti-Soviet and Commu­nist-defaming "cultural" monstros­ities as the films, T he Iron Curtain,Tb« Red Danube, and I Married aCommunist; as the plays, The

Traitor, Red Glooes, and Darknessat Noon. which is soon to disgracethe stage; as the radio broadcasts,Communism, U.S. Brand and "coun­terspy" F.B.I. thrille rs.

The degradation of content tosuit the needs of imperialist aggres­sion is necessarily accompanied byfascist-like measures of repressionand regimentation of cultural work­ers.

The blacklist and censorship havebecome a pattern throughout all themass propaganda media-radio, tele­vision, films, theatre, magazines,newspapers, and publishing houses. Itis now spreading to all workers inthese areas, to the point that at C.B.S.loyalty oaths are required of all em­ployees, including building mainten­ance men and office workers. Thispattern is reaching out, as our Partywarned, beyond the "Left" to all whowill not be completely regimentedbehind the war drive . Even a reac­tionary radio commentator likeDrew Pearson loses his contract fornot going along with Senator Me­Carthy all the way. This signifiesthe process of fascization of culture.It is an attempt to follow Hitler'spattern, to establish a Ll.S. versionof the Nazi National Chamber ofCulture.

As Wall Street rings the globewith its armies and military bases.as it invades and seizes and violatesterritories, as it perpetrates Nazi­like atrocities upon soldiers andcivilians, its statesmen and apolo­gists thicken the camouflage with

assurances like W. Averell Harri­man's declaration at the 1950 NewYork Herald Tribune Forum:

For the first time in history, themost powerful nation in the world isdedicated to peace and in partnershipwith other nations is mobilizing itsmoral force and its resources for worldsecurity.

Even so did Hitler's expansionistdrives take on the name of "NewOrder."

Thus Wall Street seeks to maskits chauvinism with bourgeois cos­mopolitanism. With catchwordsabout the "obsoleteness of nations,"and the need for a "world nation,"it attempts to break the resistanceof the nations to being sucked intothe American world empire. Itspropagandists strive to belittle, inorder to destroy, the national prideand national culture of other peo­ples. Anglo-Saxon chauvinism wouldforce Wall Street's ideas and debasedcultural products upon peoples theworld over, commandeering to thatend its newspapers, magazines,books, and broadcasts; its Holly­wood, Tin Pan Alley, and coca cola.On the home scene, no less, the Anglo­Saxon supremacy myth pervades allcultural areas, down to the standard­ized types used in advertising dis­plays. It is U.S. imperialism's super­man cult to "justify" its pretensionsto global hegemony-that blessedstate of "Pax Americana which," inthe words of The Christian Century,"would do for the planet what Romeonce did for the world of the Medi-

G

terranean,"With every propaganda medium

and agency at its command, the WallStreet "master race" ballyhoos its"American way of life," The lyingradio oracle misnamed "Voice ofAmerica" blares forth 24 hours a dayin 24 languages, besides English. Thedepraved Hollywood product is un­dermining native film productionin the Marshallized countries. InFrance, Italy, the Benelux and Scan­dinavian countries, Hollywood filmspredominate. The Assistant Secretaryof Public Affairs in the State De­partment reported in November,195°:

Our film strips and motion pictures[now go] to audiences which, at first,were out of our reach. We have a fleetof jeeps, now, with special rigs thatcarry projectors, screens, and ampli­fiers.

And Edgar Ansel Mowrer, in arecent issue of the Saturday Reviewof Literature, tells us of the many in­formation and reading libraries main­tained by the U.S. Government inforeign countries. "No branch of cul­ture, learning, or information," hereports, "is overlooked; Americanperiodicals are skimmed and thecream [!! 1 rushed for consumptionoverseas."

As for the cultural product itself,it is a garish, super-colossal publicrelations job to "Advertise God'sCountry" (from the title of Mow­rer's article), to let them all know inwhat a Garden of Eden the Ameri­can worker and his family live, where

every worker has a high-paid job,owns a car and a home and a deep­freeze, never knows unemployment,insecurity, or poverty, where all lifehas the glamour of the Hollywoodsilver screen. And if this is the work­er's blissful life, it is because "the.vmerican businessman" (not capi­talist, mind you) "differs somewhatfrom his cousin in Europe." As For­tune for December, 1950, is pleasedto inform the world, "Americanbusinessmen, by and large, do notwork for money alone." In an ar­ticle headed, "The Moral Historyof U.S. Business," Fortune intro­duces "the businessman as saint,"dedicated to "profit and piety" and"the Gospel of Service." He is shownto the world as the"trustee of wealthior the poor and for civilization." Weare told of the "considered benefac­tions of Carnegie, Rockefeller, Mor­gan," and of Henry Ford , the"apostle of the more-for-less creed."The exceptionalism of American BigBusiness, the two-hundred-year "sur­vey" concludes, lies in "its tirelessquest" for "moral motives and pur­poses" which "has bred a high orderof that 'divine discontent' which is asign of man's spirituality."

Verily, can anyone challenge theheaven-ordained claim of such acapitalism to take the world underits divine wings!

Equally trimmed for show-windowdisplay at home and abroad is thetreatment of the Negro people in theUnited States.

The treatment of the Negro peo-

7

ple is, indeed, as expressed by Com­rade Foster, Wall Street's Achilles'heel before world opinion. To poseas Prince of Peace before the world,the white ruling class resorts to many"cultural" devices to hide the oppres­sion of the Negro people. Thus, thespurious "Negro interest" films, ofthe type of PinkY, Lost Boundaries,Home of the Brave, and Intruder inthe Dust, are given wide export.The Howard University Players arebooked for performances in Europewith the purpose of counteractingthe influence of Paul Robeson-nowrobbed of the right to travel abroad­and of "proving" how "well treated"the Negro is in the United States.As the oppressors of the Negro peo­ple make use of the Bunches and theHasties, so they bludgeon into ser­vice a Jackie Robinson, a Josh White,a Hazel Scott, in the attempt to bringthe Negro people into line for WallStreet's war program, and to deadenthe national-liberation movement ofthe Negro people with the poison ofbourgeois cosmopolitanism. Theyhope with this "cultural" camou­flage to assuage the rising colonialpeoples who identify their anti-im­perialist struggle with the cause ofthe American Negro.

The people of every land to whichthis "culture" is exported can seethrough this tinselled pretense. Thereisn't an audience of sight or soundin any country that is not revoltedby this "cultural" dumping: the glori­fication of the gangster, the lurid spymania, the slick murder thrillers;

the sickening slander. uf the SovietUnion, of Communism, of peacepartisans; the overt and covert whitechauvinism; the arrogant bellicosityof the America "that cannot lose."

Clearly, Wall Street cannot todayoperate in the old wav, solely withBig Stick and jingoism, or entirelywith Hitlerian racism. While inten­sifying its use of these methods, itmust cultivate illusions of "demo­cratic" America as liberator. as bigbrother to the other capitalist na­tions, even while undermining theirsovereignty, and as protector of thecolonial peoples, even while attempt­ing to rivet their chains.

Among the most vocal counsellorsof this policy of colossal deception arelahar reformists, Social-Democrats,and Titoites, At the cited New YorkHerald Tribune Forum, WalterReuther, President of the UnitedAuto Workers. addressed himself tothe gilded array of speakers com­posed of bankers, captains of industryand insurance. oil, and railroadmagnates:

\Ve must convince the people of theworld that we propose to share withthem our material wealth, our knowl­edge and our skills.

He appealed to the assembledN.A.M. and Chamber of Commercepresidents, high-ranking diplomats,and top Army brass:

Hundreds of millions of peoplethroughout the world are in revoltagainst poverty and injustice, againstimperialism and colonialism. \Ve must

8

help these people find a democratic al­ternative or communism will move into fill the vacuum created by our fail­ure.

Wall Street and its apologists showa growing awareness of the diflicuhiesencountered by this process of decep­tion . At that New York Herald Tri­bune Forum, the president of Cow­les Magazines, Inc. warned theAmerican imperialists against com­placency as regards Asia, with thisaccount of his own wartime experi­ence with a group of university stu­dents in China:

I referred to the United States, Eng.land, France, Holland. etc., as "de­mocracies" in whom they should puttheir faith. A hostile stir went throughthe group. Finally, a young Chineseprofessor asked me how I could possiblyrefer to England and France and Hol­land as "democracies" when in fact, sofar as Asia is concerned, they were im­perial empires treating most of theOrient as a colonial possession .

And the publisher solemnly added:

I failed to convince those studentsthe United States does not approve ofcolonialism and wants to see it ended.

This frank statement is not iso­lated in the reports and commentsfrom abroad. Increasing are thewarning signals that the UnitedStates is losing the battle of ideas.

How revealing is the admission byJohn Foster Dulles in his book H'lIror Peace that in "the war of ideas . ..we are suffering reverses that cannotbe cancelled out by :my amount ofmilitary power."

It is this which explains the reso­lution introduced by William Benton,Senator for Connecticut, for a "Mar­shall Plan in the field of ideas" andfor "acceleration of the work ofU.N.E.S.C.O."· whose objectives, hedeclared, "parallel closely the long­term objectives of U.S. foreignpolicy." And Benton stated further:

If we work through U.N.E.S.C.O.,we cannot be charged with cultural im­perialism.

Notwithstanding its bombast andfury, Wall Street's ideological cam­paign is motivated essentially bythe despe ration of a social svstemfighting a losing battle against his­tory.

THE PERVERSION OF SCIENCETO MILITARIZATION

Wa ll Street's cultural anti-human­ism is nowhere so monstrous!v dis­played as in the field of science:

What is happening in sciencewithin the United States todav canbe comprehended only in the' lightof the calculated drive to mobilizeevery aspect of science for war, fordestruction, not for life.

Militar y expenditures for scientificresearch and development jumpedfrom ~22,000,000 in 1940 to morethan $1,100,000,000 following WallStreet's military aggression in Korea .These figures do not include thestupendous mi litary expenditures onthe atom bomb . At least two-thirds ofthe scientists and engineers are now

• United Nations Educational, Scientific. andCultural Orpniutioo.

9

working for either the Departmentof Defense or the Atomic EnergyCommission, with a planned sharpincrease in this number in the nearfuture. The significance of these factswas frankly proclaimed by D r. EricA. Walker, Executive Secretary of theResearch and Development Boardof the Department of Defense, in aspeech to the American Associationfor the Advancement of Science,December 30, 1950:

The size of the military research anddevelopment effort is not only startlingbut sobering. \Ve are confronted bythe fact that the greatest portion of thecreative thinking and effort of the na­tion's scientists and engineers, is, ofnecessity, being concentrated on weap­ons, devices, and techniques of warfareand countermeasures.

This appalling state of affairscompels recognition of the fact thatcapitalism, having made war its wayof life, can foster-indeed, tolerate­only that sort of science which ischained to the war machine. Thedestructive implications for scienceare not exhausted in the fact of itsbondage to militarization. Militariza­tion means an essential debasementand perversion of science. It meansalso a progressive demoralization anddegeneration of scientists. This pointis effectively made by Dr. TheodoreRosebury of the College of Physiciansand Surgeons, Columbia University,who made the most exhaustive re­search survey of weapons of bacte­riological warfare during WorldWar II :

If you want to understand BW[Bacteriological Warfare1you must fig­uratively stand on your head.... BWis an upside-down science, an inver­sion of nature. 1 formally we studydisease in order to prevent it or cure it.This is bacteriology right-side up. ButBW sets out to produce disease. It isnot normal or natural, but abnormaland artificial.

And John Kennedy and CharlesMacLeod write in their importantarticle, "The Militarization of Sri­ence," in the Autumn, 1950, issue ofthe London Modern Quarterly:

Militarization does not mean themere passive neglect of other lines ofscientific development. It means theactive extension of the military grip,not only within the Government's ownresearch establishments, but even intothe sacred precincts of "pure" science.... The nature of the work itself tendsto reduce its scientific value. It hasbeen freely admitted that work on theHydrogen bomb is devoid of any peace­time implications.

Such is the reality of the bourgeoisfiction of "free science." In the wordsof T. D. Lysenko, President of theU.S.S.R. Lenin Academy of Agricul­tural Sciences:

The barbarians of the Middle Agesburned progressive men of science atthe stake. The barbarians of today areanxious, with the help of some scien­tists, to ravage the whole of civilizationwith the atom bomb. Yes, in the landof the dollar there are unfortunatelyreactionary scientists who have soldthemselves, and science itself, to theatomic cannibals.... What have theyin store for mankind? What are they

preparing for the tiller of the soil, forthe youth engaged in study, for themother, and for her infant asleep inthe cradle? Death."

As against the death-dealing roleassigned to science by capitalism,there has arisen the life-giving sci­ence of Socialism. Soviet science, in­spired by the Party of Lenin andStalin, is exclusively the servant andinstrument of mankind in its inex­orable march to a world of peace,abundance, and truly humanist cul­ture. While the atornaniacs pervertscience into an instrument for colos­sal destruction, the Soviet systemennobles science by directing it to­ward the transformation of natureinto an unlimited source of light andlife for Man, the destined collectivemaster of the world. It is thiswondrous perspective of Man's truedestiny which is at the base of theconstruction of an epochal networkof hydroelectric stations and of themassive soil reclamation projects inthe steppes and deserts of theU.S.S.R.

GENOCIDE: THEMALTHUSIAN FORMULA

If the bourgeois scientist seeks"j ustification" for this utter disre­gard of human life, the bourgeoisphilosopher jumps to his aid withthe latest version of the Malrhus"theory" of "over-population."

Marx long ago exposed the falsityand the reactionary essence of

• N~ T;""'J, Mmcow, March .29. 1950.

10

Malthusianism, which holds thatthere is a "natural law" according towhich population growth outstripsthe growth of the means of sub­sistence. He demonstrated that anabsolute law of population does notexist, that "in fact, every special,historic mode of production has itsown special law of population, his­torically valid within its limits alone."

But this bourgeois staple is broughtout periodically to meet imperialism'scurrent needs and to shift the blamefor existing social evils from the capi­talist system to "natural" causes. To­day, the Malthusian ghost is takenout of the closet to serve the propa­ganda of Anglo-Saxon supremacyand, specifically, Wall Street's blue­print for world conquest.

Most notorious in the recent re­turn of Malthus is William Vogt'swidely-publicized tract of fascist mis­anthropy, Road to Survival. repletewith such racist epithets as "thesespawning millions," and "the hordesof India and China." Vogt expressesthe full extent of the brutality of adoomed ruling class when he says:

There is little hope that the worldwill escape the horror of extensivefamines in China within the next fewyears. But from the world point ofview, these may be not only desirable,but indispensable.

By "the world point of view,"Vogt means only the capitalist worldpoint of view, the point of view ofthe imperialist marauders and op­pressors who have literally destroyedthe lives of millions of colonial pea-

pie by their exported civilization ofmass poverty, disease, and starvation.And the empire builders of the"American Century," devise newlethal weapons and new Malthusianideologies to turn into bloody Koreasland after land, in continent aftercontinent.

The "up-to-date" war-geared useof the Malthusian formula comesfrom Julian Huxley, first Director­General of U.N.E.S.C.O. Writing inHarper's. for September, 1950, he sup­plies the ultra-"Western Civilization"emphasis :

Eastern rates of increase [whichhe claims are outstripping Westernrates], prevail among the majority ofhuman beings now existing-in thepopulations of Asia as a whole, of mostof the Balkans, of the U.S.S.R., ofLatin America. of North Africa-andwill very soon be prevailing in the restof Africa too.

From which gerrymandered geog­raphy and racist biology we get thebourgeois "humanism":

... We need a new view of humandestiny. Why, in heaven's name, shouldanyone suppose that mere quantity ofhuman organisms is a good thing, ir­respective either of their own inherentquality or the quality of their life andtheir experiences?

And who will determine theirquality? Naturally, the Anglo-Saxonself-appointed de-populators,

This is not science, but racistgeopolitics masked as science toperpetuate colonialism, to "justify"

11

atomic annihilation of whole "in­ferior" peoples.

This is racism, to justify wars ofconquest. The "colored" peoples are,first, set down as "different," "in­ferior," "over-populous," living "nat­urally" on low standards, and "usedto dying." Therefore, we need notfeel guilty about killing them.

The bourgeois press reports pro­minently Maj. Gen. Oliver Smith'sstatement in Korea that Chinese in­telligence "must be of a low order­and I don't mean their military in­telligence." Indeed, to what "high"order can the intelligence of theChinese belong when they treat cap­tive American G.I.'s like humanbeings and conduct them to safety?These are not the ways of the "civili­zation" that produced a Smith and aMacArthur.

A Tokyo dispatch, under date ofSeptember 17, 1950, informed theworld:

General MacArthur drove towardSeoul today, looked down at four deadCommunist soldiers and declared,"That's a good sight for myoideyes." ...

Here is civilization!The shameful plight of Puerto

Rico is likewise attributed to theisland's "surplus population," to its"Eastern rate of increase." By thisperverted logic, the fascist propa­gandist Vogt deplores the applica­tion of the malaria cure in PuertoRico, "where the miracles of Ameri­can medicine had been worked, withthe chief result that more people

were kept alive to live more miser­ably."

That the income per person inPuerto Rico is, by Vogt's own fig­ures, 1/7 of the per capita income inthe United States, that living costsare 27 percent higher, that there arehalf a million unemployed in a popu­lation of 2,500,000, that there is onedoctor for every 2,550 persons, andthat the mortality rate is alarming­all this is chargeable to "over-popu­lation"!

The only "over-population" af­Ricting Puerto Rico is that of theU.S. sugar trusts and shipping com­panies, which have stunted the na­tive economy with a crippling mono­culture for their super-profits; the"over-population" of U.S. financecapital, which is holding down thepeople in colonial bondage. Neo­Malthusianism today aids WallStreet's cosmopolitanist propagandato undermine the struggle for PuertoRican national sovereignty.

These population "theories" serveAmerican imperialist designs forworld conquest, for war, for atomic"equalization" of the "Eastern rate ofincrease" to the "Western.' FromLebensraum afa Hitler to Genocidea fa Western Civilization!

SOUNDS OF DOOM

While serving the arrogant chau­vinism of Anglo-Saxon supremacy,the ruling-class "culture" simul­taneousl y reflects the crisis of itsgrandiose "Marshall Plan in the fieldof ideas." More and more. that cul-

12

In the Arizona Quarterly for Au­tumn, 1950, we read in an articleentitled, "Modern Literature and theSense of Doom":

sense of doom, of a cultural impasse;a mood of helplessness and despair.

Thus, William G. Carleton, Pro­fessor of Political Science at the Uni­versity of Florida, states in theAntioch Review, summer, 1950, issue:

Contemporary man looks out uponhis modern world and is afraid. Notsince the declining days of the RomanEmpire ... have such universal dreadand despair gripped the mind of theWest.... Men look upon this awfulspectacle of a collapsing world andtheir mood is dominantly one of es­cape .. . escape from science and themachine. But escape into what? Intonihilism. Into authority. Into romanti­cism, and mysticism. Into the self.

ture expresses a frenzied recognitionof the handwriting on the wall.

The emancipation of China's fourhundred and seventy-five millionpeople from the orbit of imperialism,and the colonial-revolutionary up­surge in many areas of Asia, expressnat only a political rupture but arevulsion on a sweeping scale to the"culture" of "Western civilization."Not only have the European coun­tries of People's Democracy rejectedthe shoddy cultural wares of WallStreet, but the popular masses inFrance, Italy, and other countrieshave shown lillie enthusiasm for theracist, brutalizing, and pornographicoutput that is ballyhooed as "art" and"cultural" amusement.

The historic shift in the relationof world forces in favor of the campof peace, democracy and Socialism,led by the Soviet Union, is effectinga qualitative cultural leap amonghundreds of millions. Not only inthe lands of People's Democracy, butin capitalist and colonial countrieswhere Communist parties exert wideleadership, the masses are ever moreconsciously influenced and inspiredby the culture of Socialist humanismof the great Soviet people.

In the face of this situation, agrowing mood of dejection and dark­ness is to be noted among strata ofbourgeois intellectuals in the UnitedStates, who see in the ascending andthe new a "collapsing world," an"apocalyptic age."

If you pick up current "learned"magazines, you will find a pervading

13

The literature of our time has ...reached a dead end. The professionalwriter is still active, but the artist ashero and prophet seems to have lostboth his voice and his function.

Such lamentations are, of course,not new. In a general sense, theybegan to be heard with the adventof the epoch of capitalism's decline,sounding the basic pessimism of thedying bourgeois class. They had theirclassic expressions in Spengler's De­cline of the West and in Freud'spostulate of the "death instinct."Now this despair is aggravated bythe sharpened general crisis of capi­talism. Before the advancing colonial­liberation movements and the mas­sive successes of the world Socialist

forces, the "success story" of WallStreet-Americanism "on the up-and­up" is now disturbed by a dirge ofdoom.

These ideologues of capitalismequate the inevitable doom of capi­talist society with an alleged doomof human society: therefore, if capi­talism goes under, the world goesunder. They shift the blame for allthings onto science, the machine, inorder to absolve bourgeois scienceand monopoly-oioned technology,which pervert science and use themachine for human exploitation.They stri ve to block the vision of thenew and radiant life in the SocialistSoviet Union, in People's China, andin the European countries of People'sDernocracv. These narrators of"doom on' both your houses" are de­termined to disorient those whomight turn away from the pro-warinfluence of imperialism and whomight regard with sympathy thepeace efforts of that great state whosesystem is Socialism. They seek toconfuse the people and hold backtheir mass awakening to the hideousrealities of capitalism in the advancedstage of decline.

The same Professor Carleton, whoso sharply described the "doom," de­scribes also the "escape":

There is now an enormous pull toreturn to the simple faith of Chris­tianity. To an acute sense of distress isadded a terrible sense of guilt as manis reminded that his own wanderingfrom Christianity has produced thetragedies of our time. Jacques Maritain

tells us that mankind has no choiceexcept between two roads: the road toCalvary and the road to the slaughter­house. In America, there has been awidening stream of converts to Catholi­cism.... Some Americans are urginga return to Thomas Aquinas and Medi­eval Scholasticism as the core of a col­lege education .... There has been arevitalizing of Protestant fundamen­talism, too....

The meaning of this "God-seek­ing" is apparent from such statementsas that by Robert M. Hutchins,Chancellor of the University of Chi­cago, in an address to graduates afew years back:

. . . Civilization is doomed, unlessthe hearts and minds of men can bechanged, unless we can bring about amoral. intellectual, and spiritual refor­mation. so deep and drastic as to becalled a revolution, throughout theworld."

The present manufactured rage ofreligion ism among bourgeois intel­lectuals has its direct services to capi­talism. It is designed to paralyze thewill to struggle against the imperialistenemies of mankind, by implantinga "guilt feeling" in the common man,disposing him to self-abnegation andself-humiliation, and leading him tofatalistic acceptance of suffering anddestruction.

The vogue of religionism is re­flected in the wide promotion of re­actionary clerical books. Thus, HenryMorgan Robinson's novel, The Car­dinal, designed to glorify the Roman

14

Catholic hierarchy and to conceal itsreactionary role, is the top best-sellerof 1950. Long a best-seller, too, wasRabbi Joshua Loth Liebman's Peaceof Mind, which seeks to provide anescape from the social realities ofcapitalism through a wedding of re­ligion and Freud. Msgr. Sheen's latestrigged best-seller, Lift Up YourHeart, carries on the obscurantistcrusade. Henry Luce's Lif~ maga­zine dresses up medieval theologywith expensive pictures. LudwigLewisohn, in his latest book, TheAmerican [eio, condemns biologicalevolution and advocates an orthodoxreligious structure for the totality ofJewish life in the United States. Vin­cent Sheean "builds up" the cult ofGandhism. And the Trotskyite Par­tisan Reuieso contrives a "sympo­sium," "Religion and the Intellec­tuals," which the bourgeois press isquick to praise.

The "'God-seekers" moreover, givea mystical, God-ordained purpose toAmerican imperialism's expansionistdesigns for the kingdom of earth.

Thus Arnold Toynbee, exponent­in-chief of the "God-seeking" cult,stated on Korea:

Religion is the center of our presentideological conflict between East andWest. ... Today America has beencalled upon to assume a position ofworld leadership.

Notwithstanding the wrapping ofthe Messiah's robe about the devilsof Wall Street, the current cult ofreligionism cannot even so much as

lay claim to promoting "the brother­hood of man." For, it stems so ar­rantly from contempt for man, fromhatred of man. Robert M. Hutchinsformulated this credo:

Unless we believe that every man isthe child of God, we cannot love ourneighbors. Most cats and most dogs aremore attractive than most men.·

But the prize "humanist" amongthese "God-seekers" is Bertrand Rus­sell, who declared in a recent NewYork interview that he "would favorthe use of the hydrogen bomb if thelatter offered the only hope of savingthe Western world from defeat.""

In a lecture that same evening,this defender of the "Western world"with hydrogen bombs opened up hisheart and declared:

The root of the matter is . . . love,Christian love, or compassion.

Bertrand Russell, pride of bour­geois science, freshly crowned withthe laurels of the Nobel prize, hasth us achieved the perfect synthesis ofGenocide and Godly love.

Yet what is the "Western world"?What is the nature of the dan gerthat threatens it with defeat, to avertwhich the august philosopher isready to use the hydrogen bomb?In the semantics of Bertrand Russellet al, "Western world" is the synonymof Anglo-American imperialism andits way of life; mass impoverishment,colonial slavery, racism, the thr eat offascism, brut al exploitation, and re-

o Wd.•• N(IW Ytwl! Ti"J4J, November 16, 1950.

curring crises and wars. The greatdanger to this "Western world,"which the Russells well realize, butseek to hide, comes from the aspira­tions of the masses for economicsecurity, for democratic rights, fornational self-determination, for worldpeace, and from the inexorable marchof the working class, leading thecommon people in each country ofcapitalism, toward the direct strug­gle for Socialism.

II. MA TIFESTATIONSOF RESISTANCE

When we consider the posItIvecounterforces for peace and the de­fense of culture, Peekskill stands outas a landmark of struggle. Peekskillbrought masses into struggle, work­ing-class and Negro masses, artistsand intellectuals, people of the profes­sions. There the working class, therethe militant Negro people defendedprogressive culture and its creatorsagainst the Nazi-like attack inspiredby the warmakers. There the valiantpeople's artist, Paul Robeson, de­fended with his art and with his lifethe cultural rights of his people andof the American working class.There, too, Howard Fast by his cou­rageous stand demonstrated the vitalrole that democratic and peace-striv­ing intellectuals can play in united­front struggle against the forces offascism and war. Let us rememberthat masses of people can be reachedand brought into motion aroundsuch vital cultural issues.

And the Hollywood Ten-the best

,6

tribute we can accord these courage­ous fighters against reaction in cu l­ture is to recognize that the anger ofthe ruling class against them is ameasure of their value to the people.The struggle for freedom of the eightstill behind bars is an issue aroundwhich masses of workers and profes­sionals, here and abroad, have beenrallied and many more can bereached.

Against the fascist blacklist andcensorship campaign spearheaded byRed Channels and Counter-attack.there is gathering resentment whichcan be organized into a storm of pro­test. The statements issued by theAuthor's League of America, em­bracing the Dramatists', Screen-Writ­ers', Radio Writers', and Authors'Guilds, branded the censorship ofcontent and the blacklisting of artistsfor their political opinions as prac­tices smacking of Hitlerism. A sharpstatement against blacklisting wasissued by Actors' Equity Association.The National Council of the Arts,Sciences, and Professions (A.S.P.)has not only condemned these at­tacks, but has shown their close tie­up with the attempt to silence thevoices of peace. These protests can beconsolidated into a broad united­front movement for cultural free­dom. This movement will growstronger as it comes to realize thatits fight is part of the general fightfor peace.

vVe should note, too, the mani­festations of resistance in the ranksof scientists, though they are as yet

sporadic and weakly organized. Forexample, Linus C. Pauling, head ofthe chemistry division of the Cali­fornia Institute of Technology,sharply criticized Professor Urey forsupporting the anti-Soviet atomic­bomb policy, declaring that Urey didnot speak for the general body ofAmerican scientists in advocatingforce as the solution of present worldproblems. Leading men of sciencelike Professor Harlow Shapley, Kirt­ley Mather, Anton ]. Carlson, PhilipMorrison, and Dirk Struik have beenprominent in the cause of peace.

At the same time. it must bepointed out that the scientists as agroup have not taken a clear andconsistent stand against the attemptto pervert their knowledge in theservice of imperialist destruction. Alltoo many have allowed themselvesto be silenced by the witch-huntmania, and others have been bribedand corrupted.

A key point of the struggle againstNazi-like control of the mind is thegallant fight of the New YorkTeachers' Union against dictatorialfirings, anti-Semitism, and discrimi­nation. An outstanding example ofresistance to fascization of the collegecampus has been the struggle againstthe "loyalty" oath in California.There is mounting indignation andprotest on the part of parent-teacherassociations against militarizing thepublic schools and terrorizing theminds of children with atom-bomb"defense" drills.

In many instances the fight against

the blacklist, censorship, "loyalty"tests, and other forms of persecutionhas been seriously weakened by con­cessions to Red-baiting on the partof the victims of Red-baiting. Thisimposes on Communists and all pra­gressives the duty to warn againstthis trap and to point out the in­separable connection between the at­tacks on the citizenship of Commu­nists and on the rights of all Ameri­cans. It imposes, moreover, the neces­sity to arouse the labor movement indefense of the artists and profession­als victimized by the thought-control­lers and warmongers-a class duty to­ward allies which it has to date leftshamefully unfulfilled.

Today there is a significant de­velopment of independent expres­sions of working-class and people'sculture, such as People's Drama andNew Playrights in New York, suchas the highly talented group underthe auspices of the Committee for theNegro in the Arts now producingSimple Speaks His Mind in Harlem,the People's Artists Singers, the Yid­dish Theatre Ensemble, and othertheatres and choruses of the nationalgroups. An encouraging developmentis the formation of the film-produc­tion unit of the United Labor ActionCommittee. A welcome beginning,too, is the A.S.P.-sponsoreJ series ofcultural forums and programs. Thismovement for independent progres­sive expression in the arts is notlimited to New York. It extends toChicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco,Philadelphia, Newark, and other

'7

C111es. Its importance in this period nation. It follows (rom this that thecannot be overstated. These fine be- cultural strivings and affirmations ofginnings should spur similar cultural the Negro people as a whole, thoseformations in every section of the realized and those still latent, drawcountry. Vve must recognize with their basic sustenance and strengthgreater seriousness than ever before from the cultural mainspring, thethe need for stressing the respons- fountainhead, the subject nation.ibility of labor and progressive Consciousness of this principle willaudiences to support such groups and give us deeper understanding of thehelp their growth. significant need for the development

We must emphasize here the vital of a broad Negro people's culturalnecessity for building the Negro peo- movement as an integral part of thepie's theatre, both in the South and unfolding national-liberation mug­in the principal Negro communities gle.in the North. It is a crime that the In this period, the publishing prob­great creative talents of the Negro lems of progressive, and certainly ofpeople-symbolized by such artists Marxist, writers have, of course,as Paul Robeson. Langston Hughes, vastly increased. The commercialTheodore Ward, Alice Childress, book publishers and the editors ofand Frank Silvera-should continue bourgeois periodicals have shut theto be denied such a theatre through- door to realistic depictions of theout the land. It is the responsibility world we live in. Only that which isof the entire Left and progressive distorted. cynical, debasing, or atmovement, not only to help bring best trivial and evasive, has a pass­into existence the Negro people's port to print.theatre, but to help establish the Ne- We must offer our help to everygro people's House of Culture for manifestation of resistance on theall forms of cultural creation. part of writers to this thought-repres-

This great task demands of our sion and censorship. In addition, weParty the vanguard guidance deriv- must all the more cherish the culturaling from the Marxist-Leninist under- publications of the Left, as well asstanding of the national question as help the expansion of publicationit applies to the liberation movement facilities for honest and courageousof the Negro people. Concretely. writing. Unquestionably, more andhere, this means that the historical more writers of integrity will beroots of that attribute of nationhood looking to us for guidance and help,defined by Stalin as a common psy- as well as encouragement, in reach­chological makeup manifested in a ing people with their message.common culture are to be found in We should here greet the valuablethe Black Belt of the South, where role that Masses & Mainstream isthe Negro people constitute a subject playing on the cultural front. Con-

18

stantly strengthening itself in thestruggle it is carrying on for peaceand a people's culture, this magazinehas made a distinct contribution inits three-year existence under theeditorship of Samuel Sillen and theassociate editors Lloyd L. Brown andHerbert Aptheker. The magazineshould be warmly supported as themain publication medium for theprogressive cultural forces today. It isgratifying to know that Masses &Mainstream. which has made avail­able to Ameri can readers, in the spiritof proletarian internationalism, thewritings of eminent world artists likePablo Neruda, Nazim Hikmet, IlyaEhrenburg, and Martin Andersen1 [exo, is appreciated in many coun­tries.

The Daily Worker in its culturalpage has carried on a consistentstruggle against bourgeois culture, inits various reactionary manifestationsin literature and the arts, with parti­cular emphasis on the mass media.It has made a solid contribution inshowing the tie-up between such reac­tionary cultural manifestations andthe imperialist drive toward war. Ithas tirelessly fought racist content inthe arts and all white chauvinistpractices, and it has championed theappreciation and proper utilizationof the talents of Negro artists. De­serving of special mention is its mili­tant film department conducted byDavid Platt, which has on a day-to­day basis exposed the dangerous con­tent of the Hollywood product, TheParty membership and the progres-

sive forces, much more than in thepast, should regard the Daily TVark­er as the central mass Marxist ex­pression, not only in the economicand political spheres, but also in thesphere of culture. Its fight for Marx ­ist clarity in culture should enlist theparticipation and support of all ad­vanced cultural workers. But beyondthat, ways must be found to bring itsinfluence upon ever-wider sections ofthe working class, in the struggleagainst the fascization of culture asan organic part of the entire struggleagainst war and fascism.

AS ARTIST ANDAS CITIZEN

In the actions for peace during thepostwar years, sections of the intel­lectuals and various strata of profes­sionals have played an outstandingrole. The recent period, however, hasseen a marked decline in the or­ganized participation of culturalforces in the fight for peace from thehigh point of the 1949 Cultural andScientific Conference for WorldPeace. This decline was noticeable inthe campaign for signatures to theStockholm Peace Petiti on. It was fur­ther apparent in the negligible in­volvement of artists and writers inthe United States delegation to theSecond World Peace Congress atWarsaw in November, 1950.

It would, however, be the gravestmistake to conclude from this factthat the bulk of the cultural forceshave been won over to the war campor that they are unconcerned with the

issue of war or peace. The error ofsuch an assumption is evident, forexample, from the dismal failure ofGeneral Clay's so-called FreedomCrusade to win any mass supportamong cultural forces on a nationalscale.

What needs to be stated with re­spect to the peace-desiring intellec­tuals is that, in the absence of lead­ership by the working class, theirtraits of hesitancy and vacillation,characteristic of the petty bourgeoisie,tend to become intensified. For, onlvworking class leadership will weldthese forces into an important seg­ment of the entire peace front, ren­dering them more steadfast and moreconsciously purposive.

The Party's emphasis on the ur­gent need for a policy of concentra­tion on the workers in basic industryhas as a key objective the advance­ment of working-class leadership inthe struggle for peace. In applyingthis correct policy, we have to guardagainst neglect of the peace forcesamong the intellectuals and profes­sionals. The building of a peace frontbroad enough and effective enoughto influence events and to force achange in the foreign policy of ourcountrv must have the active andsignificant participation of the cul­tural forces.

Peekskill shows that the attack onculture is not a thing apart fromreaction's general drive, or marginalto it, but that it is one of the domi­nant expressions of the warmakers'oHensi V". It was Robeson's usc of his

great artistic talents and high culturalcontributions as weapons for peaceand the people's rights that broughtthe wrath of fascism upon him. Itwas the progressive ideological con­tent in the work of the HollywoodTen that marked them for victimiza­tion by the un-American Committee.It was the anti-racist ideological es­sence of the play They Shall Not Diethat brought the attacks of the Chris­tian Front hoodlums upon the castof People's Drama.

We have noted how monopolycapital, bent on war and fascism, issubjecting every art form and everycultural medium on all audiencelevels to direct and overt political usefor the propagation of its lying anti­Communist, anti-working class, anti­peace, and anti-humanist ideas. Drop­ped are the masks of "art for art'ssake" and of "pure science."

The intellectuals's work in thepeace movement, however, hastended to be limited to the directpolitical plane. to participation onlyas "citizens." Such activity, in theform of rallies, petitions, statementsto the press, erc., is most valuableand needs to be greatly expandedthrough united-front efforts in manydirections. Yet the full value of thecontributions of men and women ofthe arts and sciences in such progres­sive coalition actions demands for itsrealization that they participate cons­ciouslv as artists and as scientists inthe great social struggles of our times.Such integrated cultural endeavor isvital to the development of the p"ace

::0

movement and of an independentpeople's culture. A novelist whofights with his voice but not with hispen, an artist who gives his name tothe fight but not his brush, a scientistwho fights against the destruction ofhis civil rights but not of his science,fights with one hand, and with theother objectively aids the enemy.

Reactionary content in culture can­not be fought in the economic andpolitical sphere solely; it must hechallenged and fought with thecounter-ideology of progressive andworking-class culture, which theCommunists must lead in develop­ing. The "practicalism," rationalizedby the pressures of the work forpeace, that cannot pause for concernwith the content of the artist's orscientist's work, is opportunism,analagous to "economism" in thetrade unions.

Nor can we effectively wage thebroad battle of ideas, unless we battlefor the advanced, Marxist-Leninistideas in culture. For example, tocombat the general run of anti-So­viet propaganda, but not to fight forthe Marxist-Leninist principles in theSoviet discussions of the sciences,literature, and the arts, is to leavethese vital cultural fields to theenemy and to weaken the struggleagainst anti-Sovietism as a whole.

However, it would manifestlv bewrong to demand of everyone 'whoparticipates on a political-culturalbasis in a united-front peace activityor organization that he necessarilygive full expression to the proletarian

class ideology. What should be ex­pected of him is that he express him­self as citizen and as artist on thelevel of his own understanding. Ofcourse, it is the task of Communiststo help the non-Communists in theunited front to understand that thecultural forces with their pursuitsand talents can, in alliance with theworking class, labor and struggle tohasten the end of a system which,historically doomed, enslaves andhumiliates them.

THE PARTY AS ACULTURAL FORCE

A decisive turn is needed in theParty's cultural work. We mustabandon the old concept that culturalwork is activity only among culturalworkers. Cultural work has to beviewed as organically related to theParty's mass tasks-not directedlimitedly toward a single socialstratum, but carried on amongmasses of the people, the workingclass, the rural poor, the 1 egro peo­ple. the national groups. the youth,and the cultural workers. Culturalactivity is an essential phase of theParty's general ideological work, andas such is interconnected with theParty's struggles in the economic andpolitical spheres. For Marxists-Lenin­ists it should, therefore, be axiomaticthat cultural work is for the Partvinalienable from general mass work.

1 'ot only must we end any nega·rive approaches to cultural tasks, allvestices of cultural nihilism, but wemust learn to use the weapon of cul-

:!l

ture in respect to the main tasks be­fore our Party: the struggle for peaceand for civil rights; the struggle toadvance the working class to theposition of leader in the coalitionmovements of the people; the strug­gle to weld the alii: .ice of the work­ing class and the liberation move­ment of the Negro people, to bringforward the " legro workers as theleading force in that movement; andthe Partv's task of concentration inthe shops of basic industry,

This task becomes all the more im­portant because of the increased prob­lems faced by the cultural workersin finding channels for their talentsand professions, Actors' Equity As­sociation figures for the theatricalyear ending June 1950, showed theaverage player to have worked on thestage ten weeks and earned $840,With intensified chronic unemploy­ment in the theatre, music, and otherareas of the monopoly-owned "amuse­ment field," more and more artistsare being driven into industry, Thiscondition hits most heavily the Ne­gro artists, The worsening of the eco­nomic status of artists in all fields isaccompanied by growing political re­pression, thought-control, regimenta­tion, and blacklisting, which under­mine the very basis for the culturalworker to function even in a mini­mum way with self-respect. Con­sequently, ever-increasing numbersof professionals and artists will beimpelled to turn to the working classas the base and preserving force oftheir talent',

22

More than ever, therefore, it mustbecome the conscious duty of theworking class, particularly the pro­gressive trade unions, and of the peo­ple's organizations to provide at least" minimum economic base at thisstage for those artists and profes­sionals who will build independentcultural organizations serving theworking class, Such collaborationwill enrich simultaneously the talentsof the professionals and the cultureof the working class,

The main responsibility for help­ing to realize this task devolves onthe Party, It is an important task,one that affects the growth of theParty itself and the development ofa mass class-consciousness. TheParty's recognition and acceptance ofthis responsibility, its consistent ef­fort to carry through this task, willhelp to end the long era of labor'snon-resistance to capital's attackswith the weapon of bourgeois cul­ture,

The lational Cultural Commis­sion urges upon the Party adequateattention to developing cadres forwork on the cultural front, to select­ing and training such cadres, and topromoting leadership from amongthem, with special attention to Ne­gro cadres, women cadres, and cadresfrom the youth, Our Party muststrive to bring forward cadres in thecultural field who can be forces ofthe people, with unbounded faith inthe working class,

This new orientation requires,further, a re-examination of the or-

ganizauoual forms within the Party,for the fulfillment of these tasks. Itrequires most particularly the recog­nition that cultural work is not thework of a department or of a fewindividuals, that it is the work of theParty. The Party must become as awhole, through its ranks and throughthe various levels of its leadership,conscious of the need to deal withthis question adequately, and cons­cious of the opportunities that workin this field offers our Partv and theworking class. .

Therefore, the question arises ofestablishing leading bodies in thisfield, commissions, committees, etc.,and assignments of leading comradeson national, state, county, and sectionlevels, particularly in industrial con­centration areas.

The Commission takes the posi­tion that our cultural workers mustno longer be isolated in separateParty organizations. Instead of sepa­rating them from the healthy influ­ences of the proletarian membershipof the Party and at the same timedepriving the Party ranks in the basicorganizations of their broad culturalexperience, we should integrate ourcultural forces with all Party organi­zations.

Our cultural work is more than atechnique for rallying people. TheAmerican bourgeoisie, driving downthe road of total national betrayal,strives to obliterate every revolution­ary, democratic and militant tradi­tion of the people, to destroy everyexpression of people's culture. In this

fateful hour, the Party is called uponto lead in the defense of the people'scultural heritage and in the struggleto affirm the vital creativeness of thepeople. The progressive stream in thecultural heritage of the Americanpeople courses through the greatstruggles of the masses in the Ameri­can Revolution, the Abolitionistmovement, the unceasing freedomstruggle of the Negro people, thegreat militant traditions of the work­ing class in the fight against capitalistexploitation and imperialist war. Thisheritage is symbolized by such namesas Tom Paine, Phillis Wheatley andPhilip Freneau; Wendell Phillipsana Frederick Douglass; Walt Whit­man and Mark Twain; Joe Hill,Theodore Dreiser, and John Reed.

Our Party will carry this task tosuccess, if it exercises its own inde­pendent. Marxist role in culture, asin the political and economic spheres.Cultural work for the Party shouldthus become an integral aspect of itswhole activity. Only as it learns tograsp the weapon of culture andfights with it, only as our Party itselfcomes forward as a creative culturalforce, will it be able to contributeeffectively to the development of thecultural expressions of the workingclass and the people, and to mobilizethem to fight with that weapon indefense of peace and culture itself.

A true understanding of our inde­pendent role should require thatCommunist cultural workers createin the interests of the working classand from the standpoint of its lib-

crating world outlook. The situationdemands from our creative forcesnovels and plays, poems, paintings,musical compositions, popular songs,and criticism, vibrant with the Partyspirit, the very essence of Socialistrealism.

In carrying through these tasks,our Party must further unfold be­fore the people the nature, purpose,scope, and world significance of theinspiring Socialist culture of the So­viet Union, as well as the rising cul­ture of the free peoples in the NewChina and the European countries ofPeople's Democracy. \Ve must makeknown to the people the true essenceof the science and art of the eman­cipated society of the Socialist SovietUnion. We must show that Socialistculture rises on a foundation involv­ing no human exploitation andanarchic prod uction, no economiccrises, no class antagonisms, no drivesto fascism and war. The culture ofthe mighty Socialist state which is

the bulwark of world peace and thefreedom of nations, this truly civilizedculture is based on the great scientificteachings of Marx, Engels, Lenin andStalin, which guide today the Sovietpeople's course to Communism, andwhich give perspective, confidence,and inspiration to the forward-striv­ing forces of mankind the worldover.

As Marxists-Leninists, we voice thedeepest needs and aspirations of thepeople, Negro and white, native andforeign-born. The warmongers andtheir decadent cultural apologists of­fer the people physical and spiritualimpoverishment, the slow death ofsubservience and the swift death ofthe atom bomb. Our Party offers thepeople the science and culture of truehuman relations based on the guar­anteed rights to material satisfactionand cultural fulfillment. We must goforward to the people with the mes­sage of peace, of freedom, of Socialisthumanism.

More WEAPONS OF CULTURE by V.J.JEROMECl'LT ' ~ ~ 1 \ CH \ (;1(; \YOHLJ)

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