A.DAM CIOLKOSZ ' .The Expr~priati~q • OIA So~ialis,t ·Par(y· TliePresenSt ituatioonft.he -Social1istMov,ement InPoland . ' POLISH SOCIM.IST ALLIENCJ; ' . . ZWI~ SOCJAiLI~T6WfOLS~ICIJ New York, Septebar-october, 1H~. Biblioteca Gim, ~-~··-- -
• • Adam CIOLKOSZ was a Member of-the Polish Diet and secretary of the. Polith Socialist Parliamentary Party. Member of the Central Executive Committee of the P.P.S. He was one of ,the opposition leaders imprisoned by Pilsudski in the military fortress of Brest Lltovsk. , The Polish Socialist Porty (PPS) prior to the war 'fhe Polish Socialist Party (PPS) was founded in November )892 and beci.me, i\) the course of history, the undisputed Party of the Polish working classComing into being as the u1'derground Party of Russiano<icupied Poland, it closely co-operated with the Polish SocialDemocratic Party of former Austrian Poland (PPSD) and the !'olish Socialist Party (PPS) .of former• Prussian Poland. Immedfately' after ·tl~ rebirth of Poland· as an indepelldent· Re• public in °November 1918, a-11these three PaTties merged into one J:'olish Socialist Party. In ,addition, there existed in Poland Jewish, ·Ger1nan and Ukrainian Socialist Parties, with which the PPS closely co-ope~ated . . Durin"g_ the' twenty years· of Poland's independence, the PPS stood in the forefront. of the struggle against any reactionary tendencies, from whatever quarter they may have come.- In particular, it distinguished itself by the uncompromising fi_ght against the regime inaugurated by Pilsudski's coup d'etat. !n the course of this fight the PPS had to endure many serious blows, amongst which the ,imprisonment of six of its leaders in 1he military fortess of Brest Litowsk in 1930 was one of the most outstanding. An attempt to split the PPS from inside; launched by Pilsudski's followers, resulted in the creation by them of an allegedly Socialist Party~) which, however, was unable to gain any serious in.fluence within the Polish proletariat. On the other hand, it increased:-the solidity within• the PPS, -cleansed it of Pilsudski's friends and consequently made it stronger than before. With rega-1:dto Fascism and Hitlerism', tbe PPS took from the very beginning anluncompromising attitude in which there was to be no wavering or faltering. It resolutely opposed Colonel Deck's policy. • The constructive programme of the PPS with regard to in- _1,en1al_ conditiims, in pre-war Polaqd consisted in _adyoc_;itlrig f!ee and unfettered elections, based on upiversal, direct, secret, :equal and proportional suffrage- The Party had no doubts that 1the two strongest parties to emerge from such ele_ctions would be the PPS itself and the Peasant Party, and these two,· with a·working majority in Parliament, could together form a democratic Government. There was the probability of smaller parties •) "Polska Partja Socjalistyczna dawna Frakcja Rewolu- 'cyJna". 2 2 BibliotecaGino Bianco
of the Left and the Centre being included in such a. coalition. Iii m:atiers of foreign p·olicy the PPS st1pported the· J;;eague o! Nations, stood for collectfve security, closest co-operation with the Western democracies and friendship with the Soviet Union. Tlie PPS always .denol\nced and opposed any imperialist aggres~ion •or threat of aggression. The determined attitude of the Polish nation towards German aggre~sion and invasion in 1939 And· the following years, was, to a, very great extent, the result 3i years of work by and guidance from the PPS. The decision fo defend the encircled Polish capital of Warsaw in September ~9?9 w~s, in the f(rst place, a decision of the PPS. Th·e underg,-ound activities, 1939-1945 · lmmediately after the capitulation of Warsa,". and just before' the e11try of the German troops into the -Capital, the PPS, like ~II the other Polish political parties, took the decision of !'\iss·olying_the legally existing Party organization, and embarki11g'on a new conspiratorial activity. No one could possibly entl'rtain th-e i1h1sion that a legal political existence under the Nazi occupation and the rule of the Gestapo would be possible. This· dould perhaps have been ·achieved, but at the cost of far1·eachii.1gcompromises of which the PPS·was incapable. Tbe September campaign was over, bnt the war we.nt on. The leaders of the PPS - all of them - considered resistance to the German invaders to be the main task of the Polish workers- Moreover, they saw, already then, that in the final stage of the war, fovaded and conquered nations would have- to stand up and deliv-er tihe f.inal blow to the German invaders. All this iU:volved tiie necessity of the whole Movement going underground, and t.ha-t from the very , outset. Consequently, the formation of the ;,r.eret Party organisation was embarked upon immediately. For .eonspirational purposes the Party adopted the name "The Mowment of the Working Masses of Poland", generally called the .W·.R,N. from the initial letters of its slogan: Freedom (Woluosc}: Equa,lity (1{6wno§c), Independence (Niepodleglosc). Only a. few words. can be said here about the heroic and unique work performed by the WRN under the German occupation. Thus, for instance, a large secret organisational network of the WRN comprised, already at the end of 1940, over 2,000 units. The underground Socialist Press and pamphlets 1·cached, in the course of the war, the amazing figure of 2 million copies. A Socialist military organisation was created lmder the name of OWPPS (Socialist Insurgent_ Military Detachementis), which was included; as a separate and distinct organisation, in the national scheme of the Underground Home Army (AK). There was, besides, a Socialist Militia, organised both on a territorial and on a factory basis• All these organisations played an outstanding rol~, inter alia in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. :he PPS played a prominent part in the work of the Polish tTnderground Sfate. It was represented in the· Secret Parliament whose chairman, moreover, was one of the outstanding Comrades 8 BibliotecaGino Bianco
Kazimierz Puzak (the Seeretary General of the Party). It gave its support to the Polish Government in Paris, Angers and later in London, which included three Socialist Ministers. It was iilso represented in the co-called Home Coupcil' of Ministers, which formed an integral part of the Polish Government in London. Everywhere the PPS acted in accordance with its Socialist and democratic• principles and achieved g1·eat successes in ist work of ensuring to the Poland, which was to emerge after the German defeat, a bold and progressive political, social and economic policy. Notwithstanding the strict observance of all conspiratorial rules -·in which the PPS, owing to her old revolutionary trac,ition excelled anyone else - heavy losses could not be avoi~ed. Three members of the Central E.i,;2cutive Committee of· the Party (Niedzialkowski, Cza:pii1ski,Topinek) and 28 othe~ members of the Supreme Council of the Party, perished at the.hands of the invaders. Altoget'her about 700 prominent leaders· of ·the Party met tpeir death under the occupation. From these figures the losses amongst the rank ·and file can be imagined• But_ the Movement grew stronger and....stronger, new people j0ining it incessantly. In May 1944; in view of the approachG1g hour of the final and open rising against the Germans, the Monment could already afford to revert to the name of the PPS. The ,Communist Party of Poland (KPP)' 'l.'he Communist Party of Poland (KPP), whose forerunner had been the Social Democracy of the ·Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania (SDKPiL), never succeeded. in gaining the support of the Polish working clas.s in any strength of for any considerable period of time. This was due to their unforgettable political blunders, such as: a) their definitely· negative attitude to the questioh of Poland's indepepdence prior to the Fir.it World War (a congres~ of the SDKPi:L in 1905 declared that Poland's independence was detrimental to' the international proletariat and the international social revolution); b) their boycott of the elections to the Constituent Assembly in 1919 and, in general, their negative attitude to the reborn -Polish Republic; c) the"ir attitude to the Russian invasion of Poland in the summer of 1920- and thefr role during the Polish defence of Warsaw; cl) their appeal in 1932 for the severance of Polish Pomerania and Upper ~lesia from the Polish Republic in favour of Germany. Equally, the attitude of the Communists to the PolishGei·man war up to June 22nd, 1941 cannot be forgotten. It is needless to say that in spite of this Communist record, the PPS always resolutely opposed any persecutions of the Communists and claimed for them the right of free political existence. The self-styled, Lublin group On July 22nd, 1944 the so-called Polish Committee ot Na· t.ional Liberation (PJCWN) wag proclaimed in Chelm, after the entry into that town of the R;ed Army- Later, it founde(l Its ' 's1blioteca Giro Bianco "
,, Headquarters in Lublin. Its chairman Was M. Edward OsubkaJI/Iorawski, who, prior to the war, had been a member of the PPS. During tbe war, however, he left the Party and joined a 'newly arisen tiny group, constituted in 1943 and bearing the name of the Polish Socialist Workers' Party (RPPS), the remnants of which. after a numbrr of splits, took on the characte'r of an affiliate to the Polish Workers' Party (PPR), the new name for the Communist Party of ·Poland. Here it must be stressed that the Polish Communists are not only afraid of'using their old name (the Communist Party cf Polan(I.-KPP) and prefer to 'emphasize again and again that the Polish Workers' Party created at the end of 1941, has little in common w_ith the old KPP (dissolved in 1937), but, what is more, they are anxious to avoid the impression of a oneparty rule in Poland- To achieve this, it was necessary for them, 1·ight from the beginning, to have at their disposal a set of ' pse11'do-Parties, which, although bearing different names, would be C.ommunist-eontrolled. To this end, while creating their new puppet Parties, they gave them the names of old and gene- 1 rally •known Polish political Parties. Thus JI/Ir.Osubka-Morawski suddenly emerged in his self-styled capacity of the Chairman of the ·Cent'ral Executive ·Committee of the PPS, while the Lublin Committee was supposed to be based on the support of four parties bearing the names oJ the Polish Workers', Polish Socialist, Peasant and [)'emocratic Parties. Of these, only the Polish Workers' Party (Communists) was real, although with Yery little support within the nation. The other three were usurpers, with real parties bearing the respective names still mgaged in the underground struggle in German-occupied Poland and helpless to combat the usurpation . .Contrary to all normal procedure, the organis.ation of tlle fake PPS was effected in a curious way, beginning with the creation of the self-made supreme authorities, and then proceding downwards to local branches. In Lublin, controlled by the Red Army, the selfstyied PPS started the publication of a daily paper bearing the name of the "Robotnik" (the main organ of the real PPS), - while the authentic i,Robotnik" continued to appear in Warsaw right up to the end of the Warsaw Uprising. On September 10th and 11th, 1944, the fak~ PPS organised an allegedly national conference in Lublin, which they called the Twenty-Fifth Congress of the PPS. It must be emphasized that this \allegedly "national" conference, was held at a time when 1he whole of Poland to th~ West of the Vistula was still under German occupation, and with not one member of the authentic Central Executive Committee of the Supreme Council of the Party, and not one Socialist member of the former Polish Parliaments present, and in violation of all the statutory rules of the real Party. A conference, convened in such a way, elected, the supreme authorities of the fake Party, which, anyhow, had begun to function as such on their own initiative and long before even that conference. It m.ay perhaps be noted that these rupreme authorities included several people whom the Red BibllotecaGino Bianco
Army brought with them from ·Russia and who had not taken any .part in the underground struggle iJl Poland·. The Sup;reme Council of the fake Party, ap_poi9ted after such a fashion, r~- ~olved i11f.ebruary 1945 to exclude from the Party the "leaders and a1,1t);iorsof the political al)d ideological front of the Wm". 'rlius, t,hese people, some of whom ·,'vere never in their life memhers of the PPS, had the effrontery to "e.+clud,e'' the m~st devoted and meritorious Socialist leaders of Pol;md,. T.~e Crime,a verdict on Poland A new great Soviet offensive in January 1945 cleared th Germans out of the rest of Poland. In most cases, local brai;icJies of the authentic PPS spontaneously welcomed the opportunjty L'f coming' into the open and ·resuming their activitjes. - The tiublin Committee having in the meantime styled itself to ProYisional Government of Poland (December 31st, l9i4), moved to Warsaw in the wake of the advancing :S,ussian armies. 'fhe history of the Russo-Polish 1,e[a,tions in the course of the war is too well known to require a repetition here. On February 12th, 1945, the heads of th~ governments of Great Britain, the U.S.A. and the U.S.S-R, assembled at Yalta, issued the declaration on Poland. On March 15th, 1945, the Suprimc Council of the autl1entic PPS -~1etsecretly under the chairman- :<hip of Zulawski to examine the new situation which had thus arisen. In this meeting, nearly all the surviving membe,rs of the l1tst duly elected pre-war Supreme Council, present at that time in Poland, took part. The Supreme Council -surveyed and aclmowledged the whole of the PM'ty's war-time und.ergrou.nd r.ctivities. While protesting against the injustice of the Crimea verdict on J>oland, they decided to take part in the consultations that were to lead to the formation of a '':Provisional Polish Government of National Unity".· Consequently, Comrades ;E'uzak and Pajdak accepted, together with fourteen other I'ol,es, au i11vitati.on from the Soviet military a,1thorities to take _part in conversatiOllS, intended to· achieve a settlement. The f;tte of these sixteen Poles, their arrest, trial and verdict at the-,.ha.nds of the Soviet autlwrities, is notorious• Coinrade ;E'uzak w_as_sentenced to one and a half years' penal servitude, and released lidor.e the expiratio11 of that term as a result of the Soviet amn.esty. Comrade Pajdak underwent a sep.Arate trial and ~v11s sentenced to five years penal servitude. He still remains in a Soviet prison. "T~e Provisional Government of National l:Jnity" Simultaneously with the trial of the Polish deleg_ates,.t,here started in Moscow negotiations on the formation of the "Pro:visional Polish Government of National Unity", to which t,he Commission of Three also invited Zygmunt Znlawski, ChairwaJ;L of the Supreme Council of the anthent.ic PPS, ivho took part in lhc 11e.gotiations, wit_bont, l1owever, OJ)tering the ll~W Govert1n1cnt, which was formed 011 Jure 28th, 1945. Thus, ·no repre6 BibliotecaGino Bianco
sentative of the authentic PPS was included in the new Govern- · lllent. As a ma.tter o_ffact ,this new provisional Governme\li con-. sisted maiuly of the old Lublin -Government, with the addition , of a f.ew n'~.wMinis~~rs. ~fhree of them led by Mr. Mikol~jczyk, · were r_epresenta!,ives of the Peasant Party, while Mr. Stanczyk, went immediat~ly over to the Party of Mr. Osubka-MorawskL' ' · ,On J~n~ 29,th and 30th and July 1st, 1945, this Party held its next conference in Warsaw, described as the XXVIth Con- 'rere1ice o,f the P:PS, and again elected the national 'authorities, wi.th Mi:. Szwalbe (who never before the Lublin episode had 'teen known as member of the PPS) ~s the Chairman of the .S~p~eme.C~1:1ncial nd with M~- Osubka-Morawski as the Chairman of the Central Executive Committee. Of the members of the newly-elect~d Central E-xecutive Committee, only Mr. Staii.czyk had been a member of the pre-war Central Executive Committee d ·the authentic PPS. He was elected' for the first time' ~t the l;ii;t P,1'.e•w~rconferE,i;ieeof the Party and. his name was at the ~o\tom of the poll. T,he 1:.e<:og11itionf .the new Provisional Government by t~e ,Grea.t Po_w,e_rosnce again created a new situation, which becapie; tb.e su.bject of d.eliberations on the part of the Supi:eme Council of ,the an,thentic PPS, when it met again in secret under the· cJ;,.ai.rn\ansbi_p oJ zulaws~i, on July 5th, 19,45.ApproachiJ1g tl:ie· si,t1;mtjoureali.sticaUy, they decided that all efforts sboulg. be ;l}l,ad!;!,o ,secu.re a possibility of a constructive Socialist wor).cin. ·the new ani;l hard conditions prevailing in Poland. In particu,l.,ar-,t.he~up1·eme Council decLi;lednot to reject th:e possi,bility of 11, 1rie;-g,e1b·etween the aut)lentic PPS and t,JieParty led by Mr . .Psu.bk11-Moral"sk-ip, articularly, as the latter :Party had a11;eady imposed _itscontrol on .the lo~al branches of the PPS wJ:\ichhad c,oJne,into t.he open, _and_because the authentic· PPS ·was d~ni~d imy r.,ight to a legal political exis.tence and did not' wish .to_,c.ap:yon ~ts underground work uni;ler the new conditions. Ac• co·rdingly, delegations o.f the two parties met and set down. con-· ditions for a merger. These conditions, although imposing heavy .sacrifices on the authentic PPS, were ratified by it, while Mr. Osubka-Morawsl,d's C~mmittee first temporised and then definitely refused to ratify them. Attempts to form the Polish Social-Democrat_ic ~~rty . In the meantime, Mr. Mikolajczyk toge.ther with other lea-: ders of the genuine Peasant Party, managed to recreate ~hei_r)rt:· dependent Party, as distinct from the Lublin-created .Pe!lsant Party,_ and called it this time the Polish Peasant Party (PSL), · ·in order to avoid confusion between the two bodies. The· re~' ·suit.was ~hat m~sses of _p~asants now broke away from the Coµi, ~~µnist-con \rolled Peasant Party, rejoining the· Polish Peas.a~t' .rai·ty; whic,h has now become the only political party in Poland: free (rom Communist control. In addition, Mr.1 Popiel from L<~nrlon was allowed to re-create his "Labour Party", a Catholic. non-Socialist., Centre gronp, !llthongh he did not qnite iincc~e<I ~i!~. :. 7 BibliotecaGino Bianco
i~ ihaking off Communists coutrol and finally was compelled tc ~l~Spend the activities of his, party. Zulawski, left with no reply from the "official" Pa1·ty and l~ter informed of their refusal to ratify the agreed conditions qf' a merger, faced with the approaching date set down by the G-overnment authorities for all. the underground organisations to reveal themselves (September 21st, 1945), decided to ,reveal the authentic PPS leaders and to resume their open political :icti".ities• He decided, however, to adopt a different nam·e, that of "Polish Social-Democratic Party" in order.to avoid any conf~si.on which might arise between the PPS and the Party led b~· Mr. Osubka.-Morawski. To thi;;; end zulawski addressed ·the following two letters to Mr. Bierut and Mr: Osubka-Morawski. "M1-. Boleslaw Bierut, President of the National Council of \he Homeland. • I d.id not conceal for a moment that the Polish Socialist Party which I have represented for years is an entir.ely different organizations from the one represented by C'omrade Stanislaw 8zwalbe and Comrade Premier <Dsubka-Morawski. From the very beginning' I considered it necessary to unite these two organisations and we.have laid down conditions of such a unification which were to be ratified by both bodies. Up till now I have had no official notification as to this problem of unifica-. tio~ and co-operation, and, at the same time, the dat~ of September 21st is a.pproaching, whi_chdate has been set for all organizations to "come into the open" and to adapt their acti- ,,ities, to the existing rules. 'l'herefore, in view of the time limit, I notify you for formal reasons of the existence of our organ.isation and I declare that i~ intends to avail itself to the .full of the political rights which have been granted it at Yalta a£ one of the "anti-Nazi" parties, - obviously depending on the ratification or non-ratification of the agreement between .!he t'wo parties in question, of July 1945. · (-) Zygmunt Zulawski Chairman, Polish Bocialist Party, Myslenice, September 18th, 1945 ". "The Prime Minister of the Government of National Unity, :Mr. Edward Osubka-Morawski, "rrarsaw. Following my letter to the President of the National Council of the Homeland of Septembe~ 18th, 1945, (herewith inform you that in view of my having been notified of the repudiation by the Central' Executive Committee of tpe Polish Socialist Party of the ratification of the agreement between our two organisations conce·rning their unification, we have decided to undertake political activities of our own, under the name of Polish Social~Democratic Party. BibhotecaGino Bianco
A, delegation consistihg of comrade;,: :Aleksy Bien, Stani~ slaw Garlicki and Antoni Zdano~ski, lias been empowered to conduct - with the proper State authorlties - negotiation~ 1111dtalks aiming at the necessary co-ordination in connection with our undertaking of open political activities. · ~ygmunt Zulawski, Chairman. Cracow, October 2nd, 1945." The above-quoted Jetter to Mr. Osubka-Morawski was delh•ered to him by a delegation of sponsors of the PP.SD, composed of the three comrades named in zulawski's Jetter. Below are the minutes of the conversation which took plMe between the delegation and Mr. Osubka-Morawski. · 1 • "The Premier received the delegation on October 6th, 19~5, at 9-30 a. m. · · I The spokesman of the delegation declared at the outset: 'We have come to you, esteemed Comrade Premier, in order to infor1~ you that in view of tfie failure of the negatiatiom; afming nt unification which had been co.nducted in July, and on the s1rength of the articles 104 and 105 of the 1921 Constitution, as well as of the decisions of the Yalta Conference, later confirmed at Moscow consultations and at Potsdam - the Underground Group of the P~lish Socialist Party has decided to come into the open and to start legal activities under the name of the p'olish fSocial~Democratic Party and under the leadership of Comritde 7,ygmunt .Zulawski from whom we have the honour to delive\' 'ton a letter." Premier: "Does the letter concern this matter?" The spokesman of the delegation : ''Yes.'' Premier: "I am· not going to accept it. I declare that you ' 'will be treated on a par with the National Armed Forces." The meaning' of this further utterances was as follows: The activities of the WRN were harmful which is borne out by the abundant. underground literature edited'by the WRN during the war .. In reply to the delegation's statement that it does not represent the WR.N but the Polish Social-Democratic· Party just r.nnounced by Zulawski ... that it is unthinkable to· treat a man !ike Zulawski as a Fascist - the Premier declared that Zulawski may be whatever he likes but the whole group is the WRN and the Government will never allow its activities. In reply to the delegation's statement that this sort of policy is a blow aimed at a group including - as the Premier is :nvare - honest Socialists, - the Premier answered that honest Socialists ~re members of the Polish Socialist Party and as to those who still do not belong' to it, they can even now apply for membership. · · Replying to the objection that the Premier qualifies the entire group in a· one-sided way and denies its right to political existence, that this is contrary to the principles of political freedom and democracy, which - afte~ all - involve resp~ct BibliotecaGino Bianco
I' for t,h.e convicti,o,ns of .opponents - th.e Premier once mor~ re• peate,i;l.it.h.atth,e WJ;tN will be ,treated. exactly as tlie National ..1!1-megJrorces. fo the course of his ,further ,d,eclarations the Premier said, _a!I).91Jogther things: "Po yo1,1want to s~1k into ~he abyss 1 You can do so. You ,~ill get ·what you ·deserve. There will be no second amnesty"• When the .delegation remarked • that, after all, political activity has now been ~estarted by po-, lit-ical groups who, during the war, had been violently combatt-. ec).by the Premier's camp. The Prem.ier asked: "Which g~oups 1" Wh~n th!l delegation explained that •it ~eaut the Polish Peasant Pai·ty, t,h,e P~~.mier d~clared. that the Polish Peasant Par.ty is something quite different from the WRN. Iii the 'course of this whole talk with the delegation the Premi~r rather shouted ·than talked. In leaving, the delegation -left 2:utaw1Ski's letter on the Pre~ier's desk'." · · · A fu.rther consequence of zutawski's attempt to re-create an ii1depeni.lent Socialist Party, and the determination of the authorities t~ prevent this' from happening, was a resolution r,assed by the Prae3idium of the National Council of the .Home1.and·.(Krajowa Rada· Narodowa). It must be explained tha.t thi~ Coqncil is a body pretendi~g to act as a provisional Parliament o.rPoland. I,ts member~, ho\ve~er; are nominated and not elected; · 11ud their mandats may be a~·bitrarily withdrawn by the P1;ae- ~i~i1,1,nTi.he res~lution of this Praesidium, referred to ab·ove, ·as 111rnouncedby the Warsaw Radio on November 4th, 19~, stated th!l,t _the nee~ for a' d.iff~rentiatiori in de~ocratic; sociai, politicr.l programmes was fully met in ·the present pre-election p_hase o.f.Poli.sh life by the existing six political parties and that "a further diffe;·entiation of political opinion may cause an unusu- ;:;!Jydangerous pre-eminence of 'Party discord in regard to- the National's joint ai~s ''. This resol~tion ·was equivalent to a ban on any other ·political party, even "democratic and anti-Nazi" . . In the' meantime, signa,tories of the document concerning t)1e crea,1:,ionof the Polish .Social-Democratic Party were subjected to interrogation by the Security Police; nearly all of them. were even arrested and all of them were warned against undertaking any "illegal" activities ..Thus, contrary to obligation~ acc~~ted by the Polish Provisional Government at Potsdam, t.lie authentic Par_ty ·of Polish Socialism has, in fact, been out- ·1a~ved·· · · ' · · . ' A ntw agreement broken ·- .. '- _;,. ·- ... :.Ufic\erthe circumstanc~s, iulawski undertooJ;: ye,t '.1.no_th,er nt;tem~,t;,~o break .the new d.;e!l~lock.As a ·result of ;enew:~d ;up ' _gotia,tions bet"l)'e,ei_hi .in and Mr. Sr;wal~e, Chairman of .~heSup- \C~e pouncil of. ~k Osubk~-Moi:awski'.s pa_r.ty, .a new a~r~e.: rnent was reached. Giving effect to this agreemen_t, Zgla,~s.ki P,ublis}i._edon _qecember ,23rd, 1945, an ap_peal invi~ing m_embers _of,the \J,Uthe.nticPPS to join individ.ually t~e "official" Pa,rty: Very so~,n, _h.owever,it bec_a'me·evi'Clen,tthat )vhi(e ·tula_wsJ.;:iwas ,f.a_it\1fnlly ca17yin_g ,?,11,I; .t,l1~P.t'<n•_isionosf t,he-~_greeni~11t, thr, ot,her rarty did not. consider themselves in tlic least hound by it. Zn• 10, BibliotecaGino Bianco
fawski was refused the possibility of publishing an article in the official "Robotnik" and was eventually able to publish it only in a provincial weekly. In this article Zulawski, ivhile stressing that ~olida1·ity and unity are t)!e greatest assets of the working class, declared: "But just as :( did not alter my co11victio11about the need cf solidarity, so I did not alter it witl1 regard to the need of de- !nocracy and freedom either. Just as I fought for them during the period of Poland's partitions, 1./S I claimed them when they were being jeopardised <luring the regime of Pilsudski and the Camp of National l.inity, so to-day 1 consider them to be one of the fundamental conditions of life in the liberated State. It 1~ou,ldbe a grave mistafrn for anyone to believe that, after more '.han forty years {spent in.public life), I could change my opinions on this problem, - and it would be. a gravei: mistake still for anyone to try to ;mpose stich a change on me, C(intrary to w,hat has always be~n my creed·" I.ndeed, Zulawski never concealed the differences existing between him and :Messrs. Szwalbe and Osubka-Morawski, particurly 01;1 the question of democracy, freedom of expression, free elections, etc- etc. 'rhe 'problem was whether he would be 11 llowed "to voice and advocate these opinions within the "official" PPS, which was to be the test of. that Party's internal democracy. The ~i-eement between hil)l and Mr. Szwalbe was concluded on the assumption that he would. The course of events proved, the contrary. Soo11after the conclusion of the agreement, Mr. Szwalbe published three articles in the ,v arsaw "Robotnik", violently attacking the PPS for its activities both before and during the war. Contrary to any s_pirit of understanding and good will, Mr. Szwalbe declared that "the activities of the WRN during the occupation must be considered politically mistaken and, moreover, ex:tl'emely harmful." "The re-born .PPS - wrote Mr. Szwalbe' - repudiates absolutely and completely the WRN". ·"fhe reborn PPS is not a continuation, but a negation of_the, ,vRN". ',l'b.emost striking proof of the real intentions of. the "official "Party came during the last session of the Supreme C:mncil ef the "official" PPS (a body including about 120 persons), held on March 31st and April 1st, 1946. Contrnry to the provisions of the agreement, the Supreme CoUJ1cilof the "official" Party co.opted only haU of the agreed member of Zulawski 's political friends. Moreover, during the same Session the true p11rpcse of the agreement, as far as the lead·ership of the "official" Party was eoncemed, wa~ bluntly revealed by Mr. Osubka-Morawski when he declared: ,"We have lately admitted into the Party a group of comrades, because we wanted to put an end to the rumours that there are other Socialists, members of the PPS, that there is •mother SocialiRt Partr in Poland. ,ve wanted to put an end to this legend, Ro that onr friends in the ,vest contd not Ray anr longer that there is a second P9lish Socialist Party." 11 BiblrotecaGino Bianco
These words speak for themselves. The new agree:m~nt was intended to deceive Sociali,st partieS1 in the West as to the real situation of the Socialist Movement in Poland. Under those circumstances, Zulawski and his friends") resigned from the Supreme Council of the "official" Party to which they had been coopted- during that very same session of the .Supreme Council. Thus, owing to the attitude o1 the leadership of the "official" • Party, the short-lived agreement with Zulawski was broken• Leaving aside for the moment the I.act, that some of our· comrades had been personally denied the possibility of joining the "official" Party, as well as the fact that many preferred not to join it - it mui;t be categorically stated, that in view of the foregoing, the leadership of the "official" PPS is in no way entitled to represent the genuine. democratic Socialists of Poland . • .l'he rank and file versus the leader.ship There is little doubt that the bulk of the working cl81lsoJ Poland, including the rank ·and file: of the "official" PPS, remains fa.ithful to the ideals of democratic Socialism and, loya1 to the authentic PPS. The question, how it came about that the genuine Socialist rank and file found· itself within the "official" PPS easily explained under the peculiar circumstances pre- ' vailing ,in Poland. As has already been mentioned, most of the local organiza- . tions of the genuine PPS came spontaneously into the open and - J'esumed their activities immediately after the expulsion of the Germans. The supreme authorities of the authentic PPS being· denied the opportunity of resuming their normal functions, the Lublin group was able to impose their control over these local organizations, - a fact, which did not prevent these organisations from remaining in touch with their real leaders. Thus, a large part of the organised Socialist working class· of Poland ~ound itself. in the ranks of the "official" Party. Furthermore, strong pressure is exerted on employees and peo.ple dependent on public bodies to join one of the four original Lublin parties. Having to choose between the Communist PPR and the "of- .ficial" PPS, the P-olishworkers still preferred to join the latter. Not only does member.ship of one ·of the parties confer certain privileges on the members, but certain posts are unobtainable for non-party people, especially in the civil service. A telling illustration of this .situatioi;i may be found in a speech made by Mr. Osubka-Morawski, the Prime Minister ,of the Warsaw Government, in Wroclaw, on December 26th, 1945, in which he revealed the existence of a circular of the Minister of Public Security, Mr• Radkiewicz, to the effect that members of a, political party must not be arrested without their party being pre- -viousiy notified of the charges proferred against them, unless caught red-handed committing a crime. Unless this is a case, the charges against such persons have to be submitted to their political Party and only after the Party Court ha-s dismissed •) Grzecznarowski, Cohn and Rzeznik. 12 BibliotecaGino Bianco
them from the Party, can the case be handed over to the Security Police. (viz. "Naprzod Dolnoslaski" of January 4th-10th, 1946). The leadership of the "official" Party does not enjoy the confidence of the rank and file, who - time and again -l. made themselves heard at Party meetings and conferences, taking a decisive line against the policy of'the leadership. The recen1Hegional conferences at Cracow and Katowice constituted crushing defeats for the leadership. These conferences unanimously opposed the idea of an electoral bloc in which the PPS would combine with the Communists (PPR) against the Polish Peasant Party. These recent confesences became virile manifestations iu favour of the old leaders from the geftuine PPS and violent manifestations against the official leadership. Another striking example of the lack of confidence of the .rank and file in the leadership is provided by the results· of elections to the Shop Committees. Instructions emanating from the leadership or during these elections to be conducted jointly with the Communists on the basis of 50-eyo representation, were rlisregarded by the rank and fite, who put forward separate Socialist list. In the 63 such recent elections in the largest indu- ~t.rial district of _Poland, out of a total of 928 seats, the PPR gained only 193 (21%), while Socialists gained 556 (64%), the IDelilocrjatic Party--14, C4i:t:istian Labour :P,arty-10, Polish Peasant Party-2, the rest being shared by non-party and Trade l:nions lists, inclu~ing many Socialist sympathisers. ' In this connection, the fact that membership of a Party alone very often does not prove political allegiance to the leadership of the given Party, may be illustrated by a complaint made on December 8th, 1945, by the Communist leader and Vice-Premier of the VJ"arsawGovernment, Gomulka, who said: 'There were elections to the Shop Committee of the "Fablok" factory (in Cracow). Our Party cell in that factory comprises 250-270 people- And in these elections we have not gained a ~ingle seat". 'l'he leadership of the "official" PPS are not content with . attacking their own rank.. and file in the Party Press, with accusing them of not understanding the :new Party line, with opposing co-operation with the Communists, witli not being politically conscious enough, etc. etc. (viz. o.g. "Robotnik" of No- ,,ember 3rd, 1945); they also try to counteract, as far as possible; the expression of the mood of the masses. Thus, for instance, when Regional 'Conferences elected new Regional Committees ac_cording to the wishes and convictions of the delegates, such eiections were declared wholly or partly invalid by the Central Executive Committee and new officers were appointed to replace the previously elected ones. This happened, o.g.,' in- the 1:egions of Dabrowa-SUesia ·and the city of Warsaw. '· 111present circumstances, no free Socialist Press can exist. The official leadership have monopolized for tl1emselves all means of expression. Individual att,empt.s tq create a Sociali'!t Press (a, cjaily or a weekly, or even a monthly) which would not Biblioteca Gino Bianco
be controJled by the official leadership, have been frustrated. ~ot ~veO:11n individual 8oefa1ist pii°mphlct -iv-asaliowed ·to be pnblished. . :\Ioreover, there is no personal safety for a number of· prorninent comrades, who had been in tne forefront of tbe Party's 1mde1'ground struggle against the German invaders . .Assiduou~ searches to get hold of these comritdes were itensified in Feb- !·uary, March and April of this year, when their homes were s'everal times visited by the Secur.ity Police. The dividing line "The most serious origin~l mistakes of the old PPS are: the hostile attitude to the Sovjet Union and to the united working ~lass front" - wrote Mr. Szwalbe, after having already conclu<lf!clthe "agreement" with Znla:wski, as a leader and re.pre- ~entatfve of that "old" PPS .. The attitude of the PPS. to the Soviet Union was first and fnremost the result of Soviet Russia's attitude to the problem of Pola'ncl independence. In the period of the Nazi-Soviet Treaty ol' amity, the attitnde of the PPS to the USSR was the 'only one possible for a movement worthy the name of Socialists, democrats and Poles. Besides, in this respect there was no difference l)rtween the PPS and the democratic Socialists of the whole world. The defence of the Eastern half of Poland against its an·.: r:exation b.v the USSR was the duty of tl;e PPS. They do not deny this _fac"tand they are not ashamed of it. 'l'hey did not ask for 'an inch of Soviet territory. Theyi asked that the will of the local population, international freaties and obligations and the Atlantic CJ.iarter should be respected- 'l'he present situation, in ,\'hicl:i, after the amput-ation of the Eastern part of Poland, ber territoriaf gain ts in the West up to- the Rivers Oeler and Western );eisse are stiJI being questioned (although they· compensate only half o_ftbe losses in the East) is another proof of how badly needed was this defence. 'fhe accusation of refusal to form a united front with tbe C'orrimtrnists i1~the pa~t is equally t;pjustified: Is it suggested, for example, that the ,PPS should, have' created such a united front with the Communists in 1932, at the moment when they ,yere asking for1 Polish Pomerania and tJpper Silesia to be given to Germany¥ Ho,v was t4_e PPS to form a united front with them, whe11, in 1937, the Comintern itself was cofupelled to disselve the Commnnist Party of Poland, as not worth a continued existence?· ' .· · 'rn fact, the differences, iiltbough not. openly expressed, lie elsewhere. 'The authentic PPS is and will rema"in faithful to the prin- -Ciples of democracy. Repudiating any_compromise ,vith Fascism, 8rmi-Fascism and totali"tarianism of any sort, the PPS believes in democratic institulions and abhors terrorism, police ·rule oYer wo.rkers and peasants, 'Gleichschaltung", etc.· as a means to achieve Socialism. 14 BibliotecaGino Bianco
The authentic PPS-recognises the necessity of a democratic "N'ational Unity" in this difficult period of reconstruction of Poland after ruin and destruc.tion. The authentic PPS, however, i!oes -not-see any reason why democratic parties should have to be ':licensed" or why general elections should be turned into a farce on the pattern of the elections to the Nazi 1Reichstag. The authentic PPS recognises that the Communists should have·equal rights with all the other parti~s in Poland. But they do -not recognise the necessity either of a merger with the Communists or of such a close collaboration with them as is being advocated. to-day by the "official" PPS, under the threat of l'xpulsion from the ..Pa:rty of these who endanger the "purity of the Party" ('Szwalbe's arti'cJe in the "Robotnik" of February Gtb, 1946).. It m·ust. oe added, that this '.' collaboration" practically. means the subordination of the "offici'al" PPS to the . PPR a11d an arrangement under which the PPS would have to pull all the PPR chestnuts out of the fire. The· authentic PPS wis'hes to base great· economic, social• and political changes in Poland - in accordance with its prog-rainme passed by the Congress of Radom on February 2nd, 1937 - on the only lasting foundation: the will of the majority c,f.the nation, the will of the working masses in town and country. This ,foundatio1{ cannot be r~placed by a rule of terr'or by an insignificant minority, - on the contrary, such a rule threatens for the future only violent shocks and paroxysms of re-_ action. Two main demands of the authentic PPS .What 1'he authent'ic PPS asks for, is: - · a) holding of free and unfettered parliamentary elections,· t,ased on m1i-versa.l,secret, equal, direct and proportional ·suffrage; no single electoral bloc, transforming elections into mere voting, b) to this end liquidation of the police system, ·and, above P.ll, the securing for the politiool, industrial, co-opera~ive and educational branches of the Labour Movement, freedom of association, meetings, speech and Press, without which any elections would be just a mockery; freedom of existence and activity for the authentic Movement of democratic Socialism; internal 11emocracy within the Trade Union, Co-operative and other like movements. These are two demands in which the authentic PPS counts on the support of the whole Internati<lnal Socia.list Movement . .It must be emphatically stressed that the attitude of the n~thentic PPS to the present Polish regime has nothing in common with the opposition of the Right Wing groupings. Already ·nnder the German occupation the PPS (WRN) put forward the bold and by no means vague programme of' extensive ,,ha.nges in the sbcial and economic structure, proclaimed as the "Programme for •a People's Poland" in Spring 1941. Its essen1 ial demands became part of the common declaration of the Polish war-time underground coalition, published on Augu_st BibliotecaGino Bianco
... 15th, 1943, later confirmed and elaborated -several times, long before the Lublin Comm.ittee ;published itrs manifesto li.n Jnly 1944. 'The authentic PPS solemnly decla~·es that it stands for friendly relations between Poland and the Soviet Union, but it does not wish to be isolated from the Western Democracies and ti1e democratic Socia1ism,of which the PPS is the traditional expression in Poland, and firmly demands for ihe Polish Nation the freedom of shaping its way of life according to its own wil~ and needs. Standing firmly for a genuine independence of Pol~nd, the authentic PPS demands such political and territorial· conditions as to secure the free development of the Polish proletariat and the whole Polish Nation, whose unimpeachable contribution to the war against Fascism and Hitlerism and to the "\·ictory over the Axis Powers is wideJy known and recognised. PUBLICATIONS OF THE POLISIJ SO~IALIST ALLIENCE 29 East 7th Street, Ne,:vYork 3, N. Y. On Polish) Feliks Gross ' HumanisticSocialism (Socjalizm Humanistyczny) PRICE 1 DOLLAR POLAND FIGHTS 50 Broad :Street, New ~ork 4, N. Y. Phone HA. 2-5726 006356 Permit No. 113( U. S. POSTAGE Paid Sec. 562 P.L.&R. New York, N. Y. FonctaztorieAlfr~d Lewn Biblioteca Gino Bianco Biblioteca Gino Bianco
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