LONDON LETTER
last autumn on the British CP's rather languid fight against the Social
Democrats, Harry Pollitt, the former Secretary of the British Com–
munist Party, made the usual abject confession of guilt and unworthi–
ness-and seems to have carried on since in much the same way as he
did before. I think he has a big new slap coming to him fairly soon.
Clement Attlee has made an important speech in which he said
categorically that the Communists were not left-wing Socialists but
extreme reactionaries and they should be treated more as fascists than
as Labour dissidents. This is an idea that was implicit or explicit in
most Social-Democratic statements up to 1935, during the years of what
the Stalinists called "Social Fascism." The point was made theoretically
long ago but there was
a'
new note of practical conviction in this recent
pronouncement. Many people in England are now less sure than they
used to be that it is necessary to give freedom of speech and associa–
tion to those, such as the Communists for instance, who intend to use
this freedom to establish a dictatorship. About the strongest argument
(weak as it is) against outlawing the Communist Party is that it is
safer not to drive the conspirators underground. During the last few
months the number has been increasing of those who consider this argu–
ment invalid because in fact an important proportion of the CP has
already submerged. This discussion has been stimulated by the results
of the Italian elections. While there is a sense of relief at the semi-failure
of the Communists, it is more obvious than ever that as long as the
Stalinists are able to compete for power in democratic parliaments they
have always a chance, sooner or later, of gaining the crucial ministries
of war and the interior. The recent history of eastern Europe shows
that it takes a very short time after this stage for the
Politburo
to move
in.
Apart from the discussion of these grim issues the intellectual stream
in
London flows slow and thin. There is nothing in the least like the
bursting iconoclasticism of the early twenties. However an important,
really revolutionary, book about proper names and the ubiquitous prob–
lem of verbal meaning is projected by Professor
A.
J.
Ayer, author of
Language, Truth and Logic.
Humphrey Slater
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