Turnerites
Encyclopedia
Under a variety of names and within a number of organizations over at least 17 years, the group around Harry Turner, or Turnerites was a presence within Trotskyism
in the United States.
in the late 1960s. The leadership under James Robertson
wanted the group to focus on organizing among students while Harry Turner wanted to organize a series of rank-and-file caucuses within labor unions, particularly minority workers, to oppose both employers and the union leadership. To this end Turner convinced the Spartacist League to create a pan-union Militant Labor Civil Rights Committee in September 1967. Robertson, however, had this group dissolved the next year and suggested that cadres form separate caucuses in their respective unions. The Spatacist League was wracked with a faction fight over this issue during 1968 at the end of which the group led by Harry Turner was expelled. During this fight the Turnerites were allied with another faction that was attracted to the ideas of the French Lutte Ouvrière but they left to establish their own organization, Spark
, before the Turnerites were finally expelled.
Once out of the Spartacist League the Turner group looked for another Trotskyist group to unite with. After brief flirtations with the Workers League of the United States and Lyndon LaRouche
's SDS-Labor Committee
the tendency grouped around its publication, the Vanguard Newsletter. The newsletter kept some of the ideas that Turner advocated within the Spartacist League, including the building of rank-and-file caucuses within the unions with the ultimate aim of turning them into workers' council
s or soviets.
The Vanguard Newsletter group still shopped around for another organization to merge with. For a time they explored opportunities with various De Leonist
groups that had left the Socialist Labor Party
, Socialist Reconstruction and the Socialist Forum Group, but nothing ever came of it. In 1972 when the Leninist Faction left the Socialist Workers Party
and formed the Class Struggle League (CSL) the Turnerites quickly made contact with it, even though it was in the process of negotiating with the Spartacists. After an attempt to unite the three groups was rejected by the SL, the Turnerites merged with the CSL. There were still controversies in the new organization. The majority former Leninist Faction members felt that the time had come to proclaim a Fifth International
, while the minority from the Vanguard group wished to reconstruct the Fourth International
. The minority and majority also differed on the nature of the Eastern European communist states
with the later considering them deformed workers' state
s. On trade union work the first conference favored the idea of rank-and-file caucuses did not wish to build a national organization of such committees just yet, when there was no base for them.
The Class Struggle League dissolved in May 1975 with the former Leninist Faction group joining the Trotskyist Organization of the United States
. The Turnerites reorganized into an independent group, the Trotskyist Organizing Committee (TOC). At this point it had around thirty members spread out in New York
, Chicago
, San Francisco and Texas
. It began making overtures to other Trotskyist parties based on a five point programme: recognition of the counter-revolutionary role of Stalinism
, for the Fourth International, for the Transitional Program
, a national organization of rank-and-file trade union caucuses and formation of a labor party. They attempted mergers with the SWP, Spark, the Socialist League (Democratic Centralist) and the Revolutionary Workers League all to no avail.
Finally, in 1978, TOC was invited to join the Committee for a Revolutionary Socialist Party
, an umbrella group of several Trotskyist organizations. It joined the group in November 1978. However, when the CSRP proclaimed its intention to form itself into a distinct political party adhering to democratic centralism
in July 1980 the Turnerites left again, this time emerging as the Revolutionary Unity League
In January 1982 when the Morenoist
faction of the Fourth International, International Workers League (Fourth International), was preparing its first world congress both the RUL and a group called the Revolutionary Workers Front sent representatives hoping to secure affiliation. With the encouragement of the leadership of the International the two groups set up a "leadership team" to co-ordinate joint strikes, demonstrations and campaigns. The two groups also had discussions where their political differences were hammered out and eventually planned a unification convention. This convention met on June 26–27, 1982 and a new organization, the Internationalist Workers Party (Fourth International)
was founded.
However in July 1984 a sever factional crisis wracked the party with the eventual establishment of the International Socialist League (Fourth International) with Turner in the leadership. The IWP(FI) remained the official Morenoist affiliate in the United States, though the ISL(FI) remained a "sympathizing section". The ISL(FI) began publishing a newspaper, Workers Organizer, in November 1985, stating it had branches in New York, Los Angeles
, Minneapolis and Wisconsin
.
Trotskyism
Trotskyism is the theory of Marxism as advocated by Leon Trotsky. Trotsky considered himself an orthodox Marxist and Bolshevik-Leninist, arguing for the establishment of a vanguard party of the working-class...
in the United States.
History
The group originated in a controversy within the Spartacist LeagueSpartacist League (US)
The Spartacist League/ US is a Trotskyist organization in the United States. It was the original Spartacist group that helped to inspire and organize similarly oriented groups around the world...
in the late 1960s. The leadership under James Robertson
James Robertson (Trotskyist)
James Robertson is National Chairman of the Spartacist League of the United States, which is a section of the International Communist League , an international organization of small Trotskyist groups...
wanted the group to focus on organizing among students while Harry Turner wanted to organize a series of rank-and-file caucuses within labor unions, particularly minority workers, to oppose both employers and the union leadership. To this end Turner convinced the Spartacist League to create a pan-union Militant Labor Civil Rights Committee in September 1967. Robertson, however, had this group dissolved the next year and suggested that cadres form separate caucuses in their respective unions. The Spatacist League was wracked with a faction fight over this issue during 1968 at the end of which the group led by Harry Turner was expelled. During this fight the Turnerites were allied with another faction that was attracted to the ideas of the French Lutte Ouvrière but they left to establish their own organization, Spark
Spark (U.S. organization)
The Spark group is a US Trotskyist organization. It is aligned internationally with the Lutte Ouvrière tendency.Spark began as a faction within the Spartacist League that was attracted to the French group Voix Ouvrière method of propagandizing in the factories...
, before the Turnerites were finally expelled.
Once out of the Spartacist League the Turner group looked for another Trotskyist group to unite with. After brief flirtations with the Workers League of the United States and Lyndon LaRouche
Lyndon LaRouche
Lyndon Hermyle LaRouche, Jr. is an American political activist and founder of a network of political committees, parties, and publications known collectively as the LaRouche movement...
's SDS-Labor Committee
LaRouche movement
The LaRouche movement is an international political and cultural network that promotes Lyndon LaRouche and his ideas. It has included scores of organizations and companies around the world. Their activities include campaigning, private intelligence gathering, and publishing numerous periodicals,...
the tendency grouped around its publication, the Vanguard Newsletter. The newsletter kept some of the ideas that Turner advocated within the Spartacist League, including the building of rank-and-file caucuses within the unions with the ultimate aim of turning them into workers' council
Workers' council
A workers' council, or revolutionary councils, is the phenomenon where a single place of work or enterprise, such as a factory, school, or farm, is controlled collectively by the workers of that workplace, through the core principle of temporary and instantly revocable delegates.In a system with...
s or soviets.
The Vanguard Newsletter group still shopped around for another organization to merge with. For a time they explored opportunities with various De Leonist
De Leonism
De Leonism, occasionally known as Marxism-Deleonism, is a form of syndicalist Marxism developed by Daniel De Leon. De Leon was an early leader of the first United States socialist political party, the Socialist Labor Party of America....
groups that had left the Socialist Labor Party
Socialist Labor Party of America
The Socialist Labor Party of America , established in 1876 as the Workingmen's Party, is the oldest socialist political party in the United States and the second oldest socialist party in the world. Originally known as the Workingmen's Party of America, the party changed its name in 1877 and has...
, Socialist Reconstruction and the Socialist Forum Group, but nothing ever came of it. In 1972 when the Leninist Faction left the Socialist Workers Party
Socialist Workers Party (United States)
The Socialist Workers Party is a far-left political organization in the United States. The group places a priority on "solidarity work" to aid strikes and is strongly supportive of Cuba...
and formed the Class Struggle League (CSL) the Turnerites quickly made contact with it, even though it was in the process of negotiating with the Spartacists. After an attempt to unite the three groups was rejected by the SL, the Turnerites merged with the CSL. There were still controversies in the new organization. The majority former Leninist Faction members felt that the time had come to proclaim a Fifth International
Fifth International
The phrase Fifth International refers to the efforts made by sections of the far-left to create a new Workers' International.-Previous Internationals:...
, while the minority from the Vanguard group wished to reconstruct the Fourth International
Fourth International
The Fourth International is the communist international organisation consisting of followers of Leon Trotsky , with the declared dedicated goal of helping the working class bring about socialism...
. The minority and majority also differed on the nature of the Eastern European communist states
Eastern bloc
The term Eastern Bloc or Communist Bloc refers to the former communist states of Eastern and Central Europe, generally the Soviet Union and the countries of the Warsaw Pact...
with the later considering them deformed workers' state
Deformed workers' state
In Trotskyist political theory, deformed workers' states are states where the bourgeoisie has been overthrown through social revolution, the industrial means of production have been largely nationalized bringing benefits to the working class, but where the working class has never held political power...
s. On trade union work the first conference favored the idea of rank-and-file caucuses did not wish to build a national organization of such committees just yet, when there was no base for them.
The Class Struggle League dissolved in May 1975 with the former Leninist Faction group joining the Trotskyist Organization of the United States
Trotskyist Organization of the United States
The Trotskyist Organization of the United States was a small Trotskyist group active in the U.S. during the 1970s and 1980s. The group was founded by two dissident factions which had emerged at the Socialist Workers Partys 1971 convention....
. The Turnerites reorganized into an independent group, the Trotskyist Organizing Committee (TOC). At this point it had around thirty members spread out in New York
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, San Francisco and Texas
Texas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
. It began making overtures to other Trotskyist parties based on a five point programme: recognition of the counter-revolutionary role of Stalinism
Stalinism
Stalinism refers to the ideology that Joseph Stalin conceived and implemented in the Soviet Union, and is generally considered a branch of Marxist–Leninist ideology but considered by some historians to be a significant deviation from this philosophy...
, for the Fourth International, for the Transitional Program
Transitional Program
The Transitional Program, the full name of which is The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International, is a political platform adopted by the 1938 founding congress of the Fourth International, the international Leninist organization founded by Leon Trotsky...
, a national organization of rank-and-file trade union caucuses and formation of a labor party. They attempted mergers with the SWP, Spark, the Socialist League (Democratic Centralist) and the Revolutionary Workers League all to no avail.
Finally, in 1978, TOC was invited to join the Committee for a Revolutionary Socialist Party
Committee for a Revolutionary Socialist Party
The Committee for a Revolutionary Socialist Party was an attempt to set up a "united front" of several dissident US. Trotskyist groups in the 1980s....
, an umbrella group of several Trotskyist organizations. It joined the group in November 1978. However, when the CSRP proclaimed its intention to form itself into a distinct political party adhering to democratic centralism
Democratic centralism
Democratic centralism is the name given to the principles of internal organization used by Leninist political parties, and the term is sometimes used as a synonym for any Leninist policy inside a political party...
in July 1980 the Turnerites left again, this time emerging as the Revolutionary Unity League
In January 1982 when the Morenoist
Nahuel Moreno
Nahuel Moreno was a Trotskyist leader from Argentina. Moreno was active in the Trotskyist movement from before World War II until his death....
faction of the Fourth International, International Workers League (Fourth International), was preparing its first world congress both the RUL and a group called the Revolutionary Workers Front sent representatives hoping to secure affiliation. With the encouragement of the leadership of the International the two groups set up a "leadership team" to co-ordinate joint strikes, demonstrations and campaigns. The two groups also had discussions where their political differences were hammered out and eventually planned a unification convention. This convention met on June 26–27, 1982 and a new organization, the Internationalist Workers Party (Fourth International)
Internationalist Workers Party (Fourth International)
The Internationalist Workers Party was a Trotskyist group in the United States. It was the American affiliate of the Morenoist International Workers League...
was founded.
However in July 1984 a sever factional crisis wracked the party with the eventual establishment of the International Socialist League (Fourth International) with Turner in the leadership. The IWP(FI) remained the official Morenoist affiliate in the United States, though the ISL(FI) remained a "sympathizing section". The ISL(FI) began publishing a newspaper, Workers Organizer, in November 1985, stating it had branches in New York, Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, Minneapolis and Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...
.
Publications
- Vanguard Newsletter New York, N.Y.: Independent revolutionary socialists, Vol. 1, no. 1 (June 1969)-v. 5, no. 3 (Apr. 1973)
- Socialist appeal New York, N.Y.: Trotskyist Organizing Committee, Vol. 1, no. 1 (Aug. 1975)-v. 3, no. 10 (Nov. 16, 1978).
- Spartacist League split [New York? : s.n., 1968
- Theory, tasks & tactics: the program of the Class Struggle League Chicago, Ill. : The League, #1 (includes Political Resolution adopted at the Fusion Convention of Vanguard Newsletter and the Class Struggle League, April 20–22, 1973)
- Leninism and democratic centralism. Chicago, Ill. : The League, #2 (Contains the Resolution on Democratic Centralism and the CSL Constitution adopted at the Fusion Convention of Vanguard Newsletter and the Class Struggle League, April 20–22, 1973)
- ITU: union in crisis Chicago, Ill.: The League, #3