The Black Jacobins - Toussaint L’Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution

By C.L.R. James

First published in 1938

Random House – 1963 with an afterword

Vintage - 1989

Reviewed by Steve Halpern

Back in the 1970s, I had the opportunity of listening to C.L.R. James speak at a Militant Labor Forum in Brooklyn, New York. I was in my twenties, and James was in his seventies. When he spoke, James attracted several people from the West Indian community in Brooklyn. 

I remember being impressed by C.L.R. James. He wasn’t just a revolutionary, but an intellectual who easily made his ideas clear to anyone who was willing to listen. 

Then, in the early 1990s, I read James book The Black Jacobins for the first time. This was a turning point for me. Before reading this book, I had an interest in history, but was just beginning to see how that history is relevant to our lives today. In this book, James explained how an event that transpired about 200 years ago, on a relatively small island in the Caribbean, was profoundly relevant to the world today. After reading that book, I began a lifelong study of some of the watershed moments in the history of the human race.

A few years ago, I learned that C.L.R. James had discussions with Leon Trotsky at a time when Trotsky was living in Mexico. This was about one year after his book The Black Jacobins was published. Trotsky was a central leader of the Russian Revolution who had been deported from that country due to the betrayal of the revolution by Joseph Stalin.

Recently, I viewed the Netflix film series Small Axe, created by Steve McQueen. This series is about the West Indian community living in London. In a few of those episodes, McQueen’s characters recommended that people read C.L.R. James’ book The Back Jacobins. Eventually I decided that it might be a good idea to pick this book up again. I was glad that I did.

The French colony of San Domingo

Today, the island of Hispaniola is split up into two nations. The western section, that is closest to Cuba, is the nation known as Haiti. The primary language there is Creole, a language derived from French. In the east is Santo Domingo where the primary language is Spanish.

Before the Haitian Revolution, Haiti was the French colony of San Domingo. For most of the years of this colony, slavery was the law. While there were about 30,000 whites and 40,000 mulattos, there were about 400,000 slaves in San Domingo.

While today Haiti is one of the poorest nations in the world, in the late 18th century the French colony of San Domingo was a wealth producing center of the world. About 30% of the French economy came from San Domingo.

C.L.R. James gave an unvarnished history of the horrors inflicted on the slaves who produced this enormous wealth. Routine torture and murder were legal in those years. Because of those unimaginably horrendous conditions, the life expectancy of slaves was only a few years. For the slave owners, it was less expensive to import slaves on the notorious slave ships, than to make life even slightly less miserable for the slaves who produced their wealth. 

There were good reasons why C.L.R. James gave those vivid descriptions of the horrors of slavery. When we begin to realize the full weight of the unimaginable lives those slaves endured, we can also begin to appreciate the unwavering will of these same slaves to free themselves from that institution for all time.

As long as the institution of slavery existed, there were slave rebellions. One of the most famous was the slave rebellion led by Spartacus against the Roman empire. According to histories I’ve read, about 90,000 slaves joined Spartacus in rebellion.

However, until the Haitian Revolution, none of these rebellions managed to take power and put in place a government of former slaves who would maintain power. The story of the Haitian Revolution explains why this exceptional event happened in the former French colony of San Domingo.

The initial rebellion of slaves on the island succeeded in burning some of the most profitable crops on the plantations. However, most of the slave owners maintained their control. Due to their isolation, the rebelling slaves went to the Spanish half of the island, where they received support. The Spanish gave aid to the former slaves as a way of putting pressure on the French colonial authorities. 

The French Revolution and its effect on San Domingo

At this same time, the French Revolution erupted. Initially the French monarchy managed to maintain power. During this time, the principal debate in France viewed the problem of San Domingo as a conflict between the whites and mulattos. 

In San Domingo, there were 127 levels of mixed race. If someone had one part to 127 parts of Black to white ancestors, that person was not considered to be white. The white people living on the island had absolute power over the Blacks and mulattos. This meant that murder, rape, and torture against Blacks and mulattos was legal.

However, while many mulattos were slaves, many were also free. Some mulattos received advanced education in France. This reality meant that there were white people who were in debt to mulattos, but those same white people had absolute power over the very people who loaned them money. So, within France many were aware of this discrimination and felt it was wrong. However, in the early stages of the French Revolution slavery remained the law.

In the next stage of the French Revolution the masses of the working class of France became intolerant of the old order and exerted their influence. For many French workers, they felt that the slaves of San Domingo had their same interests and became horrified when they learned of the reality of human bondage. Many French workers at that time refused to drink coffee in protest of the conditions faced by slaves. Under those conditions the new revolutionary government of France united under the slogan liberty, equality, and fraternity. This same government outlawed slavery.

When the rebelling slaves of San Domingo learned that slavery was outlawed, they realized that France was the only nation that took this step. This made the revolutionary army switch sides, and they joined with the new French government to take control of the island and remove the Spanish from power.                   

Toussaint L’Ouverture was a slave who knew how to read and had a relatively better position on the Bréda plantation where he worked. Because the slave owners on this plantation were more benevolent than most, Toussaint aided those owners. This support allowed them to avoid the rath of those who were in rebellion.

Then, Toussaint joined the slave armies, and because of his medical background, tended to the injured soldiers. Toussaint was different from the other slave leaders. He understood from the beginning that the goal of the revolution needed to be the complete abolition of slavery. He also recruited about 500 former slaves and drilled them to become a competent fighting force.

By the time the French government outlawed slavery, Toussaint became the central leader and organized to end Spanish rule on the eastern section of the island. Then, Toussaint needed to deal with a British invasion.

The British attempted to take advantage of the weakened position of France. As I’ve said, the colony of San Domingo was the most lucrative wealth producing location in the world. The British sent an army to the island with the intention of taking control of this enormous wealth.

At that time, Britain and France had the most powerful armed forces in the world. However, those armies proved to be ineffective in taking San Domingo from the army of former slaves. 

Because the French government had changed, the new government supported the slave army in the war against the British invasion. Toussaint, for the most part, got along well with the first governors the French sent to the Island.

During the few years when there was relative peace in San Domingo, Toussaint made a determined and effective effort to end the horror story of slavery and develop the island in a meaningful way.

Toussaint won the support of the former slaves by making it clear that he was one of them. He not only tended to many who were injured, he worked at routine tasks along with everyone else.

For Toussaint, a meaningful development of the island meant allowing the former slave owners to keep their plantations.  However, those former slave owners needed to pay a wage to the former slaves and the use of torture was now outlawed. Under those conditions, the former slaves would gradually become literate and a meaningful development would unfold.

One of Toussaint’s top military commanders was his nephew General Moise. Moise came into conflict with Toussaint because he believed the government sided with the landowners over the former slaves in many instances. Moise led a rebellion aimed at advancing the interests of the former slaves. Toussaint defeated that rebellion and ordered the execution of Moise. This was a profound mistake that greatly weakened the revolution.

The changing political climate in France and its consequences

In France the capitalist powers were taking control of the country. Napoleon Bonaparte became their leader and the ruling powers in France began to change their political outlook towards San Domingo. Napoleon bowed to the French maritime interests who gouged out immense fortunes derived from the horrors of slavery. As a result, Napoleon developed a plan to bring slavery back to San Domingo.

His plan was based on the absurd idea that the leaders of the Haitian slaves were stupid. Napoleon thought that he could lure these leaders into supporting him, then the revolution would evaporate, and France would have slavery once again in its colony. Initially Napoleon mobilized 12,000 soldiers to advance this task. 

Toussaint felt that the only realistic way for the people of San Domingo to advance was to remain a colony of France. At that time, the nations of Britain, Spain, and the United States continued to engage in the slave trade. 

Certainly, during the years of relative peace on this island there were important advances, and the horrors of slavery appeared to be over. Given these facts, Toussaint believed that his government had a mutually beneficial relationship with France. 

The British warned Toussaint that a French military expedition was on its way to San Domingo, and that this expedition had hostile intentions. However, because of Toussaint’s refusal to believe this, the French expedition was able to land on the island unmolested. Had Toussaint mobilized to stop this invasion, the French would have never been able to take any strongholds on the island.

The other problem was that the former slaves believed that the French were their friends. So, when the French landed many former slaves supported the invasion. However, as the French made clear what their intentions were, the army of former slaves mobilized to take on the French, who were the most advanced army in the world at that time. 

General Rigaud was the central commander of the mulattos on the island. Rigaud made the catastrophic mistake of taking the French side against Toussaint. Rigaud paid for that mistake. After he supported the French invasion of San Domingo, the French had him arrested and deported from the island.

Jean-Jacques Dessalines was the top military commander under Toussaint. Dessalines had a different political perspective than his commander. Dessalines hated the slave owners and argued that the freedom of the former slaves needed to take precedence over San Domingo’s relationship with France. So, early in the revolution, Dessalines advocated for independence. 

After the French military force landed on the island, the army of the former slaves was in an extremely disadvantageous position. However, in one of the most courageous moments in human history, the army of former slaves managed to push back the French invasion of the island. After the French invasion had been neutralized, the rainy season started. The mosquitoes then infected most of the French forces and their army became incapacitated. 

Because the former slaves were more resistant to the mosquito born diseases, they had an excellent opportunity to mount an offensive to decisively defeat the French. However, because Toussaint felt that San Domingo needed to continue to be a French colony, he called for a truce to discuss a workable peace. 

While Toussaint was in the French camp, soldiers arrested him. He was placed on a ship where he was forced to sail to France. Toussaint died in a French prison. After Napoleon had been defeated in the war against Britain, he acknowledged that he should have left Toussaint alone to rule the island. This is a clear example of how racism blinds people to the facts of the world. The Haitian Revolution is a clear example how that blindness can have disastrous consequences. 

However, after Toussaint’s arrest, Dessalines took over the army of the former slaves. Now, there was no question that this army would demand nothing less than independence from France. In all, the French would lose about 60,000 soldiers in their defeat in San Domingo. 

The British took advantage of this defeat and went to war against France. The small French force that survived the revolution sailed into a British fleet. The British then sent those soldiers to prison for many years. Dessalines told those French soldiers that if they attempted to return to the new nation of Haiti, their ships would be blown out the water.

The Haitian Revolution and its lessons for the world

C.L.R. James argued that in the Russian Revolution, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin didn’t make the same errors as Toussaint L’Ouverture. Lenin had a real advantage of both a formal education, and the political legacy of Karl Marx. 

Lenin understood that the only way for the Russian Revolution to succeed would be to establish a government of the workers councils known as Soviets. When 14 nations invaded the Soviet Union after the revolution, Lenin didn’t hesitate to mobilize the masses in an army to defend their government. The examples of the Russian and Haitian Revolutions are clear examples of how the masses of working people have the potential to overcome extreme obstacles in order to defend a government they can claim as their own.

Today Haiti is one of the poorest nations in the world. Toussaint was fully aware of the difficulties an independent Haiti would face in a world where the most powerful nations supported slavery. The United States occupied Haiti for about twenty years in the early 20th century. Then, they installed the horrendous puppet governments of Francois Duvalier and his son. 

The French government demanded that Haiti pay for the Haitian Revolution that removed the French colonial government. All these measures weakened any possibility for Haiti to become a viable nation advancing the interests of all the people.

The Russian Revolution was betrayed by a clique organized by Joseph Stalin. As a result, Russian capitalism now flourishes, and Vladimir Putin is attempting to become a power broker in the capitalist world.

However, C.L.R. James identified the Cuban Revolution as following in the West Indian tradition that began with the Haitian Revolution. As a result of the Haitian Revolution, many slave owners left the island and settled in the eastern Oriente Province of Cuba. Oriente is the section of Cuba that has the largest Black population, and was the place where the Cuban Revolution began. The revolutionary Cuban government has been able to survive in spite of an imperialist invasion, threats of atomic warfare, and a sixty-year trade embargo by the United States.

While the Haitian Revolution succeeded in ending French colonialism of the island, C.L.R. James identified the central mistake of Toussaint L’Ouverture in the following quotation:

“His grasp of politics led him to make all preparations, but he could not admit to himself and to his people that it was easier to find decency, gratitude, and humanity in a cage of starving tigers than in the councils of imperialism.”

Today as the capitalist system in the world is beginning to fall apart, the example of the Haitian Revolution, as well as the words of C.L.R. James have never been more relevant.                       

James P. Cannon and the Origins of the American Revolutionary Left 1890 – 1928

By Bryan D. Palmer

2007 University of Illinois Press

Reviewed by Steve Halpern

This past summer, there were large demonstrations around the world protesting murders by police officers of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and many others. Clearly, police officers have murdered literally thousands of people before this year. Clearly, institutionalized racist discrimination has been a routine aspect of the history of this country throughout its history. However, this summer those murders by the police became intolerable for people all over the world.

Some will argue that those demonstrations were just a way of letting off steam during the pandemic. Some will argue that people were enraged by the openly racist comments of President Donald Trump. Well, in my opinion, today there is a new generation that is developing their own perspective of dealing with a world where they see profound problems in the future. 

Many young people attended universities and now have astronomical debts. Many have seen their jobs eliminated and now have no way of paying their rent. Today, people are becoming aware of the fact that there are fifty million people in this country who don’t have enough food to eat, while this country has the potential to feed the world. Then, there are the hundreds of thousands who lost their lives unnecessarily because of decisions by the government not to advance a course that could have saved many lives.  

Thinking about this reality, many are beginning to see that the idea of a socialist world might be the way to deal with the persistent problems we face. So, if the idea of socialism has the potential to begin to resolve our problems, then we need to study the history of this movement in the United States.

There are many books about the history of the communist movement in this country. In my opinion, there is one name that ties this history together better than any other. His name is James P. Cannon. Bryan D. Palmer is a professor at Trinity College in Canada, and he has written an incisive and informed biography of Cannon. This volume is only the first of three proposed volumes about Cannon’s life story. Reading this book gives us a glimmer into aspects of the history of this country that few people who call themselves historians are interested in.

Rosedale, Kansas

James Patrick Cannon was born in 1890 in Rosedale, Kansas. His parents were immigrants from Ireland, who were well aware of the Irish Potato Famine that cost the lives of about one million people on the island. After looking for work in several cities, Jim Cannon’s parents settled in Rosedale, that was a neighborhood in Kansas City. 

The shack young Jim Cannon shared with his brothers and sisters had no direct access to running water or electricity. His mother needed to carry water from a central location every day. At that time, Rosedale was in a relatively rural area where young people could roam in open fields and the forest in their free time.

When young Jim Cannon was about twelve-years old, he assisted his father working in a lumber yard. In those days, children routinely worked in industrial environments that were dangerous. An accident caused young Jim to injure his thumb. Because the employer chose not to transport young Jim to a hospital where he could be properly cared for, Jim Cannon lost part of his thumb.

We might think about the fact that in 1903 Mother Jones organized a 125-mile March of the Children that protested child labor in Philadelphia. The labor leader Eugene Debs mentioned efforts like Mother Jones’ March of the Children in his speech protesting the U.S. participation in the First World War. Debs highlighted the hypocrisy of President Woodrow Wilson’s claim that the war was a “war for democracy.” Today there is a historical marker commemorating Mother Jones March of the Children on the north side of City Hall in Philadelphia.

Jim Cannon didn’t go to high school until the age of seventeen. Before that time, there was no high school for him to attend in Rosedale. During those years young Jim worked at various industrial jobs attempting to make a living. He also gravitated to a neighborhood pool hall where he could relax and hang out with his friends.

Young Jim’s friends teased him for going to school with students who were twelve and thirteen years old. Defending himself for wanting an education was one of his first battles. In his later life James Cannon said that making the decision to go to high school and defending that decision was a turning point in his life.  

Eventually, young Jim became interested in literature, and this interest flourished in his two years of high school. Another reason high school became one of many turning points in young Jim’s life was because he became fascinated with radical politics. Jim’s father was an ardent supporter of Eugene Debs, who was one of the most articulate supporters of the interests of working people in the history of this country. While he was in high school, young Jim Cannon joined Debs Socialist Party.

Jim married one of his teachers, Lista Makimson, who was six years his senior. He fathered two children with her, and his high school education enabled him to get a low-level clerical job. However, a union federation known as the Industrial Workers of the World was in the midst of organizing, and young Jim Cannon began to travel all over the country working to build the I.W.W.

In those days, young Jim Cannon became what was known as a hobo. Hobos travelled the country looking for work, jumping on trains for free rides, trying to avoid conductors who would throw them off. This was one of the ways Cannon and others worked to travel the country to build the International Workers of the World.  

At that time, the American Federation of Labor was the dominant union organization. However, the A.F.L. restricted itself to organizing craft workers, and that strategy limited the effectiveness of the union movement. The I.W.W. filled in this void, but the combined efforts of the government as well as corporate power proved to be persistent obstacles for workers who wanted to escape horrendous conditions on the job and miserable wages. Jim Cannon never forgot how receptive workers all over the country were to the message that we have the potential to organize and transform our lives.

However, while the I.W.W. had some success in organizing workers, they were unable to overcome many of the challenges they faced. When members of the I.W.W. were arrested on various charges many refused to defend themselves because they didn’t want to plead their case in a court that effectively supported the interests of employers. Many I.W.W. members served longer prison sentences because they refused to defend themselves in court. 

For these and other reasons, Jim Cannon was one of the members of the I.W.W. who started an organization called the Workers Party that eventually became the Communist Party.

The Russian Revolution and the Palmer Raids

The Russian Revolution was a watershed moment in the history of the human race. While workers in this country went on numerous strikes against employers, the working class in Czarist Russia established their own government and named it the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. While workers around the world were inspired by this development, capitalist governments became obsessed with limiting the influence of the Russian Revolution.

So, James Cannon was one of many revolutionaries from the United States who visited the Soviet Union to see for himself what a nation with a worker’s government would look like. There he met the African American poet Claud McKay. He also met many of the leaders of the Russian Revolution. Initially Cannon became familiar with Grigory Zinoviev, who headed up international work for the Bolsheviks.

The United States government was one of fourteen nations that invaded the Soviet Union in an attempt to overthrow the revolutionary government. After a war that lasted two-and-one-half years, the Red Army, led by Leon Trotsky, defeated the invaders.

By 1919 the U.S. government, under the direction of A. Mitchell Palmer, started arresting immigrants in this country who might have supported the Russian Revolution. In all, about 10,000 people might have been arrested in the Palmer Raids, and the government deported hundreds of those arrested.

In 1920, the federal government arrested Jim Cannon for supporting a miner’s strike. This absurd charge had to do with the idea that the miner’s strike compromised the war effort. The facts were that this strike took place after the First World War was over. Yet the government demanded the astronomical sum of $30,000 for Cannon’s bail. 

At that time, the workers movement was largely comprised of immigrants who recently came here from other countries. Among those, there were Jewish workers who recognized that Cannon had unique abilities that would benefit the labor movement. This group raised Cannon’s bail money. After about two years, the government dropped their absurd charges against Cannon.

The Palmer Raids, as well as the systematic repression by the government had an effect on the labor movement. For a while, activists felt they could only operate as an underground movement. The argument was that if workers attempted to organize openly, this would setup activists for arrest, incarceration, and even murder. 

Jim Cannon argued against this perspective and believed it was possible to organize openly. He made his case while participating in an international workers conference in the Soviet Union. The leadership of the Soviet government had experienced severe repression under the regime of the Czar. However, they also understood the need to advance the interests of workers openly, and supported Cannon’s perspective.

Within the Workers Party, Cannon organized the International Labor Defense. This organization worked to defend political prisoners all over the world, but concentrated on the political prisoners in this country. The ILD had its own newspaper that had about 22,000 subscribers. 

The most prominent case that the ILD supported was the defense of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti. This was a clear frame-up and the government executed Sacco and Vanzetti in 1927. While Cannon was enraged by this execution, he argued that the defense committee prevented the execution from happening quietly. The names of Sacco and Vanzetti became known all over the world as clear examples of the horrendous injustice of the United States government.

However, for most of his years in the Workers and then Communist Party, Cannon argued against those who attempted to use that organization for their personal gain. For a while, Cannon succeeded in being a part of the majority faction of the party. However, when Joseph Stalin began to betray the core values of the Russian Revolution, Cannon’s idea of advancing a genuinely proletarian party became increasingly impossible. 

At this point, there is a question that needs to be asked. In 1928, Cannon had a salary on the staff of the Communist Party. He had been doing effective work in the International Labor Defense. So, why would he advance a perspective in support of the politics of Leon Trotsky, knowing that position would mean his expulsion from the Communist Party? This would also mean that Cannon and a few other individuals would need to start a new workers political party from scratch.

When we look at the early life of Cannon, we can also begin to see the answer to that question. From an early age, Cannon not only believed that the horrendous conditions workers experienced needed to be improved, he also believed that workers have the potential to create an organization that can transform the world. His work in support of Eugene Debs, the International Workers of the World, and the Communist Party gave him that confidence. What set Cannon apart from many others was his understanding and determination to organize a proletarian political party capable of advancing the interests of the working class. 

So, in 1928, while Cannon attended an international workers meeting in the Soviet Union, he accidentally came across a document written by Leon Trotsky. At that time, Joseph Stalin was working to transform the Bolshevik Party into a cult that supported him. While Trotsky had been a central leader of the party, as well as the central military commander of the Red Army, Stalin first had him exiled to Siberia, then he was exiled out of the Soviet Union, then in 1940 a supporter of Stalin assassinated Trotsky in Mexico.

Reading that document written by Trotsky was a turning point in the life of James Cannon. He began to realize that he had a choice. If he continued to be a leader of the Communist Party, he would no longer be advancing a revolutionary organization. Cannon began to become aware that his continued participation in the Communist Party would make him nothing more than a bureaucrat. Cannon’s life story would not allow him to live that kind of life.

So, first Cannon needed to smuggle Trotsky’s document out of the Soviet Union. Then, he spoke with two other co-thinkers about declaring their support of the political orientation of Leon Trotsky. That act prompted a trial withing the Communist Party where Cannon and his co-thinkers were expelled. One of those who the Communist Party expelled was Rose Karsner, who was Cannon’s wife and co-thinker. Karsner became one of the founding members of the organization that became the Socialist Workers Party.   

At that time the leader of the Communist Party in this country was Jay Lovestone. The Communist Party eventually expelled Lovestone from its ranks.

After Cannon’s expulsion from the C.P., other leading members of the party were also expelled. One of the cities where Cannon gained support was in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Cannon’s supporters in that city would eventually become the leaders of a teamster’s union strike in 1934. That strike would be one of three strikes that would advance a movement that recruited millions of workers into unions. 

Just as Eugene Debs gave a speech in opposition to U.S. participation in the First World War, supporters of the Socialist Workers Party opposed sending soldiers to battle in the Second World War. The teamsters of Minneapolis waged a persistent battle against the capitalists of that city for about one year. Leaders of that strike argued that workers in this country would gain nothing by murdering workers who lived in Europe.

Because the Socialist Workers Party exercised their First Amendment rights of free speech, the government arrested eighteen members of the SWP. Many of those arrested, including James Cannon, would serve sixteen months in prison. The government would later acknowledge that there was no legal basis for arresting the SWP members for exercising their First Amendment Rights.

The Socialist Workers Party then became active in defending the Cuban Revolution, supporting and publicizing the ideas of Malcolm X, and becoming leaders of the movement against the war in Vietnam. This was all made possible because James Cannon decided to support a political perspective advanced by Leon Trotsky. Cannon also carried out the seemingly impossible task of organizing a new political party with its newspaper The Militant.

During the war against Korea, Cannon sent a letter to President Truman protesting that war. We might think about how this son of Rosedale, Kansas grew up to express his solidarity with the people of Korea who fought against the invasion of their country by the armed forces of the United States.

Today, for those who are in the streets protesting against police brutality, the destruction of the environment, and the indifference of employers in establishing safe working environments, I believe that understanding the life story of James P. Cannon holds important lessons. One is how Cannon stood up, for his entire life, under seemingly impossible circumstances, to advance the interests of the working class.

We can also learn about the life of Farrell Dobbs, who was the Socialist Workers Party leader who was the central leader of the teamster’s strike in Minneapolis. All these efforts were made possible because of Leon Trotsky’s defiance of Joseph Stalin’s betrayal of the Russian Revolution.

One of the lessons we can learn from Cannon was his statement that in a healthy revolutionary party, there will be disagreements. When there are no disagreements, Cannon believe that this is a sign that the party is stagnating. So, when we hear people who are engaged in struggle say things we don’t agree with, that is not necessarily a bad thing. What is important is to establish an environment where there can be civil discussions about how to advance a political movement that can transform the world.

We are the Working Class of the World

By Steve Halpern

Everyone in this country has been barraged with information concerning the so-called Presidential election. We can also say that the news media, the government, as well as most of academia has made a determined effort to ensure that issues essential to working people would never be discussed. One of those many facts is the issue that there exists in literally every nation of the world, a working class. That working class, along with farmers, consists of the immense majority of the world’s population.

Understanding this, we might also consider that workers around the world have essentially the same interests. We all need and want food, clothing, a place to live, health care, education, transportation, communication, and exposure to culture that includes, music, art, dancing, theater, film, sports, literature, and recreation. We also want to live in a world that is in basic harmony with the environment, where women and people of all nationalities are fully liberated.

However, when we think about these ideas, we might consider that politicians routinely argue that the interests of workers in this country are different from the interests of workers in other countries. Politicians from both parties argue that one of their top priorities is to deport immigrant workers. They do this, understanding that the economy of this country is totally dependent on the labor of immigrants. They promote their policy of deporting immigrants, understanding that one of the foundations of this country has been the genocide against Native Americans. 

From time to time, politicians argue that we need to go to war against workers in other countries. Those wars cost the lives of literally millions of people. When we think of all the destruction caused by those wars, we might think about how resources might have been used to eliminate poverty in the world. This is another issue the media isn’t interested in raising.

So, in order to think about how we can advance the interests of the international working class, we might look at our history. We have had many outstanding leaders. The capitalists, on the other hand, have been relying on Donald Trump and Joe Biden to support their interests.

Before we look at some of the leaders of the working class, we might look at some of the theoreticians who supported the capitalist system. When we begin to understand their arguments, we can learn why capitalism came into existence, and why this system routinely experiences one crisis after another. 

John Locke

John Locke was a physician and philosopher who lived at a time of the British revolutions of the 1600s. This was at a time after the writers Miguel de Cervantes and William Shakespeare began to imagine the world in different ways.

Locke attempted to make sense of the transition from the systems of feudalism to capitalism. During the feudal epoch, the royal families had absolute power they shared with religious clerics. Most people were peasants who worked on farms or manors that were controlled by the royal families. This meant that peasants were not allowed to travel away from the manors where they toiled.

Feudalism became an obstacle to advancing the interests of humanity. There was little interest in developing large-scale manufacturing because the economy was based on agriculture. So, a new class emerged that worked towards developing enterprises that would be financed to produce commodities for profit. In order to advance this new capitalist class, revolutions erupted in the Western Hemisphere and Europe. 

John Locke understood that capitalism was an advance over feudalism. He argued that this new system needed to support the idea of giving everyone “life, liberty, and property.” Locke felt that the right to property was important because this wasn’t insured in feudalism, where power was centered with the royal families. This idea of Lock was similar to the slogan raised in the French Revolution, “liberty, equality, and fraternity.”  

Locke also argued that “All wealth is the product of labor.” This argument that all wealth comes from the labor of workers has been routinely rejected by people who have power in the capitalist world. 

Bernie Sanders and many of his co-thinkers argue for reforming health care with a single-payer system. If we think of John Locke’s argument, we see that health care always has been, and always will be, funded with a single payer. That single payer is the working class of the world. According to Locke, we are the ones who produce all wealth. Therefore, we are the ones who will always sustain the health care systems throughout the world. The problem is that workers don’t control how health care systems are organized.

David Ricardo and John Smith

David Ricardo and John Smith both developed a more comprehensive analysis of capitalism. They both took advantage of their understanding of the system and became wealthy. However, both Ricardo and Smith understood that because of capitalism’s routine functioning, the system would periodically experience profound crisis. 

Today, the mainstream economists reject this point of view. They argue that capitalism will continue indefinitely and has the capacity to overcome all obstacles. The current pandemic is teaching us that this confidence in capitalism is merely a matter of wishful thinking.

Karl Marx and Frederick Engels

Karl Marx and Frederick Engels drafted their Manifesto of the Communist Party in 1848. In this Manifesto, they argued that, “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.” With the emergence of capitalism, two new classes came into being. These were the capitalist class and the working class. 

As we have seen with the writing of Locke, the working class creates “all wealth.” However, in capitalism the owners of corporations, who produce nothing, are the ones who control the means of production. 

Frederick Engels lived in Manchester, England and wrote a study of the conditions of the working class there. Engels gave concrete evidence showing how capitalists profited from the horrendous conditions of working class in that city.

Looking at this reality, we might think about the so-called educational system in the United States. Boards of Education that routinely support the interests of corporations, and demand that teachers adopt to lesson plans that support capitalist interests.

So, teachers ask students to start their days by pledging allegiance a flag, they claim represents “liberty and justice for all.” Along those lines, many teachers tell students that we live in a “democracy,” and that this is the greatest nation in the world. These arguments are based on the idea that in one day every year many working people have the right to vote.   

Understanding this relationship, we see how capitalists always have had interests that are antagonistic to the interests of workers. The capitalist drive to maximize profits comes in direct conflict with the basic needs of workers. 

Since working people are the overwhelming majority, and we have no control over the means of production, there can be no genuine democracy in the capitalist system. Marx and Engels argued that, “the capitalist state serves as the managing committee of the bourgeoisie.” The state consists of the government, the media, as well as the academic community.

Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

In February of the year 1917 there was a revolution is czarist Russia. Millions of Russian soldiers died as a result of the First World War. In a nation that was a breadbasket for the entire region, the Russian people experienced famine. At that time, Czarist Russia had the reputation of being the most repressive nation in Europe. These conditions were so horrendous that the Cossacks, who normally broke up and murdered protesters in the past, refused to be used against the revolutionaries.

As a result, a Provisional Government took power. However, that government refused to end the war, or use its power to feed the people, or to institute a comprehensive land reform.

So, when Vladimir Ilyich Lenin returned to Russia from exile, his organization demanded all power to the workers councils known as the Soviets. In order to help politically arm his organization, known as the Bolsheviks, he wrote a pamphlet titled State and Revolution. 

In that pamphlet, Lenin quoted Frederick Engels and argued that the capitalist state is a “special instrument of repression.” In other words, governments were invented to be used in the capitalist system as a way of legally robbing workers of the immense wealth we produce.

In the same year as Lenin wrote his State and Revolution, he also wrote another pamphlet titled: Imperialism—The highest stage of capitalism. In this pamphlet, Lenin showed how capitalist cartels were dominating nations all over the world. This was not because of a mistake made by the owners of corporations. No, because of the nature of capitalism, corporations and banks need to obsessively work to dominate the entire planet. This is why war has become a constant feature of the capitalist system. This is another example of how capitalist governments can only be a, “special repressive force.”

Fidel Castro

Then, in the year 1959 the Cuban Revolution erupted, and a new revolutionary government took power. This new government issued a document titled, The Second Declaration of Havana. That document asked a question that was similar to Lenin’s thinking on imperialism. “What is the history of Latin America if not the history of imperialist exploitation?”

Because the corporate drive to maximize profits was no longer the priority in Cuba, the government advanced a course that is unthinkable in the capitalist world. This was in spite of the fact that Cuba is a relatively underdeveloped nation. 

Initially, the government organized a massive literacy drive aimed at teaching everyone on the island how to read. As part of that effort, many teenagers who lived in the cities volunteered to live with impoverished families in the countryside in order to teach people how to read. That literacy drive became the foundation for the Cuban health care system, as well as the Cuban initiatives in bio-medical research, agriculture, and energy conservation.

Today Cuba has more doctors, per capita, than any other nation in the world. With respect to the United States, Cuba has about three times more doctors per capita. Cuban doctors travel all over the world treating some of the poorest patients.

In the current pandemic, Cuban health care workers visited literally everyone on the island checking to determine who has symptoms of COVID-19. Cuban scientists have also developed a treatment called Alpha-2B that has been effective in preventing COVID-19 patients from getting the potentially fatal disease of pneumonia. Currently Cuba also developed vaccines that will prevent people from getting infected with COVID-19. Yet, the United States has a trade embargo against Cuba that prohibits people living here to have access to Cuban advances in medicine. 

By utilizing this approach, Cuba has been able to combat the pandemic in ways that were unthinkable to the ruling powers in the United States. When we look at the state of Pennsylvania, the nation of Sweden, and Cuba, we are talking about three places that have populations of between ten and twelve million. As of this writing, in Pennsylvania there were over 9,000 COVID-19 deaths. In Sweden there have been over 6,000 COVID-19 deaths. In Cuba there have been 132 COVID-19 deaths. Yet, while the Black and Latino communities were hit the hardest by the pandemic, 100% of the Cuban population is Latino, and about 40% are Black.

Malcolm X

Malcolm X lived his entire life in the United States while Black people were routinely denied citizenship rights. This was in full violation of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. Malcolm’s father Earl Little was lynched and, as with thousands of other lynchings, the government made no attempt to prosecute his murderers. 

As a child, when Malcolm mentioned to a teacher that he wanted to be a lawyer, his teacher responded, “That’s no job for an n—word.” Because he was blocked from becoming a lawyer, he became something similar to a corporate lawyer. He became a thief. Then, after the authorities apprehended Malcolm, he received a longer prison sentence because he was Black and was in a relationship with a white woman.

While Malcolm served time in prison, he became a supporter of the Nation of Islam. After Malcolm was released from prison, he appealed to young Black people who also became justifiably enraged with the routine and systematic racial discrimination of this country.

Malcom argued that this discrimination didn’t only exist in the states where Jim Crow segregation was the law. He said: “Stop talking about the South. If you’re south of Canada, you’re in the South.” This statement was similar to the idea promoted by Engels and Lenin that the state is a, “special repressive force.” Understanding this reality Malcolm felt that Black people have the capacity to develop a political movement that can liberate humanity and do away with the systematic discrimination we see today.  

Why hasn’t capitalism been replaced already?

So, if humanity has been experiencing this history for many years, we might ask a question: Why does the working class of the world continue to allow a tiny minority, that produces nothing of value, to control the immense amount of wealth in the world? 

Aside from the revolutions in Russia and Cuba, there were many revolutions in the world. There were the Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese Revolutions where imperialist exploitation was blocked for a while. Then, there were revolutions in Algeria, Nicaragua, Grenada, and Iran. However, in those nations, capitalism managed to adapt to new environments. 

The facts are that after the Second World War, revolutions erupted all over the world. The wars against Algeria, Korea, and Vietnam were imperialist efforts to maintain control over the world.

In the United States the labor movement and civil rights movements succeeded in improving the standard of living in this country. However, capitalist enterprises are routinely driven to sell more and more commodities and cut costs. So, they invested huge amounts of money to build factories in nations where wages are between one and ten dollars per day. This not only cut the costs of manufacturing, those new manufacturing centers created new middle classes that became lucrative new markets.

One would think that this huge exodus of capital from the United States would have had a devastating impact on the standard of living. Well, the overall standard of living in this country has been in steady decline for about fifty years. However, there are two reasons why the standard of living in this country hasn’t plummeted even more.

Women have always worked in this country. This is especially true in the Black community where there has been systematic racial discrimination. However, there was a time when many women were homemakers and didn’t need to work because the wages of their husbands were sufficient. 

All of that has changed. For the past fifty years, women have had access to contraception and abortion. This means that they have some control over if and when they become mothers. As the standard of living deteriorated, there was more of a need for two breadwinners in the family. So, today women routinely enter the labor force, and families now have two bread winners. This is one reason why the overall standard of living hasn’t deteriorated even more than it has already.

The other reason why the standard of living hasn’t plummeted more is because of the massive debt of workers with respect to loans for homes, cars, education, and health care. Corporations are also in astronomical debt. 

The days of capitalist expansion are over

Because of the steadily declining rate of profit, corporations need to routinely sell more and more commodities and become obsessed with cutting costs. This has meant that in order to maintain relative capitalist stability the economy needs to grow at a rate of about three percent per year. 

However, even with this growth, recessions erupt about every four to seven years. This is one reason why layoffs are routine in the capitalist system. The pandemic became a reality at the same time as capitalism was due for another recession. However, the economy never fully recovered from the recession of 2008.

These facts underscore the current capitalist dilemma. Added to those problems is the fact that the pandemic, and the corporate drive for profits have meant that the economy has been shrinking from where it was in 2019. However, while the overall economy became smaller, the stock market grew significantly. The one reason for this growth was the decision by the government to print money and give that money to corporations that serve the interests of some of the most affluent people in the world. 

So, when we look at this history, we can begin to understand why people who have power are indifferent to those who are suffering during the pandemic. Millions of jobs were eliminated. This means that millions of people have no way of paying their rent or buying basic commodities. This means that sooner or later the numbers of people who experience homelessness and hunger will continue to increase.

The need to learn from the past

The purpose of this article is to show that when we look at the history of capitalism, we see that we need to escape from this system in order for humanity to make any basic advances. We can also say that during the past fifty years there has been no sustained working class movement anywhere in the world. Cuba is the one place that has resisted all efforts to compromise the interests of workers. 

Saying this, we can also see that capitalism in the world is in deep trouble. The only force that has prevented a total collapse has been massive government bailouts. Those bailouts cannot continue indefinitely.

While there have been many revolutions in the world during the capitalist epoch, only Cuba has been able to maintain a genuine workers government.

Given this history, we can anticipate a few things. Conditions will continue to deteriorate in capitalism. Sooner or later there will be a massive response by workers demanding a reversal of our deteriorating standard of living. Hopefully, working people will learn from the events of the past, and develop a political movement that will allow humanity to escape the clutches of capitalism for all time.