Document 31 - Letter from E.R. Roux to Victor Danchin, 6 March 1929

From: South Africa's Radical Tradition, a documentary history, Volume One 1907 - 1950, by Allison Drew

Document 31 - Letter from E.R. Roux to Victor Danchin, 6 March 1929

                                                                                                                                                                 Copy

                                                                                                                                                                Camb

                                                                                                                                                   6 March 1929

Dear Victor,

I must apologise for ihe delay in answering your letters, for which thanks very much. I take it that the second book was confiscated by the authonties, as I sent them in a single package. I hope you will not create the impression of being"ultra left" as a result. Perhaps you could make some inquiries at your end. The two books certainly left here safely.

I hope you have now seen No 596 of the SA Worker and also SPB pamphlet "Imperialism and S Africa". I think the CI will find the final programme fairly satisfactory in its immediate demands but I can see breakers ahead as far as Bunting's 60 page effort is concerned. However, we are gradually settling down to the "new line"and getting rid ot' the "pure Marxist" outlook. SPB moves very slowly but very surely.

He is already taking up Hertzog's "kaffir state" cry and saying that that is what the CP stands for: a correct attitude I think. He still thinks of and emphasises the "telescoping" of the bourgeois-democratic and proletarian revolutionary movements in S Africa. I think he exaggerates the amount of telescoping that will take place.

As far as my own views are concerned, I find they are still in a state of flux, though gradually settling down to the orthodox Cl view. A point on which I still differ from that view is the extent of the antagonism between the "small" Afrikander imperialism and the"large" British imperialism. The imperialists are still backing the natives to a certain extent against white S.A. - a point which the CI does not realise fully. This is why I still tend lo emphasise the NATIVE republic (e.g., demands for racial equality and admittance to parliament, etc.) rather than the independent (of the British Empire)native republic.

We shall probably be able to draw important conclusions from the results of the Temhaland campaign. Whalever theory exists at present, if the CPSA continues to approach nearer to the native masses and particularly to the agrarian masses as it IS doing, it must eventually (with the assistance of the CI) work out a decent theoretical picture. I think you will admit that the "picture" hitherto has been rather too sketchy.

Thibedi is an ass about changing the slogan. It would be rather amusing if he could meet Stalin! I suppose you have heard aboul Kadalie's resignation, from the article in Worker's Life( 1/3/29).

Kind regards lo yourself and Willie.

                                                                                                                                                   Yours Fraternally,

                                                                                                                                                               E R Roux