V. I. Lenin

Message Of Greetings To

The First International Congress Of Revolutionary Trade And Industrial Unions [1]

July 18

Comrade Rykov, Please be so kind as to convey to the delegates of the
International Congress of Trade Unions the following:

I thank them from the bottom of my heart for the invitation to
the Congress sent through you. I deeply regret that I am unable
to accept it because of ill-health, for on doctor’s orders
I have had to leave Moscow for a month’s holiday.

Please convey to the delegates my greetings and heartfelt wishes
for the success o the Congress. It is hard to find words to
express the full irnpoytance of the International Congress of
Trade Unions. The winning of trade unionists to the ideas of
communism is making irresistible headway everywhere, in all
countries, throughout the world. The process is sporadic,
overcoming a thousand obstccles, but it is making irresistible
progress. The International Congress of Trade Unions will
quicken this movement. Communism will triumph in the trade
unions. No power on earth can avert the collapse of capitalism
and the victory of the working class over the bourgeoisie.

Warm greetings and confidence in the inevitable victory of
communism.

N. Lenin

Endnotes

[1] The Congress took
place in Moscow from July 3 to 19, 1921, and was attended by 380
delegates from 41 countries of Europe, America and Asia, among
them Russia, Britain, Italy, Spain, France, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Germany, Czechoslovakia, Austria, Poland, Finland,
Korea, China and South Africa. The items on the agenda were: 1)
Report of the Provisional International Council of Trade Unions,
which was set up in July ’1920; 2) The world economic crisis and trade union tasks and tactics; 3) Trade unions and
parties. The Red International of Trade Unions and the Communist
International; 4) Trade unions, factory committees and shop
stewards; 5) Trade unions and workers’ control over production; 6) Unemployment; 7) International trade and
industrial unions; 8) Organisational question; 9) Women in
production and trade unions.

It was the Inaugural Congress of the Red Trade Union
International, which existed till late 1937 and had a great
influence on the world trade union movement.

The Congress adopted the Rules of the Red Trade Union
International, and elected its Central Council. It also adopted
resolutions on other questions.

The Trade Union International fought for unity in the trade
union movement on the basis of the revolutionary struggle for
working-class demands; against the offensive of capital and
fascism, and the danger of an imperialist war. It worked for
unity with the working class of Soviet Russia.

Lenin’s message of greetings, sent in reply to an invitation from several delegations to attend, was read at the
seventeenth sitting on July 19.