Telegram to Comrade Browder from Comrade
Mao Zedong Protesting the Class-Based Verdict
Against the American People by the
Supreme Court of the United States
(March 1941)
(Xinhua News Agency, New York, Airmail Dispatch on March 10)
To [Earl] Browder: The decision by the U.S. Supreme Court has revealed the cruelty of the ruling class in domestic affairs during a time of imperialist war. We,
along with the proletariat and other progressive people of the United States and
other parts of the world, protest this class-based verdict against the American people.
We are convinced that the Communist Party and the American people will unite
around the slogan "Free Browder" to struggle for peace and democracy. In our
struggle for victory in the War of Resistance, for unity, and for progress, we shall
strengthen our militant unity with the Communist Party of the United States and
the American people.

Mao Zedong

Our source for this telegram is Mao Zedong ji, Vol. 7, p. 283, where it is reproduced from
Jiefang, no. 127. Earl Browder (1891-1973) had been sentenced to prison for passport
violations in 1940, and the Supreme Court had confirmed the sentence on February 17,
1941. Apart from his critical attitude toward American capitalism in general, Mao's reaction may well have been strengthened by the messages of support the Chinese Communists
had earlier received from the C.P.U.S.A. (See Vol. V, p. 681, and Vol. VI, p. 423.)


A Dispatch To Zhou Enlai Regarding Our
Estimates of the Present Political and
Military Situation

(March 12, 1941)

1. Our offensive (the twelve demands twice put forward¹ and our nonattendance) finally compelled Chiang Kaishek to make a direct reply, which brought
the problem into the open nationwide (our twelve conditions made it into all the
Guomindang newspapers, and this in turn exposed Chiang Kaishek's true features). Chiang had wanted to minimize the issue, but now it has become larger
(from a military issue it has expanded into a political issue and a question of parties and factions). All this is the outcome of our offensive.
2. Chiang's speech on the 6th and the Political Council's resolution employ
again the dual policy of hard and soft tactics. The telegram on the 8th from the
seven of us Council members also involves the dual policy of hard and soft tactics.
This kind of seesaw struggle will continue, or in other words, drag on, possibly for
another year.
3. Chiang's speech on the 6th seems to have the same intention as Cheng Qian's²
talk announcing our ten principal crimes, which was carried in Xi'an newspapers
in April of last year. That is, a kind of Ah-Qism: by cursing us out he saves face and
can use this as an excuse to call off the troops. Electing [Dong] Biwu as a standing
member of the Political Council and freeing [our] people in Xi'an recently seem to
be an indication of this kind of calling off of troops.
4. We should keep up our offensive, however, until the conditions in our temporary solution have been in fact accepted (mainly in terms of expanding the army,
defense sectors, the New China Daily, and fewer arrests on the roads).
5. We plan to make no defensive replies to Chiang's speech of the 6th or to the
Political Council's resolution, and to ignore them but, rather, to use the occasion of
the Guomindang's Eighth Plenary Session to have our Central Committee send

Our source for this text is Mao Zedong ji. Bujuan, Vol. 7, pp. 39-40, where it is reproduced
from Wannan shibian.
1. See above, the demands of January 20, 1941 (pp. 651 and 652) reiterated on February 2,
1941 (p. 674).
2. Regarding Cheng Qian, see the note to "The Current Situation and Our Policies,"
January 11, 1940.


them a telegram restating the necessity of the two sets of twelve demands, as a
direct assault. What do you think of this idea?
6. Of the smaller parties and factions, the National Socialist Party and the Youth
Party have for the time been turned into tools of Chiang Kaishek, but the groups
headed by those such as Huang Yanpei and Zhang Biaofang, who truly represent
the national bourgeoisie and the enlightened gentry, remain middle-of-the-road.
7. Hu Zongnan has ceased his attacks on Guanzhong, and so we have in fact
increased our area by one more district, and it is now quiet all around the border
regions. In eastern Anhui the Guangxi Army was completely shattered by the Japanese bandits. Li Xiannian is expanding in eastern Hubei, and Mo Shujie's Eighty-fourth Army is busy trying to deal with the situation. Chen Daqing in central Hubei
and Li Xianzhou north of the Huai River also find themselves unable to do much.
Things are quieting down on all sides. In a couple of months, when the European
war gets going in a big way and things become tense in Southeast Asia, it is likely
that Chiang Kaishek will have to make some concessions to us. This despicable
scoundrel is in fact one who bullies the weak and fears the strong.