Reply Telegram to Comrades Foster and Dunne Congratulating the Founding of the People’s Republic of China (October 6, 1949)

Dear Comrade Foster, Comrade Dunne, and all comrades of the National Committee of the Communist Party of the United States:  We are deeply grateful for your warm congratulations on the founding of the People’s Republic of China. Please convey my thanks to all members of the Communist Party of the United States, as well as to all peace-loving, justice-seeking Americans who harbor good will toward the Chinese people.

As you have rightly pointed out, the victory of the Chinese people is a victory over imperialism, first and foremost U.S. imperialism. This victory is but one component of the overall struggle waged by the working class and progressive forces throughout the world against the camp of world imperialism, a struggle in which the communists of the United States and all sincere democrats have fought side by side with the Chinese people. In their courageous struggle to support the just cause of the Chinese people and to oppose the reactionary U.S. policy toward China, the American communists have earned a position of special honor.

Despite the brutal persecution of the Communist Party of the United States and of progressive forces in this country by the U.S. reactionary government, and despite the illegal prosecution of eleven leading members of the U.S. Communist Party—namely, Comrades Dunne, Williamson, Winston, Stacher, Davis, Winter, Thomson, Geiss, Podach, and Green—