Library:Brazilian Communist Party

1922 — Foundation

Statute approved at the PCB Foundation Congress of March 25-27, 1922, in Rio de Janeiro.

Party constitution

Article 1. A Civil Society is founded for an indefinite period of time in Rio de Janeiro, branching out all over Brazil, with the title - Center of the Communist Party of Brazil, but which will be called the Communist Party, the Brazilian Section of the Communist International.

Article 2. The purpose of the Communist Party is to promote the international understanding and action of workers and the political organization of the proletariat into a class party for the conquest of power and consequent political and economic transformation of capitalist society into communist society.

Membership

Article 3. The Party is organized on the basis of personal memberships, and the following conditions of admission are established:

to be at least 18 years old;
to sign the entry form subscribed by three members with more than 3 months of seniority;
belong to the respective industry or trade union, when this exists;
the members of the Society are not subsidiarily liable for the social obligations.

Article 4. The members acquire the right to vote only when 3 months have passed since the date of their admission.

Article 5. The Party also admits the membership of people who, for justifiable reasons, cannot actively militate in its bodies. These members, called taxpayers, however, do not have the right to vote.

The centers

Article 6. The Party is constituted by local or district centers, as long as it contains a minimum of 9 members. In localities where there are no organized centers, isolated members are admitted, which should be constituted in propaganda groups as soon as they reach the number of three.

Article 7. No more than one center is allowed in each locality of the country, with the exception of large cities, where centers can be organized by district. In the latter case, the new centers are always initially constituted by adherents of an already existing center.

Article 8. It is obligation of each member to withdraw from its respective center, in the first quarter of each year, the official booklet of the Party, paying for it the amount of [unkown].

Within the same period, each center must send the list of its members with the necessary indications to the Central Executive Committee of the Party, in order to send them the corresponding booklets and seals.
The monthly fee of each member is 1 $000, paid to the respective center. 50% of this fee is remitted to the General Treasury of the Party in payment of the stamps provided by the Central Executive Committee.
Members who, in the judgment of the respective centers, are unable to satisfy them are exempt from the monthly fees.
Individual members or advertising groups shall pay their subscriptions in full to the General Treasury of the Party.

Article 9. Extraordinary contributions or subscriptions of a national nature are also mandatory, which can only be established by the Party congresses or by the Central Executive Committee, for specific purposes.

Article 10. In cases of emergency, the centers may resort to the Central Executive Committee to obtain the financial assistance they need.

Article 11. It is the duty of each center to organize a communist youth made up of young people under the age of 18. Those over that age may remain in the youth, with the obligation, however, to join the Party directly.

Article 12. To be recognized as such, communist youths must accept the fundamental principles of the Party, and adopt statutes in agreement with them, under the control of the Central Executive Committee and the centers. For the rest, they enjoy full autonomy, both in terms of their internal constitution and the way they develop their propaganda.

The Central Executive Committee

Article 13. The Central Executive Committee is composed of 5 full members and 5 alternates, elected by Congress.

Until the 2nd Ordinary Congress of the Party is held, only members already affiliated to the Central Executive Committee prior to the date of the Constituent Congress may be elected.

Article 14. In accordance with the principle of democratic centralization, the Central Executive Committee:

Represents and directs the Party in its multiple activities and promotes the execution of resolutions of National and International Congresses;
Seeks to respect the program and the Party Statutes, making effective the disciplinary measures provided for in the same Statutes.
It maintains the most rigorous political control over all the organisms of the Party, and is responsible for the orientation of the central organs and in general controls all the publications of the Party;
Maintains relations with Communist Parties in other countries, with the Communist International, and with other proletarian institutions;
Presents at each Party Congress a general report on the march and state of the Party's component bodies.

Article 15. The resolutions of the Central Executive Committee, in order to be valid, must be approved by majority in its ordinary and extraordinary meetings.

Article 16. Each titular member of the Central Executive Committee is in charge of a special branch of activity, according to the following distribution:

General secretariat service, organization and propaganda;
International secretariat service, worldwide relations and information;
Press and publicity service;
Service of communist nuclei in the syndical organizations and cooperatives;
General treasury service, direction and control of finances.

Article 17. The special duties of each service officer are the following:

General secretariat service:

He/she is in charge of the functions inherent to the Party's General Secretariat, represents the Central Executive Committee, oversees the application of its resolutions, the organization and discipline of the centers, and organizes and controls the Party's general propaganda.

The titular member who exercises the General Secretariat is the representative of the Society actively and passively, judicially and extrajudicially.

International Secretariat Service:

It maintains ongoing relations with the Executive Committee of the Communist International and with Communist Parties in other countries, and organizes a methodical information service on the international communist movement.

Press and publicity service:

It directs the Party's central publications and controls all other communist publications in the country, whether of collective or individual initiative, in no way admitting that any publications contrary to the general political orientation of the Party may be made on the pretext of autonomy.

It is responsible, before the Central Executive Committee, for the doctrines based on the Party's central publications.

He has the acts and resolutions of the Central Executive Committee, the balance sheets of the treasury and of the various companies of the Party published in the central body of the Party, or in a special bulletin.

It publishes in the Party's central organ all the resolutions of the centers' assemblies, as well as the observations made by the affiliates on internal or general interest matters.

Core service:

It is in charge of organizing, directing and controlling the communist nuclei in the unions and cooperatives, maintaining direct and disciplined contact between the nuclei and the Central Executive Commission.

General treasury service:

The person in charge of the General Treasury, responsible for the Party's finances, is in charge of the direct administration of the Party's central treasury, directing or controlling all the other financial and administrative services of the newspapers, editions and various Party cashiers in general, such as the centers.

Article 18. Each titular member aggregates to himself, in council under his immediate direction, the adherents appointed by the Central Executive Committee with the approval of the respective centers and according to the service needs and the qualifications or positions of each one, at the discretion of the Central Executive Committee. These councils study and organize the projects, plans and works related to the respective branch of activity. However, the service manager, a full member of the Executive Central Committee, is solely responsible to the latter, upon whom the approval and adoption of said projects, plans and works ultimately depends.

Article 19. The members of the Central Executive Committee meet in ordinary session once a week. Only the meetings attended by at least 3 incumbents shall be valid, and absences shall be filled by substitutes. The latter must attend all meetings of the Central Executive Committee, but only have a vote when they act as substitute for the incumbents.

Article 20. Members of the Executive Central Committee who miss meetings of the same without the necessary justification shall be considered dismissed.

Congress

Article 21. The Party meets in ordinary congress annually, in a place and date determined at the discretion of the Central Executive Committee. Extraordinary congresses may be convened by call of the Central Executive Committee or by initiative of two thirds of the centers.

Article 22. Each center sends to the congress a delegate for 30 quota holders or fraction greater than 15, but the votes of the delegations are counted by the number of quota holders represented.

Article 23. No center that is not up to date with the Party's General Treasury, or is at least 3 months old, can run for congress.

Article 24. The agenda and the thesis to be discussed in the congress are prepared by the Executive Central Committee and sent 60 days in advance to all centers. The latter, 90 days in advance, may present to the Central Executive Committee theses or propositions on important issues of general interest to be discussed at the congress.

Article 25. Each center sends the Central Executive Committee, 30 days in advance, a general report on the status and progress of its annual movement.

Article 26. Each member of the Central Executive Committee reads before the congress a report on the movement of the service in their charge. The congress judges these reports.

Article 27. The provisional table of the congress is formed by the Central Executive Committee until the verification of powers by a commission appointed for such purpose is made.

Article 28. The congress may modify the agenda proposed by the Central Executive Committee and include new issues in it if two thirds of the delegates so resolve.

Article 29. Each delegate to the congress may not represent more than one local center.

Administration

Article 30. The Party's central cashier is constituted by the monthly contribution of the centers at the rate of 500 réis per even member; by the direct members at the rate of l$000 per even member and by the other extraordinary entries and eventual rents.

Article 31. The Party treasurer-general reports monthly to the Central Executive Committee on the general movement of the central cash office, and the balance sheets are examined by the account commission.

Article 32. The accounts committee, composed of 3 members elected by congress, is in charge of the monthly inspection of the General Treasury balance sheets, both in relation to the centers' contributions and the administration of advertising services and other extraordinary income.

Article 33. Once a center is dissolved, its assets are transferred to the Executive Central Committee.

Statutes of the Centers, Nuclei and Youth

Article 34. The statutes of the centers, nuclei, and communist youths are written under a model presented by the Central Executive Committee.

The discipline

Article 35. In defense of the program, morality and harmony of the Party, the centers may resolve, by two thirds of its members, in special assembly, the suspension, no longer than six months, and the exclusion of one of its members, with appeal before the Central Executive Committee and the Party Congress. Suspended or excluded members may rejoin the Party whenever the causes for their exclusion or suspension have disappeared.

Article 36. For the same reasons, the Central Executive Committee may, by unanimous vote, suspend or exclude a local or district center or local propaganda group, with an appeal to the Congress.

Article 37. Those adherents who miss, without justified cause, 3 consecutive assemblies of their respective centers, have their voting rights suspended during the following 3 assemblies. In case of recurrence, they are considered excluded from the Party.

Article 38. Members who fail to pay the established contributions for 2 consecutive months have their voting rights suspended during the following 3 meetings of their respective centers. In case of recurrence, they are considered excluded from the Party.

The cases provided for in number 3 of article 8 are not subject to the conditions imposed by this article.

Article 39. Communist centers, groups, and youths cannot carry out acts in collaboration with groups outside the Party without prior approval from the Central Executive Committee.

Article 40. Only Party congresses have the capacity to reform and modify the present Statutes, once they are based on the principles and resolutions of the Communist International, as well as only a specially convened congress can resolve the extinction of society and determine the destiny of its patrimony.

Article 41. Cases not foreseen in these Statutes are solved by the Central Executive Committee.

1925 — II Congress of PCB

Então capital da República, o Rio de Janeiro recebeu nos dias 16, 17 e 18 de maio de 1925 o II Congresso Nacional do Partido Comunista Brasileiro (PCB). Publicamos, a seguir, a pauta e as resoluções congressuais.

In addition to the members of the former Central Executive Comittee (6 present), delegates from the organizations of Rio and Niterói (5), Pernambuco (2), São Paulo (1), Santos (2), Cubatão (1) took part in the Congress. The delegation of Rio Grande do Sul did not attend, due to impossibility.

A preparatory session, meeting on the 15th, had regularized the way the Congress operated, appointed the various necessary committees. The entire first session, held on 16 May, was devoted to the reports of regional organizations and the general report of the party. These reports, as well as the general balance sheet of the Treasury of the Central Executive Comittee and some other documents of the II Congress of the PCB will be published later.

We publish here, below, only the theses and resolutions on the items on the agenda and approved by the Congress. Various and insurmountable reasons unfortunately delayed this publication. And it is, so that we do not delay further, that we delete here the one of less importance and urgency.

Resolution on reports

The second Congress of the PCB approves the report of the Secretary-General of the party, in which all the work developed by the Central Executive Comittee (C.C.E.) During these three years of troubled existence of the Brazilian P. C. was exposed.

In general, and in view of the exceptional difficulties faced since its inception by the party, the party, if it did not give everything that could be expected, nevertheless knew how to keep itself on its feet, tenaciously, crossing all the multiple obstacles that arose in the way of its activity. The second Congress recognizes that the Central Executive Comittee, despite certain deficiencies and mutilated though, worked with perseverance and dedication, directing and guiding the party.

As for the reports presented by the delegates of the state organizations, the second Congress notes that only the Pernambuco report gives an idea of constant and profitable activity. The organizations of Santos, Cubatão and São Paulo, especially the latter, resent a lot of deficiency in their practical activity. In fact, only inertia and sloppiness can explain the delay of the communist organization - 12 very few adherents after three years-in a large industrial center like São Paulo. The Congress therefore insists with the comrades of these localities that in the future they develop a more fruitful work of organization and propaganda, conquering for the party the proletarian masses of that state.

Conquer the working masses to communist influence by organizing their conscious and combative Vanguard in the cells of the PCB! – Such the fundamental slogan of the II Congress of the PCB

Conclusions on the national political situation

Thus summarizing the characteristics of the national political situation, the second Congress considers as an immediate political task of the PCB:

I-to carry on the ideological struggle aimed at awakening and crystallizing the class consciousness of the proletariat. Clearly establish, in all political struggles of the country, the differentiation of interests and ideology of classes. Vigorously fight errors, deviations and illusions of both the anarchist extreme left and the socialist (reformist) right.

II-in the midst of political, civil and military struggles, between agrarian capitalism and industrial capitalism, maneuver the proletarian forces as independent forces aiming at their own class interests.

III-in the face of the petty bourgeoisie, the PCB must, without feeding its democratic illusions and ideological confusions, rather by resolutely combating them, strive to conquer or at least neutralize its elements in the process of proletarization and in the struggle against the large industrial or agrarian bourgeoisie. In a word: the PCB, The Party of the working class, must lead the petty bourgeoisie and not be led by it.

IV-with regard to the poor farmers and agricultural workers, a huge mass, numerically predominant in the labor population of the country, imposes on the PCB a policy at a safe and skillful time, in the sense of ripping it off from the reactionary and obscurantist influence. The solution of the peasant problem constitutes the touchstone of the world communist movement. It rises in large numbers in mainly agricultural countries, as is the case of Brazil. Well, nothing has been done between us on this ground. Everything is still to be done. But it is absolutely necessary and urgent to start a serious and shrewd work to solve the question about all serious of the relations of the PCB between the peasant masses of Brazil.

V-all the work to be carried out by the PCB, whether in the field of agitation and propaganda, or in the field of organization and action, must be linked, strategically and tactically, to the world situation, in connection – on the one hand, with the international revolutionary movement – on the other hand, with the struggle against imperialism. General struggle for the U.S.S.R., against imperialism and its capitalist allies or fascist and socialist (reformist) servants. Coordinated struggle in common with sister parties throughout America, particularly against anglo-American imperialism.

The international situation

Analyzing the situation in the world, says the report approved by the second Congress, regarding international slogans:

Against international bourgeois imperialism and especially against anglo-American imperialism in South America.

Against international white terror.

Against South American armament, creating a threat of war between the South American peoples and especially between Argentina and Brazil.

For the international proletarian rapprochement and in particular for the rapprochement of the South American proletariat!

For the world proletarian revolution!

The new statutes

Organizational matters

Reorganization — the second Congress approves, in general, the bases adopted at the February conference, held in Rio. However, regarding the structure of the PCB, from the cells to the Central Executive Comittee, certain modifications must be made, according to the experience already carried out and the indications of the new statutes.
Statutes — the second Congress adopts, on a provisional and experimental basis, the standard statute for the sections of the Communist International, drawn up by the Bureau of Organization of the executive of the Communist International, on May 4, 1925. Thus, the primitive statutes of the PCB are abolished. the adaptation and definitive adoption of the new statutes will be made by the III Congress. However, a number of adaptation amendments are already indicated and should be accompanied by the publication of the model statute.
Service line — these amendments refer mainly to the service line established for the work of direction, coordination and current practice of the PCB seven special services are established, throughout the scale of the Organization of the PCB, from the Central Executive Comittee, and through the region and Zone committees, to the cells, whenever possible, in these last scales; they are the following:
1. Organization
2. Agitprop
3. Treasury
4. Unions
5. Cooperatives
6. Peasants
7. Youth and women.

The first three services are mandatory in the formation of all committees, even the smallest cells.

Proportional quotas — an indication is approved authorizing the Central Executive Comittee to examine the issue in detail, deciding definitively. The category of “contributing members " is abolished, since every member of the PCB must, by definition, be an active member working in some basic organization of the same.

Trade union movement

Our task in the trade union field is immense and difficult, but to it we must devote the greatest of our activities. Trade union work needs to be carried out with Method and tenacity, systematically, according to the plan outlined in these theses. The hour is of the intemerate workers, of the active and persevering militants, although modest, who use all the remaining minutes of the hours of daily labor in the collective work of defending the interests of the working class.

For the organization and reorganization of workers!

For national and international unity!

About cooperation

Given that cooperation can offer immediate advantages to communist propaganda and that, in addition, it should deserve special attention of the P. C. as an important factor in the struggle of workers ' resistance, the II Congress resolves:

that the working class create a special information and propaganda section on cooperation;
that the working class publish, with the necessary language adaptations, the theses and resolutions adopted at the end of 1928, by the Central Executive Comittee, ON cooperation and also publish all the resolutions taken on the subject by the Comintern and Profintern;
that the person in charge of the cooperation section circulate this material widely among the sections of the P. C. and among the groups of workers and unions of the country, interested in the issue;
that union-related cooperation be adopted and advised, depending on the Union;
that cooperation be not only a weapon of resistance to commercial economic exploitation, but a weapon of resistance in the struggle for the complete emancipation of the proletariat.

The organization of Communist Youth

It is no longer necessary to insist on the importance of the Communist Youth for the proletarian movement. The importance of creating the vanguard of the young militants is all the greater now, as its organization obeying the same orientation as the organization of the party, that is, being made on the basis of cells, will conquer the young workers and proletarians within their own workshops and workplaces.

Already at the conference of the enlarged Central Executive Comittee Of The PCB in January 1924, the subject was outlined and the sections were recommended to take care of the Organization of the Communist Youth

Unfortunately, it was only in Rio that this was dealt with in a poor way. However, there is an increasing need to address the issue of the Organization of the Communist Youth

The II Congress of PCB recommends to the sections, a redoubled energy in this branch of the propaganda and Organization of the P. C.

In time the Central Executive Comittee will circulate the informative material on the subject.

Miscellaneous motions The working class

The second Congress of the PCB emphasizes the need to intensify the effort of all party organizations in the direction of support and dissemination, especially dissemination of The working class.

The general acceptance with which it was received within the proletariat, our newspaper, whose circulation is progressively increasing from number to number, well proves the importance of the Communist press in the work of penetration and influence among the broadest masses.

The second Congress indicates, from the outset, as a practical means of helping the newspaper, that everywhere, in the workshops and factories of the cities and farms and mills of the interior, pro-working class committees are formed, dedicated especially to the propaganda and dissemination of our body.

Moreover, these committees will have a twofold importance: at the same time that they will be the most precious aid to the newspaper, they will become true proletarian instruments of propaganda, agitation and organization-paving the way for the formation of party cells and factory committees based on trade unions.

Greetings

The second Congress of the PCB, At the end of its work, welcomes in general all the brotherly parties of the whole world and in particular the parties of the whole of America, with which the PCB must collaborate more closely in the fight against Yankee imperialism; to the neighboring South American parties the Second Congress sends the most fraternal word of solidarity and greeting, indicating to the PCB the need to establish closer and more affective relations with them in the future than before, in view of a common activity, demanded by the same common struggle for the emancipation of the working and peasant masses of South America.

Long live the fraternal union of the communist parties of South America!

Long Live The union of the communist parties of all America in the fight against Yankee imperialism!

Long live the Communist International United in an invincible World block!

Against the national and international reaction

The Second Congress of the PCB protests its indignation against the handling of the national and international reaction, which oppresses and massacres hundreds of thousands of workers.

From the Brazilian workers deported to the Oiapoque to the recent killings led by the Bandit Tsankov in Bulgaria, the international proletariat groans under the weight of the most cynical and brutal bourgeois reaction that history records.

Down with reactionary imperialism and fascism!

Long live world proletarian solidarity, under the aegis of the Communist International!

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