International Socialist Congress, Stuttgart 1907

The work of the congress dealt largely with matters of militarism, colonialism, and women's suffrage and marked an attempt to centrally coordinate the policies of the various socialist parties of the world on these issues.

[2] Temporary chairman of the Congress was Paul Singer, who after welcoming the delegates turned the floor over to Emile Vandervelde of the International Socialist Bureau for a keynote speech which served as the formal opening of the gathering.

[1] Sunday night was occupied with a mass propaganda meeting, held at the Stuttgart Volksfestplatz, a large open area located on the banks of the Neckar River about a mile from the center of the city.

[10] One day of debate in commission produced a majority resolution which offered a carefully measured rejection of colonialism, while at the same time recognizing the inevitability of the opening of undeveloped nations for economic development and, by extension, exploitation.

The ultimate resolution did not go far in catering to such a demand, however, condemning the importation from abroad of strikebreakers or those previously entering into restrictive employment contracts, but insisting that unions not only admit immigrant workmen but do so on the basis of reasonable initiation fees and dues structures.

[1] This position proved acceptable to the radical foes of conservative craft unions and their "narrow, petty-bourgeois" agenda, such as Russian delegate V. I. Lenin, who asserted in no uncertain terms that the resolution adopted "fully meets the demands of revolutionary Social-Democracy".

[13] The Congress attempted to address the sometimes uneasy tension between the political and economic arms of the workers movement by defining the relationship between the Socialist Parties and the trade unions of the various nations of the world.

[14] However Karl Kautsky brokered a compromise resolution in which the parties and the unions "had an equally important task to perform in the struggle for proletarian emancipation," with the domain of each logically separated and independent of the other.

[1] Expressing the belief that only a combined economic and political effort would be sufficient for the liberation of the working class, pious wishes for close cooperation were made in the resolution, echoing the declarations of previous International Socialist Congresses.

[1] In addition to its major statements on militarism, immigration, the relationship of the socialist and trade union movements, colonialism, and women's suffrage, the 1907 Stuttgart Congress passed a handful of more specialized resolutions.

The delegates approved declarations disapproving the invasion of Morocco by French and Spanish forces, expressed sympathy with the defeated revolutionary movement in the Russian Revolution of 1905, and formally condemned the "unlawful methods" employed by American mineowners in an effort to legally hang radical union leader William D. "Big Bill" Haywood.