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All this was not done without protest. One farmer declared—before he and 25 others withdrew from the Convention: "The farmers of this country, and the laborers, too, will never agree to the principles shown in this convention.
"We have a group here that believes our form of government is the best ever devised by man. They want to purge its temples but they don't want to burn them down.
"We are between the two extremes— the money power that is crushing us and the fellows whe want to change this form of government into a Soviet. Why don't you come out and say you want a Soviet Government? Why don't you put it in the platform? If you're ashamed to sail under your right name, why can I be blamed for refusing to associate with you?"
To this Mr. Foster might have replied with great point: "We don't want a pure Communist organization nor a pure Communist platform because it will serve us better to control a party which might get many non-communist votes—on that account we would have liked to ride on the tail of Mr. LaFollette's kite. It would give us an opening and make a better impression in Moscow."