Zdanowski, for years my deputy in the General Council of the T.U.C. At one time, Zdanowski, like myself, could not approve of the policy of the W.R.N. 1 You may level various political reproaches at the W.R.N. but you have.to admit that its struggle against the Germans was most stubborn, most self-sacrificing and most heroic. Zdanowski, like myself, wanted to run as an independent candidate. During the occupation he had a miraculously narrow escape, by slipping out of the office at the last moment. For this the Gestapo arrested his wife. And this man, who was then helped in hiding by the " Spolem " Co-operative Society and by Vice-President Szwalbe at the risk of the latter's own safety,-this man was accused, in the National Electoral Commission, of collaboration with the Germans by no other than a former member.of the W.R.N. And the Commission ruled that, since the leadership of the W.R.N. had "opposed the armed struggle against the occupying Power " it must deprive Zdanowski of his right to stand for ·Parliament. He appealed against this decision to the National Council of the Homeland, calling several witnesses, Vice-President Szwalbe among ·others. But the Praesidium of the National Council of the Homeland did not hear the witnesses, did not hear the accused himself and ignored his appeal, thus confirming the decision of the Commission. Is this not a slap in the face for all of you-ministers, vice-ministers and deputies-who in those days led the W.R.N. and who now sit silently on these benches; and is it not just this which drives people into the woods since they cannot gain justice by any legal means ? It is precisely decisions like this which drive the desperate ones to join the terroristic bands in the woods,-those bands which are the misfortune of this country and which render difficult any sensible and reasonable struggle for the rule of law in Poland. It is you who are guilty of this, - guilty of breaking or wanting to break people so that you may climb to power over thei~ prostrate forms. . You have won ! But so did Pilsudski in 1930 ; so did Colonel Slawek in 1935, when he fraudulently imposed a new constitution on the nation. And, like them, you to-day •. celebrate your victory. · 1 W.R.N.-the war:time name of the underground organisation of the Polish Socialist Party. so Biblioteca Gino Bianco
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