Editorial: Brimstone and Treacle. (1908)

Editorial from the July 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

Speaking at Leicester on May 24th, Ramsay MacDonald, in moving a vote of thanks to “General” Booth, stated (Morning Leader, 25.5.08) “I have a good many irons in the fire, but there is not a single iron that I find the Salvation Army does not hold one end of.” So much the worse for the irons of Ramsay MacDonald.

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“I am sitting on the Committee dealing with the Children’s Bill, and when we get into any difficulty or want any particulars,” he went on, “below the bar sit two representatives of the ‘Army,’ and they are prepared to extricate us.” Verily the source of MacDonald’s inspiration is enough to justify any act of political lunacy he may, and frequently does, indulge in. If having so many irons in the fire compels him to rely upon officers of the Salvation Army for information on the condition of the children question, it’s certainly time he took a few irons out. It is not an edifying spectacle to see even Ramsay MacDonald burning his fingers.

This, however, may be relied upon. Directly it may safely be done, MacDonald will burn his boats at present moored to the Salvation Army pier. Therefore, “lest we forget,” we credit his political account with this laudation of the most expert sweating organisation extant.

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More Labour Unity.

Will Thorne, fellow-member of the Labour Party with Ramsay MacDonald, does not agree at all with the latter’s estimate of the utility of the Salvation Army. While MacDonald (same speech) thinks that “whatever agency comes and goes, the country cannot spare one agency—and that is the Salvation Army,” Thorne expresses the hope (Reynolds’s 31.5.08) that “the Salvation Army would soon be wiped out, and all such sweating organisations.”

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Credit where credit is due. Will Thorne sometimes blunders into a correct position. How it is managed, I suspect, not even William could inform us. “Act of God or the King’s enemies,” as the way-bill puts it, probably ! The Salvation Army is an absolutely anti-democratic, quasi-religious body, trading upon ignorance for its membership, working upon credulity and barbaric fear for its funds, acting as capitalist hack and agent in its administration. With unctuous ostentation it professes to be saving the souls of the poor, while all the time it is damning their bodies, wringing profit out of their necessity, kudos out of their misery, and advertisement out of their weakness.

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It is a blend of Pecksniff and Gradgrind, with an infusion of the Cossack. It combines the methods of the Charity Organisation Society and the Inquisition. It is at once a fire insurance company, a sweat shop, and a black-leg purveyor. It grinds the faces of the poor in defiance of the biblical injunction. It is prepared to accept the money of the usurer who was whipped out of the temple, the Judas who sold his master, the welcher, the pimp, and the rest of the congregation fore-doomed to the lake of fire which burneth for ever—according to the book of love. Has not the “General” announced that he is ready to take contributions from anybody and sanctify them in further use ?

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The Last Straw.

With the result thus acquired the Salvation Army dispenses hell and skilly to the “submerged ten” (human derelicts who, forced to choose between the devil and the deep sea, select, for some unknown reason, the former) in the proportion of a full pound of spiritual brimstone to a pennyweight of carnal flour water. Its special line, apparently, is the saving of souls from the pit by the plentiful mortification of the flesh, and—it is the sort of organisation that Ramsay MacDonald delights to honour !

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All the same, I’m surprised at Thorne. If he’s not careful Ramsay will be cutting off his two hundred. He may protest that Ramsay couldn’t, but there’s no knowing what the MacDonalds and the Hendersons couldn’t work between them. There’s no knowing what they are doing. All that Thorne and Macpherson and the rest of the Labour Party know about the inside affairs of the Labour Party in Parliament is what MacDonald and Henderson tell them. Of course it will be a “dirty shame” if Bill is cut off with a shilling, but if Bill calls Henderson names in the “House” and flouts MacDonald’s opinions outside it, what can he expect ? Besides, Bill, what about that unity of purpose on all questions affecting the working class ? What about that solid front ? Where’s it gone, Bill ? Oh, Bill! you are a naughty boy!