Editorial: A Damp Squib. (1908)

Editorial from the July 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

Of course we cannot expect anything better of Victor Grayson. He’s a firework, rather damped by the humid atmosphere of the Commons, but liable to little fizzles where the powder remains dry. On the occasion of the discussion of the visit of the great peacemaker (which his other name is Guelph) to Russia, when Keir Hardie, swearing he would ne’er withdraw, withdrew his references to the bloody autocracy and feudal savagery of the “Little Father,” and his bigger sisters and cousins and aunts of the Arch-Dukeries, Victor Grayson wanted to give a one-horse pyrotechnic display. He doubtless felt that he had reached a dry spot in his powder magazine and could let off a few crackers. But Henderson, who is the “Little Father” of the Labour Party (MacDonald being his wire-pulling Grand Duke), was not going to allow Grayson to break up the order of the proceedings which the “black hundred” (less ninety-eight) had decided upon in collaboration with the Government. So Grayson was promptly “closured.”

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It was a decided exuberation of bad manners on the part of Grayson, who might easily have followed the example of Pete Curran. Pete, who is a model of self-restraint, found himself once up against the rules of the “House” when he wanted to do desperate things against the Government in connection with the shooting of the people at Belfast. (Russia does not entirely monopolise the institution of “Bloody Sunday.”) With an effort Pete managed to maintain the entente between the Labour Party and the Government unfractured, and relieve his feelings at the same time. In this way. Bubbling over with indignation, he went outside the “House,” and while no one was looking, exploded (under his breath) in these epoch-making and entirely original words—”Damn the Rules !” And so went back to his duties.

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This is the story told, with modest restraint and with less detail perhaps, by Pete himself. It is an example of statesmanship that Grayson should have at least endeavoured to emulate. That he did not is a sign of youth—and of the fact that he does not draw his £200 from the Labour Party exchequer.