Pamphlet Review from the November 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard
“The Railway Difficulty and How to Solve It” is a penny pamphlet by Thomas Johnston and Hugh Adam. The writers advocate Nationalisation as immediately practicable. But they assert that it would mean a saving of at least 20 per cent. in working expenses. In other words, the Nationalisation of Railways would intensify the unemployed problem, as Mr. Bell, M.P., pointed out at the Annual General Meeting of the A.S.R.S. The authors claim to be “unhesitatingly and uncompromisingly Socialist,” and in their conclusion admit that Nationalisation of Railways would not be of any avail, but we must have Socialism. Why, then, waste the time and fritter away the energies of the working class in going for something that will not affect their position as the subject class in the community ?
1 comment:
Thomas Johnston's surname in the original Standard is misspelt.
At the time of the pamphlet's publication Johnston was the editor of the Scottish left-wing newspaper, Forward, a paper that he himself had founded. He was later to be a Labour MP, and was the Secretary of State for Scotland between 1941 and 1945. He died in 1965.
One of Johnston's biographer's - Graham Walker - described the pamphlet as a "cogently argued pamphlet on railway nationalisation". The Standard begged to differ.
Post a Comment