Labour and Wages. (1914)

From the August 1914 issue of the Socialist Standard

Some Weird Statements dealt with.

In the second number of the “Candid, Quarterly Review,” conducted by Mr. Thomas Gibson Bowles, appears an unsigned article with the above title. The writer raises the question of industrial disputes, proclaims the necessity for close and deep investigation, and yet throughout the article never once tackles any essential or goes below the surface.

According to him, “the doubts and difficulties that haunt society to-day are of foreign extraction, and were in danger of destruction when crossing the Channel, but survived.” That there was no necessity for “labour unrest” to cross the Channel is shown in his next paragraph, the customary reference to “England’s immunity from war during the early portion of the nineteenth century, and her consequent growth of manufacture,” conditions which, in themselves, breed the class struggle. “The industrial dispute threatens England’s supremacy ; yet perhaps a greater glory awaits her. Perhaps, amid a Europe weakened by class hatred and torn by labour convulsions, England may again show the world a way of social peace.” The writer forgets that the conditions that breed class hatred on the Continent exist here in the same degree and from the same cause. The capitalist can only wish that a way may be discovered. His time-server, whether he be economist, labour leader, Salvationist, or scientist, can only grope for a capitalist solution as the alchemist groped for the philosopher’s store. But while they flounder their time grown short. They may shirk the contest with the Marxian theory of value, or refer to the Socialist Party as an insignificant minority, but and here we quote from the “Review” : “In economics there is at least this merit about the truth—that, once proclaimed, it is sure in the end to prevail.”

In order to prove to the workers that the “Socialist claim that they are being exploited is false, they must be taught economics.” No longer can this be designated the dismal science, for we are assured : “It is a mistake to suppose that the working-men take no interest in economics. It would be more nearly the truth to say that, at this moment they take little interest in anything else.” If “the truth once proclaimed is sure to prevail,” then capitalism is indeed on its last legs, for economic truth is proclaimed in “Capital,” and it in only an interested working class we wait for.

The capilalist and his journalistic hacks will consequently wish and grope in vain for a way out. It is utterly futile, also, to write of the Socialist movement as “the sedulous propaga­tion of economic falsehood,” because a fallacy can be exploded, while this braggart can only dance round the supposed fallacy, and leave a record of his utter inability to even understand the subject.

“The whole industrial system is arraigned. Capitalism is cheating, exploitation,” says he, is the doctrine taught. “It is their business to prove it, yet this is exactly what they never do.” “They,” are, doubtless, the labour leaders who either cannot or will not expose the system that fosters them, being content to mouth beliefs, and empty appeals for “justice” and “fairness.” “What,” asks the writer, “is the fair share of labour in the product of any industry ? if the present wage, then there is no grievance. Then it must be something more. But how much more ? No answer to these questions is ever attempted,” he complains, “except by the full-blooded Socialist.” Of whom else would he expect an answer ?

Wealth, in the economic sense, has no existence until members of the working class have expended their energy on the different substances common to the earth’s crust. That these substances belong to a small class in society, does not necessarily raise the question, “what is a fair wage ?” but rather, why any class or section of society should own the means of life necessary to all ? The “full-blooded Socialist” knows the answer to this; that is why he is politically organised for the establishment of a system of society where the means of wealth production will be owned and democratically controlled by those who use them.

The “Review,” in common with all the anti-Socialist crowd, is particularly concerned that the workers, under Socialism, shall be treated with fairness—even as they are to-day. So they timorously advance certain “insoluble questions.”

“Is the whole product of a factory only to be shared between the workers in that factory ? or is it to be shared by all the workers in the land ? And is each workman to share equally, irrespective of merit, or unequally ? And if the latter, on what principle and by what authority are the shares to be assessed? ”

A five shilling review is dear at the price if it can serve up nothing better than this in defence of the class it caters for.

Ownership being in the hands of the people, there will the authority be, and the common in­terest of all, asserting itself, will speedily put an end to the anomalies of capitalist authority. “Fair” wages and low wages, soft jobs and speeding up, poverty in the midst of plenly, and all the other abuses that belong to capitalism in its normal state, will end when the working class cease to be mere articles of merchandise, picked and kicked about the labour market.

The “Candid” journalist has also many doubts and misgivings on the terms “The right to live” and “A living wage.” He discusses these from many points of view, his perhaps, most brilliant and original remark being, “for happiness and influence in truth, do not depend on gold.” After this and much more irrelevant matter on rights and duties, he delivers himself of the following : “Wages are neither fair nor unfair ; they are fixed either by personal benevolence or by mercantile bargain.” As he cannot possibly claim benevolence for the employer who pays low wages, it follows that those who receive high wages are the recipients of charity. “Wages are neither fair nor unfair,” is where he should have stopped, for, so far, he had not blundered.

Wage is the name for the price of labour power. Whether the wage be high or low there can be no question of fairness, because the employing class having the power, dictate wages and conditions. They first divorce the workers from the means of life, in order to compel them to sell their energy at the cost of living.

But what is the difference between the cost of living of the working class, as represented by wages, and the total wealth produced by them ? Whether wages represent one-third or one-ninth it is obvious that the employing class only pay wages in order to obtain this surplus over the cost of maintenance of the working class. How then can wages be fair or unfair ?

The wages system is one where the workers are threatened with starvation, either if they will not or cannot sell their only possession—the value-creating energy—for a mess of pottage ; and that too, adulterated.

“Let us probe a little more deeply the allegation that the workman is being cheated.” The reader need not fear getting out of his depth, Needless to say, the writer of the article merely emphasises certain inconsistencies and peculiarities of the capitalist system, without proving anything except its utter absurdity as a system for intelligent people to live under. Like the hysterical suffragette, he runs away from the question he raises, and flogs something else to hide his cowardice. “A universal proportion of wages to profits.” The wages bill in some industries is, he says, higher than the profits. “Moreover, inequalities exist side by side in the same industries in the amount of profit.” These observations are as old as they are shallow—examples of the poverty of argument against Socialism. The depths are not probed, for the total profits of every concern are not considered ; and this would have been the surest way to ascertain whether the working class is robbed.

It is easy to see that in a competitive system differences in methods and management will produce different results. All that is proved is the inability of the capitalist class—with the assistance of politicians, economists, and scientists—to eliminate anarchy among themselves, and establish for themselves proportionate division of the spoil, by means of an even method of exploitation.

Any article on labour questions would, of course, be incomplete without a reference to co-partnership. The “candid” writer is candid, besides being illuminating and instructive. He says:

“Co-partnership has been universally successful in achieving peace . . . and the striking thing is that it has achieved this peace without any great or even any noticeable increase in the wages paid. For it must be remembered that the income which a workman under such a scheme derives from his share in the profits is necessarily a very slight part of the whole wage, and that largely owing to the liability of that share to suffer in yield in bad times, his total effective wage is no greater than that of his fellows outside. But he is content because he has been convinced that he is not being robbed. How can he be when he elects a delegate to the board and has some actual voice in the management ? It is clear, therefore, that the achievement of industrial peace is less a matter of raising wages than of convincing the workman that he is not being robbed. But as the workman (quite properly) will never consent to share in losses, its application is only possible to steadily successful concerns ; it is never-the-less to be heartily welcomed as a temporary expedient of the highest value.”

Quite a long paragraph, by the way, but reduced to simple language, it means that co-partnership workers, besides being robbed of the results of their labour—like other workers—are successfully bluffed as well.

Assuming that he has proved conclusively that the workers are not robbed, because some of them have been persuaded to believe so, the writer of the article next proceeds to show in what an Eldorado the worker really lives, according to his limited knowledge of actual conditions. Our author says :

“It is true that the individual workman without savings must sell his labour without undue delay ; he is not bound to sell it to the first bidder. His strength as a bargainer depends partly on his reputation and skill as a craftsman, but mainly upon that close competition among his possible employers, which will enable him to laugh at one who offers him too low a wage.”

A record of the number of such “laughs” would doubtless be interesting ; but if it is true that occasionally a worker “with savings” can afford to pass by a job, it is equally true that the vast majority cannot, and are compelled to resign themselves to the first situation that is vacant, without bargaining or discussion—which, to the capitalist, is impudence.

Next we have something that is profound and original. The real cause of strikes is the desire of the trade unionist to get back the money he has paid in contributions. “After wages,” he says, “have ruled high enough for long enough, a strike is nearly inevitable ; since only so can the men retouch their money.” What capacity for the detection of motives !

Then the scribe says : “In spite of all the theories of combination, one is always brought down to the individual workman. Is he or is he not to be forced, by the magistrate and the gaol, to work for wages which he himself does not approve ? If so it is slavery.”

This statement is clear and sweeping. It covers nearly the whole of the working class in every capitalist country on the globe. Discontent is universal. The workers in every occupation are slaves because at the bidding of the master class they must work for a mere subsist­ence—a wage they certainly do not “approve” of.

Throughout his long article the writer in the “Candid Review” has only succeeded in proving the incapacity of the capitalist class, with all their professional assistants, to run society on sane lines. Anarchy and poverty for the wealth producers, luxury and power for the idlers, are the nett result of capitalism. The only brilliant achievement of modern society is its marvellous productive and distributive power, developed by centuries of experiment and invention ; and these are due to the working class. It is they who have done everything useful. It is they who use energy and intelligence in the production of all social wealth.

The scribbler in the “Candid Review” says that the workingman should remember that the end of his discontent is not the improvement of wages, but the fall of society, and if at the end of it all society does fall he will be instantly buried in its ruins.

We know different. The intelligence and capacity displayed by the workers on the field of production can be utilised by them for other purposes. When they have added knowledge to their intelligence they will establish a system of society where they will consume what they produce. Production is difficult; to consume is easy. To establish Socialism, it is true, requires an effort, of which, however, an educated working class is easily capable. The fall of (capitalist) society—which cannot take place until the workers are educated—therefore, means the end of their slavery.

F. Foan

Catholic Democracy. (1914)

Book Review from the August 1914 issue of the Socialist Standard

How significant the word democracy has be­come ! Kings, State and church ministers, politicians, and even employers say they are out for the benefit of the people. Now the Catholic Church, a remnant of feudal society, also toes the line in this respect.

How queer ! The same church that was responsible for the torture and murder of thousands of human beings who would not submit to her, and for the death of such pioneers of public speech as Servetus, Bruno, and Ferrer (see Professor Bury’s “History of Freedom of Thought”), is now attempting to capture the heart of democracy ! Why is this ?

In feudal society the Catholic Church was representative of that society. About a third of the land and stock, the giving of alms, and learning, were monopolised by her. But with the coming of the bourgeois revolution in Eng­land in the seventeenth century, its power de­clined. The capitalist class, who were in need of science and a free course in the productive processes, crippled her. No longer could the Church have the full sway she possessed in feudal times.

In England, though, the week-kneed capitalists had not the necessary courage to uproot society and destroy it root and branch. They made a compromise with the aristocratic or land-owning class, and through this the Catholic Church was allowed to remain.

With the development of capitalist conditions, however, the capitalist class saw clearly that if they wished to keep the workers in subjection they must instil into their minds religion, i.e., belief in an eternal future. Since the inaugu­ration of capitalism we find ever so many reli­gious sects springing up by the side of the old Church in all capitalist countries.

The Catholic Church, then, since it is exist­ing in capitalist society, must have some special use for the capitalist class, and right well do the heads of this Church see that this is so.

The Church does not say, according to Father Day (who has written a book called “Catholic Democracy, Individualism, and Socialism”), that the capitalist revolution has not had its good qualities—it is the awful reign of terror and its consequences that the Church condemns.

Father Day says (p. 4) : “for though the revolutionary movement [French revolution] contained elements of good and eventually resulted in good, bringing about, amongst other things, the overthrow of a corrupt and oppressive aristocracy, and the emancipation of suffering and down-trodden people, it was, in reality, the outcome of a blind, popular passion rather than a rationally controlled emotion.”

Of course, it would not do to say that the capitalist revolution was “against the will of Gcd,” for look at the good positions these Catholic priests hold.

Again, the Catholic Church is serving the ruling class by preaching to the workers that Catholic democracy alone will save them from the abominable conditions of their slave state. And what, pray, is this Catholic democracy ? Anything that will help the workers ? Well, let Pope Leo XII., as quoted by Father Day, answer this question.

“What social democracy means and what Christian democracy ought to mean does not admit of doubt. The former, more or less extreme as the caee may be, is by many carried to such wicked extravagance as to reckon on humane satisfaction supreme, and to acknowledge nothing higher ; to pursue bodily and natural goods only, and to make the whole happiness of man consist in attaining and enjoying them. Such persons would place the supreme power of the State indiscriminately in the hands of the masses of the people. Moreover, they would abolish all distinctions of rank, and make all citizens equal, in order that all might equally have access to the good things of life. They would likewise do away with ownership, confiscate private fortunes, and socialise the instruments of labour. But Christian democracy ought to have as its foundation the principles laid down by divine faith, having regard, indeed, to the temporal advantage of the poorer and less educated, but designing therewith to fit their minds for the enjoyment of the things eternal. Accordingly, to Christian democracy let there be nothing more sacred than law and right ; let it bid the right of having and holding inviolate ; let it maintain the diversity of ranks which properly belongs to a well-ordered State.” (Pages 13-14.)

To show the Church’s respect for the capitalist class the Pope is quoted as follows by Father Day:

“God forbid that under the name of Christian democracy should lie the surreptitious aim of throwing off all obedience and turning away from those in lawful authority. The law of nature no less than that of Christ, enjoins respect for all such as in their several degrees hold office in the State, and further enjoins obedience to their lawful commands.”

It will be seen from the foregoing that there is no attempt to conceal the nature of Catholic democracy. The Church is on the side of the masters, it must therefore, be antagonistic to the workers, because the master class and the woking class are in conflict.

But do not think that Father Day is without his reasons for opposing Socialism. He meets all the arguments of Socialists, not excepting Karl Marx.

The pity of it all is, however, that our rever­end Father gets so hopelessly mixed up. At one time he will say that such an one is no Socialist, and will next proceed to quote him as a Social­ist. For instance, on page 112 he says :

“As far as it is a constructive system at all Bernstein’s revisionism is not Socialism, but a system of social reform on the basis of modern Liberalism. Mr. Ramsay MacDonald is its present exponent in England.”

He afterwards quotes MacDonald and his clique as representing Socialist opinion in this country.

In proceeding to attack Karl Marx’s theories. Father Day tackles him firstly on “equality.” He (the priest) cannot understand how class distinctions arise from the economic conditions existing at a given period. No, he says, “class distinctions in most cases spring directly from ‘unequal talents and capacities,’ and are, like them, ‘privileges of nature.’ ” True, as soon as society is rid of its parasites, the class who to­-day is not equal to the task of working will cease to exist.

He next goes on to criticise Marx’s theory of surplus-value, and attacks it, one must suppose, from the social labour-time theory. Says the priest (p. 134) :

“People buy objects on account of their usefulness, their worth or fitness to afford them pleasure. These qualities accordingly are the chief factors in determining the prices or the commercial value of the goods. The labour force expended in making them is a matter of quite secondary consideration. At the same time, inasmuch as it forms a part of the cost of production, it must, of course, be paid for by the purchaser. Also good workmanship, as far as it results in better qualities in articles produced, has the effect of enhancing prices. But mere embodied labour is no real measure of worth. Were it a real measure we should have to judge artificial jewelry as being more valuable than real jewelry, and bad art as often superior to good. The theory of ‘surplus value’; is therefore baseless, and falls to the ground.”

It is clear from the preceding, as well as subsequent extracts from his effusions, e.g., his definition of capital on page 260, that he has never understood capitalist wealth.

In capitalist society wealth takes on the commodity form. Undoubtedly a commodity must have a use value, but its use value can only be realised when it falls out of circulation, when, in a word, it is consumed and functions no more. In the process of exchange, therefore, it in only exchange value that can be taken into account. It is the average social labour time that is necessary to be expended on the production of commodities that determines their value. Nothing else can be attributed as a basis of value. Even if we could measure the value of a commodity by its utility—which we cannot do, for it in impossible to say how many times more useful is an umbrella than a pair of braces, for example—it would not apply at the point of exchange, for we cannot know the usefulness of an article until we have used it. Again, the question of rare art does not apply to the average wealth of society ; and that there is more average socially necessary labour time in what Father Day calls “artificial” jewelry than in his so-called “real” jewelry is an assertion he should condescend to prove before he claims it as a fact.

Thus it will be seen the priestly champion of capitalism does not in any way touch Marx’s position, whilst his own case is fallacious.

Next Father Day treats with Marx’s theory of the materialist conception of history in a rather humorous fashion, at least, from the Socialist standpoint. He says (p. 139) :

“A further general basis of the Socialist theory, not altogether relinquished, is the material conception of history which Marx had developed from the doctrine of Comte and Herbert Spencer [elsewhere Marx and Spencer are said to have borrowed from Comte. Rather funny that the moralist ideas of Comte should have shaped the materialism of Marx, whilst Spencer’s evolutionary works came out rather too late in the day for the Socialist philosopher to borrow from]. According to this conception, the production and exchange of wealth are held to be the sole determining factors of the evolution of social life and of the growth of the whole of civilisation. Society, laws, politics, morals, and religion, are simply the outgrowth of economic conditions. The doctrine is flagrantly untrue, and clearly has no value except from the standpoint of downright materialism. If man has a purely material being, and is without any spiritual faculty, it might then be claimed that civilization depended on material causes. But granted that man is endowed with spiritual soul, then it at once becomes evident that economic conditions, which are the chance circumstances of barter and exchange, cannot be the ultimate cause of all social development. Religion and moral ideas are an immensely more powerful cause in shaping social development than all the forces of industrial and economic conditions.”

It need hardly be mentioned that this is merely burking the question. Father Day must prove before we grant it that there is a spiritual being. He had a chance of doing that when he quoted our pamphlet “Socialism and Religion” on pages 177-181 of his own book, but he seemed to wish to get out of the conflict.

For us religion has no meaning, except as an instrument used by the master class to keep the workers in ignorance. People living in a savage state, where scientific knowledge is unknown, can be excused for being religious; but to-day, when the forces of nature are so largely understood and controlled by man, and when fresh discoveries are the daily fruits of scientific research, there can be little or no excuse for such ignorance and superstition.

Father Day has the cheek —or the blindness—to attempt to defend the “anarchy of production” as Engels called it, obtaining in the present capitalist mode of production. On page 151 he says :

“Thus workmen and manufacturers offer their services and commodities when and where a rise in wages or prices indicates an understocked market and the chance of a favourable bargain ; and when these circumstances are reversed, they withhold them. Purchasers and employers, on the contrary, look out for an overstocked market in order to obtain for themselves the most favourable terms. By this process of individual choice and effort social supply and demand are automatically determined, whilst at the same time labour and distribution are naturally adjusted and organised.”

How beautiful ! In the first place, can the workers, even combined, withhold their labour force for any great length of time, until the labour market demands a big supply of workers ? We know very well that the workers, possessing practically nothing but their power to labour, must sell this as soon as possible, or else they will perish of starvation.

Again, do the workers always find a master ? We know that through the system of production which Father Day eulogises, there appears after a mad run of production, the crisis. By a system in which each individual producer seeks to get rich as quickly as he can there is produced such an abundance of commodities that a crash occurs. The market is choked with goods and no more are needed ; production ceases and workmen are thrown out idle ; manufacturers who have not enough to tide over the crisis are ruined, and help to swell the ranks of the unemployed. Because warehouses and storerooms are crammed with the things the workers have produced and are in need of, they must go without them.

Capitalism, then, suffers from over-production, and not from under-production, as R. B. Suthers of Tariff Reform “Clarion” fame would have it in criticising Father Day upon this point.

Under Socialism, according to our reverend Father, the people would not have the brains to carry on production. Presumably not, since all the wizards of society, including Catholic priests, would be no more.

From amongst a whole mish-mash of wild assertions occur such glaring errors as the attribution to Arkwright of the spinning jenny invented by Hargreaves ; and in one place Marx is spoken of as a State Socialist, then Engels, the co-worker of Marx, in another place shows the State to be superfluous in a Socialist regime.

The best pages of Father Day’s book are those which refer to our pamphlet “Socialism and Religion,” and to our Declaration of Principles.

When the workers get to understand those principles they will no longer uphold the capitalist system and the horrible conditions of life it means for them ; but by organising themselves “consciously and politically,” they will usher in the Socialist regime, when the workers will come to their own.

L. M.

S.P.G.B. Lecture List For August. (1914)

Party News from the August 1914 issue of the Socialist Standard

Letter: Plainer English (2011)

Letter to the Editors from the August 2011 issue of the Socialist Standard

Plainer English

 

Dear Editors,

 

Thank you for publishing my letter on plain English in the July Socialist Standard. Unfortunately (and also ironically, given the subject-matter), you omitted part of a sentence in the editing/typesetting process, leaving it meaningless. The sentence in question actually read as follows in my original email (the section omitted is highlighted in italics):

 

An “issue” is a bone of contention, but there is certainly no contention (at least among socialists) that a lack of money in the capitalist world is nothing less than a major problem for the vast majority of the population suffering from the affliction.

Martyn Dunmore,

Brussels, Belgium. 

Letter: Closed-minded academics (2011)

Letter to the Editors from the August 2011 issue of the Socialist Standard

Closed-minded academics

Dear Editors,

 

It is infuriating to listen to those sociologists and similar ‘social scientists’, particularly the contributors Professor Laurie Taylor has on his Thinking Allowed programme (BBC Radio 4). These academic circles define the world in a multitude of classes, minutiae of people’s behaviour and so on. They publish books etc on post-communist societies and countries, which reinforce the view that communism has existed. These learned intellectuals stick to the accepted view that communism equals totalitarian state government with central control by a ruling elite. In their lazy thinking that’s it and any advance can only be to liberal democracy or, if they are a little radical, to social democracy.

 

These so-called intellectuals have never bothered to address what is communism/socialism. They don’t seem willing to make the effort to find what Marx and others meant in defining communism/socialism. Because they are part of the intellectual establishment and its output of publications reinforcing stereotypes, they effectively lie or at least mislead about the real meaning. 

 

These people give legitimacy to the view that communism/socialism has existed and is now replaced with a better system. They obfuscate the definition of Marxism on the grounds that we have moved on to the better system of ‘democracy’ but they also misrepresent even this. How do we attack these closed-minded academics and get them to try original thought to their convoluted and erroneous conclusions?

Stuart Gibson, 

Wimborne, Dorset

Letter: Resource database (2011)

Letter to the Editors from the August 2011 issue of the Socialist Standard

Resource database

 

Dear Editors,

 

Congratulations to Stefan on the excellent article, ‘Money – a waste of resources’ (Socialist Standard, July). In my view this is just the sort of empirical approach needed to clinch the argument for socialism, and one that I’ve promoted via www.andycox1953.webs.com.

 

Theory has its place, but let’s face it, more often than not, a theoretical exposition on Marx’s labour theory of value or the class struggle is likely to be met with a snort of derision or a glazed expression. Facts on the other hand have a kind of primacy that demands a considered response. Hence the urgent need for a robust, wide-ranging, and up-to-date database which Socialist Party members and others can access. 

 

A word of caution, however, should be added at this juncture: When constructing a database, one is likely to come across countless factual inconsistencies. Stefan’s source, for example, has it that there are ‘145,000 people working at casinos and other gambling joints (in the US)’. In my webs.com database, I cite a source (‘Economic Impacts of Commercial Casinos and On-Line Gambling’ by Alijani, Braden, Omar and Eweni, 2002 (?)) which produces statistics showing that there were 364,804 commercial casino jobs in the US in 2001 (205,151 in Nevada alone). 

Andy Cox (by email)

Letter: Childish? (2013)

Letter to the Editors from the August 2013 issue of the Socialist Standard

Childish?

Dear Editors

I thought your article Resistanbul in the July Socialist Standard was one of the best, most informative and helpful I have read in a very long time. But did you really have to spoil it on the front cover with a trite and infantile reference to turkeys and stuffing?

Your article was extremely respectful and sensitive to the issues and challenges facing Turkish society and the Turkish people. Your cover was cheap and childish.

Andrew Northall. 

Kettering

Letter: What about overpopulation? (2020)

Letter to the Editors from the August 2020 issue of the Socialist Standard

What about overpopulation?

A reader has asked us about overpopulation, commenting that socialism ‘might be easier with a reduced population’.

It is true that socialism would be a lot easier to implement and operate with less people to provide for. But if wishes were horses, all beggars would ride, as the old saying goes.

The reality is that globally the population is growing and the question is, can it be reduced? The stark answer is no – even if fertility rates were lowered. The number of people in a country continues to rise for years after people stop having children– a phenomenon known as population momentum.

Thus, the projection is that global population will go from approaching 8 billion today to about 11 billion in around year 2100 then plateauing and then finally begin to drop back to about what it is today.

So socialists fully expect and are required to plan for an increased number of people, something that we cannot avoid regardless of any family planning which is already being increasingly adopted without any compulsion by better educated and more empowered women, even in patriarchal dominated cultures.

Our argument is that with rational allocation of resources that should not be a problem and that free access can still be accomplished. We do have the capability of comfortably coping and still create a sustainable steady-state zero-growth economy eventually.

This is not to say that it will not be a critical crisis for capitalism and is in fact another reason why for the sake of humanity it must be done away with.

Along with a population rise we also have the related issues that will arise in the future.

Firstly, the demographic problem of higher numbers of elderly with less adults of working-age to support them. China’s one-child policy resulted in what was called the 1 – 2 – 4 paradox. One active worker supporting retired parents and because of better health prospects his or her grand-parents. Such family support is essential in countries lacking social safety-nets for the old and frail.

We also have the situation of urbanisation and over-crowding in slums and shanty towns of some major cities as the industrialised plantation-type cash-crop farming leads to the end of the small-farmers. (To be exacerbated by climate change in many areas of the world)

And thirdly, we have the nationalist prejudice against the movement and migration of people. We witness this right now. The youth of Africa thwarted by lack of prospects seek opportunities in Europe where there is already a declining work-force that requires an influx of newcomers. But rather than be welcomed, they are being excluded.

Socialists cannot deny these conditions result in suffering and misery for as long as we live under capitalism. But we challenge the view that solutions cannot be achieved with the establishment of a cooperative society. In fact, only socialism can overcome them.

ALJO

Letters: More on Marx (2023)

Letters to the Editors from the August 2023 issue of the Socialist Standard

More on Marx

Dear Editors

As a professional philosopher and a socialist I was interested to read the exchange between Brian Morris and SJW in the June Socialist Standard.

We cannot simply call Marx a philosopher, or indeed an economist or an historian. He made huge contributions to all three disciplines but more importantly he challenged their orthodoxies. He also had other things on his mind, such as fomenting a global revolution.

What shines through in all his work is a commitment to argumentation and evidence rather than just wishful thinking or arm waving. That commitment is echoed in the practice of current Marx commentators known as analytical Marxism (sometimes called by its practitioners non-bullshit Marxism). Whatever their failings politically, they too insist on logic and rigour in contrast to the flashy and obscurantist work of some other currently fashionable commentators.

An excellent example of analytical Marxism is G A Cohen’s book Karl Marx’s Theory of History: A Defence (which I reviewed in the Socialist Standard in August 1979). In it Cohen provided a philosophical underpinning for Marx’s theory and considered what implications this had for when and how revolutionary change might occur.

I am not a card-carrying member of the non-bullshit Marxism group but I used the same analytical methodology in my book Karl Marx our Contemporary: Social Theory for a post-Leninist World (reviewed by Adam Buick in the Socialist Standard for October 1992). In it I argued that the welcome collapse of the East European regimes gave us a chance to assess Marx’s theories in their own right rather than through the distorting lens of Leninism. What emerges from that analysis is that Marx’s theories are remarkably close to the position of the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

Keith Graham 

Even more on Marx

Dear Editors

I thank SJW for his response my letter. Three reflections.

I was surprised to learn that Marx was a postmodern skeptic who repudiated all ‘isms’. I always thought that he (and his friend Engels) expressed and defended philosophical materialism as a metaphysic.

Contrary to SJW’s assertion, I am unable to read other people’s minds. I simply interpreted Marx as a philosophical (dialectical) materialist through a serious study of his life and works extending over fifty years.

I too am a ‘worker’ and have been so since the age of fifteen when I began work in an iron foundry. But this has no relevance at all to an understanding of Marx’s philosophical outlook. Equating philosophical materialism with ‘capitalist interests’ (whatever they may be) is hardly enlightening.

Brian Morris, 

Lewes

Who are the Impossibilists? (1908)

From the August 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is obvious that the revolutionary attitude of the S.P.G.B. is making headway within the ranks of the S.D.P. It is recognised by many members of the latter organisation that the advocacy of reforms is not the work of a Socialist.

The Duty of a Socialist

(in his capacity as propagandist) is to explain briefly and lucidly the position the working class occupy to-day. He must bring the worker to understand that he is a wage slave, compelled by dire necessity to sell his labour-power in return for wages. He must teach the worker to recognise that he belongs to a class who are— and will be—kept in economic bondage until the arrival and institution of the Socialist Republic. This method of propaganda—certainly the correct one—adopted by the S.P.G.B. is growing with such rapidity that the wire-pullers of the S.D.P. can no longer pursue a policy of ignoring methods.

Some time has elapsed since Harry Quelch announced his intention of dealing with “impossibilism,” and of proving the necessity of the advocacy of certain reforms beneficial to the working-class. Behold, now, the long promised article (Justice, June 13/08). The article was a reply to the following letter submitted to “Tattler” :—

“I have also had the following letter handed to me by the Editor :—

“Dear Comrade,—Will you clear up for me the following point—viz., the position of our organisation towards impossibilism ? The controversy between the impossibilists and the S.D.P. I am unable to clear up to my own satisfaction. Socialism teaches that there is an iron law of wages which drags down wages to the level of subsistence. If this is a fact, how can any reform alter the operation of this law ? In other words, is not a poverty-stricken working class a necessity under capitalism ? In reference to unemployment, if unemployment is a necessity of the ruling class, what is the use of appealing to that class for the right to work ? I have heard our comrade Hyndman say that the provision of work for the unemployed would mean the collapse of capitalism. But capitalism being the cause of unemployment, to abolish unemployment is it not necessary to first abolish capitalism ? Dear comrade, if you will solve this problem for me you will earn my gratitude.”

Our organisation is opposed to “impossibilism” because it is impossibilism, and we are Social-Democrats, not impossibilists. The impossibilist position may be summed up as follows: The emancipation of the working-class can only be achieved by the working-class themselves. In order for the working class to achieve its emancipation it is necessary that the workers should be educated, organised and class-conscious. But no reforms of any advantage to the workers are possible under capitalism ; therefore the workers cannot become educated, etc., until they have emancipated themselves; yet they cannot emancipate themselves until they are educated.”

“Tattler’s” summing up of the impossibilist position contains some truth, and we recognise its truth because the italicised passages may be used against the reform-mongering parties like the S.D.P. and the I.L.P., i.e., “We do not preach pure Socialism to the workers because they do not understand it, and they do not understand it because we preach reforms instead,” say these parties.

The argument from our point of view turns upon

What is Meant by Education.

If “Tattler” takes education in its narrowest sense, then the educated class and snobocracy of the universities should be revolutionary to the core. That such is not the case, however, even “Tattler” knows. Does education necessarily mean a knowledge of the higher mathematics, Greek, and chemistry ? No ! Education from the Socialist point of view is a recognition of that class antagonism prevalent in society to-day, and a consciousness that the workers as a class must combine in opposition to the capitalist class and its supporters for the purpose of taking, holding, and controlling the political machine, and subsequently the means of life, in their own interest.

The full recognition of this basic principle of Socialist propaganda and of the uncompromising action necessary to the attainment of the above object is absolutely essential from our point of view, and the moment the individual unit of society recognises this and acts accordingly, he is, from the Socialist view-point, educated.

Unless the workers are educated in this sense all efforts at emancipation will be as futile as those already attempted. And that is why “they cannot emancipate themselves until they are educated.”

The administration of education at present lies in the hands of the capitalist class, who will take care that only those subjects tending to keep the workers in subjection, and to make them

More Efficient Producers

shall be taught. The education in Socialist principles takes place after the worker has had his mind chloriformed by the paid agents of the capitalist class.

But before leaving this we may point out that the S.D.P., whilst believing in the class war, has many prominent members of its organisation who state that, in the struggle for working-class emancipation the workers will be led and guided by members of the middle class. They are, apparently, ignorant of the fact that Socialism will not arrive until the class war has reached its most acute stage. It will then be a struggle between two classes—the working class and the capitalist class. It is difficult to discern where another class comes in.

“Tattler” admits that “as long as capitalism lasts there will be unemployed,” which admission proves the futility and fatuity of approaching the capitalist class for measures of alleviation. Such being the case, it should be the duty of the S.D.P.—instead of advocating the “Right to Work”—to teach the worker that demands a large margin of unemployed in order to keep down wages and the standard of living, and to give an increase in profits. Instead, the S.D.P. have for 25 years marched battalions of unemployed from one end of the country to the other, gulling, defrauding, and deceiving the industrial outcasts by telling them this, that and the other Bill will help them. The S.D.P. know perfectly well that the capitalist class will not, in fact, dare not, tamper with the unemployed problem. That is the rock upon which capitalism rests. Take it away and your whole system is abolished. Do the S.D.P. think the capitalist class are going to interfere, knowingly, with their own interests ?

If remedial measures were of any good, how is it that to-day there are

A Larger Number of Unemployed

than ever. Frederick Engels wrote in 1886 the following : “Meanwhile each succeeding winter brings up afresh the great question ‘what to do with the unemployed ‘; but while the number of the unemployed keep swelling from year to year, there is no answer to that question.” Since that date the number of unemployed has increased. Industrial development and the perfection of machinery grows apace ; with that goes the displacement of human labour arid consequently an increase of the unemployed. Karl Marx states in “Das Capital,” “Along with the constantly diminishing number of the magnates of capital . . . grows the mass of misery, oppression, slavery, degradation, exploitation ; but with this grows the revolt of the working class, a class always increasing in numbers, and disciplined, united, organised by the very mechanism of the process of capitalist production itself.”

Along with the exploitation of the working class grows the increasing intelligence of the workers, who are being organised in order that when the inevitable collapse of the present system takes place, they, the workers, will be competent to deal with the new method and state of society. We, as Socialists, must point out that Socialism is the only hope. That is our aim. That is our sole object. The S.D.P. do not do so, but waste their time deluding the working class into believing that some reforms are good. The “impossibilist” method will not prevent reforms being given by the capitalist class, nor can we avoid accepting reform measures passed by the governing class when it suits their interest to do so. What does matter is the wasting of energies and activities upon the advocacy of reforms, the splitting up of the forces of the workers into opposing factions, each desirous of seeing its own particular pet and paltry palliative pushed persistently and prominently before all others. In these circumstances the workers are necessarily lacking in the one common principle to which all could give allegiance.

The S.D.P. have 48 palliatives down for immediate enactment.

Note the Confusion

existing in that organisation. Harry Quelch’s principle desire is to see a “Citizen Army” in existence. Hyndman says that Payment of Members’ Election Expenses is the most important. Mrs. Bridges Adams and “Comrade” Warwick insist on the agitation for the Feeding of School Children being the first object of S.D.P. propagandists. Some advocate Old Age Pensions at an age when the majority of the workers are dead; others say that an important reform is the Municipalisation of the Pawnshops, while Mr. J. F. Green says the Eight Hour Day is a measure that he “would like to see in the forefront.” We anticipate being told that these are but individual members, but each of them has his own particular coterie of supporters, and further, each, of the reforms advocated by them and their following is on the list of “immediate reforms” wanted by the S.D.P. It must be borne in mind that while these reforms are being advocated Socialism is being neglected and put in the background. If this is not so then reform and Socialism are synonymous terms, according to the S.D.P.

But then “Tattler” again disagrees and says “There are two directions in which reforms at the present moment could materially benefit the worker,” viz., by a reduction of the hours of labour and, the better housing of the poor. With reference to the first of these it must be remembered that the shorter working day generally means a greater intensity of labour during the time the worker is employed, the

Increased Strain

being met by the greater period for recuperation.

Many instances have been cited in the Socialist Standard where a reduction in the hours of labour has led to an increase of unemployed in the particular trade affected. Such increase of production with fewer working hours causes the market to become overstocked owing to the non-effective demand for the commodities produced to excess. During these periods of glutted markets the workers who were employed producing the goods are either placed on short time or cease work until those stocks are depleted.

“Tattler” tells us that it is because the hours of labour devoted to the production of surplus-value are decreased that capitalists always fight against any reduction of the working day. There may be some exceptions to the rule, but very few capitalists revert to a ten hour day after trying one of eight hours. Messrs. Lever Bros., Mather & Platts, Allaij & Co., Brunner Mond, and other firms have not built up their great businesses on a system detrimental to their own interests.

Says “Tattler” (same article) :—

“Granted that a certain proportion of the day’s labour is necessary labour, it is quite clear that the amount of exploitation and of surplus value is in direct proportion to the prolongation of the working day. Thus, given a day of ten hours, four of which represent necessary labour, there are six hours devoted to the production of surplus value. The worker works, then, four hours for himself and six for the capitalist. If the hours are reduced to eight, everything else remaining equal, the worker then only works four hours for the capitalist instead of six. That is certainly a material advantage, and it is quite easy to understand, therefore, the vehemence with which the capitalists always fight against any reduction of the working-day.”

“Everything else remaining equal” Mr. Quelch (or “Tattler,” or the Editor of Justice— they are all the same chap) may have a case. It is precisely because everything else doesn’t remain equal that he has none. It must be recognised that if the workers obtain any

Material Advantage

it can only be taken from the capitalist class, who lose thereby. All statistics in connection with the production of wealth prove conclusively that, in spite of the reduction of the hours of labour, the workers (who produce all the wealth) are becoming poorer and poorer, whilst the idle and luxurious capitalist class get richer. Marx has pointed out that, in connection with the reduction of the hours from 12 to 10 per day, “The denser hour of the 10 hours working-day contains more labour—i.e., expended labour power, than the more porous hour of the 12 hour working day. The product, therefore, of one of the former hours has as much or more value than the product of one and one-fifth of the latter hours. Apart from the increased yield of relative surplus-value through the heightened productiveness of labour, the same mass of value is now produced for the capitalist say by three and one-third hours of surplus labour and six and two thirds of necessary labour, as was previously produced by four hours of surplus labour and eight hours of necessary labour.”

The worthy “Tattler” has manufactured a premis not of fact in order to justify a specious argument. Knock away the premis and the bottom is out of the case. By the “Tattler” method anything can be proven. From the Socialist point of view his position on Housing is also wrong. Houses to-day are erected, not for living in, but for the purpose of making profit. If the habitations in the “garden cities” produce more profit than those in the slums, it is reasonable to assume the gradual disappearance and demolition of Slumdom. The wages in Bournville, Port Sunlight, Ancoats and Whitechapel are in each case determined by the cost of subsistence. The “garden cities” mentioned naturally produce better and more efficient wage slaves than those in the slums.

No matter how we turn, no matter what reform is instituted, there the capitalist class, controlling political power and holding the wires of the administrative machinery, are able to use the same to their own advantage.

“Tattler” then concludes :

“At the same time it must be borne in mind that the tendency is always, not only to keep wages down to the subsistence level, but also to lower the level by reducing the standard of comfort.”

These remarks prove

The Logical Position

of the Socialist Party of Great Britain. Because the tendency is always on the downward grade, notwithstanding the remedial measures advocated by the S.D.P. and other reform organisations, reform is absolutely useless, as it cannot, on “Tattler’s” own admission, prevent the downward grade. It is evident, then, that the education of the working class must proceed on lines identical with the policy of the S.P.G.B. Whatever the party, the workers can only achieve their emancipation on such lines. Socialism itself implies a scientific organisation of industry, and this can only be realised by class-conscious Socialists.

—CONCILIO ET LABORE

Comments and Critiques. (1908)

From the August 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

The article “Who are the Impossibilists?” which appears in another column, deals at length with the statement Mr. Quelch, Editor of Justice, has permitted himself to make recently. I may, however, here be permitted, as the matter is of importance, to supplement that article by a few remarks of my own upon a point that it does not cover.

***

Seldom can Mr. Quelch be drawn into explanations of the S.D.P. attitude upon what he is pleased to call “impossibilism.” He knows too well the danger of that. Consequently, most of his references have been but very ill-natured ebulitions of vinegary vituperation directed against the personal of the S.P.G.B. And as Mr. Quelch is something of an expert in the language of the literary hooligan, he has, doubtless, often had occasion to congratulate himself upon the effectiveness of his efforts in this direction. Readily conceding him pre-eminence in a department we prefer not to enter, we persistently emphasize the unassailable position we occupy as a working-class party, and continually point out how, because they do not occupy our position, the other parties and the individuals composing them have been driven by the pressure of circumstances into taking illogical action with pitiably futile results.

***

However, Mr. Quelch has recently allowed himself to be drawn into something like a serious criticism of “impossibilism,” and has again demonstrated, not only the folly of his own party’s attitude, but the extent to which he is obliged to follow the line of suppresis veri, suggestis falsi in his endeavours to bolster his own case. Possibly his apology for an argument will have the effect of impressing a few, but it is certain that the man or woman who has taken the trouble to analyse the statement will at once perceive that it is a rather clumsy attempt to mislead. Take the paragraph which follows and dissect it with me.

***

That is from Justice for June 13th, and the italics are Mr. Quelch’s own.

[“Our organisation is opposed to “impossibilism” because it is impossibilism, and we are Social-Democrats, not impossibilists. The impossibilist position may be summed up as follows: The emancipation of the working class can only be achieved by the working class themselves. In order for the working class to achieve its emancipation it is necessary that the workers should be educated, organised and class-conscious. But no reforms of any advantage to the workers are possible under capitalism ; therefore the workers cannot become educated, etc., until they have emancipated themselves ; yet they cannot emancipate themselves until they are educated.”]

***

Now Mr. Quelch has, quite unintentionally, divided his paragraph into two parts just where I should myself have cut it. A distinct break comes immediately before the italicised portion. Something has been left out there that destroys completely the continuity of the argument. What is that something and why has it been omitted ?

***

The omitted sentence following the words “In order for the working class to achieve its emancipation it is necessary that the workers should be educated, organised, and class conscious,” would read something like this : “The education and organisation of the workers can only come through reforms.” The rest of the paragraph could then follow on coherently.

***

The point Mr. Quelch wishes to emphasise is clear in the words he himself italicises, viz., the contradictory contention of the “impossibilists” that reforms are useless and yet without them the workers cannot become educated. But if he had put in the sentence I claim he should have put in for coherent reasoning, everyone with any knowledge of our position would have seen that he was stating the opposite of the fact in order to justify a conclusion that reflected upon our sense of logic ; in plain, blunt English, that he was lying his way to a conclusion damaging to us. So he drops the essential connecting link from its proper place, and suggests it in his final sentence.

***

The fact is that we have never contended that the education of the workers is effected through palliatives. We have urged, urged strongly, the very reverse, viz., that the effect of palliative mongering must be the utter confusion of the mind of the workers, and to that extent delay their effective organisation. That being so, Mr. Quelch’s argument becomes at once absurd.

***

Among other reasons advanced for the “Daylight Saving Bill” are (1) that it would benefit the physique, general health, and welfare of all classes of the community, and (2) reduce the industrial, commercial, and domestic expenditure on artificial light. From which it appears that if the unemployed rose with the sun their general health would improve. I wonder they have not tried this method of improving their physique, instead of working for wages.

***

The second reason explains why chambers of commerce, borough councils, and railway companies supported the measure. Reduction of industrial, commercial, and domestic expenditure would be to their advantage. The advantages to the workers are not nearly so obvious.

***

Mr. James Billington, vice-president of the Amal. Assn. of Operative Cotton Spinners, speaking at a dinner given to Mr. Thos. Ashton, President, said “Instead of having driven trade out of the country the unions have made the British workman what he is to-day—the best workman on the face of the earth. That even the employers admit. By our existence what have we prevented the employers taking from us? . . . Taken all round the spinners are the best paid body of workmen in the kingdom.”

***

I have before me extracts from the half-yearly reports of 26 cotton-spinning concerns. One each paid a dividend equal to 18½, 11⅔, and 10½ per cent. per annum respectively, 17 paid equal to 10, 1 to 7, 2 to 5 and 1 equal to 4 per cent. per annum. The remaining one paid no dividend.

***

These figures are enough to make any operative spinner proud. Dividends being the proceeds of the robbery of the workers, it looks as if we are to understand from Mr. Billington’s remark that the more the workers are robbed the better for them.

***

“Quartus,” writing in the Manchester Guardian, 2nd July, 1908, gives an example of what a young curate in a working-class district has to contend with in the way of slums, sweating, slack trade, and their attendant evils. “He (the curate) reflects on the little that legislation has effected in removing obvious evils and making it easier to do right.” Recognising this, in our typical case the curate ultimately becomes a vigorous reformer, turns agitator, and perhaps joins the I.L.P. !

***

Our curate then would be in the same sad case as the “Socialist” who, recognising the futility of reform from the working-class standpoint, persists in agitating for them, “because we cannot let the children starve whilst Socialism is coming.” Yet Mr. Quartus does not see he has written anything funny.

***

The Editor of the Christ Church Monthly Visitor, Burton-on-Trent, thinks that the reply of the Socialist Party of Great Britain on the question “Can a Christian be a Socialist?” “will not commend itself to believers in the Lord Jesus Christ.” Ah well! we must take the consequences.

***

A member of the Chorlton-cum-Hardy Socialist Society (affiliated to the I.L.P.), speaking in criticism of the S.P.G.B., said he had no fault to find with our Socialism, it was absolutely correct; so also was the Socialism of his society, the I.L.P., S.D.P., and the Fabian Society. He was working with others to alter the I.L.P. Altering it to what ? Why is he concerned to change that which is “absolutely correct” ? If, as he says, our position, based as it is on a recognition of the class antagonism now prevailing, is correct, the position of the I.L.P., which denies the existence of the class struggle, is wrong. If our argument as to the futility of palliatives is sound, then the S.D.P. policy of reform propaganda is unsound.

***

“Economist,” in The Grocer (4.7.08), deals succinctly with the development of the system that has ruthlessly crushed out the little shopkeeper and established the large capitalist and the trustified form of production and distribution on top. If the writer is not a member of the S.P.G.B. he ought to be.

***

For the quarter ending March 31st the directors of Brunner Mond & Co. declared a dividend at the rate of 30 per cent. for the year on ordinary shares, and 7 per cent. on preference shares. £100,000 was placed to reserve fund, £2,500 to the writing off of the patent account, and £35,000 was carried forward !

***

Small wonder that the Brunners and Monds are such enthusiastic supporters of the eight hours day.

***

“The arrangements for the International Peace Congress, which opens in London on Sunday, July 26, are nearly completed. The President of the Congress is Lord Courtney of Penwith, and the Hon. Treasurer Lord Avebury. A special fund is being raised in connection with the Congress, among the latest donors to which is Mr. Andrew Carnegie, who has given the sum of £100. A meeting for adults will take place in Queen’s Hall on July 28, the speakers being Lord Courtney, Mr. Lloyd-George, Mr. J. Ramsay MacDonald, M.P., and Dr. Clifford. The United Labour Peace Demonstration in Trafalgar Square, fixed for the last day of the Congress, Saturday, August 1, is being officially supported by the following important bodies :—The Trade Unions Congress Parliamentary Committee, the London Trades Council, the Metropolitan Radical Federation, the Labour Party, the Social Democratic Party, the Independent Labour Part, and the General Federation of Trade Unions.”—Manchester Guardian, 2.7.08.

***

A notable combination. “Which way blows tie wind ? ”

Getting Socialism. (1908)

From the August 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

There is much misunderstanding as to the meaning of the phrase “The coming Social Revolution” as used by Socialists. Many inquiring workers, befogged by the teaching of the I.L.P. and of other reforming bodies, complain that they cannot conceive of a comparatively sudden or “catastrophic” change carrying society from Capitalism into Socialism. Hence, it seems, some of the attempted justification of a “palliative” program—a means of sliding into Socialism while the masters are not looking, you know. (Socialism to come upon us “as a thief in the night,” was Mr. Keir Hardie’s felicitous phrase, I believe.)

This misunderstanding would appear to arise largely from an over-consumption of Blatchfordian “rational Socialism,” and of “Looking Backward”-”News from Nowhere” Utopianism —though these, perhaps, are the least noxious of I.L.P. teachings. Certainly, to wake up one morning in Capitalism, do a barricade “turn” and go to sleep that night in Morris’s blissful “Nowhere” is not what the Socialist means by “the coming Social Revolution.”

Say Marx and Engels in the “Communist Manifesto,”

“The first step in the revolution by the working class is to raise the proletariat to the position of a ruling class, to win the battle of democracy.

“The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organised as a ruling class (italics mine); and to increase the total of productive forces as rapidly as possible.

“Of course in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production ; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production.”

Also in recent years Kautsky has said in his work “The Social Revolution” :

“It is therefore, the conquest of the powers of State by a hitherto oppressed class—in other words, the political revolution, which is an essential characteristic of the social revolution in its narrower sense, as opposed to social reform.”

Now to “raise the proletariat to the position of a ruling class”—”the conquest of the powers of State,” is conceivable.

That by dint of economic pressure and of Socialist propaganda and organisation the workers can vote themselves into “the position of a ruling class,” is conceivable.

That, given an organised, prepared, Socialist proletariat become the ruling class, its delegates can proceed to the enactment of transition measures (necessarily temporary) which in the aggregate will knock from under class-divided society its basis—private ownership and control of the means and instruments of production and distribution, thus causing the disappearance of classes, is, we hold, conceivable.

Given the common ownership and control of the means of production, the consequent disappearance of classes, dominant and subject, and the time necessary to get things working smoothly, and Socialism (Industrial Democracy; the Co-operative Commonwealth) is here: the Revolution is accomplished.

Now how about the other alleged practical and “common-sense” method described by Keir Hardie and Co.? Is it conceivable that the workers’ emancipation can be gained by an accumulation of reforms? Let us see.

Noisily trumpeted, apparently palliative reforms are at present dispensed—old age pensions on the cheap and devil-take-the-weak-and-old workmen’s compensation—and are pointed to as proof of the triumphant policy of our I.L.P., S.D.P., etc., etc. reformers. But we point out that a million such reforms, with a little municipalisation and nationalisation of capital thrown in, will still leave the workers poor, subject to competition and unemployment—still a subject class. The bridge that can alone span the chasm between Capitalism and Socialism remains as ever—the acquisition of the control of industry by the working class.

Now the present controllers of industry are certainly not less aware of this fact than are the Socialists ; and since they find domination sweet, and since history records not an instance of a dominant class voluntarily and of sweet reasonableness abdicating its controlling position, it follows that our capitalist masters will defend their control of the means and instruments of production by every device at their command, from reform dispensing to massacre. Long established privilege is not to be so easily abolished. Certainly, that our masters will kindly vote us, and hand over, one after another, the different industries, thus committing suicide as a class, is not conceivable.

The advocacy of reforms is mischievous because it does not prepare the workers for the tremendous task of beating the master class out of power, but rather teaches them to look to the masters for crumbs and, on Keir Hardie lines, for the piecemeal concession of Socialism.

No ! we cannot reform into Socialism because the capitalist class will not abolish itself, while if we gain the power to take reforms we should indeed be foolish to halt on the road and try patching up capitalism. Our clear duty would be to expropriate the capitalist class and re-organise production and distribution as the common interest dictates. That is to say, establish Socialism.

J. H. Halls

The Only Way for Clerks. (1908)

From the August 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Word to the National Union.

.

Mr. Herbert H. Elvin is a hard-shelled Baptist—or so it would seem from his biographical notes, which appear (with portrait) in the March issue of The Clerk. He is also the General Secretary of the National Union of Clerks. In the capacity of Baptist he is after souls, and is still, we learn, “in great demand as a local preacher.” As the secretary of the N.U.C. he is concerned with the salvation of bodies. In both departments his methods are the same. He builds temples to Ignorance and invites the unregenerate to come in and worship in order that they may be saved. His success as a Baptist church-builder may be unquestionable—I neither know nor care. But we of the S.P.G.B. are concerned with the measure of his success in the politico-economic sphere—meaning by success in this connection, the extent to which he may be able to induce clerical workers to regard his economic and political temple as a sanctuary from the deep damnation of their servitude.

Clerks have generally been regarded, not without reason, as amongst

THE MOST DESPERATE OF ALL THE DULLARDS

of the working class. The pathetic intensity of their passion for respectability, and the affectation of aloofness from the “corduroy brigade” which, as members of a “profession,” they have, in the past particularly, displayed, have made their organisation a distinctly difficult task. Not even such an eminently respectable society as the N.U.C. seems to be, could have inspired in them any other than a feeling of lofty disdain had it not been that the operations of a highly organised capitalist system, ruthless in its working, and certainly entirely regardless of any suppositious differences between owners of stovepipe hats and smokers of the black cutty, have crushed the clerk into some sort of recognition of the fact that, in common with all other working-class members, he is no more than a commodity in the labour market—and a very redundant commodity at that. Having, however, reached the point where he is beginning to see that his interests are, after all, bound up with those of the horny-handed sons of labour, it is of all things undesirable that he should have his devolopment warped by being put upon a polltico-economic dietry which, while it may be good enough for the sustenance of crustacean Baptists, is absolutely starvation fare for a healthy member of the working class.

Of course, Mr. Elvin cannot help being merely silly in the position of advisor to the clerks,

HIS BIBLICAL EXEMPLARS

and his contemporary religious mentors are hardly likely to guide him in the path that is economically right; and when a young man has been brought up to regard these as the embodiment of all the virtues, it is not surprising if he gives off “views” that are only notable for their, shall we say, absurdity. I sympathise with him in his unhappy position, but I must, all the same, baste his precious views. This one, for an example—

“We should not allow our branches to become mere debating societies to discuss the good and the ill of Toryism, Liberalism, Socialism, or any other ism outside trade unionism. To effect any great reform in the condition of the clerk we must first of all weld all clerks into a powerful organisation, and, knowing what I do of the temperament of the clerk, I am fully satisfied that we shall never be able to accomplish this if members try to bring the Union under the control of some political party, rather than work disinterestedly for the benefit of clerks as a whole.”

Now I will defy Ramsay MacDonald, Robert Blatchford, Bruce Glasier, or any other accepted exponent of the art, to crowd more undiluted piffle into so small a compass. Toryism, Liberalism, and Socialism are taboo in the Union. The clerks are to regard Socialism as on a par with Toryism and Liberalism so far as the realisation of their “great reform” is concerned. It is of no consequence that Liberalism and Toryism are the political expressions of the interests of the master class against which the clerks are to organise themselves. It is of no account that these masters are in politics simply in order to maintain their economic supremacy and the continued enslavement of the clerk. It does not matter that the Socialist Party stands in irreconcilable antagonism to the capitalist parties and is the only party through which the clerks and other workers may achieve any material improvement in their conditions. This is outside the purview of the trade-unionised clerk. He may come in, be he Tory or Liberal or nothing. He is to

KEEP MUM UPON EVERYTHING

except the increase of the strength of the trade union, the payment of his dues, and other matters appertaining to the union, until there is a sufficient body “organised” to warrant a move being made toward that “great reform” and then—well, we will make a move !

I wonder whether Mr. Elvin has any definite notion of what that move must be toward, and how the N.U.C. is to proceed. I understand he does not favour strikes. He is opposed to discussion that may have the effect of opening the eyes of the politically blind. Does he, then, hope to peacefully persuade the masters to concede the “great reform”—whatever that may be ? Surely even a Baptist is sufficiently awake to know the futility of that hope. How then ?

Mr. Elvin seems to see, rather mistily, that he is up against a dead wall. And he takes refuge in “pothry.” It’s an old dodge, and rather a favourite with those who are faced at the end of their argumentative tether with an irrepressible note of interrogation. Mr. Elvin’s refuge is Whittier, who exhorts the reader thus—

Perish party, perish clan,

Strike together while ye can.

and finishes

Let your hearts together be

  As the heart of one.

which is all doubtless very nice and inspiriting, but doesn’t get us much “forrarder,” seeing that we don’t know yet what we are to strike at, or how we are to strike. We cannot strike economically because strikes are taboo. We cannot hope to induce the masters to give us our “great reform.” Much more powerful organisations of much more highly skilled workers, e.g., the engineers, have failed dismally in that direction. And we cannot strike politically because, being at

POLITICAL SIXES AND SEVENS

(owing, in part, probably, to political discussion being barred in the Union) we cannot “strike together” as exhorted by the poet. On the whole it would seem easier to “Let our hearts together beat as the heart of one” !

But to do Mr. Elvin justice, he is not quite done yet. He seems to be, although he does not say so directly, in favour of the move toward the “great reform” being made if all else fails, through the medium of the Labour Party. After all the “no politics in the Union” ukase, this seems to be a little confusing. Therefore Mr. Elvin hastens to assure us that the Labour Party is not a political party “in the general usage of the term.” It is only a party taking political action. If that also is not clear perhaps this will be. “It” (the Labour Party) “is a conglomeration of the political parties. It is a union of those who are divided on questions like Home Rule, Education (sectarian or secular), Disestablishment of the Church; but are of one mind on matters affecting the interests of the workers.”

Accept this for the fact it is not. Apparently Mr. Elvin believes that political parties “in the general usage of the term,” are only concerned with questions like Home Rule, Disestablishment, etc. He doesn’t seem to have an inkling of the truth that just as (according to him) the Labour Party is of one mind on matters affecting the interests of the workers, so the other parties are of one mind on matters affecting the interests of the capitalists. If the Labour Party was of one mind on questions of real working-class interest, if it was a political party “in the general usage of the term,” it would not be the conglomeration of pettifogging palliative-mongers purveying preposterous pills for economic earthquakes that it is. It is as hopeless as the poet, as futile as Mr. Elvin’s creed. It cannot effect any material improvement in the position of the working class.

But even if it could, how is it possible to secure the adhesion of Liberal and Tory clerks in the N.U.C. to the Labour Party if discussion of party politics is not allowed ? To talk as Mr. Elvin talks about the difference between politics and party politics is simply more piffle. Political questions are broadly associated with political parties. Essential working-class politics are the politics of the party that is in irreconcilable opposition to the political parties of the capitalist class. That working-class party is not the Labour Party. It is the Socialist Party. Yet Mr. Elvin puts

SOCIALISM IN THE CART

with Liberalism and Toryism and hauls them all outside his precious Union.

All this “baffle-headedness” and positively paralysing stupidity may come of being a Baptist, or it may not. We of the Socialist Party of Great Britain are not concerned with the Baptist or greatly with Mr. Elvin. But when Mr. Elvin the Baptist, takes up the position of an instructor of the working class and pours out the vials of his drivel upon the heads of those of our class who have in their ignorance elected him to their chieftainship, we step in to show the folly of the position and the disastrous results that must accrue. If Mr. Elvin is honest (and we have no reason for the present for supposing him otherwise), let him reconsider himself and see if he cannot fit himself adequately for the post of working-class advisor—if that is what he desires to be. If, however, his union members prefer to follow his present lead ; if their action is not guided in the future by a clearer apprehension of the position they occupy as clerks in the working-class movement than their secretary seems to possess, they are in for some extremely painful experiences. But if they will take every opportunity of discussing the political situation in the light of the information the Socialist has; if they will study Socialism and let their actions be guided by Socialist science, they will go out to the fight—it will be a fight, sure enough—with no delusions about the capitulation of the opposing forces, with no misapprehensions on the score of the advantages to be derived from this or that big or little reform. They will know that there is no reform worth much more than a tinker’s anathema from the working-class point of view. They will know that the only thing worth organising for, striving for, if needs be, dying for, is the control of the means by which they live. Without this control they have no voice in the disposal of the product of labour. They are slaves without the security that the chattel slave possessed. Their position is always precarious, always one of unhappy struggle ; a position which is not, nor can be, altered in any single important aspect by any reform whatever. But given ownership and control of the means of living, and they have the guarantee of all the material things of life.

THE SLAVE HAS CEASED ;

the master of slaves has ceased. One hundred per cent. of the produce goes to the producer. The struggle for bread is done.

How may this control be secured ? Through organisation on class-conscious lines in the workshop and office and factory ; and in the political party (in the common usage of that term) that is out specifically to wrest political power from the representatives of the capitalist class in the legislature, in order that control of the machinery of production may be secured by the working class without danger of being blown to the Baptists’ devil by the armed forces, which are, of course, under the direction of the dominant power in Parliament.

The Socialist economic organisation has yet to be evolved. But the political party that answers all requirements, the Socialist Party of Great Britain, is here. The Socialist Party is the political party that the stupidity of Mr. Elvin places outside the union in company with the Liberal and Tory Parties, yet it is none the less the party the clerical workers must join sooner or later. Therefore it behoves them to treat as cavalierly as they think fit their secretarial exhortation, and discuss political action—party politics—to the top of their bent, particularly the politics of the Socialist Party.

If they require further information or literature a line to the office of the Party will bring it. Or if Mr. Elvin would like to defend his position or attack ours, we will give him all the rope he wants. And if the worst happens, his blood be on his own head !

Alegra.