New Party Pamphlet: War and the Working Class (1936)

Party Notice from the November 1936 issue of the Socialist Standard 

Do you know why modern wars occur?

Do you know what is the Socialist attitude towards war?

Do you know that the S.P.G.B. was the only political organisation in Great Britain which proclaimed its Socialist opposition to the Great War immediately it broke out and kept to that attitude throughout the War?

Do you know what attitude you as a worker should take up towards war?

For answers to these and other questions read

"WAR AND THE WORKING CLASS” .

36 pages, 2d. Post free 2½d.

Blogger's Note:

The text of this pamphlet is available on the SPGB website.

Reproduced below is the preface from that pamphlet.

War and the Working Class

The Socialist Party States the Case

Preface

The Socialist Party of Great Britain, like a voice crying in the wilderness, has always maintained that capitalism and war are inseparable.

There can be no capitalism without conflicts of economic interest. From these arise the national rivalries and hatreds, the fears and armaments which may at any time provoke war on a terrifying scale. Most people do not take the Socialist view. Even when faced with the Great World War of 1914-18 human hopefulness everywhere refused to accept what appeared to be a doctrine of despair. To say that capitalism must produce tense international situations from which war may burst at any crisis seemed like the passive acceptance of a series of wars, each more horrible than the last. So in the midst of the last Great War the peoples of all lands cherished a belief in a new world freed from fear and from war. It was left to the S.P.G.B., in its official organ, the Socialist Standard, in November, 1914, to insist on the bitter truth: “… the facts point irresistibly to further great wars. They indicate that no sooner will the present struggle have ceased than diplomats will be at work forming new alliances, and the Krupps and Armstrongs busy evolving fresh ‘surprises’ and mightier means of war. . .”

Nobody will now deny that the world is as ripe for war as in 1914. The diminishing number of those who can believe in the League of Nations since the Abyssinian fiasco carry on a disheartened struggle. The Conservatively-minded preach armaments and still more armaments, “to ensure peace and security”, while those who claim to stand for progress can think of no solution more hopeful than to restore Colonies to German capitalism – in other words to return to the state of affairs out of which the last war arose!

Only the Socialist can look realities in the face and not give way to despair. Our message is one of hope—of coming triumph. You have the choice of roads, a choice which all humanity must make. The one road is the road of blood and tears, of capitalism and war. The other is the road to Socialism. Only by ending the exploitation of man by man can we strike at the roots of war.

Executive Committee, S.P.G.B. August. 1936.

Editorial: Ourselves and the War Office. (1916)

Editorial from the November 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

The old saying regarding the effects of a guilty conscience had as much truth in it as most old sayings. Those men, however, who are not troubled by anything in the shape of a conscience for their guilt to register itself upon, who have, to find another way of putting it, no scruples in the matter of their actions, are usually the most arrant cowards of all. And thereby hangs a tale.

When those in authority over us determined that no newspapers or books should be sent out of the country without the permission of the War Office, we made application for permission to mail this journal to the Colonies and neutral countries. We have now been favoured with a reply the tenor of which is that the War Office has been compelled to stop our organ on some occasions in the past for the reason that a portion of its contents might be used by the enemy powers for “their propaganda.” And we are further informed that in consequence of this instructions have been issued to stop in future all copies of THE SOCIALIST STANDARD urn addressed to places outside the United Kingdom.

It will be remembered that the reason given for the regulation at the time it was made was to guard against information having military value being conveyed to the “enemy” by tampering with the printed matter. But does the War Office prohibit us on this ground ? Do the military even pretend that any information may reach the “enemy” by the printed matter in our paper being tampered with ? No ! They state dearly that it is the printed matter itself for which we are barred. In other words, it is our opinions which they cannot stand, and which inspires them to this new violation of the “freedom of the Press.”

But as a matter of fact, even the alleged ground for denying us expression is without foundation in truth. Nothing that we publish can be used by our masters’ enemies without being stripped from its context, for the simple reason that our criticism applies with just as much force to German and Austrian capitalists as to British. Our internationalism is so real a thing that we refuse to set national bounds even to our enemies. Not British capitalists or German capitalists are the foe, but Capitalism and the capitalist class of the world. Hence it is not British capitalists or German capitalists we attack, even when we individualize, but Capitalism—the system—and the world-class who must be vanquished before the system can fall.

But there is a further point. No longer, it appears, are our issues to be judged on their merits—they are condemned beforehand. It has been found necessary, we are informed, to stop some issues of our journal, therefore the Censor need not trouble about us any further. How well the courage of the authorities in the present case illumes their cowardice in face of the powerful but vile Harmsworth group of yellow-Press rags in the earlier months of the war !

Detestable years. (1916)

From the November 1916 issue of the Socialist Standard

Earth is sick

And heaven is weary of the hollow words

Which states and kingdoms utter when they talk

Of truth and justice.

—Wordsworth.

The rough, black years tower over the nations and no man can escape their might. Whatever our work or inclinations we cannot be free of the net of this war. The old man shut in his house is caught in the mesh, just as the young man who battles for a noble cause in public. Old occupations are away, old impulses are put to sleep, old schemes, wishes are battered and injured ; good sentiments are rare and broken. Malice, fraud, cruelty and ambition are feeding fat, while misery follows misery close as thunder clouds when there’s rain and lightning,

Yet it seemed as though the transition from quietness to bloodiness was only a matter of hours. It seemed scarcely an hour before this shadow fell on Europe that the lands were sparkling with new hopes : from end to end of this kingdom the workers listened in contentment to the sweetness of the parliamentarians, to the masses of clerics, and to the sovereign officials of trade unions. For there had come a leader among men, one above all, one with a gentle, sorrow-sodden heart in which he kept ancestral Celtic fire. I have heard that he was a Welshman. We were told that every fibre of his body thrilled with the misery of the poor, whose mourning was as an everlasting dirge in his sympathetic ear ; we learned that a sweeter heart, more in unison with the poor, never beat in old England. Over the land there was hope, and, despite the fact that his Celtic wit looked stale and cold in print, that acres of corn were too largely introduced into his speeches, that there was a superabundance of stars and too many unnecessary rainbows in his answers to questions, he must be given credit for a most astonishing thing. It is this. Although on the introduction of his Health Insurance Bill the vast bulk of the heavenly angels were indifferent to it, he did manage to interest in his proposals one Angel of Light with a less stern heart than his or his companions in Paradise. Forthwith this celestial spirit, on the invitation of the Cabinet Minister, arrived on a sudden at Kings X, incognito, and was about to start on a tour of the slums, when the world shook in the fever of war and the traffic in metals and men started. Ever since the election of the Liberals we had awaited the coming of this luminous visitor, so it was a pity that, when the diplomats let slip the dogs of war and the clownish thwacking of the drums commenced, the burning guest should spend the night, among old friends, in a rent-collector’s office. The angel’s host, the gentle Welshman, has become War Minister.

The war seemed to happen in a moment of noble indignation against the crimes of Germany. It seemed so, yet it was not so. Long before the war’s outbreak stealthy preparations were being made for the carrying on of the war with Competitor Germany. The first thing to be done was to inspire the people with confidence in the politicians. So certain gentry were boomed and praised in all ways so they might use their inflated prestige, on behalf of the masters, during any crisis. Principally through the means of sneaking newspapers virtuous reputations were gained, and are at this moment proving of value to the capitalists. It would seem that so long as a man is a reactionary with influence it does not matter what his other characteristics are. If he is ignorant then he is named sound and democratic ; witness Will Thorne. If he is cruel and unflinching then he is praised as unbending in the people’s cause ; witness Kitchener. If he is a chatterer then he is an orator ; witness the Welshman. If he is silent then it is the quietness of strength ; witness the Prime Minister. With several newspapers at his back, with a thousand lies ready at hand, the most foggy idiot, the worst shivering coward may gain a reputation for soberness, dignity, wisdom, truth, and courage.

The virtues of the hierarchy having been, planted, nourished, and a false impression of them established in the minds of the people, the politicians could turn their attention to other items of preparation. Before this war the Socialist enlightened the workers as to the worst which capitalism can do. It was not the worst to deal you out shillings from the pounds you earned, or to defraud you in the workshop or domineer over you there, or to tire your body, or to exhaust your brain. The level of life was bad but the level of life was not the worst. While you took your shillings contentedly, and derided the Socialist for fighting phantoms of evil of his own creation, other forces were sleeplessly and silently working towards this volcanic carnage on the Continent. Middling folk with power were forming treaty on treaty which have now contributed to this wreck of the nations, this modern mockery of civilisation. The worst Russians were unearthed to do vile business abroad, the most sugary Japanese too. Greedy eyes were wandering over the mines of the world : they were listed in secret catalogues. Constantinople has been secretly valued ; the riches of Morocco have been estimated ; Albania and Montenegro figure in the hidden sheets ; the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine are totalled in the chronicles ; Finland and Persia have wealth which cannot be overlooked by the avaricious. There are diamonds here, salt there, mines elsewhere. Ports, coasts, mountains, rivers and valleys of value to the masters of one land are exploited, guarded, and locked by the ships and guns of alien authorities. All the lands concerned in this war were filled with growth and rush, avarice, hate, and rotting commodities. That is the natural result of the principles of competition in modern societies, and they are the reasons for the present clash of arms. All this chatter of liberty and honour, of which we are sick, is like fat wrapped over the old skeleton of profit.

Each of the fighting nations prepared for the inevitable conflict by a combination of forces similar to that of England’s. Each erected barriers of soldiers and floated nets of ships, and in each country the workers have been cunningly engulfed to effect an interchange of vineyards and mines, cities and seas, which will in no way change their condition of wage slavery.

These then were the martial circumstances and commercial facts with which the war opened. During the early days of the campaign we might have expected that the avarice of the masters would have been redeemed by some show of skill, and their scoundrelism equalled by their judgment. It was not so. They were bigoted in their ideas and stuck to their hum-drum, traditions. In the more noble occupations of life men of genius are not trammelled by tradition. Shakespeare disregarded almost all the laws of Athenian Drama and sang his own mighty plays to perfection. In France, rough Francois Millet was unworried by any remembrance of the smooth Italian Primitives. Walt Whitman was not troubled in his mind over the metres of the past poets. Neither is the Socialist to-day deceived by the conclusions of Ricardo, or Mill, or Ruskin. In all such work vast ideas, find new vast expression. It is always so with true genius. It has not been so with the main men in this war, for they have not even the evil spark of military genius, but are prompted, solely by ambition, which mimics talent and is separable from it. Their strategy has been as befogged as their motives are villainous. It is sufficient for such contemptible folk that the Sea of Mamora is held by the opposition forces, that its waters lead to the rich markets of Constantinople, in order to send hostile vessels into it. The peaks and dells of Gallipoli are similarly owned so they must be scaled and stormed. Every effort where prudence was needed has been marked by stupidity ; every hostility where, from their point of view, vigour was required has been marked by idleness and waste.

None of our eyes are closed to the terrible things around us and yet we remain hopeful. We proceed with our work and hope in it. The masters may imprison and murder our comrades but they can never destroy our principles ; for the principles of Socialism are not the fruit of our lives but are the fruit of those forces of capitalism to which they are eternally opposed. No matter how many of our comrades are shot, no matter how many Welshmen speak, no matter how many wars are waged, our principles remain indestructible. For the Socialist at least, then, despair does not exist apart from hope ; though suffering is here it is not separated from joy. For the Socialist there is one hope, one joy, and one annihilation. None of us will suffer a miserable death till our immortal principles are dragged to an impossible grave. Meanwhile we look with hope and joy to the time when the workers will acknowledge and establish the principles of Socialism ; to the time when nation on nation will be rescued from the littleness of nationalism ; to the time when manliness, womanliness and brotherhood will develop and this painful wilderness of war, of cold faiths, and watery charities be destroyed. Then every waggon which knits the hamlets together will carry other messages than those of sadness ; every centre of throbbing looms, every acre of corn, every accumulation of houses, will help in our fight against cold and hunger. We shall be free of the profiteers, so every ship which sails will elsewhere deliver happiness, while each new ship which visits us will deepen our wealth. These, then, are some of the beauties and benefits of international co-operation, upon which we look and know well. Yet the deeper we penetrate into our philosophy the more the loveliness of our prospect increases. What we know of Socialism is worthy of our life-long devotion, but depending from such principles of Liberty must be great comradeship and calm which we know not of, of which we may sit and dream, and before which the visions of Bunyan seem garish and Milton’s golden dreams grow pale.

H. M. M.

By The Way. (1917)

The By The Way Column from the November 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

Recently we were informed that a “soldier’s wife gets £400 a year” made up by army allowances, working on munitions, and some of her children also going out to work. The sequel of the case was that the woman was summoned for the non-attendance of her boy at school. In fining the mother £1 the Mayor remarked : “£8 a week ! £400 a year ! It sounds like a fairy tale from the ‘Arabian Nights.’ “—”Daily Telegraph,” 13.9.1917.

No mention is made in the report as to whether the learned gentleman passed any criticism on the state of society which tolerates the employment of children (in this case a boy of 13 years of age) on munition work when they ought to be at school. The condemnation being reserved only for the mother. Such are the methods of those who rule over us.

During the past three years great prominence has been given to a few cases where members of the working class have been the recipients of increased money wages. So extraordinary is it for those who toil and spin to be able to count their fabulous income by the hundred pound per annum method that our capitalist masters and their henchmen are screaming themselves into hysterics. Members of Parliament may receive anything from £400 to £5,000 per annum, others may be appointed insurance commisiioners with correspondingly high salaries and emoluments, and such things pass unnoticed. But when the merry wage-slave gets an increase in his or her salary as a result of capitalist anarchy, then it is a fit subject for our “superiors” to wax eloquent on.

* * *

Three years and three months of what our masters are pleased to call the “war of liberation” have rolled by. And the time is fast approaching when the priest and his satellites will be chanting their hymns of praise to the “Prince of Peace” the while they urge their fellow humans on to the slaughter of each other! After all this time further signs are not wanting to confirm the correctness of our Manifesto issued in the early days of the war. Many stood aghast after reading our pronouncement, but at long last we are coming into our own. Those who then differed from us are having the scales removed from their eyes, and are beginning to see the position from a different view-point, which corresponds more nearly with our own.

Concerning the class to which we belong and the sacrifices that class has been called upon to make, another interesting admission recently saw the light of day in a weekly newspaper. Dealing with the Representation of the People Bill much adulation was being dispensed to the hard-working (and long-suffering) men and women who compose the bulk of the inhabitants of this isle. Then occurs the following notable passage :

“Such a measure of this kind could never have been passed by any Parliament in the days when Peace presided over the land. But there has been given to us all a new perspective of national things. The great burden of this vast war has fallen on the common people, who have had to make the highest efforts and to sorrow under the heaviest sacrifices. It is only in the hour of supreme danger that large numbers of the comfortable classes have learned how little relatively they have borne of the labours necessary towards victory in the bloody conflict on which the future of our Empire depends.”—”Reynolds’s,” Oct. 21st, 1917.

We have said similar things ourselves over and over again.

* * *

Turning to another phase of the same article one reads that “In every land the labouring man and the labouring woman have had the value of their efforts recognised at long last ;” and “the foundations are being laid for the political edifice of the future.” Passing on we observe that “so far all our electoral law has been so full of obstacles both to voters without property and candidates without wealth that numberless constituencies were safely set down as the preserves of the rich and the influential.” Having thus been taken to Pisgah’s heights we view the promised land, for the writer informs his readers that: “The new Bill changes all—or nearly all—this state of things. For the first time, the Democracy will be able to determine the course of legislation in this country in full degree, if it wants to do so.” Then follows a very significant observation, and one which we have had occasion to refer to in the past. It continues ;

“If it wants to do so. There, indeed, lies the pith of the whole matter. A people without vision, that does not know what it wants, can always be tricked by political charlatans, and set in conflict over petty things, while the graver issues are settled over its head.”

All this on the part of our contemporary is “much ado about nothing” and avails us little. Before the war the working class had all the essentials ready to hand. The one thing lacking was Socialist education. Given an understanding of the conflict of interest between capitalist and labourer, the class struggle and its necessary culmination, they could not be “tricked by political charlatans” nor “set in conflict over petty things.” Neither could they be hoodwinked by radical rag-time journals dangling the red-herring of an extended franchise before them.

                                                                            * * *

Reference was recently made to Sir Auckland Geddes’ schemes for using available man-power in the country and the case of the conscientious objector. The concluding portion of the paragraph was as follows :

“One man, engaged before his arrest on income tax and excess profits work, is now making mail-bags in Wormwood Scrubs. I suppose there are scores of similar instances of the eminently intelligent way in which our national labour resources are being husbanded.”—”Daily News,” Oct. i8th, 1917.

Such is the wisdom of our masters’ agents.

* * *

At the beginning of the war, when “voluntary” enlistment was the order of the day, we used to read of young ladies shouting to the men to “join up,” and even going so far as to present white feathers to the men who were in civilian clothes and minus an armlet. To-day we read that —

“Of the 13,000 volunteers 3,460 did not respond to their call to the Selection Board.

An official of the Ministry of Labour suggested to-day that girls should get the conditions of service from an employment exchange and ask the officials all the questions they are anxious about before filling in the form and wasting everybody’s time.

“The numbers of volunteers are not anything like what we need,” said an official to-day, “although the women are coming along steadily. The middle-class girls are still holding back.”

This appears to suggest the question : “Who are the slackers now ? Is it a case of when they are asked to join up they lack the courage, or have gained discretion ?

* * *

One has often wondered why some imperialistic capitalists have gone into hysterics over the utterances of Ramsay MacDonald. More amazing still does it become after reading the following.

“Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, speaking at Loughborough on Saturday night, said they wanted no patched up peace, or peace at any price, which would bring war in ten years. They wanted to remove the causes of war.”—”Daily News,” Oct. 11th, 1917.

Perhaps he will inform us how this result is to be obtained.

The Scout.

[Comments] (1915)

From the September 1915 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our masters could not afford more than five shillings a week as pension for their old and worn-out workers. But they can spend over three million pounds a day to defend their national privileges of exploitation against their fellow capitalists abroad.

——————————-

Apologists of the present order professed to be horrified when Socialists admitted that they were prepared, if necessary, to face bloodshed for the liberation of humanity from the horrors of wage slavery. Yet the master class is now shedding the blood of the workers in floods and for what ?

——————————-

“Are you doing your bit”. ” Join the Socialist Party and do it !

Our war volume. (1915)

From the September 1915 issue of the Socialist Standard

The attention of readers is drawn to the probability that, on account of the number of Party manifestoes on the war it contains, there will be an exceptional demand for the volume of our Party Organ which closed with the last number. Those who desire to obtain the volume should place their orders early.

50 Years Ago: Socialists in Peace and War (1965)

The 50 Years Ago column from the September 1965 issue of the Socialist Standard

(Kautsky and others had argued that while Socialists should oppose the outbreak of war, if war comes they should remain silent. Rosa Luxemburg answered this. The following are extracts from her article).

‘But now “war is a fact” and, as it turns out, after the outbreak of war Socialists are to be guided by entirely new principles . . . In plain language this means: The Proletariat has not one fundamental principle as scientific Socialism hitherto maintained, but two, one for peace and another for war. In time of peace we are to suppose, the workers are to take cognizance of the class struggle within the nation and of international solidarity in relation to other countries; in time of war, on the other hand, class-solidarity becomes the dominant feature of international affairs and the struggle against the workers of other countries dominates the proletarian view of foreign relations. To the great historic appeal of the Communist Manifesto is added an important amendment, and it reads now, according to Kautsky’s revision: “Workers of all lands unite in peace and cut one another’s throats in war!” Today Down with the Russians and French!”, tomorrow, “We are brothers all!”

‘This convenient theory introduces an entirely novel revision of the economic interpretation of history. Proletarian tactics before the outbreak of war and after must be based upon exactly opposite principles. This presupposes that social conditions, the basis of our tactics, are fundamentally different in war from what they are in peace. According to the economic interpretation of history as Marx established it, all history is the history of class struggles. According to Kautsky’s revision we must add: except in times of war.’

[From the article, 'The Rebuilding of the International', Socialist Standard, September, 1915.]

Artists and and “Fighting Age”. A Socialist’s Comments. (1917)

From the September 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

“Many of the artists, like Mr. Edgar Bundy, Mr. A. T. Nowell, Mr. J. R. K. Duff, and Mr. Wynne Apperley, continue their work as though they had never heard of the war which is now raging. If an artist is not of the fighting age it is difficult to suggest anything better for him to do.”—A. J. Finberg in “The Star.”

The above gem of reflection has been carefully preserved ever since it was culled from “The Star” for its unconscious humour and its twisted philosophy. It evoked laughter then, and has since. In an unguarded moment the critic has unwittingly revealed himself, and incidentally, the working of the mind of many others. Let us examine it from the point of view thus expressed, and then from a Socialist’s.

The art critic is evidently rather surprised, and slightly shocked. “What would happen if everyone stayed at home, like you?” (as the hoardings had it) is the question he mentally asks. The artists “continue their work as though they had never heard of the war which is now raging. If an artist is not of the fighting age it is difficult to suggest anything better for him to do.”

Evidently the main idea in Mr. Fineberg’s mind is, “Get on with the War !” If you are an artist of the “fighting age” then GO he would say ; he thinks the paramount purpose is the prosecution of the war. But if you are not of the “fighting age,” Mr. Finberg finds it difficult to suggest to the artists anything better than the pursuit of their art. Ye gods !—it is difficult. A very little frankness goeth a very long way. Let us see the logical effect of this argument.

Evidently, at the present juncture, when central Europe has been turned into a series of vast cemeteries through millions of peaceful workers, having been compelled by their masters to maim and destroy each other, the all-important thing in pro-war people’s minds is the continuance of War ! Like Lloyd George, they want to win the war ! But “there are some more concerned about ending the war than about winning it.” (Lloyd George at Queen’s Hall, Aug. 4, 1917). Yes, there certainly are ; and what is of supreme importance, there are some very much more concerned with preventing future wars by abolishing root and branch the present system that produces them than with winning this one.

The great motto for the workers should be “Let us mind our own business” ! Had the workers of Europe “continued their work” when their masters—the war-creating class—declared war, and told their rulers “To hell with you and your wars: go fight it amongst yourselves” ! then, truly, there would have been no war. It would have been stayed at the onset by “the men who stayed at home.”

Oh for class conscious solidarity of the workers, with the one aim of capturing political power, and with one goal : International Socialism ! Lacking those they have become the dupes and pawns of those who exploit and oppress then. Cajoled, deceived and driven like sheep, they have confused their own interests with their masters’. So Europe finds itself to-day in a sanguinary welter of racial hate and fratricide, with smiling fields turned into a desolate arena by the most hellish warfare the world has ever seen.

The demand for men of “fighting age” has been colossal. The glory of young manhood, its health and vigour, has been incessantly sought by the master class. The peremptory call for men to destroy their capitalist-made enemies has been enormous. All the fine qualities, and abilities to do things worth doing, have been spurned as of no worth: to be a soldier was the all in all. The world will never know what men of talent, of genius, who probably would have contributed their quota in the realms of Art and Literature, Poetry and Science, have, through their masters’ orgy of futile organised slaughter, been crushed and destroyed in the ruthless progress of the “Great War.” It is indeed a tragedy for the individuals and for Humanity also. Militarism is in truth the valet of capitalism ! Everything has been subjugated to the needs of capitalism’s brute force. “No sacrifice,” they told us, was “too great when honour and liberty were at stake.” The “honour” and “liberty” of plutocratic thieves ! Many of the men above “fighting age” have also “done their bit,” for have they not goaded others to go ? Have not some of them sat on Tribunals and “administered” the Military Service Act ?

Where also should we have been if all the art critics had joined up? The artists, free from their attentions would be at a loss, and the Press would find it somewhat difficult to fill its columns with stereotyped art-jargon in their absence, and the art-gallery proprietors would not have their shows boomed quite so much.

To a Socialist it is pleasant to know that certain artists “continue their work as though they had never heard of the war which is now raging.” The spirit of Art and that of the Warrior are frankly antagonistic. One is creative and contemplative ; the other is destructive, and thinks in terms of force. When Socialism becomes the established system of society, then, and not till then, will the workers of the world have abundant opportunity to do the work they wish, and as a “labour of love,” no matter what it be, whether expressing themselves in poetry, prose, or paint, or shaping their dreams of beauty in metal or in the marble of Carrara, or in seeking by scientific research to alleviate human pain. Then war will be a thing of the uncivilised past. Men will work for the World’s Commonwealth. Men of “fighting age” will not be considered from as potential warriors, but will be considered from the view-point of usefulness to humanity !

That is the crux of the position. “Warriors”! is all the cry to-day—”Men, Money and Munitions”! “Men, and yet more men”!—production for ultimate destructive purposes.

All this, workers, is the outcome of this system of producing for private profit. Every thing goes into the melting pot when the capitalists’ interests are at stake. No matter what your abilities are or your skill in any sphere of work, when capital calls you to fight in its own hellish wars you have to respond, and if necessary, make “the supreme sacrifice”—your very life !

Workers, organise class-consciously for the capture of the political machine and the establishment of Socialism to end these things once and for all.

Yours is the power and the ultimate victory ! The emancipation of mankind from the thraldom of the present system of wage slavery will result.

You desire peace ? You wish to abolish warfare? You as a class can alone end it for ever by your concerted efforts: by establishing INTERNATIONAL SOCIALISM under which the means of the world’s wealth-production will be in the hands of and controlled by the Workers of the World, for the benefit of the multitudes of all nations.

G.

Editorial: A Cut at the S.L.P. (1917)

Editorial from the September 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

The criticism of the Socialist Labour Party which appears in the S.P.G.B. Manifesto to the Proposed International Socialist Congress seems to have met with the disapproval of the people criticised. The people criticised try — we were going to write “to hit back,” but this would not be correct: they do not try to hit back, they simply try to parry the blow.

Of course, they cannot be blamed for confining their efforts to such defensive measures. That they can find no opening in our defence is apparently obvious, even to them. They have done their best with the unpromising material to hand, and it amounts to this:

An effusion of cheap sneers, stale witticisms, and the like as a mask to cover their skedaddling from the real issue ; a vague charge (vague in that it is unsupported by any evidence) of “flagrant dishonesty ” ; a ludicrous and lying attempt to explain away an awkward statement which appeared in their official organ ; and finally a display of fireworks on their own behalf which is as amusing as such things usually are.

Regarding the criticism in our Manifesto to the Proposed Socialist Congress, the S.L.P. state in their organ : “For ourselves we can smile at the weak criticism passed on the S.L.P.” And having thus adopted the policy of “grin and bear it, or take it lying down,” they pass on to the lighter task of finding funny names to fit the signature of our correspondent ”B.B.B.” In such easy ways are victories won in the class struggle!

“B.B.B.” quoted in our July issue the following (described by the “Socialist” of August as “an Editorial note”) from Nov. ’14 “Socialist”:

“That there are differences of opinion in the S.L.P. as in other parties, on the question of the war must have been apparent to most readers of “The Socialist.” Last month I tried to show what the different views were, but I have not been able to find out what support each side has, consequently I cannot say definitely what the official attitude of the Party is.”

And this is how the S.L.P. try to explain away that very curious, not to say damaging, statement :

“This note was quite in order; in accordance with our policy of allowing full expression of different opinions in our columns, letters were published urging a pre-war (? pro-war) policy. A discussion took place in our columns on the attitude of Socialism to the war, but the pro-war correspondents were in every case non-members of the S.L.P.

Some individuals, mislead by the correspondence and discussion, accused the S.L.P. of wavering on internationalism ; but later, when the Party Manifesto was issued and the air cleared, it was seen that the whole membership was solidly anti-war.”

That is enough to go on with. We will now proceed to handle the S.L.P. on the matter contained in this quotation.

First of all let it be noted that our opponents cling desperately to the pronouncement our comrade and contributor “B.B.B.” adduced against them. They had not the courage — or should we say indiscretion? — to reprint it, for it would then at once have provided the answer — complete and crushing — to their miserable attempt to defend it. “This note was quite in order” the S.L.P. champion says. Good.

Now what is the explanation ? “A discussion took place in our columns on the attitude of Socialism to the war, but the pro-war correspondents were in every case non-members of the S.L.P.” But the note which is “quite in order” says that it “must have been apparent to most readers of ‘The Socialist'” that “there are differences in the S.L.P. . . .  on the question of the war.” Nothing there about non-members of the S.L.P. That which MUST have been apparent to readers of “The Socialist” (and therefore necessarily from evidence appearing in that paper), was differences inside the S.L.P., concerning the war, not outside it. Who said “flagrant dishonesty” ?

It is true that in the May 1915 issue of “The Socialist” the following delectable passage occurs (“Impressions of the Conference “) :

“Imagine the surprise of all the delegates present when it was found that the Party was absolutely unanimous against the war, and that the two writers who had created the impression that the S.L.P. was a house divided, were not even members of the Party.”

But who were the two writers referred to ? Were they “M.” and Joseph Andrews, who, addressing the Editor as “Comrade,” were permitted to spread themselves over seven columns in the Jan. 1915 issue and five in the previous November number ? Were they these men, who could write such things as “The maintenance of the balance of power on the Continent is Great Britain’s object and it should be the object of all Socialists” (“M”) and “I propose that . . realising that German militarism is now a menace to the very existence of Europe, we support the Allies in their armed resistance” ? (J. Andrews.) But if these were the two non-members referred to, that still leaves unaccounted for the man who wrote the article “Shall If Fight” in the December 1914 issue of “The Socialist,” the man who penned this : “I cannot understand the stand being taken by some Socialists of refusing to kill,” and this : “I do not regard this question as a test of one’s sincerity as a Socialist,” and this : “So long as the other fellow remains armed and sets out to make mince-meat of me I reserve the right to retaliate,” and a lot more leading up to the position that we should fight. We should be pleased to be assured that this writer was a non-member of the Party; we should be hilariously delighted to “imagine the surprise of all the delegates present when it was found that” besides being the vehicle for the conveyance to the workers of the capitalist case and the capitalist pleadings for drenching the world with working-class blood, the official organ of the S.L.P. was edited by one who was “not even” a member of the Party !

We claim that it is a lie that all the pro-war correspondents were non-members of the S.L.P., and if this is not so will the editor of “The Socialist” explain that reference to the differences in the S.L.P. which must have become apparent — who to? — to those who read “The Socialist”?

Mark what the Editor of our contemporary himself says in the August issue concerning the “note” which was “quite in order,” in his vain endeavour to wriggle out of its implications :

“Bold Bad Boy, or Bunkum Balderdash and Blether, or whatever the mysterious initials cover, quotes from an article in the June 1917 “Socialist,” . . . and compares it with an extract from the November 1914 “Socialist,” where an Editorial note calls attention to the differences of opinion on the war expressed in the columns of the “Socialist,” . . . ”  (The italics are ours).

There again our opponents give themselves away. The note itself spoke of differences of opinion in the S.L.P., the Editor’s latest wriggle says that those differences were expressed in the columns of “The Socialist.” Then what becomes of the statement that the pro-war correspondents “were in every case non members of the S.L.P.”? Who said bunkum, balderdash and blether?

“Compare the S.L.P. and the S.P.G.B. in their actions,” says our contemporary. Well, suppose we do. In the first place we freely admit that there have been individuals in our party whose knowledge was not sufficient to keep them sound on the question of the war. We have never claimed that our Declaration of Principles could prevent the entry of undesirable people into our organisation ; but we do claim that when such people reveal themselves, by word or deed, as unfit material for a Socialist organisation, the Declaration of Principles to which they give their signatures on joining is an efficient instrument for dealing with them, and putting them outside. In the few cases where the war has revealed unhealthy elements the Party has promptly purged itself of such.

On the other hand, what have been the actions of the S.L.P. in this connection? The Editor of their official organ himself shows that even the columns of that journal have been used to give publicity to the pro-war views of members of the S.L.P. We do not know what action that party took in the secrecy of their councils, but the columns of their organ have not been used to give publicity to any handling of the pro-war members thereof. When the Editor of “The Socialist” is compelled to write, three months after the war broke out, “Last month I tried to show what those different views were, but I have not been able to find out what support each side has, consequently I cannot say definitely what the official attitude of the Party is “—when such a statement as that, we say, can appear in the official organ of the party, how can the party handle pro-war members ? The official organ, the mouthpiece of the Executive and therefore of the party, does not know, in the face of the controversy on such a vital question as that of the “attitude of Socialism to the war,” what the party position is ; how, then, can individual members be expected to know that position, or be dealt with for not knowing it ?

For years it has been the practice of the S.L.P. to refuse to soldiers admission to their ranks. Foolish as this was under pre-war conditions, the logic of such an attitude left no mistake as to the proper course to be taken on the outbreak of war. Yet this party, who, before the war, could not abide an unfortunate member of the working class whom stress of circumstances had compelled to sell his labour-power to the master class in the only capacity open to him, had no “official position” in relation to the war when it had been in progress three months. Up to that time, at all events, the members were “quite in order” in shouting for the despised and rejected soldier to begin the work for which he was despised and rejected, and by that same token the members were in order in “joining up” and getting on with the butchery themselves. The party was divided on “the attitude of Socialism to the war”; its Press could not “find out what support each side had,” and therefore could not say whether it was the duty of the members to rush off and join the Army, or get themselves incarcerated for opposing the war.

That is how we “compare the S.L.P. and the S.P.G.B. in their actions.”

But we have not done yet: we may as well make a job of it while we are about it. Our opponents try to prove their status as a revolutionary organisation. What is the evidence they offer ? Do they present us revolutionary principles and prove their policy to be consistent therewith ? No. They have a very different standard for judging revolutionary organisations. They judge — by the number of members they have had in prison ! In this respect what a long way they are behind the Suffragettes !

“We have had many of our members on the Clyde imprisoned and deported for revolutionary propaganda,” our contemporary says in course of proving their revolutionary character. “We have Editors, past and present, in gaol or under the shadow of gaol. (A former Editor – A. McManus – was deported and again arrested for working-class activity in the recent strike.”) All of which wears a different complexion when we remember that the S.L.P. “martyrs” to gaol in spite of abject contrition, and that McManus, if reports be true, has taken the chair for Tom Mann, whom the S.L.P. has so roundly denounced upon occasion. “And our Press and organ have been under the ban of the military,” our contemporary goes on, finally asking : “Do these things happen to a party which is pro-war, or anything but a revolutionary organisation?” Such things certainly may, as witness the Suffrage movement. But at all events, we should imagine the Government would have paid pretty heavily for some of the stuff which appeared in “The Socialist” after the outbreak of .the war. It takes rank with Harold Begbie’s ” What do you lack, Sonny?” as a contribution to the confusion which made it possible for the capitalist butchers to drag our fellow workers from their homes to the shambles. Perhaps the S.L.P. can now see how lightly “B.B.B.” let them down.

Words that bear repeating. (1917)

From the September 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

Having no quarrel with the working class of any country, we extend to our fellow workers of all lands the expression of our good will and socialist fraternity, and pledge ourselves to work for the overthrow of capitalism and the triumph of Socialism.

The World for the Workers.

— S.P.G.B. Manifesto, September 1914.

50 Years Ago: Did the Socialist Movement fail in 1914 (1965)

The 50 Years Ago column from the March 1965 issue of the Socialist Standard 

We are now at the root of the whole matter of the failure of the “European Socialist Movement” to take up and maintain the Socialist position in the recent crisis. These gigantic political organisations which disposed of so many millions of votes were not Socialist organisations. They were not founded upon the principle of the class struggle. They had not done the work of politically educating their supporters. They had not built up their strength upon an electorate understanding the working-class position and desiring revolution. These millions of so-called Socialist voters did not understand the class division in society, and did not, therefore, realise the unity of interest of the workers the world over, and the clash between the interests of the working class and the master class, at every point, nationally and internationally. Their votes had been attracted by all manner of nostrums and side-issues, and simply expressed opinions thereon, and not on the vital matter of working-class emancipation.

The Socialist Party of Great Britain calls the attention of the workers of this and other lands to the fact that, founded as a political organisation upon Socialist principles, it has maintained the true working-class position in relation to the war without difficulty. We cannot boast of the support of millions of voters at the polls, but no one can point to a single word or deed of ours, in this time of crisis, which has been a betrayal of the cause of the proletariat. Well for Socialism, well for the stricken workers, well for the great cause of humanity, if, when the present riot of anarchy is over, and those who have to pay for it in blood and tears come to count the cost and apportion the blame, they realise that the political party of Socialism, weak though it was in numbers, was strong enough to denounce the war on all sides, strong enough to expose the misleaders of Labour and their purchased “patriotism”, strong enough to avow and maintain, in the face of a frenzy of insane nationalism, the unity of interest of the workers of all countries, strong enough to remain Socialists and keep the flag of Socialism flying.

[From the editorial,  'A Blow for Socialism', Socialist Standard, March 1915.]

Editorial: Principles or Expediency (1939)

Editorial from the January 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

From its formation the S.P.G.B. took a firm stand for “principle” against “expediency,” and, unlike other organisations which also professed attachment to principle, the members of the S.P.G.B. really meant what they said and acted up to it. The controversy was not one of personalities but of a fundamentally different view of things. Yet it could truthfully be said of the advocates of expediency that most of them were not very clear about the implications of their attitude. They would say that they realised the necessity of remaining loyal to Socialist principles, such as opposing all capitalist parties, but when it came to applying the principle they would constantly find some urgent and special, but only “temporary,” reason for suspending the principle. In practice this meant that temporary became permanent, and the principle was forgotten.

The issue would arise then in just the same manner as it does to-day. There would be a Tory Government in office, and the alleged Socialists in the I.L.P. or Labour Party would say, “In principle we are as much opposed to Liberals as we are to Tories, but it would be a good thing if we were to promise to help the Liberal opposition if in return they will promise some social reform legislation.” To the superficial short view it looked good business, but the price that had to be paid far outweighed the immediate advantage. In order to help secure the victory of the Liberal Party the other parties to the bargain had to drop all pretence of Socialist propaganda and devote their efforts to convincing the electorate that Liberal social reforms were the thing that really mattered. The first duty of the Socialist Party is to make Socialists, and the policy of expediency meant the almost total suppression of Socialist propaganda.

Needless to say, when a Liberal Government was in office the expediency-mongers often transferred their allegiance to the Tory Party.

The Socialist Party condemned expediency and showed how it confused, demoralised and divided the workers. Men and women, just beginning to learn that capitalism is the enemy, would suddenly be told that it was urgently necessary to support one section of the capitalists against another. They learned to suspect their leaders, often wondering whether their chief allegiance was to their own party or to the Liberal or Tory Party. Expediency also divides the workers among themselves. It was all very well to support “Free Trade” when helping the Liberal Party, but workers in industries directly affected by foreign competition thought they had just as good a case for supporting tariffs, and the Tory Party, which advocated them. And how could the worker who was told to vote for a capitalist party and its programme of reforms go on believing that “Socialism is the only hope of the workers”?

Helping Capitalists to Power

Socialists, taking their stand on Socialist principles, went on pointing out the harm of sacrificing the substance for the shadow, the achievement of Socialism for the momentary petty concession from the capitalist class. They showed from past and present history how that policy produced only disappointment and betrayal, and prevented the growth of the Socialist movement. Above all, Socialists insisted on the hard truth that all capitalist agents who are elected to Parliament use their power to protect and preserve the capitalist system against the interest of the working class. Elect a Liberal reformer to-day on the strength of his promises and you will find him to-morrow using the armed forces to defeat a strike.

It is just the same in foreign affairs. Every capitalist and Labour politician swears his love of peace, but it only needs a realisation on the part of the capitalists that their interests are threatened to see the peace-loving politician declaring war. Liberal and Labour Party leaders, prior to 1914, were the peace-lovers; but war found them in coalition with their erstwhile Tory enemies, waging capitalist war, enforcing conscription, and so on. Only a brief while before President Wilson launched America into the War he had been elected—with the support of alleged Socialists—on an explicit promise to keep the country out of war. Chamberlain, the “peace-maker” of Munich, may be wanting war at no distant date, and if he does his way will be made easier by his reputation as a peace-lover. His present opponents in the Liberal and Labour Parties will be found helping him to win over the population to a policy of war. Expediency will again ha’ve helped the capitalist class to their task of hoodwinking the workers. Yet expediency has its surface attraction. The alleged Socialist who hails Chamberlain for preserving peace has apparently a substantial claim, just as has the opponent of Chamberlain, who urges unity with other capitalist groups, to “defend democracy.” But whichever group has its way the workers will be divided, will be deceived into entrusting control of the political machinery in capitalist hands, and will have their attention taken away from the basic fact that it is capitalism which produces wars, capitalism which stands in the way of Socialism.

Once Socialists give up principle for expediency they lose their way and get entangled in the intricate maze of capitalist political intrigue. Worst of all, they become divided, attaching themselves to different and rival sections of capitalist movements. Wars about capitalist interests masquerading as wars for democracy or nationalism are the most tragic example. Expediency in the last War naturally led to so-called Socialists fighting on the Allied side for “democracy” or “self-determination” and on the German side for “culture against Russian barbarism.”

The Czechs, who in the last War declared that they were being loyal to Socialism by fighting to dismember Austria and gain Czech independence, have their counterpart to-day in the Ukrainian “Socialists,” who are prepared to back Hitler-Germany in order to secure Ukrainian independence from Poland. One of them told a News Chronicle correspondent (News Chronicle, December 9th, 1938): “Better an alliance with the devil than continued Polish oppression.” Very short-sighted, of course, and incompatible with Socialist principle, but so is all expediency.

50 Years Ago: The War Office and the Socialist Standard (1966)

The 50 Years Ago column from the November 1966 issue of the Socialist Standard

When those in authority over us determined that no newspaper or books should be sent out of the country without the permission of the War Office, we made application to mail this journal to the Colonies and neutral countries. We have now been favoured with a reply the tenor of which b that the War Office has been compelled to stop our organ on some occasions in the past for the reason that a portion of its contents might be used by the enemy powers for “their propaganda". And we are further informed that, in consequence of this, instructions have been issued to stop in future all copies of the Socialist Standard addressed to places outside the United Kingdom.

Nothing that we publish can be used by our masters' enemies without being stripped from its context, for the simple reason that our criticism applies with just as much force to the German and Austrian capitalists as to British.  Our internationalism is so real a thing that we refuse to set national bounds even to our enemies. Not British capitalists or German capitalists are the foe, but capitalism and the capitalist class of the world.

[From the Socialist Standard, November, 1916].

Letter: Airbrushed (2014)

Letter to the Editors from the October 2014 issue of the Socialist Standard

Airbrushed

Dear Editors

On 12th July at Sheffield Anarchist Bookfair the Communist Workers Organisation (CWO) held a meeting titled ‘The only war which is worth fighting is the class war’. The subject was the First World War and at 8 minutes 21 seconds in, the speaker representing the CWO stated ‘I won’t go into the various British ones today but the only group – and it was a group rather than an organisation – that can claim to have had any real anti-war policy completely was the Socialist Labour Party’.

In Revolutionary Perspectives issue 4 (Journal of the CWO) dated Summer 2014, the article ‘Social Democracy, the First World War and the Working-class in Britain’ starting on page 14 discusses ‘The Response of Socialists in Britain’ even discussing the Socialist Labour Party (De Leonist) on page 18.

For all the CWO airbrushing of consistent SPGB opposition to the First World War, it is ironic the same CWO speaker once debated the SPGB accusing the SPGB of being ‘schooled in Stalinism’.

Jon D. White 

(by email)

Reply:

Strange indeed, and for two reasons. The first being the clear and principled opposition to the war from the SPGB (on the basis that it was a capitalist war and not in the slightest about the interests of the working class).  Second, the SLP was split into two factions, one pro-war, the other anti-war (with articles in their paper The Socialist reflecting this division at the start of the conflict). It was only some months into the war that the anti-war faction won out and the SLP clearly stated its opposition to the slaughter. We know that the CWO as ‘left communists’ venerate the SLP because after the conflict the majority of its membership left to join the pro-Bolshevik Communist Party of Great Britain at its foundation, but the SLP’s attitude to the war has been well documented and there is no excuse for such shoddy historical revisionism. – Editors.

Twenty-One Years Ago (1935)

From the August 1935 issue of the Socialist Standard

Twenty-one years ago commenced a war, in which millions of the working class suffered death and mutilation for the greater glory and profit of their capitalist masters. Not that the issue was presented quite so bluntly; the supreme aim, the British working class was told, was to make the recurrence of war forever impossible. And now, twenty-one years after the “War to end War,” the phrase, “the next war,” is beginning to become a commonplace; world expenditure on armaments has reached astronomical figures, and paternal governments seek to instruct civil populations how best to conduct themselves when subjected to poison-gas attacks.

Although ”to end war” was the supreme aim, there were also lesser, subordinate, aims. The ”World was to be made safe for Democracy,” we were told. It was made so safe that most of the post-war democratic constitutions have already given place to dictatorship in one form or another, and where democratic forms of government still survive, ”defence of democracy” continues to provide a basis for solemn pronunciamento and flaming appeals.

Twenty-one years ago Prussian militarism was presented as the implacable enemy of civilisation. To-day, for the time being, the friendliest relations exist between our capitalist masters and the Nazi dictatorship in Germany, dictatorship which, in its laudation of militarism, its cynical disregard of, and contempt for, all that civilisation is supposed to represent, would make a Prussian Junker of the old school blush with embarrassment.

We were also assured that the rights of small nations, of racial and national minorities, were to be safeguarded; to-day Jew-baiting is becoming increasingly popular, the persecution of national minorities goes on apace, while Imperialist Japan plunders a stricken China, and Mussolini prepares to “civilise” Abyssinia.

Twenty-one years ago, at the outbreak of the war, either the utmost confusion prevailed among those parties claiming to represent working-class interests, or, as in the case of the British Labour Party, they openly placed their services at the disposal of the capitalist class. Only the Socialist Party of Great Britain openly proclaimed its firm adherence to the principles of international working class solidarity, and urged the British working class to oppose its own class interests to that of the capitalists by organising together with the workers of all countries for the overthrow of capitalism, here and elsewhere.

To-day, there is every indication that the same people who deluded the workers then, are prepared to do the same again. The Labour Party talks about the need for defending “collective security,” “democracy,” and the League of Nations. Bolshevik Russia proclaims the “indivisibility of peace,” and hastens to recognise the justification of capitalist armed forces to maintain that peace—providing, of course, that the capitalist Power concerned is well disposed towards Russia.

To-day, just as twenty-one years ago, the Socialist Party asserts that as long as capitalism exists, so does the danger of war, and that the only way to abolish war is to abolish the cause of war— a social system based upon the private ownership of the means of wealth production. To that end the Socialist Party appeals to the workers to organise consciously for the overthrow of capitalism, by winning political power for the establishment of Socialism.

Arthur Mertons

Our War Volume. (1915)

From the August 1915 issue of the Socialist Standard

The attention of readers is drawn to the probability that, on account of the number of Party manifestoes on the war it contains, there will be an exceptional demand for the volume of our Party Organ which closes with this number. Those who desire to obtain the volume should place their orders early.

Obituary: Bert Mayes (2003)

Obituary from the July 2003 issue of the Socialist Standard

We regret to have to report the death in June of our comrade Bert Mayes at the age of 86. He was not in fact our oldest member but he was the one who had been a member the longest, having joined the old Battersea branch in 1934 while a teenager. He came from a told pro-working clan background with two of his uncles being members. As a socialist he refused to be conscripted to fight fellow workers in the Second World War. After the War he transferred to Ealing branch and took part in that branch's intense canvassing for the Socialist Standard in the 1950s and spoke from time to time on the outdoor platform as well as being a Conference delegate. He was an active member of the TGWU and in fact tended to think that socialists should take more interest in the short-term problems confronting workers under capitalism. For instance, he took the view, when the Tories brought in the notorious 1957 Rent Act that drastically reduced rent control that it was not enough to argue that in the long run this would not make much difference since if rents went up wages would follow. Right up to the end he used to call into Head Office in Clapham to pay his subscription to the Socialist Standard.

The Party was represented at his funeral in Morden and our condolences go out to his wife and family.

Manifesto To the Proposed International Congress. (1917)

From the July 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Manifesto of the Socialist Party of Great Britain

To the proposed International Congress

COMRADES,—

Residing as we do under the control of the “democratic” British Government, we are not permitted to send Delegates to the Congress to state our views, present our case, and defend our policy, as we so strongly wished. All the more is this to be regretted as our organisation is the only one in the British Isles that takes its stand upon a definite and avowed Marxian basis and follows a policy logically deduced from that basis.

We hold that the Working Class must march to its emancipation from wage-slavery and the domination of the Capitalist Class, by the conquest of political power. In the British Isles the means wherewith to accomplish this are already in the hands of the workers, as, despite certain anomalies in our franchise, the workers have the overwhelming majority of the votes at their disposal when an election takes place. Hence the great, immediate, and pressing work requiring to be done is the education of the Working Class to an understanding of Socialism—to a realisation of their slavery and the method of their emancipation.

The Working Class are slaves to the Capitalist Class. While the Workers produce all existing wealth by applying their labour-power to the materials provided by Nature, this wealth, and the instruments necessary for its production, along with the great storehouse of Nature’s materials -the earth- are owned and controlled by the Master Class under a system of private ownership that necessitates the selling of the bulk of the products upon the markets. But while powers of production increase by leaps and bounds, the markets grow but slowly. Hence the struggles between the various groups of Capitalists for the control of these markets and the routes thereto so that they may dispose of the commodities the wage-slaves have produced. Practically all the wars of the last three centuries, from the struggle against the Dutch and Portuguese in India to the present colossal carnage which is devastating the whole world, have had their essential causes rooted in the demands of the various groups of Capitalists to control these markets and routes.

The Workers’ share of these conflicts has been to slaughter each other in their Masters’ interests, to find a grave if killed, or be offered the degrading and comfortless shelter of the workhouse if disabled or maimed. The hardship, misery, want, and suffering following these wars fall always upon the Working Class. Thousands of cripples and tens of thousands of men with constitutions ruined by military service will feel the horrors of the struggle for existence with tenfold bitterness after the war. In the midst of the conflict the Pensions Minister, Mr. G.N. Barnes – a member of the ILP and of the “Labour Party”, and “Labour” Member of Parliament for Blackfriars Division of Glasgow – has admitted that over 100,000 men have been discharged from the British Army as medically unfit for Service without allowance or pension of any kind. To soothe the ruffled feelings of these unfortunate victims of capitalist brutality this so-called representative of the Workers said:

“It has been claimed that these men should be put on pension . . . . inasmuch as the doctors have passed them in . . . . I want to say that they will not get it while I am in the office.”—Official Report, col. 254, March 6th, 1917.

No matter which group of the Masters win the struggle, the Workers remain enslaved. The division of interests is not between the peoples of the world, but between the classes — the Master Class and the Working Class. Not, therefore, in their fellow Workers abroad, but in the Master Class at home and abroad, are the working-class enemies found.

What interest have the Workers, then, in either starting or carrying on war for their masters? Absolutely none.

Every Socialist must, therefore, wish to see peace established at once to save further maiming and slaughter of our fellow Workers. All those who on any pretext, or for any supposed reason, wish the war to continue, at once stamp themselves as anti-Socialist, anti-working class, and pro-capitalist.

Moreover, where the Working Class have the necessary means —the franchise— for their emancipation within their grasp it is clearly an anti-Socialist and treacherous act to urge them to use those means for the purpose of placing political power in the hands of the masters. The flimsy excuses so often used to cover up such acts of treachery to the Working Class merely add evidence to support the truth of this statement.

Applying these tests of real understanding of Socialist principle and correct action to the organisations in this country claiming to be Socialist, we find all of them except the Socialist Party of Great Britain failing to stand that test. The Fabian Society, with Mr. Bernard Shaw and Mr. Sidney Webb at its head, merely wishes for an extension of the Civil Service system under the control of a bureaucracy, and is opposed to the Workers being emancipated from their slavery. In addition to supporting the carrying on of the war, both the society and its individual members readily support the return of Liberal Capitalists to Parliament.

The so-called Independent Labour Party is ready at all times to make political bargains with the Capitalists and to urge the Workers to place power in the hands of the masters. Thus Mr. Ramsay MacDonald at Leicester, Mr. Philip Snowden at Blackburn, Mr. F. Jowett at Bradford, Mr. James Parker at Halifax, Mr. G.H. Roberts at Norwich, Mr. G.N. Barnes at Glasgow, and Mr. Clynes at N.E. Manchester all owe their seats in Parliament to bargains made with the Liberals, in return for which they gave their support to Liberals in these and other constituencies. While protesting — in some forms — against the war, and now urging “Peace by negotiation”, the ILP allowed its members like Mr. Parker and Mr. Clynes to assist in the recruiting campaign.

In a letter sent to his constituency on 11th September, 1914, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald said:

“I want the serious men of the trade unions, the brotherhoods and similar movements, to face their duty. To such it is enough to say ‘England has need of you’ and to say it in the right way.

“They will gather to her aid; they will protect her.” Daily Chronicle, September 9th, 1914.

In the Merthyr Pioneer for 27th November, 1914, the late Mr. Keir Hardie, another ILP Member of Parliament, said:

“I have never said or written anything to dissuade our young men from enlisting. I know too well all there is at stake.”

How is all this different from assisting in carrying on the war? How clearly it shows the treachery of the ILP leaders and Members of Parliament!

Moreover, the ILP has allowed its members to accept office in a Capitalist government without making any protest or repudiation. It is true that their 1917 Conference passed a resolution dissociating the organisation from Mr. Parker’s action in taking a Government office, but not only is Mr. Parker allowed to remain a member of the ILP, but no protest at all is made when other members, as Mr. Mitchell, Mr. Barnes, and Mr. Roberts, accept office under similar conditions. While protesting against German Social-Democrats voting war credits in the Reichstag, ILP members have steadily voted for war credits here.

The claim of the ILP to be a Socialist organisation is fully repudiated by the actions of its members, of which the above are but examples.

The British Socialist Party has been just as ready — if with less success — to try and enter into arrangements with the Capitalist parties for seats and offices. At General Elections they have shown their impartiality by advising the Workers to vote for Capitalist candidates of the Tory brand in some constituencies — as South Hackney, Norfolk, etc. — and for Capitalist candidates of the Liberal type in other constituencies. The one MP who until recently was a member of the BSP — Mr. W. Thorne owes his seat to the Liberals and Tories in West Ham combining to make him a present of that constituency. In the early days of the war he, with Mr. Hyndman, Mr. Hunter Watts, and others, took a prominent part in the recruiting campaign, calling upon the Workers of Great Britain to take up arms for the slaughter of their fellow Workers on the Continent, although Mr. Hyndman admitted that whichever side won the Workers would not benefit a single jot. Just lately Mr. W. Thorne has returned from a trip to Russia, taken, along with Mr. O’Grady and Mr. W. Sanders, on behalf of the British Capitalists, to persuade the Russian Workers to continue the war on the Eastern side.

In the ranks of the BSP a division of opinion has developed, resulting, after a struggle between the two sections, in the secession of the defenders of the war – Hyndman, Hunter Watts, Lee, Irving, and the rest — and the formation by the secessionists, of the National Socialist Party. The absurdity of the title is balanced by the merit it has of showing how completely pro-Capitalist and anti-Socialist these individuals are.

The BSP has now joined hands with the ILP in a so-called peace propaganda, but the confusion and double-dealing lying behind this movement is shown most glaringly by the fact that both these organisations remain affiliated to the Labour Party that has whole-heartedly supported the war from its inception.

One of the rewards given for this support was the appointment of Mr. J. Hodge, “Labour” Member for Gorton, as Labour Minister. Within a week of his appointment he tried to show his utility to the masters by threatening to use the powers of the Defence of the Realm Act against the Boilermakers of Birkenhead, who were protesting against the rotten conditions imposed upon them by the employers.

The organisation calling itself the Socialist Labour Party has never understood how the Workers are enslaved, and for years has propagated what it calls Industrial Unionism as the method of emancipation. Its attempts to reconcile this position with its claim to be a political party has led to such confusion in its ranks that when the war broke out it was divided as to whether it should support or oppose it.

THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF GREAT BRITAIN alone takes up the Socialist position here. At the beginning of the war we pointed out the essential factors forming its cause which we have given above, and we have steadily and consistently pressed this view by all the means in our power, and maintained it upon all occasions without change or deviation. Thus we said in the first issue of our official organ to be published after Britain’s entry into the war (Sept. 1914):

“THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF GREAT BRITAIN . . . whilst placing on record its abhorrence of this latest manifestation of the callous, sordid and mercenary nature of the international capitalist class, and declaring that no interests are at stake justifying the shedding of a single drop of working-class blood, enters its emphatic protest against the brutal and bloody butchery of our brothers of this and other lands, who are being used as food for cannon abroad while suffering and starvation are the lot of their fellows at home.

“Having no quarrel with the working class of any country, we extend to our fellow workers of all lands the expression of our goodwill and Socialist fraternity . . .”

While in the February 1915 issue we said:

“We . . . declare again that there was nothing in the conditions of any country which justified Socialists voluntarily supporting either side in the war, and record our condemnation of such action as a betrayal of Socialist principles arising from lack of political knowledge and unsound political organisation.”

So, with our own hands clean and our every action in accord with the CLASS struggle and the solidarity of the interest of the Working Class the world over, we bring before the international proletariat our DEMAND FOR PEACE without any change of attitude or re-adjustment of policy. We stand for PEACE without reference to terms, since the fruits of Capitalist war are the Masters’, and only the pains and penalties thereof the Workers’.

The grim humour of the claim that Britain is fighting to “crush Prussian Militarism” is clearly shown by the fact that a Bill is being passed through the liberty-loving, democratic British Parliament establishing “Militarism” in a far worse form than either the present Prussian or the late Russian rulers ever attempted. Men who have crossed the seas because they refuse to accept military service are to be forced into the army of the “allied” country they may be in or brought back to serve in the army here!

To the Socialists of other countries we extend our fraternal greetings. As soon as conditions will permit us to do so we shall endeavour to join forces with our Comrades for the purpose of establishing a Socialist International Congress where Socialist policies shall be decided, where misleaders and tricksters who use the name and fame of Socialism will be exposed and denounced, where the message of Socialism will be sent forth to the toilers of all countries in clear and unmistakable terms, where the gage of battle against the Capitalist Class will be thrown down to the clarion call:

“WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE! YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT YOUR CHAINS; YOU HAVE A WORLD TO WIN.”

THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF GREAT BRITAIN

193 Gray’s Inn Road, London WC1

20th June 1917

We said the same in 1939 as in 1914 (1974)

From the June 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

The 70th anniversary issue of the Socialist Standard carried throughout its pages a series of snippets from old Socialist Standard articles highlighting the SPGB's unique position on issues of the day. Where possible, I've provided a link to the full article.

In this, our first issue of the Socialist Standard since the declaration of war, we have the opportunity of reaffirming the socialist attitude that we have consistently maintained since the formation of the party, including the war of 1914-18. With the increasing international tension of recent years we have again and again pressed home the undeniable truth that as long as the world is organized on a capitalist economic basis the never-ceasing rivalries will continue to produce conflicts ranging from mere diplomatic crises to gigantic armed struggles spreading over the oceans and continents of the world. The Socialist Party of Great Britain re-affirms that the interest of the world working class – on whom the untold misery and suffering of war inevitably falls – lies in abolishing the capitalist economic system.

[From “The Socialist Party of Great Britain and the War”, Socialist Standard, October 1939]