Notes By The Way: “The Daily Express” Star Performer (1936)

The Notes By The Way column from the April 1936 issue of the Socialist Standard

“The Daily Express” Star Performer

There are many good reasons why workers should disregard the politics preached by the Daily Express. Now its readers are deprived, too, of what was one of its most entertaining non-political features, the column of guidance from the stars contributed by the “astrologer,” Mr. Naylor. Every day (including Sunday, in the Sunday Express) he advised readers what the stars foretold for those born on that day and for the whole 1¾-million not born on that day. When he missed a day consternation reigned throughout the land—or, so the Editor says. All day long the office was besieged on foot or by ’phone. Hundreds of readers refused to leave their homes in the morning to meet the day’s battle without first knowing whether this was a day for an ardent love affair, for buying houses or selling pepper, for avoiding sea-trips, or for bearding the boss for a rise. But even into the astral regions the class-struggle had intruded, so the day’s readings often gave separate advice for employers and employed.. This advice, on Saturday, February 29th, covered both that day and the next. On Saturday we were told that those born on February 29th, if in the ranks of owners of businesses, “May achieve a successful year financially by hard work. Those in employment, on the other hand, must take extra care not to offend those higher up, who can make difficulties for them.” Mr. Naylor has yet to learn that the capitalists do not thrive on their own hard work, but on that of others, and that all workers, not only those born on February 29th, have to take extra care not to offend their employer, because he can always “make difficulties for them.” The advice for all readers was sound enough, “Employees, look out for trouble, and give no cause for complaint,” though the last sentence “avoid extravagance” was hardly necessary.

The bright spot in the advice for Sunday was “Employees must try to be more assertive;” As nine-tenths of the workers do not work on Sunday it is a good day to be assertive, provided, of course, that they carried out Saturday’s instructions of minding their p’s and q’s. It is a pity we cannot know whether the Express staff working on Sunday asserted themselves to Lord Beaverbrook and, if so, with what result.

By coincidence, an article on Japan in the Sunday Express next day told us to be amazed at the queerness of that nation because, among other things, they consult astrologers!

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Poverty is not being Abolished

Ceaseless propaganda goes on—as it has for a century or more—designed to convince the poor that their poverty and the wealth of the rich are alike diminishing. The Times Literary Supplement, reviewing a book “Farewell to Poverty,” asserts (March 7th) that there has been a “great redistribution of wealth and income . . . .  in this country since the war,” and that capitalism “during the century before the war . . . .  was successfully spreading abundance.” The Economic League publishes leaflets assuring the workers that “small and working-class investors have savings of something like £3,000,000,000 in value.”

All of this propaganda is the product of ignorance or deceit.

It may be true that the funds in Savings Banks, Building Societies, etc., etc., total nearly £3,000 millions, but how much is that per head of the millions who own it? And how many of them are workers? The Economic League and the Times are silent on this. Mr. Hargreaves Parkinson, of the Economist, in his book, “The Small Investor,” provides an answer. The people who own this sum constitute “at least 75 per cent. of the total population,” and the property they own does not amount to “more than 10 to 14 per cent.” of the total national wealth. (“Small Investor,” Blackie & Son, Ltd., 1930, p. 109-10.) So we are asked to be impressed by the “equality" of ownership demonstrated by the fact that less than one-quarter of the population own nearly nine-tenths of the national wealth!

Moreover, neither the League nor the Times has ever shown that the owners are wholly or mainly workers. As Mr. Parkinson points out (p. 10), an official inquiry showed that “in any savings bank, four-fifths or more of the total deposits are in one-fifth of the accounts." He goes on to say that in his opinion the relatively wealthy depositors “comprise certain Provident and Charitable Societies, and Clubs, which deposit their accumulated funds with the savings banks; foremen and others in the 'non-commissioned' ranks of industry; the wives of middle-class professional or business men. . . ."

Now Professor G. W. Daniels and Mr. H. Campion, in a paper read to the Manchester Statistical Society on March 11th (see Manchester Guardian, March 12th), have examined the present ownership of capital, and compared it with ownership in pre-war days. This is their conclusion:—

  . . .  it cannot be said there has been any marked change in the distribution of capital in individual hands in England and Wales during the last 25 years. 

The slight extent of the change, and the present enormous inequality, is shown by their conclusion

that 

  In 1924-30 1 per cent. of the persons aged 25 and over in England and Wales owned 60 per cent. of the total capital; in 1911-13 1 per cent. of the persons owned 70 per cent. of the total capital.
  In 1924-30 80 per cent of the total capital and in 1911-13 85 per cent. to 90 per cent. was owned by 5 per cent. of the persons aged 25 and over.

They find also that “there is no evidence that the inequality will grow less marked in the future." 

The Manchester Guardian, while deploring this inequality, sees in the small change a disproof of the views held by “the cruder Marxists." It may be worth while considering this point on another occasion. Here it is sufficient to say that even if there had been a slight over-statement of views as to concentration of capital it shows the bankruptcy of Liberalism, that it can find no other answer to the appalling facts.

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“Communist-Patriots”

In 1914 Lenin and his associates coined a name for so-called Socialists who deserted internationalism. They were called “social-patriots." Through ignorance or for pay (e.g., Benito Mussolini) they preached war and nationalism. Many of them were the scum of the working-class movement.

In 1936 Lenin’s followers-from-afar are being manoeuvred by Moscow into the same position. The Daily Worker of March 9th reports that the French Communist organ L'Humanité has issued an appeal “for a united France for the struggle against Fascism and against war.” The appeal ends with the slogan: —

“Long live the Unity of France."
"Long live the International.”
“Long live the unity of all peace-loving people.”

This is precisely the way the "Social-patriots” phrased their desertion in 1914.

The Daily Worker of March 10th shows another aspect of the same “Communist-patriotic" trend. The cartoon presents a group of fearsome-looking Nazis, armed with machine-guns, to represent Germany, surrounded by a group of handsome unarmed workers representing Britain, France and Russia. The pretence that England and France (i.e., the respective Governments) are peaceful and proletarian is precisely the line those Governments themselves will take if and when it comes to a clash. The cartoon might have been taken from the Daily Mail any time between 1914 and 1918.

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Salvation by House-Ownership

One of the gifts of the "practical" men to suffering humanity is the building society movement, preaching salvation of the working man by means of house ownership. Not only the Church and the orthodox political party leaders, but also many of the Trade Union and Labour leaders have backed the movement. Now that more workers than ever before have tasted the joys of crippling mortgage payments, of road charges, repairs, jerry-building, and the impossibility of getting anything like the purchase price in the event of compulsory removal to get work elsewhere, companies building flats to let are busy exposing the snags of house-ownership. Posters on the hoardings irritate the unfortunate owner of a few bricks and a mortgage by reminding him too late that he has fallen for another illusory social reform.

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A New Kind of “Socialism"

An addition to the numerous misuses of the word Socialism was contained in a Sunday Express article on Japan (March 1st).

The aim of a movement was described as “a sort of Fascist dictatorship, combined with 'Imperial Socialism' of a Marxian tinge.”

If the Japs try to swallow that awful mixture they will be very sick.

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Blot On or Blot Out

The Daily Herald (February 22nd) had a leader on the pepper speculation, which is called a "blot on the City.” It promised that under Labour Government the blot will be erased, and the City's financial morality purified. Nothing could show more plainly the gulf between Labourism and Socialism. Under Socialism, there being no use for financial mechanism, the “City" will not be cleansed, but blotted out. Bankers, stockbrokers and others, now preparing to carve out careers teaching “Socialists” how to run finance, please note.

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Capitalism does not Feed the Workers

Defenders of capitalism who are so lyrical about the technical achievements of modern industry, might try to explain why, after all these years, even the most elementary needs of the working class remain unsatisfied. Sir John Orr, a leading expert on nutrition, in his “Food, Health and Income” (Macmillan, 2s. 6d.), states that there are 4,500,000 people in this country whose income per head is 10s. a week or less, and whose estimated average expenditure in food is only 4s. a week. Not only must many of these 4,500,000 be definitely undernourished, but millions more have a diet inadequate for perfect health. A completely adequate diet is only obtained by half the population. To raise the whole population to the standard attained by the wealthy 4,500,000 who spend 14s. per head on food each week “would involve increases in consumption . . . . of milk, eggs, butter, fruit, vegetables and meat varying from 12 per cent. to 25 per cent.”

One of the effects of the inadequate diet of the poor is that boys at Council Schools at age 13 are on an average 2½ inches shorter than boys at Christ's Hospital. At seventeen years of age the difference is nearly 4 inches, and at eighteen the sons of the rich at public schools are nearly 5 inches taller.

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Will Mussolini hold on to Power?

The following sober estimate of the condition of affairs in Italy is translated from a journal, La Voce, circulated illegally in Milan. The translation was published in the American International Review (March).

  There is always the possibility that we in Italy do not see as clearly as observers abroad. On the other hand, we are in a better position to learn what is the current reaction of the population of the country. A successful war must have the backing of the population. A revolution can only be made by the population of the country. Now while the people of Italy are grumbling here and there, it is untrue that the demands of the war have made them turn against it. As yet, they do not oppose Mussolini’s war. They will begin to show opposition with defeat in Africa and privations at home. But though our sympathies are with the Ethiopians, we still doubt that Mussolini will be defeated on the Amhara tableland. In order to be defeated in Africa, Mussolini must be opposed in Europe—by the same powers that rule the roost in Geneva. Now these powers have something more important in mind. Even England, which seems to have much to lose through the Fascist defeat of the Negus Negusti. They are playing a bigger game, and may all of a sudden decide to forgive small misdemeanours. The Hoare-Laval plan was a meaningful feeler. It suggested that London and Mussolini may reach an understanding any time the European (sic) scene dictates it. The sanctions remain to date so much preaching. Does Mussolini’s war machine really find it hard to buy coal and oil? No, they who are lyrically vituperous against naughty fascism over the Press table in Geneva continue to supply the Italian Fascist forces with large stores of oil. Let-us not be fooled by politicians’ “big and small manoeuvres.” Our job remains sober, patient education. We, unlike our Parisian and New York friends, cannot afford to listen to fairy tales.
  “When the million and a half soldiers are demobilised at the end of the war”—then Mussolini and his gang will have to pay the fiddler. Thus spake “Soda” who writes encouragement from Rome. There is something to such a promise. Demobilisation always presents a difficult situation to the capitalist State. But we have had a post-war situation before.
  “And Italian Fascists may go left with a losing war,” suggests another letter-writer. They may, because Fascism is, after all, a radical populist movement, and basically a reformist movement.
  Our job remains not merely of opposition to Fascism, but predominantly the deeper task of agitation for a fundamental social change.

Edgar Hardcastle

Here and There: Harry Pollitt (1936)

The Here and There column from the June 1936 issue of the Socialist Standard

Mr. H. Pollitt has written a series of articles in the Daily Worker on Communist policy. In the last, article, May 11th, he says: —

  “The peoples want peace. They want to be shown the clear road to be able to keep peace. The working-class movement has the sacred duty of showing them . . . what road has to be taken.  . . . Let the working-class movement of Great Britain lead the way to peace. It can do— it shall do!”

AND HOW?

  "Forward, then, to the greatest Crusade for Peace this country has ever known: —
  For the defeat of the National Government;
 for helping in every way the German people to overthrow the Hitler Government, the Government that is the chief war incendiary in Europe to-day;
 for the expulsion of the Japanese invaders from China and for a democratic Japan;
 for the expulsion of the Italian plunderers from Abyssinia, and the liberation of the Italian people from Fascism;
 for a world front of workers and peasants and all friends of peace against the instigators of war.”

If Mr. Pollitt ever gets the time to ponder on his inane slogans he might ask himself and try to explain how the working-class movement could effect the expulsion from Abyssinia of 250,000 Italians, armed with guns, tanks, aeroplanes and poison gas, without war. Having settled that problem he might also try to explain in what way the working class would benefit by the expulsion of the armed forces of Italy from Abyssinia and of the Japanese from China.

Come, Mr. Pollitt, the Daily Worker will be read with interest for your reply!

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Thieves’ Progress
Slave-ridden, barbaric, semi-feudal Abyssinia has been "annexed” by capitalist Italy. The annexation, inevitable otherwise, might have been prevented by the intervention on the side of Abyssinia of strong capitalist Powers like Great Britain and France. The intervention did not take place, despite the vociferous demands that it should by many capitalist interests, supported as usual by soft-headed Labour and Communist Party leaders. Italy’s new Abyssinian Empire, situated as it is on the British sea route to India, and in a strategic position among British African colonies, gives Italy a vastly increased bargaining power with British capitalism. The conquest has doubtless caused intense concern to British interests. That the British Government did not intervene to prevent this possible threat to its interests and prestige suggests that they had hoped for a result less decisive—a compromise giving Italy a less dominating position, or that they had considered the cost too great and the possible consequences at the moment too grave. For it is certain that if British capitalism became involved in another war that smaller capitalist Powers would seek to embarrass her by throwing off her domination, by demanding concessions, and even, if the opportunity occurred, by grabbing part of her wealthy Empire.

It is indeed a hard world for capitalist countries that have the responsibility of owning enormous wealth.

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Capitalism’s Health
“The disappointing thing to me about the Budget is that it reveals an altogether unpleasant healthiness about the capitalist system."

It must be discomforting to Mr. Maxton to reflect that six years ago he made a dramatic forecast that the capitalist system would collapse within six months. He was wrong, as we pointed out then, and as events proved. He is now disappointed in capitalism’s “unpleasant healthiness.” That much he has learned. If Mr. Maxton had the ability he might, by study, understand the workings of the capitalist system: why, in times of crisis, it appears to be collapsing and at other times shows “unpleasant healthiness.” It is more likely that Mr. Maxton will understand capitalism better and ultimately acquire Socialist understanding only as events force their lessons home to him. That is, in the same way that the mass of workers will acquire an understanding of Socialism.

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Postmen and Knights
The Annual Conference of the Union of Post Office Workers, held at Brighton, at its sitting on May 5th, had a minor breeze. Sir Walter Citrine, General Secretary of the T.U.C., who was a fraternal delegate, came very near to being refused a hearing. A resolution was moved to delete his name from the list of fraternal delegates. This drastic action was proposed because Sir (formerly Mister) Walter Citrine had accepted a knighthood. The voting was amazingly close. The resolution was defeated by 1,081 votes to 910. In explanation, lest it be inferred that the respectable postmen recognise the emptiness of titles and the futility of working men possessing them, the resolution was supported mainly on the ground that it was conferred by the National Government. The delegates supporting the resolution staged a walk-out when Sir Walter rose to speak. An awkward situation, through which, it may be assumed, the dignity of his title helped Sir Walter without undue embarrassment.

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Socialism versus Reforms
The Socialist argument that reforms have only a limited benefit for the working class is graphically supported by the following from the News Chronicle (March 12th, 1936): —

  Sir John Orr’s report on Malnutrition is no pleasant reading for a lazy afternoon; and it should dispel the belief which seems to be gaining currency in lazy circles that malnutrition is due to ignorance of food values rather than to poverty. It is easy for well-fed persons to accept such doctrines as the truth.
  Proof, if proof be needed, that poverty is, in fact, the villain of the piece can be found in Stockton-on-Tees, which boasts one of the best Medical Officers of Health in England: .
  In the last five years Stockton has re-housed nearly half its worst slum population in one of the country's best designed and spacious housing schemes.
  Economy and efficiency have made possible a rent in this new district of barely one shilling per week per head more than was paid in the slums.
  And in the last five years the only really noticeable difference between the slums and the new area has been a big increase in the death rate among those who have been better housed. The slum death rate remains the same.
  That one shilling per week per head means, in fact, sufficient food to make the difference between life and death.

We oppose reformist policy on the grounds that reforms do not solve the working-class problem of poverty, even though reforms might have some immediate benefit. The reform dealt with above— better housing—would appear to be definitely harmful to the working class: the position being that health suffers and the death rate increases as more money is spent on rent and less is spent on food. And after a hundred years of reforms we have as much poverty and more reformers than ever.

Harry Waite

Notes by the Way: The Low-down on Dictators (1937)

The Notes by the Way Column from the November 1937 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Low-down on Dictators

The famous pamphlet, “Killing No Murder," published in 1657, might have been written to-day for its acute analysis of the ways of dictators. It was a direct incitement to the assassination of Oliver Cromwell and is believed to have been written by Colonel Sexby, a leveller who had gone over to the Royalists. Here, in an abbreviated form, are his fourteen points on Tyrants, derived, as he admits, from Plato, Aristotle, Tacitus and “his Highness’s (Cromwell's) own evangelist, Machiavelli." (It is not for nothing that Mussolini, too, is an admirer of Machiavelli).

1. "Almost all tyrants have been first captains and generals for the people, under pretences of vindicating or defending their liberties."
2. "Tyrants accomplish their ends much more by fraud than force. Neither virtue nor force (says Machiavelli) are so necessary to that purpose as . . .  a lucky craft . . . Their way is . . . with cunning plausible pretences to impose upon men's understandings, and in the end they master those that had so little wit as to rely upon their faith and integrity. It is but unnecessary to say, that had not his Highness had a faculty to be fluent in his tears, and eloquent in his execrations; had he not had spongy eyes, and a supple conscience; and besides, to do with a people of great faith but little wit, his courage, and the rest of his moral virtues, with the help of his janissaries, had never been able so far to advance him out of the reach of justice that we should have need to call for any other hand to remove him but that of the hangman."
3. “They abase all excellent persons, and rid out of the way all that have noble minds . . .  they purge both Parliament and Army, till they have few or none there that has either honour or conscience, either wit, interest, or courage, to oppose their designs. . . ."
4. “They dare suffer no assemblies, not so much as horse-races."
5. “In all places they have their spies and dilaters . . . to appear discontented, and not to side with them, that under that disguise they may get trust and make discoveries. They likewise have their emissaries to send with forged letters. . . . "
6. “They stir not without a guard, nor his Highness without his Lifeguard."
7. “They impoverish the people, that they may want the power, if they have the will, to attempt anything against them. His Highnesses’s way is by taxes, excise, decimations, etc."
8. "They make war to divert and busy the people, and besides, to have a pretence to raise moneys, and to make new levies, if they either distrust their old forces, or think them not sufficient. The war with Spain serveth his Highness to this purpose, and upon no other justice was it begun at first, or still continued."
9. “They will seem to honour and provide for good men—that is, if the ministers will be orthodox and flatter, if they will wrest and torture the Scriptures to prove his Government lawful, and furnish him with title, his Highness will likewise be then content to understand Scripture in their favour, and furnish them with tithes."
10. “Things that are odious and distasteful they make others executioners of; and when the people are discontented, they appease them with sacrificing those ministers they employ. I leave it to his Highness’s major-generals to ruminate a little upon this point."
11. “In all things they pretend to be wonderful careful of the public, to give general accounts of the money they receive, which they pretend to be levied for the maintenance of the State and the prosecuting of the war. . . ."
12. “All things set aside for religious uses they set to sale, that while those things last they may exact the less of the people. . . ."
13. “They pretend inspirations from God, and responses from oracles, to authorise what they do.  . . ."
14. “Lastly, above all things they pretend a love to God and religion. . . ."

It is unnecessary to point to the abundance of parallels in contemporary Europe under Hitler, Mussolini, Schuschnigg, Stalin and the rest. Except with regard to religion, which is not so useful a handmaiden as it was, the nature of dictators and dictated seem to have changed but little.

Even the Drains are Muzzled in Italy

Mussolini, like Hitler, boasts that he has the population behind him. Mr. Harold Brust, in his book, “Plain Clothes" (Stanley Paul, 18s.), tells of the elaborate precautions the Fascist leader has to take to postpone the day of reckoning. The following is from a review of the book in the Daily Telegraph, October 12th: —

  Italian police, he says, apart from attending to such duties as examining the food supplies to the Duce, carefully inspect all his correspondence, and particularly parcels which might explode by the mere cutting of the string.
  Before Signor Mussolini enters any vehicle it is rigidly inspected, for on one occasion a bomb was found affixed to his motor car. More than 300 plain clothes “shadows" look after him, in addition to many Fascist and military guards.
  During his short journey from his home to his office the route is closely guarded as his car flashes past at high speed. Sometimes he rides his motor cycle, goggled and crash-helmeted, and he always drives furiously.
 When he is scheduled to make a public appearance the police inspect all lamp-posts, and householders are compelled by law to bar access to the roofs of their dwellings. All along the kerbs the drain slits are covered with a fine mesh to prevent the concealment of a bomb.
  When Signor Mussolini is making a public speech he always uses a balcony or a specially erected tower. Once a would-be attacker was discovered at a window with a rifle that was fitted with a telescopic sight.

Poverty and Squalor under Fascism

Colonel T. F. Tweed, Mr. Lloyd George’s experienced political adviser, recently toured Italy to find out conditions there. This is what he says: —

  “But for Mussolini's imperialistic astigmatism Italy might have avoided economic collapse," Colonel Tweed told a reporter, “but the cost of that war, not yet fully met, and the heavy sacrifices demanded in maintaining the illusion that an impoverished agricultural people have become a first-class military power are proving too great a strain on the Italian internal resources now that foreign loans are no longer forthcoming.
  “The middle class are learning to dispense with even modest luxury, but the artisan and the agricultural population, much the lowest-paid in Europe, are compelled to forego simple necessities like butter and meat, because of scarcity and price. In every province and commune one heard the same comment, 'Too mucha da macaroni,’ which is as near to criticism as most dared permit themselves.
  “Mussolini has achieved a remarkable psychological rehabilitation for Italy and at the same time reduced masses of its people to a subsistence level only comparable in squalor and monotony with the standards of Asia."—(Manchester Guardian, October 4th, 1937.)

If in Fascist Italy there is no butter or meat for the workers and peasants, in Nazi Germany the Minister of Agriculture is appealing to the people to eat less bread and make up with potatoes.

(Manchester Guardian, October 4th, 1937.)

The dictators—and their democratic capitalist rivals—show a remarkable similarity in their threefold policy of luxury for the capitalist, guns for the army, and poverty for the worker.

“I’m Chosen by God"—Mr. Aberhart

The Social Credit Premier of Alberta, Mr. Aberhart, after two years’ failure to keep his promise of an extra £5 a month for all, is hankering after dictatorship. His latest revelation is that he has God behind him, the implication being apparently that he should not be fettered by newspaper criticism, which he proposes to suppress by legislation:—

  I believe God wants me to occupy my present position. I shall not be moved by any other consideration.—(Daily Express, October 11th, 1937.)

It was observed centuries ago that would-be dictators have a habit of claiming divine guidance and assistance. But why can’t Mr. Aberhart, with God’s help, produce that promised £S a month?

No Unemployment in Germany?

Dr. C. R. Fay, Reader in Economic History, Cambridge University, has just toured Germany and was amazed at “the real joy of everyone in their life . . . no trace of unemployment, the spirit of confidence and unity on every face." His letter relating this was published on October 7th by the Daily Telegraph and Morning Post.

Surely, as the Doctor saw the complete absence of unemployment with his own eyes, it must be so?

Only, unfortunately for Dr. Fay, Hitler, two days earlier (October 5th), had officially opened the German Winter Aid, which is a vast compulsory-voluntary collection of money, food and clothes for the relief of the unemployed. The opening speech was fully reported in the Manchester Guardian on October 6th, 1937.

Hitler mentioned in his speech the German Freedom Party, an organisation of anti-Nazis which has lately been conducting propaganda in Germany. Hitler, therefore, unlike the simple Fay, does not believe there is unity on every face in Germany. Fay, doubtless, did not look at the right faces, in prisons and concentration camps.

A Catholic Priest Wants Press Censorship

Father F. Woodlock, addressing the congregation at Farm Street Church, W., on October 10th, said that he would welcome a temporary censorship of the Press, because statements criticising the dictators might annoy them and provoke war (News Chronicle, October 11th, 1937). But Father Woodlock expressly confined his remarks to the anti-Fascist Press and to Hitler and Mussolini; he does not ask that his Catholic friends be prevented from annoying Stalin. (This is an unintended compliment to the latter, who, while he suffers from that occupational disease of all dictators, known as “conspiracy mania" apparently does not also experience periodic outbreaks of “international jitters” like Hitler and Mussolini.)

Father Woodlock does not like anti-Fascist newspapers making cruel, contemptuous and insulting remarks about sensitive dictators, but he is hardly in a position himself to throw stones at others. His method of Press controversy against his opponents is about as irresponsible as it could be. On September 18th, 1936, The Times published a letter from him in which he related that he heard, “on excellent authority," that an Anglican clergyman (name not given) visited a Communist Sunday School (date and place not given). “He found that, not only were the children being taught blank atheism, but, at the end, they filed before a picture of Christ and spat upon it. . . . Can any of your readers supply reliable information as to the number of these ‘Sunday Schools' at work in England to-day and the number of children attending them?"

Note the disingenuousness of all this. Father Woodlock did not himself witness this alleged incident. He did not even get it from the alleged Anglican clergyman, but only third-hand from an unnamed “excellent authority."

Perhaps the incident happened; although Father Woodlock’s informant may well have been misinformed. Such things do occur, even to “excellent authorities.” But even if it did happen, even the most uncompromising opponents of the Communist Party (i.e., the S.P.G.B.) could not believe them capable of making a deliberate policy of something so infantile and harmful to themselves. But observe the consequences of publication of the letter. Nobody could write to The Times denying it because nobody knows where or when it is supposed to have happened. So, in default of repudiation, thousands; of Times readers will now believe that it happened, is typical of Communist Sunday Schools, and is not denied by the Communists.

The real offenders are The Times for sinking so low as to give currency to such stuff. The Times editor would, of course, reply that The Times impartially publishes letters from all sides; but the claim is, none the less, patently untrue.

The Times, like other newspapers, is guided by the political outlook of the letter and the social position of the writer. Father Woodlock is an influential person, with a great organisation behind him. Suppose, for the sake of argument, that The Times received from a nobody a letter stating that, at a certain Catholic institution, in the year 19—, at —— , it was customary for the authorities to wink their eye at the fact, known to them, that supplies they received at a very low price were stolen. “And can any reader supply reliable information as to the number of such institutions at work in England to-day?”

Would The Times publish it? They would rightly say that it was an underhand and cowardly attempt to blacken an organisation in such a way that it could not defend itself.

Father Woodlock, on reflection, should recognise that his zeal against the Communists led him to overstep the mark.

The Unco-operative Co-ops.

The Co-operative Wholesale Society, which is nearly as far removed from Robert Owen’s conceptions as Hitler’s “National Socialism” is from Socialism, declines to go to arbitration over a claim by the employees for a ten per cent. increase of pay, so the latter threaten a strike.

Simultaneously a proposal was made that the directors be given increased salaries, but this was rejected by delegates from the retail societies at a meeting at Manchester on September 25th, 1937. The proposed directors' scale of pay was £875 on commencement, rising by five annual increases of £50 to £1,125 (Sunday Express, September 26th, 1937). Delegates from Barkworth and Eccles Cooperative Society contended that £1,000 should be enough for any director.

Labour Governments and Wages

Nothing brings out so clearly the uselessness of trying to administer capitalism for the benefit of the workers than the attitude of the Labour Govenments towards strikes and demands for higher wages. In 1924, just before the first Labour Government took office, their official organ, the Labour Magazine (January, 1924), made this appeal to the miners: —

  We are sure that the miners will not embarrass the first Labour Government by pressing untimely demands. . . .

Notice the tell-tale phrasing. Those who undertake to keep going the system based on the exploitation of the workers by the capitalists are necessarily “embarrassed” by the demands of the former, and regard them as “untimely."

Similarly, in France, we had Blum's Popular Front Government, after the first gains the workers made through their stay-in strikes, appealing to them to give up the strikes and agree to a “pause" in their demands for a higher standard of living. After the appeals came the threats of the use of force to eject strikers.

Now, in India, we see the same attitude on the part of the Congress Party towards Indian workers’ demands. Pandit Nehru, the Congress leader, who calls himself a Socialist, has just warned his followers against the belief that Congress Government automatically means higher wages. These are his words:—

  The Bombay Labour organisation has lost much of its vigour by its overindulgence in strikes. Workers get their wages out of the profits of the industries, and if the industries suffer the millowners will have no alternative but to close the mills. The management of mills has a right to dismiss inefficient workmen.—(From a report of a speech telegraphed from Calcutta on October 11th. Daily Telegraph, October 12th, 1937.)

It will be noticed that the minds and words of Labour leaders in East and West are as like as two peas. Perhaps Pandit Nehru is not uninfluenced by the fact that his Congress Party obtains much of its funds from the mill-owners.

Labour leaders who try to administer capitalism are “embarrassed" by the workers' demands. This is nothing to the embarrassment the workers will cause them when they see through the Labour leaders' policy of continuing capitalism.

Shadow-Boxing about the Former German Colonies

When the German ruling class feel strong enough they will doubtless try to grab their former colonies and anything else they think they can get. At present, however, they are in the preparatory stage of arming and of working up German public opinion. So Hitler and his British rivals are full of arguments about "rights" and “wrongs," and other irrelevant considerations.

British apologists led off with the remark that colonies are worthless, anyway, just a white man’s burden. Hitler countered smartly by calling this “drivel,” and said: —

  They say colonies are of no value, but in spite of this they will not in any circumstances give these worthless things back to their rightful owners.— (Speech at Berlin on October 3rd. Times, October 4th, 1937.)

As the mention of "rightful owners" reminded many people that, presumably, the rightful owners ought to be the native population living there, the British apologists fell back on the latter's right to be consulted. Imperialists, like Mr. Amery, trotted this out, and some of them actually claimed that, although it is true that the natives are not allowed to decide that question, or any other, for themselves, they are making advances towards self-government under British rule.

Then General Hertzog, Prime Minister of South Africa, made a speech at Pretoria on September 28th (The Times, September 29th, 1937), telling the natives in plain language what their rights in the land of their birth really are: —

  Natives must obey the white man’s law. Referring to criticism of the Government in dealing with the natives, the Prime Minister reminded the people that natives were living in a land of the white man, where the white man’s law ruled. If the native did not obey the white man’s rule he would be forced to obey, even if this had to be carried out by the imposition of more rigorous punishment or by stricter supervision of the native’s freedom of movement. He warned natives not to expect equal authority with the white man.

The muddled Labourites and Communists, who are already speaking of war against Germany in defence of native population’s democratic liberties, may wake up one day to find Hitler and Mussolini posing as defenders of the natives against South African white tyranny, and if the German workers are as silly as some of their British fellows, they may fall for it.

On the other hand, some influential South African politicians have declared that if Germany tries to recapture German South-West Africa they won't raise a finger to prevent it. The explanation of their attitude is that they fear, more than anything else, the growth of a native movement demanding Africa “for the rightful owners,” and look with favour on the return of the German dictatorship to Africa to help keep the natives in subjection. They prefer Germany to France because the absence of a colour bar in French African territory puts ideas into the African mind.

Edgar Hardcastle

Letters: Parliament and Dictators (1974)

Letters to the Editors from the December 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

Parliament and Dictators
R. Barltrop in “Parliament and Private Armies” may be right but I am not so sure. He says: “If a military-minded group seeks power it must do so as a political party.” Did Franco achieve it so? Or the Greek colonels, Chilean generals, Nasser, to mention a few?

“Political power”, he states, "cannot be transferred to bodies which do not hold it.” Perhaps not, but they could usurp it. “The Nazis were ineffectual until the majority of the German people elected them.” This is not the impression I got from William Sheridan Allen’s How the Nazis Gained Power, or from Robert Cecil’s The Myth of the Master Race: The Rosenberg Ideology. Rather the power was gained by fake, coercion, bully-boys. H. W. Schneider in Making the Fascist State tells a similar story with Mussolini.

If they need the backing of capital it will be provided should capital accept them as saviours whether with cross or truncheon.

The people here and the world over will probably have to seize power. As R. Barltrop wrote in the July ’73 Standard, “Our business is revolution”. The operative word is defined, great change; forcible substitution.

The SPGB is right in that people need no élite  to lead them. We have had far too much experience of middle-class aspirants to working-class leadership referring to them in a detached manner as though not of them. Some “intellectualize” the intellect until it bears no resemblance to the brain.

Westminster’s Hall of Clowns provides the evidence where performances equate with qualifications. It proves the truth of R. L. Stevenson’s words : “Of all professions, politics is generally regarded as the one for which no preparation is considered necessary." Generals could perform as well and if conditions demand it will undoubtedly do so.

The quality of writing in the Standard is high, contrasting sharply with meanderings elsewhere which for all the professional literacy could be adduced as emanating from the ill-educated such as myself. It is elating to realize that there are those of the common people, unsung by the minions of the media, who can confront and defeat them on most occasions.

W. Rellenck

London S.E.

Reply
The facts of the Nazis’ rise to power are as follows. In the German elections in March 1933 Hitler received 17,266,000 votes (43.9 per cent.) and his allies, the Nationalists, received 3,132,000 (8 per cent.), giving the Nazis and their supporters 51.9 per cent, of the votes and a clear majority. The Social Democrats received 7,176,000 (18.3 per cent.) and the Communists 4,845,000 (12.1 per cent.).

Six months earlier, though the Nazis were the largest party in Germany they were not in control of the political machinery. Hitler was derided by President Hindenburg and members of the government; his officers were charged and imprisoned, and their activities suppressed. But once in power, Hitler was able to turn the tables, to suppress and tyrannize his former opponents.

To say the power was gained by "fake, coercion, bully-boys” is another way of saying the Nazis gained support by crudely exploiting discontent; a familiar political course, which was attempted by the Communists and Social Democrats also. You are correct, of course, in saying the backing of capital is always provided. Hitler was supplied with funds by German industrial capitalists, armaments manufacturers in Germany and France, and American and other foreign investors who needed protection.

It is likewise a myth that Mussolini "seized power”. The Italian government (a democratic, constitutional one) and monarch wanted him in office, and arrangements to this end were made before the farcical “March on Rome”. Mussolini’s first Cabinet included a number of non-Fascists, and Parliament voted him emergency powers; while outside Parliament the Fascists exploited discontent with the so-called Socialist Party to gain support.

In the more recent examples you give, of course violent upheavals take place, but whoever is successful must (a) placate the mass of the population and (b) harness his aims to the needs of the capitalist system, if power is to be maintained by him. You assert that: “The people here and the world over will probably have to seize power.” If you mean the people, i.e. the great majority, capitalism will be impotent against their will when they become Socialist. The outcome will be not “seizing power” — which implies some kind of desperate fling — but taking control of the political machinery to abolish capitalism and establish Socalism.

Women's Lib. & "Bigots”

I was disgusted to read that at the 70th Annual Conference it was decided that being a member of Women’s Lib. is incompatible with membership of the SPGB. At the moment I have no wish to join Women’s Lib. but one of the reasons I left the Party was that I objected to having my life ordered about by a group of narrow-minded, authoritarian bigots. I thought maybe the Party would, however, gradually become more libertarian as time went on but it does not appear to be so. It is a great pity because the Socialist message is itself invincible. Soon Party members will have to get permission before they can join the local choir, I expect — a heinous crime to sing Christmas carols or vote for anything that is going to improve the lot of the workers, both men and women.

Jeanne Conn

London S.E.9.

Reply

We are sorry that you think single-minded determination to pursue an object is bigotry However, the reasons why we find membership of Women’s Lib. incompatible with membership of the Socialist Party were set out at length in our July issue and in a reply to a correspondent in October. It would be more constructive if you explained where, in your opinion, that reasoning is wrong.

Have you considered that the left-wing parties — Communists, International Socialists and so on — which support Women’s Lib. stand for the establishment of dictatorial regimes, and exclude democracy from their practice?

Your letter makes some wild assertions which are quite untrue, and you should be ashamed of them. As you know, members of the SPGB have interests and pursuits from football and painting to the cinema and genealogy (don’t know if there are choristers) and lead what lives they wish without interference by the Party. Would you have expected your letter to be published if half of what you say were true?

Appreciation

Enclosed is money order for the next 12 issues of the Socialist Standard.

I would like to compliment you on the recent Anniversary issue which I thought quite outstanding. Also I believe the SS is now much more interesting than previously due to the correspondence columns being given greater prominence.

Keep up the good work. You might be interested in the enclosed cartoon which appeared recently in the Sydney Morning Herald. As you can see we still have a long way to go.

With best wishes from "down under".

George Boldison,

New South Wales

50 Years Ago: Fascism and the State (1977)

The 50 Years Ago column from the December 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard

When we urge the supreme importance of the working class capturing Parliament, with the administrative departments and local councils which it controls, we are often met with the argument that the Fascists came to power in defiance of the then constitutionally elected Italian government.

★ ★ ★

But as we have pointed out before, the Fascist seizure of power took place not in defiance of, but with the approval and active assistance of, the democratically elected Italian government. But for that active assistance Mussolini and his followers would have been helpless. Then, as before and since, the possession of the State machinery proved to be the deciding factor. Our view has received interesting confirmation from three sources—the Italian Communist, Bordiga; Professor Salvemini, a Liberal; and Modigliani, of the Italian Socialist Party.

Bordiga says (Labour Magazine, February & March 1923):- ‘After the Nitti, Giolitti, and Bonomi governments, we had the Facta Cabinet. This government was intended to cover up the complete liberty of action of Fascism in its expansion over the whole country. During the strike in August 1922, several conflicts took place between the workers and the Fascisti, who were openly aided by the government.

★ ★ ★

Wherever Fascism had been beaten back by the workers, the power of the State intervened; workers who resisted were shot down; workers who were guilty of nothing but self-defence were arrested and sentenced; while the magistrates systematically acquitted the Fascisti, who were generally known to have committed innumerable crimes.

Thus the State was the main factor in the development of Fascism.

(From an editorial “Fascism and the State”, Socialist Standard, Dec. 1927.)

What to Do About Fascism (1936)

From the November 1936 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Fascist Pot and the Communist Kettle

In the sacred name of liberty Sir Oswald Mosley – who proposes, like his heroes, Mussolini and Hitler, to destroy all opposition parties if he gets power – demands the right to lead his blackshirt troops into the East End. In the sacred name of liberty the Communists – who propose here, as in Russia, to crush all opposition parties if they get power – call upon us all to rally against Sir Oswald Mosley. The Socialist Party of Great Britain, which does not propose to prevent anyone, anywhere, from voicing his opinions and organising peacefully to propagate them, is completely and permanently opposed to both of these suppressive movements. We are opposed to their objects, their methods and their secret finances, but principally to their objects because they neither of them have the solution for the problem of our age. The underlying discontent with things as they are in State-capitalist Russia is so widespread that the dictator and his yes-men are thoroughly scared lest one exile in Norway should prove a rallying point and endanger their positions. In the Fascist lands poverty and promises are as much the order of the day as in the capitalist democracies. Italy and Germany are as much the paradise of the moneyed men, the exploiters of human labour, as England and America. Nothing is changed except the patriotic trimmings and the colour of the shirt.

The Right to Wear what Clothes We Wish

When Sir Oswald Mosley, fresh from his visits of adoration to Mussolini and Hitler, asks if in this country “a man might not wear the clothes he wished to wear?” as he did in an address to Manchester business men on October 9th (Manchester Guardian, October 10th), he at once betrays the limitations of the Fascist movement, and of his own understanding. Nowhere in the capitalist world, whether under Baldwin, Sir Oswald’s former political associate, or under the foreign Fascist dictators, at whose feet he now sits, can a man wear what clothes he wishes to wear. All he can wear is what his class-position enables him to afford. If he is a typical worker, a wealth-producer, he will wear clothes that are cheap and nasty, tasteless and inadequate. If he is a member of the propertied class, whether Liberal or Nazi, Conservative or Fascist, then, and only then, can he exercise his choice about the way he lives, including the clothes he wears. This is the crucial test of all the reformist movements from Mosley to Morrison. None of them dare face up to the question why it is that they propose to use power to preserve the class ownership of the means of production and distribution.

The Fascists Can’t Cure Capitalism

True, the Fascists can point to the manifold reformist activities of the Fascist Governments – and to the decline of unemployment. But this is now the favourite theme of all the apologists for capitalism, everywhere. Capitalism, after its latest crisis, is going through an expanding phase. So unemployment declines because of the expansion of trade and also because of the expansion of capitalism’s most thriving industries: armies and armaments. The Berlin correspondent of the Economist (September 19th, 1936) reports that the official number of unemployed is down to 1,098,000, and adds:

  "The Reich Unemployment Board considers that the shortage of skilled labour in certain industries is the result of compulsory military service.”

And what does it mean, anyway, when we admit that all the capitalist Governments are busy with schemes for patching up this, that and the other evil of capitalism? It means that capitalism is always producing more evils, and that the Fascists are as incapable as any other capitalist Government of solving them. Catholic Dictator Schuschnigg, in Austria, plays the age-old game of bread and circuses because the “Corporative State” is as mangy as all the other variations of capitalist rule. Read what the Vienna correspondent of the Daily Telegraph writes:

  “The Government is presenting 50,000 tickets of admission to football matches, 50,000 cinema, and 10,000 theatre tickets to the members of the (Fatherland) Front. About 400,000 free breakfasts and free railway transport for all will be provided.” (Daily Telegraph, October 15th, 1936.)

This was Schuschnigg’s great victory parade at which the population were to give a spontaneous demonstration of loyalty and enthusiasm. The attendance was splendid – it was compulsory for large numbers of workers: “attend or lose your job” was the threat. Still the dictator failed. His “promises of improved conditions for the masses were received without enthusiasm. When he denounced Socialism and democracy the great crowd remained silent.” (Daily Telegraph, October 19th, 1936). It appears that the workers opened their mouths for the free meal and then kept them obstinately shut.

In Italy, a land of semi-paupers and millionaires, like the rest of the big powers, Mussolini blethers about Empire and prosperity like any Conservative but he cannot cure unemployment, he does not find a remedy for desperate poverty, and he never fails to look after capitalist interests. What else can he do, having no choice but to carry on capitalism? On Tuesday, October 13th, his Government instructed stockbrokers to submit the names and addresses of all clients who buy industrial shares. This was at 9.30 a.m. The Fascist syndicate of brokers promptly held a meeting and passed a resolution that “it would be advisable to close all the bourses rather than have to obey the latest order.” The Government instantly climbed down and agreed by 9.45 a.m. to waive the order. (Daily Telegraph, October 14th, 1936.) This is Mosley’s paradise for the workers in which he affects to believe that money no longer rules.

Then in Germany, where the Nazis claim to have got rid of talking-shops, and introduced Socialist deeds instead of capitalist and Labour Party promises, Hitler stages his own brand of circuses for keeping the workers’ attention off their own slave-like conditions. The Nuremberg rally of the Nazi Party in September, at which Hitler begged the German workers to keep their eyes fixed on poverty in Russia (lest they should look nearer home), was a splendiferous jamboree costing £2,000,000 (Daily Telegraph, September 8th, 1936). It contained all the fun of the political fair, every species of mental dope calculated to stop a worker from thinking.

Then, at home, what has Mosley to offer except a mixed bag of reforms of capitalism picked up on his passage from the Conservative Party, via the Labour Party, I.L.P., and New Party to the British Union of Fascists. I.L.P. reforms – 40 years old – plus Communist violence, plus the current exaggerated economic nationalism and patriotism, plus half-baked Stafford Cripps doctrines of rule by Order in Council. That is the sum total of Mosley’s programme: it is as rotten as the rubbish heaps from which it has been gathered.

The Fascists and Disorder

The Fascist technique of propaganda and gaining power is simple, but its effectiveness depends entirely on the level of political knowledge and experience of the workers and on the behaviour of the opponents of Fascism. Fascism (copying most of the traditional methods of the Labour Parties) exploits every phase of working-class and small-capitalist discontent. It denounces Jews, Freemasons, Catholics, Trade Union officials, bankers, all big corporations, bureaucracy, Parliament, financial scandals, unemployment, etc., etc. Where it scores over the older methods is in provoking disorder with the assistance of those who believe they are hindering it. Given an increasing number of marches and the appearance if not even the reality of disorder the Fascist leaders know that they can count, with certainty, on growing support from numerous quarters. They get the support of all who have grievances against Jews, Freemasons, and so on, but, above all, they get the support of large numbers of people who, knowing little of politics, are simply scared by disorder. Such people, if they believe they have to choose between the Communist Party and the Fascists, choose the latter. Every riot brings Mosley support from them.

How, it may be asked, do the Fascists manage to win over workers who formerly supported the Labour Parties; as they succeeded in doing in Italy and Germany, and are doing here? Why is the Labour Party reformist demagogy less successful than it used to be? The answer is simple.       

Labour Parties and Fascism           

Before the War the world was obviously governed by and for the propertied class, landed and plutocratic, on a more or less restricted Parliamentary franchise. The inevitable discontent with capitalism naturally drove workers to support democratic parties claiming to be particularly concerned with political and social reforms.

After the War the franchise was made more or less universal in nearly all countries, and Labour or Liberal-Labour Governments became common. With what result? Capitalism continued, therefore discontent continued. But now the discontent had to find a new outlet. Having tried capitalism under democracy, the workers were ripe for a new kind of demagogue, one preaching dictatorship. Renegade Labour leaders hastened to adjust themselves to the change of fashion. They reaped the harvest, but who sowed the seed? None other than the Labour Parties. It is they who poisoned politics with their doctrines of reforming capitalism without abolishing it.

The Key to Modern Politics

The idea still survives that politics is concerned with a struggle of ideas about Government, trade, etc. Nothing could be further from the truth. Politics is concerned with the ownership of the land, factories, railways and all the accumulated property of the country. The small minority who own and control all that matters, the late Sir J. Ellerman with his £50 million, Joseph Rank and Lord Nuffield, reputed to be worth upwards of £20 million each, the Lady Houstons and the Wills and Coats families, and all the rest of the owning class, have one overriding interest, one motive, one determination. They may tell simple-minded newspaper readers that “Money means nothing to me. I could just as easily go back to where I started – in fact, I might be happier if I did” (Lord Nuffield, News Chronicle, October 17th, 1936), but their actions, individual and combined, belie their words. No exploiting class ever gives up its privileged position until it has tried every conceivable device to retain what it has.

Broadly speaking, in the 20th century the capitalist class are on the defensive. Ideas are on the march. Workers are beginning to think. From the capitalist standpoint that movement must be stopped, destroyed, divided, or turned into blind alleys – anything to preserve capitalism. If the discontented organise to secure reforms the capitalists can try buying off the leaders, offering small concessions to the rank and file, playing off one section against another, Catholic against Protestant, Jew against Arab, German against English, Blackshirt against Greenshirt and Redshirt. And if one group forges ahead and becomes influential, then the capitalists must come to terms with it – hence Labour Governments, and if, in due course, the popularity of Labour Governments wanes then the new rounders-up of working-class votes, the Fascists, must be given their turn. So capitalism goes on.

In Italy and Germany Mussolini and Hitler trod on the heels of discredited Syndicalism and Labourism, backed by capitalist money and under the protecting arm of the State.

Now Mosley says that he is receiving support from English industrial capitalists (see Rome Giornale d’Italia, quoted in News Chronicle, October 19th, 1936). They hope that he will be able to give capitalism – meaning themselves – a further lease of life.

If the Workers Go Fascist

Many who are alarmed at the growth of Fascism in England talk in a panicky way of fighting or crushing the movement, and appeal to the Government to ban uniforms. This is all so much waste of words. The issue rests with the workers in the main. If the workers understood capitalism and Socialism they would not fall for the Fascist claptrap – but neither would they fall for Liberal. Labour or Conservative claptrap. If, on the other hand, the workers here can, as in Italy and Germany, be won over in their hundreds of thousands to the Fascist programme then all talk of suppression is idle. If the workers want Fascist Government they will get it, as they got Labour Government. At certain stages of the Hitler movement the Prussian and German Governments did try to ban his movement, forbid uniforms and demonstrations, etc., but they failed to stem the drift towards him.

The only answer to Fascism, as to other capitalist-reformist movements, is knowledge and understanding. Their economic programme would deceive no worker who gave serious thought to it –which is, doubtless, one reason why the Mosleyites prefer riotous demonstrations to quiet meetings at which their programme has to be stated in all its poverty.

The most seductive claim of the Fascists is that they are Socialists. Hitler repeated this again in Berlin on October 6th (News Chronicle, October 7th, 1936), and it is the common argument of the Mosley movement nowadays. Every Labourite will laugh at the notion that the Mosleyite programme of reforms is Socialist; but they have little enough reason to laugh. Who, if not the Labour Party and I.L.P., started this dishonest practice? Who made it possible for Lord Beaverbrook’s Daily Express to say (October 1st) that it opposes Socialism but not the Labour Party – “that is a very different thing.”

If the Fascists can get support by misrepresenting Socialism, that is largely due to all the Labour speakers who have done the same in the past.

The Struggle Will Go On

The rise of Fascism to power in this country is, to say the least, improbable. The problems facing the British capitalists, in particular the international situation, are not of a kind to make them give up flattering the Labour and Trade Union leaders in order to encourage Mosley. At a pinch a more likely development, if the situation threatens war, is an enlarged “National Government” in which Trade Union leaders and Mosley work happily together defending British capitalism. 

What is more important to remember about Fascism here and abroad is that the eventual failure of the Fascist movements is as certain as the failure of Labour Governments which helped them to rise. Fascism is incapable of making capitalism work satisfactorily. It is an impossible task. Capitalism goes on producing discontent under the surface. The future of Fascism is forecast in the growing activity of anti-Fascists in Italy and Austria. Sooner or later all the Fascist facades of capitalism will fall away, leaving the main problem still to be tackled. The workers will still have to be won over to Socialism. That is the task for Socialists, whether under Dictatorship or Democracy.

Edgar Hardcastle

The Labour Party Conference (1935)

From the November 1935 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Labour Party Conference was held this year at Brighton. For many reasons it was outstanding. The imminence of a general election gave it a cautious tone. The memory of two Labour Governments served to remind delegates and leaders that economic and political problems do not vanish as before the wave of a magician's wand when a Labour Government is elected. This robbed them of some of the cocksureness of former years. Promises of what they would do if and when they were elected were not so lavish. Delegates seemed to sense their limitations. Mr. George Lansbury, for years, had talked of “classless society" and “the brotherhood of man” in a way which implied these things to be Labour Party objects. He still talked of “classless society" and the “brotherhood of man," but only as an “ultimate goal." The irrefutable fact has apparently penetrated his mind that whatever else these objects are they are not Labour Party policy, and that Labour Party policy does not go beyond the immediate one of administering capitalism.

Mr. Lansbury is perhaps typical of many thousands of members and followers of the Labour Party. It is to be hoped that events have had the effect of similarly dispelling their illusions. In seeking to get the votes of the workers the Labour Party resorts to the electioneering trickery of the other capitalist parties. Unemployment and other evils which are part and parcel of capitalism are attributed to the policy of the party in power, completely ignoring the fact that no remedy for these evils was produced when a Labour Government itself was in power. This, however, was forgotten when Conference made comparisons between Labour Governments and the present Government. The “National" Government was described as a fraud, but no mention was made that many present leaders of the Labour Party were alleged to have been prepared to join it when it was formed if the trade unions had not threatened to withdraw financial support from the Labour Party.

The Question of Sanctions Against Italy

There was one question—the Italian dispute with Abyssinia—which dominated Conference, took up most of its time and caused other matters to be treated as routine questions. A resolution demanding that sanctions be applied against Italy was carried by the enormous majority of twenty to one. No effort was made to conceal the fact that sanctions might lead to war. In winding up the debate on the resolution, Mr. Morrison said : “The economic and financial sanctions may well be effective. But do not let us delude ourselves with that belief. If they are not effective, I am not going to say that military sanctions are to be ruled out when it may weaken the power for peace" (Daily Herald, October 3rd).

Mr. Morrison, however, did not explain how military sanctions could strengthen peace. He did not, because he could not. To send British and other armies to Abyssinia to drive out the Italian army is not peace, but war. Nor did Mr. Morrison explain how war would serve working-class interests. He did not, because he could not. If war is the outcome of the present capitalist quarrel it will be because of the competitive basis of capitalist society. The Labour Party has apparently learned little since 1914. If there is any difference at all between their position in 1914 and now it is that their support of capitalist interests, and willingness to send workers to the shambles, is more shameless now than it was then.

It is not surprising in view of his demand for sanctions, including, if need be, military sanctions or war, that Mr. Morrison obtained the withdrawal of the resolution which came next on the agenda. It ran: —

  This conference declares its hostility to the proposals for instituting civilian air-raid drill, and considers these proposals not only futile as a means of protection against aerial attack, but a definite attempt to arouse public feeling in favour of the Government’s arms policy.
   This conference therefore instructs the National Council of Labour to draw up plans immediately for organising public resistance to compulsory air-raid drill, and recommends all Labour controlled authorities to refuse to operate the Government’s plans in any way.—(Daily Herald, October 4th.)

That piece of simple-mindedness, or electioneering tactics, was obviously on the agenda before the present crisis developed.

The open discussion in the Press of the sanctions being applied against Italy, together with the present dangerous international situation, has produced some strange results. Many who imagined that sanctions were a guarantee of peace, suddenly had brought home to them that they might lead to war. It may be crediting Mr. Lansbury with ingenuousness to say that he shared this illusion, but it appears that that was the case. Indeed, how else could his change of mind be explained. Sir Stafford Cripps, who was not under this illusion, and demanded that sanctions be applied to Japan when that country invaded China, changed his mind when the question was nearer home and when the possibility of the Labour Party, as the Government, having to apply them was less remote than then. Perhaps the most ardent sabre-rattlers were those who suggested that Fascism was the real enemy.

The present support by the Labour Party of the League of Nations is the logical result of its policy since the last war. To go back on this policy now would, they think, mean a loss of political prestige, and consequently of votes.

Harry Waite

The Present Condition of Italy (1935)

From the September 1935 issue of the Socialist Standard

 This article, which we publish for the information of readers interested in the attitude of Italian workers towards their rulers, is taken from the Indian Labour Journal, July 28th, where it appeared under the title, “Through Italy." It was supplied by the International Transport Workers' Federation and was written by a former resident in Italy who recently had the opportunity of making a tour of investigation. For reasons of space it has been necessary to shorten the article. While offering it for information, we do not share the writer's point of view on all points.—Editorial Committee

Grotesque as it may sound, Italy is at present a Fascist state in which there are no longer any Fascists. This is the astounding result of the observations I have made during a tour of several weeks through the entire country, a tour which enabled me to come into touch with all classes of the population and to learn what their disposition was. Clear distinctions must be made between appearances and reality. As far as appearances go, the Fascist spirit is still trumps. Fascist uniforms and badges are still being worn, and the Roman salute is given. But I have found that people who are outwardly out-and-out Fascists confess, in confidential chats, to being the most downright anti-Fascists. That this is not due to a concatenation of coincidences but represents the general situation is shown by a saying now current in Italy, which runs as follows:

Three Italians together—three Fascists; two Italians together—two friends; one Italian alone— one anti-Fascist!

The estrangement from Fascism is equally marked in all classes of the population. Workers are anti- Fascists, the farmers are anti-Fascists, the middle-class people are anti-Fascists, the capitalists are anti-Fascists. Some are so because, besides taking away their liberty, Fascism has also robbed them of their scanty livings, others because they tremble to observe that Fascism is steering more and more towards an economic disaster. Those basing their judgment on appearances alone and not getting into closer touch with the people, will have no inkling of such a disposition of the people in Italy. Again and again tourists in Italy have recounted to me in the most enthusiastic terms the great and far-reaching changes that have taken place under Mussolini. Fascism, according to them, has extracted Italy from its former position of backwardness, and raised it within hardly thirteen years to the level of the big European industrial states. In proof of this they point to the up-to-date arterial roads met with all over the country, one of which actually leads up Mount Etna to a height of 2,000 metres; to the work of modernisation, the signs of which are to be seen in any of the larger towns; to the progress of traffic facilities, etc., etc.; not forgetting, of course, the construction of new towns like Littoria and Sabauda, which announce their existence to the tourist from afar, being bathed in seas of light such as are elsewhere only to be met with in a metropolis.

Those are all incontrovertible facts. Those visiting Italy to-day, and remembering the state of the country ten or twenty years back, got the impression that a fresh state on a gigantic scale has been made in the direction of progress. But this impression rapidly fades on deviating even a few kilometres from the main roads of the tourist traffic in Italy. There the order of the day is not construction but dilapidation. The houses and alleys are dirtier than ever before. Nowhere is a new building, or even so much as a scaffolding, to be seen. The people are badly dressed and badly nourished. The tourist witnesses a scene of indescribable squalor. In Messina, for example, slums dating from the time of the earthquake are to be seen, generating pestilential smells. Usually—at least in the south—electric light extends no farther than a few kilometres from the towns, and even the railway stations have to carry on with oil lamps for illumination. In many cases drinking water has to be conveyed in big tank trains to places where there are no springs, not to mention water mains. Sicily, once the granary of Rome, is even now still withered and dried up in summer over two-thirds of its area, because Fascism, too, has failed to provide the necessary irrigation works, the construction of luxurious, and consequently uneconomic, arterial roads evidently seeming to Fascism to be of greater moment and thus more urgent.

It will be readily understood that the Italian country people are not exactly rapturous about the arterial roads. They are shrewd enough to know not only that they only swallow up the money needed for the construction of irrigation works and the better maintenance of their own roads, but also that their own increasing poverty is somehow connected with the luxury constructions of Mussolini. The country people, they say, must fare worse, so that the townspeople may fare all the more luxuriously.

Campaign against Abyssinia

What distinguishes Italy nowadays very markedly from what it was in former times is the dominance of the uniform in street scenes. Many towns give the tourist at once the impression of just having wandered into a big barrack. It is as if the entire Italian nation had exchanged the mandoline for the rifle and as if Mussolini cherished ambitions—besides those of being a maker of roads and builder of cities—to make Italy the Prussia of the Mediterranean.

In the south, uniforms are much more plentiful than in the north. Anyone travelling from Messina to Milan might get the idea that he was travelling, through two different countries, one at war, the other at peace. Militia especially are rarely to be seen in the streets of northern towns. In Milan I could go about for hours in the busiest parts of the town without coming across a single militia uniform. Fascist badges are also less plentiful in the north, while the Roman salute is conspicuous only by its absence.

These distinctions are not confined to appearances, either. The people of the north have not managed to get up any real enthusiasm for Fascism. They consider it as a fruit of the south and, above all, a costly one.

That antipathy to Fascism is stronger and less covert in the north, could be inferred from the short-livedness of the Fascist placards. Stuck up overnight they were torn up by the next day, in the hub of the town as well as on the outskirts. I was told that this has been quite a common occurrence for a long time past. Typical Fascist papers, too, are read in the north to a much less degree than in the south. Mussolini’s Popolo d'Italia, which is published at Milan, was indeed vociferously hawked about the streets, but hardly any were being sold.

Is this land of uniforms also indeed a militarised land? This question interested me keenly. During a long stay in the country previously I had come to regard the Italians as a peace-loving people, to whom militarism and war were abhorrent. It was just when more than two decades back I stood for the first time in the square fronting the cathedral of Milan, that I found myself surrounded by crowds of people taking part in a mass demonstration against the Lybian war. Had Mussolini succeeded in so completely reversing the character of a nation as to cause it now to greet a similar enterprise with jubilation?

In order to satisfy myself on this point I have taken great pains, making observations throughout the country as to how the nation is reacting to the Abyssinian conflict. And I have discovered no trace of any such enthusiasm as the Italian newspapers would like to make out as existing, for the sake of opinion abroad and even at home. The attitude of the people is one of earnest reticence, and in intimate chats I was able to elicit surprising opinions, lending a somewhat sinister aspect to the present state of affairs in Italy. A former Communist, now to all appearances a strict Fascist, explained to me that Mussolini’s assault on Abysinia was the most palpable proof that he was at the end of his resources. It had not been forgotten in Italy, he said, that former regimes had always begun an African campaign when they got into difficulties; and Mussolini was pursuing the same method. He should not be restrained, however, in this enterprise, but rather urged on. On the rock-bound plains of Abyssinia grew no laurels for him to pluck. He would merely be running his head against that rocky wall as so many others had done before him, not least the Italians.

In uttering these sentiments the Communist was only voicing the thoughts of many an Italian as to Mussolini’s Abyssinian venture. Similar expectations were expressed by the Italians in most of the conversations I had with them, and simple workers more than once remarked: “We need the guns to put an end to the famine.’’ And when, with feigned astonishment, I inquired whether by “famine” they really meant Fascism, the answer was in the affirmative every time.

A Hunger-Stricken Land

It made a great impression on me that the workers had hardly let themselves be infected by Fascism at all. Of one accord, north and south, they reject it; and this observation of mine has frequently been confirmed by remarks I have heard in bourgeois circles. This contrasts markedly with Hitler’s national socialism which, by means of the so-called “Battle of Labour,” has succeeded in sweeping a considerable portion of the workers off their feet.

I seek the explanation in the fact Mussolini had no such hard and unfortunately effective predecessors in wage-cutting as Hitler had later in Brüning and Von Papen. He had to make the cuts himself and consequently to unmask himself before the workers from the very outset. Besides this, the severe unemployment prevailing in Italy to-day first came into the country under Fascism, so that Mussolini was not able, either, to lay the blame for it on to his predecessors in the Government; nor could he make “Marxism” the scapegoat, for its organisations had never obtained representation in the Government. The relief work provided by Mussolini in the shape of the construction of arterial roads, harbour works, public buildings, etc., did not succeed in making the desired impression on the Italian workers, who, in contrast to the Germans, are not satisfied merely with working, but want to make a living by it, too. And Fascism has failed to enable them to do so. The thirteen years of Mussolini’s dictatorship have proved to the workers to be thirteen years of continual robbery of their wages and thus of their subsistence.

The most deplorable conditions in this respect I have come across in the south. Here the average daily wages amount to a mere seven lire, equivalent to about 2s. 4d. Only in quite exceptional cases is this level exceeded in the south. A wage of twelve lire is regarded there as quite a big income. In Central Italy and, above all, in the north, the level is, generally speaking, higher, and would be, for the broad masses in the region of 18 lire. Skilled tradesmen may occasionally be found earning more, in exceptional cases perhaps as much as 30 lire, but this is exceptional indeed. The elite of the manual and brain workers is considered to be the civil servants, whose monthly incomes vary for the most part from 400 to 700 lire. All the figures given represent gross earnings which, in practice, suffer considerable reductions in the shape of compulsory contributions to Fascist organisations, etc.

But it should by no means be inferred that this low level of wages carries with it a correspondingly low level of prices. Italy is rather to be classed among the dear countries than among the cheap ones.

Another rock menacing Mussolini is his increasing isolation in the midst of the Italian people. It has already led to a fundamental alteration in the character of the Fascist dictatorship. Able, formerly, to rely on the support of certain sections of the bourgeoisie, it has now no other backing than that provided by the Fascist militia. For the alienation of the bourgeoisie from Fascism has been accompanied by an increasing loss of hold on the regular forces, the officers of which practically reflect the opinions and ideas in vogue among the bourgeoisie. The higher officers’ circles were never particularly attached to Fascism. The generals had compounded with it because they were in need of its services, and because they had their orders from the King. Now the old discrepancies have cropped up again, and on the part of the officers, at any rate, little effort is made to conceal them from the public. Yet Mussolini need have no immediate fears on this score. A military dictatorship would be compromised in Italy to-day just as much as the present dictatorship of the militia is, and at all events the fall of Mussolini would, to the masses of the workers, be the signal for a storm such as no military sabres could hope to arrest. This is indeed the sole reason why the bourgeoisie find it expedient to fold their hands and let things take their natural course. Fearing the consequences of Mussolini’s policy as they do, they fear even more the unknown things that may lurk behind Fascism to emerge when it has fallen.

Nor need Mussolini fear as yet the hostility of the agricultural and industrial workers. Their limbs are paralysed by the terror of dictatorship, and they lack, too, the organisational connections and political conceptions needful to enable them to carry out a really menacing movement against the dictatorial system.

More important to my mind at present, therefore, appears the rock which may loom up in Mussolini’s path in the shape of his own militia. It is no uncommon thing for the good understanding between dictators and their militia to be of short duration. We have a bloody case in point in the events of June 30th, 1934. Such St. Bartholomew’s Eves among friends Mussolini has not been obliged to exhibit to the world, only because, being a better student of history than Hitler, he had thoroughly purged his militia long before the fabled “March on Rome,” and thenceforward subjected it to continual siftings. Only just during the last few weeks he seems to have resumed his activities in this direction, for the dispatchment of strong contingents of militia to Africa is generally attributed to difficulties that Mussolini has experienced out of the ranks of his own troops. Everything points to the fact that this time he is carrying out the most drastic purge that ever the Fascist militia in Italy have experienced. But cauterise the existing sores as he may, the virus, uneliminated, is sure to break out again in fresh places, and the more evident the isolation of his dictatorship becomes to the public, the more and the worse these sores will grow.

I have not been in sufficiently close touch with the internal affairs of the Fascist militia to be able to determine with any degree of exactitude the extent and the reasons of the conflicts that have arisen within its ranks. But the looming shapes of these rocks are becoming more and more clearly outlined. Will Mussolini be able to steer clear of these, too? Just now it rather seems as if he will run straight on to them at headlong speed, if he does not run up against the financial or the Abyssinian rocks first.