Editorial: May 1st, 1906. (1906)

Editorial from the May 1906 issue of the Socialist Standard

Os this day, the world over, the advance guard of the army of the revolution which is to break the power of the private possessors of the means of life to dominate and keep in subjection the workers who alone manipulate those means in the process of production, will meet in demonstration of their solidarity of purpose. On this day, in every country where capitalism has entered in to wring from the sweat and the sorrow of Labour, those profits which provide for capital's ministers luxurious comfort and all the pleasures that wealth can command, in earth and sky and sea, the harbingers of the co-operative Commonwealth destined to arise upon the debris of the present capitalist system which must give it birth, will gather rejoicing in the knowledge that everywhere their comrades have special thought for the international character of their mighty movement; that even where their comrades have turned aside from the work immediately before them to survey the vast field over which the operations of their many organisations extend, and to observe with glad satisfaction the measure of success which has attended the efforts of each section of their party. North, South, East and West, separated by vast seas and great mountains, yet animated by the same desire, inspired by the same ideal, fired by the same enthusiasm, the working-class armies press forward, steadily recruiting their strength as they go. Rank upon rank in ever increasing numbers they march confident in the final issue of the struggle in which they are engaged.

It is well that we should take a short breathing space occasionally and renew our strength for our fight at home in the observation of the success of our comrades overseas. To-day, whatever suggestion of insularity there may be in our work as a national section of an international movement, is dispelled as we stretch out the hand of fellowship to the organised, class-conscious workers of other countries, and echo back the shout of fraternal greeting with which they salute us.