The way out. (1910)

From the August 1910 issue of the Socialist Standard

The greatest problem before the working class to-day, the problem that requires immediate attention, is poverty. On all hands the existence, of poverty amid extreme wealth is admitted. All parties, no matter what their label, admit the existence of this problem and trot out one scheme or another that they claim will alleviate the evil. Before considering remedies, it is necessary to discover the cause of the evil, and having found that, to endeavour to, if possible, abolish the evil by removing the cause.

The first important fact that confronts us in this examination is the fact that poverty is confined to one section of the community, and, strangely enough, to that section which alone produces the welter of riches we see around us. We find that it is the hewers of wood and the drawers of water that are poor, while the idle class are rich.

Why is it that those who produce wealth in abundance receive but sufficient to keep them alive ?

It is not that there is not sufficient wealth in the country to supply the needs of the whole people, for we find it admitted on all hands that that wealth is increasing by leaps and bounds, while at the same time the poverty and misery of the workers increase.

The very fact that men able, and willing to produce are unemployed shows that there need be no scarcity of wealth.

There is sufficient for all, but the working class are denied the opportunity of consuming it; nor are they allowed to operate the tools of production in order to produce what they need.

We are forced then to see that members of the working class, while desirous of producing, are prevented from so doing by another class, who own the means of wealth production. This class are thereby enabled to dictate terms to the workers, who are forced to accept them in order to obtain sustenance.

The terms are that they shall create a value far in excess of the amount paid to them in wages. The difference between the value they receive and the value they create is taken by the capitalist as his profit.

This surplus, the result of the robbery of the worker, is piled up by the capitalist, who is unable to consume it fast enough, with the result that sooner or later the markets are glutted and the workers discharged. With the growing productivity of labour we find these periodical gluts recurring with ever greater rapidity. The unemployed army, growing greater and greater, clamouring for a purchaser at almost any price, force down the wages of those employed to the lowest possible level, despite all attempts on the part of the latter to raise them.

The class that produce the wealth are in poverty because that wealth when produced is stolen from them by the capitalist class.

The capitalists are enabled to steal the workers’ product because they own the only means by which they can live.

As we have seen, the working class are compelled to produce more than they receive because they are forced to accept the masters’ terms in order to live. Should they endeavour to take those things necessary for their maintenance, or try to use the means of production for themselves, they are faced with the police and, these not sufficing, the military.

The master class control the fighting forces and are prepared to use them to maintain their position. They are enabled to use those forces through their control of the political machine—which they hold by the votes of the class they have robbed. In a word, the continuation of the workers’ poverty is due to the fact that they have voted their enemies into power.

What, then, is the remedy ? How are the working class to regain that which has been stolen from them ? How are they to stop the robbery in future ?

Obviously by the removal of the root cause ; the ejection from power of the capitalist class ; the control of political power by the working class, in order that they may throw off from their shoulders the class which oppresses them and theieby gain access to the means of wealth production.

This can only be accomplished by the organisation of the working class into a party hostile to their enemy the capitalist class, determined to end capital, capitalist and capitalism.

The capitalist hirelings, led by the “statesman of Labour,” John Burns, tell you that the poverty of the worker is due to his thriftlessness and excessive drinking habits. While telling you this they are compelled to publish figures proving that poverty is on the increase while the expenditure on intoxicating liquors de-creates year by year.

Despite an increased expenditure of £93,000 on wines (certainly not a working class drink), the total drink bill for 1909 shows a decrease of £5,897,997 compared with that of 1908. Taking into consideration the increase in prices the total decrease in the consumption of liqour amounts to about £11,147,997.

Capitalist statisticians and others, while attributing the greater amount of poverty to drink, are compelled to admit that it is not possible to eradicate the “drink evil” while the housing condition of the workers remains as it is. Drinking habits, they admit are largely due to the vile housing accommodation and the course and indigestible food of the workers.

The workers live in the slums and consume bad food because they are poor, so we are brought back again to the original cause, namely, poverty. The Tory party, in order to get the votes of the working class, bring forward a proposal which they call Tariff Reform. They tell us that a tariff placed upon foreign manufactured goods will keep out foreign competition and at the same time raise, by the tax (upon the goods that are to be kept out), sufficient to enable them to finance measures of social reform.

The Tory leaders, however, have admitted that Tariff Reform will rot solve the poverty problem, and a little enquiry into the conditions of the working class in those countries where protection has been established will show that Tariff Reform is no solution.

The Liberal party have been compelled to admit that they have no remedy. Free Trade, they say, is the workers’ real protection, whereas under free trade capitalism the workers starve. Both parties are pledged to support the present system of class ownership and are consequently enemies of the working class,

The Labour Party are pledged to support capitalism through the Liberal party, while in its turn the I.L.P. has sunk its political identity in the Labour Party.

The S.D.P. has all along shown its ignorance of the working-class position. While at times preaching the antagonism of interest existing between the two classes it has constantly blurred the issue by advising the workers to support sections of the master class. It exists merely for the purpose of advocating reforms of the present system, such as State maintenance for school children, the right to work, etc., none of which touches the poverty problem at all. They also have endeavoured to make alliances with the historic enemies of the working class and can be lumped with the other parties as being worthless from the point of view of the worker.

The only party that stands for the entire abolition of capitalism and all that capitalism involves ; the only party that has laid down a clear and definite set of principles in accord with economic truths, and stood by them consistently ; the only party that aims at, and steadfastly works for, the elimination of the causes that make for poverty, is the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

Twel.

A Lesson from a “White Paper.” (1910)

From the August 1910 issue of the Socialist Standard

The futility of palliatives, amongst which we must perforce reckon conciliation boards, is strikingly illustrated by the consideration of the Board of Trade White Paper containing the preliminary statement relating to the railways of the United Kingdom for ’09. The result of a few of the decisions of the conciliation boards operate in favour of the men, but only on comparatively unimportant questions. By judicious “wangling,” ruthless cutting down and agreements between companies, any slight advantage to the men has been more than out-weighed, smd there is more despotism than ever. The financial results of the year’s operations compared with 1908 were as follows :

	1909	Inc. Or decrease
	£	£
Passenger receipts	51,198,000	-467,000
Goods receipts	68,971,000	+742,000
Working expenses	75,033,000	-1,375,000
Net receipts	45,130,000	+1,649,000

Maintenance of way, works, etc., cost £60,000 more, but there was a saving of £1,422,000 in locomotive power. Such facts invest the dryest figures with interest. The quantity of minerals and general merchandise conveyed increased by 7,727,000 tons, but the number of train miles declined by 3,035,000.

The lesson here is clear and plain. Any tinkering with conditions of labour, whilst the chain of wage slavery remains unbroken, can only, if it affects matters at all, result in a tightening up of the links. After all, the bargaining with employers, be it through conciliation boards, deputations, recognition of Union officials or what not, is not progressive. It is only the half conscious effort of the workman to recover the ground that capitalism ever pushes away from beneath his feet. It is a struggle against retrogression. Only in Socialism do we find the larger hope. Let us, then, abandon trying to patch up a rotten system ; let us desist from the fatuity of endeavouring to make worse more bearable. All such effort is mere resignation to the slave condition. There is far better work to do than to struggle for such crumbs as your leaders lead you on to. When those leaders led you into the “conciliation boards” trap they delivered you, bound hand and foot, into the hand of the masters. We said so at the time and events prove us correct. Join the S.P.G.B. . . . and concentrate on your freedom.

Wilfred.

Buy ’em out. (1910)

From the August 1910 issue of the Socialist Standard

The text for this article is the following abstract from a speech delivered by Mr. P. Snowden in the House of Commons, July 4th, 1910.

“Mr. P. Snowden (Lab. Blackburn), speaking as a representative of Socialism, said he was not appalled by the figures of the Budget ; on the contrary, he hoped to see the day when the Chancellor of the Exchequer would bring in a Budget for 3 or 4 hundred millions . . . The Labour Party supported last year’s Budget because it was a good beginning. He would not tax landlords out of existence, but would buy them out.

A Unionist Member: Where would you get the money ?

Mr. Snowden : That is a question often put by ignorant men at open meetings. (Laughter.) If they tried to float all the public-houses of the country as a trust with assurance that they would be free from increased taxation there would be no difficulty in obtaining the money. (Labour cheers.)” Daily Chronicle, 5.7.10.

Mr. Snowden’s claim to be a Socialist representative is soon disposed of. His election address and speeches at the last General Election, to say nothing of an analysis of the votes cast for him, amply disprove that claim. Goaded, possibly, by the disaffection in the ranks of the I.L.P., he blossoms out, on occasion, as a ‘”Socialist representative.” This is part and parcel of the political game he and his colleagues are playing.

But I wish to deal with his piffle about buying up the land.

How Mr. Snowden and his like can rave to an I.L.P. audience about the robber landlords whose ancestors filched the land from the people, etc., etc. Of course he knows his audience. He has to tickle their political palates in order to earn his lecturing fee, with one eye on a return engagement. But to a more “respectable” audience, such as the House of Commons, he adopts another tone. He appears to be quite unconcerned as to the lack of consistency (I had almost said lack of honesty) in raving at one time against the robbers and parasites on the body politic, and at another time admitting the claim and title to their monopoly by talking about “buying them out.” If this is not confusion, what is it ? To the Socialist, with regard to the land and ALL other means of capitalist exploitation, there is no question either of “compensation” or “confiscation,” but simply RESTITUTION.

Again, taking Mr. Snowden’s remarks on the level of his own verbosity, which is not the Socialist level by any means, we observe his smart wangle in reply to an interjector who asked “Where would he get the money from ?” Possibly the writer is equally ignorant; anyway, I repeat “Where would he get the money from” to buy out the landlords ? Obviously such a transaction could not be concluded in the coin of the realm, as there is not sufficient coinage minted in this country with which to do it, and moneymanias will doubtless tell us that if such an enormous sum was specially minted for the purpose, when put into circulation it would swamp the money market, etc., so as to make it just about valueless. Therefore it would have to be done with scrip, treasury bonds, and the like, and to be of any value these bonds would have to be interest-bearing.

So, here you will see the drift. Here, with very little imagination to fill in the gaps, we can foresee the birth and result of a new side-tracking agitation for another “drastic reform.” Shout it from the housetops; sing it in the music halls. “Land Purchase.” “The Land for the People.”

Miles of fulminations and perorations on the platform and in the Press over a course of years, perhaps generations, would induce the landowning section of the capitalist class to “reluctantly” give way (with their tongues in their blasted cheeks), and accept in exchange for their rent rolls, treasury bonds bearing perpetual interest of certainly not less amount than their present incomes—the dominant political power, the capitalist class, will see to that. And the result to the gullible members of the working class who had been bluffed by the afore-mentioned perorations ? Simply, as you were. They would still have to provide the luxuries for the parasites, the only difference being that they would be called “interest” now.

Let us suppose that “hand” John Smith’s wildest dream is realised and in consequence of this very revolutionary change he lives “rent free,” what happens ?

“Times are bad,” says the employer to John, “Business is rotten, and I really cannot keep this place going in face of the foreign competition unless you accept less wages. You can easily do this: you have NO RENT TO PAY now; therefore I must dock your wages 10s. per week.”

“But,” protests John, “my rent was only 5s. per week.”

“Indeed,” retorts the boss. “Then let us compromise and call it 7s. 6d.”

Of course John will fight, but after tightening his belt daily for a few weeks and watching his wife and kiddies starve while he is on strike, he will return to work at 5s. per week less than formerly ; meanwhile his boss has got rid of his surplus stock at enhanced prices and treats himself to a new aeroplane. John soon forgets, in his anxiety to get a living, all the balderdash he swallowed during the “drastic reform” agitation (unless the wicked Socialist is there to jog his memory). He has got the reform all right, but he has yet to learn that he and his class will never, while capitalism lasts, receive more on the average, than a bare subsistence.

Poor John ! Is it any wonder that some people think that he only get his deserts ? Well, he must thank, amongst others, Messrs. Snowden & Co. for the condition in which he finds himself, and in which he will remain until he learns the one grand lesson—that Socialism is the only remedy.

W. E.

S.P.G.B. Lecture List For August. (1910)

Party News from the August 1910 issue of the Socialist Standard