Editorial: Atrocious Argument. (1917)

Editorial from the August 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

Those German atrocities ! The last raid on London gave opportunity for an almost unprecedented flood of feeling, mostly cant. It is not the agony of the parents who have lost little ones, the wives who have lost husbands, the husbands whose mates have been cruelly butchered, the mutilated remnants moaning in the hospitals, that finds expression in the horrified Press. No. They are horrified to order, and with a set purpose, and that purpose is not to deter the Ge­rmans from making such raids, but simply to inflame popular feeling against the “enemy.”

Those who want the war, and shout for it, and shove other people into it, and exhibit so much aptitude for bloodshed in the smashing up of pacifist meetings as one would hardly expect to find outside the trenches or the House of Commons, try to blind themselves to the true facts of the case. War is a serious business—a much more serious business than one would imagine from a perusal of the report of the Mesopotamia muddle. People wilfully entering upon war, in order to take that calm view of it that is essential to its prosecution to the “last man and the last shilling,” should themselves be above military age, or at least sure of a staff job, well behind the firing line, and not too adjacent to the miseries of the trenches—and they mostly are. But having embarked on war; having consented to this most serious business in life, having adventured thousands, and perhaps millions, of human lives in the trial by brute strength, it is folly to talk of putting any limit on the appeal to brute strength. Such talk is usually mere cant and humbug, and where it is not it arises from a boss-eyed sort of view of things.

Much has been made of the fact that women and children have been numbered among the victims of the German air raids. But it is no worse to kill a woman or a child than it is to kill a man, notwithstanding all the sloppy nonsense that has been written on the subject. As a matter of fact the mental torture of a man dying in consciousness is probably far greater than that of a child similarly placed, while as for women, the fact that they find themselves brought within the range of actual hostilities may help them to realise their responsibility for the war—and it is not a little.

A harsh judgment this may seem to be, but then every phase of war must be judged by harsh standards, and the only ones who have any grounds for complaint are those who are opposed to the conflict, or at all events are no consenting parties to it.

It is stated that the Germans can have no military object in these raids, but this is sheer rubbish. They may have several perfectly legitimate military objects. In the first place there is the popular clamour for protection. This, of course, cannot be ignored, but it admittedly can only be satisfied by weakening the striking forces on the British front. Those living a few miles out on the Eastern side of the metropolis may from their own observation gather some idea of the effectiveness of the raids in this particular.

It is also common knowledge that there are in and about London numerous munition works even the temporary disturbance of which, to say nothing of a lucky hit with a bomb or two, is a distinct advantage to the Germans, while it was openly stated in the Press a few days back that the wrecking of the War Office might be a bigger disaster to the Allied cause than the loss of an army corps. And finally, if only the Hun airmen could find the House of Commons with a fat bomb, dropped plump through one of the ventilators onto the table while Lloyd George stood there with his mouth open ! Ah, if only they could !

Society and Morals. Part I. Morality. (1917)

From the August 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

When we examine the mental condition of any people or section of mankind it is invariably found that, among each and all of them, human actions are judged as good or evil according to the degree they approximate to an ideal standard of conduct, held up and “somehow or other” acquired by the people in question. This standard by which conduct is judged is usually termed their moral or ethical code. The voluntary actions and opinions of men, be they savage or civilised, are guided by the moral code which either they have partly inherited, unconsciously grown up to accept, or their ripened experience has suggested.

The utmost variety is to be found in the moral notions of mankind. Cannibalism, incest, nudity in public, chattel-slavery, piracy, and a host of other practices to-day considered immoral have, in their age and place, all been perfectly moral and thoroughly justifiable.

The Problem of Ethics.

The problem of the origin and nature of the “moral law” has been one which thinkers in all ages have taxed their brains to solve. We all remember being told in our childhood how the god of the Jews gave to his “chosen people” the ten commandments. Most barbaric peoples believe their moral standard to be thus decreed by their god or gods.

Among all people who hold this view, be they uncivilised, or civilised people who accept the barbarian beliefs of Christianity, we naturally enough find a violent intolerance of those codes which differ from their own and sanction actions which theirs condemn. Those people who hold and act up to these other codes, are “working against the will of God” ; they are condemned as wicked, perverse, immoral, or as devoid of a “moral sense.” The books of missionaries are full of such allusions regarding the “heathen.”

It was only after morality in general was made the subject of research in the critical scientific spirit that any serious opposition to the “god theory” was forthcoming. Even the ancient Greeks did striking work in this field considering their very limited means. Notably the so-called “Sophists” of the Protagorean school denied the absolute and emphasised the relative character of morals. With the revival and growth of science in Europe since the fifteenth noiitury, ethical science advanced step by step ; Adam Smith, Kant, Locke, Hume and others building up a scientific theory which was finally rounded off by the work of Darwin, Spencer, Marx, and Morgan.

Social Regulations.

The labours of travellers, explorers, and historians gradually piled up data and widened the field for investigation. As in all other branches of science, the accumulated array of material first had to be sorted out and classified by finding the common characters in which the seemingly unlike agreed. It was then discovered that there is one common factor running right through all varieties of morality—they all have a social basis.

We have stated that the moral law is a guide to action. But all the activities of men do not come within the scope of the moral code. In the wearing of clothes there are fashions and customs the violation of which is not, usually, to-day, regarded as immoral. In the performing of the normal operations of living, e.g., eating, drinking, and sleeping, there are certain manners and customs, but they are not considered moral obligations where they affect only the personal welfare. But consider certain variations of the above cases. Let a man over-eat so as to knowingly deprive others of food ; or by being drunk cause obstruction in the public highway ; or being a working man remain in bed when he “should be working for his employer,” then contempt and perhaps punishment are meted out to him for he has outraged the morality of the community.

This is the crux of the matter. It is those activities which, when performed by an individual, affect and interfere with his fellows which are embraced within the moral law. Morality is a regulator of the relations existing between beings living in association. It is essentially a social phenomenon. A few illustrations will make this clear.

To-day a farmer may plough his land, sow and reap his crop on any day which suits him without regard to his neighbours ; but in the Mediaeval village where the villagers held several strips of land each, these strips being strewn and intermingled over a large area, such independence would have led to endless confusion, and accordingly certain days were allotted for the various kinds of field work and the whole agriculture of the community was carried on according to customary rules. Strict adherence to these rules was of the highest moral importance. In the first case, the labour was an individual concern ; in the second, one affecting the entire village community.

Again, the killing of a person, for private reasons, which brings discord into a society, is highly immoral ; when the killing, however, is multiplied a millionfold, but is in the “national interest,” showers of praise fall upon the heads of the slaughterers.

Barbarian societies are usually small, self-sufficing, and independent of other communities. While, in them, theft, fraud and murder are considered awful crimes when a fellow-tribesman (a kinsman) is the victim, such actions are permitted against men of other groups, are indeed, considered glorious and praiseworthy, for the neighbouring tribes are usually dangerous enemies and thus any injury to them is beneficial to the community.

That which is believed, by the bulk of its members, to be in the interests of the social group, is regarded as moral, that which is injurious to it—immoral. Apart from, society morality has no significance—solitary beings would have no use for it.

The Light of Evolution.

Before the science of society itself developed, the moral code could never be really understood and this was the great handicap upon the early ethicists. One school carrying their belief in the “supremacy of reason” to the extreme believed society to have originated in a consciously made agreement or contract entered into by primitive man. All moral principles were the product of reasoning from experience. Recognised social utility was, they argued, the basis of morals, hence this school is often entitled, the “utilitarian.”

Another school pointed out, however, that the basic impulses towards social unity and harmony appear to be grafted into the very personality of man—to be part of his physico-mental nature.

Conflict waged between the two schools until the evolution theory revealed for the first time man’s real place in the scheme of nature. Man was then clearly proven to be the outcome of a long line of changing animal ancestors, developing in succession from a jelly speck in the warm primeval ocean, through the worm, fish, reptile, lowly mammal and finally ape stages. Darwin showed in his “Descent of Man” that altruism and social solidarity is widespread among the higher types of gregarious animals and that a sort of instinctive “morality” is very prevalent.

It required the historical materialism of Karl Marx, Engels, and Morgan, to reveal how, granting the animal origin of sociability, its many-sided applications as reflected in morality are worked out, as we see them, in human society—savage, barbarian and civilised.

The Social Instinct.

Animal societies are bewildering in their number and variety. There are temporary unions like the wolf packs for hunting in winter ; the wonderful organisations of the ants and bees ; the fine examples of mutual support, among the hoofed animals, the rodents and the monkeys. The closer and more permanent the unions, the more developed are the social impulses of sympathy, self-sacrifice, the sense of duty and responsibility which are vital to a society’s existence, for they function as a protective discipline against the too full assertion of the primary instinct for purely personal welfare.

The impulses bound up with sociability therefore, develop in the same proportion as the greater efficiency of co-operation over individual competition asserts itself in the struggle for existence which pervades the animal kingdom.

The social instinct was, it must be remembered, not evolved to safeguard the community for its own sake, but only because the organisation was a factor in securing the welfare and survival of the bulk of its members, as individuals capable of perpetuating the species. The more thoroughly social a species becomes the more dependent upon the association is the individual creature, and, correspondingly, the greater is its danger and helplessness when isolated from its kind.

Early man, conspicuous and yet without any efficient organic means of defence, was forced to use collective might and action to struggle successfully against opposing nature. Speech evolved through and for social intercourse, and reacting, greatly aided his intellectual development. Even the artificial tools and weapons which man uses were dependent upon social habits for their progress. Perfected by an infinite series of modifications, such did not pass away with the death of the inventors but were taken up, adopted and passed on to succeeding generations by their fellows. Primitive man was therefore as dependent upon his social organisation as is a lion upon its teeth and claws.

At their dawn the social impulses are as unreasoned and instinctive as those of sex or maternity and so can hardly yet be classed as moral forces, which presuppose a certain consciousness of choice in actions. But once reason begins to supersede blind instinct in the ordinary work of living it also urges in man an enquiry into the why and the wherefore of his conduct in relation to his fellow man, and a conscious conception of morality gradually takes the place of unreasoned, half or non-conscious social impulsiveness.

R. W, Housley

(To be Continued.)

An I.L.P. “belief”. (1917)

From the August 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

“The Independent Labour Party believes that the war was caused by the breakdown of class government in Europe. The peoples had no voice in policy before the war, and when they suddenly found themselves faced with “enemies” they had to fight.”

This statement contained in No. 1 Leaflet “The I.L.P. and the War” is not supported by facts or evidence of any kind ; it is merely a belief. Though whether the word “believes” applies to the first sentence only, or to the whole paragraph, it is impossible to say, nor does it matter much. The first sentence, expressing the belief that the war was caused by the breakdown of class government in Europe, if it is truly the belief of the I.L.P., is by far the most important statement, not only in this paragraph, but in the whole leaflet.

The writers fail to justify their belief. The master-class would ridicule it, and the Socialist would laugh at their self-inflicted credulity. What would be the attitude of the capitalist politicians ? First they would deny the existence of class government. Secondly they would claim that government was vested in the representatives of the people, was therefore democratic ; that government had not broken down, nor was it in the slightest danger of doing so. If the I.L.P. never anticipated this attitude it is politically sightless. If the capitalist position—so often expressed by its agents and spokesmen—was present in the collective mind of the I.L.P., they should not have been satisfied with the mere expression of a belief ; they should have shown in definite and unmistakable language that, in spite of capitalist boasting of the democratic nature of their system, class government exists. Moreover, they should have justified their statement that it had broken down.

They have done none of these things, it is, therefore, left to the Socialist to show the absurdity of their beliefs. In no country of Europe was there any government, at the outbreak of war, that showed signs of collapse. In every country of Europe—and the world—there was poverty and suffering, always on the increase, among the working class. There was discontent everywhere, but the suffering and discontent of the workers does not in itself mean the breakdown of capitalist government, on the contrary, it is proof of its power—and confidence in itself—to exploit and subjugate. At the outbreak of war, we are constantly being told, the Central Powers were organized and equipped for the struggle. That is to say, the working class of those countries were fully controlled and disciplined by the governing class. Obviously, class government had not broken down in those countries, but, on the contrary, had reached a high degree of perfection. In those allied countries where conscription was in vogue the military authorities, at the instigation of those who controlled the political machinery, gave orders for mobilisation and were obeyed almost to the last man. In this country the process was slower but just as sure. Everyone knows how the masters co-operated with their representatives in Parliament by “releasing” men fit for active service. But it is not everyone who knows how dexterously Mr. Asquith and his government, on behalf of the capitalist class of this country, engineered towards conscription. Had he been satisfied with having achieved his object and not boasted of his political dexterity, the workers would have been left to think that the Government had simply blundered from one pledge to another until conscription was accomplished, as much to their own surprise as other people’s. But the competition for ministerial portfolios often compels Ministers—however modest they may wish to be thought—to construe their actions in such a way as to gain them credit for acumen and foresight. Thus Mr. Asquith claimed that his government, by devious methods, had gained “compulsion by consent,” in the following utterance:

“Next, in the earlier stages of the war more men came in than we could effectively train and equip, and it was not until the beginning of last Autumn that the shortage of men, actual or prospective, became a serious problem. Compulsion, whatever may be said of its abstract merits or demerits, is alien to British traditions—(cheers)—and its introduction would have been viewed with the greatest suspicion in the absence of a proved case of absolute necessity by the vast bulk of Liberals, by a large body of Conservatives, and by practically the whole of organised labour. (Cheers.) I have consistently maintained ever since the recruiting problem became urgent that compulsion could only be practicable and made effective when at each stage of the road it was accompanied by general consent. That is exactly what has happened. Everyone who knows anything of our political life must be aware that such measures as have been passed by enormous majorities in Parliament this spring would even a year ago have encountered the most strenuous opposition, with most dubious prospects of survival.”

Whether this boast is true, or whether such a complexion had been given to a series of blunders, or whether the Government was dragged or forced along the road to conscription by the governing class, the result was the same and was never in doubt. The ruling class with their agents preserved their authority and achieved the same degree of power over the working class here, as the Allied and Central Governments exercised at the commencement. Clearly class government had not broken down in this country.

But possibly the I.L.P. intellect will object that these facts only apply to the period of the war, and that the outbreak of war placed the Government once more on their feet, or braced them for the struggle. But they cannot take this attitude in view of the concluding sentence in the paragraph quoted. “The peoples had no voice in policy before the war.” Quite so. The Government conducted the business of the ruling class in utter disregard and contempt for the working class, until they called upon them to defend “their” country—their country, who’s?-and the credulous—or should it be shuffling and treacherous ?—I.L.P. babble about the people who “suddenly found themselves faced with enemies they had to fight.” Had the people—that is the working class—understood their class position they never would have waited for the master class to choose enemies for them. But thanks to the I.L.P. and the rest of the parties and organisations that serve the master class, the workers have had but little chance of learning who are their real enemies. Had the workers of every country understood the nature of capitalist society and their own slave position, the governing class in each country would never have succeeded in persuading them that the workers of other lands could be their enemies. There is no possible ground of antagonism between the wage-slaves of one capitalist State and another. The antagonism that exists is entirely between the different groups of the governing class. When these groups fell out they knew that the workers under their control and domination could be relied upon to do the fighting in their interest. Had they entertained any doubts as to the docility of their wage slaves they would have hesitated before plunging into war. A working class really antagonistic to its rulers would use such an occasion to further its own object : they would face the enemy their experience pointed to ; not the enemies of their enemy.

Once again the real Socialist position must be emphasised. The I.L.P. complain that “the peoples had no voice in policy before the war.” Would there be any difference if they had? Without knowledge the workers can be led to support any policy that happens to be in the capitalist interest. We have seen the workers in the past—plastic as clay in the potter’s hands—led to conflict against those who are “their allies” to-day ; or fighting on the side of those who are designated as their enemies, and through all the sanguinary wars engendered by capitalist production and distribution they have remained a slave class under the domination of those, for whom they fought. Before wars can cease the workers must gain the knowledge that will enable them to prosecute the class war to a successful conclusion ; until that time arrives their lot must be to work the factory machine, or the machine gun, at the instigation and in the interest of the governing class.

F. Foan

Sheer cussedness. (1917)

From the August 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

It may be remembered that the commander of the American forces in France assured us, in a speech upon the occasion of the welcoming of some part of the American fighting forces on this side of the sprat puddle, that the men in America are “simply crazy” to be over here and in the game. And now comes full confirmation in the following, presented to us by “Lloyd’s Newspaper” August 5th :

ARMED RESISTANCE BY U.S. CONSCRIPTS EXPECTED

“It is estimated that more than 75 per cent. of the drafted are claiming exemption.

It is reported to the Department of Justice that armed resistance to the draft is in the highest degree likely.”

You see Americans have such a high example of veracity in George Washington that the truth bubbles from them spontaneously, like wisdom from Lloyd George.

——-0——-

This gentleman has the wisdom faculty of Solomon after he (Sol.) had subjected himself to a long dieting of serpents. Only this week he has been at it again, and the acumen of one particular statement of his reaches about the limit of human profundity. He is reported as having told the gaping world that “No one in in Britain, France, Italy, or Russia, or even in Germany or Austria has any idea how near to the summit of our hopes we may be.”

Not only in what was said is the speaker’s quality revealed, but even more so in what was left unsaid. One has but to add three little words, clearly enough suggested, to the statement in order to complete its immortal value, and launch one on a train of thought of peculiar depth and richness. Those words are : “or may not.”

That, of course, is the whole message which the Welsh Christ gave us in a moment of five-thousand a year inspiration—a sermon on the mount, since he was using a mountaineering analogy. “We do not know, nor does anybody else, how near or how far away from victory we may be.” True. The Prussian does not know how near or how far from a terrible licking he is. True again. Translated into the language of the people for the people, “Nobody don’t know nuthink.” Loud Jaws has told us so.

——-0——-

Talking of analogies, Mr. Lloyd George supplies us with a notable one. Some years ago he raised the water line of ships, and converted dry ships into wet ships. Now he has raised the water line of beer, incidentally converting dry sailors into wet ones. And, if he wants to complete the analogy, he has but to claim that just as he “with a stroke of the pen,” as was said at the time, added millions of tons to the carrying capacity of the mercantile marine, so, with a stroke of the pump-handle, he has considerably increased the carrying capacity of the mercantile mariner—or any other.

And this cuss is wondering whether Lloyd has got his money in breweries or water companies—or both.

The Cuss.

Jottings. (1917)

The Jottings Column from the August 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

I am going to quote two items of historical interest:

“Suraj-ud-Daulah, possibly at the instigation of the French, chose to take offence because the British at Fort William were strengthening their fortifications in case they should find themselves involved in hostilities with their French neighbours at Chandernagur. The Nawab ordered them to demolish the fortifications, the Governor replied with a remonstrance; and the Nawab responded by despatching an army against him. The Governor and some others fled on some British ships which were in the Hugli ; those who remained behind had no choice but to surrender. The unhappy prisoners, one hundred and forty-six in number, were packed into a chamber twenty feet square, three human beings to the square yard, with one small grating to let in air, on a sultry night in July. Suraj-ad-Daulah forgot them till next morning, when twenty-three of the hundred and forty-six were found to be still alive.”

“I was standing on the bridge in the evening when the Medjidieh arrived. As this ship with two barges came up to us, I saw that she was absolutely packed, and the barges, too, with men. When she was about 300 or 400 yards off it looked as if she was festooned with ropes. The stench, when she was close, was quite definite, and I found that what I mistook for ropes were dried stalactites of human faces. The patients were so huddled and crowded together on the ship that they could not perform the offices of nature clear of the edge of the ship, and the whole of the ship’s side was covered with stalactites of human fæces. A certain number of men were standing, some with blankets, some without. They were in a pool of dysentery about 30 feet square. They were covered with dysentery and dejecta generally from head to foot.”

I can hear the reader crying “Enough! Whose devilish imagination has conjured up such revolting details ? Wherever could such things as these happen ?”There is no imagination about it, dear reader. The first item is a brief description of the Black Hole of Calcutta ; the second item is merely an incident in the great war of liberty, 1916, as described in the Report of the Mesopotamia Commission.

—–0—–

After the foregoing it will be gratifying to all lovers of their country to learn that “the glorious Minster windows, the pride, not only of the city of York, but the unique possession of the English Church, are to be taken down because the enemy sought destruction with engines of war unknown in days of old, and with a ruthlessness unequalled in the most savage times.” That ought to remove the nasty taste left in the month after reading the preceding paragraph.

—–0—–

M. Phillips Price, Petrograd correspondent of the “Manchester Guardian,” describes (“Manchester Guardian” 17.7.17) a visit he made to the Kronstadt prison in June. One portion that he visited contained a number of admirals, generals, and naval and military officers of all ranks who had been arrested at the outbreak of the revolution. “They all complained,” he says, “that they had been kept there three months without any trial or examination of their cases. But the young sailor who accompanied me chimed in: ‘I sat in this very prison for three years for having been found with a Socialist pamphlet in my possession. All that time I never had a trial of any kind whatever.’ I pointed out to the sailor that the prison accommodation was unfit for a human being. He answered,’ Well, I sat here all that time because of these gentlemen, and I think that if they bad known they were going to sit here they would have made better prisons !” A case of what’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.

—–0—–

Opponents of Socialism used to be fond of saying that under such a system there would be no progress, no advance in science, art, etc., in fact, all incentive would be destroyed. No inventions would appear, no researches would be made, for the simple reason that it wouldn’t pay—there would be no adequate return for services rendered. Of course, the inference always drawn from this kind of argument is that under the present beautifully adjusted system every effort made ensures due appreciation and reward to the full. Does it ? A perusal of the Civil List Pensions from time to time will indicate the extent to which incentive is “rewarded” under the present system.

Among the items on the latest list I notice the following:

Mrs. Charlton Basti»n, in consideration of the services to science of her late husband, Dr. Charlton Bastian and her straightened circumstances, £100.

Mrs. Minchin, in consideration of the scientific work of her late husband, Prof. E. A. Minchin, and her straightened circumstances, £75.

Mrs. Roland Trimen, in consideration of the eminent services of her late husband to biological science, and of her straightened circumstances, £75.

Mrs. Albert Gunther, in consideration of the scientific work of her late husband, Dr. Albert Gunther, and of his distinguished services to the British Museum as Keeper of Zoology, £70.

The Misses Aimee, Clotilde, and Nora Evelyn Legros, in consideration of the artistic eminence of their late father, Professor Legros, and of their inadequate means of support, £75.

—–0—–

The thousands of homes that have been broken up in order that our masters’ property might remain secure will, by now, have disposed of the favourite argument of the “anti” that Socialism meant the break-up of family life. The newspapers week by week are full of heart-rending cases where homes are utterly broken, with perhaps, the loss of the loved one by legal murder to complete the ruin. In the Manchester district there are eight homes for waifs and strays ; now it has been found necessary to establish a receiving home, such is the traffic.

The Bishop of Manchester, who “dedicated,” found the explanation of the increase in child destitution in the fact that the war has taken so many of the husbands and fathers away from their homes—never to return, he might have added.

The bishop said that the removal from home of one of the parents was the primary cause of many children becoming destitute. No, reverend sir, not the primary cause ; but it was a near shot, and we shall always take care to remind you and your friends of it.

On the same day (18.7.17) a jug was sold at Christie’s for 3,600 guineas.

Lucilius.

Baby Week. (1917)

From the August 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

The re-shaping of old morals to suit new circumstances. 

The city of London has been en fete for a whole week. Members of the idle master class gathered in large numbers at classic Westminster in order to do honour to the resurrection era of King Baby. Never since the days following the Great Plague has “Mother’s boy” been so sincerely greeted, and fondled, and feted, as during this right royal national reception. Ladies of the highest title and social standing took upon themselves the honourable task of tickling the tootsiess of mere working-class kiddies what time they showered congratulations upon their beaming mothers.

Let it be most distinctly understood that the object of all this chivalrous attention was to do honour to WORKING-CLASS babies. Should you be so indiscreet as to inquire why the “sunbeams” of our particular class should be singled out for this shower of sentiment I should merely suggest that it arises from the fact of these ladies of title having no children of their own, comparatively speaking.

Why have they no children of their own, you ask. Well, sir, my lady has her form to consider, as well as her position in society, in addition to which, childbirth is a rather painful and disagreeable process.

And how comes, you again ask, that, during the progress of the world’s greatest war so many ladies—and gentlemen—are able to find so much time to spare when so many humbler folk are in the trenches or the munition works ? Ah ! to be coloured like a canary or disfigured in an explosion is not fashionable in high society, nor, come to that, is—WORK !

But what is the reason for this celebration of “Baby Week” ? It appears to our masters that the male population of the British Isles is falling to alarmingly proportions, and that the death rate among children of working-class parentage has increased to dangerous limits. The reasons advanced for the high mortality are many and varied. One newspaper ascribes it to “Slums, dirt, disease, drink, ignorance, and virmin.”

The inclusion of drink as a contributary cause is only to be expected, for the bosses’ agents always declare that “drink is the basic cause of poverty.” It is, of course, a deliberate lie. The working man is poverty-stricken before ever he starts to purchase drink. Apart from this, the price of drink has placed it almost beyond the reach of poor people at the very time that infant mortality is reaching its highest point.

In the present period it matters not so much whether your child is born in the legitimate manner or not, so strangely has capitalist society transformed its moral code in order to fall in with supply and demand. This come-down in social morality is all the more notable because it strikes such a staggering blow at the foundation of the Christian Church. A slight idea of what is taking place may be gathered from a perusal of the following extract:

“The time has gone when people turned up their noses at illegitimate children, and now these, as well as legitimate children, are welcome, so long as they are healthy,” said Coroner Graham at an inquest held at Gateshead.”-“News of the World,” 8.7.1917.

This spectacle of the unfortunate girl who dared to give birth to a child out of wedlock now being fawned upon as a desirable member of society by those who never hesitated to ‘down” her would afford an interesting study for a cynical philosopher. Still, in these days when those who should have been the fathers of the future are dying like flies, the upkeep of the children of whatever parentage is of vital consequence to the British capitalists.

At London celebrations of “Baby Week” numerous speakers referred to the imperative duty of every working-class wife bearing children for the benefit of the State. No serious proposal, however, was made as to the State aiding her in feeding the children she bore.

The patrons of “Baby Week” would admit, doubtless, that they regard it as a matter for general regret that Mr. McNiell’s “war baby” prophecy was not more true than it proved to be. Had it been the necessity for a “Baby week” might never have arisen.

Just at the time when people are wailing about the paucity of good, healthy children it behoves us to look back in order to see how carefully babies were looked after in pre-war days. Referring to our London milk supply Lionel W. Lyde, M.A., F.R.G.S., Professor of Economic Geography in University College, London, wrote some few years back the following significant statement :

“For our huge city population the milk supply is miserably deficient. Holland, which is only about about one-tenth the size of the United Kingdom, has about 4,000,000 more cows ; more than a quarter of our milk supply is used for making butter and cheese ; hundreds of gallons go bad every day, because the poor cannot afford the price demanded for it ; and a large proportion of the milk which is sold in poor districts is watered, especially in London and on Sundays.”

When we recall that countless children of working-class parentage have died because pure milk has been beyond their mother’s slender purses, the damnable character of the practice of destroying foodstuffs in order to keep up prices becomes increasingly apparent.

As a concluding comment. I would commend to the reader the appended statement made by A. A. Phillips, M.B.C.M., late Medical Officer of Public Health, Northern Divisions of Scotland, in his book, “What a Young Husband Should Know” :

“The change in social conditions, the modern struggle for life, has brought women everywhere into competition with men. Look at as we may, like it or dislike it as it pleases us, it becomes daily more clear that women are being FORCED into sexlessness by causes which are beyond our or their control.”

When you are tired, therefore, of listening to the usual humbug of the master-class agents regarding the size of your family as distinct from their own, you might reasonably examine the Socialist case. Wake up now, for the age of enlightenment is upon you. Think out your position and study the only means whereby you may free yourself from the tyranny and oppression of capitalism. Only when you have done this can you satisfactorily solve the question of the number of children who should be brought into the world. Arm yourself against the menace of modern society, and march in the already singing army whose voice rings out the glad words : “The International unites the human.”

B. B. B.

In Peace as in War. (1917)

From the August 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard

When the capitalist class plunged the workers into the vortex of war the toilers took up the capitalist cry of “down with German Militarism.” It was easy for our masters to see what willing tools their wealth producers would be, and they organised and engineered, with the aid of the labour leaders, various schemes to entrap the workers for cannon fodder. For a short period thousands flocked to the recruiting offices, but with an alarming falling oft of willing targets, other means had to be adopted to “induce” them to join. Article after article in newspapers began to tell gruesome tales of the horrible brutality of the German soldiers and what it would mean to the workers here if they only landed on these shores. But finding this failed to appeal to their patriotism, the employers were urged to dispense with the young men in their employ and so force them into the army. Many other snares they tried signally failed, and having in view their determination to introduce the Military Service Acts and so make them law they, without disclosing their real intentions, compelled every man and woman to register and so clear the way of all obstacles for the administration of the aforementioned Acts. Wedged in between the employers’ action and conscription was the “Derby Volunteer” attestation, but in spite of all their hypocritical promises, lying and deceit, thousands of men still refused to be coerced into the army. In order to successfully bind the military chains around the married men the single men were called slackers and shirkers. The insults and innuendoes were swallowed, the single men were roped in, shortly to be followed by their married brethren.

Side by side with the stupendous slaughter of the workers on the battle-fields of Europe the cry of the workers of both sexes at home grows louder and louder. The intensified pace of exploitation hurls its victims in greater numbers on the heaps of human wreckage, some to linger with cruel tenacity to life in spite of their mangled bodies, others becoming an easy prey to the ravages of consumption and other fatal diseases. Here and there workers in different industries have feebly struggled against the encroachments of the masters when they have seen their hard fought-for trade-union rules and regulations gradually being smashed ; but taking them on the whole they have acquiesced in the worsening of their economic conditions. The rise in prices of the necessaries of life have become a common-place feature, the while wages have miserably failed to keep in touch with it. Hence the workers’ position gradually becomes worse in spite of all statements to the contrary.

The working class as yet do not comprehend their real relation to the capitalist class in modern society ; do not understand that by virtue of the fact that the capitalist class own and control the means and instruments of wealth production they take the wealth produced and hand back in the form of wages just sufficient to keep their slaves efficient. On the one hand there is always the struggle between the producers and non-producers concerning the price of workers’ labour-power ; on the other a struggle between the various sections of the international capitalist class for the disposing on the world’s markets of the wealth filched from the workers.

All economic wealth is the result of human energy applied to natural objects, and as it is only the working class who spend their energy by applying it to the natural objects, it follows that they are responsible for all wealth in existence. When the capitalist hires the worker he purchases the one commodity (labour-power) which has the unique quality of returning to the capitalist all the value he pays in wages and a surplus value in addition—hence his profits. The machinery and instruments of production and the raw materials being owned and controlled by the master class, involves the ownership and control of the wealth when produced. It is this private ownership that is responsible for the class struggle, responsible for the clashing of interests among the international capitalist cfess for the available markets of the world for the disposal of their commodities, that is the source of ALL modern wars. With the ever-growing productivity of the means of wealth production the world’s markets are choked with commodities. There is not room for all the struggling capitalists. Someone must be got out of the way. The forces behind each powerful combination are put into play until one or the other are economically and militarily crushed.

A favourite theme of articles in the Press to-day is that the end of this war will bring permanent peace. We are out to disillusion our fellow-workers on this lie ; to point out to them that while the private properly basis of society obtains, wars must inevitably occur. The workers must always haggle over the price of their labour-power ; the capitalists of the world must fight against each other for the world’s markets for the sale of the wealth stolen from the workers. Hence, whether the ghastly slaughter continues or not, the workers will—unless they organise to change the basis of society—be continually faced with the brutal struggle for existence, and gradually see their standard of subsistence get lower and lower.

As yet but few understand the cause of the awful manifestations of modern society. Thousands are groping in the dark for a way out of the morass, and it is to them the Socialist explains the remedy. We claim that if the workers are intelligent enough to manipulate the machinery of wealth production and distribution on behalf of their masters, they are intelligent enough to manipulate that machinery for themselves and to own and control the wealth when produced.

We urge our fellow-workers to study their position, endeavour to realise their relations with the masters, to understand that the capitalist class control the destinies of the workers of the world by their control of political power ; that every time they vote for the masters’ nominees they give the political power to those masters.

While we recognise the need of the workers to always fight the capitalist over the price of their labour-power, we would nevertheless fail in our duty if we did not point out that this struggle is powerless to alter the antagonism between the producers and non-producers. The workers must understand that their organisations—political and economic—must be grounded on class lines, having for their object the abolition of the capitalist system and the establishment of a system of society based upon the social ownership and control of the means of wealth production, in short—Socialism.

Only by recognising and embracing those principles can the workers eradicate from their midst such frightful carnage as is now raging in Europe, and abolish the painful destruction of the world’s toilers in “peace” and in war. Not only does the Socialist vehemently protest against the wholesale slaughter of his fellow-workers in this capitalist war, he with equal vehemence proclaims his hostility to the systematic murder of his fellows in the production of wealth to maintain the human race in the “piping times of peace,” where thousands are done to death yearly in the mines, on the railways and in factories, heaping up huge profits for our masters. It needs no comment of ours now to narrate the horrors of explosions in the coal-mines where gas has been known to be present to make it dangerous to work many months before, nor is it necessary for us to draw your attention to the Board of Trade figures in reference to the maimed and murdered recorded on the railroads each year, the men who have lost their lives in ships overloaded since the raising of the load-line by Lloyd-George.

To-day in the munition factories men and women are done to death, battered bruised, to say nothing of those who have contracted diseases of the most awful character in the production of explosives. The same toll of useful lives is taken in the greed for profits as in pre-war days ; the numbers in the mines, mills and railroads reaching an appalling figure. Whether in this capitalist war or in the class war always with us while the present system obtains, the same cruel murderous manifestations can be seen. Those who produce the sustenance and comforts of life are butchered, or exist in poverty and misery, while those who do not produce live in affluence and luxury. The only war that should interest you is the—CLASS WAR.

Farmer’s Boy