SPGB Meetings (1962)

Party News from the October 1962 issue of the Socialist Standard

SPGB Rally (1962)

Party News from the October 1962 issue of the Socialist Standard

Blogger's Note:

It is perhaps worthwhile to check out the editorial from the October 1962 issue of the Socialist Standard for more background on the purpose of this rally.

Socialist Sonnet No. 249: Going through the Motions (2026)

From the Socialism or Your Money Back blog

Going through the Motions

 

Fine promises are all too glibly made

In a conference hall, filled with delegates

Gathered from the political estate,

Where future electoral plans are being laid.

All this nation’s ills are the fault, of course,

Of other parties, but power won’t be lost

With well thought through proposals, fingers crossed:

All delivered with rhetorical force.

The only real obstacle is the cost,

Because money’s always in short supply.

Profits remain sacrosanct, which is why

Though politicians try, markets won’t be bossed.

Conference approves what has been arranged

And then departs; yet nothing will have changed.

 

D. A.

Labour under Liberal Rule. (1911)

Book Review from the October 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

What the Workers owe the “Great Liberal Party”.

L. T. Hobhouse, M. A., Professor of Sociology at London University, is the author of a book on Liberalism (Home University Library). The book coming from a well-known supporter of the Liberal party, many may turn to it expecting to find a serious examination of the aims and methods of Liberalism. The capitalist Press has been profuse in its praise, but those who seek a knowledge of Liberalism will get little direct information therein.

Our Liberal apologist indulges in a long academic dissertation upon Manchesterism, Benthanism, abstract ideas, and absolute rights, and throughout the book there runs the hypocritical plea that Liberalism, from its inception to the present day, has carefully guarded

THE INTERESTS OF THE WORKER

and made his lot better and brighter.

The real position and interest of rising Liberalism is not dwelt upon, but an understanding of it is essential.

The Liberal Party represented the developing manufacturing class, the merchants, etc., who found the progress of their order hindered by the old forms that had survived from feudal days. The landowners, the nobility and the clergy had placed various restrictions upon the trading class—the bourgeoisie. It had imposed taxes and tariffs, and made the trader and the manufacturer bear the greatest part of the expenses of carrying on the various wars.

The Liberal Party arose an a protest against the prevailing semi-feudal institutions. Representing, as it did, the manufacturers and middlemen, it objected to any interference by the landowning legislature. In its battle against them it was aided by the workers, but when the Liberals had won their battle they spurned and betrayed those whom they had beguiled into helping them.

Laissez-faire, the gospel of the Liberals, was a policy conceived in the direct interest of the industrial capitalists.

It believed that no limits or restraints should be put by the State to the rate at which they could pile up wealth and

MURDER THE TOILERS

and their children in the process. Our author says:

“The condition produced by the new factory system shocked the public conscience and as early as 1802 we find the first of a long series of laws out of which has grown an industrial code that year by year follows the life of the operative in his relations with his employer into more minute detail. The first stages of this movement were contemplated with doubt and distrust by many men of Liberal sympathies.”

Thus cowardly and cunningly does the Professor of Liberalism hide the savage ferocity with which the members of the “Great Liberal Party” opposed all attempts to improve the conditions of the Capitalism’s insatiable greed.

The Legislature had enclosed the land, driven the labourer from the soil, and confiscated his cottage. The artizan found his simple tools and plant superseded by the giant machinery and factories that had arisen all around him. These propertyless workers were forced to seek work from the Liberal manufacturers, who took a fearful advantage of their outcast condition. These manufacturers piled up huge wealth by the unlimited toil of men, women, girls and tiny children. They used every subterfuge to prevent any legal limits being placed to the crushing slavery even of tender little ones. In the forefront of this great army of industrial murderers stood the champions of Liberalism, John Bright, Richard Cobden, C. P. Villiers, W. R. Greg, and W. J. Fox. Bright and Cobden are the revered pioneers of the present Liberal party, and the book under review is lavish in its praise of these

PIOUS PURITAN HUMBUGS.

Hobhouse says to the Liberals: “Rather we want to learn our supreme lesson from the school of Cobden.” The history of the attitude of the Liberal party toward the awful sufferings of the working class in those early days has more than a passing interest for workmen. Their record in opposing factory legislation, trade unionism, manhood suffrage, etc., is pregnant with significance. For insight into their actions then, helps to show the true nature of their motives and methods in the present.

We have the following admission grudgingly made (p. 88):

“It is true that in the beginning factory legislation enjoyed a large measure of Conservative support. It was at that stage in accordance with the best traditions of paternal rule, and it commended itself to the religious convictions of men of whom Lord Shaftesbury was the typical example. It is true also that it was bitterly opposed by Cobden and Bright.”

But our Liberal apologist seeks to water down their opposition and lead the workers to believe that it was a very transient one.

No more damning indictment of Liberalism could be penned than a bare description of the awful condition of the workers in the days when the Liberal manufacturers were uncontrolled by factory laws. The toilers’ Inferno has been truly described in the pages of Engels’s “Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844.”

Richard Cobden owned print and cotton works at Manchester (R. Cobden & Co.), and his life, written by that Czar of India, Morley, is replete with

DETAILS OF HIS VILLAINY.

Speaking of Cobden’s opposition to the legal shortening of the working day, Morley says, p. 68,

“What he maintained was that all restrictions, however desirable, ought to be secured by the resolute demands and independent, action of the workmen themselves, and not by the intervention of the law.”

But when the workmen did try to obtain shorter hours and better conditions, what did Cobden say ? Listen to Morley (p. 68) :

“Singularly enough, while he thus trusted to the independence of the workmen, he objected to workmen’s combinations. ‘Depend upon it,’ he wrote to his brother, F. W. Cobden (Aug. 16, 1842), ‘nothing can be got from fraternising with trade unions. They are founded upon principles of brutal tyranny and monopoly. 1 would rather live under a Dey of Algiers than a Trades Committee.’”

Cobdcn’s co-worker, John Bright, was a Rochdale cotton manufacturer (John Bright and Bros.) He was highly esteemed by the Liberal party, was a member of their Cabinet, and acted as their champion against the struggling wage-slaves. His biographer, C. A. Vince, the leader of the Birmingham Liberals, says of one occasion (“John Bright,” p. 19) :

“In August 1842, a general strike or, as it was then called, a turn out, was organised in Lancashire. Bright issued a long address

TO THE WORKINGMEN OF ROCHDALE,

urging them to return to their employment. ‘Neither act of Parliament nor act of a multitude can keep up wages. You know that trade has long been bad, and with a bad trade wages cannot rise. If you are resolved to compel an advance of wages you cannot compel manufacturers to give you employment. Such attempts must always fail in the end and yours must fail.’ ”

This was always the cry : “Bad trade !” Yet they were running their mills day and night, and gaining huge profits. These were truly the days when “Capital celebrated its bacchanalia.”

Yet present-day Liberals delight to talk of the “Hungry Forties,” and identify the landlords alone with the horrible sufferings of the people. Vince, speaking of Fielden’s (M.P. for Oldham) Bill to limit the labour of women and young persons to 60 hours per week, says :

“This Bill was opposed by Peel, Cobden, Bright, and Mr. Villiers, and rejected by a small minority. . . . Bright had already successfully resisted a proposal made by Lord Ashley (afterwards Lord Shaftesbury) two years earlier. His speech on that occasion had of necessity been acrimonious.”

The method of the Liberals was to claim that the condition of their workpeople was better

THAN THAT OF THE TORY LANDOWNERS’ TENANTS.

But it wasn’t true, as was easily proved.

Bright urged against the Bill of 1844 for limiting the labour of children under 13, that it would mean shortening the hours of adults too. And Vince says (p. 33)

“That this was the intention, as well as the effect, of the Bill, was proved by the refusal to accept an amendment of Bright’s to allow the women to work in relays”

He declared that if the Bill passed they would have to close their factories ! This was the cunning way of these past masters in trickery. They opposed the reduction of children’s hours by talking of its effect upon men’s hours. ” ‘Most of our evils,’ says Bright” (quoted Vince, p. 34) “‘arise from legislative interference,’ and this maxim, eminently characteristic of the Manchester school, continued to approve itself to him to the remainder of his career. . . . The same principle led Bright a few years later to throw cold water over Sir G. Forster’s Bill to strengthen the Truck Act. ‘Under the present condition of labour in the country there can be no permanent, continuous and irritating tyranny such as has been described by the promoters of the Bill, which the working classes are not perfectly well able to correct without coming to the House of Commons for a new measure !’ Finally, in 1855 he successfully resisted an attempt of J. M. Cobbett to improve the Factory Act.”

Thus did the Free Trade leader look after his pocket interests. He was not above raising the good old cry: “I’ll take my capital out of the country !” On page 36 Vince quotes Bright as saying :

“If I thought the elements of discord were again to be stirred up, I should myself be glad to leave the country and to

GO SOMEWHERE ELSE

where Capital and Labour are allowed to fight out their battles on their own ground without legislative interference.”

Vince further tells us that Bright “was also an enemy of any possible scheme of national education.”

The history of the fight for the Factory Acts is a record of the war of Liberal manufacturers against the slightest reduction of their enormous profits. The children—boys and girls—were semi-starved, flogged and brutally ill-treated for the slightest slackening of their terrible toil. Lord Shaftesbury, the Dorsetshire landlord, after long and bitter straggles, succeeded in getting a Bill passed during the Liberal administration of 1833. Bat it was such a hollow fraud that the battle continued for over 20 years longer. The Act of 1833 and other Acts were passed as a result of protracted warfare, but it was many years before the Government would vote a halfpenny to provide inspectors to see them carried out. The Acts long remained a dead letter. Even afterwards Leonard Hornerer and Alexander Redgrave—the best factory inspectors the workers ever knew—bitterly complained that when they brought cases into court they found the magistrate was the

LOCAL MANUFACTURER HIMSELF

and, of course the workers lost.

The Act of 1834 permitted 8 hours to be worked by children under 13, and young persons between 13 and 18 were allowed 12 hours actual work per day, but these regulations were not to come fully into operation till 1836. The Liberal Government with a majority of 307 refused Shaftesbury’s amendment to improve the Bill.

Shaftesbury introduced his 10 hours Bill (for young persons) in 1838, and the Parliament with a Liberal majority of 51 threw out the measure. Lord Melbourne was Prime Minister, and “The Times” (June 25, 1838) said :

“The public attention cannot be too forcibly directed to the scandalous conduct of the Melbourne Ministry with regard to the factory question. It was not that Lord Shaftesbury had been mocked and deluded by the broken promises and callous feeling of a mercenary and jobbing clique, but that laws of our making have been left unenforced and the unfortunate children unprotected, and that all the representations and remonstrances made to the members upon the subject had been treated with total neglect and contempt.”

It shows the unspeakable hypocrisy of the Liberals when we recall that it was this same Parliament with the largest majority of any in the 19th. century, that allowed children under 13 for years after to be employed for

72 HOURS PER WEEK

while in the “Emancipation” Act it limited the hours which adult Negro slaves could be worked by the planters to 45 per week !

The 10 Hours Bill came into force (partly) on May 1st., 1848, but the manufacturers rose up in a body against it. Karl Marx well says (“Capital,” chap. 8):

“The working class was everywhere placed under a ban, under a virtual law of suspects. The manufacturers had no need any longer to restrain themselves. They broke out in open revolt, not only against the 10 Hour Bill, but against the whole of the legislation that since 1833 had aimed at restricting in some measure the “free” exploitation of labour-power.

“It was a pro-slavery rebellion in miniature, carried on for over two years with a cynical recklessness and terrorist energy all the cheaper because the rebel capitalist risked nothing but the skin of his ‘hands.'”

The methods they pursued are beyond description, but they can be read in the factory inspectors’ reports for the years that followed. Sufficient to say here that they practically nullified the Acts. How well they carried out the nefarious work may be gathered from the speech of Mr. Ferrand in the House of Commons (27th. April, 1863):

“The cotton trade has existed for 90 years. It has existed for three generations of the English race, and I believe I may safely say that during that period it has

DESTROYED NINE GENERATIONS

of English operatives.”

In urging the claim of the Liberal party to working class support, Mr. Hobhouse says (p. 84): “Trade Unions gained the first step in emancipation through the action of Place and the Radicals in 1824.”

The fact is that the workers found the chief opponents of trade union combination in the Liberal-Radical party. The ferocity with which the workers were treated by the Liberal Government reminds one of the worst incidents of Russian rule. In 1824 Francis Place, the tailor, and Joseph Hume “smuggled” a law through Parliament annulling the Anti-Combination laws. But directly the workers sought to actually combine for defensive purposes the law pounced upon them. The presence of more than two workmen together laid them open to the charge of conspiracy, and in the reign of the strongest Liberal Government (1834) six Dorchester labourers were sentenced to seven years transportation for the “crime of combination.”

And again, under Liberal rule in 1838, five Glasgow spinners were condemned for the same term under the charge of illegal combination and conspiracy. Lord Melbourne and “the historian,” Lord Macaulay, were members of the Cabinet, and they did all they could to support those who were coining millions out of the blood and tears of women and children. They acted as in a panic and appointed numerous commissions to enquire into methods to

COMBAT AND SMASH WORKMEN’S UNIONS.

Bright, Cobden and Gladstone in their day were prominent enemies of working-class combination.

After long years of strife and suffering the workers got the Liberals to pass the Trade Union Act of 1871. This was proclaimed the “charter of the trade unions.” But it was so futile that the masters and the Courts still carried on a bitter war against the workmen. The following year (1872) some London firemen engaged at gasworks were charged with striking and sentenced to 12 months imprisonment.

Of Gladstone Mr. Hobhouse says (p. 103):

“He was not sympathetically disposed towards the ‘New Unionism’ and semi-Socialistic ideas that came at the end of the ’80’s, which, in fact, constituted a powerful cross-current to the work he had in hand.”

Right up to the present day the same class legislation in trade union matters continues. The Liberals claim to have legalised peaceful picketing by their Act of 1906, but it lies with the carefully selected judge to interpret this clause.

Hundreds of convictions have occurred since the Act was passed. The London polishers, the Newport dockers, the Hull seamen, the Belfast dockers and the agricultural labourers of Norwich—all have been fined or imprisoned for picketing amongst possible strike-breakers.

The Liberals, despite our author’s claim, in fact acted just as fraudulently

OVER THE SUFFRAGE

as on other issues. No mention is made of the long, terrible struggle on the part of the workers for a share in the franchise under Liberal Governments. Nothing is said about the ferocious fight the Liberals waged against the Chartist pioneers for simply advocating Manhood Suffrage. The trickery and treachery of the Liberals over “Household Franchise” in 1867 is completely passed over.

“The most striking victory of Liberal ideas,” Mr. Hobhouse tells us, “is the establishment of Free Trade,” and he points out that “the battle is one Liberalism is prepared to fight over again.” This shows the essentially capitalist character of Liberalism, for Free Trade is the manufacturer’s panacea, though it was obtained by deluding the working class and winning them away from Chartism by telling them, in the words of Cobden (Morley) : “Is it not clear that if capitalists were free to exchange their productions for the corn of other countries, the workmen would have abundant employment at enhanced wages ?”

Listen to Cobden’s appeal to his capitalist brethren (Morley’s “Cobden,” p. 74) : “Let us,” he said, “invest part of our property to save the rest from confiscation.” And he further says:

“At one meeting in Manchester one man after another called out’in quick succession, ‘A thousand pounds for me,’ ‘A thousand pounds for me,’ until 60 thousand pounds had been subscribed on the spot. They were spending £10,000 per week. . . . ‘ I am afraid,’ said Cobden, ‘that most of us entered upon the struggle with the belief that we had some

DISTINCT CLASS INTEREST IN THE QUESTION.’ ”

Vince, in his life of Bright, says (p. 28): “The battle of the corn laws was a contention between the middle class and the aristocracy.” How hypocritical the agitation for repealing the Corn Laws was we may gather from the report of the Inspector of factories for 1849, where we learn that wherever the circumstances permitted the manufacturers reduced wages 25 per cent. upon the introduction of Free Trade.

Nearly 65 years have passed since Free Trade was introduced. Mr. Hobhouse tells us that “the 19th. century might be called the Age of Liberalism” (p. 214); and the National Liberal Federation, speaking of the period since 1832, says (“The Work of Liberalism since the Great Reform Act”): “It has been in the main an era of Liberal administration. The Liberal Party has had practically unfettered control of the interests of the country in foreign, colonial, and financial policy.” Yet after all this what is the position of the worker ?

After detailing the high claims made by the pioneers of Free Trade our author says :

“The actual course of events has in large measure disappointed these hopes….. the prospect of a complete and life-long independence for the average workman upon the lines of individual competition, even when supplemented and guarded by the collective bargaining of the Trade Union, appears exceedingly remote. The increase in wages does not appear by any means proportionate to the general growth of wealth.

“There appears no likelihood that the average manual worker will attain to the goal of that full independence covering all the risks of life for self and family, which can alone render the competitive system really adequate to the demands of a civilised conscience. The careful researches of Mr. Booth in London and Mr. Rowntree in York, and of others in country districts, have revealed that a considerable percentage are actually unable to earn a sum of money representing the full cost of the barest physical necessities for an average family.”

Of industrial competition he says : 

“That system holds out no hope of an improvement which shall bring the means of such a healthy and independent existence as should be the birthright of every citizen of a free State, within the grasp of the mass of the people of the United Kingdom.” 

But what is the remedy ? Surely not more Liberalism and Free Trade ! Despite the above admissions of the

FAILURE OF CAPITALISM,

Mr. Hobhouse devotes many pages to attacking what he calls “Mechanical Socialism” and defending the present system of society. He defends it, though his leader, Mr. Lloyd George, told us (Swansea, Oct. 1, 1908): “No one can really honestly defend the present system.” Mr. Hobhouse ignores the great combinations and trusts the workers have to fight by making this statement (p. 99):

“It is possible under a competitive system for rivals to come to an agreement. The more powerful may coerce the weaker, or a number of equals may agree to work together. Thus competition may defeat itself and industry may be marshalled into trusts and other combinations for the private advantage against the public interest. Such combinations, predicted by Karl Marx as the appointed means of dissolving the competitive system,

HAVE BEEN KEPT AT BAY

in this country by Free Trade.”

This is a fitting statement for a capitalist Professor of Sociology to make. Anyone, without propertied interests to defend at all hazards, can see all around him the existence of great combinations and trusts. From the Imperial Tobacco Company to the gigantic Coats Cotton Trust; from the Salt Union Ltd. to the United Alkali Manufacturers, Ltd., they thrive and flourish even under your Free Trade.

One of the leading members of the Free Trade Union (Mr. J. A. Hobson) points out in his work “The Evolution of Modern Capitalism,” that Great Britain is honeycombed with trusts and combines ; and recently the great Birmingham Free Trader, Mr. Arthur Chamberlain, told us that rings and combines were necessary to the capitalist and inevitable even under beloved Free Trade !

A. Cleveland

Why Socialists Oppose Anarchism. Its Fallacies and Dangers Exposed. Part 2. (1911)

From the October 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

[Continued From August Issue.]

The false conception of social laws leads the Anarchists to the unsound and dangerous methods in which they indulge. The wild denunciations of the “State” and “government” and everybody vested with authority turns the heads of their ignorant followers. These uneducated worshippers of Anarchist fallacies, believing that this and that official is the real enemy, plan to make away with them, and they are inspired by the “propaganda by deed” teaching. Of course, they receive direct incitement to do so from the fountain-heads of Anarchist “philosophy.” Jean Grave, in his “Moribund Society and Anarchy,” teaches individual violence thus : “Let us suppose a struggle between employers and workmen — any sort of strike, In a strike there are surely some employers more cruel than others, who by their exactions have necessitated this strike, or by their intrigues have kept it up longer than was necessary ; without doubt these employers draw upon themselves the hatred of the workers. Let us suppose one of the like executed in some corner with a placard posted explaining that he had been killed as an exploiter, or that his factory had been burned from the same motive. In such a case there is no being mistaken as to the reasons prompting the authors of the deeds, and we may be sure they will by applauded by the whole labour world. Such are intelligent deeds which show that action should always follow guiding principle.”

In the flourishing days of Anarchism in England, when they had captured the “Socialist League,” after William Morris, Eleanor Marx and others had left it in disgust., the Anarchists used its organ, the “Commonweal,” to push its reactionary propaganda. Thus D. J. Nichol, the editor, wrote of a Trafalgar Square meeting : “Some people condemned the throwing of the bomb at Chicago ; for my part I think it would have been well in London if a man had been found courageous enough to hurl death and destruction among the ruffians who attacked a peaceful meeting.” (Nov. 11, 1891)

In the next issue they eulogised the Tennessee escaped prisoners who carried on open pillage in these terms : “You have shown the workers of America—aye, and of the world—how to free themselves, not at the ballot-box but with the rifle, the torch, and the dynamite bomb.” It commended the Anarchist, Ravachol, who murdered and robbed an old man and was guillotined, in the following words : “Thus finished another stage in the career of a man who has shaken capitalism to its foundations and shown the workers an example worthy of emulation. We are anxiously awaiting the advent of some English Ravachols.” (July 2, 1892.)

Many other examples could be quoted but one more must, suffice. “We say that individual acts have always been a success. The man who strangled Watrin [a French mine-owner whose men were on strike], Pini, who robbed the banks, have opened more eyes than all the pamphlet writers in a century. Our aims can only be attained by accumulated individual actions against property and the men who hold it.” (Dec. 19, 1891).

When the Anarchist “movement” was less feeble its votaries carried out its teachings. In 1893 August Vaillant, the French Anarchist, threw a bomb into the French Parliament from the public gallery. Over 60 people were wounded and he was guillotined. In 1894 Martial Bourdin blew himself to atoms while fixing a bomb near the Royal Observatory, in. Greenwich Park. In the same year a Deptford “comrade,” Rolla Richards, got 7 years for blowing up several South London Post offices, Emile Henry, too, threw a bomb from the balcony of the Paris Cafe Terminus, and 2 persons were killed arid 21 injured.

The foregoing demonstrate that Anarchism is hostile to working class organisation. While it advocates individual violence, it paves the way for the armed forces of the State to intervene and crush it.

The need of the age is a virile organisation of the toilers, but the murder, violence, pillage, and riot that the Anarchists teach has led to their ranks being honeycombed with police spies. It reminds one of the story told by Alexander Herzen, who upon reaching a little Italian town, found, he said, only priests and bandits, but he was greatly puzzled to decide which were the priests and which the bandits.

Just so with the members of the Anarchist groups. It is often difficult to find out which are the genuine “comrades” and which the spies. Its secrecy and underground working make treachery possible : that is why they have never really started to organise the working class.

During the Walsall trial in 1892 it leaked out that the man who informed the police of the proposed bomb outrage was a trusted “comrade” named Coulon, who actually managed Louise Michel’s Anarchist school in Fitzroy Square !

Their clubs all perish owing to the one cause. The “Autotomie,” the “Grafton,” the “Scandinavian,” are cases in point. The “comrades” spend a lot of time accusing each other of being police spies. David Nicoll (of the “Commonweal”) bitterly denounced two of the leading members, “Dr.” Netllau and “Dr.” Macdonald, yet many others testified to the genuineness of these men. A late editor of the “Commonweal” came under suspicion, and is still under a cloud, though he left the “cause” long since.

As the Anarchists’ numbers have declined their methods have been somewhat modified. They do not appeal with the same frequency to individual violence, yet they cannot stop their ignorant supporters from forever harping on its necessity. Indeed, the extent to which the Anarchist followers gloat over deeds of violence, high-sounding threats and the fury they delight in, prove a distinct menace to the true revolutionary movement.

Emma Goldman’s (the American Anarchist) manager, Ben Reitman, visited this country a short while since, and the wild, idiotic advice he gave his audiences — urging them to break policemen’s heads, etc. — could not been have surpassed by an agent-provocateur, for it openly invited the suppression of public meetings, and the condemnation of any anti capitalist movement to lasting persecution.

The Anarchists are frequently the best friends the capitalists have. Whenever they consummate one of their melodramatic outrages the police and Press use it to brow beat the Socialists. The working class are shown how the “foes of capitalism” avoid any civilised weapon at their hand, and appeal to the fruitless and insane personal attack, street battle, etc.

How thoroughly dishonest the Anarchists arc when attacking Socialists may be judged from their plea that Parliament has been tried and has failed ! Listen to the voice of ” Freedom” (Aug. 1911):

“The complete failure of the Labour Party to bring to the toilers any relief from the burdens of capitalist exploitation and the barefaced lust of personal aggrandisement shown by the majority of Labour M.P.s have compelled the workers not, only to again resort to the strike to resist the capitalists, but to realise with more or less certainty that other means than Parliamentary action are needed to help his cause.”

Who expected the labour leeches to advance the cause of the workers? Only those who, like the Anarchists, ignored the facts around them. “Parliament has failed !” the Anarchist bleats. Seeing that it has been filled by supporters of the present system — Liberals and Tories and their allies for centuries, what else but continued working-class enslavement could result ?

“The political machine has been used for the exploitation of the worker,” says the Anarchist, and it is therefore useless to our class.” One might as well say that because a cotton weaving machine has been used for the exploitation of the workers, it cannot be used in their interest when they control it.

As with the loom, so with the political machine. Controlled to-day by the capitalists, it is worked in their interests as far as possible, but upon the working class controlling it, they will use it for their purposes.

The whole of the writings of Anarchists teem with the condemnation of political action. Marx and Engels are denounced by every leading Anarchist, from Kropotkin to Malatesta, for their far-seeing and scientific conception of the value of political action to the proletariat. Malatesta — perhaps the best known Anarchist in Europe speaking at their International Congress in 1907 said (“Freedom” report) : “He often heard Political Action referred to as if it involved Parliament. This was a great mistake. What, for example, was Bresci’s act (killing a king) ? Was it economic? No! it was political. Marx was responsible for this confusion.” In order to see whether it is confusion let us review the facts.

In the “Communist Manifesto” Marx points out that “the proletariat must first of all acquire political supremacy.” What does “political supremacy ” and “political action” mean? Are they necessary ?

The growth of private property in society led to the parting off of those who possessed it from those who did not. A section of the possessors gradually became installed into offices of State, and their reign lasted until changes in the material conditions favoured the rise of a new class to power. The struggle between those who own and those who do not manifests itself as a class struggle, and its final purpose is the seizure of the political machine by the submerged class. The class struggle is waged also on the field of modern industry, and is typified by the suppression of discontented workers, the attempt to reduce the worker’s share and the workers’ resistance to those attempts.

This action relating to the field of industry is rightly termed Economic Action. Action pursued through the channels of local and national control and government is Political Action. For politics is but the science dealing with the laws of the control of society.

That the workers are scientific in using their political power (i.e. possession of the suffrage—the weapon) to obtain political supremacy is clearly seen by surveying the class struggles of the past and their lessons for us.

Constitutional history — the only appeal — tells us that the bourgeoisie in every land, though holding some economic power (i.e., means of production), were compelled to prosecute a long and often bitter struggle against the feudal nobility and the Church in order to secure political supremacy (executive power) and so rid themselves of the hindrances and embargoes put in their path by the nobility.

The Hansa towns, the staple cities, etc., had to petition the King and his feudal co rulers for charters granting them the privilege of trading, in certain merchandise and in certain districts thus showing the value of political control.

The political machine is represented by different institutions according to the state of the country ruled the material condition. As every land advances out of Feudalism into Capitalism, it sooner or later throws off the “absolute,” and finally all, rule of King and Court, and is forced to delegate power to representatives of the now enfranchised ruling class. These latter possess money which makes kings bow — therefore they finally prevail over the effete aristocracy.

Germany, Japan, Persia, Turkey — as each of these countries has emerged from Feudalism proper, it has had to introduce a Constitution with a Parliament as its central feature. The Executive later is chosen from this assembly and becomes a Cabinet.

The powerful nature of political control is shown by the light in England between merchant and noble and the victory of Parliament over the Crown. The Crown was re-introduced later, but shorn of its power, privileges, and noted prerogatives. All specialists in Constitutional history — from Gardner to Professor Dicey and Lord Courtney — are agreed that Parliament is the real arbiter, and that survivals such as the House of Lords are trimmings that matter not.

Political machinery, then, in modern society, includes, as its central feature, Parliament, and the Socialists, in urging the workers to displace their enemies from that citadel, are but pointing the right road. Parliament controls “supplies” — the force against Court and Bureaucracy alike. Through its control over “supplies” it rules the Army, though it employs a War Minister, and he in turn an Army Council, to arrange details. Political control relies eventually upon power over the armed forces, and these are under the control of Parliament.

Therefore Politics DO include Parliament.

Adolph Kohn

[To be continued.]

The Trade Union Congress. (1911)

From the October 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

At the recent Trade Union Congress, held at Newcastle-on-Tyne during the week beginning September 4th., Mr. William Mullin, in his presidential address, made an appeal which is certainly worthy of note. In speaking of the railway strike he expressed admiration for the men, saying that “they accomplished a great deed, and the fruits will speedily come to them.” The present writer has been puzzling his brains to think what great deed, such as would call forth the admiration of Mr. Mullin, was accomplished by the railwaymen in their strike, and has come to the conclusion that it can only be the sheep-like readiness they evinced to return to work at the bidding of their leaders.

Surely that must be it. Such action would undoubtedly commend itself to Mr. Mullin, for he continued his address by urging upon the railway workers to “place implicit trust in their leaders.” Presumably in the same child-like fashion as they did in 1907, when Richard Bell and the other A.S.R.S. officials delivered them over, bound hand and foot in the meshes of the “conciliation” scheme.

But this appeal to the workers to put “implicit trust” in their leaders becomes really almost too funny for words when we consider—upon a perusal of the report of the Congress proceedings on the following Friday—the spirit in which such trust has been accepted by the trustees. A resolution was moved on the Friday severely condemning the Bill introduced into Parliament by Mr. Will Crooks to end industrial disputes. The Bill is a curiosity. No one who has any knowledge of Mr. Crooks would accredit him with any excessive degree of subtlety. He often speaks of himself as being nothing more than a “plain, honest man.” But one would have thought that even Mr. Crooks could have managed to frame a bill that was not so obviously all in favour of the employers. Why did he not obtain the Machiavelian help of Mr. Ramsay MacDonald or Mr. Snowden ?

A delegate remarked, during the discussion, that he could understand such a bill coming from an employers’ association, or from those interested in keeping the workers down, but he could not understand its being the proposal of a trade unionist. We, however, of course, can quite understand the bill—apart from its lack of the confusing elements usually to be found in Labour bills—being the work of a “Labour leader.” All that has happened is that “plain” Mr. Crooks has, in this particular instance, been rather too plain in his support of capitalism.

Briefly, it is a bill that seeks to abolish strikes altogether. It lays it down that employers and employees should give at least thirty days notice of an intended change affecting conditions of employment with respect to wages and hours ; that it shall be unlawful for any employer to declare or cause a lock-out, or for any employee to go on strike on account of any dispute before or during a reference of such a dispute to a board of conciliation and investigation, any employer declaring or causing a lock-out being liable to a fine of not less than £20 nor more than £200 for each day or part of a day that such lock-out exists, and any employee going on strike being liable to a fine of not less than £2 nor more than £10 per day. (Why didn’t Mr. Crooks make the employees’ fine £100 or £1,000 per day while he was about it ? The modesty of the bill in only claiming £10 per day from a man who is probably striking for a living wage is distinctly rich.)

A further clause in the bill declares that any person who incites, encourages, or aids in any manner any employer to declare and continue a lockout, or any employee to go or continue on strike, shall be liable to a fine of not less than £10 nor more than £200.

Apart, however, from its contents, the Bill is noteworthy by reason of the position and action of one of its backers as showing how he regards the “implicit trust” that has been placed in him by his followers. The bill was backed by Mr. Arthur Henderson, Mr. George Barnes, Mr. Fenwick and Mr. Enoch Edwards. The last-named gentleman, upon the bill being attacked and severely criticised as being in every sense derogatory to the interests of trade unionism, gave a remarkable explanation and repudiation of his backing. He said, firstly, that “the Bill contained propositions which he, after 40 years study of these questions, could not support.” He then went on to explain that “when I gave my name to Mr. Crooks, I had no idea I was being asked to put my name to a bill of this sort . . . my name is there purely by inadvertence, and I shall take every means possible to assure everybody that the sentiments in that bill are not in harmony with my own views. To tell you the honest truth, I had not seen the bill.” (Vide “Daily Chronicle,” 9.9.11.)

A delegate hereupon very pertinently remarked that “Only fools put their names to things without looking at them.” But this expression is not strong enough to be used in condemnation of the criminal negligence and vacuity of an avowed leader and paid representative of Labour, who assents to a Parliamentary measure which, if passed and carried into effect, would take from the workers the only weapon they possess while capitalism lasts, to combat the encroachments of their masters on the economic field. These be your gods, O Israel; these are the men in whom the workers are asked to place “implicit trust.” The impertinence, the cynicism, of such an appeal !

It might have been expected—that is, except by anyone who had some general knowledge of trade union officialdom—that one of the most important points to be considered at the Congress, and one that would raise the most animated discussion, would have been the question of the late Labour upheavals and their so-called settlements.

But, as a matter of fact, only a very lukewarm interest was shown in the resolution passed condemning the use of the military by the Government, and in the congratulations extended to the transport workers upon the result of their previous strike. Neither the prominent leaders, nor the Standing Orders Committee, nor the assembled delegates, appeared desirous of raising any great discussion on the matter. Doubtless there were efficient reasons for this inanition. But when Mr. Will Thorne brought forward his “hardy annual” on Secular Education, then were the delegates in their glory. In spite of the fact that at the last general election he had, according to the “Daily Chronicle,” 2.12.10, the support of ministers of religion, and that he had S.W. Ham placarded with posters announcing that he had answered the questions of the Free Church Council satisfactorily, Mr. Thorne moved his absurd resolution re the trade union education policy, and incidentally gave an opportunity (which was immediately seized) to the assembled Christians to give proof of their Christian meekness and charity by addressing one another as “cowardly hounds,” and by raising what one report calls “a perfect pandemonium” for about ten minutes.

Mr. Thorne had previously in the week distinguished himself by seconding, and speaking in favour of, a resolution advocating the establishment of a citizen army. His view appeared to be that, in some way or other, if organised Labour were armed and trained for defensive purposes—it was not quite clear whether voluntary or compulsory—the need of conscription would be obviated.

In speeches opposing the resolution it was pointed out that “Lord Roberts, General Hutchinson, and all the Service Press advocate Thome’s bill,” and that Lord Roberts had said in the hearing of a dozen or more of those present : “I don’t care whether you call the army a citizen army. Call it what you like so long as you give me authority to bring the men in and train them. I will see what they do.”

Undoubtedly a citizen army would be a very good thing—from a capitalist standpoint. It would probably make the workers stronger and more efficient wage-slaves; it would implant into them a sense of discipline and obedience to their “superiors,” which would be found very useful by their employers in the event of any industrial dispute; it would, by concentrating their minds on military training and exercises, tend to stultify at a very vital and important period of their lives, any desire they might have towards understanding and solving the various problems that affect their economic position.

It will thus be seen that in supporting a measure such as this Mr. Will Thorne is only doing what might have been expected of him—that is, furthering the continuance of the present social system.

There were other incidents and interludes during the week, notably one interlude wherein Mr. Ben Tillett and another “fraternal delegate” came to blows over a “black-leg” trade union which had, apparently, been formed in opposition to one in which Mr. Tillett happened to be interested.

Sufficient evidence has, however, been given and sufficient conclusions drawn, to show how trade unionism, as exemplified by the proceedings at the Trade Union Congress, actually stands. The reports of the meeting show, with what dignity and mastery the various subjects were tackled by the chosen delegates of the trade unionists.

Mr. David Shackleton and the other advisers to the Home Office and Board of Trade will be able to carry to their Departments gratifying reports of the proceedings. And, one thinks, the Liberal Ministers, on hearing or reading these reports, will wonder how they could ever have thought it necessary to bring military coercion to bear upon the workers during the recent strikes, when there were, all the time, such serviceable exponents of confusion and puerilities as the trade union leaders and officials, who could surely have been depended upon to keep in hand such of their followers as dared to evince a tendency to disturb the even tenour of Liberal reform legislation.

F. J. Webb

Should the Capitalists support Trade Unionism? (1911)

From the October 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

Trade Unions do not pretend to be revolutionary organisations. They accept the capitalist system as part and parcel of this happy cosmos, and consider their function to be simply that of haggling with the master class about the price of their members’ labour-power. But even this limited work they do badly—the heads of the unions preferring soft jobs under the State to the grim work of bargaining with powerful monopolies.

Now a change has taken place of late in the attitude of employers towards trade unionism. Half a century ago their attitude was one of relentless enmity, but now the far-seeing and intelligent employers adopt a friendly tone towards the unions. Radical journals such as the “Manchester Guardian,” often point out that it is just in those, trades where the most powerful unions exist that we find the least friction ‘twixt master and men, and that it is amongst the casual and “unskilled” workers, badly organised, that the class struggle is waged the fiercest. Whether this charge be true or not, such a position, when taken up by capitalist organs, deserves examination.

Cute and underground methods were not used by the capitalists a hundred years ago. Workers who had the audacity to fight for higher wages by combination were handled in ways drastic and open. Take, for instance, the following extract from the “Observer” of a hundred years ago:

“Yesterday at Guildhall, John Stanley, Joseph Jeffery, Thomas Brean, and Thomas Brent, journeymen bootmakers, in the employment of Mr. Hale, of Fleet Street, were charged before Mr. Alderman Scholey and Mr. Alderman Maguay with conspiring to raise the price of wages. . . . The magistrates sentenced them to be confined in Newgate for two months each. Two others escaped on a point of law.”

According to the law at this time, any breach of contract on the employer’s part was a civil offence, on the part of the employee it was a crime. The Act of 1871 was hostile to the workers, and picketing was illegal. But much water has flowed under bridges since 1871, and there are signs that a new generation of employers look with not unkindly eyes upon trade unions.

In the early part of the 19th. century trade unionism was associated with Owenism, and the idea was wide-spread of a single trade union for all the workers in the country. But later a “New Model” of trade unionism sprang up. To quote Meredith’s “Economic History of England,” its “characteristics were the accumulation of large funds which might be employed either for general benefit purposes or, in case of need, as strike pay, the employment of a permanent, salaried executive to advise and carry out its policy, concentration of attention in the case of each union on the interest of the particular trade in which it was formed, and the absence of interest qua union in any social problems which had not a direct bearing on the wage contract in the trade concerned.”

It is towards this “New Model” of trade unionism that employers are looking with a winning smile; it is this unionism that they are watching with feelings of thankfulness. To again quote Meredith (who, writing from a bourgeois point of view, is especially valuable) :

“Down to the great Parliamentary struggle between 1867 and 1876, the opinion of employers in almost all industries was intensely hostile to collective bargaining. There were few who recognised a moral right of combination ; still fewer who believed that the exercise of the right was in the true interest of their employees, and a mere handful who saw in it a socially beneficient force. In the last thirty years a considerable change has occurred. In most industries where the system has long been established, a large minority of employers hold all the views indicated above, and a certain percentage maintain that unionism, in the long run, promotes the interest even of the employer. Especially in large-scale businesses many employers find in the organisation of their wage-earners a useful check upon the integrity of their foremen and departmental managers, and a conveniently impersonal way of bringing pressure to bear upon dishonest or idle wage-earners. Further, the employer who relies for his profits upon skill in organising his business, and marketing his output, is protected by the existence of a union against the competition of those who, whilst inferior to himself in these respects, excel him in the will or power to beat down the standard conditions and wages of the trade. Above all, the existence of a strong organisation makes it possible in a great measure to settle the general terms upon which labour shall be employed for long periods. The employer is set free from the risk of constant minor stoppages and disputes, and can concentrate his attention for months, or even years, at a time on other problems.”

In the “Shoe and Leather Record” of August 25th. appeared a remarkable proposal, a curious gem to find in the capitalist Press. After an appeal for Industrial Arbitration the editor said: 

“Those men who are already organised may be expected to stand up for their rights. Those who are not organised have few friends, and so it is with organised labour that we have to deal, at any rate in the first place. The first thing to do seems to be to so arrange matters as to give the unions an advantage over unorganised labour. As things stand, any advantage which the law gives is in favour either of the unorganised or the disorganised. It would be easy to enact that the advantages of the Trades Disputes Act of 1906 should only apply to organised labour—that is to trade unions. For example, Section 2 of that Act might be altered so as to read that ‘it shall be lawful for one or more persons acting on behalf of a trade union,’ etc., to do such and such things in relation to what is facetiously known as ‘peaceful picketing.’ At present the Section says that picketing may be conducted by ‘one or more persons acting on their own behalf or on behalf of a trade union.’ The words printed in italics could be erased from the statute book and other words consequential thereto inserted without exacting the antagonism of organised labour, and probably with the active approval of the Labour Party. The effect of this single alteration of the law would be to compel labour to organise or to lose the advantage of the Trades Disputes Act. And without organisation compulsory arbitration is a vain thing, because unless both employers and employed can be represented in a responsible manner before the tribunal it would be useless to consider complaints.”

“To compel labour to organise“. This phrase is truly an indication that capitalists have changed their attitude towards trade unionism. It is support of the view that the unions are reactionary organisations ; that bodies of lackadaisical men bossed by leaders with the gift of the gab and an inordinate ambition, are pleasing phenomena to capitalists, especially when these capitalists, by virtue of their being “The State,” can offer the men’s leaders soft emolument and tempting pensions. Capitalists are aware that arbitration, conciliation, and all the remaining fakes, are only applicable to those industries where trade union “leaders” can boss and bully non-thinking herds of workers.

The proposal of that “friend” of Labour, Mr. Will Crooks, is one more example of the dangers run by the workers in tolerating orthodox trade unionism. A Labour Disputes Bill has been concocted, backed by him and other Labour M.P.s. This bill proposes that in the case of a trade union and the employers agreeing on a Conciliation Board, any employee refusing to abide by that decision by “going on strike” will be liable to a fine of not less than £2 nor more than £10 for each day or part of a day. Such is the treachery of men who have reached fame and fortune on the backs of the wretched English proletariat.

This is the naked truth. The worker is to be “cribbed, cabined, and confined” in iron-bonnd trade unions, hedged around with conciliation, arbitration, “local and central boards,” and the like. Surrounded by such local threats he is to lose the right to strike, lose the miserable claim that even under capitalism he should be able to take advantage of economic conditions when selling his only possession—his labour-power, an advantage possessed by the owner of any any other commodity.

Yes, the men who propose to put English wage-slaves, during the whole of their working life, still more in the power of the tenacious tenacles of the capitalist these men are their own leaders ! What wonder, then, that capitalists beam on trade unionism ? Is it matter for surprise that they propose compulsory membership of a trade union to be the lot of the workers ? Remember the quotation before cited : “Above all the existence of a strong organisation makes it possible in a great measure to settle the general terms upon which labour shall be employed for long periods.” Workers, it is for you to say that you will no longer be “employed” or “sold” at the dictates of those who pose as your leaders, but who are, in reality, the most valued servants of the capitalists.

John A. Dawson