SPGB Meetings (1957)

  Party News from the February 1957 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Passing Show: The Congo (1961)

The Passing Show Column from the February 1961 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Congo

U.N. officials report that 300,000 people are slowly starving to death in the Congo, with two hundred dying every day. This is still further proof, if it were necessary, that it is not enough to be merely against capitalism, or colonialism, or the rule of a particular imperial power; one must have constructive proposals as to what is to replace the system to be destroyed—one must, in short, work for the achievement of Socialism, not merely for the destruction of any other economic and social system. A year ago, there were those who criticised the Socialist Party because it would not join in movements for “colonial freedom”, such as the one that aimed to throw the Belgians out of the Congo. We pointed out that this would only entail the Congolese people exchanging one set of masters for another. And this is what has occurred. It would be hard to argue, in face of the mass-starvation, in face of the pictures of Congolese children who are nothing more than skin and bone, that the Congolese people are better off today than they were a year ago. In fact the new Congolese masters, to whom the Congolese people were exhorted to give their support, cannot even agree among themselves. And in the squabbling and fighting among the various sections of the new Congolese ruling class—each of which calls in help from foreign states, Russia, America, Ghana, and Belgium among them—it is the ordinary Congolese who suffer. The system of food-growing and food-distribution has in some parts (notably Kasai) almost entirely broken down. And every day more people starve.

Land of opportunity

Feeling depressed in a monotonous job? Worried about the endless struggle to keep the weekly budget down to the size of your pay packet? Thinking about emigration—perhaps to Canada, land of opportunity?

Before you go, have a look at MacLean’s magazine (it calls itself Canada’s National Magazine) for November 19th, 1960. It carries an article telling you about Canada’s rich. A favourite place for their holidays is Frenchman’s Creek in Jamaica, where millionaires and their wives can have peace and privacy for two thousand dollars a week. Last year a Calgary oil millionaire flew a party of his friends to England to watch his horse run in the Derby; the bill he paid covered a week’s stay at the Ritz for the party and Rolls-Royces for his friends’ trips. A Toronto manufacturer had two swimming pools put in his backyard, complete with lighted fountain, hi-fi music and Japanese teahouse, for 30,000 dollars. A Montreal construction business tycoon often flies to Florida or the Caribbean for weekends in one of the family’s two private planes (a DC-3 and a flying boat); once he couldn’t get a favourite Chinese dish in Miami, so he rang up his usual restaurant in Montreal and got them to make it and fly it down to him. A multi-millionaire distiller had his house festooned with fifteen thousand lilac blooms for his daughter’s wedding; the total wedding bill was reported at 100,000 dollars. Twenty-five upper class wives dress entirely in Paris and London creations at an annual cost of up to forty thousand dollars.

The other side of the coin

You’re keen to? Have a look at the next page. This carries the stories of some of the families of Canada’s 327,000 unemployed workers. (If we had the same percentage of unemployment in Britain there would be nearly a million out of work.) It tells of the bitterness of men trying to make ends meet on unemployment pay. “Today the boss wants a twenty-year-old man with forty years’ experience”, some of them said. A fifty-three-year-old steamfitter suggested, “Why don’t they shoot us old men? Digging graves for us would make jobs for the younger men”. The stories are much the same—mounting bills which cannot be paid, threatening letters from hire-purchase companies as the payments fall behind, the despair of men combing the town every day for jobs and being everywhere refused.

Still, there it is. In a system run by the capitalists you would expect the capitalists to be well off. And you would expect the workers to be badly off. In other words—capitalism in Canada works out much the same as capitalism in Britain. Emigration will give you a change of scenery, but it can’t change your class-position in society.

Unfair to the rich

In the current number of Oxford Tory, the Conservative undergraduate journal, there was a surprising item. One writer commented “To say that we have a just society would be, to say the least, an exaggeration”. Clearly a true statement, but what a place to find it. However, the very next words dispelled the astonishment. “Look”, the writer goes on, “at Schedule A, and the absurd level of death duties”. So it isn’t the ownership of all the country’s factories, and mines, and land by a small ruling class that this Tory finds “unjust”, nor the fact that the workers have to labour to support idlers in luxury: he was only concerned with the arrangements made by the capitalist class to pay for the State which looks after their interests. Perhaps if he examines the nature of society a little more closely, he will be able to find some more penetrating criticisms of the “just society”.

Flogging

Sir Thomas Moore, the Conservative M.P. for Ayr Burghs, is again agitating for the introduction of flogging for crimes involving violence. Sir Thomas said that “peace and justice” were the “keywords” of Hitler’s policy, and also that “Herr Hitler is absolutely honest and sincere,” at a time when Hitler had already set up a dictatorship and begun his campaign to “solve the Jewish problem” with every circumstance of brutality. Socialists do not join in the debate about how criminals should be punished: we go to the root of the problem, By attempting to end the society which gives rise to crime and to criminals. But if Sir Thomas thinks that a man who injures a single other man ought to be flogged, what does he think should be done with political leaders who support dictators whose declared policy is the “liquidation” of millions of their fellow human beings?

Alwyn Edgar

Blogger's Note:

"A year ago, there were those who criticised the Socialist Party because it would not join in movements for “colonial freedom”, such as the one that aimed to throw the Belgians out of the Congo. "

This is in reference to the 'Hackney 13' who resigned from the SPGB in 1960. Hackney is in reference to the fact that they were members of the Hackney Branch of the SPGB. From 'Kaz's paper on SPGB disputes down the years:

The Hackney thirteen, 1960 (13)

Thirteen members of Hackney appended their names to a circular, dated 25th May 1960, announcing their resignation. The letter noted that those listed were “deeply concerned about racialism, about South Africa, about the hydrogen bomb, living standards and other things” and that the resignations were a protest against what they saw as the “unconcern” of the Party with these issues and its “refusal to consider…the welfare of the working class.” 

Connolly, Leo (5929)

Coster, Mrs M (5075)*

Crome, Jack (5735)

Dane, S (5551)

Gleason, J (5856)

Ivimey, AW (5572)

Ivimey, F (5573)

Jarvis, R (5885)

Lawrence, JW (5835)

Temple, MF (5008)

Walby, Dennis (5906)

Walby, S (5292)

Wood, AH (4724)

One name missing from that list was Robert Barltrop ('R. Coster'), who was part of the same dispute within the Party, and resigned from its ranks around about the same time.

The Moscow New Look (1956)

From the October 1956 issue of the Socialist Standard

More light has been thrown on the methods of the Russian dictatorship by the recent “reinstatement ” of various old guard Communists who were liquidated during the purges of the thirties.

In Hungary, for instance, Bela Kun, the leading figure of the pre-war Communist Party, has been posthumously restored to favour, and hailed as a revolutionary hero who fell foul of “the cult of the individual." 

Tuominen, the former secretary of the Finnish Communist Party, has presented a hair-raising picture of what actually went on during those bloody days of the great purge. He describes, in an article in Uusi Kuvalehti (1) the actual Comintern meeting where Kun was exposed:— 

“One such ominous meeting was convened in the Spring of 1937. Immediately the session began the chairman, Georgi Dimitrov, laconically announced that the case of Bela Kun would be discussed. It was to be presented by Manuilsky, the liaison official between the Comintern and Stalin. Manuilsky began reading from a document. After reading a couple of paragraphs, he asked: ‘Does Citizen Bela Kun recognise this? '

“The word Manuilsky used—'Citizen'—seemed to affect Bela Kun like an electric shock. The rest of us, too, except Dimitrov and Manuilsky, were startled. When the word 'Citizen' had been substituted for 'Comrade' on this sort of occasion, it meant nothing less than a sentence of death. Horrified and pale, Bela Kun mumbled: 'Yes, I do. It is written by myself. It is a circular sent to Communists in Hungary.'

“Kun vainly tried to defend himself against the allegation that he had criticised Stalin and the Comintern: 'This is a vile conspiracy. I did not mean Comrade Stalin, but you, Manuilsky, and Moskvin, who are secretaries and bad Bolsheviks. I do know that Stalin is a member of the presidium and Zhdanov and Yezhov members of the executive committee, but.after all, they seldom attend meetings. They are good Bolsheviks, the best in the world, but you, Manuilsky, you’re no Bolshevik. Didn't Lenin even in exile call you a god-seeker?' This attack made Manuilsky flush with anger. He, too, lost his temper. Trying to keep calm, he started in an ironical vein and said: 'Such a great leader as Citizen Bela Kun considers himself to be shouldn't waste his ammunition on such a small bird as I. But Comrade Stalin is a big enough target even for him, and it’s at Comrade Stalin that he aimed in this circular.'

“. . . We all sat there, silent and horrified, watching this great and strong popular leader fight for his life, and the sharp, poisonous attacks of his executioner. Nobody dared to speak, nobody could think of anything to say. for or against.

"As the fight was beginning to wane, Dimitrov tinkled the chairman's bell, declared the discussion closed, and announced that the case would be referred to a committee of three. Until the case had been fully cleared, Citizen Bela Kun was relieved of all duties in the Hungarian Communist Party and the Comintern. The session was over. Bela Kun was allowed to go, and as he left the hall two N.K;V.D. men took him away. Nothing more was heard of him, and his case was not discussed again at the Comintern meetings. Rumour had it that he had been shot.”

It is interesting to note that Wilhelm Pieck, the East German Premier, and the Italian Communist leader. Togliatti, are mentioned by Tuominen as being present at this meeting. One can realise with what consummate hypocrisy Togliatti and other European Communists now condemn the evils wrought by Stalin’s “personality cult,” after acquiescing in, and being a party to these very evils for all the years of Stalin’s lifetime.

The case of Kun is by no means unique. At the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, the old Bolshevik leader, Anastas Mikoyan, resurrected two of the party leaders who disappeared during the great purge—Antonov-Ovsenko and Kossior. It is worth while to observe, however, that Kun and these two were not brought to trial, but merely “disappeared.” The situation with regard to all those who were brought to trial and executed has not yet altered, and Khrushchev’s continued denunciation of “Trotskyites, Bukharinites, bourgeois nationalists and other enemies of the people” is the mixture as before.

It is impossible to predict how far the Soviet Government will carry this “resurrection from the dead” policy, but it seems unlikely that many of the thousands of prominent Bolsheviks who were purged, will be restored to a posthumous position of dignity. The favourable mention of Antonov-Ovsenko is particularly interesting, as he was one of the members of the 1917 Bolshevik Government (Council of People’s Commissars) of whose 15 members only one survived the purge—no prizes for the correct answer! It is highly improbable that other members of this Council, which included Trotsky and Rykov, will ever be commiserated with by the powers-that-be as “innocent victims of the cult of the individual,” as this would in effect deny everything that the Communists have been saying for years about the “truly democratic” nature of the Soviet Government.

Another revealing event is the publication of part of Lenin's so-called political testament. This is the document that the Trotskyists have been publicising for years, but until recently, the Communist party has always denounced it as a forgery. With the publication of that part of the document that criticises Stalin, however, the Communists have in effect admitted the authenticity of the rest of the testament, which singles out five people for praise—Piatakov, Bukharin, Zinoviev, Kamenev and Trotsky. The only other person mentioned in the testament is Stalin, who comes in for a considerable amount of criticism and is said to be unfit for the post of General Secretary of the party. Ironically, enough, it is of course only Stalin who survived, the other five being executed or murdered.

Further criticism of Stalin at the 20th Congress came from A. M. Pankratova, the Soviet historian. She condemned Stalin's version of history for its “arbitrary handling of the facts,” for “fostering the personality cult,” and for “poorly reflecting . . . the activities of the Old Bolsheviks, the collaborators of Lenin.” As has been pointed out, most of Lenin's collaborators were either shot, imprisoned or committed suicide, and this is certainly a “poor reflection” on somebody.

The apparent frankness of the 20th Congress in facing up to its problems is in reality just as spurious as the declarations and resolutions of die previous Congresses. When one looks at the record of the Soviet Communist Party Congresses, it can be seen that since the late 20's every resolution has been carried unanimously, and no one has spoken in opposition to a resolution. The 20th Congress is no exception. The statement by Mikoyan that “in the course of about 20 years we had in fact no collective leadership" doesn't really indicate any better state of affairs than when he said at the 19th Congress (1952)—“At the present stage in world history and the history of our Motherland, it is unthinkable to live, build, fight, without thorough mastery of all the new concepts Comrade Stalin has contributed to the Marxist-Leninist science . . . After the 19th Party Congress our party will go forward still more calmly and confidently to the victory of Communism, under the guidance of our leader and teacher, the brilliant architect of Communism, our beloved Comrade Stalin. Glory to the great Stalin!” (Stormy, prolonged applause. All rise.) (2).

It is also worthwhile to note that although the Party Congress is theoretically the democratic organ that determines the party, and eventually, government policy, there has been a strange neglect to hold Congresses at all, and in fact since 1925 the gaps between Congresses have become wider and wider. Although the Party Rules required that Congresses be held annually, the Congresses held since 1925 have been as follows:—1927; 1930; 1934; 1939; 1952 and 1956. (3).

One is led to conclude from all this that the ferment in the Communist parties of the world with regard to “overcoming the cult of the individual” is so much hot air, and merely a display put on for the benefit of those who are anxious to see the Russian bureaucracy placed on a more stable footing. Indeed, it would not be unfair to say that all those former undoubting Communist party members are only having doubts now because Moscow tells them to. 

In spite of all the reassuring speeches of Krushchov, Bulganin and other Soviet leaders, in spite of all their barnstorming “goodwill” tours, and in spite of the alleged restoration of collective leadership, there is fundamentally nothing that has happened since Stalin's death that would lead an intelligent observer to draw the conclusion that shattering changes have been made in the Russian bureaucratic governmental system. The fact remains that a ruling class has been put in the saddle in Russia and the other so-called Communist countries and no amount of juggling with the reins of power of the substitution of one official by another will alter the fact that the Russian workers are fundamentally in the same position as their brother-workers everywhere else—the position of exploited wage-slaves.

Albert Ivimey

1.—New Statesman & Nation, September I, 1956.

2—Pravda, October 12, 1952.

2—Stalinist Russia, T. Cliff, p. 97.

SPGB Meetings (1956)

Party News from the October 1956 issue of the Socialist Standard

Blogger's Note:

Background to Joe Thomas and the Workers' League is available at the following link.

Party News Briefs (1957)

Party News from the June 1957 issue of the Socialist Standard

Conference proceeded this year in a very business-like fashion, the Agenda was completed by 5.30 p.m. on the Sunday afternoon. On the first day forty-four delegates were present, representing twenty branches; on Saturday and Sunday the numbers were slightly less. Although the Agenda was a full one, all the items were dealt with, despite the fact that there was no Saturday morning session this year. The dance held on the Saturday was better attended than the one held last year, and a very happy evening was enjoyed by all. On Sunday a Party Rally was held, but the audience was not a very large one, and it has been suggested that the rallies should be discontinued. However, if Comrades would like to see them continued and are prepared to muster up support for them, they can easily voice their views through the branches with a view to the continuance of the Rallies.

May Day. Full details are not yet to hand (at the time of going to press), but good meetings were held in Hyde Park, in addition to the meeting in the evening at Denison House. The Literature Sales Committee will be reporting later on the special efforts made for the sale of the Standard.

Lewisham Branch is holding two more lectures at their Branch Room, Davenport House, Davenport Road. Rushey Green. On Monday, 3rd June, Comrade Ivimey is speaking on the Rent Bill, and on Monday, 17th June, Comrade D’Arcy is speaking on “The Cost of Living." Both lectures commence at 8 p.m.

The "Daily Telegraph.” In an endeavour to get the Party’s case more widely known, advertisements are placed from time to time in various journals. It was considered that the “Personal Column” of the Daily Telegraph offered one useful medium, but both in May 1955. and again this year (the only two occasions we have approached them during recent years), they declined to accept our advertisement, thus depriving their readers of studying views which may be new to them. This is symptomatic of the difficulty of more widely spreading the Party’s case. Not only are we handicapped by lack of funds, and barred from the air by the B.B.C., but even small advertisements are liable to be banned by the consortiums which sell the news.

The advertisement they refused to accept is given below. No explanation was given, merely a curt note from the Classified Advertisement Manager (6th May, 1957): “It is regretted we are unable to accommodate the above announcement in our columns.”

 “It could be worth your while to investigate Socialism (as distinct from Labourism or Russian “Communism”). Why not send for Socialist Comment—a reprint of several outstanding articles from the Socialist Standard? 8d. post free. S.P.G.B., 52. Clapham High Street, S.W.4.”

Phyllis Howard

Letters from readers invited.

Our Annual Conference in April decided that a section of the Socialist Standard be reserved for letters from readers as a regular feature. Readers are invited to send letters of comment and criticism and questions for answer. Letters should be kept as short as possible as space is limited, and the shorter the letters the larger the number that can be printed.

Editorial Committee.

Party News Briefs (1957)

Party News the May 1957 issue of the Socialist Standard

May Day, 1957. Once more the Party is making a special propaganda effort, this year on Sunday, 5th May. In London there will be several outdoor meetings, and Birmingham, Glasgow and Nottingham will also have afternoon and evening outdoor meetings. A May Day Rally will be held at Denison House. London, in the evening, commencing at 7 p.m., when the speakers will be Comrades Ivimey and Wilmott. Further details of all meetings are elsewhere in this issue.

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Meeting on Strikes. At very short notice the Propaganda Committee arranged a public meeting at Denison House on Sunday, 7th April. Comrades R. Critchfield and J. D’Arcy spoke on “Another General Strike?" Although the audience was not as large as usual at such meetings, the meeting was a lively one and after both speakers had made a contribution, several members of the audience put some good questions and took part in discussion. Some had taken part in the recent strike. A collection of five pounds was taken up during the interval.

#    #    #    #

Conference will be over by the time this issue is printed, although the Standard will have gone to the

printers beforehand. Conference news will be reported, therefore, in the June issue.

#    #    #    #

The May S.S. Sales Drive. During this month many Branches are undertaking an extensive programme of canvassing the Socialist Standard. Plans are also in hand for a special drive on May Day.

Last year over 6,000 Standards were sold, and this year we are hoping to do even better. All members are especially asked to do all they can to help in canvassing, contacting newsagents, selling at outdoor meetings and by personal contact, etc. The Literature Sales Committee will be pleased to give any further information required.

PLEASE SEE LIST OF CANVASSING ARRANGEMENTS ELSEWHERE IN THIS ISSUE!

Phyllis Howard

London County Council Election (1958)

Party News from the March 1958 issue of the Socialist Standard

Hackney branch is putting forward three candidates in the Bethnal Green Division in the forthcoming L.C.C. elections, which take place in April.

Canvassing is taking place within the division, and a number of indoor and outdoor meetings are being held, which are advertised elsewhere in this issue.

An election manifesto is being prepared, and it is hoped to distribute this throughout the whole of the constituency, which contains over 60,000 voters. This will necessitate a considerable effort on the part of the membership and all members and sympathisers who are prepared to assist should attend at the campaign headquarters any week-day evening from 7 p.m., from Monday, March 17th onwards. The headquarters are to be 56, Weymouth Terrace, E.2 (near Odeon Cinema).

It is hoped to hold two election challenge meetings just prior to the election, and these will be advertised in the April issue.

Election Manifesto (1959)

Socialist Party Election Statement from the May 1959 issue of the Socialist Standard

Hackney Borough Council Elections

Why We Are Here

The three candidates of the Socialist Party of Great Britain are entering this election with a viewpoint that is completely opposed to those of the other parties taking part—that viewpoint is one of working-class interests. You may consider that the Labour Party, or even some other party, is concerned with working-class interests, but a brief look at the facts shows that this is not so.

For all its talk of “democracy” and “equality of opportunity,” what has the Labour Party ever done for you or for the working-class generally? Did it solve the housing problem? Did you become substantially better-off between 1945 and 1951? Did the threat of war recede? The answer to all these questions must be an emphatic NO! Of course, the record of the Tories is no better.

Why is this so? The answer is a very simple one. Neither of these parties sets out to solve your problems or to make you better off—what they set out to do, in fact, is to run this social system called capitalism in the only way that it can be run; that is in the interests of your bosses, employers, ruling class, call them what you will.

What then is the basis of this social system? Capitalism means a social organisation where all the means of producing wealth (mines, land, factories, transport and so on) are owned by a small section of the people. That leaves us, the working class, with nothing except our ability to work. And work we must, or else we starve. From the employer’s point of view, it is a simple proposition—more for you means less for them, and so they do all that they can to prevent any raising of your living standards. The fraud of inflation carries out this job well, so that wage increases are often nullified by a corresponding rise in the cost of living.

But this isn’t our only objection to capitalism. Our bosses are always squabbling with the ruling classes of other countries over the distribution of the loot, resulting in continual international crises and minor wars, leading sooner or later to major ones.

The Alternative

We say that there is an alternative to this state of affairs—the alternative of Socialism. Socialism means a world where the things of life will be produced solely to satisfy the needs of mankind, instead of for the purpose of realising a profit for your bosses; a world where the whole of humanity will own and control the means of living and where wars and international tension cannot exist: a world where people will no longer be subject to the threat of unemployment and to the perpetual struggle to make ends meet—in short, a world where everyone will freely and equally associate and enjoy all the fruits of their labour. 

It may be objected that these are hardly matters which concern local electors, but in fact the problems of local government are the same as those of the national government, only at a lower level. The measures affecting rates, rents, housing, education, etc., are no more than the carrying out of government policy, which means capitalist policy.

Housing

One of the most pressing questions of local government is the housing problem, and although the Labour and Tory parties talk glibly of the numbers of flats and houses built, the fact remains that to-day’s housing problem is as bad as it ever was. At root, the lack of decent accommodation for working people is a part of the working-class poverty problem. If you happen to be well-off, there is no lack of fine houses and flats—at an appropriate price. In other words, workers live in poor houses and flats because they cannot afford anything better, and never will be able to afford anything better as long as they remain members of the working-class.

Education

Education too, under capitalism means the fitting of our children for the tasks required by the social system; in other words, the production of the engineers, clerks, miners and all the other kinds of worker that are essential to capitalism. The present-day bias towards technical education is but a reflection of industry’s needs for more and more technical workers. Nothing wrong with that, you might think. But the trouble is that capitalism has no regard for the realisation of a child’s potentialities or for education in the sense of equipping children for full and happy lives.

Rates And Taxes

The problem of rates is another that is much discussed in the council chamber, but basically it is not one that really concerns workers. The whole principle of taxation, national or local, is the levying of a share of the profits for the State, in order that it might efficiently carry out the task of keeping capitalism going. Your wages, generally speaking, are no more than sufficient to keep you and your family going from one pay-day to the next, and this is affected little, if at all, by the raising or lowering of the level of taxation.

We say that all these problems are capitalist problems, which means that they are inseparable from the nature of the society under which we live. All the efforts of the reformers over the years have not altered your basic position one bit. What is required is something far more drastic—a revolutionary change in the nature of society.

What Can Be Done?

Our proposition is a simple one. We and people like us (the working-class) not only produce all the wealth but also carry out all the necessary functions to keep society going. The tragedy is that we keep it going for the benefit of a privileged minority. What we suggest is that workers throw off the domination of the ruling class and organise and run society in their own interests instead of in the interests of their bosses. Then and only then will we see an end to the problems that have beset the working class for so long.

This is a proposition well worth struggling for, hence our participation in this election. Our candidates are here as a protest against capitalism, and to give working people an opportunity of registering their support for the only constructive alternative to capitalism and for the only effective solution to their problems. Every one who joins us in the struggle against this pernicious social system is helping to make the life of capitalism shorter and helping to bring about a sane and rational social order.

Do not think that because there are only three of our candidates in this election, there is no point in supporting us. At least, three socialists in the Town Hall would mean a lot of useful propaganda for socialism and would ensure that there were a least some members of the council who really did represent the working class. In any event, the need for socialism becomes ever more pressing in a world riddled with frightening problems, and a start must be made in wresting power from the ruling class. Every socialist vote means another step towards a freer, better world.

The only Socialist candidates are: — A. Ivimey, J. L. Read, F. Ivimey

The Snoopers (1959)

From the June 1959 issue of the Socialist Standard

A furore arose recently in the readers’ letters column of the Daily Mirror, when an article revealed that there were thousands of people employed by Finance Companies whose job it was to snoop into people’s lives, and report on would-be hire purchase customers’ credit reliability. Confirmation of this disturbing practice was forthcoming in subsequent letters, some even rushing to the defence of the maligned investigators. A snooper’s letter pointed out that they performed a very important social function, in that they prevented goods being supplied either to people who couldn’t afford them or to people who had no intention of meeting the repayments.

Irrespective of the ethical considerations involved, there is no doubt that this practice is here to stay, along with its progenitor, Hire Purchase. The growth of Hire Purchase and credit trading in this country since the war has been phenomenal, although, of course, far less than that in America. The increase in the total Hire Purchase debt here in the last eighteen months alone amounted to £220 millions, the total figure in November, 1958, amounting to the colossal sum of £565 millions. Allowing one half of this for commercial credit (machinery, vehicles, and so on), this means that the average personal debt per family works out at something over £20. And in the U.S.A. nine out of ten families live on credit of one form or another.

With this growth of credit selling to working people, it was inevitable that there should grow up the practice of "status reports" or enquiries into the means and earnings of customers. This has reached its highest peak in the U.S.A. with “credit ratings" by which every credit customer is given a record card at a central agency to which Finance Companies can refer. In 1955 the Associated Credit Bureaux of America had 1,700 branches in the U.S.A. and Canada, with files on 75 million buyers. These files contain exhaustive information on the credit subject, including the earnings of all members of the family, personal habits, litigation record, records of past business dealings, value of house and mortgage position or amount of rent paid, and so on. By this system, the good and bad customers can be assessed and defaulters avoided, although strangely enough, the more credit commitments a customer has (promptly paid, of course), the higher his credit rating.

In this country the credit rating system has been proposed many times, but always to be turned down by the Finance associations because their members were not prepared to bear the cost. This is hardly surprising at a time when bad debts amount to less than one-half per cent, of the finance companies’ turnover. However, one can confidently predict that when things become a little more difficult and the bad debt rate increases, the rating system will appear here, too, and we will all have little dossiers giving details of our earnings, family, virtues and vices (shades of the "police state”!)

Until that happy day arrives, the finance houses will make do with the snoopers, those raincoated individuals who, masquerading as friends or relatives, call on our neighbours to make discreet enquiries about our jobs, wages and homes. Then they pop along to the nearby shops and see if we run up bills or live beyond our means, and afterwards call on the factory gateman to make sure that we really do work there. In due course a little buff slip headed "confidential” is sent to the finance company stating, perhaps.—"Works as engineer in local factory at salary of approx. £12 per week—two children aged 6 and 3—good standing with local tradesmen—well-kept home—considered good risk for the amount of credit mentioned.” Or—if the customer is less praiseworthy—"Worked for last two months as fitter—frequently changes job—5 children. 18 months to 7 years—poor home—considered unsafe.”

In this country, although the enquiry organisation is not as complete and exhaustive as that in the U.S.A., it is highly organised. In some towns, the enquiry agencies have files on tens of thousands of hire purchase customers, and the motor-car trade has its own comprehensive system. There is a central agency which records all hire purchase transactions on cars, and issues reports to all its members. This, of course, is essential in a trade dealing with goods that are often priced at £1,000 or more, and where strict control has to be exercised to prevent hirers from selling cars that are still the property of finance companies.

The Hire Purchase Trade Association has 20,000 part-time enquiry agents on its books for the purpose of obtaining “status reports.” There are many smaller organisations using such agents, who are normally part-timers, supplementing their income from rent-collecting and so on. Many are retired Police officers; some are ordinary housewives.

These agents are only a small part of snooperdom. There are many thousands of private enquiry agents who, unlike the romantic figures of Sam Spade and Dr. Thorndike, are kept busy by the sordid divorce investigations and the routine serving of writs and summonses.

Most people look upon snooping as an unsavoury occupation, but do not see where the real unsavouriness lies. This kind of activity is an essential part of property society, a society which provides even more unsavoury occupations, such as the policeman who breaks strikers’ heads with his truncheon, or the soldier mangling workers of other countries. The jobs themselves are not likely to ennoble the characters of the performers, but this is not the main issue. They are carrying out a necessary function of an irrational and harmful social order, and one which exemplifies the sheer idiocy of the social organisation.

What sensible reason can there be for an arrangement whereby some workers produce goods, other workers advertise them, yet more workers arrange them in gaudy shop-windows, more workers fill in hire purchase forms, even more run the complicated accounting and collecting system of the finance companies, some more occupy their time snooping into the buyers’ lives, others add up the bosses’ profit, a few store it away in bank vaults, and finally, a tiny section of the population live more than comfortably on the proceeds?

Surely a simpler and less wasteful arrangement is called for? Why should a vast number of people have to perform useless and frustrating tasks, in order to satisfy the selfish wishes of a ruling clique? Yet it is working people themselves who perpetuate this foolish system; who do the useless tasks as well as the useful; the unproductive as well as the productive.

The trouble is that the alternative, a world of common ownership and common effort, is frightening in its simplicity. It seems too easy to be true. Nevertheless, true it is. It’s as simple as that!

Albert Ivimey

What is Democracy? (1959)

From the August 1959 issue of the Socialist Standard

Most people support, usually in some vague, ill-defined way, the principle of democracy. However, if one questions people as to exactly what democracy is, the replies are varied and usually unhelpful. Majority rule; the rights of minorities; the freedoms of speech, thought and the press; the right to vote; the right to organise in Trade Unions—all these will be mentioned by one person or another as being essential ingredients of democracy. Democracy, though, has become such a dangerous, emotionally charged word that McCarthy carried out his witch-hunts under its banner, workers slaughter each other in its name, and people are incarcerated in gaols and prison-camps in defence of its holy writ.

Confusion

It is a confusing concept that permits the perpetration of slavery in the name of freedom, slaughter in the name of peace, oppression in the name of tolerance, and what is perhaps more important, minority government in the name of majority rule.

In this country, the result of the party system so far has been that power has remained in the hands of the “right" people. The Labour, Tory and Liberal parties, either as Her Majesty's Government or Her Majesty's Opposition, are pledged to the support of the status quo —which means the continued subjection of the working class and the preservation of the sanctity of private property.

Basically, of course, the reason that enables these parties to continue in this way is the passive support of workers for the kind of world that we have today. Although workers may grumble and agitate about specific problems, and even join large-scale protest movements about such things as the H-bomb, it is only among Socialists that one finds a conscious desire for complete social change.

In other words, the theory of democratic control by a majority means in practice a rigid control by a minority supported by the passive acquiescence of the majority. In this sense “democracy" is a hollow term which cloaks class ownership.

Of course, the ruling class and government know this better than most, and consequently play on workers' acquiescence and apathy through the vast means at their disposal—the press, radio, cinema, television and so on. Every kind of phony idea and concept is dinned into the working class by these means—“patriotism" (not so effective now, this one); “gracious living"; “getting on"; “making a world fit for heroes to live in";—all these, and a thousand more, bombard workers from all directions.

Hard Won Rights

This is not to suggest that the hard won gains of adult suffrage, secret voting, organisation of Trade Unions, freedom of speech, and so on, are not important. Of course they are, but it is equally important to realise that they were not granted to the working class by philanthropic, liberal-minded rulers who were abdicating their power. They were wrested from the ruling class after years of struggle, and the dead of Peterloo, the Tolpuddle martyrs, and all those who have suffered for such causes bear witness to the fact that it is the working people themselves that must work out their own destiny.

Paradoxically enough, these hard-won rights are often used as a justification for our rulers to enlist our support in fighting wars or oppressing others. But of one thing the workers can be sure—wars are not fought over democracy or democratic rights. This appears obvious from the war-time line-ups of states—some ostensibly “democratic" and others flagrant dictatorships. So in the last war, one could find varieties of both, specimens on either side of the front. Similarly, today one finds that countries such as Portugal and Spain are looked upon as allies, while in South America, the many dictatorships are often in alliance with “democratic" America.

Perhaps the most important thing to remember is that terms like “freedom" and “democracy" are not absolute and must be examined in their social context. To talk of “freedom" today, in a world of social and economic class domination, is as absurd as talking of the “democracy" of the Western capitalist countries, all of whom practice in one form or another the suppression of minorities and the flouting of majority wishes.

Limited Meaning

So it is that, under capitalism, democracy can have only the most limited of meanings, and is usually given a meaning and justification that is completely opposed to its theoretical principles.

The principles of majority rule and the recognition of the rights of minorities can only really achieve practical fruition in a world freed from economic and social domination. It is only with the establishment of socialism that people will be able consciously to effect their wishes through democratic practice. Only then will today’s empty and hollow cry of “democracy" bear a meaning worthy of human organisation.

Albert Ivimey

Letter to a Georgia Mother (1957)

Film Review from the July 1957 issue of the Socialist Standard

This film, made by the American Agricultural Workers’ Union and recently shown at Head Office, gives a shocking picture of America’s four million unorganised migrant workers, who travel up and down America following the crops, and eke out a miserable existence picking peaches or pulling potatoes.

Their periods of employment are irregular and their wages low. The accommodation provided by their employers is usually primitive, and often disgustingly inadequate. The film showed dozens of negro workers sleeping side-by-side in a two-roomed shack, and whole families who cook, sleep and live in tiny wretched tarpaper huts.

Of course, it is the Negroes or Puerto Ricans who are the worst-treated, but even the condition of the whites is not to be envied, as anyone who has read Grapes of Wrath will appreciate.

This kind of film provides a useful rebuff to the usual Hollywood effusion in praise of the good life that America offers its citizens, and there is surely a moral to be drawn from the fact that in “the land of the free” the workers who have the misfortune to be unorganised and unprotected are viciously exploited in appalling conditions.

Albert Ivimey

The Labour Party Conference (1956)

From the November 1956 issue of the Socialist Standard

WITH all the usual brass-bands and ballyhoo, the Labour Party has emerged triumphantly from the Blackpool Conference with what they fondly describe as a policy “ towards equality."

As always, the usual hallmarks of futility and chicanery were apparent. The pious but embarrassing resolutions of some of the constituency parties were turned down on the solemn recommendation of the Executive; the “safe” composite resolutions blessed by the Executive were ushered through (both with the aid of the Trade Union block vote), and once again the Labour Party, under the expert guidance of Mr. Gaitskell, sallies forth to meet all comers.

When all the shouting has died down, however, what is it that remains? Nothing but a pitiful collection of woolly and sometimes well-meaning resolutions, that signify nothing as far as actual practice is concerned, and a document called “ Towards Equality," which purports, in Mr. Harold Wilson’s words, “to set the ideals of the Socialist pioneers against the framework of the 1956 society.”

One would be at a loss to understand why a spirit of optimism pervaded the conference by merely looking at the resolutions passed and the policy statements adopted. What is really behind the optimism is, of course, that the Tories have struck a bad patch, and this in itself is sufficient for the Labour Party to entertain hopes of winning the next election.

So far as actual policy is concerned, a brief comparison of the attitudes of the Conference with the Labour Party’s actual record will amply demonstrate the emptiness of their claims.

Perhaps the most blatant example of the Labour Party’s hypocrisy over policy—and here it must regrettably be said that this hypocrisy is not confined to the leadership, but extends to the rank and file, too—was the attitude of the Conference to rearmament and conscription. There was the inevitable resolution that conscription be abolished as soon as the next Labour Government takes office, but this was turned down at the earnest request of the Executive, who stated that they should not be committed to the immediate abolition of conscription, but that they would dispose of this thorn in the side of the electorate in easy stages. And this from the party that extended conscription from 18 months to 2 years and instituted the biggest peace-time rearmament programme in this country’s history!

Mr. Frank Allaun, M.P., who supported the resolution to abolish conscription, stressed the obvious when he said that “National Service is becoming a national curse, and if delegates doubt this they should ask the conscripts and their parents, teachers and employers. The knowledge that at 18 they will be taken from their homes and jobs is unsettling the whole of the 15-year-old school leavers, and when they are called up they find that two years of their lives are wasted. It is utterly immoral to send boys of 18, who are not permitted to vote, to kill or be killed, not to defend freedom in this country, but to deny freedom to people in other lands.’’ All very true, but what has this to do with the Labour Party—a party that is committed to protect British capitalist interests when in power.

Another subject on which glib and pious resolutions were passed was colonial policy, particularly with regard to Cyprus and Kenya. One resolution stated that Cyprus should be given self-determination, and condemned the Tory Government’s policy, and another called for a commission of enquiry to investigate the brutal punishments imposed on non-Europeans in Kenya.

Here again, it must be pointed out that the Labour Party’s policy has in the past completely conflicted with their avowed ideals. As far as colonial policy goes, during the years 1945-51 they carried out a policy that hardly differed at all from the policies of Liberal and Tory Governments before and since. One has only to think of Malaya, Palestine and Seretse Khama to appreciate the hollowness of the Labour Party’s fine-sounding phrases, and it is fairly obvious that here too they have, when in office, followed the lines that one would expect from a party administering capitalism.

The example of Palestine is one that immediately springs to mind when considering the way in which the Labour Party, because of the pressure of world capitalist politics, has been forced to do something quite contrary to their prior declared intentions. At the 1945 Conference, Hugh Dalton, on behalf of the Executive, stated: “It is morally wrong and politically indefensible to impose obstacles to the entry into Palestine now of Jews who desire to go there . . .  we should facilitate this going by the provision of economic assistance in various forms for the development of the Land of Promise and Hope in a world which, for the Jews, has been blackened to an extent which none of us who are not Jews can begin to understand or appreciate." Not long after this, Britons, Israelis and Arabs were slaughtering each other.

Another dead and decayed horse that was further flogged at the Conference was the old story about the Labour Party getting together with the leaders of Russia and their allies and coming to some amicable settlement over disarmament It is well known that the memory of the electorate is short, but surely the Labour Party cannot imagine that it is that short. It is only a few weeks since the fiasco of Khrushchev and Bulganin’s dinner with the Parliamentary Labour Party, and one recollects the bitter aftermath of similar pronouncements in 1945, such as Dalton’s “Given that Anglo-Soviet relations are still clouded from time to time by suspicion and misunderstanding, I most emphatically hold that a British Labour Government is far more likely to remove these suspicions than a British Tory Government,” which was followed by the Cold War and the somewhat hotter wars in Malaya, Korea, and elsewhere.

These examples can be multiplied over every sphere of the Labour Party’s policy, whether it be pensions, housing, nationalisation, rent restriction, or anything else. The real tragedy is that in spite of the contradictions that riddle the Labour Party’s policy and history, and in spite of workers’ disillusionment during six years of Labour rule, the majority of the electorate will once again register their votes for capitalism—either the Labour or Tory variety.

What is basic to the whole question is this: The Labour Party is a party that intends to administer capitalism when in power, and to administer it in the only way possible—that is, in the interests of the ruling class. For all their fine phrases about equality and opportunity, they have nothing more to recommend them to workers than the Tory or Liberal parties. Mr. Gaitskell himself let the cat out of the bag when be said: "It is not true that we want exact equality. Provided there is a decent minimum wage, we don't object to a system of rewards related to the nature of the work." (News Chronicle, 4th Oct., 1956). This in itself adequately demonstrates the point that the Labour Party is no champion of the working class, and, in fact, is a more efficient oppressor than the Tories. Remember the wage freeze, or the rise in the cost of living between 1945 to 1951?

The Labour Party has certainly a lot to answer for. They have frittered away the energies of the working class by so-called reforms that have left the workers in the same position as when they started; they have turned working-class militancy into apathy; they have upheld the slaughter of one nation’s workers by another; they have led the trade unions into a position of tacit support for capitalism, by basing their wage claims on rises in the cost of living and production, instead of the basic fact of worker's exploitation. One could go on enumerating the policies by which the Labour Party has caused incalculable harm to the working class of this and other countries, but what is perhaps most unforgivable of all. they have deluded people into imagining that what they were doing was somehow bringing the equalitarian society of socialism nearer.

Our message to working people is this: Instead of looking to leaders and political racketeers to solve their problems, they should start examining the problems for themselves, and see what it is that keeps them in economic subjection. Once they do this, they are well on the way to seeing that only the abolition of classes and private property can solve their problems, and at the moment of this realisation, the golden days of Henry Ford. Bernard Docker, Anthony Eden (and Mr. Gaitskell) will be over.

Albert Ivimey

"The Prisoner" (Plaza) (1955)

Film Review from the June 1955 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Prisoner is based on Bridget Boland’s play of the same name which had a short run in London a few months ago. The play, which was one of the very few worthwhile serious plays shown in London in the past year or so, had two of the main characters in common with the film—Alec Guinness as the Cardinal and Wilfred Lawson as the warder. The interrogator, the other principal character, is played in the film by Jack Hawkins.

It is a story of a Cardinal in an iron curtain country who has fallen foul of the regime by his outspokenness. The authorities, however, are unable to merely arrest and liquidate him owing to his fame and popularity, and it is therefore necessary for them to extort from the prisoner a confession of crimes sufficient to discredit him and to ensure his fall from public favour. In the words of the interrogator: “You are a public monument and that monument must be—defaced.”

The story, then, deals with the efforts of the interrogator to discover the chink in the Cardinal’s armour that will enable him to break down his resistance and eventually bring about his public recantation and “confession.” The interrogation takes months and although the prisoner is subjected to no actual physical torture, his spirit is broken by solitary confinement, the complete absence of sunlight and other well-thought-out “psychological” methods of torture. Inevitably roe chink in the armour is discovered and exploited and the State triumphs, although the interrogator discovers in the process that he himself is not free from pity, and is bringing about his own destruction as much as the prisoner's. The interrogator's method of breaking the prisoners’ will (or “curing him” as the interrogator puts it) and the Cardinal’s struggles to thwart him make a fascinating, although horrifying, study.

Any other conclusion to the story would have been dishonest for, in fact, in the so-called “Communist peoples' democracies” the State has always triumphed.

Bridget Boland has also written the script for die film and, unfortunately, has been prevailed upon to embellish the severity of the play with some romantic interest and some other tiresome, Hollywoodesque, film conventions, presumably at the instance of the box-office experts. The action of the play took place completely in the interrogation room and in the prisoner's cell, but there are a number of outside episodes added to the film that are both distracting and pointless. For instance, there is the disjointed love story of one of the police-warders; then a young boy is shot by the police while chalking “ Freedom” signs on a wall; a gun-battle breaks out between troops and an armed man in a house; a subversive journalist is arrested in a cafe; and so on. The addition of these episodes ruins the original unity of the play, and makes the film crudely anti-Communist, sprawling and inconsequential. Less reprehensible, perhaps, is the addition of the Cardinal's arrest in the cathedral and the trial. Both are quite effective but again, add little to the unity and point of the original.

The political trials that have taken place in Russia and the other so-called “Communist” countries generally follow a consistent pattern. At the trial the accused generally gives an abject “confession”; admits to all his crimes; extolls the virtues of the leaders of the party; admits the complete wrongness of his thought and sometimes even demands that the maximum penalty be exacted for the benefit of the people he is confessing that he has betrayed! A few extracts from the accounts of some of these trials should be sufficient to demonstrate this.

Trial of Zinoviev, Kamenev, and others. (Russia, 1936):—

“Vishinsky: How is one to judge the articles and declarations which you wrote in 1933 and in which you expressed devotion to the Party? As deceit?
Kamenev: No, worse than deceit.
Vishinsky: Breach of faith?
Kamenev: Worse.
Vishinsky: Worse than deceit, worse than breach of faith. Do you find this word? Is it treachery?
Kamenev: You have said it.
Vishinsky: Zinoviev, do you confirm this?
Zinoviev: Yes.”

Trial of Traicho Kostov and others. (Bulgaria, 1949):— 

Kostov: “So I repeat, I plead guilty of nationalist deviation in relation to the Soviet Union, which deserves a most severe punishment”—and—“I must confess that my readiness to put myself at the disposal of the British Intelligence Service was due partly to my left-sectarian, Trotskyist convictions of the past as well as to my capitulation before the police in 1942 . . . "

Nikola Nachev at the same trial:—

“Citizen Judges, having fully realised my criminal and hostile activities, carried on by me against my Fatherland and the Bulgarian people, I have described these activities in my written depositions before the People’s Militia. I will now tell you about what I did and what I know, so that the criminal conspiracy in which I also participated may be revealed. . . .”

One could go on quoting indefinitely this kind of thing. No one in their right mind could accept these confessions as being genuine and it is impossible not to feel uneasy when thinking of the methods which must be resorted to in order to obtain them. George Orwell in “Nineteen Eighty-Four” has, perhaps, described these methods in their ultimate form. For example, when O'Brien is explaining to Winston Smith the methods and ideals of the party he says, “Shall I tell you why we have brought you here? To cure you! To make you sane! Will you understand, Winston, that no one whom we bring to this place ever leaves our hands uncured? We are not interested in those stupid crimes that you have committed. The Party is not interested in the overt act; the thought is all we care about. We do not merely destroy our enemies, we change them."

It is ironical to think that after thousands of years of human progress, a large part of the world's population exists without even those elementary freedoms that the workers in this country possess, but this in itself does not justify despair, for though tragic failures, the Berlin riots and the Vorkuta rising are two signs that the “Communist” dictatorships do show cracks.

However, to return to the film. It merits a visit in spite of its faults, not only because of the superb acting performances of the three principals, but also because it throws some light on one of the most remarkable social phenomena of our time:—the political trial.

Albert Ivimey

The Films (1955)

Film Reviews from the May 1955 issue of the Socialist Standard

At the Curzon Cinema recently there was an excellent programme, both from the point of view of the film-lover and of the Socialist. The films are De Sica’s Umberto D and a Spanish family comedy called Meet Mr. Marshall.

Umberto D has been described by the filmic “blurbs" as “De Sica’s masterpiece,” and this seems to be one of the few occasions when they are right The film seems to be much nearer perfection than De Sica’s two most famous earlier films—Bicycle Thieves and Miracle in Milan. It is the story of an Italian old-age pensioner and his mongrel dog, and lays bare the misery and unbearable loneliness that workers suffer in their old age.

The film opens with a demonstration by old-age pensioners for an increase in their pensions. The demonstrators have no permit and, inevitably, they are dispersed by steel-helmeted police in jeeps. The film goes on to show in agonising detail the neglect of the old; the indifference of the majority of the young; the distrust even of other old people; and their attempt to cling to their last vestiges of human dignity.

The principal character in the film, a retired government employee, is in arrears with his rent His landlady, a brassy blonde singer, is anxious to throw him out in order to convert his pitiful single room into a parlour. Umberto (that is his name) who has lived in the room for years, is determined not to leave, and sells first his watch and then his books in a despairing effort to rake the money for the rent. In order to save money, he gets himself admitted into a hospital for a week. When he returns home he finds his room in a shambles, his landlady having taken advantage of his absence to start work on the flat. Despairing and tired of life, the only thing left to the old man is his dog, and it is his love for the dog alone that gives him the will to go on living.

The story is all on this simple and unheroic level but, needless to say, has far greater impact than any Hollywood “epic.” I will not spoil the film-goers pleasure by further description of the plot but will be content with some observations on the social implications of the film.

Perhaps the most pitiful and most crying problem that capitalism has thrown up is its treatment of its workers in old age. Condemned to inactivity and loneliness by the “Great God Profit” for which they have sweated away the greater part of their life, they are generously granted an old-age pension which has rightly been described as the final insult to the worker. There is no doubt that it is among the old, both of this country and of the other “civilised” countries, that the problem of poverty is at its most acute. They are condemned to exist on what is no more than a pittance, often in complete loneliness.

Owing to the nature of the Society in which we live, their children are often unable or unwilling to care for them, or even to help support them. The majority have the further indignity of having to apply to the National Assistance Board for money, who enquire closely into their means and capital and also whether they have any relatives capable of supporting them. This film does a very worth-while job in spotlighting this problem, and De Sica (whose Bicycle Thieves flowed that he was alive to the social problems of our day) is to be complimented for doing so and and for making a great film.

The other film in the programme provides the necessary light relief. It is an extremely amusing satire from Spain which turns on the fact that the world in general, and America in particular, looks upon Spain as being a land of gypsy dancers, bullfights, and peculiar hats. The little town portrayed in the film is in the province of Castile, and is as unlike the outsider’s concept of Spain as Devon or Cornwall.

The mayor, who is in co-operation with the rest of the population in "fiddling” their taxes, is informed that the American “Marshall Aid” officials will be visiting the town and showering their dollars wherever they go, and that a suitable welcome and demonstration must be prepared for them. The satire, not only aimed at America, but at almost everything and everybody, is carried out to great effect The sequences in which the principal personages of the town dream about America are particularly good. The town priest, for instance, dreams that he is cross-examined by typical Hollywood gangsters and subsequently, dragged before an inquisition of Ku Klux Klan members who sentence him to the gallows. This seems to be aimed, not only at the "K.K.K.” but also at the Catholic Church and the inquisition.

It is perhaps surprising that a satire of this kind should have come out of Spain, considering that unhappy country's political institutions and economic circumstances, but one frequently finds that films and books of high quality spring from the most unexpected quartos. A good example is Los Olvidados, an excellent film about poverty and juvenile delinquency in Mexico City which showed living conditions at their most debased, and which was sponsored by the Mexican government.

We find sometimes that people who are not Socialists have facilities for vividly illustrating things that we say. I would look at Umberto D in that light. Perhaps I can reiterate that this programme is well worth a visit. Both Socialists and those who do not accept our point of view will come away feeling mentally stimulated.

Albert Ivimey

The Films (1956)

Film Review from the July 1956 issue of the Socialist Standard

"Storm Centre"

This film is a timely reminder that the spirit of McCarthyism is not yet dead—only a little less vociferous. In fact, it can fairly confidently be said that this spirit will not die as long as capitalism lives. As long as it serves a political or economic end to have purges, scapegoats or witch-hunts—which means for the duration of capitalism—then these things will continue.

It is welcome, however, to find a film from Hollywood which is openly hostile to "red-baiting," though of course, the makers of the film had difficulty in getting it made at all, and no doubt the next time that the Un-American Activities Committee turn their attention to Hollywood, they will pounce on this film with glee.

The story is simple—An elderly woman librarian in a small American town refuses to remove from the library a book on "Communism" which the City Council find embarrassing. As one might expect in the land of the free, she is branded as a "red," ostracised, and her life made impossible generally. The little boy whom she befriends and encourages in his love of books, becomes disillusioned, and with his father goading him with talk of reds, spies and Communists is eventually driven to the verge of insanity, and expresses his neurotic confusion by burning down the library. However, the film's simplicity carries with it conviction, at least for a substantial part of the plot, but what makes the film so disturbing is its deliberate understatement of its case. One is not presented with the McCarthys, the Cohns or the Schines of the American scene, but with the "nice ordinary people," who, with their bigotry, stupidity, and political infancy, violently rush to defend "democracy" and "the American way of life," and become the oppressors. This provides a striking parallel with the burners-of-books, the Jew-baiters, and the racial persecutors of the maligned "undemocratic" nations, and indeed the film stresses this parallel in the symbolism of the burning of the library.

The characteristics of the film is good, Bette Davis being extremely convincing as the librarian, although somewhat more restrained than in her more youthful days. Kim Hunter and Joe Mantell (who made a good first impression as 'Ange' in "Marty"), also give extremely effective performances, the latter as the boy's All-American father who eventually drives the boy crazy by his talk of subversion, Communists, and "Pinko-talk."

As one would expect, a happy ending is engineered, albeit somewhat unconvincingly. The burning of the library and the tragedy of the boy's mental state brings the City Council to their senses, and all is forgiven. One is left in doubt, however, as to whether the forces that were at work hysterically crying "red" would be appeased by this, and when one considers that many of the persecuted political "suspects" do not have the advantages of influential friends and happy circumstance that this librarian has, one appreciates that the real situation is much worse. In fact, political intolerance in America, with the suicides, imprisonings, exiles, and ruined lives that it leaves in its wake, is little less evil (if at all) than similar products of the Capitalist world in the "iron-curtain" countries or in former Nazi Germany, or even this country for that matter, if the dismissal of Mr. John Lang from I.C.I. is a reliable manifestation.

This film is a clear reflection of American opinion which is openly hostile to McCarthy, political and judicial corruption, and other less pleasant aspects of God's own country. It is at pains to point out that McCarthyism, censorship, and the like, are denials of the very freedoms which Americans claim differentiate them from the "dictatorships." Actually though, it is the unscrupulous up-and-coming politicians in the film who really gives the game away from the Socialist point of view. He states that practically any step is justified in order to save America, and goes on to explain that a country at war, whether hot, cold or lukewarm, must be drastic in its measures, and that if innocent people get crushed in the process, it is just too bad. Of course, whether the Liberals like it or not, that is in fact the position, and that beside the fundamentals of Capitalist cut-throat competition, all talk of freedom and democracy is just so much hot air. In spite of this, and of the artificial ending, the points that the film makes are valid and telling, and apart from the not inconsiderable value of the drama itself, make this a worth-while film.

Albert Ivimey

What is Morality? (1960)

From the February 1960 issue of the Socialist Standard

Morality is not, as High Court Judges and Humanists would have us believe, a firm base of fixed, immutable rules of behaviour, by which all decent men should lead their lives. Rather it is a quicksand of changing shape, colour and size. Yesterday's moral precept becomes today's flouted rule, and yesterday's music-hall joke can become today's unwritten law. To look upon moral and ethical rules as constants is to ignore social change, which itself changes the content, and sometimes the form, of these rules.

The doctrine " Thou shalt not kill," for instance, is not an eternal ideal thought up by some good holy man. It is the application of a common sense rule of behaviour made necessary by man's very social existence. Even then it is a rule which is subject to numerous qualifications, and in time of war it is almost wholly ignored. Even so, it is an ethic which arises from man's collaboration for social production, and in the absence of this and similar rules, social organisation would be impossible.

To understand why morality and ethics change, we must look at the social organisation which forms their background. For instance, in primitive societies where simple agriculture forms the basis of production and where there is no competition with other tribes for the means of subsistence, one is likely to find that murder and the slaughter of war are almost unknown. On the other hand, in hunting communities where there was population pressure on the hunting grounds available, it was usual to find warlike tendencies in evidence, and also to find that the ability to kill members of rival tribes was a highly respected attribute.

Morality then, is no more than a set of rules, established during the course of time and designed to protect and preserve the productive relationships in operation at any one period. Under capitalism, with its class ownership of the productive forces, one finds a corresponding class morality, with its sacred Ark, private property.

Christians will object that the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount provide ethics that are timeless, and which existed long before capitalism. The fact is, however, that these Christian principles do not represent the current moral standards, and as Bernard Shaw pointed out, the literal following of such principles would lead to the collapse of capitalism. What use does a competitive society have for the injunction "Love thy neighbour"? The practical ethics of capitalism are" get on," "keep up with the Joneses" or "may the best man win." Where would capitalism be if people followed Jesus's injunction to share their worldly goods? In actual fact, of course, such ethics have no practical application in modem society at all, and have no chance of becoming generally held in a property society.

Modern society, with its morality, prevents human nature from fulfillment, in the sense that it chains the mind and body with economic and mental fetters. The practical ethics of the modem world are the real fetters, and not the professed morality of the Christian or the traditional " good man."

Take a look at the way in which these practical ethics depart from the so-called fixed moral codes. The prohibition against taking life, as already mentioned, is important in the prevention of civil disobedience and the maintenance of capitalist law and order, but does not extend far enough to prevent the execution of certain classes of murderers, or the slaughter of the troops and civilians of an enemy state. "Thou shalt not steal " is perhaps the most important of the ideal ethics and the one with which the powers of the law are most concerned. The meaning of this one is distorted so as to prevent people taking property from the ruling class (who have the only property worth stealing), but on the other hand, allows the exploitation in the factory and office by which the ruling class acquires its property. It also sanctioned the annexation of land and property from the Colonial native populations. by which the great Christian British Empire was created.

If, then, the form and content of morality is twisted and distorted to fit the social pattern of a particular society, why should its form remain at all? To answer this, one has to look into the basis and origin of morality itself.

Co-operation 

Morality is as old as human social organisation. Its origin is in co-operation. The members of a tribe who depended upon each other for their survival, obeyed the social injunction to defend the tribe and to perform their social tasks. The imperative "protect your kin" arose out of the necessity of the situation, and certainly not from idealism or abstract thought. In a situation such as this. members of a tribe recognised their dependence on each other. Thus to perform one's social tasks promptly and efficiently had merit, and to fail to perform them was bad, because it threatened the tribe. In time, injunctions such as these formed the basis of an organised morality.

So society passed from primitive tribal culture with its primitive ethics, through the Judaic tribes and the elaborate rules and doctrines of the Talmud, down to Christianity with its slave ethics of humility and love of one's neighbour. Then, after 1500 years of Christianity, industrial society appeared, and made nonsense of Christian doctrine. Society became a jungle, where the fiercest survived and the weaker perished. Thus terms like " blessed are the meek" were mocked by the reality of the situation. Efforts of well-meaning people to stem the tide were akin to the traveller who tries to placate a tiger by reading biblical texts to it. However, the Churches themselves didn't try too hard to alter the pattern of capitalism, for they were practical people, and they knew that to compromise was the only way to survive.

The Catholic Church, for example, which was the original Christian church, has a mass of impressive dogma which urges the holy to be good, kind, peaceable and so on. Nevertheless, the Church itself was not so foolish as to take these injunctions too literally, and followed the same practical morality as the world outside. This is the explanation of the apparent contradictions between Christian teaching and the Inquisition, and between the ten commandments and the "holy" wars.

Basically, it is the division of mankind in to classes which today creates the split between the kind of morality which most people would consider desirable, and the day-to-day activities of a competitive world. After all, morality is only the form of expected behaviour within the framework of a particular social system. Therefore, morality has relevance only to the practical possibilities of a social situation, and not to ideals. Where the possibilities are, as today, limited by economic circumstances, it is inevitable that morality also becomes limited and one-sided.

In other words, because there is a ruling class, today's morality is of a kind dictated by, and in favour of, that ruling class. This does not mean that there is one law for the rich and another for the poor. It merely means that today's morality favours the privileged, and is designed to preserve that privilege. Some examples of this one-sided morality have been given. Another example is that of the tax-dodgers, bilkers, people who avoid paying their fare and so on. This is something that government spokesmen say is undesirable, and yet is, to a considerable extent, regarded as fair game. The man who pays five pence for a sevenpenny fare feels be is gaining a victory at the expense of a vast impersonal organisation, but his gain is hardly worth the trouble involved. On the other hand, practically all business-men conduct a ceaseless war with the Inspector of Taxes, in order to avoid payment of tax, and a vast complicated machinery of Inspectors, Collectors, Commissioners, Accountants, clerks and so on, exists because of this. As everyone else does this, the business-man does not feel that he is doing anything immoral, although it is impossible to reconcile his behaviour with those moral principles that be probably believes in.

Thus, although mankind is neither "naturally" good or evil, the prevailing social circumstances determine to a large extent the way in which they will conduct their lives. It is because man is organised in a social way and because his survival depends on co-operation with others, that most people recognise perfectly well what is the right course in a particular situation and what is the wrong course. The trouble is that the practical circumstances of modem society make it almost impossible for people to behave in away that is to the common good.

In other words, a truly human morality cannot exist in a world where people's bodies and minds are imprisoned by the amoral "morality" of a sick society. Neither can the social circumstances be made more favourable by trying to convert people to a selfless and more human morality, for this is like trying to uproot a tree while resting in the top branches. 

First, man must free himself from economic domination. Then, and only then, will he be able to take the tremendous strides in morality necessary for him to achieve full stature as truly human man.

Albert Ivimey