Capitalist Republic (2023)

Book Review from the October 2023 issue of the Socialist Standard

Abolish the Monarchy. By Graham Smith. Penguin, 2023. £16.99

This book by the campaign group Republic’s CEO makes clear that its formal aspirations are for a liberal republic. They see the monarchy as something of left-over business (indeed, at one point in the book he actually argues that the rump of royal powers cannot be exercised because of the lack of legitimacy of the Crown, but that a president could deploy those powers: a cry for more executive power seems an odd stance for democrats).

In fact, the liberal fantasy gripping his work is on full display while he segues into discussing an elected House of Lords. Despite bemoaning the lack of imagination of those who can’t think past having a monarchy, he likewise cannot imagine a state without a bicameral legislature (albeit wanting all parts to be elected). Smith’s republicanism is simply wanting to continue the liberal project and sweep away the last vestiges of feudal power.

His book is worth reading for two features, though. The first is for his accounts of being a campaigning activist outside the political machines, and secondly for his attempts to describe a process of big reform to society, such as a wave of activism that sweeps away the monarchy. Unfortunately he doesn’t have a motor, beyond hope, for how this could come about, but nonetheless there is a certain, well, nobility in his continuing to plug away.

Smith, noting the predilection for the BBC to propagandise on behalf of the monarchy, says he is not suggesting a conspiracy, yet for the first half of the book he describes the very real secretive way the monarchy act and the determined way it protects itself. It is an organised conspiracy against the public, and by misunderstanding the nature of power beyond the formal and public roles, he is missing the real class nature of monarchy. Despite this, he is interesting on the actual real wealth the monarchy wields, and the way in which that buys considerable sway alone (especially as it has special access to the laws around which it can operate its businesses).

Pik Smeet

Rights Act is promise to pay of the bankrupt (2000)

From the November 2000 issue of the Socialist Standard

Although Labour has made a big fuss about the Human Rights Act, those rights are subordinated to the interests of the capitalist state

Whenever the Labour government are challenged for their uncanny resemblance to the Tories or for their authoritarian political tendencies, their representatives declaim loudly how they are the government devolving power to Scotland and Wales; that they are the government that has reformed the House of Lords; and that they are the government that has passed the European Convention on Human Rights into British law so that, for the first time in British constitutional history, the subjects of the United Kingdom now have individual “rights”.

Historically, unlike many of the European constitutions (and that of the USA) established in the 18th and 19th centuries, from first principles, under the influence of Rationalist philosophy, the British constitution has not guaranteed “rights” to its subjects. Rather, it has been understood that people were free to do as they chose, so long as no law existed to prevent it: a system, more or less, of negative rights. The documents that the pompous like to trumpet regarding the British constitution—the Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights—actually only serve to establish the rights of certain structures of state, specifically Parliament and the monarchy, rather than Universal Rights of Citizens. Traditionally, the concept of “convention” has been elevated against European style constitutional rights.

This line of constitutional thought was first propounded by Edmund Burke, the 18th century dread opponent of the French revolution, whose thought now forms a bedrock of the modern Conservative Party. As against this conservative approach to constitutional evolution, the Labour Party has long had elements within its ranks who have propounded the Enlightenment model of a rational constitution, often terming themselves the progressives. Despite the apparent, and in most cases actual, accommodation to Tory fiscal and economic policies, the rationalist elements have retained enough centrality and strength to enable the Human Rights Act to be passed. This has been largely made possible by the fact that this law will be marginal at best to economic considerations, and has the advantage of presenting a genuine difference in approach between Conservative and Labour.

The Act itself was passed back in 1998, to relatively little attention. Recently, the Tories attacked Cherie Blair for an article of hers discussing the ramifications of its implementation this October, and implicitly attacked the Act itself, as a litigant’s charter. What the Act does is pass into British law the European Convention on Human Rights, a treaty signed up to by Churchill. Although Britain has long been bound by its strictures, it has not been enforceable in British Courts, but only through the European Court of Human Rights in Strasburg. The Convention outlines the basic rights to be expected by the citizenry of the signatory countries.

The rights outlined therein are the usual fare of liberal politics—a right to freedom of association and expression; a right to life; freedom from torture; a right to due processes in law. As such it has little to distinguish itself from the fabled American Bill of Rights—save perhaps the absence of a right to silence and of a right to bear arms. A more significant difference, however, is that the terms of the Convention are not laid out in as much an absolute manner as those in America. Article IV posits the “Prohibition of Slavery and Forced Labour.” Within that article, though, subsection 3(b) states that “any service of a military character or, in case of conscientious objectors in countries where they are recognised, service exacted instead of compulsory military service” shall be exempted from the rights. That is, we are to have freedom from forced labour, except . . . er . . . when the states decides that we don’t.

Indeed, the whole Human Rights Act is riddled with exceptions—the rights to freedom of association, to privacy in family life, and to freedom of expression, are all limited by the caveat:

“No restrictions shall be placed on the exercise of these rights other than such as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others. This Article shall not prevent the imposition of lawful restrictions on the exercise of these rights by members of the armed forces, of the police or of the administration of the State.”

That is: these rights shall not be infringed unless the state wants to. Further, far from being universal, the various political rights are deemed not to be extended to “aliens” by Article 16.

Illiberal agenda

The Labour Government has, simultaneously to the activation of this law, provided us with a stunning example of its contradictoriness (as well as showing Labour’s real illiberal agenda), the appropriately named “Terrorism Act”. The Act defines as terrorism any act of which “the use or threat [of] is designed to influence the government or to intimidate the public or a section of the public, and the use or threat [of] is made for the purpose of advancing a political, religious or ideological cause” that (a) involves serious violence against a person; (b) involves serious damage to property; (c) endangers a person’s life, other than that of the person committing the action; (d) creates a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public; or (e) is designed seriously to interfere with or seriously to disrupt an electronic system”—a list of actions that are illegal anyway.

The Terrorism Act limits expression and association. The Act makes it an offence to belong to an organisation engaged in such activities, to materially aid such an organisation, to attend a meeting at which a representative of that organisation speaks (a meeting being defined as either a public or private event at which three or more people are in attendance), or to wear an item of clothing so as to “arouse suspicion of membership”. All of which carry sentences of up to ten years. Further, it is made an offence to not inform on someone for a breach of those sections, an offence which carries a sentence of up to 14 years. The Act makes it illegal to be in possession of information which could be useful for terrorist purposes. To enforce these draconian measures, police officers are able to arrest and detain someone suspected of contravening this Act for up to 7 days before charge.

Although many of the provisions of this Act are old news—indeed, they mostly come from the old Prevention of Terrorism Acts, they do represent a significant new change in that for the first time the Act applies to the whole of the UK, and for the first time is permanent rather than temporary legislation. The limitations it prescribes drive a coach and horses through those given by the Bill of Rights, but are allowed to be justified by the national security exemptions (certainly, British judges are more likely to accept such considerations than the Judges at the European Court, another reason, perhaps, for passing the rights into British law).

Further evidence of Labour’s illiberal tendencies can be seen in the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, recently passed. Although intended to provide privacy rights for employees sending e-mails, it also imposes an obligation on firms engaging in e-mail service provision to install equipment in order to enable the security services to intercept e-mail. Further, the Act makes it an offence not to provide an encryption key (such as a password) in order to be able to access systems that have warrants served upon them. This would carry a two year jail term, as compared with the five years the Act imposes for disclosing that an interception warrant has been issued. Unsurprisingly, the businesses have objected to both the privacy provisions and the imposition of the costs involved. Some business groups have expressed concerns with regard to commercial confidentiality and the power of the state to snoop.

“Human Rights” have long been a feature of the capitalist programme. Capitalists’ business needs have required freedom of information flows, freedom of movement, and the freedom to buy and sell labour power. Having experienced the serious effects of arbitrary power on business—in terms of aristocrats refusing to honour contracts, and engaging in forced loans—the capitalist class has always been keen on propounding “the rule of law”. This means, however, that any rights brought about by the capitalist class will always be rights conditional upon the material practice of their class interest, and any abstract rights that get in their way will be overridden or ignored.

“Rights” are an ethereal IOU of freedom that compensates for the absence of practice on the ground. You don’t need a right to silence if there is no agency trying to incriminate you, freedom of speech is meaningless without access to the public space to exercise it. Rights on paper are as meaningless as a bankrupt’s promise to pay, endlessly on offer but never obtainable. In a society that has such utter contempt for human existence, little else is to be expected. Only a society based on the co-operative equal worth of all human beings can guarantee the realisation of that promised human worth.

Pik Smeet

Greasy Pole: The fall of the House of Lords (2007)

The Greasy Pole column from the April 2007 issue of the Socialist Standard

The House of Commons has expressed a preference for turning the House of Lords into a wholly elected chamber. This is being touted as a great democratic advance: the final abolition of the hereditary principle in political decision-making, something that has been talked about and promised by Liberals and Labourites for well over a hundred years, and the end of the sale of peerages to jumped-up businessmen and their distribution to cronies and superannuated politicians.

A second chamber (such as the House of Lords evolved into) is an anti-democratic concept. Nearly all capitalist states have one and in all cases it was intended to be a check on the power of the more popularly elected first chamber. The US Constitution is a prime example. It was drawn up towards the end of the 18th century when the propertied class were still afraid – as they were to be for the whole of the following century – of what might happen if they gave the vote to all (male) adults, such as the taxing away or the dividing up of their property. They therefore provided for a Senate that was explicitly modelled on the British House of Lords except that it excluded the hereditary principle.

Feudal relic

Britain doesn’t have a formal constitution; only a set of constitutional practices that have evolved over the years. The House of Lords dates from feudal times when the Norman barons who had conquered England forced their leader, the King, to take their views into account. Originally it was the House of Lords that was the “first chamber”. The House of Commons was a body convoked to represent the non-noble elite in the towns whenever the king wanted to raise money by taxing them.

The House of Commons became the instrument which, from the 16th century onwards, the rising capitalist class of the towns used to win control of political power, first at the expense of the king and, later, at the expense of the House of Lords. Under Cromwell, not only was the king executed but the House of Lords was abolished. That proved to be an interlude only. Even so, Charles II, when his family was restored to the throne in 1660, did not undo the anti-feudal reforms carried through under Cromwell. But he did restore the House of Lords and made many more lords (some his illegitimate sons). When his successor, James II, tried to revive the “divine right of kings” to rule, both the Lords and the Commons united to boot him out in what they called the “Glorious Revolution” of 1688 and replace him with a new king – William of Orange – and a new royal family chosen by them.

From that time on, the king’s chief – “prime” – minister and the “cabinet” of other ministers had to be able to command the support of a majority of members of the House of Commons. That body was elected, but not on any sort of democratic basis. Only a tiny minority of those living in a parliamentary constituency had the vote. In many cases, these depended on the local landowner who was thus in a position to choose the MP. All the same, parliament was able to reflect changes of opinion amongst the privileged class of landowners and merchant capitalists and there were changes of government even in the corrupt 18th century.

With the industrial revolution, the newly emerging propertied group of factory-owning capitalists agitated to share in the political decision-making process. The result was the Reform Act of 1832 which admitted the “middle class” – in the proper sense of the term as the propertied class between the upper class of landed aristocrats and the lower class of propertyless wage workers – to the franchise and so to a say in who got elected to parliament and who formed the government.

For the rest of the 19th century the British constitution was a compromise between the capitalist class and the landed aristocracy. The capitalists accepted that the top posts in the government should be in the hands of landed aristocrats as long as these governed in the capitalist interest. Thus, apart from the Gladstone/Disraeli double act, most of the other 19th century prime ministers were lords – the Duke of Wellington, Earl Grey, Lord Melbourne, the Earl of Derby, the Earl of Aberdeen, Lord Palmerston, Earl Russell, the Marquess of Salisbury, the Earl of Roseberry. But, by the 20th century this was no longer acceptable and when in 1963 the Tories, rather inexplicably, chose the 14th Earl of Home as their Leader he had to renounce his peerage and get elected to the House of Commons.

Lloyd George knew my father

In 1909 the Lords made the fatal mistake of putting their own sectional interest as landowners first by rejecting the budget drawn up by the Liberal Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lloyd George, because it imposed death duties on landed estates. Nemesis was swift. The Liberal government called two general elections and won both. The Lords submitted and voted for the budget. In 1911 the powers of the House of Lords were restricted to only delaying for two years, not rejecting, any laws voted by the House of Commons and from then on they only second-guessed the Commons on minor matters of drafting detail. The British State had been made subject to complete capitalist control.

If the Lords hadn’t submitted in 1910 the Liberal government had been prepared to create enough new peers who supported them to obtain a majority for its budget in the House of Lords. The idea must have appealed to Lloyd George since, when he was the prime minister in a Liberal-Tory government after the first world war he earned a reputation for selling seats in the House of Lords. This led to the Act of Parliament banning this, under which the Blair government is now being investigated. But the practice of a peerage for jumped-up businessmen in return for donations to the Tory or Liberal or Labour parties continued, though more discreetly.

In 1948 the period by which the Lords could delay laws voted by the Commons was reduced to one year. The Labour Prime Minister of the time, Clement Attlee, had once declared that if offered a peerage he would call himself Lord Love-a-Duck of Limehouse. When he retired from politics in 1955 and was made an Earl he chose the rather more conventional title of Earl Attlee. Life peerages were introduced by the Tories in 1958 and in 1999 the Blair government limited to 90 the number of hereditary peers entitled to a seat in the House of Lords pending a final settlement of the question.

It is by no means clear that the proposal for a wholly-elected House of Lords will go through, despite the vote for this in the House of Commons. The present members of the House of Lords – life peers just as much, if not more, than the dukes, earls and marquesses – don’t want to vote themselves out of existence. So, more negotiations and amendments can be expected as the saga continues.

Much time and energy will be wasted on this irrelevant side-issue which won’t affect the position of workers either way. Irrelevant because the point at issue is a detail of the structure of the capitalist state. Diverting because it sustains the impression that politics is about what goes on in parliament: the sham confrontations of Prime Minister’s Question Time, the ambitions of leaders and would be leaders, the squabbles of the professional politicians. Whereas politics is really about collective action to deal with the everyday problems that affect everyday people.

Adam Buick

The constitution of the future. (1923)

 

From the June 1923 issue of the Socialist Standard

Among a variety of matters reviewed at the I.L.P. Conference in early April was a resolution which, as reported by the “Daily Herald” (4/4/23), “aimed at the abolition of the Cabinet system, and the substitution of Government by committees with Ministers as chairmen.” An indeterminate discussion took place, ending in the questions being referred to a Committee of the National Administrative Council for consideration. The question was raised at the Conference, of course, because the Labour Party, to which the I.L.P. is affiliated, hopes to become the Government Party within the next few years : and the fact that it was raised throws an interesting light upon what it will do when that time comes.

What is the Cabinet? It is the Committee of Ministers who preside over all the important state departments. How it is chosen? By the Prime Minister, whose selections require only the King’s approval. Who chooses the Premier? The King, usually on the advice of the retiring Prime Minister, and having regard to the predominating party in Parliament. The business of the Cabinet is to regulate foreign and colonial affairs, issue temporary decrees, re-appoint to vacant offices, introduce legislation into Parliament, and so on. Practically the whole initiative of Government is vested here : in fact, with the acquiescence of the majority in Parliament, the Cabinet is the Government.

The Cabinet system in its modern character was developed by the representatives of the merchants, bankers and landowners, after their political victory of 1688. They had robbed the monarchy of much of its power, but by no means wished to abolish it. Its presence at the head of their system sanctified their rule, by reason of the sentimental veneration with which wage-workers, shopkeepers, small manufacturers, etc., regarded, and still regard it. They took care, however, to keep it well in hand. The King no longer acted independently, but either “in Council” (in which case the counter-signature of the Privy Council was necessary), or “in Parliament” (in which case consent of the Commons and Lords was necessary). In practice, of course, sittings of the full Privy Council proved totally impracticable. There was never enough agreement amongst its members upon the policy to be pursued, or the legislation to be framed. Besides, in the matter of shaping bills, no matter what views might carry the day in Council, they were of no effect unless the legislation embodying them recommended itself to Parliament. Therefore, this clumsiness was overcome by that party undertaking the task which for the time being could command a majority in Parliament.

A body would be formed of five, seven, or more members of the Privy Council (nowadays the number has increased to round about twenty), all belonging to one party, to fill the ministerial posts. The holders of all the more important offices in the Government, says the “Encyclopedia Britannica,” are “generally selected as the influential politicians of the party, rather than for special aptitude in the work of the departments.” (Coalitions are rare, and formed for joint action in times of emergency, when opposing parties deem it expedient to sink their differences temporarily, as did the Liberal, Unionist and Labour Parties during the late War). This body, the Cabinet, discharged all the important functions nominally performed by the “King in Council.”

Meanwhile, what powers remained to the Sovereign were taken over by this or that State office, until the monarchy to-day remains nothing but a figure—”the mascot,” as it has been called, of the ruling class.

Now this was a good system for the Capitalist class. It provided, and still provides, the various sections of Capitalist interests with a convenient means of mobilising their votes in Parliament; and they have a check upon what is done “in Council” by the yearly financial votes. (The House of Commons exercised that power as recently as April 11th last by refusing to go into Committee of Supply on the Civil Service Department.) The Cabinet system, and indeed Parliament itself, which is of much earlier growth, are products of times when the State was very little concerned with the organisation of industry; and whenever the requirements of modern Capitalism make it necessary for the State to take control of some branch of industry, it simply becomes the responsibility of one of the ministries, and is developed with the direct assistance and advice of Capitalists, through the committees, commissions, boards, etc., that all converge on the Cabinet. Yes, the Cabinet system serves the Capitalists very well.

But how different will be the requirements of the working-class when it comes to power ! The business of production will then be the supreme concern of the Commonwealth : the co-ordination of the activities of workers in mines, fields and schools, on the roads, on the sea, in the laboratory, studio and theatre—with the purpose of furnishing the healthiest and most joyous life for all. Those who are to enjoy the fruits of labour will also be those who do the work; and from both points of view, public business will be the intimate concern of each one.

It follows that the problems with which it will be called upon to deal will be different also. For example, instead of devising ways to pacify the unemployed, it will have to decide how an over-plentiful supply of labour-power in one branch of production can be used to lighten work in another. Instead of protecting home Capitalists against foreign competition, it will determine, in consultation with workers of other lands, in what part of the world a given kind of goods can be most economically produced. And so on.

It is too early yet to pronounce in detail what form the administration of this business will take. That will be for the victorious workers to decide when the time comes. But its outlines are clear. It will not be, as heretofore, a Government, ordering affairs from the top, with merely the acquiescence of the mass of the people. It must have the character of an Executive, giving effect to the decisions of the workers themselves. Every public office must be elective, responsible, and revocable.

We do not share the fear of Mr. Charles Trevelyan, M.P., who at the I.L.P. Conference took part in the debate referred to. He said :

  “We do not want a pledge-bound or an oath-ridden party. When you comrades join us in the House of Commons, after the General Election, we want vital representatives and not merely delegates—men who are going to think and act for themselves.”

Why, the Socialist organisation of industry implies control by the workers. Anything else would be a bureaucratic State, a travesty of Socialism. We are convinced that when the workers are ready to take possession of the means of life they will be ready to begin to control them democratically. Moreover, a delegate can and should be a vital representative. On some matters it is possible to give detailed instructions, on others, general orders only, the particular execution of them being left to the intelligence of the delegate. But in all matters the will of those whose work he is doing, and not his own, should determine his actions. The contrast between Capitalist and Socialist democracy is sharply indicated—by a paragraph in the Manifesto of the International Working-men’s Association, issued in May, 1871, immediately after the crushing of the Commune of Paris. It refers to the Communards’ design for the new constitution :

  “Instead of deciding once in three or six years which member of the ruling class was to represent the people in Parliament, universal suffrage was to serve the people, constituted in Communes, as individual suffrage serves every other employer in the search for the workmen and managers in his business. And it is well known that companies, like individuals, in matters of real business generally knows how to put the right man in the right place, and, if for once they make a mistake, to redress it promptly.”

The Cabinet system, therefore, in the Socialist Commonwealth, is as unthinkable as the private ownership of the means of life. If the I.L.P. questions for a moment whether a Labour Government would discard that system, it is because it knows a Labour Government could not and would not inaugurate Socialism, notwithstanding that it has placed it upon its programme. Only a party of revolutionary workers, organised for that purpose, and that alone, is equal to the task.

A.

Blue bloods for progress? (1985)

From the March 1985 issue of the Socialist Standard

Many noble eyebrows must have arched in astonishment and indignation, when the House of Lords was congratulated by Red Ken Livingstone's County Hall on their resistance to the government over the abolition of the GLC. This uneasy alliance between blue blood and left wing bogeys was another example of the Lords' changing reputation, from a home for senile aristocrats to a crucible of incisive debate and defence of democratic freedoms. Whether this reputation is deserved or not, the Lords press on; now they have dared to experiment with live TV coverage. Perhaps we shall have a show to rival Game For A Laugh, with a more elegant set and rather wealthier — if more menacing — participants.

The reputation which the Lords seem to be trying to lose, for obstinately refusing to recognise the times. let alone move with them, was set hard in a century of battles with the Other Place, sometimes known as the Lower House or the House of Commons. Joseph Chamberlain in 1884 responded to their obstruction of the Reform Bill with the unoriginal sneer that the Lords represented a class "who toil not. neither do they spin" (he was probably meaning to be offensive). In 1910, at the height of the Asquith government's long crisis over parliamentary power, Lloyd George described the peers as "descended partly from plunderers who came over with William the Conqueror and partly from plunderers of the poor at the Reformation" (he was in favour only of plunderers of the more modern kind).

The Lords have always defended themselves, apparently against the odds, on two main grounds. Firstly, they have asserted that their privileged standing in parliament, free of the need to campaign for the votes of the lower class, enabled them to be more objective and independent; secondly they have been sure that as a vetting chamber they do a much better job than the Commons anyway. Lord Salisbury, speaking in 1907. claimed that the hereditary principle had the merit of "trusting a man because of his sense of public duty", which was like arguing that a few people are rich because they are worthy, and worthy because they are rich. In 1910 Lord Cawdor, referring to some of the issues at dispute between the Lords and the Liberal government, said that the former were the closer to the people's will on Home Rule for Ireland, the Licensing Bill, the Education Bill and the Budget.

Cawdor was speaking at the time of the most important clash between the two Houses, which ended in victory for the Commons when the Parliament Bill of 1911 was pushed through (in theory the Lords could have blocked it) on the threat to ensure its passage by the mass creation of Liberal peers. (When it was all over and the Bill had become law the king, obviously exhausted by the prospect of all those ennobling ceremonies, rushed off to holiday in Yorkshire.) The 1911 Act cut the Lords' power to delay a Bill to a maximum of two years and less in the case of finance Bills. That remained the situation until 1949 when the Attlee government, to ensure the passage of measures like steel nationalisation, pushed through another Parliament Act which reduced the delaying power to nine months. That government, in the overall interests of the British capitalist class, planned a lot of state ownership and they could not tolerate any obstruction by the Lords. Their case was much the same as Lord Roseberry's. in a letter to Queen Victoria in 1894:

  When the Conservative Party is in power, there is practically no House of Lords: it takes whatever the Conservative Government brings it from the House of Commons without question or dispute: but the moment a Liberal Government is formed, this harmless body assumes an active life. and its activity is entirely exercised in opposition to the Government . . .

The Lords' image as a bunch of diehard, crusty Tory backwoodsmen who would travel up from the slaughter of the grouse moors to kill off the policies of a popularly elected government, was potent ammunition for their opponents. Persistent criticism on these lines undermined their own confidence in their superfluous function; clearly. British capitalism could do without the House of Lords. There was irresistible pressure for reform, if not for abolition. The only chance of this happening seemed to be in the Labour Party, which had once stood clearly for abolition but had since then failed to make it a priority in their election programmes. The more impressionable Labour supporters were quite excited by the prospect of abolition, regarding this, in the face of all the evidence about the nature of capitalism in those countries without an hereditary second chamber, as a step towards socialism But as usual the reformists were disappointed; when Labour was in office they did not get rid of the Lords but helped to keep it alive with regular infusions of new blood.

In fact, both the recent significant reform measures have been the work of Conservative governments. The Life Peerages Act of 1958 introduced life peers — and. for the first time, peeresses — so that the Lords became infested with retired trade unionists, business people, university dons and media personalities. A few years later, after a long campaign by Tony Benn, the Peerages Act of 1963 allowed hereditary peers to disclaim their title. It was never quite clear how Benn could represent this as a step towards socialism even if it was a step forward in his political ambitions. It also came in the nick of time to help two prominent Tories Lords Home and Hailsham — in their bid to win the party leadership and so to succeed Harold Macmillan as Prime Minister. Unlike Benn. these two were not opposed to the hereditary principle. When it suited them, they took their title again and now sit again in the Lords. Home inclined wearily beside the frail form of Lord Stockton and Hailsham slumped pompously on the Woolsack.

These two Acts also did a lot to avert the abolition of the House of Lords which was a great boost to their lordships' battered morale. Nowadays there is no certainty that the Lords will tamely fall in with the Conservative line. Instead, the House is populated with bodily testimonies to the impotence and confusion of the men and women who have tried to control and modify the capitalist system. There sit. or have sat. so called economic experts like Balogh and Kaldor, who bore so much responsibility for the economic policies of the first Wilson government — as well as Lord George Brown, who so enthusiastically and rashly took on the job of showing how futile those policies were. Who now, apart perhaps from someone writing their thesis on Great Confidence Tricks Of Our Time, remembers the Department of Economic Affairs and what it promised to do for us? There sits the centurion Lord Shinwell. who travelled politically from pacifism to being Minister of War. but whose opinions are nevertheless listened to with awe. There also can be seen Lord Thorneycroft, one of the monuments to the Age of Supermac, who resigned as Chancellor of the Exchequer because he thought we were having it too good and that government spending should be cut. Somewhere on the Labour benches rests ex-TUC chief Len Murray, exhausted by his adoption of something called the New Realism, which was actually no more than an appreciation of the fact that there is a slump on and that it will weaken the unions' bargaining power.

Exposing themselves to the TV cameras is likely to do the Lords no harm. Indeed, it has already given a lot of publicity to Stockton's patronising of the miners and to Scarman's call for a Bill of Rights (people who have already been denied their "rights" in police cells and prisons will wonder what difference another law will make). Parliament has always needed the media, whatever form it takes, but it has always tried to control how and when the media reported on it. The objections to live TV reporting were the same as those used against radio and. a long time before, against the presence of newspaper reporters. Such publicity, it was said, would encourage demagogic speeches aimed at a wider audience outside, it would lead to ministers taking up too much debating time, it would reduce spontaneity and emphasise the theatrical elements of parliament at the expense of the workaday. These objections were usually put most strongly by those members who feared that they would fail to get into the limelight; as far back as the 1950s slick parliamentary performers like Ian Macleod. Jo Grimond and Aneurin Bevan were in favour of allowing the TV cameras into the Commons.

Parliament's readiness to compromise with the media has been ensured by the Members' need to win votes for their party. It was in the late 19th century that the parliamentary timetable, which had hitherto been set by seedtime and the harvest, began to take account of the requirements of the press. This was encouraged by the rise of the popular newspapers (the Daily Mail was launched, as a halfpenny newspaper, in 1896) and the decline of the morning provincial papers (between 1900 and 1940 their numbers fell from 52 to 25). In 1850 a separate press gallery was first set aside. In 1902 Arthur Balfour, conceding that "We must arrange our proceedings. I presume, so that they may be reported in the newspapers that have currency all over the country", brought Question Time in the Commons forward so as to meet press deadlines.

The result of the publicity has to some extent been as predicted. The parliamentary exhibitionists, the specialists in newsworthy subjects and the headline-conscious Members have been encouraged at the expense of the heavy, soporific speechmakers. It has also, more crucially, given an opportunity to the listeners and the viewers, who have the power of the vote at their disposal, to see how the people they vote for do the job of running capitalism. The voters can now witness. as it happens, all the sound and fury of Neil Kinnock shadow boxing with Margaret Thatcher over some trivial difference in their policies for British capitalism. They can view the political cast-offs in the House of Lords reviewing the state of British capitalism as if their own failure to operate the system in the interests of the mass of people had never happened. They can watch mature people playing games in archaic dress, except that they should beware that behind this seeming tomfoolery lurks the awesome power of the state machine.

There can be no doubt that it is progressive and encouraging, that workers should be able to observe all of this. The important thing is how they absorb it — and how they interpret what they absorb. Will they conclude that titles and rituals are of little account; what matters is that it is by the overwhelming preference of the working class that the power to monopolise the means of life is given to a small parasitic elite? Will they see it as further evidence of the decadence of capitalism and of the urgent need to act on the issue of who controls the state machine and for what purpose? Or will they miss the whole point and regard it all as just another soap opera, even if it is one which they can't switch off when they've had enough?

Ivan

Correspondence. Many Questions, Chiefly Concerning "Economic Power." (1920)

Letter to the Editors from the April 1920 issue of the Socialist Standard

To the Editor.

Ardenvohr,

Woodstock Rd.,

Belfast.

Gentlemen,

For the past couple of years I have been interested in the Socialist movement, and have been a constant reader of the official organs of the different parties, particularly the Socialist Standard and the "Socialist," of the S.L.P.

I have not yet made up my mind which of the two parties (the S.P.G.B. or the S.L.P.) advocate the correct tactics to be adopted in order to usher in Socialism. There seems to be such a fog about the whole question of method that I will be much obliged if you will answer in a straight, clear, and satisfactory manner the following questions, taking each one separately.

1. Is it true that the master class control the armed forces solely through having political
 supremacy ?
2. If the working classes sent a majority of Socialists to the House of Commons would that in itself give them control of the armed forces unless at the same time they had an Industrial Union to back up their political majority ?
3. If you agree that Industrial Unionism is necessary as well as political action why do you disagree with the S.L.P. ?
4. Is it not due to their control of the means of life on the industrial field that the master class control armed force, and if so, what use would a political majority be to the workers as long as the masters held the means of production in their hands ?
5. Is it true that the military council over-ride Parliament instead of vice-versa, as witness, for instance, Churchill's expeditions, which were taken in hand without consulting the members of Parliament ?
6. If class-conscious political action alone is necessary is it feasible to think that the master class are going to allow the workers to vote them out of power ?
7. Is it necessary to wait for Socialism until the majority of people are class conscious ?
8. What is your Party's opinion of the Russian Revolution and why did Kautsky of Germany and the Marxists of Russia oppose the Bolsheviks ?
9. Does your Party agree that Lenin is a Marxist, and if not, why not ?
10. Is it not a historical truth that economic power always preceded political power, and why, therefore, does your Party not help on the advocacy of Industrial Unionism ?
11. If through the big number of Socialists that may be returned to the House of Commons the masters suspend the Constitution, what can the workers do then unless they are industrially organised ?

Hoping, gentlemen, that you will answer the above questions each in turn as I have asked them and as soon as possible, 

I am faithfully yours,

Samuel Smyth.

Our Reply.

Regular readers of this paper will see at once how careless Mr. Smyth has been in his reading of our columns, as most of the questions he asks have been answered therein during the period he mentions. Thus in the issues for January and February 1918 the front page articles cover a large portion of this ground. For the benefit of new readers it may be useful to deal with the points again.

1. Yes. There is no other way in which the capitalist class can control the armed forces. It is significant that those who try to belittle this important fact never attempt to show in what other way the capitalist class could exercise this control.  
2. As it is by their majority in the House of Commons that the capitalists control these forces now, obviously a Socialist majority would control the same forces then. The Industrial Union— if it existed (and there is no ground for supposing that it will)—could not "back up" a political majority. On the contrary, the greatest efforts any union, industrial or other, could put forth could easily be crushed by that majority. 
3. That any reader of the "S.S." should not be aware that we have opposed Industrial Unionism from its inception in 1905 seems almost impossible. Both the articles mentioned above and one given below answer this question. 
4. What this question suggests is exactly the reverse of the truth. The masters are only able to retain their possession of the means of life because they control the armed forces through their political power. What is the first action of the masters when a big industrial dispute occurs ? Is it to use their "economic power"? Not at all. The political machinery is set in motion and the armed forces are sent to protect the masters' property from being damaged, or taken hold of by the workers. Without this political power the capitalists' control of the means of life would vanish at the first move of the workers. 
5. No. The Army Council derives all its authority from Parliament through the channel of the Cabinet. No expedition can take place without instructions from the Cabinet. This Cabinet is the executive committee of the majority in Parliament and can be turned out of office at any moment the majority decide to do so. In the present Parliament the majority have always agreed with these expeditions, and it is only a few individual members who have protested, and they have been outvoted each time by the majority. 
6. It is quite possible to think that the master class will "allow" what they cannot prevent. When a sufficient number of workers decide to vote for Socialist candidates there will be a majority of those candidates returned to power. By this action the master class will be voted out, whether they like it or not. 
7. "People" includes both classes in society—the capitalist class and the working class. It is only the latter class who are interested in establishing Socialism. A certain portion of this class are always more or less apathetic, and accept the actions of the active sections. A majority of this active section must be converted to Socialism—must become class-conscious—before the Revolution can take place. 
8. Our opinion of the Russian "revolution" is to be found in the "S.S." for August, 1918 and February, 1919. In the latter issue is the article referred to above in answer to question 3, which gives complete proof of the anti-Socialist character and actions of the S.L.P.  When Kautsky and the "Russian Marxists," whoever they may be, publish their reasons for opposing Bolshevism we shall know why they did it. 
9. Really, this is too thin, even from a Belfast man. It does not lie with us to prove a negative. Let those who assert that Lenin is a Marxist give their reasons for such assertion and we will deal with their case. 
10. Economic "power" does not and cannot exist until political power is in the hands of the class concerned. Only when they have conquered this power are they able to control the means of life and the labour-power of others. As Industrial Unionism can neither supply this political power to the workers, nor defeat it when it is in the hands of the masters, to advocate it would be idiotic. 
11. If the masters suspend the Constitution the workers may take one or more of the follow
ing courses:

• Start peaceful agitations and demonstrations against the suspension.
• Indulge in strikes to try to enforce the re-establishment of the Constitution.
• Form secret societies for the purpose of using physical force against the masters.

 The success or otherwise of the first two courses depends entirely upon the divisions in the ranks of the master class. If the minority of the masters against the suspension of the Constitution was fairly strong, either or both of these methods would stand a good chance of success. If the minority was small, then both methods would be useless. The masters could easily ignore the peaceful demonstrations—or forbid them being held—and crush any strike that might occur.

In these circumstances the workers could not be "industrially organised," because with the suspension of the Constitution the legal right of the workers to form combinations would be abolished.

There remains the method of secret societies. A small group, organised for a special, limited object, such as the assassination of a crowned head, may sometimes be successful, but it would be utterly impossible to organise the mass, or even the majority, of the workers into a secret society. Even the small groups are often failures, and the actual perpetrator hardly ever escapes.

Thus it is easily seen that this method is as useless as the other two.

But all this is based upon the IF. A serious student would not have asked such a question, but would first have inquired : "Can the master class suspend the Constitution ?" This would have led to an examination of the Constitution, and then it would have been seen that the master class could only suspend the Constitution at the cost of the collapse of capitalism and the bringing in of chaos.

Capitalism has long outgrown the power of the capitalist class to manage all its activities. In production the capitalist has to employ special wage-slaves to organise his business, known as foremen and managers. In social affairs the complexity and area of the operations make it quite impossible for the capitalist class to manage the business, or even fill the offices required.

Hence thousands of functions have to be delegated to subsidiary bodies, as County Councils, Town Councils, etc., down to the little Parish Meeting. But this delegation of activities is necessarily based upon representation. Year by year the area of these delegated activities increases, and this increase compels an increase in the basis of representation—the Franchise. In every capitalist country this increase of the Franchise is steadily progressing, owing to the necessities of the system. In this country there has lately taken place a huge increase in the number entitled to use the Franchise.

Thus while persuading the workers to place the centre of power—the Parliament—in the hands of the masters, these masters are compelled to place administration into the hands of elected bodies. To stop the activities of these bodies, while unable to carry them on themselves, would mean chaos and the collapse of capitalism.

The suspension of the Constitution would be a last act of despair on the part of that section of the master class who, Samson like, would endeavour to involve all in a common destruction. Even then it would fail of its ultimate purpose as the workers could, sooner or later, build up order out of chaos, though vast suffering and misery would ensue until that order had been accomplished.

Editorial Committee.

Palliatives and Practical Politics: An Indictment of Reform. (1905)

From the August 1905 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are in the throes of another great agitation. The popular pulse has been quickened, the popular mind has been stirred, the popular spirit has revolted against the latest flout of the popular will and the popular fiat has gone forth in a yell of popular execration “Death to the House of Lords! Death!” Wherefore all the forces of progress have formed up in lighting array ; the progressive pulpit, the progressive press, the progressive politician, have all leaped to arms animated by one great popular principle, united in one great popular party, and have gone forth with “practical politics” inscribed on their banners to do battle with the pallid peers or, parenthetically, perish in the process. For the “Over the Bridges” Tramway Bill, fashioned by the mediocrity of Spring Gardens, after many exhibitions of practical statesmanship on the part of the L.C.C. M.P’s., has been incontinently kicked out of the House of Select Thieves after having passed

THE HOUSE OF COMMON THIEVES

by the casting vote of that memento of mediaevalism, Mr. Speaker.

Hence these tears. Hence these wild and whirling words. Hence this display of frenzied determination on the part of professional politicians out of office, who, scenting the spoils from afar and calculating upon the short memories of the working-class, have rushed into the public places of the land in an endeavour to create a popular turmoil that will assist them into position.

How many of these great agitations for the same old and hoary object are contained in the memory that can encompass the last 25 years? And how many times have the working-class risen like gudgeons to the bait, only to find their energies wasted and their interests sold in the result?

As though the House of Lords mattered. As though it were not an institution built up upon the same system of

WORKING CLASS SPOLIATION

buttressed by working-class ignorance to which can be directly traced all the economic evils that working-class flesh is heir to; an institution that must go down with the system upon which it depends, before the pressure of an educated, well organised proletariat.

The House of Lords, the Monarchy, the State Church and the rest are all so many embellishments of the capitalist system, so much embroidery of the ugly basal fact. The destruction of such embroidery would not effect the working-class position in the smallest degree. The abolition of the House of Lords would not necessarily have effected the passing even of a trumpery Tramway Bill. If the measure was one that materially affected capitalist interests, in the event of the non-existence of the House of Lords, it would never have passed the House of Commons. As it is the House of Lords plays the game of the capitalist members of the other House. The latter know that their titled confreres can be relied upon to

CONSERVE CAPITALIST INTERESTS,

and therefore under some circumstances they will indulge in something that savours of working-class legislation, and secure the kudos of enhanced political standing in the eyes of a purblind people. In other words they succeed in conveying the idea that they are friends of the working-class, and so strengthen their position at the hustings what time their non-elective fellows in the House of Lords look after the swag. And then with tongue in cheek they conduct abolition of the House of Lords agitations while the workers cheer them on.

Well, the workers will cheer until they understand. And until they understand, that cheer is all the cheer they will get. But presently they will appreciate the fact that they are poor and wretched because they are robbed, and they will know that the

REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ROBBER CLASS

sit in the House of Lords and the House of Commons alike, and on both sides of both Houses.

There is no greater barrier to working-class emancipation therefore in the House of Lords than exists in the House of Commons. It makes no difference to the working-class whether their exploiter is the Lord Dudley or the plain Mr. Smith. Plain Mr. Aird was no less an exploiter than Sir John Aird now is. Consequently an educated and well organised proletariat would concentrate upon the central fact upon which all else depends, and the measure of their determination will be the measure of the concessions they will obtain. Subsidiary obstacles to working-class advance, such as the House of Peers is supposed to be, will be removed by the capitalist-class in the hope that the glamour that once magnified them into matters of importance in the eyes of the working-class will still be sufficiently strong to dazzle their understanding and induce the belief that the capitalists are prepared to make large sacrifices for the benefit of their poor brethren of the lower orders.

That is the position of The Socialist Party of Great Britain, both in regard to

POLITICAL REFORM AND SOCIAL REFORM.

We hold, and can produce evidence ad nauseum to show, that to focus the working-class mind upon two or three or a dozen palliative proposals, simply plays the game and saves the face of the capitalist-class. Every palliative measure (when they are such) can be conceded to a working-class so concentrated, without endangering the central position. Because, except the workers are class-conscious, they will, and do, treat such concessions as evidences of the friendliness and concern of capitalism for labour. The class position is, for a time at any rate, abandoned. The class struggle is obscured. That is the lesson that the history of reform movements teaches. That is the reason, and the only justification for the existence of parties claiming to be socialist. Moreover, and this point merits all the emphasis that can be applied to it, many of these palliatives are directly advantageous to capitalist interests. In such cases the workers are at

THE DOUBLE DISADVANTAGE

of being seduced from their class position and being the more easily manipulated as instruments of profit production.

On the other hand, with the workers educated and organised on the basis of their class position and alive to the perennial, irreconcilable antagonism of interest existing between them and their exploiters, any palliative measure secured would mean the strengthening of their position and the facilitation of their advance.

To the objection that the working-class are not prepared to assimilate the whole Socialist philosophy and must be brought along on the milk of reform before they can be fed on the strong meats of revolution, the answer is that the comprehension of the simple facts of Socialism involves no great mental exertion. Indeed, the absorption would have been an exceedingly simple process for the normal person had not an army of half-loaf politicians and reformers with the baseless fear of the inability of the average mind to understand more than their

POTTERING AND PATHETIC LITTLE FUTILITIES

in their hearts, spread their wares like the pedlars they were, before the untutored gaze of the workers. Honestly or otherwise they manufactured a man of straw, a bogey, and having done so, called upon all good men concerned for the true advancement of the poor to scream with affright. And to this day honest and dishonest reformers and palliators have screamed and fled before the miserable straw-stuffed effigy they themselves created.

Small wonder therefore that the workers, fed for so long upon the diluted wash that answered for mental food with propagators of procrastination, should regard with suspicion the real and satisfying viands (to persist with the food simile) the Socialist offers them.

Had it been otherwise, had the real causes of, and only remedy for, working-class poverty been preached clearly and consistently by those who knew the truth, we should have

A FAR DIFFERENT TALE

to tell to-day. Our tale would have been of a rapidly growing and solidly welded working-class party such as few if any countries could excel.

I repeat that the normal mind, cleared of the confusion that the dissemination of futilities has largely caused, can easily understand the simple proposition that the poverty and misery within their daily experience, is due to the fact that the wealth they create is not theirs; that it is not theirs because the land and machinery by the aid of which they have been enabled to produce and distribute wealth, are in the private possession of a comparatively few people ; that the non-possession of these means of life (by and through which alone they can produce the things necessary to their existence) reduces them to the necessity of selling the only thing they have their power to work—to those who do possess the means of life; that therefore they are themselves

NOTHING BUT COMMODITIES

(because they cannot dissociate themselves from the labour power which they sell) and are bought and sold as other commodities are bought and sold; that just as the price of other articles is determined by the supply of and the demand for those articles, so is the price of labour power determined ; that just as competition causes the price of other articles to revolve about the cost of their manufacture, so does competition cause the price of labour power to revolve about the cost of its manufacture (which is, of course, the cost of the keep of the worker and his family); that therefore the existence of the unemployed is necessary to capitalist interests because while the market is flooded with labour, competition for work will keep the price of that labour (wages) low, and because if labour was scarce its price would rise, to the detriment of course, of profits; that therefore the capitalists, whatever their professions, will never do aught to materially affect the unemployed problem. And finally and because of this.

THE ONLY REMEDY

for working-class poverty and the unhappiness arising from it is the destruction of the system of the private ownership in the means of life upon which the whole evil rests, and the substitution of common ownership and control, that is ownership and control by the whole people, of those means.

This, we claim, is simple enough for the wayfaring man, though a fool, when his mind has been cleared of the stumbling blocks assiduously created by the agents of the capitalist-class, acting in that capacity unconsciously or deliberately. Among these agents we include of necessity

REFORMERS AND HALF-LOAFERS

and all others who by act or word contribute to working-class confusion because they, in so doing, are buttressing the capitalist system which depends upon working-class ignorance.

And that is briefly the explanation of the clause in our Declaration of Principles (at which so many cavil) which says that we are in opposition to all other political parties, whether avowed capitalist or alleged labour, because all as we show—as we have shown—(see the Manifesto of The Socialist Party of Great Britain, just published) contribute in act or word or both to working-class confusion.

Therefore are we opposed to farcical anti-House-of-Lords agitations and the like.

WE PREACH THE CLASS WAR.

We show that the capitalist as such can never have interests in harmony with the worker as such. We hold up Socialism as the only hope of the workers. We urge the futility of palliatives (except to the class-conscious worker) while the central fact remains unaffected. We refuse to be scared by the wretched bogey which reformers have created. We are out to keep the issues clear as a pike. We preach Socialism— we, THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF GREAT BRITAIN.

Alec. J. M. Gray

Editorial: The side show (1999)

Editorial from the January 1999 issue of the Socialist Standard

Reform of the House of Lords, changing the voting system, elected local mayors, these are the issues the politicians and media have wanted us to get interested in recently. But why, when a recession is looming, are they trying to get us so worked up about constitutional issues?

The experience of the three previous recessions since 1973 has taught politicians that they can do nothing to stop a recession coming. All they can do is brace themselves and wait for it to pass by. There is, however, one field where a government does have some power to change things—the constitution. The Blair government has been exploiting this to the full, in a bid to avoid losing credibility through appearing to be completely powerless.

The House of Lords is to be reformed. This was an issue when the Socialist Party was formed in 1904. At that time and for many years afterwards the Labour Party campaigned for the abolition pure and simple of the House of Lords. Like the Monarchy this is indeed an anti-democratic relic of feudalism which will have no place in a socialist society. (It may have no place in a modern capitalist society either, but that’s for supporters of capitalism to decide.)

Attlee, as pre-war Labour leader, once unwisely said that if he was ever offered a seat in the Lords he would call himself Lord Love-A-Duck of Limehouse. When the offer came he bottled out, and his son now sits in the Lords as the second Earl Attlee of Walthamstow. As a hereditary he may (or, it now seems, may not) be booted out by Blair and be replaced by some superannuated hack nominated by one or other of the main political parties who will still be entitled to call themselves Baron or Baroness.

As to electoral changes, the unelected but non-hereditary (which, apparently, makes it alright) Baron Jenkins in his Report commissioned by the government recommended a complicated hybrid system whose main aim would seem to be to give his party—the Liberal Democrats—more MPs. In the days when a spade was called a spade this would have been known as gerrymandering.

But this is to fall into the trap of discussing these constitutional reforms seriously. The fact is that they are completely irrelevant as far as the real, social and economic problems people face are concerned. They won’t make any difference to these, and they aren’t even democratic.

Blair’s battle with the Lords is a side-show that should not distract us from the real issue. What is required is not constitutional reform but social revolution—a change in the basis of society from class ownership and production for profit to common ownership by all and production to satisfy people’s needs. This is the only framework—which will end the privileges of wealth and not just of birth—within which the urgent problems of pollution, mass unemployment, transport chaos, a crumbling health service, social breakdown and so on and so on can be solved in a rational way.

The Importance of Parliament. (1932)

From the March 1932 issue of the Socialist Standard

The State is the public power of coercion. It arose out of the early division of society into classes, and developed with the development of class conflicts. It is the result of the desire to keep “order”; that is, order in the interests of the class that is supreme; order to allow the ruling class to subdue and exploit the rest of the population without hindrance. Through the ages the State has been controlled, as a rule, by the class that has been economically the most important. It is maintained by taxes, and hence a class that has outgrown its economic importance can often continue for a time to control social affairs. As the State grew in size and complexity, it became more burdensome and the taxes grew with it. This led to quarrels among property owners over the amounts of their contributions. Much of the apparent cleavage between parties in modern States is at bottom only a question of who shall take the weight of taxation.

In the development of the State the modern Parliamentary system emerged as the most appropriate means for securing the domination of the present capitalist class, the last class to obtain social control. Parliaments were subjected to modification in the course of time and the modern product ensures to the capitalist the unquestioned right to the proceeds of the exploitation of the working class.

But the State controlled a huge aggregate of people of various social standings and nationalities, a relatively small number of whom moved in a circle so distinct from the majority that they might almost have belonged to another world. Production and distribution of wealth also developed on such a tremendous scale that social affairs became correspondingly burdensome and complicated. One could compare the past with the present as the comparison between Stephenson’s first locomotive and a modern railway engine. In order to run the State smoothly and secure the peaceable flow of profit, it became necessary to alter Parliamentary procedure so that the voice of the mass of people could be heard and their needs met; but only in so far as such alterations did not jeopardise the rule of the capitalists, in the opinion of their leading thinkers. Thus, in due course, the electoral machinery was modified until universal suffrage became the rule.

Parliament is the centre of power in this country. It makes the laws and it enforces them. Local bodies have certain lawmaking and enforcing powers, but these are subservient to the central body, which is supreme and which, where required, supplies the local body with any extra force necessary.

The instruments of power are the Army, Navy, Air and Police forces. The final word for setting these forces in motion rests with Cabinet Ministers. The Cabinet is the executive council which carries out the will of Parliament. Its members belong to the majority group, or are allowed to function by that group, or by arrangement, through a coalition of parties. In other words, the group that has an absolute majority in Parliament can put into operation whatever decrees it wishes by means of its control of the executive—the Cabinet. In theory the Prime Minister is appointed by the King (though the selection is confined within narrow limits) and has a free choice in the selection of his Ministers; but in fact no Cabinet could live without a Parliamentary majority to sanction its proposals.

Members of Parliament are elected by universal suffrage, and the vast majority of the voters are members of the working class. The result is near enough democratic to ensure that when the mass of the working class understand the meaning of Socialism they have the means to bring it into being through Parliamentary action when they desire to do so.

Up to the present, the mass of the workers have lacked political knowledge and have voted for people instead of principles. They have given their votes to the people who made the most alluring promises, and as time proved the hollowness of the promises, the workers turned in disgust from one group of people to another, and then back again as the memory of previous disappointments faded.

This fact has led many to question the usefulness of Parliament. They have forgotten that whenever the workers have placed their trust in leaders they have almost always been let down. The workers have been as readily betrayed on the industrial field, as they have on the political field. The trouble has not been due to the field of combat. It has been due to the method adopted. When the workers cease to regard certain individuals as endowed with some special capacity of "leadership,” they will adopt the method of issuing instructions to delegates that are to be carried out regardless of the delegates' own views or wishes. The ground will then be cut from under the feet of those who prosper out of leadership, and such people will no longer have a saleable article for the capitalist in the shape of a blind following.

There has not yet been a Parliamentary test of the power of delegates acting on instructions given them by a large body of workers who knew exactly what they were after and how to get it. In fact, outside the Socialist Party of Great Britain the method has never been really applied. Time after time the specious words of some acknowledged leader have diverted groups of workers from their original aims, generally on the plea of “expediency." The word “expediency" has acted as a useful veil for generations to cover the compromising activities of leaders, but of late there are indications that “tactics" will replace it. The truth is that the foolish and cowardly belief in this fetish of leadership has been a considerable barrier to working class knowledge and progress. The power and wealth leaders acquire induce them to fortify their positions and insist on the necessity of leadership as a permanent institution with the development of appropriate means for wire-pulling and mutual bargaining for position. The Labour Party has given striking proof of this in recent years.

Socialism will not be possible until the mass of the workers understand it and are prepared to vote for it. If a working class that did not understand Socialism were to vote for it, the result would only be chaos, as the first attempts to put it into operation would bewilder the majority of people and leave the way open for a counter-revolution. When the workers understand Socialism they will know what to expect and what will be.involved in putting it into operation, and here they will defeat the efforts of any delegates ready to sell themselves to the opposition. In such circumstances a delegate could only sell once; he would not get a second chance. The price he would demand would be proportionately high. Even if the absurd view were accepted that all the delegates would be sellers, the price would be too great to be paid out of even the huge wealth of the capitalists.

Parliament has supreme power and the armed forces are only kept in existence by the yearly voting of supplies. As Marriott points out in “English Political Institutions":—

   Under the English Constitution there would be no greater difficulty, in a formal and legal sense, in decreeing the abolition of the House of Lords or the House of Commons, than in procuring an Act for the construction of a tramway between Oxford and Reading, (p. 20.)

The Army Council controls the Army, but, as Sir John Creedy showed in his memorandum to the Civil Service Royal Commission, December, 1929, the Secretary for War, who is a member of it, is supreme and is solely responsible to King and Parliament. The Permanent Under-Secretary is solely responsible to the Secretary for all internal finance.

The Privy Council has no legislative authority; cancellations from it and appointments to it are at the discretion of the Prime Minister. Privy Council proclamations are not made at full meetings, but where the presence of two or more members is arranged by the Cabinet. In practice not more than four members are summoned, and rarely is anyone invited to attend a Council meeting who is not an active Cabinet member. It is executive in those matters only where the Cabinet does not require Parliamentary authority.

Marriott (“English Political Institutions"), adds the following relating to the Admiralty:—

   The Board of Admiralty now consists of six Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, a Financial Parliamentary Secretary, and a Permanent Secretary. The responsible minister is the First Lord, invariably a civilian and a member of the Cabinet.
   . . . The Board meets at least once a week, and is in a very real sense responsible for the first line of National Defence, though in a technical and parliamentary sense the First Lord has undivided responsibility, (p. 116-117.)

A similar organisation obtains in the Air Force, the Air Minister being the responsible official.

The above shows how complete and secure is the grip Parliament has upon the armed forces, and the strikes and disturbances of past years have shown how readily these forces are put in motion, and also upon whose side they act. They are a forcible illustration of how necessary it is for the workers to obtain control of Parliament before attempting to uproot the existing foundations of society. They further show that the only way to obtain control is by the legal one of sending delegates to Parliament.

It has been suggested that when the workers' movement began to really challenge the position of the capitalist, the latter would suspend Parliament. The suspension of Parliament would, in the first instance, abolish the right of the workers to combine, and would thus put a legal end to all forms of working-class combination. But the cost to the capitalist of the permanent suspension of the Constitution would be the end of their rule and the beginning of chaos.

The size and complexity of a modern nation is so great that the time has long since gone by when members of the ruling class could occupy any considerable number of the administrative posts and manage any appreciable part of its activities. From top to bottom all departments are filled by paid or elected officials, and only a very few of these officials are drawn from the capitalist class itself. Practically all the work of controlling the activities of society to-day is performed by people who depend for their livelihood upon the pay they get for the work they do—members of the working class.

Thousands of functions have had to be delegated to subsidiary bodies, such as County Councils, Town Councils, Parish Councils, and the like. Year by year this delegation of function grows greater and representation increases at the same rate.

Circumstances, therefore, have compelled the masters to place administration in the hands of elected bodies, and they can only withdraw it by bringing their house down about their ears.

The importance of Parliament is quite plainly recognised by the capitalists, and they give clear evidence of this at election times by the amount of wealth they spend and the inconvenience they suffer in order to ensure their control of it. 

Gilmac.

Puppet Kings and Labour Prudes (1937)

From the January 1937 issue of the Socialist Standard

The most talked-of political event of the past month was the dramatic exodus of King Edward VIII. One week he was the world’s most publicised figure, titular head of the world’s greatest Empire, moving with the authority of his position among one of the world’s wealthiest circles yet at the same time able to arouse great enthusiasm among the poorest of the poor by his visits to depressed areas and references to the poverty problem. The next week saw him spirited away under cover of darkness to a wealthy semi-exile, robbed of his royal position, and replaced by his brother. And this, says Mr. Baldwin, all occurred because the proposed marriage to a woman who bad been married twice before to men still living would have robbed the Crown of some of the lustre and respect essential to the maintenance of the bonds of Empire.

For us, as Socialists, the incident has its own significance. We aim at a system of society, Socialism, that will have complete stability because its foundation, the method by which the wealth of the community will be produced, owned and distributed, will be completely satisfying to the mass of the population. Having no privileged class, such a society will have no need of armed forces to protect the haves from the have-nots. Nor will it need those institutions which cover the naked reality of class privileges and class rule with the glamour of kingship and aristocracy, and thus prevent the working class from perceiving how they are robbed and by whom. Socialism will need no kingship, for it will have no need of an institution the main function of which now is to hide the fact that the State is an instrument used by the propertied class to enable them to exploit the propertyless.

It has always been the aim of the Socialist Party of Great Britain to point out how easily that State machine could be captured by the working class and transformed into an instrument of working class emancipation. Our propaganda has been faced with many obstacles, two of which have centred round the Crown. We have been told, on the one side, that the King “rules as well as reigns,” and that, therefore, to gain control of Parliament is useless, as the King could defy a Socialist majority controlling Parliament. On the other side, we have had to meet the argument that the Crown is not part of the capitalist machine but an independent force which might help the workers against capitalists and the capitalist class. The events of November, strikingly dispose of both contentions and thus will help to remove from workers’ minds doubts that prevented acceptance of the Socialist message.

In the first place we have witnessed how easy it was for the Party controlling Parliament to dismiss the most popular monarch of centuries because he would not accept their conditions, be a docile royal rubber stamp, and order his life as they wished. Many members of the Cabinet must have reflected that it was more easily carried out than the dismissal of organised wage-earners in their own factories. (Incidentally, those who still believe that Parliament is an unworkable machine may usefully observe how expeditiously it put through on operation of such magnitude and importance to the ruling class.)

The second point concerns the former King himself, for here we had an individual on whose behalf it has been claimed that he. interested himself in some of the problems of the working class. The extent of his understanding or the depth of his interest need not concern us here. It can, however, be said that it is impossible for anyone brought up in such surroundings to gain a correct appreciation of the working class point of view, let alone accept it. Nor would such an individual be prepared to support the only remedy, Socialism, since that involves the end of class privilege as well as the end of the monarchy. Inevitably, in essentials, the Crown must be the handmaiden of capitalism.

Nevertheless, in several directions Edward VIII interfered in social and political questions sufficiently to incur the disfavour of the ruling groups, and that was a reason why his abdication was desired in addition to the question of his marriage to Mrs. Simpson. The astonishing ease with which they accomplished that feat should prove to everyone that the notion of the modern monarchy opposing capitalism or even acting as a check on it is fantastic.

The episode is instructive, too, for the way it exposes the ruthlessness and hypocrisy of official circles. The Crown must, in the interest of the propertied class, be an untarnished symbol fitted to deceive the masses into a belief that the ruling class are a superior caste and that the country is governed by them in the interest of all, not merely of themselves. Also, the Monarch must be an apt instrument, prompt to obey capitalist orders. Edward, having some tastes and views of his own, was not willing. So Edward must go. Then, without more than an instant’s pause, the high-powered slush machines—the Press and the Pulpit— plastered the new King with all the amazing attributes with which they had been endowing his predecessor only a week before. One journal, simultaneously with the announcement of Edward’s abdication, hastened to inform its readers that the brother is a better golf player and tennis player, and better all-round athlete. Within a day or two we had learned that the new King is the only member of the Royal Family who was in action in the Great War (Edward was in France, but not in action, it seems, but we were never told so until now), that he drove a railway train, attends summer camp for boys, and takes a keen interest in social questions.

One good thing about all this is that it overreaches itself, and thousands of workers will be set on the road to useful thought through their feeling of nausea at such sycophantic utterances. The capitalists got their new King, but they have fortunately struck a blow at the institution, and through it, at their own position.

Regarding the way in which the dismissal was arranged, the full story will no doubt not be told for a long while. Sufficient is, however, apparent to show that the official Baldwin version is by no means the full story. The insistence that the King’s wish to marry Mrs. Simpson was the whole issue is hard to square with certain facts. It is an open secret that the King’s visit to South Wales, like previous excursions of his, and his awkward references to slums and poverty, were offensive and harmful to the Cabinet. And it was on this issue, not on Mrs. Simpson, that the Times and Daily Telegraph (November 24th and 25th) fired the first public shots in the conflict. They took the line that, to contrast the King’s “personal and representative concern for the well-being of a section of the people with the administrative steps of his advisers, is a constitutionally dangerous proceeding, and would threaten, if continued, to entangle the Throne in politics.” In form the attacks were directed against certain newspapers, but in substance against King Edward. It is interesting to recall also, that, at his accession, the Times evidently had their doubts about him (January 23rd, 1936), and put in a plea for him to be given "time to take the strain of his new duties.” . . . ” There is a feeling instinctive in the British race which likes to give any newcomer to any walk of life a fair chance.”

(Cynical people might say that King Edward ought to have expected trouble as soon as the organ of the British ruling class had started talking about “fairness.”)

On October 14th, The Week published a statement that a scheme was then being set on foot “for a social bomb to be exploded under the King.” This was a few days before Baldwin, according to his own statement, first broached the question of Mrs. Simpson to King Edward. The Times editorial on the South Wales visit (November 24th) coincides with the period in which, according to Mr. Baldwin (Hansard, December 10th), the suggestion had been made of a morganatic marriage. It appears that the Times at that stage was warning the King that even if he gave up Mrs. Simpson, or, alternatively, if the morganatic marriage provided a way out, he would still have to toe the line marked out for him by the Cabinet on behalf of the propertied class.

Two other aspects of the abdication deserve to be placed on record. One is the unanimity with which the Press lords agreed that there was not the slightest attempt to suppress the news about Mrs. Simpson in the months during which it was filling the columns of the foreign newspapers. Yet the New Leader reports that its printer not only refused to publish material on the matter but asserted that other printers would refuse to touch it also. Unofficial pressure by those who control industry and the Press can be as tight as any official censorship.

The other incident is the refusal of the Cabinet to allow Edward to broadcast before his abdication (Times, December 12th, 1936). The significance of this is that the British Broadcasting Corporation operates on a Royal Charter, and is thus nominally an organisation more directly under the authority of the Crown than any other. Yet he was not allowed to address his “own” subjects over his "own” B.B.C. Those who still persist in believing that the Crown has control over the armed forces or other bodies which work in the King’s name should ponder this. In fact, Parliament’s control is effective whenever those who are in a majority want to act. When a politically organised Socialist majority gains control of Parliament they will find it an effective instrument for the emancipation of the working class. Neither lords nor kings, lawyers nor financiers, will be able to stand in the way.

The conduct of the Labour Party towards the question was truly laughable. Having no policy— unless a palsied fear of Fascism can be called a policy—the Labour Party lined up behind "honest” Stanley Baldwin’s Cabinet. It shuddered at the idea of Mrs. Simpson becoming Queen —"married twice already. Both her former husbands are living" (Daily Herald, December 5th)— and echoed the capitalist plea that the Dominions would not accept her. It discovered, with the capitalist Press, that the King's acts "are the links which hold the Commonwealth together” (Daily Herald, December 3rd). The statement is absurd, whether from a capitalist’s or from a worker's standpoint. Capitalist interests hang together in the Empire from motives of mutual profit and mutual fears. The Crown is only the symbol with which the capitalists dazzle the eyes of the dispossessed populations in all the Empire countries. From a worker's standpoint—that is from the standpoint the Labour Party pretends to occupy—what binds the workers of the Empire and non-Empire countries together is their common fate as an exploited class and common interest in ending exploitation. Instead of basing its attitude on these elementary facts of the working class position, the Labour Party supported the capitalist monarchy and helped the capitalist class to sack an awkward occupant of the throne. They even sank so low as to echo the excuse that Edward had failed in his duty of sacrificing his personal affections—“The King failed to subdue the man" (Daily Herald, December 11th, 1936).

What a policy and what a Party!

Edgar Hardcastle