Comic Confessions of a Capitalist. (1928)

From the July 1928 issue of the Socialist Standard

One would have thought that with unemployed everywhere, because more wealth exists than can find markets, more production would not be advanced as a “cure for poverty.” Sir Ernest Benn, who claims to be an individualist, whatever that is, seems to think that he makes some wonderful discoveries. He informs us, in all seriousness (Daily Telegraph, March 17th, 1928), that :—

“The wealth of nations consists of things. Poverty is the absence of a sufficient number of things.”

Marvellous! What things? Whose things? And why, and by whom, are they wanted? Does mere want bring possession of these things? Have the Workers, who undeniably suffer a shortage of the most desirable things, failed to produce sufficient of these things for other people who are non-workers? Are their productive powers greater or less than their needs? In an age when millions of the population are employed uselessly from a wealth-producing point of view, when machinery and other means of production lie idle, this “individualist” talks as if we were living in the stone age. Note this simple stuff :—

“Let us try to discover what it is that people want and how far it is possible to supply these needs.”

A boy or girl from a village school could tell Sir Ernest what it is people want, while even a superficial acquaintance with the achievements of the Industrial Revolution and the mechanical marvels of manufacture to-day will show that these needs could be met easily, even anticipating the most extravagant demands of the future generations. What has this great business mind to offer in the way of constructive proposals? Arithmetic and the wildest of suppositions. He says :—

“Let us get straight down to our arithmetic. Suppose we set the problem like this: Let us give to some railway porter of our acquaintance another £5 a week. Let us suppose for the sake of the argument that the adult male population of the nation is composed of railway porters whose income it is proposed to increase by £5 a week” (ibid.)

Having supposed in this farcical manner, everything is now straight sailing into Utopia. Our nation of supposed railway porters, we are told, will want :—

“Ten million houses, 10 million baths and hot-water systems, 135 million clothing outfits, 15 million umbrellas, etc.”

It hardly seems credible that in a daily paper, supposed to be read by educated people, that one who claims superior capabilities could pen the following in his conclusion of a two-column article :—

“All these facts emphasise the truth of the theory that the problem of poverty is not a problem of money but of things, and that if we make the things the problem disappears.”

IF ! Then will Sir Ernest Benn tell us why we do not make them? Will he, or anyone, show where the Socialist is wrong when we claim that these things will not be produced unless such production serves the profit of the idle few who own the means of producing these things? This insane system can be ended when a politically enlightened Working Class break the fetters of ownership by the Capitalist few in order to establish common ownership, by which means that class can at once win emancipation and abolish poverty by the ease with which they can now produce wealth.

W. E. MacHaffie

An Individualist’s Defence of Capital. (1928)

From the January 1928 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Daily Mirror (28/10/27) introduces an article by Sir Ernest Benn with the following-headlines :—

“Why Capitalism is “Ruthless.”  

Economic law as old as Adam—not a system but a great natural force.

There are a few socialists who still imagine that capitalism is a system invented by the rich to exploit the poor.”

No man can truthfully call himself a Socialist who says, or thinks, that the Capitalist system was invented. Whatever he may call himself, or whatever the Daily Mirror may call him, however, it is plain from a perusal of Sir Ernest Benn’s article that the charge against Capitalism of exploitation is unanswerable.

Had it been possible to show that the working class is not exploited by the capitalist class, Sir Ernest would have done so, instead of stringing together a number of statements that can only be described as what he and other Capitalists wish or would like to think. He says :—

“The future of capitalism will be exactly like its past. Capitalism is not something which alters or varies or changes.

A great deal of confused thinking is caused by people who imagine that capitalism is something to do with the industrial revolution; something which can be altered by Act of Parliament ; or something which we can put off or put on or adopt or reject at our pleasure.”

For the Capitalist, of course, Capitalism is perfect. The Capitalist hates to hear his system attacked. It suits him admirably. He hates to think of the possibility of change. The snag in evolution, for him, is that he cannot apply it to the universe at large, and rule it out where his material interests are concerned. His particular method of exploitation, wage slavery, is quite recent in its general application, when compared with the system of exploitation that preceded it. Feudalism and chattel slavery, other forms of exploitation, though more enduring than Capitalism has shown itself up to the present, were short periods compared with the early Communism that preceded it.

To speak to a Capitalist of the industrial revolution is like reminding a decrepit octagenarian of his youth. That period of Capitalist history when the means of wealth production changed from tools operated by muscular energy, plus wind and water, to machines driven by steam, is generally spoken of as the industrial revolution. That period was the youth of Capitalism. Its childhood was passed side by side with Feudalism in the Middle Ages. The change —termed progress by the Capitalist—that has taken place since the industrial revolution even, is so great, so important, that it forms part of every child’s education. Sir Ernest must eradicate this teaching from the minds of the workers before he can frighten them away from Socialism by flatly asserting that Capitalism is something which does not change.

“A great deal of confused thinking is caused by people who imagine that Capitalism is something to do with the industrial revolution,” says Sir Ernest; but is it merely confused thinking on his part to say that Capitalism is the same now as then, or is it merely lying?

“Capitalism is the unhappy word invented, I think, by the Socialists to express the way we live and the economic forces that govern our lives.

The two predominant features of Capitalism are work and saving, and we cannot live without both.”

In this last sentence Sir Ernest acknowledges the debt owed by the capitalist class to the working class ; the latter being the only class that works and the only class that denies itself the satisfaction of its desires, with the result that wealth is accumulated in the hands of the capitalist class.

The working class does, in fact, deny itself the satisfaction of its desires. The workers are in a huge majority over the Capitalists. When they understand Socialism, they can, in spite of everything Sir Ernest says to the contrary, change the system. They can take over the means of wealth production, making them common property. They can arrange for the continued production of all necessary wealth and the manner of its individual appropriation and consumption.

The predominant features of Capitalism are not “work and saving,” but class ownership of the means of life and wage-slavery. Even the “Socialists” put up by Sir Ernest Benn know that the system means exploitation of the working class. Whether they think the system was invented or whether they think it merely grew, matters little. They have grasped the essential fact—exploitation. It is but a short step to discover the manner of this exploitation : the class ownership of the means of life and the merchandise character of human labour-power.

F. Foan

More new leaders for old (1942)

From the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

In an article, entitled “Politicians, Bureaucrats and the New World,” in the Evening News of May 19th, Sir Ernest Benn, criticising the vagueness of the post-war proposals made by our by our present politicians, says the following :—

“When . . . this war is at last brought to a victorious conclusion, there will be a lot to do. Whether it is going to be a new-fangled world or the same old natural world with a new coat of paint is beside my present point. There is quite obviously a great big job of work to be done, and the nation—that is the British public, all the little John Citizens—will have to decide to whom that job is to be entrusted.

“There will be many applicants, and we shall have to go through the normal, usual processes of ‘taking up’ and making inquiries into character and qualification.”

It is obvious that this procedure of selecting applicants and “taking up” references is taken quite for granted by Sir Ernest Benn. That the majority of his readers would likewise regard this practice as the usual thing is also probable. It does, however, seem remarkable that the full significance of the above quotation has not yet been appreciated by our fellow-workers.

May we therefore remind them that for the last sixty years or more they have been doing nothing else but selecting applicants and “taking up” references; that for the last sixty years or more they have been incessantly cajoled, flattered and persuaded into electing “trustees,” whom they hoped would rid them of the many evils to which they are constantly subject; that, in spite of these years of promises and pledges relief from their problems has not been achieved.

Might we then suggest to them that it is high time they realised that the remedy for the problems confronting them cannot be achieved by the promises of leaders and professional politicians (of whatever stamp) but can only be accomplished through the independent, political action of the workers themselves, the basis for that action being a sound understanding of the fundamental objects and principles of Socialism.

Lastly may we say that this Socialist understanding is not beyond the mental capabilities of the working-class. They require no great intellect to grasp that the evils of poverty and insecurity with which they are afflicted arise from a certain system of wealth ownership and production, capitalism, nor do they need the intelligence of supermen to perceive that the system and its evils can only be eradicated once and for all by their organising consciously at a class and gaining political power for the establishment of Socialism.

The advice of Sir Ernest Benn is of no value to workers in their struggle. For them to put their trust in leaders and the like is to put their fate into the hands of men who will lead them but deeper into the quagmires of Capitalism.

As Engels so truly said in his “Socialism, Utopian and Scientific” :—

“To accomplish this act of universal emancipation is the historical mission of the modern proletariat. To thoroughly comprehend the historical conditions and thus the very nature of this act, to impart to the now oppressed proletarian class a full knowledge of the conditions and of the meaning of the momentous act it is called upon to accomplish, this is the task of the theoretical expression of the proletarian movement, scientific Socialism.”

Possessed of this “thorough comprehension,” the working-class will not require advice or directions from leaders. They themselves will know the way to go.

Stan Hampson

Individualism and social evolution. (1926)

From the October 1926 issue of the Socialist Standard

The channels of propaganda open to the defenders of the present system of society are enormous. Apart from their control of “Education,” with its distortion of history, their Press, with its daily circulation of millions, would enable them—if they had an answer to the Socialist attitude—to cancel any effort the latter could make.

Their inability to keep the workers in the ignorant and docile state that they desire is demonstrated on the one hand by the steady growth of understanding among the working class of their common interest, and the fading of their prejudice against the propaganda of Socialism. And on the other hand by the panic that is exhibited on certain occasions by the Capitalist Class, breaking out in all manner of forms, and giving further evidence of the hopeless case they have to handle.

Their latest attempt to check the growth of working-class enlightenment is the formation of a company, with £20,000 capital, called “The Individualist Bookshop, Ltd.”

The Daily News (15/7/26), in giving particulars of this company, tells us that:

”The object of the company is to provide a London bookshop, where the Individualist as opposed to the Socialist point of view will be expressed in various ways.”

“Only books free from what the promoters consider the unsound economic theories of Socialism; will be sold.”

“It will collect books on economic subjects, written from the Individualist point of view : promote the publication of such books; provide a reference library for the use of students ; establish a circulating library, and organise lectures.”

An “Individualist Bookshop” that is a limited company would make even its founders laugh, if the concern to save their skins did not prevent them seeing the joke.

But apart from the stupid title of this company, with its £20,000 capital, described by Sir Ernest Benn, who is largely responsible for its formation, as a “modest beginning,” let us take a book from the shelf of this peculiar shop, and examine it.

The first point that strikes us is, that before the book could be produced, a written language was necessary, and before this, language could be written it was developed in an oral form. This, articulate speech, commencing with man in his most primitive state, is his earliest effort to lift himself above an individualist and animal existence and become a social being. Speech, which is of necessity social, emphasises the distinction betwen man and the lower forms of life.

During a period of thousands of years, and by the co-operation of unnumbered people, was produced the dialects out of which have grown the modern languages of to-day.

From the spoken to the written word there is again an enormous period of time, extending over thousands of years, from the early savage to the dawn of civilisation. This fact gives us an idea of the countless number of people who contributed to the production of writing from the hieroglyphics to the alphabets now in use.

Another factor needed in the production of this book is the printing press, which has been made possible by inventions which carry us back to savagery. The discovery of the use of fire by the early savage, and later in the next period the production of iron, are inventions which, apart from the influence they had on the state of society in which they were discovered, are still in the twentieth century needed to produce the modern printing machine, which owes its existence to the work, thought, and cooperation of thousands of generations of people.

This simple little book not only represents the accumulation of knowledge through the ages from earliest man to the present day, but is also in the modern sense a social product.

The miners that secure the various minerals, viz., coal, iron, and copper; the lumbermen who fell the trees; the transport workers who convey this material to the mills and factories where other workers await to convert it into the numerous forms needed to produce this “individualist” book, such as the machinery that reduces the giant of the forest into pulp for paper, the circular saw that rips others into planks, the printing press and the tools used for its production, are all necessary to make this book. Then the workers in the building trade erect the factory, and the different branches of the printing industry commence operations.

With this vast army of workers the picture is not complete. The farm labourer, the miller, and the baker; the weaver, and the tailor; the tanner, and the bootmaker are needed to supply this industrial army with food and clothing. We see, therefore, that in the production of a simple article, not only must the individual take part as a social unit in that work, but that each industry is dependent upon many others, a dependence that often extends beyond national boundaries.

Without the accumulated knowledge of the past, and the social activities of the present wage workers, Sir E. Benn and his friends would be climbing among the branches of trees and living their individualist life on nuts and roots.

We have seen that speech was man’s first step forward. This implies the common acceptance of certain sounds to mean certain things. As the language developed, the rules governing it grew and changed in proportion, and now to speak a language we must learn and obey the rules that control it. This is generally accepted, and even the Anarchist falls into line without an ungrammatical curse at the necessity of so doing.

As the rules alter with the development of a language, so with society. The rules and regulations are changed as the methods of producing wealth and the character of its ownership changes, and creates new needs and interests, and makes old laws and customs obsolete.

In their early days the Capitalist Class forced the development of society forward at a rapid pace; institutions that stood in the way were crushed out of existence. The Handicraftman and the Trade Guilds could not survive against the competition of factory production, made possible by the development of machinery and the use of steam power. With these changes the worker lost his individual character as a producer and became a social unit.

The rapid growth of capitalist production with the concentration of capital into fewer hands have forced these concerns beyond their individual control. Nationalisation or joint stock companies managed by a staff of wage slaves takes their place. The average capitalist draws his dividend without knowing anything of the business he owns shares in, and in many cases does not know where his money is invested. By the manipulation on the Stock Exchange he can go to bed owning an interest in one part of the world and wake up to find that interest transferred to another concern thousands of miles away.

While taking no part in production, but owning the wealth that is produced, the Capitalist Class find the task of concealing their useless nature from the workers becomes more difficult. With the distinction between the non-producing owners and the propertyless workers becoming clearer as the system developes, its defenders are alarmed at the growth of the propaganda that points these facts out to the workers and which explains that as their trouble is the lack of the wealth which they produce in abundance, the remedy is to abolish the system which enables this useless class to rob them of the fruits of their labour. This implies a change in the form of ownership from private to common. The conditions are ripe for this change, which can be accomplished when a majority of the workers know what they need and how to get it.

Recognising that the confusion of the working class is one safeguard against the overthrow of Capitalism and the establishment of Socialism, these defenders of the present system raise the cry of individualism to defend a form of society based on social production, and in which the exploitation of the workers by the capitalist has lost its individual character and become one of class robbery.

For the same reason they welcome confusionists like Ramsay MacDonald, who, speaking at the “Christian Endeavour Convention,” says, “You are fashioning the world into the likeness which is in your soul ” (Daily News, 22/6/1926).

But such nonsense, which would disgrace a village parson, will have no effect on the workers when they know what they fashion neither a world nor a system in either their mind or “soul,” but that the means of wealth production prevailing when the present system of society ends will form the starting-point or foundation in the one that follows. Also that the character of the ownership of the social wealth and the manner in which it is produced determine the nature of the class struggle. And, further, that the political institutions necessary to maintain the present system offers to the modern wage workers the means to end it and establish Socialism.

Securing political power, they will overthrow the Capitalist Class and establish a system of common ownership in harmony with social production.

The Socialist, therefore, while recognising the causes of social development, does not ignore the human factor, but gives it its true value. By this means he avoids the pitfalls of the Utopian, who builds castles in the air or “fashions a world” with his “soul” for a pattern. But, acting in conformity with the knowledge obtained from a correct conception of history, he carries on the class struggle, knowing that this war, fought out by an enlightened working class, must end in their emancipation from the present degrading position of slavery.

E. L.

A Look Round. (1924)

From the September 1924 issue of the Socialist Standard

Who are the loafers.

   “Deducting loafers and criminals one person in three was in a state of perpetual poverty . . . The merely idle should be taught with the lash if need be, the dignity of work.” (Rev. Basil Bourchier, St. Jude’s, Hampstead, Morning Post, August 11th, 1924.)

Without doubt the bogey men of Capitalism fear the danger of being left behind with their out-of-date contributions toward stifling working-class discontent. Statements upon social evils become increasingly common; but a tirade against poverty does not imply the knowledge or desire to remove the cause. Witness Lloyd George, who, with his fulsome pretence of sympathy for the workers’ suffering, still makes every effort to win their support for the system that makes that suffering inevitable. Our cleric is another, but lacking the experience of the astute politician, he lets pussy out of the bag easily. He said :

  “Poverty was dangerous, it created the revolutionary temper, and was a menace to the very existence of society.”—(Ibid.)

The Socialist knows, of course, that poverty alone does not make the revolutionary. It is the knowledge of their class position and knowledge of their potential strength as a united body that makes revolutionaries among the ranks of the working class. But when we read the suggestion of flogging loafers, well ! We fear there is a grave mistake somewhere. A real Lady, writing in the Express, August 11, 1924), says :—

  “The London season that has just closed has been the most brilliant and noteworthy in my memory. . . . Three months of perpetual amusement take their toll of everyone, and society is obliged to retire to the sea and the moors, or to seek the peace and tranquility of the countryside in order to recuperate. … I am inclined to think it would be better to reserve some charitable functions for the winter months, when there is little to do and time hangs heavily on our hands.” (Lady Alexander.)

* * *

A Message From Mars.

  “Attempts are to be made during the coming days by several scientists to communicate with the Planet Mars, which will be in closer proximity to the earth than it has been for years. Life of a very high order it is suggested lives upon the Planet.”

Man of Mars : Say ! you must be pretty comfortable over yonder with your science, machinery, fertile soil, etc.

Earthly Socialist: Well, not exactly, there is plenty of everything for all, but the producers haven’t got it.

M. of M. : Here, no leg-pulling ! Who the stars has got it if the producers have not?

E.S. : Truth to tell, the non-producers, our masters who we do the job for.

M. of M. : Good heavens ! Are you all mad?

E.S. : No, not exactly; we, the workers, keep the show going, but our masters keep us mighty poor. You see, they have pinched this old earth and everything on it. We’re trying to get our mates to see through the game. Better news next time.

* * *

The Reward of Ability.

It is not in the least surprising to the Socialist that in the rotten system of to-day those with any outstanding ability unless possessed of cunning and business acumen, lay up little for moth and rust to corrupt. Just as the labours of the inventors have mainly benefited those who could financially exploit their ideas, leaving them mostly in the direst poverty, so we find the story re-told in every walk, of life. For over 30 years the late T. E. Dunville, the music-hall comedian, continued to provoke laughter, holding his own, until quite recent time, with every popular star of his day. But fear of a declining popularity and a much reduced salary brought him to a watery grave in despair. (Daily Chronicle, March 24, 24.) As a laughter maker he must have brought fortunes to the music-hall magnates, yet he left behind the paltry sum of £236. (Daily Chronicle, August 11, 1924). How much of the great wealth of the few is coined in the tears and agony of men, women and children of the working class?

* * *

The Artful Dodgers.

Ask the average worker, Do the capitalists as a class work? and he will probably answer: “Well, with their brain.” Karl Marx, in his work, Capital, showed how the reaching of a certain stage of capitalist development relieves the capitalist of his one-time function of directing industry, bringing forward at the same time a special kind of wage labourer whose exclusive function now becomes the work of supervision, management, etc. Capitalists still endeavour to convince the workers that they are indispensable in order to justify their now entirely parasitic part in society. The enormous wealth extorted from the working class demands no service or ability from its receivers; they may be financially interested in dozens of concerns without any personal contact:

  “Colonel Arthur Barhum is director of 62 concerns, Mr. Seymour Berry, J.P., appears as director of 71, while five of the Cory family, partners in Orders & Hansfords, are directors of 136 different companies.” (Directory of Directors.)

Let our so-called business men speak and show how they buy the brains they require like they do raw material.

  “Mr. Eric Gamage, Director and General Manager of A. & W. Gamage, Ltd., says: ‘I never wasté time in doing work other people can do for me equally well.’ Sir Ernest Benn is Managing Director, Benn Brothers, Ltd. ‘These,’ he says, ‘are my rules. I never do a piece of work that can be avoided; I never do anything until I am perfectly sure that no one else is capable of doing it. It is the greatest folly to hug work.’ Sir Charles Wakefield, Director, C. C. Wakefield and Co., Ltd., ‘is emphatic upon the importance of the delegation of duties which it is not necessary he himself should perform. “I must not be interpreted wrongly when I say that I have found the golden rule to be ‘Do no work that you can put on other shoulders”.’ ”—Quoted from “How we get more into the business day,” System, July.).

 * * *

Catching them young.

Outlining the objects of the Boy Scout movement at St. Andrew’s Hall, Glasgow, Gen. Baden Powell said (Observer, June 22, 1924) what was at the root of our troubles to-day was :—

  “Selfishness of class against class, party against party, between employer and employed, and between the rich and the poor; there was continual fighting for self interest, and that was what they were out to combat.”

Which we call, without sentiment, the class struggle. That the object of the Scout movement should be to combat self-interest we never doubted—but in whom? Do the capitalists, who enjoy all the advantages arising from the workers’ efforts, require instruction as to which is the most desirable life, theirs or the workers’? Or will they rather use every effort to subdue self-interest in our class, upon whose docility and submission their privileges are based? The Chief Scout tells us other objects are the stimulation of character, handicraft, and physical health.

  “All three went together, and the fourth was to harness those three points of efficiency to the service of others of the community.”

There you have it. Our masters require patriotic, industrious, and healthy boys, so that when the time arrives they may be efficient in the SERVICE OF OTHERS—in war and peace. Fellow workers, to-day you are notoriously unselfish. When, like your masters, you fight for self-interest through understanding your class position there can only be victory for you and the establishment of Socialism.

W. E. MacHaffie

A Look Round. (1927)

From the April 1927 issue of the Socialist Standard

Who Pays For Royal Trips?

Those who must have the support of the majority of the workers in their present mental state must also of necessity appeal and act in a manner which will not arouse hostility, even although not in the workers’ interest. Whether such appeals are the outcome of sincerity or duplicity does not alter this fact. In the debate on the expenditure for the Duke and Duchess of York’s Australian trip we have a useful illustration, the Labour members being, of course, well to the front.

Mr. Scurr “did not think that this is a time when this visit ought to have taken place, considering the distress existing in the country.” Mr. Buchanan “thought it unjustifiable to expend this money on a useless visit.” Dr. D. Shiels seemed quite charmed because those in Australia “who belong to the same movement as we do are looking forward to the visit,” as they regard the Royal Family as “the symbol of the unity of the Empire.” How truly democratic these Labourites are ! Perhaps the “best” was what Mr. Kirkwood got off his chest:—

  Here we have got to pay for the sending out of their Royal Highnesses on this excursion, which is simply a joy ride. … I know the responsibilities that my own class are carrying at the present moment and they are very heavy. …. The Duke of York and his wife are being voted this £7,000, and who has to pay for it? The working class has to pay for it— my class, my fellow tradesmen; the engineers, with their £2 15s. a week; the miners have to pay for it. I wish the working class were here just now. I wish they had their eyes on me protesting here on their behalf.” (Hansard, Feb. 17th, 1927.)

This is just clap-trap. The inference is that if capitalist expenditure were curtailed, the money so expended would flow straight into the workers’ pockets. Actually, the enormous wealth you produce is the property of your masters, and that the portion returned to you (wages) never does much more than pay for the food, clothing, shelter and incidentals necessary to sustain your class as efficient units of wealth-producing energy. When you have purchased these necessaries, you could not give any away and maintain the efficiency your masters require. You are too closely rationed for that. How, then, can you pay for anything beyond these rations and incidentals? What you actually receive as wages is not the mere money, but what it buys. 60s. with high prices is no more to you than 30s. with low prices, if it only maintains the same standard of life. It is the money payment that permits the illusion so dear to the workers that they “pay for everything.” Those who retain all you PRODUCE, minus the fraction they return to you in the form of wages, must meet the expenditure incurred in maintaining their Royalty, their navies, armies, paupers, criminals, lunatics, and so on. Though you pile wealth mountain high, the wages system never gives you more than subsistence. These capitalist agents endeavour by any means to hide this fact, because they recognise that for you to have a clear understanding of the cause of your poverty would fit you for the working out of your own emancipation. In that case you would send them about their business, for the capitalist henchmen that they are. At present their only chance of keeping place and pelf is by preventing you from gaining knowledge of your class interests.

* * *

Is Production Too Small?

  But the total production of the world has never been sufficient to keep the population of the world in decency, that is to provide that all shall live up to the standard recognised at any given time as desirable. (Sir Ernest Benn, Times, Nov. 17th, 1926.)

The above is one of those meaningless ambiguities beloved by the so-called business men of to-day. Any standard work dealing with industrial history or a summary of the applied science and inventions of the nineteenth century would show that our potential powers of production were multiplied in that period far beyond anything the human family were ever likely fully to utilise. Allowing for the limitations imposed because capitalism produces only for sale, Dr. Russell Wallace, in “The Wonderful Century,” calculated that our producing capacity at the end of the century had grown ten times faster than the population. Ample evidence is available to show that as far as production is concerned the poverty question was no longer a problem with the coming of modern manufacture and mass output. We learn from a magazine to which Sir Ernest Benn has himself contributed many times : —

  Of all the agricultural countries of the world Canada stands first in ratio of increase of production in the first quarter of the twentieth century. Wheat production at the end of this quarter century was over 600 per cent. greater in yield than in 1900, oats 200 per cent., barley 500 per cent., rye 600 per cent. … It is, in the light of these facts, and prospects, not an exaggeration to say that we are only beginning to grow wheat in Canada.” (Business Organisation, March.)

What applies to agriculture applies equally to manufacture. The fact that in practically every leading industry (agriculture included) production has had to be curtailed, makes Sir Ernest Benn’s statement look childish. The following is only a sample of what takes place with tea, rubber, cotton, wool. etc. :—

  The steel cartel has decided to reduce production by 1,500,000 tons for the first three months of 1927. (Daily Chronicle, Dec. 11th, 1926.)

We do not expect our masters to point out the cause of our poverty; their privileges as landlords, shareholders, and dummy directors are based upon our exploitation as producers. Obviously, then, it must be the workers’ task to convert those material means of providing comfort and security for others into the common property of all. Then, not only could the race be kept in “decency,” but a life of grandeur could be made available for all.

* * *

The Source of the "Social Evil."

It is in the very nature of the reformer to take for granted the continuance and the inevitability of the present system of society. After years and years of tinkering with social evils separately, and seeking to sum up the net result of their efforts, they are often in their more honest moments driven to confess utter failure and despair.

A committee of experts recently made extensive enquiries on an international scale upon the White Slave Traffic, and a lengthy report has been made to the League of Nations. Among some of the causes enumerated are :—

  Bogus offers of employment in a foreign country are not infrequently used as a means of leading girls to become prostitutes. . . . The contracts also are often drawn up in terms so harsh that the girl who signs one has little or no security. Governments would be well advised to protect their nationals against victimisation of this character. (Times, Mar. 12th, 1927.)

It is almost needless to point out that those who must seek employment, bogus or otherwise, here or elsewhere, are girls of the working class. They have no more security here in “free” England than have their male counterparts in wage slavery. Here, too, the terms of living for thousands upon thousands of girls are so harsh that whole armies are driven to live in the same way as that which is deplored in these Continental cities, considered such sinks of iniquity. A country that can boast 80,000 fresh cases of venereal disease yearly (pamphlet issued by the Council for Combating Venereal Disease) has little right to claim Britain to be the “one bright spot.” Our ruling class, however, are essentially hypocritical, a relic of the Puritanism with which they helped to fight their way to power. The sentiments of this report are akin to the canting ethics of the cotton lords who shed crocodile tears for American slaves whilst fighting legislation aimed at preventing them from working their own child operatives to death. After a column of proposals the Committee practically admits its whole work to be a waste of effort, for we are told :—

  The measures to which we have referred above are not likely to be successful while the incentive of money-making remains. Profit is at the bottom of the business. (Ibid.)

While profit is here held responsible for one evil, we claim that it is production for profit in the wide sense—the capitalist system—that engenders other evils. In our pamphlet, “Socialism,” we show how it begets unemployment, intensified exploitation, and the misery and general poverty from which our class suffer. We have no time to wring our hands and bemoan the foulness of a particular social evil, but carry on our work of spreading the knowledge that Socialism is the remedy for all of the economic problems of the working class.

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Is Socialism government ownership?

Sir Herbert Samuel is a Liberal who makes a few assertions, dubs them Socialism, shows their absurdity, and then congratulates himself that “it won’t stand criticism.” In the “Forward View” (quoted Westminster Gazette, 14/3/27) he writes :—

  But the Labour Party committed two great errors. First, it definitely bound up its fortunes with the theory of Socialism. And Socialism has not been able to stand criticism. . . . the idea that here was a panacea which would cure poverty and unemployment, did not pass the calm examination of practical, impartial minds.

The Liberal is, of course, practical; his remedy, like that of the Labour Party, is to perpetuate the system that produces the evils that they are always going to remove. With years of office and a huge majority, they still have to leave poverty and unemployment to the Young Liberals. The others have grown old in the cause of such stirring reforms as Labour Exchanges, Insurance, and Home Rule. And what, pray, is this panacea that impartial minds can’t pass? Is it Socialism, or only what Samuel, through ignorance or imposture, calls Socialism? It is, he falsely says :—

  …. Transferring the greater part of production, distribution and exchange from private enterprise to some form of public ownership and management. (Ibid.)

This he calls Socialism, but he is only repeating the confusion spread by the Labour Party and their leaders, like Mr. Hartshorn, who says that :—

  The Post Office was really the one big Socialist organisation that had ever been built up in this country. If they could introduce the same principle and the same spirit into the other great industries they would be able to build up a great international brotherhood.  (Vernon Hartshorn, Labour P.M.G., Observer, May 5th, 1924.)

State activities such as the Post Office are run like other capitalist concerns : their profits either go to relieve taxation, or Government bondholders take them, instead of receiving dividends as shareholders in a private company. The workers remain under the State concern as before—wage-slaves—even if their condition is not worsened owing to co-ordination, speeding-up, and consequent displacement of large numbers.

  So far from being a charge on the community the Post Office has in the thirteen years 1912-13 to 1924-25 made a profit of 44 millions, all of which has gone in relief of taxation. Since 1914 there has been a decrease of more than 24,000 in staff, while much work has been added to the Post Office. This has resulted in speeding up and overwork. (Daily Herald, Dec. 14th, 1925.)

Apparently what the Labour Party look forward to is an international brotherhood of overwork and speeding-up. In Australia they have had Labour and State activities for years, yet we get the following admission from those who support the same thing at home here :—

  Australia has had more experience of Labour Government than any country in the world. Some people may expect it to follow from this that Australia is the most Socialistic country in the world ; but, alas ! for democratic illusions. . . After years of office it has nothing to show except pettifogging reforms, and it has actually condoned and encouraged the dominance of Finance capital in its area of control. Is there any guarantee that in Britain politicians of the same school of thought will do otherwise. (Labour Magazine, Nov., 1926.)

No, they will not do otherwise, even were they the most straightforward men who ever took office. Not until the number of workers wanting Socialism is greater than those who are opposed or apathetic, can it be at hand. Socialism is common ownership. Public ownership is State capitalism. Emancipation cannot take place without the former, which involves the abolition of capitalism, and not a mere change in its form.

W. E. MacHaffie

Here and Now: Gone—But Not Forgotten (1942)

The Here and There Column from the August 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

Gone—But Not Forgotten

At the Labour Party Conference Mr. James Walker, M.P., replying for the Executive to the resolution urging the removal of the ban on the Daily Worker, said : —

  When our lads were standing on the beaches of Dunkirk, when they were wounded and bleeding on those beaches, had lost their equipment, and we called for the people of this country to rescue them, out came the ”Daily Worker” denouncing the war and telling the people that their sons and brothers were fighting a capitalists' war in the interests of the plutocracy of Britain.
 When Holland was being bombed and over-run by the Germans that paper was saying that Britain had spread the war to Holland. The “Daily Worker” has changed its attitude more than once since the war started, and how do we know if things change in the East they will not do the same thing again? (“Daily Telegraph," May 29th, 1942.)

Whatever future might be in store for the Communist Party of Great Britain, there is no doubt that it will never be allowed to forget its brazen, calculated and cynical changes of policy in relation to the present war. It is a curious thought that the inability of the Communist Party to get permission to republish the Daily Worker might in some way indicate the measure of respect held for British Communists by their Russian masters. British capitalism, in view of its debt to the Russian Government, would hardly ignore a hint from that quarter that the Daily Worker should be republished.

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Everything Will Be All Right

Everything is going to be quite all right—when this war is over. Everyone says so—except that very forthright defender of capitalist privileges, Sir Ernest Benn, and the Socialist. This is what Mr. J. C. Winant says about it:—

   Anti-Fascism is not a short-term, military job. Fascism was bred in poverty and unemployment. To crush Fascism at its roots we must crush depression democracy. We must solemnly resolve that in our future order we will not tolerate the economic evils which breed poverty and war. This is not something that we shelve “for the duration.” It is part of the war.
  We know there was something fundamentally wrong in the pre-war days when, on one side, workers were standing idle, and, on the other side, people were underfed, badly housed, short of clothes, and children were stinted on education and deprived of their heritage of good health and happiness
  What we want is not complicated. We have enough technical knowledge and organising ability to respond to this awakening of social conscience. We have enough courage. We must put it to use.

(“Daily Telegraph,” June 7th, 1942.) 

Let us prompt a line of thought for the American. Ambassador. Let us not dispute those qualities of “social conscience” and "courage” to which his Excellency draws attention. We put to him or any who think like him the question: How are the evils of capitalism to be abolished without abolishing capitalism, i.e., the private ownership of the means and instruments of production? Mr. Winant cannot answer that question. The evils of capitalism are bound up with private ownership and production for profit. Production of things for sale, the scramble for markets, unemployment, glut, a state of things where capitalists hope for the Colorado beetle to destroy crops because the markets are already full of goods which cannot be sold—these will be at least as intense problems after this war as at any time during the history of capitalism. It would be a safe bet to say that they will be more intensified. Whilst the workers are now asked to increase production to defeat Nazi capitalism, the situation is likely to arise, when that object is achieved, where they will be asked (as after the la«t war) to increase production and to accept lower wages in order to defeat the foreign competitors of British capitalists. And ponder, too, fellow worker, that among these competitors are to-day the allies of the British capitalists! Miners are likely to remember the stories that were told after the last war of the low wages paid to Polish miners which were used as an excuse by the British mineowners to press the British miner to accept lower wages. It will not—and cannot—be essentially different after the present war. If pious wishes would change it, if to will that workers should not suffer the evils of capitalism had any effect, then the workers’ social problems would have disappeared long ago. As it is, the efforts of hard-headed and well informed reformers from Shaftesbury to Rowntree and Booth, as well as the modern political reformist movements, have demonstrated that there can be only one solution for working class problems, the dispossession of the private owners and the institution of Socialism by the working class itself.

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A Noble Lord on Democracy

News Review (June 18th, 1942) reports the following interview with the Marquess of Londonderry: —

  Facing his room in Park Lane’s Dorchester Hotel, the one-time pillar of the Anglo-German Fellowship talked like an old hand trained in the Vansittart school about the German instinct for domination, fertilised cunningly by Adolf Hitler. His only quarrel with Lord Vansittart is that, since he knew all along what the Germans were up to, he did not do more about it.
  "I firmly believe in the British Empire," said wealthy Lord Londonderry. There is only one Herrenvolk, in spite of Germany’s claims. We are the Herrenvolk. "The Almighty put us outside Europe so that we could rule better.”
  After the war, thinks Lord Londonderry, the world will be ruled by great influences—Britain, America, Russia, and the greatest of these is Britain. As for Lord Selborne’s idea of an Imperial Parliament, it appeals but little to him. It is "Democracy run wild. We have done enough of asking people what they want—we know what is best for them, and must tell them."
   Said he: "There is nothing totalitarian about this; it is just a case of guiding others on the lines of our convictions. It is real Democracy."
   Of course we must do away with slums and glaring inequalities, but that does not mean scrapping the system altogether. For expressing such views, continued his lordship, some of his friends had called him a Socialist.
  "The real Fascists or Nazis in this country are the T.U.C.,” added he surprisingly. "They want everything regimented.” All these thoughts the Marquess has put into a new book, which only awaits official approval and censorship before it is published.

A very nicely expressed attitude of ruling class mentality. News Review might have asked this erstwhile friend of the German Nazi leaders how he would describe the latter if the “T.U.C. are the true Nazis.”

As for the race superiority nonsense, “The Almighty put us outside Europe so that we could rule better,” we offer no prizes to the reader who guesses who is the famous person who says no more than this concerning the “inside” of Europe.

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Equality Under the American Constitution

After the noble lord on race and democracy it is depressing to read an account of racial prejudice and ignorance among workers, who should, and usually do, show better intelligence than their masters.

  Because 350 men protested against the arrival of negro employees, the Chrysler Corporation’s Dodge army-truck factory at Detroit shut down the plant for the day and sent all their 3.000 workers home.

   "Report hack to-morrow,” they were told.

   The men were told by their trade union leaders (says Reuter) that "they will have to accept the negroes. The union’s policy calls for equal treatment of negroes, and so does the American Constitution.”

("Evening Standard,” June 7th. 1942.)

Harry Waite

Editorial: The Liberal Industrial Fraud. (1928)

Editorial from the March 1928 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Report of the Liberal Party Industrial Enquiry has at last appeared, but it should be called “The Capitalists White-Washing Programme." From beginning to end it calls attention to bad conditions, but never once does it enquire into the cause. The remedy proposed is more of the conditions that caused the evils. More Capitalism. Empire Development of—Capitalism. More shareholders in—Capitalism. More Free Trade in goods—and labour power. Less taxes for the industrial lord. Cheaper coal. More roads, and similar pills for the Economic Earthquake.

The dependence of the working class upon the employers for a chance to work; the resulting exploitation and insecurity of work, together with actual unemployment all the time under Capitalism—this situation is not dealt with by these Liberal experts. All these quack doctors can suggest is the workers should buy shares where they work and get a share of the profits in large concerns, and when jobless they can work on the roads or in the forests — developing capital for the capitalists. They tell us that ownership is far too concentrated, and while they report thus, the Liberal capitalists, like their Tory friends, are busy amalgamating, centralising, combining and trustifying modern capital in more powerful concerns, whether like Sir Ernest Benn in the publishing world, or like the Brunners in the chemical industry.

The Labour Party are angry because the Liberals have pinched their policy and put it in the Liberal Report. The MacDonalds and Hendersons say the Report embraces much of Socialism, but any Socialist who looks into the Report to find the Socialism will wear his eyes out in vain. What the Labour leaders mean by Socialism is municipal trams and beer and such schemes, to run things by a Capitalist State when it pays better than ordinary capitalist ownership.

The Labour Party’s programme is proved to be a capitalist one by its adoption by Liberals.