The Capitalist New World. (1919)

From the January 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

By this Sign.

The "War that will end War" is over, and on the strength of this an immense explosive trust, called Explosives Trades Ltd., has been formed with an authorised capital of £18,000,000 (vide "Daily Chronicle," 2.12.18). If all wars are to end the combination of the 29 firms forming this company for the production of explosives is somewhat perplexing. If munitions of war are still to be manufactured on a large scale although, there are to be no more wars, then the only conclusion one can come to is that they are to be produced for the keeping of the peace—that eternal "order" the capitalist cries for when working men attempt to interfere with his profit-making career. 

On a superficial examination we are driven to the conclusion that those who raised the cry that this war would end war were liars—that in reality it was only the commencement of war on the grand scale.

When we come to look below the surface, however, we see that there is just a possibility that the war crowd were not quite such liars as we thought. Perhaps, after all, it is the end of wars as understood by the capitalist mind—a struggle among the robbers for the largest share of the spoil. Perhaps they think that the end of this war will enable them to settle their local differences and thus be left free to pursue their policy of exploitation to the uttermost parts of the earth, with only one barrier—the growing class-consciousness and revolutionary tendency of the world's working class.

Bullets Still Needed.

This being so their old enemy the workers, now growing to formidable proportions, neither so docile nor so pliable as of yore, having eaten to the full of capitalist bullets and capitalist gratitude, must be suppressed and kept within a certain prescribed relation to their masters. Hence the wheels of the munitions of war machine, the instrument of suppression, must continue to whiz merrily round, and "pile up the war material" continue to be one of the watchwords and orders of the day.

Hands Off Profits.

Proof that there is at least a grain of truth in the above forecast is shown at every turn. Sir Charles Macara, writing in the "Daily Chronicle" (18.12.18) bears witness to the intended great trade revival, and also reflects the deadly fear of his class that their profits may fall through a too rapid fall in prices. While workers are finding it difficult to obtain necessaries in the shape of food and clothing this cotton magnate writes:

  "These raw materials, which contribute so largely to the production of clothing for the inhabitants of the globe, have been raised owing to the vicissitudes of war to almost unprecedented prices, and I hope the Allies will act together in controlling these commodities and distributing them equitably.
  Further, it is in the interest of all just as important to prevent a too rapid depreciation in the price of these raw materials as it is to prevent a further undue inflation."

Workingmen have lost homes, limbs, and lives as a result of the war, but for God's sake don't let the capitalist lose a penny piece of profit !

Poor Sir Charles groans at the fact that wages were increased instead of bonuses being given, as the latter are more easily knocked off. He hopes :

  "The nations of the world would only fully realise their interdependence and organise capital and labour, work together in developing the undeveloped resources of the world."

Ready to Sweat.

Sir Charles need have no fear : the devil looks after his own. The process of organising capital and labour has already begun. The war has splendidly shown the capitalists how maximum of output can be obtained with the minimum of labour.

Contests have been held among workers for turning out work at the greatest possible speed. Women, have been introduced into numerous employments previously banned. "Unskilled" labour has been diffused among "skilled" in a way hitherto untried. Undertakings of all sorts are being fused, bringing further economies in the cost of production. Small firms have been wiped out by the thousand.

An Industrial Fatigue Research Board has been set up to determine the most economical ways of applying labour.

 "The Board's Investigations will be directed towards finding the most favourable hours of labour, spells of work, and rest pauses, and they hope to receive help from both employers and workers in their enquiries." "Daily Express," 20.12.18. 

  "The nation that secures the most efficient production will be dominant in the new world on whose threshold we stand. That nation will be the one whose workers are the most contented, the best nourished, and the most physically fit. Keen, eager work—with the real heart and the real joy in it—judiciously blended with healthy exercise and sane recreation, gives the secret, the "open Sesame," to success. Our final word to the professional fatigue victim —there will be a terribly long rest in the next world." —"Daily Express," 20.12.18. 

  "Appointed by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research and the Medical Research Committee jointly, it will consider hours and conditions of labour and methods, and how they cause fatigue, having regard to industrial efficiency and the health of the workers.
 The Board will investigate, organise and promote by research, grants or otherwise, investigations in different industries, to find the most favourable hours of labour, spells of work, rest pauses, and other conditions applicable to the various processes, according to the nature of the work and its demands on the worker." "Daily Chronicle," 20.12.18.

The meaning of all this is to transplant the military system into the industrial world still more completely, to develop as efficient an industrial army as our masters can so that the greatest possible amount of wealth can be produced and the smallest possible part of it returned to the workers in the shape of wages.

Our kind and loving masters, having laid their plans for a production of wealth (and profit) previously unheard of, standing as they do on the threshold of a new world of untold treasure, find one bar to the realisation of their ideal. This bar is the growing discontent and revolutionary tendency of the workers everywhere. They therefore must strengthen their military power and hold secure their political supremacy.

The situation in Russia fills them with anguish, and they are sending soldiers from all quarters to quell the revolution as quickly as possible. Classing themselves as the "Saviours nf Society" and the champions of democracy, they pour vituperations upon the Bolsheviks and invite all comers to assist in saving Russia from destruction. The destruction they fear, however, is the destruction of the debts owed by Russia to European and other capitalists and the spreading of the revolution to other countries with the consequent break-up of the capitalist regime. They therefore fall over each other in their anxiety to smash up and discredit the Bolsheviks.

What the workers may expect in the future is illustrated by the following which is reported from Amsterdam : 

  "Serious rioting has occurred in Bottrop as a result of the Westphalian miners' strike. A large crowd of demonstrators proceeded to the Gladbeck pits with a view, it is supposed, of wrecking the works, but the military intervened and fired machine guns among the strikers, killing some and injuring others." —"Daily Express," 20.12.18. (Italics mine.)

Now more than ever the need to get behind the guns should be obvious to all workers. The masters still control the military machine, and so long as this is so they can, in the last analysis, defeat all attempts of the workers to alter the basis of society. Working men and women must therefore organise politically to obtain control of the political machinery from which all power emanates. They will then be able to render the capitalists' dream of a new world but the stuff that dreams are made of.

Gilmac.

Letter: Mr. Rock says we err. (1919)

Letter to the Editors from the January 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

We have received the following letter from Mr. J. Rock annent a statement which appeared in our November issue:

19 Grange Rd., N.W.1 

Nov. 17, 1918. 

Sirs,—I beg to acquaint you of an inaccurate statement in the November issue of your paper, The Socialist Standard, under the heading "By Request." You state in dealing with the London Aircraft Strike that that dispute failed to save Rock, the shop steward. 

  On the contrary, as a result of the further negotiations following the enquiry when the dismissal of Rock was confirmed resulted in Rock being reinstated. I was re-instated on Monday 12th, started on the same bench, and still am chairman of the Shop Committee. I  have continued working at Warings and Gillows to date. 

  Therefore the findings of the Committee of Enquiry set up in the first place by the Ministry of Munitions were quashed as a result of the M. of M. agreeing to the terms of the final settlement,

—yours fraternally, J. B. Rock.

Reply:

Mr. Rock's "correction" reads rather curiously. We said : "The London Air-craft Strike failed to save Rock, the shop-steward." This statement our correspondent denies by referring to the "result of further negotiations," but forgets to mention who carried on these "negotiations" and where the findings may be found.

To make the matter quite clear we place the following facts before our readers :

Mr. Rock was dismissed from the Alliance Aeroplane Works, Hammersmith (an offshoot of Waring & Gillows, Ltd.) on June 26th last for blowing a whistle to call a meeting of the employees during working hours. This dismissal was the chief and immediate cause of the air-craft strike, though other subsidiary matters were mixed up with the affair. On the 11th July it was announced in the Press that the strike had been settled on the following terms: 

"That we, the National Woodworkers' Air-craft Committee, the London District Air-craft Committee, and other representatives of the workers (both metal and wood) hereby pledge the whole of the men and women now in dispute to loyally abide by the decision of the proposed inquiry if Mr. Rock be allowed to start work as soon as the Ministry of Munitions has assumed the effective control of the factory, and that if Rock be acquitted he shall receive compensation from the date of his dismissal from the Alliance Aeroplane Co. Further we hereby recommend an immediate resumption of work at all shops now on dispute." —("Daily News," July 11, 1918. Italics ours.)

Note the pledge that we have italicised, to abide by the decision of the proposed inquiry. What was that decision ? According to the Official Report, dated 15th July, 1918, of Mr. Alfred Hopkinson, who was appointed by the Ministry of Labour to hold the inquiry, it was as follows : 

"15. The calling of this meeting in manner above mentioned was the direct cause of Rock's dismissal, and I feel bound to report that Rock's action in the matter was such misconduct as to warrant the immediate termination of the contract of service between him and the company, and that his dismissal was justified."

Acting on this report the Minister of Munitions issued the following statement to the Press:

"In view of the finding that Mr. Rock's action in the matter was such misconduct as to warrant the immediate termination of the contract of service between him and company, and that his dismissal was justified, the Minister considers it his duty, in accordance with the with the agreement entered into with the responsible trade union officials by which the dispute was settled, to confirm the dismissal of Mr. Rock." —("Daily News," July 23, 1918.)

The above decisions completely prove the correctness of our statement. The strikers returned to |work on the pledge of their officials that they would accept the decision of the inquiry. That decision was that the dismissal was justified. On that finding the Minister of Munitions confirmed the dismissal of Rock. Hence the strike failed to save Rock from dismissal.

Mr. Rock says he was reinstated on Monday 12, but he does not say of what month. We may suppose he means the 12th of August. The Inquiry Report is dated 15th July, and the Minister's decision to confirm the dismianal is announced in the Press on 22nd July. We may presume that Mr. Rock received the Minister's decision somewhere between the two dates. What was his action on receiving this decision ? To accept his dismissal as an accomplished fact and to seek other employment. We are informed that the first firm he applied to refused to let him start, after promising him a job, when they found out who he was. Later he obtained employment in the South-Western district of London. Thus he not only accepted the dismissal, but actually started work with another firm, thereby adding further confirmation to the truth of our statement.

Editorial Committee

Self-Convicted Thieves. (1919)

From the January 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

Though the great Business War is over the sun is still shining for the "profiteer," and he is sedulously "making hay" while opportunity offers. His stereotyped reply to all expostulation is that material is scarce and wages high. Both these statements may be correct, but how any combination of them within present experience works out to the effect that two-and-half lbs of galvanised iron, wrought to the form of a common housewife's pail, at one time hanging fire at 6½d., should cost the present scribe 4s. 9d., wants a bit of understanding. But here is a little example which shows whether inflated prices are due to greater costs or to downright thieving.

During the recent election Parliamentary candidates had released to them paper, envelopes, cards ard so on. They got their permits, took them to their printers, and the latter, upon presenting them to the paper merchants, were supplied with the stuff.

But the galling part is this: the paper and other materials were released to the candidates at prices which were less than half those asked of the printer in the ordinary way. Thus paper known in the trade as "news," was released at 5½d. a lb, while the printer has to pay 11d. to 1s. 3d. for an inferior quality. (The pre-war price was about l½d. a lb.) Envelopes were released at 5s. 6d. per thousand which the printer for his ordinary business would have to pay 12s. to 17s. for.

Are the paper merchants losing on this deal? Are they themselves bearing the "great advance in the cost of materials and labour" out of gratitude to the politicians who allow them to carry on their shameless thievery with impudent impunity? They might well do so, but it is hardly likely that they are. No, nobody is losing on this reduction of prices to election candidates. That it has been done is simply a confession that the magnates of the paper trade are seizing the opportunity provided by the war to plunder on a scale they could never have dreamed of before August 1914. They boasted quite early on, when they were deliberately holding up supplies for higher prices, that they would have the price up to 1s. a lb before the war was finished. But they have long since surpassed this, and in some cases have more than doubled it. Down with the thieves ! Down with the canting humbugs who urge the workers on to butchery in the name of patriotism while they scheme in their palatial offices to wax fat on the reek of the shambles and wring loot out of the agonised needs of their war-striken victims ! The agents of these ghouls are shouting "Germany begins to pay !" It is time that we had a squaring up of accounts with the thieves nearer home.

Jacko.

A Duke on Hard Work. (1919)

From the January 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

The “Daily Chronicle” of December 11th ult. gave us the following intoxicating toothful in spite of the no treating order:

HARD WORK THE REMEDY. 

According to the Duke of Northumberland the only firm foundation for reconstruction was self-denial and hard work, and politicians should draw attention to this instead of trying to persuade people that they could get something for nothing.

One would hardly have thought that the noble gentleman would have deemed it necessary to point the way to politicians just at the present moment, at all events, for ever since “reconstruction” showed its head above the political horizon politicians have done precious little but preach toil and abstinence on the part of the workers.

In all the election promises which have recently flooded the country—mere humbug to catch the wage-slave’s assent to his own undoing—there is not one but which is found on analysis, if it means anything at all, to mean hard work and penury (for this is what the duke really means by “self-denial") for the working class. All their schemes of “reconstruction,” from Adult Education to Afforestation, are schemes for securing hard work for the class which does not include the Duke of Northumberland, while the politicians’ idea of the importance of “self-denial” in the scheme of “reconstruction” reveals itself in the provision of a paltry dole equal to FOUR DAYS’ COST OF THE WAR to tide their teeming millions of human cattle over the hard times of the “transition period” !

How little respite the political and other hirelings of the master class intend to fall to the lot of the toilers is shown in a score of ways. No windy gasbag from the Welsh Messiah to the Lib-Lab Pensions Minister who declared that no soldier was going to get a pension out of him in order to live without working, has held out any hope of the worker getting something “for nothing.” Everywhere the claims of the broken warriors to not by any means “something for nothing,” but to something for all they have suffered, and all they have given of health and limb, to keep contemptible and useless dukal parasites safe in their lordly domains, are being repudiated without scruple. No poor cripple, tormented by the agony of his wounds, is there but must, if he has within him any atom of industrial capacity, be “trained” in order that he may yield it up—a paltry additional “something for nothing”—to those who are not satisfied with having robbed him of his joy in life, but desire to “reconstruct” him on the basis of what little strength he has salved from the shambles—to pare down his niggard pension. Even the blinded soldier is not prey beneath the contempt of these ghouls, and St. Dunstan’s “reconstructs” on the foundation of “hard work," and not of “something for nothing."

It is only the master class who get anything for nothing, and they get everything for nothing. This “reconstruction" is THEIR RECONSTRUCTION and it is quite true that it must be founded upon hard work and “self-denial". But it will be the hard work and the forced abstention of the wage- slaves, not of the Duke of Northumberland and his like.

There are signs, however, of the approach of the day when we, the workers of the world, will undertake a “reconstruction," and it will be upon the foundation of the labour of all who are capable of labour, including those who are quite strange to work nowadays. No dukal coronet will then protect loose jawed humbugs from sampling the work they are so fond of prescribing for the workers, and the Duke of Northumberland may yet support the “dignity of labour” with a scavenger's broom in the glorious day when, in William Morris’s beautiful words—

“. . . a man shall work and bethink him, and rejoice in the deeds of his hand,
Nor yet come home in the even too faint and weary to stand.
Men in that time a-coming shall work and have no fear
For to-morrow's lack of earning and the hunger-wolf  a-near.
I tell you this for a wonder, that no man then shall be glad
Of his fellow’s fall and mishap to snatch at the work he had.
For that which the worker winneth shall then be his indeed,
Nor shall half be reaped for nothing by him that sowed no no seed.

B. B. 

Milner Tries To Excuse "Intervention". (1919)

From the January 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Government are now making a frantic effort to throw dust in the eyes of the people on the question of what they are pleased to call the “British intervention in Russia.” The Secretary of State, Lord Milner, claims to have received a letter on the subject from a correspondent, and whether this is a put-up job or not, his statement purporting to be an answer to this letter is such a wishy-washy production as to be little else than a subject for derision and laughter.

Lord Milner states that:

    . . the Bolsheviks, whatever their ultimate object, were in fact assisting our enemies in every possible way.
    It was owing to their action that thousands of German troops were let loose to hurl themselves against our men on the Western Front. It was owing to their betrayal that Roumania, with all its rich resources of grain and oil, fell into the hands of the Germans.

These are deliberate lies. The facts are plain enough to view. Russians were beaten to a standstill under the regime of that advanced and enlightened ruler whom our bosses’ papers at that time referred to as “our Gallant Ally,” and some time previously had honoured with the name we still love to know him by—Bloody Nick.

It was under Nick’s generals that the “Russian Steam Roller” was reduced to impotence. The poor, unlettered moujik played his unwilling part in the war “according to plan.” He was the cheapest cannon-fodder in the whole arena, in the sense that there were enormous numbers of him, and he was probably the only soldier in the whole conflict who could be driven half armed and ill equipped into the slaughter merely as a stop-gap, a. mass of quivering, valueless flesh to keep the "enemy” busy while rival generals and statesmen squabbled over the questions command, and personal and “national” dignity.

So, in spite of the Allied liars who are casting about for excuses for attacking those who are threatening capitalist interests in Russia, defeat, complete and irretrievable, was the legacy left the Bolsheviks by their feudal and capitalist predecessors. Even had they desired it; even had the capitalist revolution not completed the ruin of the giant Russian military machine, the Bolsheviks had not the means to carry on the war against the powerful, victorious, and perfectly equipped German host. Already, under the capitalist Premier, Prince Lvoff, in 1914, the Russian forces had begun to melt away. Skulking Kerensky and his fellow butchers tried to keep them together by the usual means of wholesale slaughter, but their failure was ignonimous. It was not for want of the will to murder that they failed. “General Kornlioff is given orders that deserters and runaways are be shot,” declared the “Daily Chronicle” on the 24th July 1917. The war-mongers had their opportunity, and their failure proves beyond all refutation, that peace was the ardent desire of the Russian peoples. The very success of the Bolsheviks is based on this almost universal desire of the people of Russia for peace. No honest man with a knowledge of the facts can contend that the Bolsheviks find their chief support among those who understand Bolshevist principles. They found a war-sick people—a people who had been driven to war by organised military brutality and tyranny—they promised them peace and—wonder among politicians!—kept their promise. And this our British capitalist apologists call treachery, and "helping the Germans.”

The fact is that neither the Bolsheviks nor the Russian people ever made any promises to the Allies, or entered into any compact or treaty with them. All such contracts were entered into by the Tsarist gang. These ghouls did not represent the people, and the Allies knew it. They did not worry in those days about “only negotiating with governments representative of the people,” nor did they think it “an obligation of honour”—what language from one of the central figures of the South African outrage) “to save” those with whom they entered into the treaties. For they rushed to congratulate those who overthrew their allies, co-plotters, and partners, Bloody Nick and his circle. It never entered into their heads when they expressed gratification at the downfall of their partners in this awful crime, that “it would be an abominable betrayal, contrary to every British instinct of honour and humanity” to, “simply cause our own immediate purposes have been served, leave them to the tender mercies of their enemies.”

All the Allies' reasons for invading Russia, as put forward in Lord Milner’s letter, since they turn on the alleged German exploitation of Russian resources, cease to afford any pretext for the continued occupation of Russian territory by the Allies in view of the present military position of Germany. The only shred of excuse offered is that they must not leave the “thousands of Russians” who, ‘in the course of this Allied intervention" have “taken up arms and fought on the side of the Allies,” to “the tender mercies of their enemies before they have had time to arm, train, and organise so as to be strong enough to defend themselves.” This cant might go down but for the light shed upon it by other events. These (probably mythical) Russians are not the only people who have fought on the side of the Allies. To use a phrase Lord Milner is very fond of, “I say nothing of the poor, cast-off crippled soldier at home abandoned to the tender mercies of private charity. There are others. The Armenians, for example, they fought on the side of the Allies, yet the latter have not scrupled to abandon the poor remnants of an agonised people to the tender mercies of their enemies, the vengeful official Turk.

What Lord Milner really means can be read in his reference to the arming, training, and organising of the Russians who have fought on the Allied side. These Russians are the Russian capitalists and their hireling butchers. It is to arm and aid these, and to establish capitalist rule in the vast domains now under Bolshevik administration that our lads are now being kept from their homes. It is to assist in crushing out a working-class rising, that British sailors are firing at Bolsheviks on the shores of the Black Sea.

A. E. Jacomb

The Imperialist Victory. (1919)

From the January 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

Capital’s Coalition has swept the country at the election. According to reports the Coalition Unionists number 334, Co. Liberals 135 and Co. Labour 10—a total of 479 out of 706 members. The rest consists of 28 Liberals, 62 Labourites, 50 Unionists, 73 Sinn Feiners, 7 Nationalists, and, about 7 Independents. The Sinn Feiners are pledged not to take their seats, so they can be deducted, while 50 Independent Unionists may be counted on to support the Government on most occasions. By adding these to the Coalition and deducting the Sinn Feiners from the Opposition, we get 529 Coalitionists against a total combination of 104. 

Even this does not complete the tale, for several "official” Labour men like Hodge, Clynes, and O'Grady, are strong supporters of the war and the Coalition. The Coalition thus has the largest majority ever returned to Parliament.

The most striking feature of the Election is the almost complete destruction of the Liberal Party as represented by the followers of Asquith. Leader and lieutenants alike have been swept aside by the Coalition flood. To cover up this crushing defeat Liberal newspapers are claiming that the Coalition possess seats far in excess of the proportion of votes cast for their men, and that in numerous instances candidates have been elected by a minority of the votes cast. True, but when has a Liberal resigned his seat because he (as in several cases) did not obtain a majority of the votes polled?

On behalf of the Labour Party Philip Snowden and Ramsay Macdonald point jubilantly to the  great increase in the votes cast for Labour Party candidates, forgetting to mention that the number of voters on the new register is more than double that at the previous election, and secondly that a much larger number of Labour Party candidates were put forward than ever before. When allowance is made for these facts the figures lose much of their seeming significance. Nor is this all. A large number of the “Labour" votes were given by opponents of the Labour Party’s programme. During the brief campaign the “Daily News" repeatedly urged the Liberals to vote for the Labour man where the fight was between a Labourite and Coalitionist, and in constituencies where a Liberal and a Labourite were opposing a Coalitionist, to vote for the best man, irrespective of label. In some cases Liberal and Tory combined to make the Labour man a present of the seat, as in the case of Crooks, O’Grady, Clynes, Wardle, and others who were returned unopposed. “Colonel’' Will Thorne had the support of the official Liberal and Tory parties, and only had an “Independent” to fight. Hodge at Gorton, Walsh at Ince, Tyson at Westhoughton, and Wilkie at Dundee were free from official Liberal or Tory opposition. J. Jones, C. W. Bowerman, J. Sexton, F. Roberts, R. Young, J. Guest, J. Davison, W. Bromfield, A. Onions, and W. Adamson had no Liberal opposition to face, while Capt. Smith, G. Spencer, R. Richardson, W. Carter, T. Grundy, G. Hirst, J. Williams, F. Rose, C. Edwards, and W. Graham had no official Unionist candidate run against them. This absence of a straight fight against the other parties shows how little the  votes cast for these candidates can be claimed, with any justification, as Labour votes.

Neil Maclean, one time Secretary of the S.L.P., now a member of the I.L.P., owes his seat far more to his position as organiser to the Scottish Wholesale Society than to any “Labour” principles he may have professed.

To show it had no “class bias” Holland with Boston returned a “Labour” man—W. S. Royce— who twice previously had contested Spalding as a Unionist and who is a wealthy landowner in the district, though at the moment of writing it is not clear whether he had the official endorsement of the National Labour Party. Anglesey returned the first titled “Labour” man to the House in the person of Brig. Gen. Sir Owen Thomas. We are getting on! We shall have “Labour” Lords next if the “widening process” of the Labour Party succeeds.

To have secured 62 seats out of 368 contests, and that only with all this arrangement and assistance from the capitalist parties, shows how small is the influence and power of the Labour Party.

Despite its affiliation with the Labour Party the I.L.P. has done even worse, for out of 50 candidates that it claims only three were elected. Like its pal the Liberal Party it has lost all its leaders—Snowden, Macdonald, Jowett, Anderson. This shows how much the leaders depended upon Liberal votes for the seats they held.

The intense disappointment felt by them at this is shown when Macdonald declares—

  Unfortunately the Labour Party lacks in men . . who would enable it to perform the functions of an official Parliamentary Opposition.—'Manchester Guardian.’

That is adepts in Parliamentary trickery and bargaining like himself, Snowden says of the new men:

  There are amongst them some of the most reactionary of the Trade Union leaders. There are amongst them men who have been most prominent amongst the Trade Union leaders in supporting every reactionary proposal the Government put forward.—“Labour Leader,” 2.1 19.

And as the I.L.P., by its alliance with the Labour Party, has supported these men in their actions, it is clear that the real trouble is not the reactionary character of these men, but the fact that they are “in” while Snowden & Co. are “out.”

The National Socialist Party—the Hyndman-Lee section that broke away from the B.S.P. on the question of the war—claims eleven candidates, of whom six were returned. But with the exception of Dan Irving, these successful candidates were run by the official Labour parties. They are J. O’Grady, W. Thorne, J. Jones, Ben Tillett, and A. Hayday. All are prominent T.U. officials, ran as “Labour” men, and the N.S.P. had no influence whatever on their return. Irving’s long career of trickery and bargaining in Burnley has at last been rewarded. He will, of course, obey the orders of his political masters, the capitalists.

Both Liberals and I.L.P. are stating that Lloyd George did not desire so overwhelming a majority as it places him completely in the hands of the Unionists. Our Ejection Manifesto had already pointed out that he was the tool of the Imperialists and was completely in their hands before the Election, and therefore he will be only continuing in the same position in the new Parliament. The “Daily Mail” admits this when it says (31.12 18):—

  Sir George Younger Lord Downham (Mr. Hayes Fisher) and Mr. Bonar Law have manoeuvred our gallant little Welsh wizard into a position in which he is almost entirely dependent upon the votes of those whom he so vigorously denounced at Limehouse a few years ago.

No one knows this better than LI. George himself, but he hopes to persuade some people that he is independent, and repeats the trick he played in 1906 of threatening to resign if 'the "great” measures promised, are not carried through. Speaking at Carnavon on Jan. 1st he said

  If the Government did not do their best to fulfill the promises made he would no longer be head of the Government, but would go back to the people and ask for a renewal of their confidence. -“Daily News," 2.1.19.

This is just as much cant and humbug as his similar statements in 1906. The last Government broke all its pledges, but it had the vigorous support of LI. George in all its dastardly actions. The same will be true in the future. Whatever his paymasters order him to do he will carry out, no matter what promises are broken or what crimes are contemplated.

This Election has been a great victory for the Imperialists. Riding the wave of relief and excitement consequent upon the signing of the Armistice, they have regained political power with a largely increased majority, and will be able to carry out their schemes practically unhampered. The workers will presently see their new position is worse than the old one, that the masters are more strongly entrenched than ever, and that the struggle to retain the old standard of living will be intensified and more bitter than before.,

When they apply this knowledge they will set to work to return a majority of their own representatives to Parliament for the purpose of wresting power from the master class and using that power to establish the common ownership of the means of life, whereby all will be able to enjoy life in the fullest sense of the word.

Jack Fitzgerald

Editorial: "What Will He Do With It?" (1919)

Editorial from the January 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Martial Law General Election has come and gone. As was generally expected, the “Coalition” gang got there. They polled, in the United Kingdom, 5,091,528 votes, against 4,589,486 polled by the non-coalitionists. Thus they had a majority of 52 per cent of the votes cast. This astounding majority, we are seriously informed, overwhelmed David Ll. G. But, as showing how minorities fare under capitalist “democracy,” it may be remarked that this five per cent. vote majority gives the Coalition (leaving Ireland out of it) a majority of some 317 seats.

For us, of course, the election was bound to provide consolation prizes. It is sweet to observe that Butcher Asquith has got left, and it is sweeter than saccharine tablets to note that J. R. Macdonald has bitten the dust. The Liberal henchmen have proved who their masters are, alike in the defeat of men like Henderson and Macdonald who have been unfortunate enough to lose their masters’ support, and in the victory of men like Thorne who, openly flouting their “labour” crutches, clung frantically to the hand that doles them out their £400 a year, and found, if we may mix the metaphor in a good cause, that they had backed the right horse.

And now Lloyd George goes on to juggle with his promises. Pledged up to the hilt to Home Rule for Ireland, he is going to carry it with a vast Unionist majority! He is going to make a “beautiful new world” with a majority of the stoutest defenders of the old sordid and bestial working-class environment. Well, we hope the workers are about to learn a few useful lessons—and we think they are.

Another Election Lie.

At the fag end of the election campaign Lloyd George made a bid for the soldiers’ votes by declaring for rapid demobilisation and no conscription after the war. As to the first, we shall see presently what he means by that, but as for the second, he has warned us beforehand that he was simply lying.

Earlier in the campaign the wily one said that the question of Conscription depended upon the terms of the peace settlement. He was opposed to Conscription, he said, but if other countries had large armies—why, of course, and so on. He at the same time declared that Britain must retain her navy, which he said is a defensive force.

Now it must be obvious that if Britain is to retain her gigantic navy other countries are going to provide themselves with instruments of defence. The American Naval Secretary soon showed this when he declared that “It was his firm conviction that if the Versailles Conference did not result in a general agreement to put an end to naval construction the United States must bend its energies to the creation of incomparably the greatest navy in the world.” (‘"Star,” 31.12.18.)

It is sheer rubbish to talk of the Navy as being a defensive weapon. Lloyd George’s persistent claim that without the British Navy the Allies had never won the war proves that it was an offensive instrument of the first order. If it were merely a defensive weapon then it might be extinguished in a general disarmament. But Lloyd George says no, it must be retained. And Secretary Daniels, knowing that it is the factor in the control of trade routes, and therefore of.the world market, declares that America does not intend to be shut out of the world market.

And so there we are. The game is about to begin all over again—and nobody knows it better than Lloyd George. So when he says that he is in favour of no-conscription he is only lying to catch votes. He tells us the truth when he says Conscription in this country depends upon what obtains on the Continent, for that means that he is already preparing to institute it as an integral part of the “beautiful new world.”

Confirmation!

“If Germany had waited a single generation she would have had a commercial empire of the world.”

Thus spake President Wilson in Rome on Jan. 3rd. Strange, is it not, how our opponents and apologists for the war prove the correctness of our statements regarding the root cause of the conflict and belie their own beatitudes concerning the high ideals which have actuated the Allies. Can it possibly be that they find, when the bill is finally presented, and shows ten million naval and military deaths alone, to say nothing of the millions of other deaths for which the war is responsible, that the old shallow bunkum of honour and the like is really too absurdly inadequate, and that is better to rely on the truth—that it was an economic war?