Dynamite. (1908)

From the December 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

WAS GOING TO SMASH SOCIALISM

At a sitting, before Mr. Registrar Brougham, for the public examination of E. W. Mockler, of Hungerford Road, Holloway, works manager, it appeared that he had interested himself in politics, and that about June, 1907, he became treasurer of the Constitutional Speakers’ League, which was to send vans round the country and supply speakers at meetings to be held on the subject of tariff reform. In respect of that league the debtor stated that he had personally incurred sundry liabilities, and he estimated that, including money advanced to the chairman (about £300 now appearing as a bad debt) and other expenses, he had lost about £750 in connection therewith. The horses and vans were eventually seized and sold for the payment of keep and storage. To his losses and liabilities on behalf of the league the debtor attributed his failure,—”Morning Advertiser,” 7.11.08.

__________

LETTING THE CAT OUT

Sir,—I beg to assure you that there is nothing of revolt against the Government in my letter stating I would not again contest Walworth. I wish to give the Prime Minister, Mr. Burns, and Mr. Haldane every support. What I do revolt against is any pandering to Socialism by less experienced and less wise Ministers, and entirely because their doing so helps reaction and blocks the way of the urgent reforms to which I am pledged. REFORM AND SOCIALISM ARE LIKE WATER AND FIRE—MUTUALLY DESTRUCTIVE.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

C. J. O’Donnell,

House of Commons, Oct. 26.

—” Standard.”

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HOW ABOUT YOUR CHILDREN?

When you go back to the early years of the nineteenth century, and read the accounts of children’s sufferings due to the cruelty of slave-drivers, your hearts are apt to cry out in anguish. Just think of today. Think of today in these great United States, children five and six years old, working from six in the morning until six in the evening, and at the hardest and most trying kind of labour. These children are being ruined by thousands by the manufacturers. It is killing the whole white race of the South.

It may be surprising, but it is the absolute truth, that things just as bad are going on right here in New York City. Child slavery thrives here in greater proportion than in the South.

There are parts of this city where little children are driven to work early in the morning for two hours and then sent to our American schools, and after school are forced into sweatshops, where they are obliged to work from three in the afternoon until eleven o’clock at night.—William H. Maxwell, Superintendent of Schools of New York City.

—”St. Louis Labour,” Oct. 17, 1908.

Who said ” Tariff Reform” ?

__________

CANDOR

Asked at a mass meeting last January, “What do you advise a conscientious working man to do who is out of a job and whose family is starving because he can’t get work ?” Mr. Taft, who weighs over twenty stone, flung his hands above his head in a gesture of despair as he answered, “God knows, I don’t.”

That pregnant ejaculation has travelled from New York to San Francisco and its echo has been heard from New Orleans to Minnesota. It is characteristic of its author—as honest an American as the United States ever produced.

“Star,” 8.11.08.

For the first time a mountain in travail has brought forth something that may pass for the truth. Taft may know God knows what a starving man should do, but certainly Taft, the capitalist doesn’t.

__________

WHAT DO THEY KNOW?

Much amusement was caused in the Lobby of the House of Commons last night by the circulation of a portrait in a New York newspaper. The words underneath were “England’s Bulwark Against Socialism—Mr. John Burns,” but the portrait, by some mischance, was that of Mr. Keir Hardie.

—” Daily Mail,” Guy Fawkes Day.

__________

No one, surely, can be so unkind to John Burns as his friends.

“Mr. Burns has seen one relevant fact of great importance. He has realised that if municipalities distribute their work with more regularity over the year and give out as much of it as possible during the winter months a good deal of unemployment can be prevented, and for some of it a resource will always be available.” “Daily News,” 26.10.08.

How can unemployment be affected by starving men in summer to feed them in winter ?

__________

We do get the truth, sometimes.

“The pretence that the existing distress is merely a transient phase due to financial disturbance in the United States and so forth is absurd.”—”Standard,” 26.10.08.

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This is interesting.

“One remedy for unemployment would be to double the wages of every working man. If that could be done to-morrow the spending power of the people would be doubled, and work would be provided, for every man and woman in Great Britain in providing for their needs.”-(Keir Hardie at Merthyr, 24,10.08.)

It is as difficult to mitigate unemployment by doubling wages as it would be to remove unemployment by abolishing wages.

__________

What d’ye say, Henderson ? What’s the good of it if it don’t find work for every child as well ?

__________

Oh ! these “Socialists.” Here is another specimen. Author, Philip Snowden.

“He wanted to assure all temperance workers of his sympathy and of the sympathy of his colleagues, who were working in other fields of reform—reforms which were no less temperance reforms … As one who deeply appreciates the very great injury and the very great obstacle which the drinking habits of the people present to the progress of every movement of a social reform character, I want to assure you that we are heart and soul with you, and we wish you God-speed. … In connection with the Trade Unions Congress there was always held a temperance fellowship meeting. Mr. Steadman, M.P., the secretary, had told him that he could remember the time when a temperance resolution was struck out of the agenda on the ground that temperance had nothing to do with labour. 

“There was at the present moment another question besides that of temperance touching the hearts of the people—the wide-spread suffering and privation from want of employment.”—(“Manchester Guardian,” 10.10.08.)

The quotations are quite in their proper order. Observe the great question of “temperance reform” comes first, then the secondary matter of “unemployment,” while as for Socialism, that seems to have been “struck out of the agenda on the ground that it has nothing to do with labour.”

Editorial: Out-Heroding Herod. (1908)

Editorial from the December 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

After the little scene in the “House” on Nov. 12, it can hardly be argued that the workers have gained even a more sympathetic administration of capitalism by the advent of the workman Cabinet Minister. After Mr. Asquith, who has no reputation for kindliness toward the workers, had promised the removal of certain restrictions in the dispensation of relief, the L.G.B. order, instead of instructing such removal, made it a voluntary action by the authority. Taxed with this in the “House,” Mr. Burns replied that he had adopted the best way of carrying out the Prime Minister’s promise. Mr. Asquith, however, disagreed, and the order is to be replaced by one incorporating the removal of the disability of having received Poor Law Relief within a specified time. Mr. Burns had better be careful. Already dissatisfaction is being expressed in high Liberal circles owing to his not playing the game carefully enough, and if he assumes a callous, unsympathetic attitude toward an unemployed problem which compels even the Premier to affect commiseration, he will have to give place to one who will smile and frown with his master, and shed tears to order. A few more examples like that under notice will blow the gaff on Liberal hypocrisy completely. Burns’ special function in the Cabinet was to conciliate working-class demands for independent representation and to show that the Liberal Party was so concerned to have the voice of Labour in its counsels as to obviate the necessity for separate representation.

To realise that the “short, square built man in the straw hat” who talked himself hoarse on behalf of the dockers in 1889 and the man who is out-Heroding Herod in the cruel, callous administration of relief to the unfortunates of capitalism are the same John Burns is difficult, and shows how complete a control over their representatives must the workers exercise before their convictions can be made to prevail.

Revolution. The Problem of the Out of Work. (1908)

From the November 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Strange Inversion.

The free born wage-worker of to-day has a heaven that is peculiar to himself and his age and which speaks volumes for the wretchedness of his position. It is his paradise to be exploited, regularly—to have plenty of work—while his hell is to have none. And, truly, the hell is genuine enough ! Use, however, becomes second nature, and many a worker is so inured to his position that he accepts his lot uncomplainingly, or even with a certain smug satisfaction, so long as he is in work, his “manly” breast swells with pride when he hears the politicians talk of “honest toil,” and he grasps with humble gratitude the few mouldy crumbs that are flung to him out of the heap of good things he has created. So might the chattel slave have been proud of his chains, grateful for the offal thrown to him, and jealously appreciative of the dignity of his toil and his right to do it.

Modern times, however, differ somewhat in that the society of to-day cannot feed its slaves. Its slaves go begging for a master and yet are turned empty away. Thus in a period that is heir to the discoveries of the ages, and that possesses means multiplied a thousand-fold for producing all the good things of life, and wherein labour-saving devices have reached a perfection hitherto undreamed of, there exists, nevertheless, among the very class whose labour made this abundance possible, a mass of poverty and suffering that makes the famines of olden time trivial by comparison.

And this is caused, not by scarcity, as of old, but by sheer plenty ! The producers are but the hirelings of those who own field, factory, and workshop, and these leave no stone unturned in their feverish anxiety to find means, by improved combination and machinery, of reducing the number of wage-slaves they need hire. Hence the unemployed—a permanent and growing feature of capitalist society.

No Hope in the Master Class.

During the coming winter, indeed, the question of unemployment may be expected to reach an acuteness never before equalled. And what will the master class do ? Will they solve the unemployed problem ? Only fools think so, for the master class themselves confess that it is, to them, insoluble. They neither can nor will solve this riddle of the Sphinx. A capitalist system without unemployed would be impossible, and our masters know it.

Economic development under capitalism, however, makes the out-of-work army grow rapidly to huge dimensions and become in fact a serious menace to the security of the class that rules. Indeed, the indifference of the ruling class and the needs of the unemployed make disturbance the only resource of the latter in their endeavour to get an immediate plate of soup or crust of bread to prolong their pitiable existence. Yet, by appealing to the class in power to do something what will they get ? What but promises and then more promises ? What but paltry relief works that do not relieve and votes of sums of money that may not be spent ? Works that can wait no longer for execution will be said to be put in hand to “help the unemployed.” If a City alderman, having worn out seat of his trousers with constant dining, buys a new pair, it will also, presumably, be for the sake of the unemployed, just as tramway works that have been delayed until they can be delayed no longer are started ostensibly “to relieve the unemployed.” And so the fraud goes on.

The Treachery of the ‘Labour’ Members.

Meanwhile the unemployed, as though their misfortunes were not great enough, continue to have their misery exploited by reform organisations and fresh editions and emulators of John Burns. For whatever else the recent Grayson episode may have emphasised, it made once more abundantly clear that the “Labour”, members are prepared—even anxious—to range themselves on the side of Labour’s enemies when it suits their book to do so—although whether this will be apparent to those who pay the piper is, unfortunately, still very dubious. But so many things have happened that it would seem must come to those who have pinned their faith to these Labour misleaders as direct blows, full between the eyes, and yet have been practically unnoticed, that there is little immediate hope that this last instance will have much greater effect. The Parliamentary group rely for their present maintenance upon working-class ignorance, and knowing how abysmal that ignorance is, feel safe in taking action the results of which must overwhelm them and render further misleading impossible directly the working class have anything like an adequate appreciation of their class interests. Just as recent bye-elections have been significant of nothing so much as of the desperate concern of the “Labour” members to hang on to the coat-tails of Liberalism outside the House, lest the security of their seats and their £200 a year be imperilled, so the Grayson incident made it clear that the methods to be pursued inside are those that will not embarrass the Government, and may result in recognition and advancement, if not to the elevation of a seat in the Cabinet, at any rate to the comfort and security of some minor official job that will remove them from the risk of the loss of their £200 a year consequent upon working-class enlightenment.

We Warned the Working Class.

Of course, to us this was apparent from the very inception of the Labour Representation Committee and we said so. The “half-baked” and the semi-enlightened then preferred to call us very much the sort of name some of them are now applying to the opponents of Grayson. If, however, incidents similar to those referred to have the effect of opening a few eyes to the actual and potential power for working-class evil resident in this precious “Labour” Group, it will be some sort of satisfaction. They have now reached a stage where, as we have said, it seems almost incredible that any man could be left who failed to see just what the Parliamentary “Labour” leaders are after and where they are leading. The attitude of the S.P.G.B. is more than vindicated.

Let there be no misunderstanding as to our view of Grayson’s action. Grayson is a man who has no very clear idea of where he stands upon questions of economics, who certainly does not understand the Socialist position, and who cannot, therefore, be accepted as in any adequate sense a representative of Socialism. He is, we should say, a product of Clarionism, Clarionism being compact of sentiment and snobbery, with a strong infusion of capitalist “progressive” ideas and a mild dash of Socialist thought —a queer compound that a staff consisting of little girls and old women serve up for the gratification of the elect weekly.

From a product of this sort of food nothing great can be expected, but Grayson took up a position on the unemployed question in the House that, at any rate, compelled attention and translated into action a protest against the callous indifference of capitalism to the growing volume of misery that capitalism had created, and the flacid, supine, “respectability” and “statesmanship” of the pseudo-Labour Group. With one accord these “Labour” gentlemen ranged themselves on the side of capitalism. Let that be included as a count in the indictment that in the name of the working class we bring against them.

What’s Bred In the Bone.

And now, lest their treachery be too palpable, they hasten to explain that the Government were on the point of saying something, and they wanted to hear what it was before taking action. If the something had been unsatisfactory they proposed etc., etc. The same old story. The same contemptible lie, or the same hopeless, helpless stupidity—whichever they like. First they do not know the forms of the House. We were to wait until they had time to familiarise themselves, and then we should see something. Then—give the Government a chance. Let us wait to see what it would do. If it did not do anything . . . ! Then again, let us see what Burns would make of his opportunity. If nothing came of it we . . . ! And so on.

Not even sufficient originality to invent a new lie or a decent excuse. They either knew that the Liberal Party, and the Liberal Party’s jackal, Burns, would not do anything if they waited till the last trump, or the whole record of the Liberal Party was a closed book to them, or they had not even a glimmer of that essential antagonism of interest of which the Liberal Party is a political expression on the side of capitalism. In short, and not to put too fine a point on it, they were either damned fools or doubly damned knaves.

Now we have our Pete Currans who were cursing the forms of the House and praying for something to break them up, our Will Thornes who are forever mouthing “revolution” and the absurdity of awaiting the Government’s convenience, our Jowetts who are always ready to make scenes if necessary, our Phillip Snowdens—the Daily Mail’s fierce and bitter iconoclasts, and the rest of them turning to sneer at the theatricality (it may have been that, of course) of Grayson, and protesting that they could not be led by boys who indulge in expensive suppers and so on—banal puerilities given off in the hope that that which cannot be justified may be obscured.

Well, since the Grayson outbreak the Government has spoken, and the unemployed know that, except for an additional £100,000, they are where they were last year. Burns is to administer the fund as before—a wholly grotesque sum in the hands of a wholly fraudulent (from a working-class point of view) administrator. In addition, the necessity of the unemployed is to be used as a means, if possible, of making up Haldane’s special army reserve that would otherwise, in all probability, have failed to materialise. Indeed, the Liberal Party are full of sympathy for “the honest workman starving through no fault of his own.” We don’t think.

Keir Hardie, on behalf of the “Labour” Group, made certain dark references to what they would do if the Government’s proposal was unsatisfactory. The “Labour” Group’s action (at the time of writing) takes the form of an amendment expressing dissatisfaction !

One other notable thing the present agitation has emphasised that can only be very briefly referred to, viz., the impotence of the “one step at a time” or “something now” “Socialist,” directly his “evolutionary not revolutionary” theory is put to the test. The people, the women and children, are starving. They want something now. What is the use of preaching Socialism to them ?—before they get that they must die of want. And so they proceed to get the “something now” by asking Governments who, by their very nature, cannot prevent starvation and do not even pretend to try, to take action. And the Governments take “action,” and have been taking “action,” and the starving people continue to starve, and the children continue to cry, and the unemployed army grows and grows, until—until we have reached the stage of crisis where the honest adherents to the “something now” policy, in desperation of ever getting their “something now,” throw in their lot with those who advocate riot and pillage as the only means by which food may be obtained immediately ; the only means by which fear may be stricken into the hearts of the capitalist class. Overboard goes “evolution” (their brand), and in its place they preach—anarchy. They break up their stepping-stones to use them as missiles.

Well, to the extent to which this change of attitude represents the demolition of the quasi-intellectual posture, it is good. But we have to point out that to preach pillage is to bring trained, armed, and well fed men against untrained, unarmed, and starving men. The.result harmful to the latter, although not necessarily more disastrous than the process of starvation they are at present undergoing, while the menace of a desperate crowd threatening to, or actually, running amok, invariably has quite a notable effect in stimulating the flow of doles.

While we cannot speak for God, as Cardinal Manning claimed to do, we agree that Manning was quite right in affirming that a starving man was entitled to take food—notwithstanding that, as Curtis Bennet, the magistrate, pointed out to the ferocious Will Thorne, M.P. (who mildly allowed himself to be bound over not to be naughty again), it was bad “law.” If anyone knows of any alternative for a hungry man, woman, or child other than that of getting food by some means or other (any means being justified) or starving, we have still to hear of it.

The point is, then, that only out of fear for their own position and possessions can the “something now” be obtained from the capitalist class. And that fear is struck more surely and far deeper by the fact of a working class, understanding their class interests, consciously organising for the overthrow of the capitalist system in its entirety, than by any conglomeration of unorganised human atoms blindly struggling for food with no idea beyond their immediate requirements. These last can be dealt with and their agitation “scotched” by judicious sops, or, in the last resort, by the use of the police and soldiery. The former cannot be so easily put off the scent. It will have to rain sops like manna before any hope of check can be entertained.

Now, is it not high time that the working class—in work or out of work, realised the futility of expecting those who live by working-class exploitation to seriously grapple with a problem the solution of which would spell their extinction as a class ? Instead of useless parading and futile tinkering with effects, is it not clear that the problem must be attacked at its root ? Its root is in the system of capitalism, and as an evil to the workers it can end only when capitalism ends—when the means of living are owned and used by the democratic community of those who labour.

That, however, will not be accomplished by those whose source of life is profits, but will and can only be brought about by the conquest of the powers of government by the working class for that object. This is the only way to deal with the unemployed problem, for what avails it to waste time on effects if the source of the misery pours unchecked an increasing flood upon us ? The task before us is not to appeal to the capitalist class to do something, but to organise the workers for the overthrow of that class so they (the workers) may do something for themselves. The battle-cry of the workers’ party is not “The Right to Work,” but “The Right to the Product of Our Labour,” and that right waits only upon their might. That is the really revolutionary way.

And you, reader, have a duty as a worker to yourself and to your fellows—it is to join the political party of your class. If unemployment is to cease to be your scourge, if you in common with your fellows are to have your lot made brighter, if you and those dear to you are to have the means of health and happiness secured, you must take your place in the ranks, for the deliverance of the workers from wage-slavery can come from none others than the workers themselves.

The party of the working class is the Socialist Party of Great Britain, which works democratically and consistently for the end of unemployed misery, and declines to exploit the wretchedness of the unemployed by parading them in futile appeal to the robber class. Your duty is to join it, for your only hope lies in the democratic organisation of your class for Socialism, since through working-class victory only can class oppression cease and the toiler come at last by his own.

Blogger's Note:

". . . the recent Grayson episode . . ." is a reference to an incident in the House of Commons, which took place on the 31st October 1908. According to the Victor Grayson page over at Spartacus Educational:

On Tuesday, 31st October, 1908, Grayson stood up in the House of Commons and shouted out: "I wish to move the adjournment of the House so that it can deal with the unemployment question... people are starving in the streets." When he refused to sit down he was escorted from the Commons. As he left he turned to Labour members and shouted: "You are traitors! Traitors to your class."

Dynamite. (1908)

From the November 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

Jeering at the claims of the Tariff Reformer as the possessor of a nostrum that will alleviate poverty, Burns, at Tynemouth, 14.10,08 (Daily News report) said “I am not a prophet, but I suggest this : If Protection were in existence, it would never see one hard summer because the people would perish.” So. The people who under Free Trade have so great an advantage over the miserable wretches who are forced to exist under Protection, are so strong, so virile, so well nourished after their generations of prosperity, that they would perish in one summer of Protection that the miserable weaklings of Protection manage, somehow, to pull through years of. No, we should not describe Burns as a prophet. A much shorter word will suffice. He doesn’t seem to have sense enough to know when he is giving the game away. Verily, if his salary is to be preserved to him the Lord must make quick and violent incision in him, for he is indeed raw.

* * *

“In Newcastle Mr. Hudson (Labour) was hand in glove with the Liberal candidate at the last (general) election. He was entertained at the Liberal Club less than 36 hours before the election, and he urged his supporters to split their votes between the Liberal and himself, which was very loyally done.” 

Sunday Chronicle, 13.9.08.

* * *

“Mr. Hudson says that he is not going to take a hand in the contest and his attitude is the outcome of his loyalty to the Labour Party. Newcastle is a strong one-man seat for Labour. Two Labour candidates mean that both would be defeated at the next general election.” 

Sunday Chronicle, 20.9.08.

* * *

“The Independent Parliamentary Labour Party which boasts of its independence of either of the old political parties, has refrained from putting up a candidate at Newcastle because Mr. Hudson, the “Labour” member for the double-seated constituency, believes he cannot be independent of the Liberal vote at the next election ; or, at any rate, the leaders of his party believe that . . . Conservatives can afford to smile at the sight of Labour kow-towing to the Liberals who make helots of some state servants.” — Evening Chronicle, 18.9.08.

* * *

“Forty-six deaths from starvation in the county of London for 1907.” 

Home Office White Paper.

* * *

The Registrar General’s analysis of the 1901 census recently published shows that general labourers in industrial centres have an average mortality more than twice as high as the average for all workers, while the mortality among clergymen is less than half the average.

* * *

“The time is fast approaching when the real struggle will be between the man who wields hammer and chisel and the man who holds the cash-box—Capital versus Labour, if you like. Whig and Tory must give place to these.” 

The Business Man’s Magazine.

Whig and Tory know this already. The Business Man’s Magazine’s writer’s point is merely that Whig and Tory will soon be forced to drop the present pretence of political partizanship in the general interest and come out in what the draper would call “fast colours.”

* * *

Since the law came into operation that closed public houses in Scotland all day on Sunday and early on Saturday, the proportion of charges of drunkenness and disorderliness per 1,000 of the population of Glasgow has increased from 17.7 in 1904 to 27.7 in 1907 according to the official figures supplied by the Chief Constable of Glasgow. In 1904 there were 13,850 charges; 1905, 15,263 charges ; 1906, 20,458 charges ; and in 1907, 22,314. This is how the facts support the argument of the temperance crank that the absense of facilities for drinking prevents drinking being indulged in.

* * *

From 1896 to 1905 the total deaths from all classes of accidents in connection with mines in the United Kingdom was 10,202. (Blue Book.)

* * *

The latest report of the General Board of Commissioners states that since 1858 lunacy in Scotland has increased by 202 per cent. as against a population increase of 58 per cent. On the 1st January last the total number of insane person in Scotland was 17,908.

* * *

“According to the Board of Trade ‘Labour Gazette,’ returns from 268 trade unions, having a net membership of 648,585, showed 8.9 per cent. of the net membership as unemployed. According to the report of the New York State Labor Department, out of a total of 387,450 trade unionists reported on, 138,131, or 35.7 per cent., were unemployed on 31 March. The New York correspondent of the Daily Telegraph stated, on 27 April, on the authority of Mr. Herman Robinson, general organiser of the American Federation of Labor, that at least 40 per cent. of the trade unionists of the city of New York were unemployed on 1 April.” 

Morning Leader, 5.10.08.

The Pillory. (1908)

From the November 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

Mr. John Burns at Tynemouth, 14.10.08 (Daily News report) said in reference to the Tariff Reformer’s allegation that under Free Trade England was a country of vanishing trades, “If that was true (which he denied) it was unpatriotic to allege it.” Burns’s conception of patriotism is, then, a readiness to lie with all the heart, and soul, and strength, when circumstances require it. Burns is a patriot—for £2,000 a year!

* * *

David Cummings, of the Boilermakers, has gone the way of Isaac Mitchell, of the General Federation. They both have jobs under the Board of Trade, and the capitalist class will doubtless find them eager to justify their salaries. It is better so. In the ranks of the workers they were worse than useless. The workers know now where they are—and why. George Barnes is said to be in the running for a similar job. He also will be better there—if he goes. At present he denies it. But these denials are generally to be taken cum grano salis. If George doesn’t go it will probably be due to the fact that he hasn’t a biblical name. Men with biblical names seem in much greater request, witness John, Isaac, and David. Now if George had been named Barrabas——

* * *

A. S. Headingly, of the S.D.P., is advertised in the St. Louis Labor (3.10.08) as open to speak in the large cities of America at 15 dollars a time. It is not stated whether his address will consist of exhortations to the workers to keep their finger-nails clean and see that the crease in their pants is always in perfect alignment, or whether he will take as his subject “the application of soap below the collar line and its relation to the Revolution.” These grave questions will doubtless be duly considered as usual, notwithstanding that the lecturer’s fee is so low.

* * *

We have been requested to announce that “on Oct. 12th the Rev. Ernest J. B. Kirtlan, B.A., B.D., late chaplain of H.M. Prison, Wormwood Scrubs, member of Fabian Society, and lecturer for the S.D.P., will speak in connection with the anniversary of the South London Wesleyan Mission. Subject: ‘Fag-Ends.'” The combination of qualifications and the occasion, not less than the importance of the subject, have impelled us to comply. We are sorry that the address will have been delivered some weeks before we can publish the news to the world, but we have done what we could.

* * *

Act 1. Mr. W. Thorne, M.P., introduces a Bill to provide for a citizen army.

Act 2. The S.D.P. issue a pamphlet explaining what Mr. Thorne means. (This was laudable and eminently necessary.)

Act 3. Has not yet been constructed. It might properly take the form of an explanatory pamphlet on the S.D.P. explanation of Mr. Thorne’s Bill.

* * *

Mr. A. E. Wachter is, I understand, a well-known Clarion Scout in his own neighbourhood. He writes to the Sunday Chronicle to enlighten a “middle-class father of eight,” who seems to have alleged that the working “classes” do not pay rates. Mr. Wachter says the working “classes” do pay rates. Mr. Wachter should read THE SOCIALIST STANDARD regularly. It would save him making exhibitions of ignorance. The working class does not pay rates; and there is only one working class. To refer to working classes is absurd.

* * *

“He did not care tuppence ior the abstract opinion of any man who did not come into his trade union and plant down his little bit of money and do his little bit of work.” (G. N. Barnes, M.P., Salford, 4.9.08.) The value of a man’s views is in proportion to the regularity with which he planks down his little bit of money in the union. Mr. Barnes is refreshingly frank.

* * *

At the Sanitary Inspectors’ Conference at Liverpool on the 9th, Sir J. Crichton-Browne said that if Mrs. Hemans were alive she would have to add another verse to her well-known poem in eulogy of tenement buildings. It would probably run, he said, thus—

The tenements of England, piled tier on tier on high.

Stand not by brooks, in verdant nooks, that rest and glad the eye,

But they rest fair, in sun and air, are clean and free from croup,

And safely there the weary sleep, and the sickly cease to droop.

If this is humour it is of the type that requires labelling. If it is not perhaps the least unkind remark one could make would be that Sir J. C. Browne’s poetry is at least as good as his facts; to which might be added that while the poet may properly claim licence for his fanciful figments, the scientist must make his appeal on more solid ground.

A Look Round. (1908)

From the March 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

Who are the “impossiblists” ?

* * *

At the Central Hall of the Social Democratic Federation Mr. Herbert Burrows has been tearing up the Programme of the S.D.F., pointing out that it contains contradictory proposals and also wants boiling down. Many of the changes demanded should not be included in the list of immediate reforms and others are not Socialist at all ! Moreover, he entirely disbelieves in the establishment of a National Citizen Force. The S.D.F., then, which claims to be out to unite the working class, has not yet even united itself upon the means to be employed to unite them.

* * *

An elevating sight was witnessed last month. Mr. H. M. Hyndman publicly trounced his “comrade” Will Thorne, M.P. On January 31st at the Holborn Town Hall Mr. Hyndman declared that it was an absolute disgrace that the Labour Party in the House of Commons took no more vigorous action in the Unemployed Debate. John Burns should have been denounced as a traitor of the foulest and most loathsome type. Someone should have got up on the floor of the House and insulted him.

* * *

How very Hyndmaniac ! And yet since Burns became a “traitor,” the S.D.F., with Mr. Hyndman’s consent and largely upon his advice, supported his candidature for Parliament, and prominent members canvassed for him.

* * *

W. Thorne is a member of the Labour Party in the House, and also a member of the S.D.F. He is therefore included in Mr. Hyndman’s public condemnation. Verily, the “father of English Social Democracy” gives it “hot” to some of his offspring at times.

* * *

Hyndman is most unfair to Thorne. He knows his position and the extent to which he is bound to his Union. The S.D.F. would have been more manly had they expelled Thorne years ago for breaking their rules by supporting Liberal candidates, as he has done on so many occasions. It would have been better for the S.D.F. and also for Thorne. Instead of which they have assisted him into an untenable position and now publicly denounce him for his inaction.

* * *

Thorne is no doubt doing his best. On February 13th he brought in a Bill defining luggage on railways with regard to bicycles. Thus the revolution proceeds apace.

* * *

Mr. H. Quelch, too, who will vigorously denounce the writer of the above pars when he reads them, who is always protesting against this policy of “pin pricks,” who will “go for” the Wigan branch of the S.D.F. at the forthcoming annual conference with all the vehemence and vituperation at his command (and that’s not a little), when they urge, if permitted by the Conference, the deletion of the palliatives from the S.D.F. programme, has also been distinguishing himself recently.

* * *

In the Daily Express for January 30th he had an article on Mr. J. Ramsay MacDonald, M.P., with whom he associates and co-operates at various conferences and congresses. For that attack on the chairman of the I.L.P. he received, I suppose, four or five guineas. He, therefore, is quite willing to become a capitalist hack in pursuance of his desire to discredit one whose success (by means quite as creditable as those employed by many S.D.F. aspirants for political honours) has made him green with envy.

* * *

In the House of Commons on January 29th Mr. A. Henderson opened his remarks on the King’s Speech by saying that the Labour Party welcomed most heartily the references to the policy of the Government in regard to Macedonia and the Congo Free State. It is, of course, most important from the capitalist point of view that as much attention as possible should be diverted from evils here to troubles thousands of miles away.

* * *

On the following day Mr. Ramsay MacDonald declared that the existing machinery for dealing with unemployment is very simple and the Act establishing it, for which Mr. Walter Long was responsible, was one of the most courageous pieces of statesmanship seen in our generation ! Mr. Pete Curran followed and asked the Government and all parties in the House to prevent the possibility of revolution in this country !

* * *

There is no possibility of revolution so long as the workers are content to be represented by the Hendersons, the MacDonalds and the Currans, and the Liberals and Conservatives are fully aware of it.

* * *

Mr. A. Henderson has been elected to the committee of the Nonconformist members of the House of Commons. His election is another proof of the value of the Labour Party pledge to abstain from identifying themselves with any section of the Liberal or Conservative Parties.

* * *

Whenever it has to define a policy on social and economic questions the Labour Party is forced by the logic of circumstances to proceed on Socialist lines, say the Executive of the S.D.F. in a circular appealing for more money. From this we gather that the Labour Party’s Unemployed Bill, with its Penal Clause, is, in the opinion of the S.D.F. on Socialist lines. No wonder it’s a difficult job to convert the workers to Socialism.

* * *

Mr. E. R. Pease, in The International, makes a similar remarkable statement. The particular measures the Labour Party introduces, he says, and the proposals it makes are without exception Socialist !

* * *

“Bold advocacy might win the middle classes to see that their interests are in no way injured by a policy of social justice and humane reform.”—Daily News.

* * *

In his “Report on Sanatoria for Consumption and Certain Other Aspects of the Tuberculosis Question” issued on January 23rd by the Local Government Board, Dr. H. Timbrell Bulstrode says that whilst the prevalence of consumption is contributed to by many causes, poverty stands out prominently above all others. “Although” he says, “it is a matter for dispute which elements of poverty are mainly operative, there is much evidence in support of the view that poverty as a whole, with all that it comprises and implies, may be regarded as one of the most, if not the most, potent predisposing causes of the malady. Poverty acts in many ways ; it may, for instance, diminish resistance of the individual to the disease by promoting overcrowding of persons, semi-starvation, lack of sunlight, of ventilation, and of cleanliness; it may induce occupational predisposition, and increase opportunities for infection.”

* * *

“Where are your hospitals?” demands the thoughtless opponent of the Socialist speaker. But they are not ours. They belong to the capitalist system to which they are necessary. They will not be required under Socialism, because the poverty and the risks of employment common to capitalism will have disappeared.

* * *

In opening his campaign at South Leeds on February 3rd Mr. Fox, in reply to a question, said that he didn’t agree that capitalism is the root of poverty, but he did agree that Socialism is the only real remedy!

* * *

Giving evidence before the Factory Commission at Cawnpore (India) on January 18th, Mr. Francis Horsman, of the Cawnpore Cotton Mill said they had worked twelve hours a day for the past year, as compared with thirteen hours previously, and the gross production was just as good. In other words, with the shorter hours each operative produced more per hour than previously.

J. Kay

The case of Philip Snowden, M.P. (1908)

From the March 1908 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Labour member for Blackburn, like others who came to the front at the general election, strives to add to his income, (a paltry £200 a year with an extra £25 now and again) by lecturing at high fees, and by writing articles to suit the purposes of the millionaire proprietors of the trustified Press.

In the course of his peregrinations he has run up against members of the Socialist Party of Great Britain, and in our last number we briefly recorded that our Manchester comrades had forwarded to Mr. Snowden particulars of compacts made between I.L.P. candidates and Liberals, with special reference to Mr. Ramsay MacDonald and Mr. James Parker.

Mr. Philip Snowden replied as follows : 

(Copy). 

10, Baron’s Court Road,

West Kensington, W.

Jan. 23, ’08.

Dear Sir,—There is nothing at all in all you say which gives any proof of an alliance or understanding. Your extracts simply prove what everybody knows, namely, that in the absence of a second Liberal the Liberal electors voted against the Tory.—Yrs very truly,

(Signed) Philip Snowden.

Now what do we say ?

“Mr. Ramsay MacDonald was adopted as the Labour candidate for Leicester, at a meeting held at the Temperance Hall on Jan. 5th, 1906. In the course of his speech he said that the trade union section, and that practically comprehended the whole of the movement, said that in connection with this election they must vote so that all votes in the House of Commons they could influence would be cast in favour of the upsetting of the Taff Vale judgment. They said the danger of Protection to the wage earners was so great and so pressing that they must fight and kill Protection, and so, after full discussion, their local Labour Representation Committee came to the decision, and he was empowered to communicate it to them that night, that on no account was it going to ask them to plump on Monday week (cheers), and their Trades Council came to the decision the other night to advise every working man, and everybody who was influenced by the Labour movement, to use both their votes, to give one to Mr. Broadhurst and the other to himself (loud cheers).

Councillor Hill proposed the resolution in support and asked every Progressive elector to use his two votes solid for progress and the advancement of Labour.

Alderman Wood, president of the Liberal Association, seconded. He said that his friends had decided not only to run one candidate, but they were going to take off their coats and work not only for the return of their candidate, but also of their good friend, Mr. MacDonald. Let them all work hard and vote for both the Progressive candidates, and then he should be confident of the result.”

Mr. Snowden may find a full report of this meeting in the Leicester Daily Post of January 6th, 1906, headed—

THE BOROUGH ELECTION.

LABOUR CAMPAIGN OPEN.

BRILLIANT SPEECH BY MR. J. R. MACDONALD.

UNITY WITH THE LIBERAL PARTY.

PROTECTION MUST BE KILLED.

Undoubtedly it was a brilliant speech, from a Liberal point of view.

The Leicester correspondent of the London Daily News, on January 15th, 1906, said, “Mr. Broadhurst and Mr. MacDonald, although on separate platforms, are urging that electors should not plump, but allocate their votes to the two Progressives.” Only by accident, of course, Mr. Snowden, there was no “understanding.”

In the Leicester Daily Post for January 16th, 1906, further speeches may be found. The polling took place on the previous day. The following is a reprint from the article “Labour at the Polls” which appeared in the Socialist Standard, March, 1906 :—

“After the poll was declared a meeting was held at the Liberal Club, at which Ald. Wood congratulated them upon their magnificent victory. He was proud of the Liberals of Leicester, proud of the Labour Party of Leicester and of the unity of action which had brought about that great triumph. Mr. Henry Broadhurst said that Labour and Liberalism had known no difference, as shown by the extraordinary equality of votes between Mr. MacDonald and himself. That is what they did when they had trust in each other. There was one man who had made that grand result possible, and that was Alderman Wood, but for whose years of devotion to unity they might have been a divided people again. Three cheers were given for Ald. Wood.

At the same time a meeting was being held by the Labour Party. Councillor Banton, in opening, said the Liberals had polled with them (cheers) and they reciprocated the fight side by side (loud cheers). Mr. MacDonald said there had been one very significant fact about the contest. Practically every voter of the 14,000 had polled Broadhurst and MacDonald (cheers). The plumping had been insignificant, and consequently—(Voices: “Three cheers for MacDonald and Broadhurst.”)—he wanted to read the following message to them : “I wish you to give my hearty congratulations to the Labour Party on the Progressive victory at Leicester to-day. (Signed) Ald. Wood,” (Voices: “Three cheers for Ald. Wood,” which were heartily given). The Alderman had told him that he would be 67 years of age to-morrow. They had given him a magnificent birthday present (cheers). Let them be perfectly clear. The Mercury had said that the two parties— Liberal and Labour—had been occupying quite independent positions during the whole of the contest, but owing to the great crises that the late government had brought upon this country—the crisis to Trade Unionism and the crisis to Industry—they had, upon those specific and definite points, cooperated for the purpose of killing the late government, and preventing things going from bad to worse.”

If no alliance existed, no “understanding” was arrived at, when these two parties—Liberal and Labour—”co-operated for the purpose of killing the late Government,” we have yet to learn what an alliance or “understanding” is.

With regard to Halifax, we said in March 1906:—

“At Halifax Mr. Parker openly advised his supporters to give one vote to the Liberal. The defeat of the Tory, said the Halifax Guardian, was entirely due to the alliance between the Liberal and Socialist Parties, which had occurred for the first time in the political history of Halifax. The figures showed unmistakably that the combination had held good, that Liberal votes by the thousand went for Socialism, and that Socialism reciprocated this support to the fullest extent of its power.

The Guardian, however, is a bit out in calling it a victory for Socialism. Even Mr. Parker only claimed “that the result had shown that Halifax at heart was in favour of progress.” At the Oddfellows’ Hall Mr. M. J. Blatchford said, after speeches from Mr. Parker and others, the result showed that the arrangement made by the Liberals had been honestly carried out by both parties. It had been a magnificent display of confidence. Nothing could be more splendid than the confidence each party had shown in the other. He was entirely satisfied that the Labour Party and the Liberal Party had done what they had undertaken to do and he thought both sides might be proud of it (cheers).”

And Mr. Snowden says that Mr. M. J. Blatchford’s words do not prove the existence of any alliance or undertaking ! What would prove it to Mr. Snowden?

In November last we referred to Mr. Parker as having “made a compact with the Liberal Party to secure election,” and Mr. Parker wrote to us to dispute a certain statement made concerning him in the same article, but did not deny the truth of this particular one. But Mr. Snowden rushes in where Mr. Parker feared to tread.

The member for Blackburn says that what happened was that, in the absence of a second Liberal, the Liberal electors voted against the Tory ! But if the votes polled were merely anti-Tory votes, what becomes of Mr. Bruce Glasier’s arithmetic in the Labour Leader of April 26th last ?

In the Smethwick Telephone for February 8th, appeared a column, which doubtless also saw the light in many another local journal, headed: “From Labour’s Standpoint, by Philip Snowden, M.P.,” in the course of which he says:—

“There is one great omission in the King’s Speech. There is no reference to the question of unemployment. It is amazing that a Government professing the zeal for Social Reform which carried this Government into power should ignore the acuteness and urgency of this matter. . . . The appointment of Mr. John Burns to the control of the department responsible for this work, a man who had himself known the want of food through unemployment, strengthened the hope that a sympathetic treatment of the problem would be adopted.”

Is Mr. Snowden simple or is he merely playing the game ? We must incline to the latter view. What Socialist could expect a capitalist Government to recognise “the acuteness and urgency of the matter of unemployment” from the viewpoint of the unemployed ? A reserve army of labour is necessary to capitalism ; the problem therefore will only become acute and urgent when that reserve army, assisted by those in employment, becomes dangerous, and that period, thanks largely to the tactics of Mr. Snowden and his friends, is a long way off. What Socialist regarded the appointment of Mr. John Burns as any promise of sympathetic treatment of the problem ? His appointment was a clever, very clever move of the Liberals. Burns understands Socialism, and was appointed as a foil. The Labour members are either envious of Burns or afraid of him,—probably both. He knows that their precious Unemployment Bill is a fraud, and has probably told them so, has sneeringly pointed out to them, say behind the Speaker’s chair, that if they are Socialists they cannot support their own Bill, with its monstrosity of a penal clause. Mr. Snowden complains that in the debate on the Labour Party’s amendment to the Address, John Burns—

“adopted an offensive attitude from the first. He had no justification for such a course. He followed almost immediately after myself and I had taken special pains to be friendly and sympathetic, and to recognise and admit the difficulties of his position.”

As if John Burns wants the sympathy of Mr. Snowden and his friends ! Of course his attitude was offensive, and it will be until the Labour Party make up their mind (if they have one) to fight him and the master class whose interests he so ably serves. Mr. Snowden continued :—

“A Labour Party in Parliament which remained quiet while men and women and children were starving outside would merit the condemnation of the country.”

Heavens! think of it ! All the time that there has been a Labour Party in the House, men, women, and children have been starving outside. And the Labour Party has been quiet, damnably quiet. It has boasted of its “sensibility, respectability, and adaptability” ; its fighting men have taken a turn on the terrace when they wanted to say that wicked word “damn” ; it has moved the adjournment of the House to draw attention to the shooting of natives in Natal, but behaved with Christlike meekness over the shooting of workers at Belfast; it has boasted of its connection with the Nonconformist humbugs and canted in P.S.A. pulpits, appealing for charity for the Hemsworth colliers (who have now been locked out for 171 weeks) when it should have been denouncing these people for supporting a system and a government which make such things possible ; it has expressed its gratification at the references in the King’s Speech to the Congo and Macedonia when it should have been raising hell over the condition of the people here at home; it has attended Royal Garden Parties and told funny tales concerning the working “classes” to “Docks” when it should have been organising the workers for the Social Revolution.

The Labour Party does “merit the condemnation of the country” !

Jack Kent

Unconsidered Trifles. Being Letters not hithero published. (1907)

From the September 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

To the Editor of the Daily News.

Sir,— I observe in your issue of date that Mr. D. A.Thomas, M.P., has been threatening that unless the Government is prepared to bring in forthwith a radical measure of temperance reform, he will seriously consider the advisability of going over to the “Labour, Independent Labour, or Socialist Party.”

This I think is most kind and considerate of Mr. Thomas and I make no doubt that the “Labour and Independent Labour Party,” which is always on the look-out for persons of political or social standing, will be happy for the chance of welcoming the Welsh gentleman to its councils and adding his political scalp to the tent pole of its wig-wam. Particularly as he is in favor of a “radical measure of temperance reform,” which so far as I have noticed, represents the “Labour and Independent Labour Party’s” most revolutionary proposal. I cannot speak for that Party, but I can speak for The Socialist Party of Great Britain—the only real Labour Party of my knowledge—and on its behalf I must inform Mr. Thomas, M.P., that we cannot do with him.

Mr. Thomas would, I am sure, prefer to have it pointed out quite frankly that we have no use for M.P.’s whose political development has only reached the stage in which such grotesquely unimportant matters as temperance reform occupy pre-eminent positions. The Socialist Party has to deal with great working-class issues and until Mr. Thomas has given some evidence of his appreciation of those issues I am afraid it will be useless for him to apply for membership. Our measure of the fitness of a man to voice Labour’s claims is neither membership of a Westminster political club nor a standing in “Society,” but the indications he gives of a clear knowledge of the. working-class position, its causes and its only remedy, and of his determination to proceed to that remedy along the only lines that can logically be followed by any person claiming to be a Socialist, viz., the lines of relentless hostility toward all other parties of whatever political label.

This may sound strangely to Mr. Thomas but then clearly Mr. Thomas doesn’t understand. The Socialist can only justify his separate organisation upon the ground of the futility of all the other bodies claiming working-class support. Not being able consistently or honestly to support futilities or to stand by passively while his own object is obscured and his work frustrated, he must actively oppose. If he does not he is useless as a Socialist—worse than useless indeed. That is our complaint against all other political parties. If they are representing capitalist interests as is indisputably the case with the orthodox Liberal and Tory, they cannot represent working-class interests which are always and in every essential particular, in antagonism to capitalists’ interests,—witness Belfast where, by the way, Liberal sympathy with the workers in revolt under oppressive conditions, is manifesting itself in the same old way: through soldiery and quick-firing guns even as at Featherstone and Hull. If they are claiming to specially represent working-class interests (as in the case of the “Labour” Party falsely so called), they must establish their claim by giving evidence of their understanding of the working-class position and directly pointing their efforts to the overthrow of the prevailing (capitalist) method of production based upon the exploitation (robbery) of Labour. This evidence is entirely lacking and the conclusion is forced upon us that the “Labour” Party is either composed of ignorant persons, or those who have deliberately bartered their Socialist principles for the wages which the Party pays. If they are definitely asserting their Socialism as is the case (at times) with the Social-Democratic Federation, they are also, by supporting capitalist candidates, by arrangement with capitalist parties and by the propaganda of inconsequentialities sometimes called palliatives, nullifying any good effect of their occasional assertion of Socialism as admittedly the only hope of the workers, obscuring the class issue, confusing the working-class mind and, therefore, as Socialism is inconceivable apart from a class conscious working class, delaying the day of Labour’s emancipation.

For these reasons we are opposed to them all. For these reasons we claim to stand as the only party of the workers—the only Socialist Party in this island. And for these reasons we cannot at this stage of his development accept any application for membership from Mr. Thomas. It will save the gentleman some humiliation if he will try and understand this at once.

Yours etc.,

AGRA.

30.7.07.

__________________

The Menace of Socialism

To the Editor of the Daily Express.

Sir,—I pray you be gentle. As you value truth—and how much you value truth the world knows well—be merciful. Say what you will; do anything that seemeth you fit, but spare us who are Socialists the dire infliction of the public association with our movement of the names of such gentlemen as the vice presidents of the Land Nationalisation Society or similar organisations—names like Thomasson, Cornwall, Macnamara, Bell, Vivian, and unkindest cut of all, Burns ! Scourge us not with whips like these. Have pity ! We do not deserve it—really !

And, oh ! Sir, tell the trenchant, virile, truthful and painstaking author, of your articles under this head, to take it from me that there is nothing subterranean about our propaganda. We are loudly, openly, and unblushingly preachers of discontent, organisers of working-class revolt, propagandists of a fierce, unrelenting war upon Capitalism and all its works and all its champions and must remain so while we remain Socialists, until the working class, with whose well-being we are solely concerned, shall have taken control of the political machinery and through that the whole of the land and other means of life, in their own interests. And we include among the works and champions of Capitalism all shufflers and intriguers, all misleaders whether styling themselves Labour men or otherwise, or whether merely fools or arrant knaves ; Liberals and Tories to a man, Constitutionalists and Tariff or Municipal Reformers so called, literary pimps and panders, journals with the largest circulations, and so on. All who do not accept Socialism as the only hope of the workers, all who are not with us, are against the working class.

Of course we who are Socialists cannot help people taking our name in vain and working in dark ways for the realisation of their ends any more than you could help the good name of your paper (if it had one) being besmirched. But if these people think, as some of them, I believe, quite honestly do, to achieve Socialism by back-stair methods, they must be deplorably stupid people; and deplorably stupid people cannot be Socialists—any more than jingo editors can be honest. If they are not stupid they may be and probably are as you describe them, “political fakes working craftily in the dark” but they will be working for their own aggrandisement.

But that’s not our fault. Not every one who cryeth “Lord! Lord!” shall enter the Kingdom of Heaven ; and not every one who sayeth (on occasions) that he is a Socialist will come through an examination creditably. In short, we are not all Socialists now, notwithstanding a certain fat and be-knighted person’s notorious asseveration to the contrary. We repudiate these men of craft and do our best to let in the light upon the stupid; and we are continually exposing the working-class misleader. The young person with a passion for righteousness who spreads himself on your front page every morning, should read THE SOCIALIST STANDARD, the organ of The Socialist Party of Great Britain. He would then be able to get a notion of what Socialism means, the only way it can be realised and the only position a Socialist party can take-up. And he would learn that the Express is not a Socialist paper because it is presumably in favour of the nationalisation of the postal service; nor are Belgium and Germany Socialist countries because they have nationalised railways ; nor is Japan Socialist because she has a form of land nationalisation. And then he may discover to his (probable) surprise that a man may even be a “Constitutionalist,” an anti-Socialist, and a member of the “Socialist” Land Nationalisation Society ! I say probable because I have some reason to know that the writer is quite as well aware as I am that he is writing “piffle.”

However, I note with more than ordinary interest that you include in your latest, list of “Spies and ‘plants’ and political fakes who work craftily in the dark and fight under any colour but their own” the name of your erstwhile particular political pet, your own levelheaded labour-leader, your strong anti-Socialist fighter, Richard Bell, M.P., who, I conclude from your remarks, is really working insidiously for Socialism in the “Socialist” Land Nationalisation Society” ! I hope poor Richard will be properly grateful.

Finally, Sir, I don’t suppose for a moment that you will publish all this. What you will do (if you publish anything at all) will of course be to select those sentences which you think may in themselves look rather atrocious and arrange them in an order that will either seem to reflect upon the writer or support your contention. That of course is the pretty way usually affected by the Northclilfe-Pearson combination. But as I have taken the precaution of keeping a copy which I expect will appear in THE SOCIALIST STANDARD, it won’t greatly matter what you do.

Believe me, Sir,

Yours appreciatively,

AGRA.

24.7.07.

The way out. (1910)

From the August 1910 issue of the Socialist Standard

The greatest problem before the working class to-day, the problem that requires immediate attention, is poverty. On all hands the existence, of poverty amid extreme wealth is admitted. All parties, no matter what their label, admit the existence of this problem and trot out one scheme or another that they claim will alleviate the evil. Before considering remedies, it is necessary to discover the cause of the evil, and having found that, to endeavour to, if possible, abolish the evil by removing the cause.

The first important fact that confronts us in this examination is the fact that poverty is confined to one section of the community, and, strangely enough, to that section which alone produces the welter of riches we see around us. We find that it is the hewers of wood and the drawers of water that are poor, while the idle class are rich.

Why is it that those who produce wealth in abundance receive but sufficient to keep them alive ?

It is not that there is not sufficient wealth in the country to supply the needs of the whole people, for we find it admitted on all hands that that wealth is increasing by leaps and bounds, while at the same time the poverty and misery of the workers increase.

The very fact that men able, and willing to produce are unemployed shows that there need be no scarcity of wealth.

There is sufficient for all, but the working class are denied the opportunity of consuming it; nor are they allowed to operate the tools of production in order to produce what they need.

We are forced then to see that members of the working class, while desirous of producing, are prevented from so doing by another class, who own the means of wealth production. This class are thereby enabled to dictate terms to the workers, who are forced to accept them in order to obtain sustenance.

The terms are that they shall create a value far in excess of the amount paid to them in wages. The difference between the value they receive and the value they create is taken by the capitalist as his profit.

This surplus, the result of the robbery of the worker, is piled up by the capitalist, who is unable to consume it fast enough, with the result that sooner or later the markets are glutted and the workers discharged. With the growing productivity of labour we find these periodical gluts recurring with ever greater rapidity. The unemployed army, growing greater and greater, clamouring for a purchaser at almost any price, force down the wages of those employed to the lowest possible level, despite all attempts on the part of the latter to raise them.

The class that produce the wealth are in poverty because that wealth when produced is stolen from them by the capitalist class.

The capitalists are enabled to steal the workers’ product because they own the only means by which they can live.

As we have seen, the working class are compelled to produce more than they receive because they are forced to accept the masters’ terms in order to live. Should they endeavour to take those things necessary for their maintenance, or try to use the means of production for themselves, they are faced with the police and, these not sufficing, the military.

The master class control the fighting forces and are prepared to use them to maintain their position. They are enabled to use those forces through their control of the political machine—which they hold by the votes of the class they have robbed. In a word, the continuation of the workers’ poverty is due to the fact that they have voted their enemies into power.

What, then, is the remedy ? How are the working class to regain that which has been stolen from them ? How are they to stop the robbery in future ?

Obviously by the removal of the root cause ; the ejection from power of the capitalist class ; the control of political power by the working class, in order that they may throw off from their shoulders the class which oppresses them and theieby gain access to the means of wealth production.

This can only be accomplished by the organisation of the working class into a party hostile to their enemy the capitalist class, determined to end capital, capitalist and capitalism.

The capitalist hirelings, led by the “statesman of Labour,” John Burns, tell you that the poverty of the worker is due to his thriftlessness and excessive drinking habits. While telling you this they are compelled to publish figures proving that poverty is on the increase while the expenditure on intoxicating liquors de-creates year by year.

Despite an increased expenditure of £93,000 on wines (certainly not a working class drink), the total drink bill for 1909 shows a decrease of £5,897,997 compared with that of 1908. Taking into consideration the increase in prices the total decrease in the consumption of liqour amounts to about £11,147,997.

Capitalist statisticians and others, while attributing the greater amount of poverty to drink, are compelled to admit that it is not possible to eradicate the “drink evil” while the housing condition of the workers remains as it is. Drinking habits, they admit are largely due to the vile housing accommodation and the course and indigestible food of the workers.

The workers live in the slums and consume bad food because they are poor, so we are brought back again to the original cause, namely, poverty. The Tory party, in order to get the votes of the working class, bring forward a proposal which they call Tariff Reform. They tell us that a tariff placed upon foreign manufactured goods will keep out foreign competition and at the same time raise, by the tax (upon the goods that are to be kept out), sufficient to enable them to finance measures of social reform.

The Tory leaders, however, have admitted that Tariff Reform will rot solve the poverty problem, and a little enquiry into the conditions of the working class in those countries where protection has been established will show that Tariff Reform is no solution.

The Liberal party have been compelled to admit that they have no remedy. Free Trade, they say, is the workers’ real protection, whereas under free trade capitalism the workers starve. Both parties are pledged to support the present system of class ownership and are consequently enemies of the working class,

The Labour Party are pledged to support capitalism through the Liberal party, while in its turn the I.L.P. has sunk its political identity in the Labour Party.

The S.D.P. has all along shown its ignorance of the working-class position. While at times preaching the antagonism of interest existing between the two classes it has constantly blurred the issue by advising the workers to support sections of the master class. It exists merely for the purpose of advocating reforms of the present system, such as State maintenance for school children, the right to work, etc., none of which touches the poverty problem at all. They also have endeavoured to make alliances with the historic enemies of the working class and can be lumped with the other parties as being worthless from the point of view of the worker.

The only party that stands for the entire abolition of capitalism and all that capitalism involves ; the only party that has laid down a clear and definite set of principles in accord with economic truths, and stood by them consistently ; the only party that aims at, and steadfastly works for, the elimination of the causes that make for poverty, is the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

Twel.

Random Notes. (1907)

From the May 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

Bernard Shaw has a three column article in the Clarion upon “the moral of the L.C.C. elections,” one column and a half of which is devoted to his showing, mainly on the evidence of the return of Sidney Webb and Frank Smith, that the results of those elections do not spell defeat for Socialism. The other column and a half is mainly devoted to supporting the contention of Robert Blatchford, that the results of the elections do spell defeat for Socialism ! And yet we are urged by the quidnunc and the cognoscente to believe that Shaw is not merely the farceur he has been represented, but, on the contrary, is a desperately earnest person.

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The Tribune (April 1st) quotes this from the report of the Executive of the S.D.F. to their annual conference :—

“It is necessary here to call attention to the conduct of Mr. John Burns, who, as President of the Local Government Board, has now gone back entirely upon his former opinions, and the most hypocritical employer of sweated labour, with a predilection for conventional Sunday-school morality, might well envy the power of glib pharisaical cant which the “man with the red flag” can now always bring to bear upon the unemployed question.”

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and this is the S.D.F. conception of correct tactics on the unemployed question :—

“This conference further calls upon the Government at once to amend the existing Unemployed Workmen Act to such an extent as to provide useful and remunerative work for unemployed men, and to make sufficient grants from the Imperial Exchequer to local authorities to enable them to give employment to all citizens in need of it.”

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And then reflect that Burns is at the head of the Governmental department which must deal with the call “to provide useful and remunerative work,” etc. And that the Government is, according to the S.D.F., representative of capitalist interests. And that, also according to the S.D.F., capitalist interests absolutely rely upon continued labour redundancy. So, we will call upon the capitalist Government to put into operation the pharisaical cant of their obedient servant, the ex-“man with the red flag,” in order that the unemployed upon whom capitalist interests depend, may obtain the work that the capitalist Government cannot provide !

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Sweet, isn’t it ? Likely to have an exceedingly enlightening effect upon the working class the S.D.F. allege they are educating—what? Don’t tell the unemployed that the capitalist Government can do nothing for them. That would be the truth, of course, but it wouldn’t be good “tactics.” Therefore we will lead them to suppose that the Government can do something for them, and we will call upon the Government to do that something which they cannot ! So will our reputation as practical politicians grow.

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May the beneficent fates turn the hungry eyes of the uneducated working-class unemployed away from such tactic-struck educators. And may the same beneficent fates turn the brains of those well-intentioned S.D.F. rank-and-filers in order that they may see their own stupidity in following with such pathetic fidelity the fatuous leading of their purblind—or is it pharisaical—captains. We offer the beneficent fates aforementioned, the columns of THE SOCIALIST STANDARD as a medium for the expression of their powers. Indeed, the S.D.F. man may rightly regard these columns as the instrument which the fates are using to divert his path from that abyss of political impotence toward which his unthinking steps are being urged by the tactical grotesques he hails as leaders. If he will not so regard these columns, he must needs gang his ain gait (I hope that’s good Scots) and suffer the penalty which “baffle-headedness” always invokes. And he may count himself a fortunate fellow if he awakes from his somnambulistic perambulations before he finds himself up to his neck in a slough of despond, being pelted by the objurgatory brickbats of a long-suffering working class.

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At the annual dinner of the athletic club of Messrs. J. Lyons & Go’s employees, the chairman (Mr. Isidore Gluckstein) in responding to the vote of thanks to the directors of the Company for the support they had given the club, remarked that they were pleased to encourage athletics among their staff because “outdoor sports not only bettered a man physically but enabled him to do his indoor work all the better.” So. Scratch the benevolent director and you find the hungry capitalist. It is good for the men that they should be physically robust. It is also good business for the employer. And the greatest of these (to the employer) is the good business.

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The Paris Herald reports the death, in Pittsburg, of John Brislin, the inventor of modern rolling mill machinery. John was a boyhood friend of Andrew Carnegie, and John thought, when, in conjunction with Anton Vinnac, he perfected his patent, that his old pal, Andrew, who was in the steel business, would see him through all right. Instead of which, John and Anton had to take action against the Carnegie Steel Company for stealing and working their patent. They estimated their invention to be worth 40,000,000 dollars. Andrew’s company offered them 100,000 dollars. They refused and the States District Court gave a verdict in their favour. Then old pal Andrew’s company took the case to the Federal Court of Appeal which, being a court of commercial justice and Andrew’s company easily having the most money, naturally reversed the order of the lower court. Having no more money to fight, Anton died of grief and John lost his eyesight and Andrew by the grace of God and the poverty of his old pal, waxed fat upon the invention that didn’t belong to him and began to make a name as a philanthropist and library purveyor. Recently John received a letter from Andrew in which Andrew seems to have held out some hope that Jobn might expect some justice soon and John was so shocked that he died of heart failure.

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Under Socialism of course, it will be impossible for genius to reap the reward due to it. It is only under capitalism that genius can hope to secure adequate recognition. All the same I don’t marvel that John died.

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“There is no other movement in the world, unless perhaps the Christian Church, which numbers among its professed followers so many who fail to understand or appreciate, the meaning and application of its fundamental teachings, as does Socialism in England. This is the more remarkable as the points in dispute are scientific facts, capable of the fullest and most complete demonstration.”

E. J. Lamel in “Justice,” 6.4.07.

Many a true word spoken even in Justice. We entirely agree with Mr. Lamel, but cannot allow the exception which he makes in favour of the S.D.F., to which he belongs.

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Our objection to the S.D.F. is quite as strong as Mr. Lamel’s objection to the pseudo-Socialists who will have none of the S.D.F. because that organisation refuses “to accept an anaemic, milk-and-water ‘Socialism’ as the genuine, full-blooded article.” And our objection to the S.D.F. is for very much the same reason. S.D.F. “Socialism” is anaemic and milk-and-water as Mr. Lamel will find if he will peruse fairly the statement of the position set out in the Manifesto of The Socialist Party of Great Britain (price Id.)

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It is curious, too, to find a writer like Mr. Lamel, who seems to pose as an exponent of the scientific view, making reference to the private ownership of land and capital, as though the common ownership of capital, like the common ownership of land, was conceivable. He speaks of the predictions of Marx with the air of one who has Marx at his finger-tips. But if he really knew his Marx he would not confuse (as he appears to do) capital with wealth.

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Nor would he fall into the error common among those unscientific persons whom he so vigorously trounces, that the working class which “suffered the most” in prosecuting the South African War, “now has, directly or indirectly, to pay the piper.” As a matter of fact the working class temporarily benefited by the industrial incentive which the war gave. And if it is true, as Mr. Lamel states (a statement in which the “scientific Socialist” will concur), that the working class “has to rely for its livelihood upon the proceeds of its labour” (read labour-power) “sold as a ware,” it will be interesting to know how the working class can ”pay the piper,” having regard to the fact, accepted by all “scientific Socialists,” that competition for work reduces the average working-class return to a bare subsistence level.

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These points are urged, not with a view of scoring off Mr. Lamel’s ignorance, but rather with the idea of suggesting to Mr. Lamel and those who stand with him, that just as the S.P.G.B. has been at pains to establish itself on what Mr. Lamel may regard as the minutiae of Marxian economics, so it has been at pains to discover the error of the pseudo-Socialist Parties in order that it might, by dissociating itself from such error, and the confusion which it must inevitably work, present a clear issue to the working class.

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This clear issue is absolutely necessary to enable the working class to begin to build up that organisation upon which it must rely in the struggle of the future. That is essential to class-conscious action—the only action that can effect working-class emancipation. Wherefore, to Mr. Lamel and all those whose desire it is to do all that men may to forward the revolution, we throw out the challenge to show us wherein our position is unsound. Failing that—and in the three years of our existence it has not been done once—we insist that the S.P.G.B. is the only Party of the workers, and that in it all Socialists (the term connotes a scientific appreciation of all the facts of the economic situation and needs no qualification) should be organised for the purpose of giving effective assistance in the working-class struggle for freedom.

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At the meeting of the London Central Unemployed Committee (April 5th)—

“Mr. Lansbury said he thought it was time the Body seriously considered their position. THEY HAD FOOLED THE UNEMPLOYED LAST WINTER. They had the amusing spectacle of Parliament voting £200,000 and setting up in London elaborate and costly machinery, and yet they had not been able to spend that money in providing work.

They had registered the unemployed, investigated their birth, and “inquested” them up and down London, and the result had been that a petty few thousand had received a few weeks’ employment. He protested against the way in which things were being managed and against the man at the head of affairs and the whole of his wretched department.

He protested against the return of £90,000 to the Treasury and against the man who was doing it. The Liberal Government was fooling the unemployed.”

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And this is the organisation brought into existence by the Government measure for which the S.D.F. claimed credit ! This is the abortion which was hailed by “Labour” members, (and those who want to be “Labour” members,) as something very like a revolution. For the first time, we were told, Parliament had recognised its duty towards the out-of-work. For the first time the legislature had admitted its moral obligation—and so on. We pointed out at the time that the thing was a fraud—must be a fraud and could not by any chance be any other. And now Lansbury comes along to say that the unemployed has been “inquested” and “fooled” and that practically nothing had been done or could be done,

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What now ? Well, if the unemployed are not sick to death of the dreary business ; if they are content to believe that their self-styled representatives in the House are doing everything needful or possible ; if they can still manage to find spiritual sustenance from the faith that is in them—faith in others doing what they require—if these things still are, then the next step will be the step that was taken last. And it will be productive of the same result. But if the unemployed recognise the futility of starving and insist for themselves upon the right to the things which are life, then, although the unemployed problem will not be solved, they will not be hungry.

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There is no solution for the unemployed problem short of Socialism. The working class sooner or later must recognise that and organise accordingly for the overthrow of capitalist domination. But in the meantime? Well, in the meantime they will get the equivalent of nothing unless they evince a determination to refuse to starve quietly—unless, in short, they constitute themselves a menace to the peace of mind of the master class. We are no advocates of rioting because an unarmed mob versus a well disciplined, well armed force means immediate defeat for the rioters. The most powerful menace to official complacency is the growth of a class-conscious working-class organisation. Given that and a refusal to be satisfied with promises or with anything short of the extirpation of capitalism, and doles will come tumbling down as manna from heaven. Take the doles in your stride but do not allow them to divert you from your purpose a hair’s breadth. Concentrate upon THE WORLD for the working class and, as the scriptures have it, all other things shall be added unto you.

Alegra.