We Are World Changers (1942)

From the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

An Irish writer, Seán Ó Faoláin, in a book he wrote entitled “An Irish Journey,” made the following remark ; —

“When you go to war you do what you do in the movies, tear your ticket in half, and the half you leave outside is your critical faculties.” (p. 252.)

The statement has another meaning as well as the one the writer wished to convey.

The tragedies and upheavals of war give fresh life to philosophical, religious and mystical views of various kinds, partly because mental strain disturbs the capacity for clear thinking in many people, partly because these views give the feeling of an escape from problems bound up with war, and also partly because these views serve the interests of the class of privileged people who wish to emerge from the war with their privileged position unshaken.

The more the brains of workers are tortured or lulled with mystical views the less clear is the thinking they can do about their fundamental problems. The worst of the matter is that people derive a temporary relief from putting these problems behind them as insoluble or accepting them as inevitable. In this they are like the early Christians who gave up hope of improvement in their earthly life and despairingly accepted their miseries without resistance, treating them as scourges on the path to paradise.

The problems of the workers, endless toil, poverty and insecurity, are neither inevitable nor insoluble. They are the product of the economic conditions of to-day just as the problems of the chattel slave and the serf were the product of the economic conditions of the times in which they lived. In fact, the fetters that bind the producer are a heritage from the dawn of civilisation, when a portion of mankind grabbed a privileged position and forced others to do the work.

Food and air provide what is called physical and mental energy—moving and thinking. The limbs move and the brain thinks. Thoughts are either pictures of the world around us or are based upon our surroundings. We can only understand what people may tell us by relating it to our own actual experiences. In the early days of the human race picture-writing gave place to the use of symbols in passing on messages and ideas. It is similar with the mental development of the child in our times; actual pictures are replaced by symbols but behind the symbol is the immediate world around the child.

Our thoughts are based upon our surroundings and our surroundings, our environment, is partly physical— mountains, rivers, plains, and so on—and partly social— our connections with our fellows. Our thoughts therefore are shaped partly by the physical and partly by the social environment. As our main concern is obtaining the necessities of life, which can only be accomplished by close connections with our fellows, the social environment is the dominating influence in shaping our thoughts. This social environment has undergone radical changes across the centuries and so have man’s thoughts.

Looking at the matter from another angle, the fundamental aim of human beings is to be happy, and happiness for the overwhelming mass of the world’s population is bound up with an adequate supply for each person of the physical necessities of life—food, clothing and shelter.

But the satisfaction of his bare material needs is not enough to make man happy. He also requires mental satisfaction. That is to say that as man has been helped onwards to his present civilised state through mental exertion it has become essential to him to engage in mental as well as physical activity. Thus, whatever form it may take, the opportunity must exist to exercise the intellect. In other words, man cannot be satisfied with a mere animal existence like a cow in a field—however much some may have cause to envy the cow !

Across the ages man has exercised his brain to enlarge the supply of necessities and also to explain the world around him. His endeavour to explain the world has been limited by the state of knowledge of his time, but, more important still, by the nature of the glasses through which he has looked at the world. Thus to the Greeks and Romans, in spite of their intellectual achievements, a world containing universal suffrage was unthinkable because chattel slavery was the basis of their social systems.

The bare, gloomy mountains and the fructifying river gave a colouring of savagery and voluptuousness to the religious outlook of the Egyptians. But under this colouring was a basis of thought that reflected the social conditions in the valley of the Nile; for instance, the threat aimed by the religious hierarchy at the ignorance of the well-to-do about what would happen after death. By playing upon this ignorance the priesthood was able to acquire vast wealth and influence. From that day to this the wealthy have paid for their ignorance but have also been assisted by the priesthood to hold on to their privileged positions.

Apart from the few mystics who, intentionally or unintentionally, blind themselves to the needs of the world around, the main preoccupations of people to-day is either adjusting present society to make it run more smoothly or building a new society out of the present one. Thus it is agreed that the present social order creaks badly. As the Socialist is bent upon building up a new society out of the old he examines the old to find out the nature and the cause of the creaks. This cause is the private ownership of the means of living.

The problem that should encase the attention of the workers, apart from the obtaining of the means to live, is therefore the problem of how to get rid of poverty and insecurity for ever so that they may live like men and women and not like beasts of burden. This problem is bound up with the present organisation of society into wealth owners and wealth producers—capitalists and workers. All the producing and distributing of wealth is done by workers—those who are compelled to sell their energies in order to live. All the fruits of production pass into the hands of the investors, the capitalists, who in the main do not, and need not, work, but who own the products of labour because, through their shareholding, they own the land, factories, ships and other means and instruments of production.

While this division of society into two classes, with interests that are fundamentally opposed, remains, there is no way of abolishing the poverty and insecurity problem. In other words, there is no way by which the workers can lose the characteristic of beasts of burden providing comfort and security for wealthy idlers. The solution of the problem makes necessary the abolition the basis of classes—the abolition of the private ownership of the means of living. This abolition can only be accomplished by building society upon another basis, the common ownership of the means of living—Socialism.

Thus the Socialist accepts the materialist conception of history which is one that is based upon the knowledge provided by history that changing economic conditions are the driving forces in social changes. It is the Socialist outlook upon the world, the glasses through which he looks, and necessarily so as the Socialist is out to change the world. Whatever views philosophers may hold is therefore, immaterial to the Socialist because he is a world changer and is only concerned with what works towards that end.

It is for this reason that the Socialist turns a cold eye upon the new philosophic, religious and mystical interpretations that bubble up from a tormented world, as attempts on the part of their authors to find a mental escape from evils that frighten them or to parry the blows that promise to sweep privilege out of the world.

Philosophical views of the world are numbered by hundreds but, in the long run, they have not influenced for the better the lot of the wealth-producing classes throughout history, though they have sometimes provided battle cries for new classes seeking privileged positions for themselves.

Thus whatever kind of philosophical or mystical views may be put forward at different times to explain the world as it is, it has no fundamental bearing on the practical question of changing the world because the latter depends upon the economic interest of sections of the population. The Socialist appeals to the workers on the ground of their economic interests which is what counts in the struggle to obtain a secure basis for happiness for all.

All people are born alike in this, they pursue what they believe is their best interest. It is therefore the duty of the Socialist to convince the workers that the movement for Socialism is a movement that is in harmony with their fundamental interests, which of course it is.

While the poverty problem remains the workers need not bother and bemuse themselves about the views of philosophers and their like. The point is to change the world by establishing Socialism and then they will have time and opportunity to dream in comfort about whatever systems of thought give them interest, amusement or satisfaction.

Gilmac.

Editorial: Human Nature, the Black Market and Socialism (1942)

Editorial from the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

Many who are vaguely sympathetic towards Socialism complain that they cannot see what basic difference there is between the S.P.G.B. and the organisations which seek to reform the capitalist system. They think we are exaggerating when we say that there is a fundamental similarity between the admirers of capitalism and the reformists which separates both from the Marxist. A glance at a topical problem, the “black market,” will show that there is no exaggeration in our claim, for both the admirers of capitalism and the reformists believe that it is possible to retain the basis of the capitalist social system and yet to change its operations and the conduct of the human beings who live under it, by means of Acts of Parliament and appeals to goodwill.

When the war began we were told by those who claimed to know that there would be no “profiteering” in this war. Socialists smiled and were disbelieving, knowing that a system built on a foundation of private ownership and profit-making will go on producing its evil results whether in peace or war. We smiled again when the News-Chronicle, nearly two years after the war began, said “the days of, the profiteers in clothing and other necessities of life are numbered” (News-Chronicle, July 25th, 1941). We were not impressed with the story that the capitalist thistle would suddenly produce a crop of social figs because of the appointment of “34 Board of Trade inspectors” who were going to track down the “profiteers.” Nor were we mistaken. Here are some brief items from the Press in June, 1942 : —

“The retail price of salmon was controlled. At once salmon disappeared from the shops. Now the salmon is a case in point of a great public evil. The Black Market must be destroyed or it will destroy us”. (“Sunday Express,” June 7fH, 1942.)

The News-Chronicle (June 18th, 1942) reported that when a “slight accident” occurred to a railway van containing furniture

“The backs of half the wardrobes were missing. On the floor lay a litter of asbestos chips. Superficially got up with a lacquer sprayed ‘oak’ graining, the wardrobes were intended for sale in a big industrial town. . .”

Again the reporter says : —

“I saw wardrobes, chests and dressing tables made of cardboard, and was told of others made of linoleum. They will be sold wholesale at £30 a suite. When they get to the shop windows they will be ticketed from 50 to 60 guineas—pegged prices authorised by the Board of Trade’s recent control order.”

Then there are motor cars. An investigation is being made into the prices of second-hand cars.

“In the last 18 months car prices have soared to a fantastic level. A car which cost £265 at the beginning of 1939 would have realised only about £160 a few months after the start of the war, but shortly afterwards prices rocketed so that it could be sold for £365, and even to-day such cars are being sold in the region of £300” (“Evening Standard,” June 18th, 1942.)

And food ! After the start of the Order fixing 5/- a head as the maximum charge for food in a restaurant the Daily Express (June 16th, 1942) reported the following; at a small fashionable restaurant . –

“Two luncheons 10s., two house charges 4s., six Martinis 22s. 6d., one bottle of Burgundy 27s. 6d., four cups of coffee, 6s.—Total £3 10s. 0d.”

It was all quite legal, “the prices of drinks are controlled only in the case of whisky, gin and beer.”

The following extracts are from articles in the Sunday Express (June 14th, 1942) : —

“The racketeers are using the existing shortage of supplies as a suitable occasion to corner stocks of many commodities and re-sell them for big profits. . . . One of the biggest profiteering ramps to-day is the whisky racket. . . . The furniture profiteering ramp to defeat both income tax and maximum controlled prices is worked in this way: A small manufacturing firm sells to the “boss” for absurdly low prices. The furniture is installed in a luxury apartment and resold at prices often 300 per cent. above those paid, and the profits are shared out. Jewellery, furs, silk stockings and underclothing are sold for cash in £1 notes in the West End by racketeers, who do not ask for coupons. Cosmetics and beauty preparations, too, can be bought in any quantity for cash.”

Lastly, there is the Judge sentencing some men charged with frauds in connection with corporation contracts who said : —

“This corruption will either be cut out of commercial life or it will destroy the State.” (“Daily Mail,” June 20th, 1942)

A pretty black picture. But, retorts the reformer, make the penalties more severe, copy Russia and Germany and introduce the death penalty, then it will cease. How little they know of that “human nature” they so often talk about. The history of capitalism has demonstrated beyond refutation that given the opportunity (the ownership of goods for sale and a ready market) and given the motive (big and quick profits) nothing will stop illicit deals in one form or another, from robbery and smuggling to black marketeering, and to the numerous operations that can be conducted just on the borderline of legality. The severity of the penalty may to a degree restrict, but it will never stamp out such deals, for operators will always be found who will discount the risk. Even within the limited sphere of keeping the number of such transactions to a comparatively moderate total, experience has proved that it is not the severity of the penalty but the small chance of escaping detection that is alone effective. Otherwise the intending law breaker always hopes that he will not be caught. This was the lesson of the Factory Acts, of the legal minimum wage of agricultural workers, and of income tax evasion. What alone made any impression was not the size of the penalty imposed on law breakers who were caught but the appointment of sufficient inspectors and the use of other means of convincing the offenders that their chances of escaping discovery were small. Even so, most legislation of such a nature is largely a dead letter. The capitalist basis which provides opportunity and motive still prevails against the puny efforts by law or pious resolution to make a competitive system work for the social good.

So much for those who hope to change by Act of Parliament the conduct of people living under capitalism as its exists to-day. But almost equally foolish are the Labour Party and I.L.P. reformists who believe that they can retain the capitalist or State-capitalist basis, with its rich and poor (but with the degree of inequality lessened), with its production of goods for sale, its property incomes and profit-making, and its whole paraphernalia of money, bonds and banks, and can yet persuade or compel capitalists and workers to desist from conduct which flows naturally from a two-class, private property social system, and go over to conduct appropriate to a social system based on human needs alone.

The present spectacle of the “profiteers” and racketeers and the comparative futility of the efforts to stamp them out should be a warning to all who believe that capitalism can be reformed. Socialists take their stand on the very different principle that only by a fundamental change in the basis of society, from private ownership to the common ownership and democratic control of the means of production and distribution will human conduct likewise change. It is to the economic foundation, not to the legal and ethical superstructure of society, that attention needs to be directed.

More new leaders for old (1942)

From the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Stan Hampson

If We Are To Survive (1942)

From the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

(Reprinted from The Western Socialist, Boston, U.S.A., January-February, 1942)

If ever there was a term whose constant use is rivalled only by an equally constant misuse, that term is Human Nature. Rich man, poor man, beggar man, and politician—all consider themselves qualified, if not expert, to discuss the whys and wherefores of human behaviour. And yet, in spite of its widespread popularity, no other subject, no other field of study is beset by so much ignorance and superstition.

In no other endeavour does man make less progress than in the study of himself and his activity. He has given his life to fathom the mystery of things from murders to the movements of the constellations. With the utmost in perseverance he has solved many of the unknown in physics, chemistry and other sciences. He has solved many of the phenomena relating to his own physical structure. But when it comes to the thinking and behaviour of a human being, he is content to get nowhere fast. In fact, it appears that he enjoys standing still.

The quest for knowledge in any field has always run a gauntlet of persecution against tradition and superstation. However, in what is commonly referred to as the exact or physical branches of science, proofs have become so obvious that the opposition has been forced to retreat. In the study of sociology and human behaviour, organised superstition has yet to be defeated. The inner-man, his “soul,” his responses are considered something intangible and under the influence of a supernatural power. His actions are looked upon as a product of his own independent and free will. The argument is frequently proposed that human nature cannot be analysed and tabulated in a laboratory as are other subjects of study.

It is a current conception and a constant charge that man’s inhumanity to man, his inate qualities of selfishness and greed are the core of all social ills from poverty to wars, from thefts to depressions. The pious are devout in their claim that man’s difficulties are due to his lack of faith and his ungodliness. The intellectuals are equally consistent in maintaining that the masses are not only incapable but also unwilling to lead a better life. The “practical” men insist that a rigid and authoritative leadership is necessary to control the ignorance and stupidity of the mob.

In almost all social codes and doctrines human nature has become the universal scapegoat, the object of contempt of men everywhere. But instead of natural resentment and righteous indignation arising as a result of this, we seem to take delight in the wickedness and frailties of human nature. Indeed we boast of it as a hopeless affliction. The more optimistic and humanitarian of our fellow men insist that, although a better world is possible, human behaviour must necessarily be improved before that glorious status can be achieved.

Human Nature actually represents the last entrenchment of the anti-socialist. Being no longer able to justify or explain the basic contradictions of capitalism, such as poverty in the midst of plenty, overproduction and war and being unable or unwilling to recognise the bankruptcy of present day society, the defenders of the status quo must invariably become apologetic. What better basis for their position than man’s inhumanity to man ? For, looking narrowly at the world about us, what is more glaring than the abundant evidences of selfishness, greed, persecution and cruelty ?

But here is where the socialist is at a tremendous advantage over the most erudite of capitalist theoreticians. Not only is the Marxist a materialist, that is, not only does he look for a material and physical explanation of all phenomena, but he is also a dialectician. In other words, he does not look at people or society, or at anything for that matter, with a static or stationary viewpoint. Rather, because he is scientific, he conducts his investigation with a view to the processes and developments which all things undergo. Nothing in our environment is static. All things from mice to men are in a constant process of flux and change.

Men are not born with patterns of behaviour. They do not inherit vices or virtues. These qualities are a gift from their environment. Ideas, beliefs, characteristics do not originate in the germ plasm. The new-born babe possesses no knack for mechanics and shares no views on world affairs. He is completely ignorant and indifferent to the state of the nation. He is neither Jew nor Christian, Moslem nor Atheist. He is merely a human being equipped with brain, nervous system, sense organs, digestive tract, and a lusty pair of lungs. Above all—he is open-minded.

Once he is subjected to the influences of his environment, he begins to acquire habits, notions, prejudices, and opinions. He is limited by the scope of his experiences. His training in school and church, his home and associations, his reading, his daily adventures are all contributing factors poured into the mould from which a particular personality will be produced. Like all living organism he will be motivated by the basic impulses of the preservation of himself and his species. The manner and means he will employ in this struggle for existence will be determined by the customs and institutions of society.

Those who wish to impose on human behaviour a pattern of constancy are completely ignorant of man’s history. . For the hundreds of thousands of years of Primitive Tribal Society men lived in small but cooperative communities. All things were owned in common. There were no rich and no poor. Women and the aged or infirm were allotted the tasks close to the community, the making of clothes and the preparing of meals. The young and sturdy among the males were devoted to the hunt and the procurement of food. The wisdom of the elders (of both sexes) found their expression in the tribal councils. Privileged classes were non-existant. In times of plenty, all prospered; in times of famine, all suffered. The prizes of the chase were divided according to the needs of the tribesmen. Even to-day, among eskimos who have been able to resist the white man’s bible and whisky, “mine” and “thine” are words foreign to their language.

Without the existence of private property there was no stealing, for who would steal from himself. Crimes against the tribe usually resulted in ostracism, a punishment worse than death to the gregarious tribesmen. Murders by individuals were, according to historians, rare occurrence and almost invariably involved the obtaining of a mate. Of course, human offerings and religious sacrifices are not to be denied. But they were part of the mores and customs of the tribes. Certainly they are no more reproachful than the commercial offerings of the twentieth century. On rare occasions wars were waged when hunting grounds and fertile valleys essential to the tribe’s well-being were involved. But withal, within each primitive tribal entity was a democratic, harmonious communal life that puts to shame the much-vaunted societies of civilisation.

It does not follow, however, that primitive man was imbued with finer qualities than the humans of later years. Nor is the reader to deduce the inference that we should return to tribal life. But the history of primitive people is indisputable proof that man is capable of living a peaceful and harmonious life.

Man’s social nature is no supernatural or mysterious virtue. In order to live men have had to come together and associate in all types and sizes of communities. A child must of necessity be in the company of parents and adults to survive the early stages of living. In the same way people cannot live alone, isolated from their fellow men. Primitive man was in a constant struggle against wind, rain, storm, fire, and wild animals. In order to successfully combat nature he was forced to come together with his fellow beings. In unity there is strength. In strength there is safety and to the tribesman the survival of the individual was part of the safety and well-being of the tribe.

Eric Hanson

(To be continued next month)

The Labour Party and Socialism - Part 2 (1942)

From the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

Link to Part 1

It is by means of these catch phrases, which pay lip-service to Socialism, and its variety of importunate reforms, that the Labour Party was able to draw under its wing all sorts and shades of political opinion. The strength of a Party lies in the rank and file. An eclectic statement of policy gains a very versatile support, and when the Party endeavours to implement its policy it finds there are wide divergences in the rank and file as to how and when it should be done. We might say in the case of the Labour Party that it has gained support for everything but the abolition of capitalism, and as a consequence has achieved nothing except the retention of capitalism.

The means shape the ends : means are ends.

A policy based on the idea that the position of servitude of the working class can be gradually abolished by reforming the relation of wage-labour and capital cannot produce the abolition of wage labour and capital. A policy which allows for co-operation with avowed anti-Socialist parties cannot lead to the establishment of Socialism.

With the above points in mind it is easy to understand the reason for the splits inside, and the secessions from, the Labour Party just prior to, and following, its “betrayal” by MacDonald.

It must be remembered that the Labour Party was in power as a Capitalist Government, not as a Socialist Government. Supporters of the Labour Party may differ from this statement, but it is an undeniable fact. The nature of a government is not determined by the name which it takes or which it may be given. In so far as we are discussing the question of Capitalism and Socialism the nature of the government is determined by the mode of production and distribution in being during its time of administration. The Labour Party attempted to continue to run the country’s affairs on the basis of capitalism.

It is in this fact that the explanation lies of the failure and collapse of the Labour Party in 1931. The economic crisis of the time arose, as usual, from the mode of capitalist production and distribution, not through the mismanagement of political affairs. It was common to the whole world : it was not particular to Britain. Try as they might the Labour Party could not combat the laws of the capitalist system, which over-rode its reformist theories and forced its actions to conform with them.

The causes of the splits in, and secessions from, the Labour Party are not to be found in mere ideological variations but in the differing theories of its supporters, leaders and rank and file, as to what should be done in the face of changing economic conditions.

Although Attlee accuses MacDonald of “betraying” the Labour movement by uniting with the Conservatives and Liberals in the National Government, was this action to be unexpected in view of the resolution of the Labour Representation Committee in 1900, of which MacDonald was the secretary ? Since the retention of capitalism is implicit in Labour Party policy, when things got in a mess to whom was it best to turn for advice ? The avowedly capitalist politicians and economic theorists, of course ! It is the sole purpose of the capitalist class to maintain the present economic system. It has a century and a half of theory and practice behind it. It has the knowledge and the control of the organs of propaganda by means of which it can seduce the working class to come to heel in times of emergency. When MacDonald turned to them for advice it was a case of walking into the spider’s parlour. Homo sapiens works differently from the insect world, however, and instead of being gobbled up he changed his fly’s wings for spider’s legs and his new brothers invited him to assist in the nefarious work of spinning the deceptive web !

Thus it was that during 1929-31 we saw the paradoxical phenomenon of a party arising from a workers’ ideology, built and paid for by the working class, founded on an eclectic policy of reforms and co-operation, achieve considerable power; and when in power we saw that it could take no other course than to continue to run the capitalist system. It would be a contradiction in terms to say that this can be done in the interests of the working class. The nature of the mode of production and distribution absolutely precludes this course of events. We saw, therefore, an alleged working class party controlling the political machine and the economic affairs of the country on behalf of the master class and against the interests of the class it purported to represent.

It is now eleven years since MacDonald and some others “betrayed” the Labour movement and entered the National Government in coalition with the Tories and Liberals. Where do the Labour leaders stand to-day ? We find Attlee, Greenwood, Morrison, Bevin, Cripps, etc., in the present National Government actively assisting the master-class. What is it that has led them to coalesce with the capitalists? Mr. Attlee, addressing the Annual Conference of the T.U.C., reported in the Daily Telegraph, October 9th, 1940, 

“emphasised the reasons why Labour is taking a part in the Government. The reasons were three : "To secure the defeat of the enemy,

"To maintain the unity of the nation,

"To preserve the freedom of the people‘.

"It was a difficult matter, he said, to maintain the principles of freedom at a time when the country had to be organised to keep the right balance between authority and liberty. . . . The Government was composed of different parties with different outlook, but there was enough measure of agreement for them all to work together.” (italics ours.)

This statement may sound very sweet to Labour supporters to-day, but what did Attlee have to say regarding Fascism, coalition with avowedly capitalist parties and national unity in 1937.

Turn to the pages of The Labour Party in Perspective. After discussing the divergent trends of opinions within the Party on foreign policy, he says (p. 219) : —

“The alternative policy is not the support by Labour of a Capitalist Government, but constitutional opposition.” (italics ours.)

He discusses the trend this opposition should take, and then says (p. 220) : —

“There is yet one other tendency among Labour supporters. There are those who, realising the danger of menace of the Fascist Powers, tend to take up an attitude of supporting a Capitalist Government at home as the least of two evils. They tend to under-estimate the reality of the struggle between Capitalism and Socialism and to magnify the differences between democratic Capitalist States and Fascist States. The danger of this attitude is that in fighting foreign Fascism they may encourage the subtle introduction of Fascism at home. The Fascist danger in this country does not come from the crude activities of Sir Oswald Mosley, but from the clever propaganda which has been actively disseminated ever since the formation of the National Government in favour of what is called national unity. There has been a deliberate attempt made to suggest that after all there are no real political differences in this country, and that everybody is in reality in agreement. The increasing danger of the international situation affords an opportunity for pressing this point. The speeches of Mr. Ramsay MacDonald are full of Fascist ideas and even Fascist phraseology. The essentials of the Corporate State without any coloured shirts might be introduced in this country in a period of international tension.”

We have read in Mr. Attlee’s own words that the policy of co-operation with capitalist parties and governments is anti-Socialist and anti-working class. Yet it is explicit in Labour Party policy, and Mr. Attlee and other Labour leaders follow it out when their turn comes round.

After thirty-six years of political life where has this sort of thing led the Labour Party, and with it the Trade Union movement, in its struggle for the improvement of working class conditions ?

All the Labour movement can now offer the workers is “blood and tears, toil and sweat,” and as has been pointed out often in these columns, the statements of post-war prospects point to nothing but the elimination of the first item.

After this sad tale of thirty-six years of misplaced thought and action by a large proportion of the British working class let us finish up on a note of hope for the future.

That hope lies in Socialism. The S.P.G.B. has had two years of life longer than the Labour Party, and although we cannot show the same spectacular electoral success we can claim one thing, at least. That is, that in thirty-eight years, because of its insistence on the fundamental Socialist objective, the S.P.G.B. has done more for progress towards Socialism than any other party or combination of parties.

The only solution to working class troubles is to be found in the establishment of a Socialist system of society.

N. S.

James Brindley and the Duke of Bridgewater (1942)

From the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Sidelight on Our Old Nobility 
James Brindley was the man who planned and carried out the building of the canals that revolutionised transport in 18th century England. This is the brief comment on Brindley and his patron, the Duke of Bridgewater, made in “A Social and Industrial History of England" (F. W. Tickner, page 525) : —

  The first important English canal was due to the enterprise of the Duke of Bridgewater, who found the output of his coal-mine at Worsley greatly hampered by the difficulty of transporting the coal to Manchester, seven miles away. The engineer he employed was a millwright named James Brindley, a man of little education, but of great shrewdness and practical ability.

Now for the other side of the picture, provided by Howard Spring in a review of Bernard Falk’s "The Bridgewater Millions" (Daily Mail, June 20th, 1942) : —

   He has been called the Father of Inland Navigation, but he was only its financier. The prouder title belongs to James Brindley, the illiterate Derbyshire man who did all the work and solved all the problems.
  What the duke did was to risk his fortune in the venture. That was his one act of courage, and it brought him rich rewards. He spent £220,000. His income out of this was £80,000 a year, apart from enormous profits on the sale of his coal.
   What did Brindley get out of it—Brindley, whose solutions of some of the problems were pure flashes of engineering genius? Well, when things were bad he and the duke pigged along together, living in pubs on bread and cheese and beer, neither of them having money because there was none.
   For seven years Brindley’s salary was not paid, while the duke, prosperous now, was paying off everyone else who had lent him money—rich bankers who could enforce their , claims, and such like.
   Poor awkward rustic Brindley could enforce nothing. He died with the salary unpaid. Two years later his widow was given £100. As Mr. Falk says: "The amount probably represented his Grace's modest estimate of what was due to his brilliant coadjutor.”

G. M. Trevelyan (“British History in the 19th Century,’’ page 154) classes Bridgewater among the “great noblemen who were also great coal owners, working their own mines, and thereby becoming in due course still greater noblemen.”

The moral of which appears to be, heaven help the moneyless man of genius who falls into the grasping hands of our old nobility! Bridgewater, to quote Howard Spring, “was a great curmudgeon, a great boor, a great robber of better men’s resources.” He wasn’t even redeemed by the idiot sense of humour of his own illustrious kinsman who "will be remembered for nothing more than his habit of having his dogs at table with him, dressed in* neat little coats, with a flunkey behind the chair of each.”

Edgar Hardcastle

The Planners of Capitalism (1942)

From the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialists have had to contend with multifarious groups and parties that held, and hold yet to-day, the view that every inroad of the capitalist state into the realm of industry is a step in the direction of Socialism.

Seeking support on those lines is the major party —the Labour Party—which stands for the nationalisation of the main industries of the country, with compensation for the owners at a fair rate of interest by giving them government bonds, equal to their assessed capital. The Labour Party has been influenced by such people as the Fabians in the shape of G. B. Shaw and the Webbs, who have contributed much to the doctrine of State control, along with the I.L.P. which, in the past, declared that it would convert the Labour Party to Socialism, by which it really meant State-capitalism, and even now is only critical of Russian State-capitalism on democratic grounds.

A later arrival was the “Communist” Party, which made the wildest claims for the “dictatorship of the Proletariat” that they declared was in operation in Russia.

But the “Workers’ State" picture has somewhat faded over the years until to-day sociologists have some difficulty in differentiating the State system in Russia from that of Nazi Germany. The question now arises as to why the Labour movement plumps for State control of one kind or another. In the first place, State control can be viewed as being in line with the centralisation and concentration of capital, “for capitalist development had its genesis in the expropriation of the pigmy property of the many into the huge property of the few,” and State boards, corporations, trusts, nationalisation and the like are but parts of the higher evolved capitalism.

Illustrating this is the statement of the Board of Trade and the Minister of Food that there will be the closing of half of the retail shops by midsummer this year which means that some 300,000 “small man" businesses will be “telescoped,” and their trade taken over by the bigger organisations. (News Chronicle, April 6th, 1942.)

This “freeing” from the world of business of a type that has attempted to rise above the proletariat, that has given his children a better education, forms a nucleus from which come the sometimes brilliant men with ideas who flow into the parties of the “left," and as trained writers, intellectuals and professionals, make well thought out schemes for the planning of capitalism, motivated, you may be sure, by the prospect of filling the requisite posts in its administration. Against the planners, the Tories, representing the solid property owners, and holding high office in the state for decades, appear reactionary to the suggested new order of things, and resent the move to superannuate them to a back seat politically. For against the Tory conception that a man’s worth—his substance—is the amount of property he owns the embarrassing newcomers have the “revolutionary” cry of “equal opportunity,” and declare that ability should he the test of a man’s right to income, so away with private property. Let the State take over for Socialism now! Whilst this haggling goes on as to which type of capitalism should be adopted, and who is to run it, the great majority of “base” mechanics, the proletariat, must be thinking that they have a role to play in this era of change and are fearful that totalitarianism and State capitalism are of one piece, that their liberty, and thus of humanity, depends on what part they play.

We declare that we Socialists have earned the right to be listened to, for of all sections of the working-class we have been true, whilst the concept of Socialism has been distorted, and used as a cover to march our class from one morass to another, their labour-power bought and sold like merchandise, their children snobbishly belittled.

We still propagate that you must abolish the wages system, must fashion a society to your needs, a class-less society, where mankind passes from the realm of necessity to the realm of freedom. Will you hear us? 

Frank Dawe

The S.L.P. Still prefers to say nothing (1942)

From the July 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

In a column and a half of wild words the Socialist (June, 1942) continues to denounce THE SOCIALIST STANDARD for "shuffling," but still prefers to keep mum about the extent to which the Communist Party in 1920 was formed out of former members of the S.L.P. The assertion is now made that the S.L.P. "had no connection with the formation of the Communist Party. It was not even asked to take any part because the C.P.'ers knew very well it would refuse. No member of the S.L.P. joined the C.P."

If the last sentence is meant to imply that no member of the S.L.P. left that party to join the Communist Party it is a falsehood. If it means that at the moment of joining the Communist Party they were not members of the S.L.P. that is an evasion of the issue, though possibly true. All we can do is to leave it alongside Mr. Allen Hutt's claim that "the main part of the S.L.P. was fused with the Communist Party," and Mr. G. D. H. Cole's claim that "most of its more active members . . . passed over to the Communist Party in 1920."

One other interesting remark in the article in the Socialist is that they cannot remember how they came to issue a joint manifesto with the I.L.P. in 1918—"How the I.L.P. came into it, we cannot remember, and it is beyond the limit of our time to look it up."

We do not question the accuracy of the statement, but we cannot help remarking that such an explanation comes very badly from the Socialist. When we explained that the incorrect remark of a writer in THE SOCIALIST STANDARD (that the S.L.P. was one of the organisations fused into the Communist Party in 1920) was an error made in good faith, their reply was that "the facts could easily have been verified and there is no excuse for the falsehood unless it be that he lied deliberately. . . ." People with short memories and who have not the time to verify easily verifiable facts might well refrain from such charges against others.

Editorial Committee