These Foolish Things: Monopoly money (1995)

The Scavenger column from the October 1995 issue of the Socialist Standard

Monopoly money

Most members of the capitalist class avoid drawing attention to themselves. For example, one of the largest owners of property in London is the son of a German banker, Otto Wisskirchen. This discreet young man, educated at Lancing public school, has so far bought shops and offices in London worth nearly £400 million. But he is only one of a number of German capitalists who have, between them, bought £2.5 billions-worth of central London in the past five years.

Salary slaves

Research by the Institute of Personnel and Development reveals that 42 percent of senior management and a third of middle management said work pressures meant they were failing to take all their annual holidays . . .

After a strong start to the year, recruitment of managers and senior specialist staff has fallen to disturbingly low levels . . . the last time the higher-paid job market showed a similar downward pattern was in 1989, when a severe recession followed. Blaine Cavanagh and Michael Dixon, Financial Mail on Sunday, 16 July 1995.

There's a law against it

Recent Home Office figures show that the use of illegal drugs is escalating out of control in Britain, in spite of strenuous efforts by police and customs officers to prevent it. Registered addicts (only a small fraction of the total) have increased by twenty percent to 34,000 and deaths of addicts by 7.5 percent. Last year the number of those applying for medical treatment shot up to 6,000.

Rich for the Law

The Lord Chancellor is trying to save money on the historic lodgings used to accommodate High Court judges on circuit. These arc often listed buildings, costly to maintain, and staffed by butlers, cooks and housekeepers.

There are 33 lodgings costing £4 million a year. The dearest has been Lincoln, occupied by only one judge for six weeks of the law’s 36-week year. This works out at £24,098 per judge-week.

Lord Mackay has no plan to change this system which bolsters the majesty of capitalist law, but he would like to reduce the average cost to a modest £2,500 per week’s use.

The (un)Free Market

When economists sing the praises of The Market and its ability to regulated capitalism’s running of society, they conveniently forget the universal scope the market provides for dishonesty, and the huge superstructure of law and enforcement needed to deal with it.

In 1986, the Financial Services Act provided for the setting up of the Investors’ Compensation Scheme for those who became casualties of the investments market. But the investment companies involved had to be authorised firms already controlled (avowedly) by one or more of the following: Financial Intermediaries’, Managers’ and Brokers’ Regulatory Association; Investment Management Regulatory Organisation; Life Assurance and Unit Trust Regulatory Organisation; Personal Investment Authority; Securities and Futures Authority.

ICS paid out £25.4 million in 1994 to 2,276 such investors from money provided by the investment industry, but the recent life assurance scandal threatened to disrupt the compensation scheme; and the Treasury had to back ICS with a guaranteed £17 million. 

The Scavenger

Law and society (1974)

From the September 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialism will be a system of society where the mass of formal rules and regulations which now govern human conduct will disappear. There will also be none of the trappings which inevitably accompany any advanced legal system.

The crushing environment of capitalist society helps to instil in people the idea that the law is some sort of external norm governing human behaviour and that those individuals administering it are a breed of superior beings. The foolish notion that judges and lawyers are somehow of a better moral or intellectual fibre than the rest of us, should not need debunking in the 1970s. Shakespeare did it over 350 years ago. King Lear says, “. . see how yond justice rails upon yond simple thief . . . change places and handy dandy which is the justice which is the thief.”

More recently Belfort Bax in The Religion of Socialism said:

. . . it is an undoubted truth that no judge can be an honest man . . . and why? Because the aspiring member of the bar when he accepts a judgeship knows that in doing so he deliberately pledges himself to functions which at any moment compel him to act against his conscience and wrong another man . . . He lays himself under the obligation of administering a law which he may know to be bad on any occasion when called upon merely because it is the law. He makes this surrender of humanity and honour for what? For filthy lucre and tawdry notoriety. Now I ask can we conceive a more abjectly contemptible character than that which acts thus?

But the Socialist’s attitude to the role of law in society is not based on exposing the fallacy that those who administer the law are a nobler breed of men. It is reasoned on the basis of the law’s function in present day society. Although academic lawyers divide the realm of law into hundreds of different branches, when looked at from the point of view of society as a whole, there are really four main areas of law. These are state, criminal, contract and what is sometimes known as welfare law but is usually more accurately described as poverty law. An examination of these four branches of law shows their bases in capitalist society and how they will be totally irrelevant and unnecessary in Socialist society.

State law is the area of the legal machinery which deals with the individual’s right in society as against the machinery of government and its armed forces. States only exist in capitalist society as arbitrary boundaries, defining areas of competing capitalist interests. Internal state law is the legal machinery used as the front to back up the armed control of the capitalist over wealth produced by the workers. A world community where everything is owned in common will have neither place nor need for laws to keep one section of society in subjection.

Now let’s take criminal law. The vast bulk of this area is concerned with offences against recognised property relationships. All wealth in capitalist society is owned by definite individuals or bodies (e.g. companies or governments). The law takes no notice of how it came about that X owns vast estates and Y owns nothing. Criminal law is there to preserve those relationships that currently exist. The shareholder’s title to his shares is protected by the law (backed up by the armed force of the state); the landlord’s title to his land is likewise defended by the law. The criminal law takes no notice of the social robbery that is a fact of everyday life, i.e. that the land, factories, mines etc. are owned by a small minority. Clearly in a society where all wealth is owned by the whole of mankind, i.e. Socialism, there will be no part to be played by a system or rules to enable robbers to hold on to their booty.

The rest of the criminal law, which is not directly related to the defence of private property is largely concerned with state control of production and distribution. Factory legislation and road traffic legislation set a standard (usually the absolute minimum) for controls in the interest of the whole of the capitalist class. Lorries going at 80 m.p.h. are a danger to other products on the road; men working more than a certain number of hours at a stretch driving these lorries are also a danger to other commodities on the roads. They also risk damaging the goods of their own employer.

It is fairly well known that legislation protecting workers from dangerous machinery and processes is ineffective. Firstly the number of factory inspectors is totally inadequate. Secondly the penalties that are imposed for the breaches that are discovered and brought before the courts are derisive. Many employers find it cheaper to pay the penalty fines that are imposed for hazarding workers’ lives by, for example, unfenced machinery, than foot the bill for complying with safety regulations. In a Socialist society the needs of those involved in the productive processes will not be swept aside by the insane drive for profit.

The final part of the criminal law deals with ‘‘offences against the person’’. In terms of the legal machinery of capitalism it occupies a small part in the whole process. The majority of crimes in this category (often inter family disputes) are traceable to frustrations and problems caused by private property in society. When father comes home having worked a ten-hour day, doing a simple, boring, degrading, mind destroying process, to a wife cooped up in two rooms with three children, it is hardly surprising that domestic violence sometimes results. Other crimes of violence are generally linked with theft in some way or other though a recent ugly development has been political violence. The hooliganism of the football match and the thuggery of the tubes and street corners are only a reaction to the horrific conditions the majority of people face in private property society. In a society where material deprivations have been left behind the need for legal restraint will be found to be obsolete.

The third main area, contract law, covers an enormous field, from buying a joint at the local supermarket to property “developers” buying slag heaps. Quite obviously the majority of workers have little contact with this area of the law or the courts that administer it. Disputes over the amount to pay for a loaf of bread seldom reach the somber pomposity of High Court Judges. On the other hand a dispute over the correct price of a shipment of copper from South America could involve millions of pounds. The capitalist class needs the Civil Courts to sort out their property disputes. The only times the average worker has any real contact with this area of the law is when he is buying a house) of course on mortgage so it is really the building society or the local authority that is buying it); or if he fails to meet his instalments on the h.p. or the fridge. But it is a brief look, and many workers do not even have this glimpse into the mysteries of the workings of the law. Need it be added that when all wealth is owned in common, laws of contract will be as relevant as a horse and cart at the motor show.

Which leaves poverty law. The area embraces the law dealing with state benefits of whatever sort, local authority benefits (e.g. subsidized housing) and certain areas which are known as social law. It is an area where most lawyers know little and care less. After all there is no money to be made for the lawyer in explaining to the pensioner how he can obtain an allowance of 2p off the cost of his butter. It is, however, the area of the law with which most workers make some contact. In 1972 over 10 million received some sort of regular state “benefits", out of a total population of 56 million. (Social Trends 1973 published by the Central Statistical Office). That is a high proportion of the adult population. The distribution of the pittances that are given to the members of the working class, unable to keep even their abysmal standard of living afloat (£16 per week for a married couple not a pittance?) is surely evidence of the appalling failure of capitalist society to produce an answer to poverty. This despite the Lloyd Georges, the Beveridges and the mile upon mile of statutes dealing with poverty.

The vast complicated structure for measuring the subsistence allowances that are doled out to workers only has a place in a world that allows a small minority to live in luxury and forces the vast majority to live in poverty.

Finally, under this general heading of poverty law might be included “family law". The Law Society is responsible for administering the civil Legal Aid system in this country. That is the fund to enable people who cannot afford legal advice or assistance to have it paid by the state in certain circumstances. (This fund is different from the one relating to Legal Aid in criminal cases.) The Law Society calculates that the majority of its funds are used in proceedings relating to divorce, maintenance or custody of children. With the greater pressures that capitalist society bring on personal relationships the divorce courts (which have the task of rearranging the poverty of the working class when family situations get out of hand) are the courts that workers increasingly enter.

In Socialist society where there will be no buying and selling and therefore no money, there will be no financial pressures on human beings, adults or children. The relationships between the sexes will not be complicated by the irrelevant considerations which are of such importance to-day. If people who were formerly living together wish to separate there will be no financial or “moral” pressures to prevent them doing so, and no humiliating proceedings to be endured as a result.

When Socialism is introduced amongst many of the vast changes in human existence will be the following:

1. Wealth will be produced in the abundance necessary to satisfy man’s physical wants. This is technically possible now, but production is limited to what can be sold at a profit on the market.
2. There will be free access for all in society to the goods produced. In these circumstances laws defining people’s property relationships will be as unnecessary as they are useless. When poverty is abolished, who needs poverty laws? When private property is abolished, who will want contract and criminal laws defending it?

Ronnie Warrington

Life and Times: Small change in the small claims (2023)

The Life and Times column from the September 2023 issue of the Socialist Standard

A friend recently asked me to assist her in taking a roofer she’d employed to the Small Claims Court. The work he’d done, she said, was so poor that she needed to employ someone else to put it right and she felt justified in taking out a case against him to claim the extra money it was going to cost her. That was around £3,000 and she didn’t have it.

A speedy resolution?

I’d been told that the Small Claims Court was a place where, for a small fee, you could go to an informal hearing in front of a judge for a speedy resolution of your case. In the event what I discovered was entirely different. You could indeed go to this Court to claim any amount under £10,000 by filling in a relatively simple form and paying a sum of around 10% of the money you were claiming, which you hoped would be added to the amount you were awarded at the end. But any simplicity ended there and what came next was unbounded complication.

First of all, the defendant, the roofer, on receiving notice of the claim against him, denied all responsibility and issued a counter-claim arguing that my friend actually owed him money since he’d miscalculated the cost of the materials he’d used, even though he’d not told her about that at the time. Manifestly absurd of course, but the Court then ordered her to respond to his claim and send that response both to him and the Court. Then, when, after several weeks she received the roofer’s response to her own claim, she was instructed to respond to that as well.

Pompous judge

Eventually, some weeks later, a date was set for a ‘preliminary hearing’. The day came and I accompanied my friend. To say what happened at the hearing was – what’s the word, farcical? overblown? – I don’t know. I imagined we would have a chance to put our case to the Court directly. Instead, the judge, who really was the proverbial pompous ass, told us that the point of the hearing was not for him to hear what we had to say but to inform us how the case would progress henceforth. He then took 45 minutes to impart much largely irrelevant information, only at the end of which did he lay down instructions – of an incredibly complicated nature -about what we now needed to do. Though the roofer was clearly a hostile opponent, we should get together with him to seek and agree on an independent assessor who would draw up a report on the work done, for which we should expect to pay around £1,500, the cost to be shared by both parties. There would then be another £300+ to pay towards the cost of the final hearing, which amount would fall upon my friend. The hearing itself, referred to by the judge as ‘the trial’ would, he decided, last a whole day sometime in the future.

We were discouraged to say the least, and even more so a couple of weeks later when we received the judge’s formal written instructions confirming what he had said but adding a few additional hurdles. One of these was to supply both the Court and the defendant with all relevant documentation (contracts, bills, plans, photos, valuations, etc.) within a very limited timescale. Another was to send to everyone involved, ahead of the ‘trial, a ‘hearing bundle’ containing all items of evidence from both sides ‘with an index at the front and with each page numbered’ and ‘contained in a suitable ring binder’. All this for a hearing where £3,000 might or might not be granted on an undetermined day in the future.

Bemused

What would most people do in the circumstances? My friend, understandably bemused by all this, asked me what I thought. My advice to her was that, despite the blatant injustice of it, she needed to drop the case on the grounds that it just wasn’t worth the time, energy and stress of it all. She agreed readily and said she realised that the ‘Civil Justice Centre’, which was responsible for processing the claim, had at best a tenuous connection with justice, its main concern being the discharge of bureaucratic procedures. So we put together a letter stating that the absurdly heavy-handed way in which our simple claim was being handled left us with no choice but to discontinue it. As for paying for the extra work that needed to be done, she told me she would try and get an additional loan on her mortgage from the bank she held it with. Not ideal of course, but anything seemed better for her than staying in the bureaucratic maze she’s entered.

Human energy wasted

What to conclude? Well, first of all, the very existence of the Small Claims Court (also known as the ‘Money Claims Court’) is a prime example of how the system we live in is ruled by money, with workers having to spend much of their time seeking to make sure they have enough of it to keep their heads above water. Even a small overspend or unexpected expense can put someone on the wrong side of solvency and make them have to scramble around, via such routes as the Small Claims Court, to try and put that right. Secondly that Court is just one of the many examples of the enormous waste of human energy and resources inherent in a system that spawns vast amounts of socially unproductive activities resulting in huge complex bureaucracies and large numbers of what have rightly been called ‘bullshit jobs’.

Anyway, there’s no doubt about what I’ll say the next time I hear someone talk about going to the Small Claims Court. ‘Just forget it.’

Howard Moss

Imagine a world without law (2000)

From the November 2000 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialism will be a society without law, but not without problems

The Law Society of England and Wales represents 76,000 solicitors. At the end of 1999 in the Society’s official poll for “Lawyer of the Millennium” the clear victor was Sir Thomas More the 16th-century Lord Chancellor. In some ways such a result seems unsurprising as More was an eminent lawyer of his day and has been respected by many subsequent generations of lawyers. On the other hand, it can be seen as a little more surprising when you consider that in Utopia, his most famous book, More depicted with apparent approval a society without law or lawyers. Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas, but lawyers, it seems, are possessed of a little less electoral foresight.

Sir Thomas More’s Utopia

More began writing Utopia in 1515 and it was published the following year. There is academic argument about whether the text should be read as a blueprint for More’s desired future or whether it should be seen simply as a provocative picture designed to generate debate. Either way, it is certainly worthy of our close consideration. Let me quote to you a few extracts. This is Raphael, the traveller who had visited the island of Utopia:

“I don’t see how you can ever get any real justice or prosperity, so long as there’s private property, and everything’s judged in terms of money—unless you consider it just for the worst sort of people to have the best living conditions, or unless you’re prepared to call a country prosperous, in which all the wealth is owned by a tiny minority—who aren’t entirely happy even so, while everyone else is simply miserable” (Penguin, 1961, translated by Paul Turner, p.63).

And again, and this is a theme worth warming to:

“I am quite convinced that you’ll never get a fair distribution of goods, or a satisfactory organisation of human life, until you abolish private property altogether. So long as it exists, the vast majority of the human race . . . will inevitably go on labouring under a burden of poverty, hardship and worry. I don’t say that the burden can’t be reduced, but you’ll never take it right off their shoulders. You might, of course, set a statutory limit to the amount of money or land that any one person is allowed to possess . . . You might make it illegal to buy, or even to apply for public appointment . . . laws of that type would certainly relieve the symptoms, just as a chronic invalid gets some benefit from constant medical attention. But there’s no hope of a cure, so long as private property continues” (p.66)

He goes on later to say that it was better “to provide everyone with some means of livelihood, so that nobody’s under the frightful necessity of becoming first a thief and then a corpse”.

In More’s perfect society there are no lawyers and every citizen was counted a legal expert. Since Utopians needed so few laws the simplest interpretation would always be the right one:

“they think it is better for each man to plead his own cause . . . the point at issue is less likely to be obscured . . . for if nobody is telling the sort of lies that one learns from lawyers, the judge can apply all his shrewdness to weighing the facts of the case”.

In Utopia he also says “they have no lawyers among them, for they consider them as a sort of people whose profession it is to disguise matters . . .” and as for the Utopians themselves he said,

“everyone of them is skilled in their law, for as it is a very short study, so the plainest meaning of which words are capable is always the sense of their laws . . . for it is all one, not to make a law at all, or to couch it in such terms that without a quick apprehension and much study, a man cannot find out the true meaning of it . . .”

Marx and Engels on law

In the 19th century the views of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels included an analysis of the way that law worked. In general it was their view that law was made to serve the interests of a ruling elite. For example consider this view from Engels:

“Laws are necessary only because there are persons in existence who own nothing; and although this is directly expressed in but few laws, as, for instance, those against vagabonds and tramps, in which the proletariat as such is outlawed, yet enmity to the proletariat is so emphatically the basis of the law that the judges and especially the Justices of the Peace, who are bourgeois themselves, and with whom the proletariat comes most into contact, find this meaning in the laws without further consideration. If a rich man is brought up, or rather summoned, to appear before the court, the judge regrets that he is obliged to impose so much trouble, treats the matter as favourably as possible, and, if he is forced to condemn the accused does so with extreme regret, etc etc and the end of it all is a miserable fine, which the bourgeois throws upon the table with contempt and then departs. But if a poor devil gets into such a position as involves appearing before the Justices of the Peace—he has almost always spent the night in the stationhouse with a crowd of his peers—he is regarded from the beginning as guilty; his defence is set aside with a contemptuous ‘oh, we know the excuse’, and a fine imposed which he cannot pay and must work out with several months on the treadmill.” (The Condition Of The Working Class In England).

In some ways, things appear to have changed:

• Today’s judges, most of whom are younger than Mick Jagger, are proponents of human rights and are against the death penalty
• The law is sometimes seen to be applied against erstwhile very powerful figures like Jonathan Aitken and Jeffrey Archer
• The 30,000 magistrates of England and Wales are drawn from a wider social band within the working class—witness last year’s poster campaign from the Lord Chancellor’s Department “Have you thought about being a Magistrate?”, depicting ordinary people standing at a bus stop or mending a road

But all these recent changes to the composition of the judiciary are rather superficial and cosmetic.

Protecting the profit system – there will be no need for law in a classless society

The class system, and the chasm between the rich and poor is still here. Look at Bill Gates. As Bill Bryson points out in his marvellously funny book Notes from a Big Country (1998), if you initialled one dollar per second you would make $1,000 every 17 minutes. After 12 days of non-stop effort, you would acquire your first $1 million. Thus it would take you 120 days to accumulate $10 million, and 1,200 days—something over three years—to accumulate $100 million. After 31.7 years you would become a billionaire, but it would still take you over 1000 years of signing a dollar every second to become as rich as Bill Gates.

The bulk of law accepts and promotes the existing set of social relations. It could when you think about it, do no other.

Writing in Theories of Surplus Value, Marx is quite sardonic about what it is that law has actually contributed to civilisation, he notes,

“The criminal moreover produces the whole of the police and of criminal justice, constables, judges, hangmen, juries, etc; and all these different lines of business, which form equally many categories of the social division of labour, develop different capacities of the human spirit, create new needs and new ways of satisfying them. Torture alone has given rise to the most ingenious mechanical inventions, and employed many honourable craftsmen in the production of its instruments.”

There is an absolutely enormous quantity of law (and lawyers) governing our social relations today. And it is growing. There has certainly been a significant increase in the number of lawyers per capita of the general population. In 1968 there were 54 million people in Britain of whom 23,000 were solicitors, whereas today we have a population of 60 million (11 per cent growth) and 75,000 solicitors (44 per cent growth).

The law in the library has also grown considerably over the years. In his inaugural lecture at Oxford in 1883, the distinguished constitutionalist A.V. Dicey noted that even until well into the 19th century it was possible for a person to read the entirety of English law (presumably within the compass of an ordinary adult life). It could be contained in under 200 volumes. Today, an earnest reader would probably need to live for over 600 years to read all law and regulations applicable in Britain.

But, after all, law does confer some advantages on us. Listen to Marx again:

“The effects of the criminal on the development of productive power can be shown in detail. Would locks have ever reached their present degree of excellence had there been no thieves? Would the making of bank notes have reached its present perfection had there been no forgers? Would the microscope have found its way into the sphere of ordinary commerce . . . but for trading frauds? Doesn’t practical chemistry owe just as much to adulteration of commodities and the efforts to show it up as to the honest zeal of production? Crime through its constantly new methods of attack on property, constantly calls into being new methods of defence, and so is as productive as strikes for the invention of machines. And if one leaves the sphere of private crime: would the world market ever have come into being but for national crime? Indeed, would even the nations have arisen? And hasn’t the Tree of Sin been at the same time the Tree of Knowledge ever since the time of Adam?”

Law as propaganda

There are, of course, a great many branches of law, of which Criminal Law is only one. The question sometimes arises as to why this particular area of law plays such a vital part in ordinary public discussions, is covered so extensively by the mass media, and is always high on political agendas? A proposed change to the perpetuity rule in constructive trusts would not usually be the newspaper editor’s choice for a front page banner headline, whereas a relatively small and technical change in the criminal law or procedure (like the current debate about the right to jury trial) is usually presented as a major item of news. The basic reason for this is that criminal law carries a symbolic and propaganda value as well as being the main set of rules to govern public order. Alan Norrie has pointed to the political use to which the criminal law was put in the 19th century, quoting the 1843 Report of the Criminal Law Commissioners:

“The high and paramount importance of the Criminal Law consists in this consideration, that upon its due operation the enforcement of every other branch of the law . . . depends. [And] there is [no branch] which is so capable of being made intelligible to all classes of persons, or which, in its relations and bearings, is calculated to excite greater attention and interest—none, the knowledge of which can tend more effectually to convince all ranks of Your Majesty’s subjects that the laws are founded on just principles.”

The historian Douglas Hay’s Albion’s Fatal Tree (1977) has also looked at the operation of law in a class context. In his account of Criminal Law Processes in 18th-century England it is Hay’s opinion that “criminal law more than any other social institution made it possible to govern the country without a police force or large army”. He looks at the apparent paradox that this century witnessed—both an enormous expansion in the number of capital offences, but at the same time a weak and declining enforcement of the law with frequent acquittals of defendants on technical grounds as well as frequent pardons or commutations of the death sentence.

Contemporary reformers of that time argued to little avail that property could be better protected and crime more efficiently controlled by a more serious commitment to the detection of crime and to certain but graded punishments. This argues Hay, though seemingly irrational, is explicable if we adopt the perspective that the social function of the criminal law was not the management of crime but the sustenance of the moral authority of the gentry and the creation of a complex and richly articulated system of social relationships of personal dependency that constituted the structure of power. The law was important as gross coercion. But it was equally important, he argued, as ideology. It’s majesty, justice and mercy helped to create the spirit of consent and submission, the “mind—forged manacles” which Blake saw binding the English poor.

Not all rules are law

The Soviet jurist Eugene Pashukanis in his work Law and Marxism: A General Theory (1929) developed a theory of law which saw it as arising from commodity relations. He used an example provided by Marx who analysed exchange in terms of the labour theory of value, albeit that the price-form of commodities extends to cover things which do not contain labour or have no economic function at all, e.g. a rare bird. In much the same way Pashukanis claimed that public law relations, for example criminal law between the state and the individual are simply an extension of forms generated by relations between commodity owners, albeit that the contents of such public law relations are less than adequate to this form.

In bringing out the specific character of legal regulation of behaviour, Pashukanis contrasts it with technical regulation by arguing that in the latter, singleness of purpose can be assumed whereas the basic element in legal regulation is contestation—two sides defending their rights.

Pashukanis illustrates the distinction between technical and legal regulation by assigning to the former such a thing as a railway timetable and to the latter a law concerning the responsibility of the railways to the consignors of freight. Those drawing up the timetable assume that all concerned are interested in the smooth running of the service whereas those parties to the freight contract have an eye to such things as who should suffer the consequences if something gets lost.

Pashukanis (who was liquidated by Stalin in 1937), wrote:

“human conduct can be regulated by the most complex regulations, but the juridical factor in this regulation arises at the point where differentiation and opposition of interests begin”.

In a socialist society, critical decisions affecting whole communities will not, as is so often the case today, be made undemocratically by a Board of Directors meeting privately or by some autocratic state committee as in China or Cuba. Decisions will have to be made democratically by anyone in the community who wishes to participate in the process and vote. Everyone will need to have access to any information they require. There will be no separate economic interests, as now, but there will of course be multifarious social interests. Experts and campaigners will disagree. If that sort of debate and progression through the clash of ideas ever ceases, society will stagnate. Some people will favour more rail transport infrastructure and others will be opposed, some will favour one form of energy development while others will disagree. These disputes will need to be democratically settled according to set procedures not dealt with all over society in a sort of random, capricious, chaotic way according to whatever mode of decision-making happened to prevail in a particular area at a particular time.

In order for this to be done reliably, and in a way which allows all citizens the comfort of knowing in advance of any decision how it will be made and how, if need be, it can be challenged, there will need to be rules. Anyone who thinks that all rules, by definition, are bad would need to ask whether he or she would say, if caught in a hotel fire, “bugger the Fire Rules about the procedures to be followed in the case of a fire, I’m not being dictated to, I’m jumping out the 12th floor window”. Rules are not always made by one person or group to oppress another.

A socialist society will have to operate according to rules. There will be lots of them. Who can practise medicine, who can pilot planes, who can drive cars, what procedures will be required to be followed in order to stop an allegedly incompetent person from practising, the procedures for deciding on whether society wishes to build more roads, and the priorities of using resources will all need to be governed by a democratic process which will require rules. A democratic process is not something you can make up as you go along.

Laws are a consequence of a buying and selling society that casts people in oppositional positions. And as Gerrard Winstanley put it in an early observation in 1649:

“. . . we must make use of gold and silver, as we do other metals, but not to buy and sell withall; for buying and selling is the great cheat that robs and steals the earth from one another. It is that which makes some lords, others beggars, some rulers, others to be ruled; and makes great murderers and thieves to be imprisoners and hangers of little ones, or of sincere hearted men” (“A Declaration from the Poor Oppressed People of England”, in The Law of Freedom and Other Writings, ed. Christopher Hill, 1973, p. 101).

Gary Jay

One law for the rich . . . (1979)

From the August 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

While there are many uses for law, two are fundamental: to enforce and maintain the barrier between those who own property and those who do not, and to perpetuate the illusion that a world of rich and poor is inevitable.

Most workers still have only occasional contact with the law, but when they do it is often a nightmare experience. Every day courts throughout the world haul workers before them and put them through a most degrading experience, treating them like animals — even locking them up in cages.

A common tourist attraction in London is the Old Bailey, one of the traditional sights conveniently near to St. Paul’s, to which it is remarkably similar. The latter is a monument to the cowering of the working class by the means of a very old, but still potent, myth. The former has the same purpose, but uses more direct means of coercion. Whereas most tourists go into St. Paul’s, few bother to enter the Old Bailey. If they did, they would find every day a bizarre sight — members of the working class (the jury) condemning other members of their own class. And for what? Mostly for offences which beside the large-scale crime that goes on every day — the theft by the capitalist class of the wealth produced by the workers — are positively trivial.

In the Thorpe case, for example, a working class jury carefully listened to the arguments, patiently sat through the speeches and (almost on the instructions of the judge) like good dogs, did not bite their masters. Next door, meanwhile, the swindler, bank robber or housebreaker was getting different treatment. Few people were watching, and even the jury who usually convict without too much persuasion were often inattentive. In the magistrates courts where most cases are heard, there is not even a jury. Sometimes magistrates convict on the word of the police alone.

Juries

Historically, there is some evidence to suggest that jurors used to be far more conscious of working class interests. Juries were not always mere sops, dutifully doing as the representatives of the authorities told them. They would frequently refuse to convict, especially where they knew that savage penalties would follow. But it was not just the cases of ‘hung for a lamb’ where juries asserted their independence. Right across the board they would try to redress the balance of savagely repressive laws by acquitting the ‘guilty’ as well as the ‘innocent’. This must not be exaggerated; many a poacher, for example, suffered death or transportation even though poaching was common and in some areas absolutely essential for families to exist at all. But juries, at least on occasions, provided some sort of buffer against the savageries of pre-capitalist and early capitalist legislation.

By contrast, juries now seem more docile. That could mean that the rule of capital has become even more effective as it has increased its insidious power over the minds of those it exploits. But if times are hard, then the efforts to counteract the prevailing ideas must be stronger. No amount of pleading, no amount of reforming, marching, demonstrating is going to alter the fact that capitalism is a society of haves and have-nots, rich and poor, owner and non-owner. From this follow all the problems faced by workers, including problems of spending part of their lives in cells or, in some parts of the world, of being officially murdered on behalf of those whose rule and property some workers appear to threaten. There can be only one verdict on capitalism — guilty: and only one sentence — death.

Ronnie Warrington

Diabolical liberty (1985)

From the June 1985 issue of the Socialist Standard

Is the individual right to go to work during a strike equal to the collective right to strike? This is the issue at the centre of a row within the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL) which resulted in the resignation of Larry Gostin, the General Secretary, four members of its Executive Committee and an Independent Inquiry team appointed to look at the civil liberties implications of the policing of the coal strike. It has also led to reports in the Press that NCCL has been hijacked by the Left, and claims from some NCCL members that, on the contrary, they have stopped the organisation from being dragged off its libertarian course by preventing an unholy alliance with such dubious elements as the uncivil and illiberal right. The latter was the policy that they claimed was advocated by Larry Gostin and his supporters.

NCCL was set up in 1934 as a result of concern about police brutality towards hunger marchers. Its objective as stated in its founding constitution was:

to assist in the maintenance of hard-won rights, especially freedom of speech, the press and assembly, from all infringements by executive or judicial authority contrary to the due process of law, or infringement by the tendency of governmental or other agencies to use their powers at the expense of the precarious liberties for which citizens of this country have fought

and to:

aid in advancing measures for the recovery or enlargement of these liberties (cited in Patricia Hewitt. The NCCL Fifty Years On in Peter Wellington (ed), Civil Liberties 1984. p.15).

Over the years NCCL's activities have included monitoring police behaviour at marches and demonstrations; preparing legal test cases where it is believed that an individual's rights have been abused; setting up enquiries into incidents such as the demonstration in Southall in 1979 which resulted in the death of Blair Peach; campaigns for withdrawal of, or amendments to, legislation which has extended state power such as the Prevention of Terrorism Act and the Police and Criminal Evidence Act.

NCCL has consistently claimed to be an organisation concerned with civil liberties issues rather than with social justice (a point reiterated by Larry Gostin on his resignation). Patricia Hewitt, a former NCCL General Secretary, wrote:

From the outset. NCCL saw its activities as belonging to a specific tradition of civil liberties — the defence of civil and political rights, such as freedom of speech and association, rather than economic and social rights, such as the right to education or a minimum standard of living (Patricia Hewitt, op. cit., p. 16).

It was hoped that by adopting such a position NCCL would be able to cut across party political divisions. But this stance has not. over the years, always proved successful. In 1946 such eminent members as George Orwell and E.M. Forster resigned from NCCL because they believed it was being used as a front organisation for the Communist Party. NCCL's traditional links with the trade union movement have also led to accusations that NCCL is too closely associated with the Labour Party — a view that has gained increasing currency as a result of the recent developments.

The recent controversy, which came to a head at NCCL's AGM, arises from a resolution taken by the 1984 AGM to set up an independent inquiry into the policing of the coal strike. The inquiry's terms of reference were as follows:

To inquire into and thereby establish the fullest possible account and the civil liberties implications of the role of the police, the police authorities and the criminal courts in the events arising from and relating to the NUM dispute, which began in March 1984 (Preface to Civil Liberties and the Miners ' Dispute, First Report of the Independent Inquiry).

In December 1984 the Inquiry team published an interim report which immediately sparked off angry debate within NCCL. While the report was largely critical of the conduct of the police towards striking miners, it also contained the following paragraph:

We accept that the freedom not to take part in a strike is as much a fundamental right as the right to strike. Going to work during a strike is in any case a lawful activity, and like any other lawful activity ought not to be impeded by violence, threats or physical obstruction. We have identified the freedom to travel unhindered for any lawful purpose as a fundamental liberty; this is equally so whether the purpose is peaceful picketing, taking part in a demonstration, or simply going to work (First Report of the Independent Inquiry, p.6.)

It was this equation of the "right to strike" with the "right not to take part in a strike" and the report's comments about the behaviour of both striking and working miners which led to its being condemned as a "Scab's Charter".

At the end of February, NCCL's executive committee passed a number of motions which censured the inquiry team. Firstly, they "regretted" that the independent inquiry "exceeded its terms of reference in commenting on the conduct of striking and working miners and in setting out civil liberty principles which did not directly relate to the role of the police, police authorities and criminal courts". This resolution was upheld by the AGM. Secondly, the executive committee "regretted" that the presentation of the report, and especially its plea that all sides "refrain from violence, intimidation or other actions likely to cause injury or public disorder or provoke unnecessary ill-feeling", was "unnecessarily damaging to the miners' cause". Again this was upheld by the AGM. Thirdly, the executive committee stated that "the right to strike is a fundamental civil liberty and entirely rejects the proposition that those who break strikes are exercising an equally fundamental right". The AGM passed a similarly worded resolution.

Larry Gostin resigned as General Secretary a few days later because, as he wrote in his letter of resignation:

I, of course, respect the democracy of NCCL, but feel I could not publicly defend the full range of NCCL policies in good conscience, and with conviction and credibility. (The Times. 3 May 1985)

What should be made of this controversy? Is it just an internal political battle between different factions within NCCL? While this may be the case, it raises serious questions which are worth examining in greater detail, particularly that of the right to strike versus the right not to strike.

In the context of the coal strike this issue was made more complicated because the NUM did not hold a strike ballot. The miners who continued to work could therefore claim, with some justification, that since they had not been given the opportunity to express their views democratically through a ballot, the only way they could exercise their freedom of "thought, conscience and belief' (a ''right" contained in NCCL's own Charter of Civil Rights and Liberties) was by continuing to work during the strike.

But suppose that a strike ballot had been called and a majority of NUM members had democratically decided to take strike action. What then would be the position of the minority of NUM members who. for whatever reason, disagreed with the strike? One option open to them would be to obey the strike call but not to take part in strike activities. such as picketing, on the grounds that while the individuals concerned did not support this strike they did support their trade union, recognised the importance of trade union solidarity and felt that more damage would be done to the Union as a whole through continuing to work than they would gain as individuals by exercising the "right" to act on conscience.

An alternative, if the "dissenter" within the union felt strongly enough against the strike would be to continue to work, but at the same time to accept both the "right" of strikers to try to persuade him not to cross the picket line during a strike, and also the "right" of the union to decide that such actions were incompatible with union membership.

Both of these positions are equally tenable for a civil libertarian. A majority of delegates at NCCL's AGM decided however that the collective "right" to strike took precedence over the "right" of the individual to carry on working during a strike. Their argument was that the strike weapon — the most effective weapon that workers have against their employers — is undermined if the majority of union members do not support the strike and so their "collective right" can be rendered useless by individuals exercising their "right" to dissent.

One can't avoid the feeling that those who support this position have taken a number of ingredients (as contained in NCCL's Charter) which they like the sound of, mixed them up and have then become disappointed when they can't stomach the resulting cake — that is, that civil liberties, according to their recipe, also apply to people whose actions they find unacceptable. At the AGM they tried to change the recipe by saying that there should be a little more "collective rights" and a little less "individual rights". Several of the cooks of the original cake took offence and resigned.

However, it has not occurred to any of the protagonists as yet that maybe they need a completely new recipe. An organisation like NCCL whose intention is to defend civil liberties (however they are defined) is only necessary in a society in which the "liberties" of citizens can be curtailed by "governmental or other agencies". In most cases this means incursions by the state — the police, courts, army, government — or by those who hold economic power, the capitalist class, against those who are powerless in society. These two institutions, the state and the capitalist class, are not independent of each other. On the contrary, they live in a symbiotic relationship: the capitalist class, the minority who own and control the means of producing wealth in society, require the state to defend and administer their interests and the state would be unable to function without the resources that the capitalist class grants it. NCCL seeks to defend people from what they regard as the unjustifiable use of state power but to do that within the very system — capitalism — which itself creates the need for the state.

The coal strike exposed the diametrically opposed class interests of workers and the capitalist class. Both sides in the dispute expressed these interests in terms of "rights the right of the Coal Board to manage (to close pits that didn't produce enough profit) and the right of NUM members to express their opposition to pit closures by taking strike action. Some miners did not see the dispute in these terms and mistakenly thought that their interests were better served by continuing to work and claimed the "right" to do so.

While organisations like NCCL and the trade union movement can fight to preserve rights we should never forget what the "right to work" and the "right to strike" really mean. The right to work amounts to little more than the right to sell our labour power for a wage or salary so that we and our families can live. It means spending a considerable amount of time engaged in work that we may not enjoy and from which we, as workers, never derive any benefit. The right to strike is one of the few weapons that the working class has at its disposal to use against capital to prevent working conditions and living standards from being driven down still further. It should be used cautiously since it is the weapon of last resort and entails considerable hardship and suffering for workers engaged in strike action.

Where then does this leave NCCL? If it is to be a consistently civil libertarian organisation that applies the principles set out in its constitution and Charter, and works within capitalism without concerning itself with social justice, then it must accept all the contradictions that that will entail and also the possibility of upholding the "rights" of individuals whose views or actions it finds abhorrent.

Perhaps at least some workers among NCCL's members will have been led by this argument to look more closely at the whole issue of civil liberties and to question the value of trying to defend such rights and liberty in the context of a system of society which itself constantly acts as a fetter on the freedom of all workers — that is the freedom to democratically control the society in which we live and the wealth we produce.

Janie Percy-Smith

Letters: Super-nurses (1998)

Letters to the Editors from the November 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

Super-nurses

Dear Editors,

Being a student nurse I had spent the day looking after nine seriously ill patients, together with a junior staff nurse and part-time nursing auxiliary. Most of the patients required help to perform the basic activities of living, some in the terminal stages of illness. Just dealing with the urinary and faecal incontinence was a full-time job,. With the best will in the world, we tried to get basic care completed and to a large degree we somehow managed, needing the ability to do three things at once. Or did we? Struggling to get basic care completed leaves no room for the so-called “holistic” approach required by the models of nursing. The gap between theory and practice is measured in light years.

After a mentally and physically exhausting day I arrive home to be told that Tony Blair is going to introduce the concept of the super nurse. The concept is flawed and ignores the real problems in the NHS. Nurses are not angels or super, just workers seeking meaningful work, doing a job that helps to care for people. a caring attitude that is exploited to get nurses to do as much as possible for as little as possible. The clinical grading system already means that a few nurses are paid higher rtes of pay than the average nurse and it is the higher grades that are now being made redundant at my present hospital, because the Hospital Trust is in the red. If any NHS Trusts can afford the super-nurse it will represent a desirable post for the few and help pit nurse against nurse in the competition of who can achieve the most unpaid overtime or least amount of sickness.

The UKCC code of conduct for nurses requires that they serve the interests of society, to do this nurses need socialism not super status.

M.T., 

Wessex

 

Nothing but the truth

Dear Editors,

Herewith is a short piece which I wrote when serving with the West Midlands Police in the early 80s. I have been prompted to send it to you as the result of reading the short story by Heather Ball in September’s issue of the Socialist Standard.

It was whilst serving with the police that I came to the conclusion that it is the values upon which society is based which creates world-wide dishonesty. The world revolves on dishonesty.

Before giving evidence at any judicial proceedings it is practice to take the Oath or make a sworn affirmation, thereby promising to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth in the name of God, Allah or any other mystical omnipotence that you have been conditioned to have faith in. a sworn affirmation amounts to much the same thing except that the “almighty” is not brought into it.

Having completed this solemn and apparently sincere ritual all that remains to be done, so you might think, is to relate your evidence to the Court as honestly as you can recall . . . but, it doesn’t end there. Having given evidence the witness is then invariably subjected to a verbal flailing form a highly trained advocate with the sole purpose of proving that the witness has, wholly or in part, told anything but the truth. This so called cross-examination has the full backing of the Court and effectively reduces the value of the Oath/affirmation to something akin to the scribblings to be found in most public toilets.

Regardless of any promise to tell the truth the fact remains that the honesty of a witness is not enhanced one jot in the eyes of the Court by taking the Oath. If any value at all was placed on this ritual then there would be no need for the demeaning Court scenes where highly educated and articulate lawyers seek to prove that some hapless (though possibly truthful) witness is telling porkies.

If you or I should be so naïve as to believe that all witnesses, some witnesses or just a few witnesses tell the truth or, are expected to tell the truth, despite having taken the Oath/affirmation, then the procedure in our Courts confirm beyond all reasonable doubt that such a belief is just wishful thinking. So why take the Oath? It certainly doesn’t do anything to elicit the truth and what is more no one expects it to . . . and so the Oath/affirmation is without value and meaningless. Additionally it reduces any concept you might have of God to something less than a scab on a donkey’s ear and the holy scripture might just as well be a pile of second-hand comics.

John Phazey, 

Sutton Coldfield

 

Goldwater

Dear Editors,

Dave Alton (September Socialist Standard) was far too lenient to Barry Goldwater.

In the first place, the word “libertarian” is a gross misnomer for those who advocate capitalism without a welfare state or government intervention in the economy, and we should not use it uncritically. What they actually stand for is slavery—wage slavery. As Dave says, “there can be no liberty to defend until humanity is liberated from capitalism”.

Secondly, Dave claims that Goldwater’s opposition to welfare spending involved “detesting the concept of people becoming dependent upon the state”. Leaving aside the point that most capitalist who spout this stuff are more than happy to accept state subsidies for themselves when they’re available, the fact is that such campaigns are basically designed to cut taxes and so keep up profits. Goldwater of course wasn't opposed to workers being dependent on selling their labour power.

Paul Bennett, 

Manchester

Criminals or victims? (1972)

From the March 1972 issue of the Socialist Standard

In recent months so-called British Justice has frequently been called into question. The main points of contention have been the trials of OZ, Jake Prescott and Ian Purdie of the ‘Angry Brigade’, Pauline Jones, who kidnapped the baby Denise Weller, and the ‘Mangrove Nine’, a group of black immigrants living in Notting Hill. These trials have caused quite a stir in the Press, and several valid points were raised and questions asked by some of the newspapers. For instance, in the OZ trial Judge Argyle said that as the convicted men were not rich a fine would not be relevant, and therefore a prison sentence would be more in order. Some of the newspapers came to the realisation that by this token someone with money could bribe his way out of a prison sentence and that capitalist society was on the side of money, not people!

Jake Prescott was found guilty of conspiracy and sentenced to fifteen years in gaol. His actual crime was addressing three envelopes which contained letters informing the police that certain explosions were the handiwork of the self-styled Angry Brigade. In the Press, especially the underground press, the length of Jake Prescott’s sentence was contrasted to the sentence of two to three years meted out to two youths for throwing a fire bomb into a West Indian party and severely injuring ten black people. The fact that the punishment for the Angry Brigade bombings (which were directed against property) was harsher than the punishment for the injury to the West Indians only goes to show that under capitalism property is always more important than people, as we learned with the thirty year sentences some of the Train Robbers received, while murderers are sometimes freed before serving ten years.

Pauline Jones was sentenced to three years (now reduced to twenty-one months) imprisonment for kidnapping a baby while under mental stress. The Press was quick to point out that this punishment could not benefit the parents of Denise Weller, the kidnapped child, or in any way compensate them for their anguish, or rehabilitate the disturbed Pauline Jones. The papers did not go as far as to say, though they should have, that no one has ever been helped by prison sentences, and that capitalist “justice” is always obsessed with punishment, not rehabilitation, in a crude attempt to protect the position and the property of the ruling class and to keep an innately unworkable system stable. The philosophy is that anyone causing an inconvenience to the maintenance of a profit and property motivated society, whether ideologically, as in the case of OZ, or Prescott, or unknowingly, as in the case of thieves etc., must be restrained as cheaply as possible.

In the early days of capitalism it was simple; people were hanged for all sorts of petty offences. The capitalists could not afford prisons or orphanages to fit the requirements of the age, so destitute adults or children could be hanged for stealing a loaf of bread, or in some cases for vagrancy. Since, however, modern capitalism has found it necessary to engender an educated and versatile working class these old methods are no longer acceptable. Prison and Borstal are the punishment for those whose behaviour is fashioned by their deprived circumstances; for remember, it is rarely that members of the ruling class find their way into penal establishments.

The Mangrove Nine were charged with various offences from assault to disturbing the peace, for their part in a demonstration in Notting Hill. There were allegations of police brutality and deliberate incitement of black people. While many journalists were able to write that perhaps the relationship between the police in Notting Hill and the black immigrants of the area “left much to be desired”, apparently no one realised that this was just another manifestation of the old capitalist maxim “divide and rule”, for while white members of the working class are arguing and fighting with black members of the working class, the working class as a whole will not concentrate on the real problem of abolishing capitalism.

While many valid points were raised in connection with these trials, as is to be expected, the real vital questions were not asked. For instance, there was no enquiry into the role of “justice”, and while the press often sympathised with the accused, no one asked “Why are these people criminals? Is not society to blame in some degree?” As already shown, the role of “justice” is merely to keep the present corrupt system running as smoothly as possible. Although the alleged obscenities of the underground Press are no more than amusing or deliberately sick, the fact that so many of the younger generation spend a good deal of time actively and overtly mocking and rejecting the values of the society they find themselves in, is symptomatic of the fact that that society is in a state of decadence.

When one considers the case of Jake Prescott, one must look again at the environment of the society in which he lives. Although no Socialist could condone bombings as a constructive revolutionary activity, he could quite easily understand what motivates someone of Prescott’s background to unreasoned violence. Prescott has spent his entire life being shunted around from orphanage to foster home to Borstal, to prison, and so on, a victim of the fact that capitalism cannot or will not take care of those who do not fit readily into the normal pattern of things. Capitalism’s need for a mobile working force is not met by the “extended families” and pattern of semi-communal living of the old rural economy and this has given way to the more insular and mobile nuclear family, consisting solely of man, wife and children. Naturally enough there are many who cannot fit into the scheme (the unmarried, old age pensioners whose children have grown up, orphans, illegitimate children), and capitalism being what it is, they have to suffer for it.

Pauline Jones is another victim of the family structure which has been instituted by capitalism. She became pregnant while unmarried; the stigma of this in a nuclear-family based society is enough in itself to cause the greatest anxiety. She then lost the baby through a miscarriage. The resultant psychological instability led to the kidnapping of Denise Weller, and capitalism’s solution to the whole sordid business is to incarcerate Pauline in gaol! The disturbing fact is that, despite the unusually large publicity given to these people, their cases are by no means exceptional. Britain’s gaols are full of people who, like Jake Prescott, have never been given a chance by capitalist society. Britain’s other prisons, the mental asylums, are also full of people for whom the system has been too much. In fact, no one is safe from the corrupting influence of capitalist society. Any child born into a working class family stands a very good chance of facing the authorities charged with some petty offence at some time in his life. Many people will be driven into mental asylums because they cannot fit into society’s “norms”. Sexual deviants, unmarried people, women who are sterile yet would love to help rear children, are all subject to neuroses deriving from their treatment at the hands of capitalism.

Most crimes are directly concerned with money or want, neither of which would exist in Socialist society. Freed from the strictures of the economic unit that is the nuclear family Man would become a far more social animal, and become, in the words of Marx, “Truly human for the first time”. The loneliness, bewilderment with, and hostility towards, society would not exist, and would not therefore, give rise to the many neuroses which lead to crime today. Capitalism is a dangerous system from which no one is safe — the “criminals” of today, including those discussed in this article, are more sinned against than sinning.

J.P.L.

Cases from the Courts (1939)

From the September 1939 issue of the Socialist Standard

Re-Written for the Socialist Standard. (The original reports appeared in the “Evening Standard” of July 3rd and 24th.)

Sambo, the curly-haired negro worker, was not drunk. His work consisted of playing the guitar to theatre queues. But he had stolen one bottle of gin and one of whisky. He was sent to prison for a month.

Another gentleman did not steal any whisky. He did not need to, for he was a company director. The evidence added that he was a good-living, religious man. But he had some whisky at the house of a friend, and was later charged with driving while under the influence of drink. He was fined £5 (which he could afford) and was disqualified from driving for a year.

It will be noticed that Sambo’s offence was one against property. Hence the comparatively severe sentence of a month’s imprisonment. No to turn to the other case. Anyone driving a motor vehicle under the influence of drink is a potential manslaughterer. But human lives under capitalism are not valued very highly. Hence our friend the director got away with a nominal payment plus the inability to drive his own car for a twelvemonth. (Of course, there are chauffeurs!)

Under capitalism it is evidently much better to be a company director than to be a queue musician. We hope that Sambo, after his month’s rest cure, will line up for the blood transfusion test.

An old man, 76, entered the court. He was charged with being poor. The technical charge was “wandering and failing to give a satisfactory account of himself.” A policeman had found him sleeping on a bench in a park close to Mayfair. Asked if he had any money, he said, “No.” The policeman invited him to go to the London County Council institution at Charing Cross, but he re­fused to go, saying, “We don’t get enough to eat there.” (What do you say to that, Herbert Morrison?) In court it was disclosed that he lied when he said he had no money on him. Actually, he had twopence and a pair of scissors ! Nothing else. “A week in custody won’t do him any harm,” said the magistrate. So that was the end of Edward—for the time being. Capitalism—and the Law—had got out of their quandary.

This was the case of a man who, despite his poverty, had declined to be regimented into the meshes of the P.A.C., and preferred the compara­tive liberty of the streets, the parks, the pubs., and the police courts. Capitalism, however, is such that a poverty-stricken old man cannot choose the three former to the exclusion of the latter. Notice, inci­dentally, how he was not even allowed to sleep in peace in a public park.

Ramo.

It’s a bloody crime – or is it? (2007)

From the May 2007 issue of the Socialist Standard

   “The law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest. That would seriously interfere with business” (Clarence Darrow).

The man in front of me in the bus said to his companion “You know, it’s a bloody crime!” He was obviously referring to the front page story in the evening newspaper which he was holding and which I had read earlier.

The story referred to a sick child who needed intensive care. The hospitals locally and elsewhere had been canvassed by medical staff for an intensive care cot but none were available. Last year, given the same level of demand, a cot would have been available but pressure on NHS funding had necessitated cuts in services. The child died, a newshound got a story and the grieving parents were left to wonder why.

But the man in front of me on the bus was wrong; it was not a crime. In fact he was using the term ‘crime’, as many do, as a designation for something that is obviously wrong or bad or evil and these qualities are not necessarily the considerations that determine what is and what is not a crime.

Crime is a transgression of the laws governing particular societies; specifically rules usually endorsed by a ruling executive that, in a political democracy, has been elected by the people or, in a dictatorship, has amassed sufficient coercive power to impose its authority upon the people.

Laws or rules of behaviour

It need hardly be said that whatever the form of society some form of behavioural rules or mores are necessary; equally, of course, the form of society we live in creates the conditions that determine the need for specific rules. Society is continually evolving and it is this evolution that continually creates the need for ruling executives amending existing laws and passing new laws to meet the exigencies created by new situations like, for example, the social implications of technological advances in automotive transport.

Much of this form of legislation should be straightforward, at least in motive; if people driving cars did not abide by defined regulations road accidents would increase incalculably. If anyone was allowed to pilot an aircraft there would be frequent air disasters. Unfortunately, in our present society, interests outside the province of safety can impact on the lawmakers. The vast wealth of vehicle manufacturers, petroleum refiners, civil engineering contractors, et al, can be used, and is used, to ensure that as far as possible their specific interests are not adversely affected and such interests are rarely in the general interest. It would be difficult to think of any new regulation, even one patently beneficial to the general good, like restrictions on passive smoking, that will not find opposition from some commercial interest.

Arising from property

The overwhelming body of laws in all countries today are not primarily concerned with public health, public safety or public well-being. They are concerned with property in all its forms; with the endorsement, protection and conveyance of possessions. In fact, the greatest volume of law, the millions of pages of legislation, the myriad volumes of case law, is based on relationships arising from the existence of property.

The whole legal circuses, clown-attired judges, wigged councillors, solicitors, the solemn decorum of the courts, the years of legal study and practice behind the imposing façade of erudition, these are not necessarily concerned with acts that are in themselves bad or injurious to people nor are they faithful to some abstract principles of good and evil. The entire fabric of what is absurdly known in the United Kingdom as ‘the Queen’s justice’ or elsewhere as State Justice is solidly founded on the appalling injustice of property society; specifically today, the Laws of capitalism and the Order necessary to allow for the smooth functioning of those Laws.

The French anarchist, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, affirmed that ’Property is theft!’ He was, like the man on the bus, wrong. The act of theft is a crime but the possession of property rather than being a crime is lauded by the major religions and is the very foundation of capitalist civilisation.

The cornerstone of freedom

Inevitably, in a property society people will aspire to ownership and those who claim that the right to property is the cornerstone of freedom often cite this aspiration as proof that capitalism conforms with the natural order of things. But the capitalists and their political defenders are not promoting some unworkable concept of equality within a property society nor are they referring to the right of every citizen to a home and such personal appurtenances as reflect the material needs of everyone in the pursuit of a full and happy life.

What the capitalists and the political advocates of capitalism effectively promote is the legal right of a minority class of people to own and/or control the machinery of production and distribution; the land, the factories, mills, mines, warehouses; in fact the resources of nature and the machinery and tools used by the working class to produce all the vital goods and services needed to sustain the whole of society.

It is the Law that enforces the right of a minority to use its ownership to take possession of all the goods and services produced by those who labour by hand or brain in exchange for a wage or salary that restricts the overwhelming majority of workers to conditions of relative poverty or dire want. It is in fact capitalism’s law that confers on the working class the apt designation of wage slaves.

But the effects of this much-vaunted ‘cornerstone of freedom’ do not end there. Ownership of the means of production and distribution also gives the capitalist class the right to embargo any productive activity that does not hold out for the owning class the promise of profit. Additionally, in today’s world, technology has facilitated the mobility of capital thus gifting to the capitalists the ability to locate wherever the rate of profit is most beneficial to them irrespective of the hardships they impose by unemployment on the workers whose labour is already enshrined in the fortunes of the capitalists.

Additionally, this mobility has given capital an effective weapon in enfeebling trade unions and resisting wage claims with the threat of re-locating plant where the slaves are paid less.

Majestic equality

Behind capitalism’s legal system is its vast array of coercion; ultimately the armed forces of the state but more usually police forces, judges, magistrates, lawyers and jailers. We hear about their work through the media; overladen, they toil diligently as a vast conveyor belt of capitalist justice, keeping vandals and villains and thieves and robbers off the streets; stuffing the jails to overcapacity. Essentially virtuous in their majestic equality.

The French writer, Anatole France, perhaps better than most exposes the vacuity of capitalism’s legal charade when he said:

  “The Law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to beg in the streets, sleep in the parks or to steal bread”.

Reality means that we live in conditions determined by capitalism and it is those conditions that almost without exception create the circumstances in which all forms of crime occur. In the past the power of the cop and the judge, unquestioning instruments of class justice, were reinforced by the fictions of religion and the Ten Commandments.

In today’s world the sins of the gods, like the legal misdeeds of the rich are increasingly evident. None would challenge the observation of the eminent American civil rights lawyer, Clarence Darrow – he of the famous ’Monkey’ trial – that “the law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest. That would seriously interfere with business”.

The Order that capitalism needs to underpin its Law is showing evident signs of breakdown. The hired hands that the system needs in the political system and the pensioned media to maintain its rotten values scream for ever more laws, ever greater penalties, against the evidence that crime is a reflection of capitalism and will remain as long as that system does.

Richard Montague

It was reported . . . (1983)

From the May 1983 issue of the Socialist Standard

The same offence, at the same store, tried at the same Court

“A young woman who stole another woman’s handbag whilst in Harrods was given a suspended sentence at Horseferry Road Court. Miss Cathleen Mullins, 24, unemployed, admitted stealing a handbag and contents worth together £268. The Officer told the court that Miss Mullins had been jobless since 1979 due to illness. . . Explaining why Miss Mullins had not worked for such a long time, the lawyer said that she had been the victim of a ‘vicious knife attack’ in which she had received 380 stitches and that as a result she still suffers from headaches.”

“Charges against a High Court judge’s wife of shoplifting have been dropped following a hearing held in camera. Lady Lavinia Dorothy Nourse, 39 years old wife of Mr. Justice Nourse, was arrested at Harrods . . . She was bailed to appear at Horseferry Road Magistrates’ Court last week, but before the court was opened to the public, an application was made in camera and the charges were withdrawn . . . Lady Lavinia had been charged with stealing two handbags, two pearl necklaces and five belts, worth together £358.40 from Harrods. She had also been accused of stealing two carpets worth together £190 from the store on the same date. It is believed the charges were dropped on medical grounds."

Marylebone Mercury

The rich widen the gap

“'The gap between rich and the unemployed has widened dramatically over the period of Sir Geoffrey Howe’s five budgets. This is shown by a special study commissioned by the Sunday Times from the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies. A typical company director on £45.000 a year has enjoyed a £120 a week rise in his real take-home pay under Howe, an increase of a quarter. By contrast a typical man without a job is worse off by £15.30 a week, a 21.3 per cent fall in his real income. . . The company director’s good fortune continues with this Budget, which gives him an extra £11.64 a week, compared with a gain of only 58p for the unemployed man," Sunday Times. 20 March, 1983

“Referring to reports that a woman earned less than 78p an hour for cleaning the home of Mr. Ian MacGregor, chairman of British Steel, Mr. Bottomley said ‘With his British Steel salary of £48,500, you would have thought there would be a little more flexibility in what the market could pay for her services’.”

Yesterday in Parliament,  Daily Telegraph, 19 March, 1983.

Greasy Pole: Court in the Act (2001)

The Greasy Pole column from the January 2001 issue of the Socialist Standard

Dominic came up the steps from the cells, which were airless and gloomy, and stood blinking and smiling in the glare from the tall windows across from the dock in Court Number One. He smiled because he had long ago learned how useful it was. He knew that a smile could open doors, defuse anger, evade awkward questions about your past. With a bit of luck it might even get you off a charge of shoplifting.

Today was not his lucky day. Looking down on him was a single magistrate instead of the three who usually sat on that bench. This was a stipendiary magistrate—a qualified lawyer paid to dish out what people like Dominic have to call justice. Stipendiaries work much faster than lay magistrates; for one thing they don’t need the Court Clerk forever instructing them in the law or interfering in their deliberations. Operating singly means they never have to endure any tedious arguments about guilt or sentence. In some courts they give out their decisions with intimidating speed.

There is an assumption that stipendiaries are not only objectively infallible but uniformly so. Reality is rather different. A punitive stipendiary can create a type of havoc in the Court. There was one who would sit hunched vulture-like over the bench positively stating his public display of prejudice against offenders. The sentences he handed down, and what he said to the poor wretches in the dock as he did so, showed the hatred he nurtured for anyone who transgressed the sacred laws of property. There was however a marked exception to this; anyone who stole from a public house or an off-licence—even if it was while they were working there in what is called a “position of trust” (as if all employees don’t have to be “trusted” by the employers to make profits) could hope for a lenient sentence. This was because the stipendiary seemed to hate alcohol even more than he did criminals.

Another stipendiary who was notorious for his passion to imprison people surprised everyone in his Court when he allowed a mentally disturbed man to go free on bail. Shortly afterwards the man’s behaviour at his home was disturbed enough for someone to call the police. A policewoman burst through the barricaded door and as she did so the man stabbed her to death.

The magistrate looking down on Dominic was not likely to make such a mistake. He was straight and square and predictable. He always listened carefully to everything said in his Court and his decisions were always strictly in line with the law and the offence he was dealing with. This was not a good omen for Dominic, who had been caught as he was about to leave a shop with a load of CDs in a plastic shopping bag lined with foil to avoid detection at the electronically monitored exit.

The Clerk asked Dominic his name and date of birth and address. He was, he said, of No Fixed Abode. Then the Clerk gabbled a sort of catechism about how Dominic intended to plead and if he intended to plead guilty that would be taken as a plea of guilty and the case would go ahead there and then. Unlike a lot of defendants, Dominic understood this straightaway. A sure way to delay a case is to say you will plead not guilty to the charge; the snag is that if you eventually admit it you will not get the discount on a sentence which Courts can give for a first-time guilty plea. This is part of the government’s strategy to speed up the processing of defendants by the Courts; faster means cheaper.

Dominic was represented by a barrister, a young woman who was keen and caring and clearly captivated by his smile and his posh accent but who now squirmed with embarrassment as he faltered and stuttered that he did not know how he should plead because he had not actually left the shop with the CDs, which meant the Court would have to acquit him of theft. The Theft Act of 1968 was designed to clear up some confusion on this score, after the rise of the supermarkets had killed off the shops where customers were served by assistants who, however much more expensive for the shop, at least prevented shoplifting, which boomed when excited thieves misinterpreted the term self-service. The Act laid it down that the offence of theft was the taking of someone else’s property with the intention of permanently depriving them of it. In the case of shoplifting, after a few test cases, this meant that to make a charge of theft stick the shoplifter had to leave the shop with the stolen goods.

Dominic’s hesitation showed that he was not optimistic about getting away with this. In any case the magistrate curtly informed him that he was misinterpreting the law. So he smiled and pleaded guilty and his barrister sighed with the relief of not having to put so leaky a defence to so stony faced a stipendiary. Just how leaky was revealed by the Crown Prosecution solicitor’s description of the foil lined bag and how when Dominic was approached by the shop staff he had thrown the CDs on the floor. And then came the clincher; he was, she said, “known”—a euphemism for having a criminal record. Just how much of one was apparent when she peeled off from her file a thickish wad of paper which listed Dominic’s attempts to beat the property system through his own unaided efforts. There were 32 previous Court appearances for shoplifting, which represented those which Dominic had not been able to get away with. The stipendiary silently studied the list, as Dominic’s smile faded.

There was not much the barrister could say, except that Dominic was addicted to hard drugs and stole to support his habit—which may not have been true and in any case did not soften the magistrate’s attitude. In fact it seemed to persuade him that a prison sentence was unavoidable, which meant that the case had to be delayed while a Probation Officer wrote a report. “And what about bail?” asked the stipendiary wearily, knowing that the nice barrister would take time in applying, without a shred of realistic hope, for Dominic to be back on the streets and in the shops. Her best efforts were undermined when the magistrate raised his eyes from the list of Dominic’s offences to point out that he operated under 14 aliases and 12 different dates of birth. The gaoler guarding the dock expectantly fingered his keys and Dominic, still smiling, went back down into the unwelcoming cells.

Everyone had done their job. The Court had protected the property rights which this social system is based on. The prosecution had got all their papers in order so that the case against Dominic could be briefly and pointedly put. The magistrate had asserted that capitalism sanctions only one type of theft and that is not the one tried by Dominic. The defence barrister had done her futile best, like a lot of people who are uncomfortable when they are up against the reality of class society, to make the system work in a slightly less inhumane way. Dominic had played his part, with his calculated manipulation of the case, to discredit the whole business. What a pity none of them knew what they were really doing and why and what it means to human society.

Ivan