Editorial: Progress ! (1907)

Editorial from the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

The 1905 criminal statistics recently issued from the Home Office show that while there is a decline in convictions for drunkenness, manslaughter, bigamy and malicious wounding, there is nevertheless a significant increase in burglaries and crimes against property with violence. Sir John Macdonell says in his summary : “The enormous preponderance of crimes against property is remarkable : nearly nine-tenths of the whole fall every year within that category.”

Indictable offences have increased from a yearly average of 51,612 during 1896-1900 to 61,463 in 1905. While, instead of drink being the cause of crime, drunkenness has declined while crime has increased. The statistics are eloquent of the dependence of crime on economic conditions, the increase in crime coinciding with greater distress and unemployment among the people. The accumulation of property into few hands and the corresponding lack of the means of existence among the many lead irresistibly to what are called crimes against property, and the Socialist is not surprised to find that the year of acutest distress and unemployment among the workers was at the same time “a record year of National Prosperity.”

Truly there is progress and prosperity, but it is not for the workers—yet; and instead of the class cleavage becoming less marked it daily grows wider.

To abolish the contradictions and antagonisms of interest that exist, the working class must gain control of Society and dispossess the owners of capital so that unity of interest may be secured by the participation of all in production. Those, however, who think of securing the support of those whose superior position depends upon the slavery of the workers, must, if honest, be ignorant of the lessons of history and of everyday experience.

Thus Mr. Keir Hardie tried to assure the Cambridge undergraduates recently that “Socialism was not a class movement.” “Down with it!” they cried. “Many of the Socialists’ most enthusiastic advocates are university men,” shouted Keir Hardie. “Shame!” howled the undergraduates. “These men and women from the middle and upper classes realise that there is something more sacred than property,” continued Hardie. “Rot!” yelled the gownsmen ; and there is no doubt that the undergraduates differ in no essential from the generality of their class.

Blogger's Note:

This is the 19,000 post on the blog. It begs the question: will I hit 20,000 before the end of the year? Stick around to find out.

Editorial: The Sweets of Rusticity ! (1907)

Editorial from the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

A recent enquiry into the housing conditions of a small Hertfordshire village, known as Chipperfield has apparently been greatly agitating the Daily News and our pro-stock exchange, anti-gambling, nonconformist contemporary is of course mightily shocked at the revelations which have been made as to the unhappy state in which the villagers,—or some of them—exist so far as their lodgement is concerned. Most of the houses in which the agriculturist (the backbone of England’s greatness—see Tariff Reform Handbook) has his abode, have no sanitary conveniences ; many of them are in bad repair (in one case it is alleged that the happy tenant would go to bed on wet nights with an umbrella up !) and there is the usual scarcity with its inevitable overcrowding and comparatively high rents.

Excepting, perhaps, the somewhat novel feature of an umbrella protected bedroom, these are not unusual features of village life. Few villages indeed can boast of being free from all of them. They are just complementary to the private ownership of the land and housing accommodation, and there is no adequate and final remedy apart from the complete abolition of such private ownership and the extirpation of the capitalist and land-owning class. Conceivably the local authority could erect sanitary and well constructed houses even under present conditions, but as the obsession peculiar to local authorities is comprised in the necessity for showing a profit on any work of this character they may undertake, and as the great labour statesman at the head of the Local Government department has expressed his strong disapproval of any suggestion of increased indebtedness (and thereby earned the “well done good and faithful servant” of his capitalist paymasters) it is hardly conceivable, under present conditions, that the local authority would let any house erected by them at a rental within the possibilities of the agriculturist’s attenuated purse.

What generally happens is that houses are erected ostensibly for those in want of them, and let to those for whom they are not supposed to be intended, because these last only are in a position to pay the rental demanded. That is to say that in practice the Housing of the Working Classes Act is, like most other capitalist “working-class” Acts—a fraud.

The agriculturists of Chipperfield and elsewhere will therefore—unless it suggests itself as it very well may to the local authority or local landowner as good business to lose a little on the swings in order to get it back on the round-abouts—have to continue pigging together until such time as better housing accommodation is thrown to them as a sop to stay their conscious progress toward that Socialism which is the only sure cure for housing and other economic ills. Hopeless though it may seem, the agriculturist will have to organise himself in company with his town bred fellow for the overthrow of capitalist domination. There is no other way.

In Defence of Property. (1907)

Book Review from the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

“Socialism: Its Fallacies and Dangers.” A collection of papers edited by Frederick Millar. Published by Watts & Co. for the “Liberty and Property Defence League.”

“Let us jealously watch the encroachments of the State, and never suffer it to become more than a watchdog.” Such appears to be the political doctrine of the band of belated individualists who are responsible for this book, for they include and condemn under the name of Socialism practically all State activity other than that of the mere policeman. Since, however, the propertied class has in its own interests been compelled to add to the State many other functions than that of the “watch-dog,” it is hardly necessary to consider the question at issue as being individualism versus collectivism at all, but rather as being—the class which lives by labour versus the class which lives by ownership, and whether those who produce should not own and control the product.

To those who seek a clear and useful criticism of Socialist principles the book under review will be disappointing. The facts of industrial evolution are not appreciated. The significance of the huge company and combine, where great and complicated branches of industry are run by hireling workers for absentee shareholders, is not taken into account. Nor is it recognised that industry is developing to the point at which the workers’ choice lies only between the oppressive collectivism of the trust or capitalist State for the profit of a few, and the collectivism of democracy for the benefit of all united in producing. The writers place themselves athwart the economic trend, and though as modern Mrs. Partingtons they may be excellent at a slop or a puddle, yet, trundle their mops as they will, they can hardly succeed in checking the rising Atlantic of economic development.

That there are misrepresentations is to be expected from such a source. Thus on page 17 we meet our old and hoary friend, “Sharing Out,” Socialism being referred to as the “confiscation and division of the national income.” It is also stated that Socialists “maintain that if a man lives in the house of another man, it is an extortion to ask him to pay a rent.” But the scientific Socialist knows that, apart from what is called economic rent, house rent is but the price of a commodity that, like every other commodity, tends to exchange at its value, which already includes its proportion of unpaid labour. The Socialist, therefore, holds that the robbery of the worker really takes place in the factory, not on the market.

Those who go into the highways and byways facing the opposition and abuse of the ignorant and the interested, and who, in their championship of the workers against oppression and robbery, brave the malice and persecution of the defenders of property, are told on page 24 that “The root of Socialism is cowardice. Here is the real source of the whole movement. It is the whine and the dream of the weaklings’ base fear of rivalry, of competition. It is the duty of real men to circumvent and defeat, by war if necessary, by invasion if necessary, by conquest if necessary, by extermination if necessary, the despicable effeminacy of creatures unworthy of the name of men, because they fear to carry on the competitive struggle in which the true life of manhood consists. The Socialist movement is popular because it appeals to these numerous creatures ; panders to their baseness ; promises them what they would be ashamed to desire or seek if they were men.”

Socialism and the Family.

Next comes the war-cry of the pro-property hypocrite,—”Socialism means the abolition of family life.” On this subject the defenders of that class whose heroes fill the divorce courts and whose morals are said to be “of the poultry yard,” have only vague innuendo and misrepresentation to offer. But what are the simple facts ? The family life of the workers is being destroyed by capitalism through the man, wife and child being forced into the factory to earn the daily bread; and where the home life remains it too often spells brutalising drudgery and ill-temper, owing to the poverty of the wage earner and the great waste of labour entailed by the individual household. The tremendous saving in drudgery that the co-operative household under Socialism will allow, the improvement in comfort, health, and happiness that it will bring, leave no room for doubt regarding the future of the home, while should any prefer the greater labour and discomfort of the old style, they would certainly be allowed to please themselves.

But what of the relations of men and women ? The Socialist knows that the methods of obtaining the material living, and the social order essential thereto, form the foundations of the moral and intellectual life of the time; and that with the changing economic foundation, not only must the relations of individuals to each other change, but their ideas also. The history of family life affords a striking example of this. As Prof. Jenks points out, permanent marriage had its origin in patriarchal society, and was due to no improvement in morality, but to the necessities of the pastoral pursuits of the man, and to his desire to secure for himself exclusively the labour of the woman and her offspring. The wife was bought or captured, and the children were valuable articles of merchandise. The very word “family” is derived from an old Italian word, famel, meaning a slave.

From its origin in the institution of property the marriage relationship has reflected the changing needs of property. Children are no longer chattels or assets in the old sense ; they are “encumbrances,” and paterfamilias’ former power of life and death over his household is now restricted to very meagre dimensions. The present marriage contract expresses the needs of the economic dependence of women and children on the man, and becomes an instrument for the control and transmission of property. Mutual affection is quite subordinated to questions of property and income, with the consequent outcrop of hypocrisy, adultery, and unhappiness. While on the one hand the number of men who do not marry is made greater by the insecurity of their lot, on the other hand the number of women who sell themselves on the streets is increased by the inability of many to obtain otherwise even the bare necessaries of life.

But when socialisation ends the reign of capitalist property and insecurity, when woman has economic equality with man, and the fear for the children’s future is ended by communal life, then the relationship between the sexes ceases to be a property one and becomes human ; and who can doubt that modern forms must alter with such change of circumstances, and that the matrimonial market and property contract, with the buying and selling of cohabitation for title and income, must, together with the corollaries of prostitution and domestic misery, become mere memories of a dark past. Who can doubt that the relations between man and woman, when freed of the demoralising influence of economic inequality and vicious social surroundings, will be healthier and purer than ever before being based no longer on a property transaction or economic compulsion, but upon mutual affection. Yet we are told, among much other nonsense on page 29 of the book under review, that under Socialism “the union of men and women would be an affair of the State, not of mutual regard” !

The Intellectual Few.

On page 54 the reader is told, “the more the origin of wealth is enquired into, the more clearly will the truth appear that wealth is caused by the intelligence of the few, as distinguished from the labour of the many.” Now even if this were so it would not bear the inference that the propertied class are the intellectual few reaping the reward of their intellectual labour, for the wealth of the few is accumulated from the purchase and exploitation of both “manual” and “intellectual” workers. But what is the truth regarding the wonderful inventions and improvements which have occurred in industrial processes ? Have a series of supermen arisen to produce at each stroke a great wage-saving improvement ? Herbert Spencer himself has exploded the “great man” theory, and has shown that the great man is the product of his age, whilst the history of industry shows that nearly all improvements have been the result of an accumulation of small inventions which up to a certain point were ignored or despised, in spite of their possibilities, because they were not immediately cheaper to work than the older methods. But a last slight improvement, based upon and supplementing the labour of those who had gone before, rendered the new process more profitable than the former methods, and rapidly the features of that industry became transformed. In 1857, Hodge, before a Commission said : “Present spinning machinery is supposed to be a compound of about 800 inventions. The present carding machinery is a compound of about 60 patents.”

And those who wrought these improvements, were they rewarded ? And were they members of our amazingly intellectual ruling class ? They were, indeed, rawly rewarded, while it is almost entirely from men of the working class that the leading inventions have come. J. Burnley, in “The Story of British Trade and Industry,” says, “It is a notable fact that the leading inventors of the latter half of the eighteenth century were of the artizan class—humble workers who, in their cottages and little improvised workshops, quietly worked out the mechanical problems which achieved so much for the world, if not for themselves.”

John Kay, after inventing the fly shuttle, died a pauper at the end of a few years of ineffectual struggle. Wyatt, who after three years of close effort produced a machine which “spun the first thread of cotton ever produced without the intervention of human fingers,” was poor, and allied himself with Lewis Paul, of Birmingham, who promised to finance the invention. Wyatt, however, never benefited by it, for nothing came of the idea until Arkwright revised it at a later date. Another poor inventor, Crompton, set himself to combine the spinning jenny and the water frame. It took him five years of secret experiment, but he eventually succeeded and for a while quietly used his improvement in his own work. Crompton, however, was asked how he managed to spin such fine yarn ; he then let the manufacturers into the secret on their subscribing about £50. The firm of which Sir Robert Peel, the grandfather of the statesman, was principal, were the first to make big profits out of the invention, making their machines after Crompton’s model. Soon millions of the spindles were working, but Crompton died a few years later in extreme poverty. Such is, indeed, the usual answer of capitalist practice to capitalist theory. The brains of the workers are picked, and their bodily strength exhausted, in order to increase the wealth of those who own the means of living.

The whole argument that “wealth is due to the intelligence of the few” is, in reality, nonsensical. There is no intellectual labour without some degree of manual labour, and no manual labour, however mechanical, that does not imply intellectual labour also. The marketable wealth of the world is not produced otherwise than by labour, intellectual and manual; yet the fact remains that it is a non-producing class who, by their ownership of the means whereby wealth is created, and by their control of political power, are enabled to compel the people to carry on production for them, and to hand over to them all the enormous surplus that remains when the bare necessities of the producers have been grudgingly provided for.

And it is in defence of the title of this owning class to the wealth created by others, that the book under review is published. Well does the League that is responsible for the book deserve to be called, as it is by many working men, the Liberty to Rob Defence League.

F. C.Watts

Blogger's Note:

There isn't a lot of information about Frederick Millar on the net, but he does get a few mentions in Edward Bristow's 1975 article, 'The Liberty and Property Defence League and Individualism', which was published in The Historical Journal.

Doubts and Difficulties: Why Every Other Party is Hostile to the S.P.G.B. (1907)

Letter to the Editors from the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

Jan. 7th, 1907.

To the Executive of the S.P.G.B.

Whilst thanking you for the courtesy with which your contributor dealt with my “Doubts and Difficulties” in the December issue, I beg leave to put one or two more points. In the first place allow me to say that when I stated that I accepted your Declaration of Principles as a sound basis of waging the class struggle, I did not accept that portion of it which, it now appears, declares war on other Socialists,—because they are not of your party ; but because it was hostile, as I then understood it, to the two capitalist parties. Truly the S.D.F., the I.L.P., and the Fabian Society are political parties; but they are avowed Socialist Parties. The Liberal and Tory Parties are not. You must admit that when they take on themselves the title of “Socialist,” they all have one end in view, viz., the common ownership of all the forces requisite for man’s necessity. But the capitalist parties never advocate such measures. That to me is where the whole difference lies. The quarrel between Socialists appears to me as ridiculous as the sham-fighting between Liberal and Tory. There is no difference between their interests ; and where is the difference of interest with Socialists ? There can only be a difference of tactics. Therefore if you cannot conscientiously help other Socialist parties why not cease to hamper the little good they may be doing ; and instead, use the time, space and energy in fighting the capitalists, and exposing their alluring promises, etc. It would at least keep the issue clearer.

My respondent does not think I am justified in saying that you should recognise everybody and everything making for Socialism. I did not say that. The next sentence is thus : “We fully recognise that every action of every party, person, or economic force is making for Socialism.” Then, how can you say you do not ? Now, I said, “assist everyone aiming at . . Socialism . . irrespective of party or religion, etc.” “Economicus” then asks, ”How are we to recognise them ?” Why by respect and toleration, if not help.

My replier owes his conversion to Herbert Spencer and asks how is he to be recognised, and his types. Well, I suggest you should recognise him by advising others to read his works also, pointing out that he was only a learned philosopher, not an infallible god ; for if one intelligent man can be brought to the light that way, why not others ? Tell the people to read all sides ; the truth never suffers, and the more sure the result. Intelligent Socialists are not made by reading socialistic literature alone, but by thinking broadly on all subjects.

You say you do not attack Socialists of the S.D.F. because they are such. But, where there is a meeting, your party, instead of keeping quiet and hearing if the speaker is unscientific, get up in deliberate opposition, as though he were a fraud, while he may be a more able speaker, temporally, than your own supporter. One of the crowd hears both speakers, and can’t for the life of him make out what the two parties exist for, much less what the quarrel is.

But I must not intrude on your generosity for space. There are many points I should have, liked to have contested in the reply, but I refrain. But I put this to you : would it be wise for me to leave my trade society, and start another on my own account, because I did not get satisfaction for my endeavours, great or small ? Would it not be better to remain inside, and by persistent propaganda in the branch, monthly report, or workshop, try to secure a majority of those who think as I do, and thereby alter the government of it ?

That is how I look at the action of your party ; to say nothing of the split that has occurred, as I foreshadowed in my previous letter. Verily, to accomplish Socialism—make Socialists. For Socialism, to be successful, must be directed by intelligence ; but the bulk of the people are ignorant, and to place ignorance in power would be to establish a system more terrible and tyrannical than the present. Therefore, however much you may disagree with what you term palliatives, such as feeding the children before “educating” them, healthier dwellings, municipal buildings, shorter hours, increase of wages, etc., bear in mind that most of them are economic advances ; and only by this means will the people gradually become intellectually, morally, and physically fit to wield the power they will possess, safely, securely and permanently. It will take a long time, but slowly and surely the race will be run.

Yours very fraternally,

Fredk. W. Tod.

92, Duckett Road, 

Harringay.

Reply:

The break down of the feudal system of wealth production was necessitated by the growth within it of a new system of production under which the worker was divorced from his means of production. The new society evolved from the old and worked at first harmoniously with it, but a time came when the forces of the new industrial system were hindered by, and became antagonistic to, the powers of the old. An inevitable struggle ensued and, inevitably, the old society had to go.

* * *

The new mode of production brought in its train an entire revolution in the conceptions of mankind arising from entirely fresh conditions of wealth production. The development of this society, with its introduction of machine produced wealth, its dependence of the worker upon the owner of the machine, its placing political power in the hands of the machine-owning or capitalist class, has gone with the development of the antagonisms latent within it. Machine owner against wage worker, profit against wages, capitalist class against working-class interest—these oppositions. made necessary the growth of a working-class political party fighting against the ruling powers controlling the administration. of the nation.

* * *

Such a political party of the workers made necessary by the oppositions of class must have as an objective the capturing the political machine. But to what purpose ? So as to so administer the affairs of the community that every man should be ranked among the workers and that the production of wealth and its distribution should be socially controlled in the interest and for the welfare of the whole people.

* * *

Such a party must be a Socialist party. Further, it must be a working-class party. Only the working class can work out working-class emancipation. The past history of class warfare shows that political power is wrested by each successive class in the social strata which then absorbs within itself the former ruling class and refuses to share its power with the class below. Only one class now remains the working class—and it, too, must finally wrest power from the hands of the capitalist class and thereby absorbing that class, secure the abolition of all class. This strife for dominion can end only when classes have ceased to be.

* * *

The class strife, of which I have just spoken, must be mainly political, but alongside the political struggle must go pari passu the economic organisation of the working class. On such field of the struggle they must be prepared. The class strife manifests itself in a struggle on the political plane which involves the building up of a political organisation prepared to capture all the powers of government.

* * *

Being a class struggle nothing can be hoped for from either of the capitalist political parties. Hence any alliance or agreement with them must necessarily hinder the emancipation of the working class and confuse the class issue. Whether such an alliance or agreement is entered into in local or in national politics the end to be gained, even if gained, must remain of less importance than the keeping a clear class issue before the working class.

* * *

We have therefore to recognise (1) a class strife, manifesting itself in (2) a politico-economic struggle for power on the part of the workers, necessitating (3) a Socialist Parliamentary political party fighting for Socialism and for all that Socialism implies. This fight must be without hope of aid from the other political parties whose interests harmonise with the maintenance of the present class society. We have also to recognise the impossibility of securing the palliation of the present capitalist society, except at the hands of a Socialist Party Government. When you have a Socialist Party Government in power you will find that they do not mean to allow the capitalist regime to exist sufficiently long to need palliation. They will rear a new society rather than patch up an old ; revolutionise and not reform.

* * *

Any political party, then, call it by whatsoever name you will, which has a palliative programme is a party which seeks the assistance of a political party of capitalist texture. They can only carry any palliative measure on their programme by the aid of the capitalist government. To have such a hope says little for their understanding of the class war. Such a programme is the first step towards alliances and agreements, and we cannot, therefore, experience much surprise when we find that every political party other than The Socialist Party of Great Britain has entered into such alliances and agreements. Such parties are a danger to the Socialist movement in this country and must be opposed and exposed.

* * *

It is of no avail asking why we could not have remained in this or the other party with a view to rectifying their errors. We have made every possible effort in that direction but have signally failed. We know that there are many earnest, self-sacrificing Socialists in those parties among the rank and file, but so long as they support their present parties their Socialism is of little utility to the furtherance of Socialism in this country.

* * *

Again we criticise the actions of those parties and of the members of those parties in detail—and apart from their erroneous basic principles—whenever we find them inconsistent with Socialism. We criticise, not so much from any expectation that they will act differently, but, so that our readers may clearly understand the course of conduct these parties pursue.

* * *

My critic, Mr. Tod, thinks that we should recognise men like Spencer by advising people to read his books, and parties like the S.D.F., I.L.P., Fabian Society, and Labour Party by toleration if not by help. We have no objection to people reading Spencer’s “Synthetic Philosophy” or even the organs of these organisations. I do not see, however, why we should advise them to do so. The party of reaction is sufficiently strong without our aiding it by giving such advice. In giving the readers of the Socialist Standard advice as to books to study we shall be governed by what we consider best for Socialism and by no other motive whatsoever.

* * *

But toleration if not help ! Toleration of compromise !!! Of the denial of the class war !!! Surely not. The difference between The Socialist Party of Great Britain and the parties which Mr. Tod takes under his wing is not merely difference in tactics, but is a difference in the underlying principles upon which those tactics are based. As an example I may again point out that our principles determine that we are the only political party in Great Britain which has from its inception rejected a palliative programme.

* * *

It is not that we are opposed to such desirable objects as the free feeding of children, or the free feeding, housing, clothing, &c. of adults. It is that we are firmly convinced that nothing which can materially benefit the working class will ever be given by the one and only capitalist political party. If there were two capitalist political parties we might—but I trust not.

* * *

For there is but one capitalist political party—the Liberal-Tory Party. They are like unto a wedded couple. Bound in the ties of holy matrimony their essential interests are the same. Like all married couples they have their petty differences. Seek, however, to gain an influence over either, or to side with either, or to obtain an advantage detrimental to either, and we soon learn to “beware the redding stroke,” for they twain are of one flesh.

* * *

I may conclude my remarks arising from Mr. Tod’s letter with the following quotation from Wilhelm Liebknecht:

”On the ground of the class struggle we are invincible; if we leave it we are lost, because we are no longer Socialists. The strength and the power of Socialism rests in the fact that we are leading a class struggle ; that the labouring class is exploited and oppressed by the capitalist class, and that within capitalist society effectual reforms, which will put an end to class government and class exploitation, are impossible.

“We cannot traffic in our principles, we can make no compromise, no agreement with the ruling system. We must break with the ruling system and fight it to a finish. It must fall that Socialism may arise, and we certainly cannot expect from the ruling class that it will give to itself and its domination the death blow. The International Working Men’s Association accordingly preached that ‘the emancipation of the labouring class must be the work of the labourers themselves.’ ”

* * *

Thus by these words of wisdom we are justified.

Economicus.

Literary Curiosities No. 5—E. E. Hunter in Sackcloth and Ashes. (1907)

From the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

Stratford Socialist Club,

3, Well Street, Stratford, E.

3rd April, 1906.

To the Members and Branches of the Social Democratic Federation.

Dear Comrades,—In April 1903 I was expelled the S.D.F. Early in the present year I applied for re-admission to the Stratford Branch, and they accepted me subject to the consent of the Executive Council. They, however, have withheld that consent, and writing on March 6th, comrade H. W. Lee informs me “that they (the E.C.) do not see their way to grant such application at the present time.”

The Stratford Branch are now appealing against this decision to the Annual Conference at Bradford, and it is in support of this appeal, and in order to explain my position that I pen this letter.

During the three years that have elapsed since my expulsion there are, of course, many of my actions that the S.D.F. can legitimately call me to account for, and as I was fully aware of this fact I requested the E.C. to allow me to attend their meeting with a view to coming to an understanding upon such matters. I duly attended the meeting, and made a statement fully dealing with my reasons, and my attitude as regards my past relations with the S.D.F. Several questions were asked including one by comrade Qnelch as to whether I was willing to put in writing what I had said to them. I replied that I was perfectly willing if they so desired it. This I now do.

As distinct from my criticisms of the organisation, I have made certain charges against the party and individuals which were simply founded on hypothesis. These I unreservedly withdraw. Where these charges have caused pain to comrades, I can only express my regret, and trust that loyal work for the party in the future will efface any feelings of bitterness that may remain. One thing I would emphasise in fairness to myself, and those whom up till October last were my colleagues, that at any rate we were conscientious and sincere. Personally I am thoroughly convinced that the “impossiblist” movement in so far as it developed into a revolt against the real organisation of revolutionary Socialism in Great Britain was a great and grievous error.

Experience has taught me that it is an impossibility to build a party in which every unit shall, temperamentally, economically and politically toe a given line. The party of the workers must be one that always keeps the class standpoint in view, that politically stands in antagonism to all the sections of the capitalist class, and that always keeps to the front the vital principles of the social revolution. The S.D.F. fits these qualifications, and is therefore the party to which, should rally the class-conscious Socialist of the country. On minor questions that deal with the policy to be adopted in relation to this or that palliative, or reform of capitalist society there may be legitimate differences of opinion, but as long as there is no sinking of principle involved the drawing of a hard and fast line is apt to disintegrate the movement by enforcing cast-iron discipline in small things that are not vitally important. The same remarks apply to my attitude towards alliances, temporary or otherwise, for a specific purpose. As long as such an alliance does not hide our principles, and the object of the alliance is good in an agitational sense, such an alliance is of utility ; as soon, however, as it has tendency to smother the party’s principles, and associate it with dubious company it becomes dangerous. I am convinced, however, that the S.D.F. has sufficient political acumen to discriminate between good and bad alliances.

I trust that this confession of faith will help to clear the air. In the main, I, of course hold that the Socialist, movement progresses in equal ratio to its independence and sturdy clearness of utterance. The more clearly it is able to define its position, the more it gathers to itself all that is best and strongest in the working class. On these lines the S.D.F. has fought, and its strong position to-day after all its expulsions and secessions is ample justification for its existence. The S.D.F. undoubtedly represents the revolutionary working class, and it is folly to hinder its way with carping criticism, and spiteful opposition.

In conclusion I trust that the comrades will fully consider my application, and by endorsing my membership of the Stratford Branch, put an end my wandering in the wilderness.

Fraternally yours,

Ernest E. Hunter

Blogger's Note:

Admittedly, it is rather vindictive publishing this mea culpa from Hunter in the pages of the Socialist Standard but, in fairness to the SPGB, he is pretty much throwing his old impossibilist comrades under the proverbial bus in the course of his letter. You can't help but feel that the SDF leadership was going out of its way in publicly humiliating a young man — Hunter would have been in his mid-20s in 1907 — for  previously stepping out of line.

It turned out okay for Hunter in the end. A brief moment of public scorn didn't stop him from carving out a long career in left-wing reformism. His wiki page - linked to above - is well worth a read.

[Press Cuttings.] (1907)

From the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

Child Labour on Farms.

It passes one’s comprehension that after 100 years’ legislation on behalf of factory children, the farmer and other individuals may yet employ younger children than were ever dragged into cotton mills, and may work them for longer hours than were ever known in the history of the factory system ! 

Co-operative News.

____________

Street bookmaking is practically dead ; but its place has been taken by bookmaking through the post. This—according to a prominent member of the Metropolitan Police force, who has been engaged for twenty-five years in the prosecution of street bookmakers—is the main result of the new Betting Act increasing the penalties for street betting, which came into operation at the beginning of the year.

So that in getting rid of one evil it is questionable whether a greater evil is not being created. Street betting has probably disappeared, but the betting will be carried on just as much as before. 

Daily Chronicle

____________

Of all the Western industries introduced into Japan, the one which has made the most rapid progress is, says Engineering, that of cotton-spinning and manufacturing. Its products are also those which compete most directly with the corresponding British manufactures. Some of the most enterprising men of the Japanese Empire control the factories; and behind the young industry is the whole force of the paternal Government urging it on. There are 49 cotton-spinning companies in Japan, operating eighty-five mills. At present Japanese mills are making profits, not because of any special skill of their operatives, but simply on account of the difference in price between the raw materials and the simplest forms of manufactures therefrom. It is simply a question of keeping the belt on the tight pulley ; and that they are doing this to the fullest extent is shown by the fact that for the last six months of the period covered by this report, 81 out of 85 mills ran both night and day, and averaged over 22 hours a day.

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The Law Journal, referring to the question raised in the music hall strike whether pickets, whose proceedings lead to the gathering of crowds in the streets can be fined under the provisions of the Highway Act, 1835, having regard to the fact that peaceful picketing is legal under the provisions of the Trades Disputes Act, says it should have supposed that the section was intended to take away doubts as to the legality of picketing itself, and not to make the pickets entitled to over-ride public rights as well as molest individuals in the course of a trade dispute. If Mr. Atherley Jones’s reading of the Trades Disputes Act is correct, pickets would be entitled to trespass on private property in furtherance of their trade dispute.

Blogger's Note:

Llewellyn Atherley-Jones was the son of the famous Chartist, Ernest Jones.

From the Fighting Line. (1907)

Party News from the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

West Ham.—Fair to middling. Little to rejoice at except increase of membership, and little to complain of but the apathy of the workers. Our success, of course, is equal to our power to command it, and that both may increase we have now reason to hope. The central classes for which we have yearned and worked are now an accomplished fact, and so far we can confidently recommend them to the careful consideration of the comrades who are still young or at least are not too old to learn. The Hammers look forward to meeting members of all the branches at this intellectual venue of the Party. We already feel the benefit in our own classes of the stimulus of “something done,” in the way of co-ordination of intellectual effort.

G. C. H. Carter

Tooting.—The working class can be united in demanding Socialism, but the reform has yet to be named that does not succeed in dividing their interests more or less. The I.L.P. manifesto on the L.C.C. elections which contains as one of its principal planks that revolutionary reform “A Municipal Milk Supply” is a case in point. Four Tooting milkmen, who had just commenced to take an interest in Socialism, saw this reform alluded to in the daily Press as “a Socialist demand” ; and knowing full well that it would mean that at the most only one fourth of their number would be required to deliver milk under that system, they, on meeting one of our speakers recently, charged him with seeking reform which would put three-fourths of their number out of work. It will take our comrade more than one evening to convince those milkmen that neither municipal capitalism nor the I.L.P. have anything to do with Socialism except in so far as the I.L.P. preaches confusion under that name.

The Wandsworth Trades and Labour Council are affording ample justification for the attitude of the Party in running candidates for the Borough Council against theirs last November. According to the aforesaid Labour Council neither the Progressives nor the Rev. Anderson (Tory) were then able to represent the interests of the workers, so they opposed them with candidates of their own. Somehow the L.C.C. elections have altered the complexion of affairs. First the Trades Council held a meeting for the purpose of hearing an address by Mr. Kellaway, the Progressive, candidate. This not affording complete satisfaction, they invited the Rev. Anderson to run in their interest. He declining they finally decided by 21 votes to 14 to support the Progressive, Mr. Kellaway !

This is independence as practised by Labour groups alliliated to the Labour Party. Opposition to all sections of the capitalist class at all times is the only attitude that will ever release the working class from its present bondage; and many outside our membership are beginning to see the impregnability of our position, in which mental transformation they are being assisted by the vacillating policy of the Wandsworth Trades Council, who have shown so completely that they neither know where they are nor where they are going.

Paul Dumenil

Paddington.—Once again the Paddington Borough is seething with political manifestations, having arisen out of the Slough of Despond into which it had been plunged since the last general election. Progressives and Moderates, aspirants for municipal honours, appear before the working class in this and other districts, clamouring for votes, each party stirring up the emotions of the working class with vague promises that can never be fulfilled while capitalism lasts, even if they wanted to fulfill them.

When the polling day arrives the climax will be reached, the Progressives or the Moderates will be announced as the victors. The glib-tongued politicians having had their purpose served (viz., the perpetuation of capitalism) will, disappear from the public gaze, and the majority of the working class having trusted their own interest to another class, will consider their duty done and await another general uprising in capitalist politics.

In distinct contrast to this flash in the pan, we, the Paddington members, assemble every Sunday morning throughout the year at the junction of the Walterton Road and Elgin Avenue, for the purpose of discussing political and economic questions of vital interest to the working class. We make no promises as to what we will do for them, we solicit no favours from them, nor ask them to support us, but to support themselves by combining with us. For working-class emancipation can only arise from working-class activities being directed in a scientifically organised way by that class itself. We invite all, of every shade of political opinion, to come and analyse the position we take up, and to ask questions of us. For the conclusion we draw from past experience is that the future belongs to us, for ours is the way, the truth, and the light.

T. A. Wilson

Philanthropy and Profits. (1907)

From the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

The real nature of the pretendedly disinterested benevolence of some large employers is at times laid bare even in the journals of the enemy; and capitalist “philanthropy” is then found to have a very material basis. The Berlin correspondent of the Daily Chronicle has, for example, after a visit to Essen, the following to say regarding the famous firm of Krupp :—

“Krupps are honourably known for the patriarchal benevolence which they display towards their workpeople Their model dwellings, their sick-clubs, their co-operative stores, and a great variety of other institutions to alleviate the lot of their workers, have often been described, and always in terms of adulation. For my part, I carried away a different impression. I felt that all the mature thought bestowed by the famous firm on their benevolent institutions was the result of sound business principles, tinctured by despotism, rather than the manifestation of any special leanings towards philanthropy. This is the opinion of a large body of their own employees who regard the many admirably-conducted institutions as so many chains binding the men to the firm. The chains are covered with cotton wool, but that does not impair their strength ; it only makes them less galling. A concern like Krupp’s could not afford to have a large body of their workmen disaffected ; a strike could have most disastrous consequences.

“With my Socialist friend I visited several of the model dwelling-houses, and found much to admire, but a good deal also to criticise. Rents on the whole were high, and I found a far larger proportion of the tenements than I had expected anything but comfortable. Indeed, in too many cases the dwellings looked gloomy, forbidding, and absolutely devoid of homeliness and comfort. The colonies known as Schederhof and Nordhof were dreary and squalid in the extreme. An incessant guard, moreover, is kept over the men that they do not live a life outside the works which is displeasing to their employers. Their political activities, for example, are very narrowly scrutinised. Every workman on entering Krupp’s employ must sign a document of portentous length, in which his work and his play are both regulated. He must, for example, sign that he will not attach himself to any political organisation which has as its object the upheaval of existing social or political institutions. As Socialism in the eyes of Krupp is synonymous with revolution, this means that any workman known as a Socialist is summarily dismissed.”

Party Notes. (1907)

Party News from the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Third Annual Conference will be held on Good Friday and Saturday, March 29th and 30th respectively, at the Communist Club, commencing each day at 10 a.m.

* * *

On Good Friday evening a Social and Dance will be held. Admission by programme, to be obtained from branch secretaries or direct from Head Office.

* * *

Enquiries have been made as to whether membership of Clarion Cycling Clubs is compatible with membership of the S.P.G.B. Were the clubs merely social there would, of course, be no difficulty about the matter, but in point of fact one of the rules of the N.C.C.C. adopted last year at Warwick, specifies “The propagation of principles of Socialism as advocated by the CLARION.”

* * *

The “Principles of Socialism as advocated by the Clarion” are the principles of rate-saving municipal capitalism, and state industry on the lines of the Post Office; the transference of capital and the function of the capitalist from the individual to the Public Body.

* * *

A member of the S.P.G.B. would, then, clearly be wrong in joining a Clarion Cycling Club.

* * *

In some walks of life a man is compelled by economic necessity to become a member of an organisation which devotes a small portion of its funds to a political policy as a side line. But there are plenty of purely social clubs, and the member of the S.P.G.B. consequently finds that he need not support a club that is run to advertise a confusionist journal and to propagate an “ism” that is inimical to his class, while in so far as the cycle can be used as an auxiliary to political activity the S.P.G.B. wheelers fill the bill.

* * *

The economic and speakers’ classes meet every Thursday evening at the Head Office.

* * *

Our comrades, “the two revolutionaries,” are pushing the sale of the Party Organ in the Northern industrial centres, thus performing services to the organisation that will, no doubt, be of material service to us in our endeavour to enlarge the scope of our political activities.

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Now that the propaganda season is upon us comrades should throw redoubled vigour into the work of pushing the sale of the Party Organ and other Party literature. No more effective work can be performed for Socialism.

Wholesale and retail agents for the Socialist Standard. (1907)

From the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

The lessons of the German elections. (1907)

From the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

The most important lesson to be derived from the results of the recent elections in Germany is the fact that where the workers once attain full class-consciousness they can no longer be misled by the juggling and somersaults of the capitalist class. We therefore value election campaigns and political representation only in so far as they are a means for rousing the workers to full class consciousness. The organised forces of labour cannot gain permanent economic or social advantages unless they are prepared to seize the political machinery with the view to socialising the means of production and will back such effort by force to the degree of capitalist resistance. We also know that with the development of capitalism economic pressure is continually increasing and class-consciousness is forced  on ever wider circles of the proletariat. 

Looking at things from the above standpoint we are neither discouraged by the lost of 38 Parliamentary seats to the German Socialist Party, nor are we unduly elated by the increase of close upon 250,000 votes gained by the Socialist candidates. We are merely concerned with the extent to which class-consciousness has grown among the working class of Germany, and while we deem it our duty to condemn in Germany, as at home, the policy of compromise and reform, we are ever ready to recognise the value of propaganda work from the uncompromising standpoint wherever such is persistently and unflinchingly pursued, and to note the pleasant fact that a small but steadily growing faction of the German Party has for some years put forward a tremendous effort to induce the Party to abandon its policy of reform and compromise. We are, however, compelled to state after considering all the circumstances, that the German Socialist Party have pursued and are still pursuing a policy that has resulted in conveying a false impression as to the real extent of class-consciousness among the German proletariat.

When the results of these elections became known, the capitalist class and their reptile Press in Germany and abroad naturally announced for the benefit of the many still class-unconscious wage-slaves that Socialism has been hopelessly shattered, although the increase of nearly a quarter-of-million votes for the Socialist candidates did not exactly furnish proofs for such a sweeping allegation. On the other hand the Socialist papers in Germany brought explanations for the Socialist reverses, showing exhaustively the influences traceable to ignorant hangers-on and factions of the capitalist class, but omitting, almost without exception, any allusion to the most important reason of all, viz., the influence of mistaken policy and tactics, in which compromise and reform played so significant a part. Being unable to accept these inadequate explanations which were in most cases put forth with dignity and caution, we naturally scorn the childish abuse levelled by some of the would-be Socialist organs at the “blatant bourgeoisie of Germany”. H.M. Hyndman, for instance, in Justice of February 2nd, 1907 says: “The Radicals in Germany, as elsewhere, are a cowardly set, physically and morally, but they may be compelled to join with the Social-Democrats and the Centre in opposing the Kaiser’s efforts to turn the world upside down”. When we mention that the same author has stated that the workers will be emancipated by a class above them, and that not so very long ago he appealed to the Radicals through the columns of Reynolds to join with the S.D.F. in promoting measures of reform, our readers will feel more amused than surprised at the above.

Insisting upon the truth that the working-class must emancipate itself from wage-slavery, we must confess that to us the most pleasing feature of these last elections is that all factions of the capitalist class without exception have at last thrown over the pretence of compromise with the Socialist Party and have actually compelled the latter to look for support to themselves alone. In face of this fact are the German Socialists prepared to tell us that they could not of their own accord long ago have taken up the position now practically forced upon them? Or, are they ready to solicit capitalist compromise as heretofore?

When soon after the last General Election in this country we were constrained to protest against Comrade Bebel’s action in sending a compromising telegram to Reynolds, on the grounds that it interfered with our propaganda, the Socialist, of S.L.P. renown, in its ardent desire to make us appear ridiculous, took up the defence of Bebel and said that the German Socialist Party were bound to compromise with the capitalist class, owing to the backwardness of the economic development in Germany. How strange that within twelve months of this incident the economic development in Germany has experienced such marvellous impetus that all the factions of the capitalist class, including even the Radicals, can afford to renounce all compromise with the Socialist Party! Some such for the wise-acres of the Socialist.

The German Socialist Party itself admits the necessity and immediate possibility of relying solely upon the support of the proletariat. In Vorwaerts of February 9th, 1907, an editorial article entitled, “The lessons of the Reichstag Elections” concludes with the following: –

  “Whether the stage of social development in Germany of to-day is such as to already make possible the Socialist ‘aim’, is a futile question. This aim cannot be reached by one stroke; it presupposes transition stages. But that the division of classes created by the social development has progressed to that extent that the non-possessing class by virtue of their majority in numbers could conquer political power and produce the democratic and social preliminary conditions for the transition to Socialism, would be denied only by those who have not the least inkling of the statistics relating to occupations and incomes. For the Socialist Party it is only a question of making the majority of the non-possessing class conscious of their class position, of awakening the proletariat to class consciousness! That, however, can only be accomplished by the class struggle itself, by incessant warfare against the capitalist system, and not by concessions to capitalism”.

After this frank admission on the part of the German Socialist Party the Editor of the Socialist should take a back seat.

The aforementioned excerpt, however, not only, as far as the German Socialist Party is concerned, demonstrates to the full a discrepancy between its practical pursuance of the class struggle and the admittedly only correct attitude, but it also gives more concisely the gist of the awkward and flimsy arguments used persistently by the S.D.F. and I.L.P. in defence of their advocacy of capitalist palliatives and reforms. It is certainly most ingenious on the part of Vorwaerts to make the need of transition stages the excuse for the advocacy of reforms and palliatives. What the workers (and that means the whole of Society) will do after the proletariat have seized control of the political machinery is a totally different question to what the wage-slave class must do to be emancipated.

If in 1903 the German Socialist Party succeeded in winning 81 seats in the Reichstag, it was merely due to the fact that many thousands of Radical bourgeois voted for Socialist candidates because they judged from the great stir the Revisionists were then making that the Socialist Party would at its Congress in Dresden in August embrace Revisionism and abjure the Social Revolution for ever. And on being rudely disappointed in their expectations these former allies of Bernstein, Calwer, and Co. returned to their own flock at the recent election; hence the loss of all the seats, which were formerly obtained by a mere snatch-vote among Radicals.

The first great blunder of the German Party is in retaining the revisionists, men who were, and still are, working for the fusion of bourgeois democrats with Socialist wage-workers. Then the false attitude on the colonial question of opposing colonisation in South West Africa on the grounds that it would not be profitable, instead of showing that the colonial policy meant nothing but an extension of the sphere of exploitation abroad, to the detriment of the wage-slaves at home. It was solely because the Centre Party succeeded in getting the Socialists to take up the same position as the Clericals regarding the colonial policy that the Centre was able to precipitate the Dissolution which suited its ends admirably. Helped by the false attitude of the Socialists, the Centre Party was triumphant all along the line and increased its number of members in the Reichstag as well as its number of votes.

Another source of weakness was the items of purely bourgeoisie reform on the program of the German Party. This attracted pro-capitalist voters and unreliable supporters, whereas a straightforward declaration of their revolutionary principles would have kept away those who could only be a cause of confusion and weakness. The contradictory tactics pursued at the second ballot as compared with the first were unworthy of a great worker’s party. At the first ballot the order was hostility  to all capitalist factions, but at the second ballot those Clerical and Radical candidates who gave an undertaking not to support interference with the franchise or right of combination of the workers, were officially recommended as deserving of Socialist support. And last, but by no means least, we have to condemn the efforts of the German Socialist Press for threatening the workers with a possible increase in rates and taxes, if they supported certain factions of the capitalist class. Seeing that rates and taxes form part of the surplus value robbed from the workers, that the workers during the most prosperous periods can obtain only a subsistence, it is nothing short of a crime to make the wage-workers believe that the question of rates and taxes can have any bearing on their position as wage-slaves. And it may perhaps interest our readers if we inform them that a few days before the election, Vorwaerts published a series of articles entitled: “The burden of taxation of the German and English workers”, wherein the position of the English workers was described as comparatively much better off than the German workers, “because of the greater burdens of taxation borne by the latter.” What wonder that the more cunning of the capitalist class, especially the Clericals and the Radicals, joyfully seized upon this declaration of the Socialists, and, promising the workers immediate relief in respect of the pressure of rates and taxes supposed to be endured by them, succeeded in obtaining in that way a great number of working-class votes.

Considering the  confusion caused in the minds of the German workers by the many false issues raised even by the Socialist Party, it is, of course, not possible to speak precisely regarding the number of workers who would be prepared to back the social revolution all the time. But there is every reason to believe that in at least twelve constituencies where the Socialist vote in 1903 was between 52 to 58 per cent of the electorate, and where at the recent elections there had been throughout an increase of 2 to 3 per cent, that there are many who thoroughly understand the working-class position. 18 other constituencies were also won on the first ballot, in which the Socialist vote was about half the total. Among the 21 constituencies lost at the second ballot there were 14 which had been won in 1903 at the first ballot with between 40 and 50 percent of the poll. Two constituencies, Breslau West, hitherto represented by Edward Bernstein; and Zschopau-Gekenan, until a few months ago represented by Schippel, who resigned, were plainly lost because the Revisionist Radicals were disgusted with the attitude taken up by the Party at their Dresden Congress and also because a number abstained from voting in order to shake off Bernstein.

It is true that the German Socialist Party has nothing to grumble at from the truly Socialist, that is the propaganda standpoint, seeing that of the 662,323 votes recorded in excess of the number given in 1903, the Socialist Party received 248,197. And if we consider that the Party vote has become much more proletarian and less weak-kneed owing to the thousands of Radicals leaving the Socialist ranks, we are justified in saying that the result of the recent election is by far sounder and more hopeful than that of 1903.

We should only be able to gauge the extent of class consciousness among the German workers if the Party would throw overboard all reforms and compromise and, organising the workers in the political and economic field on the lines of the class struggle alone, would offer a united front of revolutionary hostility to the possessing class.

There is no gainsaying that the German Party possess the material needful for such a fight; many good speakers, writers and organisers, 60 daily, 15 weekly, and 27 trades’ papers and ammunition galore in other directions. Let us hope that the criticism given in a fair, comrade-like spirit, will be of some assistance in bringing the oldest section of the international labour movement to the reconsideration of their tactics and their adopting in the near future a position of “no compromise”, and of hostility to capitalism every time and all the time.

Hans Neumann

The Brutality of the Bourgeoisie. by W. J. Ghent. (1907)

From the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

Originally published in the Toledo "Socialist."

In reading again the story of the Paris Commune, especially in the light of other class conflicts, one is struck afresh with a sense of the ferocious brutality of the bourgeoisie when repelling attacks upon its property. It is not necessary to say that individually the property owner is more brutal than the proletarian. Perhaps he is not. But no informed person can deny that when acting by group or class in defense of its material interests, the bourgeoisie reverts to a bloodthirstiness, an inhumanity, like that of the lowest savages. In such times all the veneer of civilization is sloughed off as a snake sloughs its skin, and the most cruel passions are awakened. It would seem that nothing that men will do in defence of their wives, their state or their religion, can compare, in desperate ferocity, with what they will do in defence of rent, interest and profit.

And, after all, it is by group and class that men are prompted in the larger activities of their lives. Primarily there is a struggle of individual against individual. But this individual struggle pertains to only a part of our activities, The workman competes with the workman for a job; but in all the larger matters that affect him as a member of an economic class, he feels, thinks and acts with his fellows of like needs and aims. And so the trader, tho’ he will cheat and rob his fellow trader, will still instinctively feel, think and act with him in all matters wherein his class interests are involved.

In the mob the worst passions are developed. What the individual would never dream of doing alone, he is prompted spontaneously to do when in company with his fellows. "Crowd consciousness ” is one thing, "class consciousness” is another. But when the two are met in the same persons, at the same time, there is developed an impulse and a power for evil which spurn ordinary restraints; And when those two are met in the bourgeoisie, repelling attacks upon its possessions, or meting out punishment for a baffled attack, the result is a diabolism of frenzied malice worse than anything which Milton has inscribed to the cohorts of Satan.

It matters not when or where the occasion. At Peterloo in 1819, in Prussia in 1848, in Paris in 1871, in the Coeur de’Alene, in Pennsylvania, in Colorado, in Russia, in more recent years, it is all the same. The bourgeoisie will fight among themselves with some show of restraint. The little fellows, under the constant hemming in of their scope and province by the big fellows, are developing a sort of group feeling and community of interest which causes them to battle against the increasing domination of the magnates. But however fiercely the conflict rages, it is restrained by a fundamental sense of a certain likeness of interest. It is only by the attacks of the proletarians on capitalist property, that the real frenzy of the bourgeoisie is awakened; and then every one, from petty retailer to industrial overlord, unites with his fellows in a cry for the defence of property, religion and the state, and for the annihilation of the proletarian aggressors.

The lesson of Colorado is still fresh in most minds. The beatings, the deportings, the killings, the forced starvation of men, women, and children, the overthrow of civil government, combined to illustrate again the instinctive brutality and lawlessness of the bourgeoisie when roused in defence of its possessions and its privileges. But it is to the Commune that one turns for the chief instance. Here was a class conflict on a gigantic scale, and here the frenzy of the bourgeoisie manifested itself as perhaps it never did before. The frightful deeds of the victors are not to be ascribed to racial temperament, as some of our Anglo-Saxon sentimentalists assume. The French can be quite as humane as the English or the Americans. Nor were the deeds done because the Communards were considered traitors. Treason has been a pretty respectable crime in France. The deeds were done because the Communard home rulers were led by men who strove for a better order of society, which involved the abolition of capitalism. All the mad ferocity of the bourgeoisie was awakened by this attempted subversion of its material interests, and it slaughtered the victims till its rage was glutted.

The Communards held the city of Paris for a little more than nine weeks. They rapidly and efficiently organized its municipal activity. They suppressed vice and crime; they kept industry and commerce moving. Betrayed on every hand by the agents of the Versaillese, they maintained a rare leniency in their treatment of their enemies. From April 3 to May 24, tho’ provoked by every manner of brutality and treachery on the part of the Versaillese. they did not execute a single prisoner. Only in the last desperate days of the defence, after the Versaillese had shot down hundreds of prisoners and of unresisting citizens suspected of sympathy with the Communards, did the latter retaliate. They then executed 63 prisoners out of some 300 in their hands. As frightful as this act appears, it is one in entire accord with the rules of warfare. It has been resorted to in probably every war, and was certainly practised in our Civil War. When one side violates a flag of truce, or executes a prisoner, the other side invariably retaliates in kind.

The Versaillese seized the city, and for days gave it up to almost indiscriminate slaughter. Probably 20,000 persons were killed. The number of wounded will never be known. The dead were strewn all over the city. Burial on such a gigantic scale became impossible, and the corpses, saturated with petroleum, were burned in the casements of the fortifications or in the open air.

Tired with the slaughter, the further ferocity of the bourgeoisie was wreaked upon the hapless victims through the form of “ law.” More than 40,000 prisoners were taken. Thousands of these, men, women and children, were driven along the roads to Versailles, scourged, beaten and insulted, packed into foul dungeons and stockades, where they were systematically starved. No words can adequately picture the horrors of that time. The worst degraded savages would have shown instincts of humanity superior to those manifested by the victorious bourgeoisie. The "trials" followed, lasting several years, and 13,221 men, 157 women and 63 children were condemned. Two hundred and seventy of these were condemned to death and 7,500 to transportation.

It is from this bourgeoisie, the same in America as in France, that we must take our laws, our institutions, and our moral codes. This class rules, and its intellectual retainers formulate and hand down the principles and precepts of conduct which are obligatory upon all of us. But not for long we hope. As tho working class comes gradually to a consciousness of itself, it throws off its ingrained timidity and learns to trust the validity of its own instincts. More and more it learns to condemn the cheap moralities of the bourgeoisie—the "fair weather” moralities which it mouths in times of ease and security, but which it forgets in times of stress. The virtues of usefulness, of fellowship, of magnanimity, which the working class instinctively develops, but which, out of its timidity and subservience to the ruling class, it hesitates to proclaim, come more and more to be the conscious and reasoned bases of its ethical code. And so, as it comes to a full consciousness of itself, it purposes the overthrow of the regime of the bourgeoisie and the installation of an order of society wherein its own code shall have ample field for expression.

And for all its sacrifice of blood it will not retaliate in kind. Out of its instinctive magnanimity, tho’ it remembers the massacres, the indescribable cruelties practised upon it by the propertied class, it will obey the injunction of Shelley:

"Do not thus when ye are strong!”

W. J. Ghent

The Socialist Party and the Labour Party. (1907)

From the March 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Wing of the Liberal Party
We of The Socialist Party of Great Britain have cherished no fond delusions concerning the Labour Party. From our inception we have consistently opposed it, and the proceedings at its recent Conference confirm us in our antagonistic attitude.

In our Declaration of Principles, adopted on June 15, 1904, we declared “war against all other political parties, whether alleged labour or avowedly capitalist,” and in that reference the Labour Party (then the L.R.C.) was included. In the first issue of the Socialist Standard (Sept. 1904) we described the L.R.C. as the working-class wing of the Liberal Party, [It is amusing to note that "Justice" has lately arrived at the same conclusion.] with whom the I.L.P., who had neither the courage to proclaim themselves Socialists nor to disavow Socialism, were coquetting. After two and a half years not a word of our description need be withdrawn.

As might be expected, the President’s address at Belfast was a model of moderation, well reflecting the conduct of the members in the House of Commons. Referring to the artist who, at the end of the General Election cartooned the leader as "Queer Hardie,” he said : "We were a queer party, and a queer party we have proved ourselves to be. Absolutely mistrusted at the beginning of the year, we finished the year with the praise of all impartial critics. For sensibility, adaptability, and respectability, the Labour Party stood first in the British House of Commons.” Admirable! No phrasing of ours could better describe them.

They were a queer party and they are a queer party. On the one side Mr. H. Quelch of the S.D.F. Executive (who wants to smash the Liberal Party) and lesser lights of that body, not there as represeuiatives of the S.D.F., but sneaking in as trade union delegates; at the other extreme, Mr. R. Bell, M.P., who makes no secret of his Liberalism, risking even his position as trade union official in defence of it, a striking contrast to the servility of Will Thorne and other S.D.F. men, who, because they are trade union officials and might lose their jobs if they refused (so runs the S.D.F. excuse) have been permitted time after time to support Liberal candidates, a crime for which ordinary members of the S.D.F. have been expelled; and between these two, all sorts and conditions of men and women, lacking principle, lacking policy, and therefore an easy prey to the astute and plausible professional politicians who lay in wait for them.

As They Darn Well Please
Readers of the Socialist Standard who remember the extent to which the Labour Party candidates made compacts with Liberals at the General Election, and pledged themselves so many directions in order to secure votes, will not be surprised at the effort made to throw over the Party and leave the members in the House free to do as they “darn well please.” Their original recommendation, however, was even too strong for some of their most trusted (or cutest) supporters, and it was amended ultimately carried as follows: "That resolutions instructing the Parliamentary Party as to their action in the House of Commons be taken as the opinion of the Conference on the understanding that the time and method of giving effect to these instructions be left to the Party in the House in conjunction with the National Executive.” “Respectability and adaptability" indeed! Keir Hardie and A. Henderson complained that the affiliated societies were continually pestering them at their party meetings and, of course, they wished to put a stop to this! Is not this the attitude always taken up by “respectable and adaptable” Liberals and Tories? Conferences may come and go, resolutions may be passed, reforms may be urged or demanded, Newcastle or other programmes may be formulated, but the rank and file, whose votes and work and, in the case of the Labour Party, whose pence have been the means of transforming these “pestered” legislators from mere agitators or carpet baggers into “respectable” esquires, are referred to the exigencies of the political situation and told that, although they may pass resolutions, they must not expect their members (no longer their delegates, but their members) to carry them out. We fear the Labour movement must endure many editions of John Burns before it comes to its senses.

S.D.F. Jesuits
The S.D.F. members made a determined attempt on the second day of the Conference to provide a bridge over which that body might again walk into the ranks of the Labour Party and share its funds for disappointed S.D.F. candidates. These men were not there as delegates of the S.D.F., as we have already pointed out. That body joined the L.R.C. when it was first formed, but afterwards withdrew, for reasons which have been different every time they have endeavoured to explain them. Certain it is they regret their withdrawal and are now pursuing a Jesuitical policy. Despite this withdrawal and despite the fact that the S.D.F. has declared “it is not the business of Socialists to ‘permeate’ a ‘labour’ party, any more than the Liberal or Conservative Party," its prominent members are permitted to attend the Conference and its branches are allowed to affiliate to local Labour Parties. Its members are allowed to break its rules by running as Labour Party candidates, thus securing labour Party Funds, and the S.D.F. itself officially supports “Labour” candidates. The official S.D.F. call this “policy," but neither they nor the rank and file can prove it to be either honest or logical.

A Very Ultimate Object
And so in the names of various trade unions, W. Atkinson, H. Quelch, T. N. Cathrall, J. Gribble, and other S.D.F. men submitted a resolution to make the ultimate object of the Labour Party the overthrow of the present system of capitalism and the institution of public ownership and control of the means of life.” The mover wished the Party to have “something to attain, something to strive for, something worth striving for." only it must be "ultimate.” Don’t frighten people by striving for it now. One by one the I.L.P. men rose “as Socialists" to oppose it. Hardie would have voted for it had it been moved in another way, (Oh! respectable and adaptable M.P.). and so on. But Hardie was certainly right, and none knew it better than Quelch & Co., when he pointed out that the people behind the delegates were not Socialists. And by the same token the people behind the “Labour" M.P’s are not Socialists, the victory of the "Labour" candidates was not a victory for Socialism and therefore not a victory for Labour. but, as we showed in our issue last March, a victory for confusion.

Can it be wondered at that a party such as these confusionists should full victims to the professional politicians and the sections supporting them. The recommendation submitted by the E.C. on the “Temperance” question professed a desire to confer full and unfettered power upon localities for dealing with the licensing question in accordance with "local opinion" and then rendered this impossible by laying down the definite propositions upon which localities were to vote. If a locality desired free trade in drink, for instance, it could not obtain it under the Labour Party’s “full and unfettered power.” In short, they fell into the local option trap, as no doubt A. Henderson, D. J. Shackleton and others intended they should.

Although claiming to be concerned with only “practical politics” the Labour M.P’s would have no programme drawn up by the Conference. Shackleton put the matter in a nutshell when he declared that if candidates were to be tied down their chances of being returned would be reduced. If, for instance, he and Mr. Gill were compelled to put the abolition of child labour on their programmes they might lose their seats and the society they represented might have to withdraw their payment of £900 per year. And, of course, the delegates decided that £900 sterling and the presence of two such "sensible, respectable and adaptable” men in the House of Commons was much more important than the yearly slaughter of thousands of children in the factory towns the gentlemen represent!

Voteless Women, Workless Workers

And so the Conference went on, each resolution that was submitted proving how greatly different were the views of the delegates even upon what they regard as “practical politics". And on the last day there occurred the scene that showed what manner of man Keir Hardie is. At a public demonstration held previously at Ulster Hall, he had declared that “they were democrats, they believed in the will of the people.” On the last day of Conference a Suffrage resolution was passed with which Hardie disagreed. He immediately showed what kind of democrat he was, just as he had previously shown what kind of a Socialist he was. He said that if the resolution was intended to restrict the action of the Party in the House, he would have to seriously consider whether he could remain a member. He could not give up his principles, and so on. This was, of course, very pretty but it was hardly "democratic". Moreover, how greatly Hardie has changed since 1893. In October of that year he was asked to part in an Adult Suffrage Demonstration in Trafalgar Square, organised by the S.D.F. He declined, accusing the S.D.F. of "desertion of the cause of Socialism." "Is the case of the three million voteless workers," he asked, "whose hard lot you are so eager to champion, worse than that of the four million, including dependents, workless workers? By your present action you proclaim it to be so, and in this every sweater in the land will agree with you. Whether the best men among your own members will is another question.” But to-day Hardie, having in the meantime become “sensible, respectable and (particularly) adaptable” is quite prepared to put a few thousand propertied women, whose only lack is votes, in front of millions of men, women and children who lack first, last, and always, food.

The attitude of the S.P.G.B. towards the Labour Party remains the same as when our Party was formed. Events have proved that our position is the correct one. We agree with Hardie that you cannot go beyond the position taken up by the people behind you. The people are not yet Socialists. Hardie, Thorne, and the other Labour members did not win their seats on Socialist principles, and therefore cannot fight for those principles in the House. We are opposed to every non-Socialist as well as anti-Socialist party—we are therefore opposed to the Labour Party. Capitalism has nothing to fear from these “sensible, respectable, and adaptable” members of the Labour Party, and the capitalists know it. They are a queer party. A , true party of the workers must be a straight party, not a queer one. It must stand for Socialism at, as well as between the elections. It must endeavour to prevent people who are not Socialists voting for its candidates. Neither the S.D.F., I.L.P., nor Labour Party do this. The workers must therefore reject them. This, the straight, uncompromising policy, is the policy of The Socialist Party of Great Britain. The S.P.G.B. is therefore (he party of the workers. 

Jack Kent