Who is the alien? The working-class view of the burning question. (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

Opportunity is a Fine Thing.

The recent world-stirring East End melodrama (in which provoking police agents seem to have pulled the strings) has afforded another opportunity to the capitalist platform, pulpit and Press to thunder against the “alien”. The pseudo-Socialist organisations and Press have, in their fear of losing supporters through this business, been profuse in their repudiation and condemnation of the “crime”, and in their praise of the armed forces in dealing with it. It is, as usual, left to the Socialist Party to point out the Socialist lesson, both with regard to the “crime” and the anti-alien agitation which it served to stir up.

On contemplating all the facts of this “mysterious anarchistic” display, the question rises uppermost in our minds: “Who are the alien impostors and criminals?” And the Socialist answer is – “the capitalist class”.

Why, the attempt to obtain property without labour is contrary to the very principles of Socialism, which insist upon labour for all and subsistence for all. But those who to-day are endeavouring to obtain wealth by filching – and with the aid of armed force into the bargain – are only carrying out the basic principle of capitalism to its logical conclusion.

Who is more honoured to-day than the successful thief, who filched millions from the product of other people’s toil? For his operations capitalist economists find such high-sounding names as “industry”, “foresight”, and “thrift”. And who is more despised and down-trodden than the worker, whose labour produces all wealth? His outrage and robbery, so long as it is carried on in the orthodox way (which converts the plunder into “rent, interest, and profit), is “legalised” by the robbers and supported by giant instruments of murder, while his aspiration to keep for himself the produce of his own toil, draws upon him every term of reproach and contempt.

Let us look back upon the record of the British Government for the last twenty years, and we shall see that the armed forces of capitalist society have been used again and again against unarmed, defenceless workers – men, women and children. In contrast to this, the modern burglar is up against the whole forces of the State, armed to the very teeth.

A Little Bit of History.

In September 1893, the Liberal Government, with Mr. Asquith as Home Secretary, sent soldiers to Featherstone, and striking miners were fired upon, some being killed and others wounded. (See Hansard, vol 17, pp. 1725-1726.) In 1894 the same Government sent a gunboat to Hull to help quell the dockers on strike in that town. In 1907 a Liberal Government again sent military with Maxim guns to Belfast, where a lock-out of dockers had taken place, and the police had gone on strike out of sympathy. In that instance again unarmed workers were maimed and murdered. And recently during a lock-out of Welsh miners, troops and police were sent to fight the masters’ battle for them, and once more wounds and death were dealt out to defenceless workers who wanted to enjoy a little more of the fruits of their toil.

Now if it can be shown that the capitalist class have obtained their possessions by robbery, that in the process of robbery thousands of workers’ lives have been sacrificed, and that in their effort to protect their ill-gotten gains they employ the armed forces of the State to butcher the workers, then it is proved to the hilt that it is the master class, and not the foreign workmen, who are the real aliens, the race apart from and antagonistic to, the people.

The last point has been sufficiently proved by the preceding descriptions of the British Government’s action during certain strikes and lock-outs. The first point is most fully and effectively established by Karl Marx, in his great work Capital, particularly in the historic chapters, which are based on documentary evidence in the British Museum. The second point, however, still requires substantiation.

And a Few Eloquent Facts.

Now according to Government statistics about 2¼ million members of the working class are annually in receipt of poor relief. That means that they are, to all intents and purposes, on the very verge of destitution. Over 200,000 workers annually meet with accidents (over 5,000 fatal) in the course of their employment, and most of these accidents can be traced to the want of life-protecting contrivances – which are not adopted by the master class because their cost would lessen profits.

In addition to this, many thousands gradually starve to death, for not all unemployed and destitute workers apply for poor relief. Thousands, too, die through over-work, bad housing, and insanitary conditions, or are driven insane by the awful economic stress of the present system of society.

So the Socialist allegation that capitalism spells the robbery and murder of the workers by an alien class is fully justified. And the workers in the East End, against whom the master class direct their epithets of “undesirable aliens”, dirty “foreigners”, and the like, and against whom they assiduously try to foster popular hatred, these workers form part of the army of the exploited. And as such they are received with open arms by the very class which, in order to cover their own plundering, attempt to direct popular anger and scorn against them, as the authors of working-class poverty.

Pocket Patriots.

When in 1905, during the debate on the Alien Bill in Parliament, an amendment was moved to keep the foreign workers out during strikes and lock-outs, the great mass of the members of Parliament, representing the vested interests of the capitalists, – the robbers living upon rent, interest, and profit – of course rejected the amendment.

The patriotism of the master class, like their professions of kindness, generosity, and magnanimity, is sheer hypocrisy. In the quest for profits all barriers are broken down, and the capitalist’s love of his country withers before a fraction percent on the yield of his capital. He has no scruples in the matter of displacing the native worker with the “alien”, provided that it pays him – any more than he hesitates to displace either with machinery, directly he can save wages by so doing.

We do not stand alone when we allege that the “alien” workers of the East End are even more completely robbed and worse treated, if that were possible, than the native workers. The Rev. Canon Barnett, of Toynbee Hall fame, writing in the Daily News of January 10th last on the “Sidney Street Lesson”, made the following statements:

“The great need in East London is that the people by receiving more respect should gain self-respect. They do not receive such treatment. The streets in which they live are not lighted or cleansed according to the standard which respectability demands. The second or third best in buildings or in entertainment are good enough for the East End, and Police Court humour and Police Court law, which most vividly represent the attitude of society, are often insulting. I doubt if it would have been possible for the police to have adopted in a West London Square, the methods they adopted in Sidney Street. Respect for the neighbours and neighbourhood would have prevented them from setting men to fire at and to burn two criminals in the open streets.”

A “Socialist” Adviser.

And what has Robert Blatchford, the jingo cat’s paw of gutter-press journalism, to say on that question? The following are from his article in the Weekly Dispatch of January 8th.

“Our wise and kindly British law was not made to deal with foreign Thugs of the twentieth century type . . . I am not discussing the existing law. I am only suggesting that the police should be legally empowered to deal with undesirable aliens immediately on their arrival at any British port. In all such cases as this, where the foreign police have warned our police against an immigrant, that immigrant should be sent to the right about turn at once. In cases of suspicion the immigrant should be detained and, failing a satisfactory explanation, should be deported.”

The above is not quote with a view to proving Mr. Blatchford to be an anti-Socialist of the worst type. His actions have fully exposed him, and very few people indeed can still believe him to be out for Socialism. His German war scare, his glorification of the Army and Navy, and lastly his present attitude on the “alien” question, show distinctly enough that Mr. Blatchford is ignorant of the very rudiments of Socialism. And that is not the most annoying feature. That which Socialists most resent is that the capitalist class should obtain from professing Socialists, advice as to measures of repression and persecution against members of the working class.

The whole Houndsditch spectacle looks as if it had been instigated by Russian police agents in order to create a popular clamour for legislation against “criminal” aliens, to the end that political offenders (especially Socialists) might have cut off their last means of escape from the savage vengeance of the knout and the appalling horrors of Siberia.

The capitalist press, pulpit and platform continually gloat over the apathy and indifference of the workers hailing from other countries to their own utter poverty, misery, and degradation, and whenever the dominant class make an attack upon the Socialists it suits their purpose to praise these “aliens” to the skies as splendid examples of “peaceable and law-abiding citizens”, On the other hand the master class, when it suits their purpose, ascribe the poverty of the native workers to the presence of “alien workers” in this country, or to the importation of labour products from abroad.

In short, it is the business of the capitalists to set one section of the working class against another in order to prevent them perceiving who are their real enemies. Hence the outcry against the “alien” which has followed upon the recent affray. But the development of the present murderous system is gradually revealing to the workers of all countries, that between worker and worker there can be no alienism, because there can be no alienation. They are bound together by the common ties of their class position – a common class interest. On the other hand, they have nothing in common with the master class, whose interests are everywhere opposed to theirs. Therefore it is the master class who are the aliens.

H. J. Neumann

So very orthodox ! (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

So we are to have a Labour daily newspaper in London—in fact, and to be more exact, at the time of writing these words we have got it.

Fate, and kindly Fortune, spare the face of the present writer ! —who is quite innocent of wilful falsification in this connection. But inasmuch as “In the midst of life we are in debt,” mine will increase by the accretion of a two horse load of gratitude if the newcomer survives to prove me true, until these lines come before the eyes of my expectant multitude of intelligent and gentle readers. But even should Fate decide otherwise, at the time of writing we have got it.

Many things born into this world announce their arrival with sound, but few so understandably as the “Daily Herald,” which cries on the day of its birth : “We have arrived.”

Epoch-marking announcement ! An astonished world raises its cap in reverence.

“If,” the new-born pressling goes on, “we differ at all from the orthodox daily press, it will be in the fact that we shall give the correct position of affairs from day to day.” (The italics are not mine.)

There is something very refreshing about the modesty of that “If.” In these days of blatant self-assertion it does one good to meet with a little bashful diffidence. It has been charged against the SOCIALIST STANDARD (and, candour compels me to confess, not without grounds) that it somewhat aggressively flaunts the fact of its difference, in every respect possible to collingual printed matter, from the “orthodox daily press.” But the “Daily Herald” aspires to no such distinction of character—which the unkind call eccentricity. Not, of course, that it is an “Herald” angel, fearing to tread where we fools rush in.

The only point of difference, if any, between the “Daily Herald” and the “orthodox daily press,” we are forewarned, is in the matter of the presentment of “the correct position.” We know well enough what the “orthodox daily press” is, and, since we are left in doubt as to whether the newcomer is to differ therefrom, we will go together, gentle reader, in search of the “correct position,” in order to discover if the “Daily Herald” differs from the “orthodox daily press” even to the extent hinted at.

To begin at the beginning, we read, immediately under the first caption, the following :

What is this—the sound and rumour?

   What is this that all men hear,

Like the sound in hollow valleys

   When the storm is drawing near ;

Like the rolling on of ocean

    In the eventide of fear ?—

‘Tis the people marching on.

And at the end of the address “To ‘One and All'” thus poetically introduced, the “Herald” scribe soars to this Olympic altitude :

On we march, then—we, the workers,

   And the rumour that ye hear

Is the blended soul of battle

   And deliverance drawing near.

For the hope of every creature

   Is the banner that we bear:

50—48.

Shade of William Morris ! To think that his verses should have been rescued from oblivion and enshrined in such a climax as that ! “The banner that we bear: 50—48.” How sublime ! Who of us would not have made that deathless effort and have died ? With that heroic banner: 50—48, the people are marching on indeed, and it is well within the truth to describe it as “the hope of every creature”—though of course there are creatures and creatures. And how happily is the “sound and rumour” of it likened to “the wind in hollow valleys” and the “rolling on of ocean.” ! The simile is perfect. The empty windiness (or is it windy emptiness ?) is a real presence, and one can almost hear the “slop—slop —slop ” of the waves upon a slimy beach. “Deliverance drawing near : 50—48.” Ye gods, yes !

Between the pathos of the beginning and the bathos—-pardon, the swelling paean of the close, optimism runs riot. “If it is to be war,” it is declared, “well—

"We don’t want to fight

   But, by jingo, if we do,

We’ve got the men, we’ve got the spunk,

   And we’ll get the money, too ! ”

And later we read: “‘Ask and ye shall receive.’ Ye have asked—to be rejected. Very well, then, in the name of Christ, ‘KNOCK and it shall be opened unto you.'”

Here I would remind the reader again how like it is unto “the wind in hollow valleys” and “the rolling on of ocean.” Slop—slop—slop.

But this is clear : If the exhortation quoted above “differs at all from the orthodox” advice of the orthodox Press and Pulpit provided for us by a considerate and disinterested masterclass, it must be in the “capitalised” importance of the first word and the italicised emphasis of the fourth—for the rest is very orthodox.

So “KNOCK, in the name of Christ, and it shall be opened unto you” is the “correct position,” on the showing of the “Daily Herald” ; and the only difference between that paper and the “orthodox daily press,” after all, is a matter of a few “caps” and italics. We shall see.

Before we leave the introductory address we may note that it is said : “There is a Labour Party in the House, and it holds supreme power.” That, perhaps, is why, in this year of grace, those for whom the “Daily Herald” speaks have “got the spunk” to carry that glorious banner, the “hope of every creature,” the “deliverance drawing near : 50—48.”

In the 7th issue occurs this illuminating passage : “. . . belittle the effect of Trade Unionism upon character as you may, . . . the one great outstanding fact remains—it provides you [the masters] with men of stirling worth, disciplined with regard to certain rules of conduct, and ever ready, through their officials, to deal honestly and fairly with employers who are prepared to meet them on equal terms.”

That has the true, respectable ring about it. It is as orthodox as the blooming Prayer Book. And on the same page we read: “The interests of both employer and employee are so entwined that to rend asunder those interests means disaster for the dissenting party.” We can recognise here the old, old “Capital and Labour are brothers” axiom of the “orthodox daily press,” so it seems that even the latter can sometimes present the “correct position”—unless (perish the thought!) the “Daily Herald” is so far orthodox as to give a position which is not correct.

They make orthodox humour in the “Daily Herald,” as here followeth :

Imported “Weary Willie” (a machine minder) to layer on after the first week : —

“I eats well, I drinks well, I sleeps well, but when I sees a job of work coming along, I’m all of a tremble.”

A very neat little take-off of the lazy blackleg (who has committed the amazing error of taking on a job) on the part of those who love work so much that, as they say in another burst of boisterous merriment, they want to work 50 hours a week and the masters won’t let them. Again :

Man entering printing office to answer an advertisement ; he is dressed somewhat slouchy, with a choker round his neck. Inside he is met by a man in the warehouse, when the following query and answer ensue:

Warehouseman : “Empties ?”

Applicant’ “Empties be—— ! I’m not a ——carman ! ! I’m a machine minder ! ! ! ”

Note the subtle humour of this. The machine minder isn’t a union man, hence he is dressed “a bit slouchy.” Had he been a union man he would probably have supported the “dignity of sich” in a stove-pipe hat and spats, and have been mistaken for one of the masters. But the disreputable, not to say “slouchy,” blackleg—oh dear ! the excruciating humour of the wag ! —-was mistaken for a carman—perhaps a trade union carman ! And notice the indignation of the “imported” machine minder. Even he, in the depths of his degradation, and the miserable and hopeless apathy of his benighted, non-union condition, was not so bereft of all sense of what is due to the ancient and honourable profession of the machine manager (I must mildly protest against the gross familiarity of our humorist’s term, machine minder) but that he could find “langwidge” to resent the insult. I hope, for the sake of the “Daily Herald’s” aspiration to become a permanent “general Labour daily,” that the carmen will also appreciate the point.

It may be true—and probably is—that if the “Daily Herald” “differs at all from the orthodox daily press,” it is in the matter of the position presented ; or it may be that it does not differ even that much, (as would appear from the statement that the strikers do not want to stand in the way of the masters making fortunes : they want to help them !) but, for my part, I prefer the good old orthodox. Because, after all, if I must have all the vices of orthodoxy, at least let me have its virtues too.

Besides, in the “orthodox daily press” there is not quite so much of the “wind in hollow valleys” and rolling ocean’s “slop—slop—slop.”

A. E. Jacomb

Editorial: The Printers’ Strike. (1911)

Editorial from the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

During the past few weeks the equanimity of London Printingdom has been disturbed by a strike of some magnitude on the question of hours. The men have taken action in support of a demand for a 48 hour week, and though at the time of writing the strike is not at an end, it looks very much as if the employees will succeed in obtaining the demand they put forward as a compromise: 50 hours immediately, and a future consideration of the 48 hours question.

Now the attitude of the orthodox Press toward this strike is full of significance. Silence can be more eloquent than speech, and their silence carries an important testimony as to the reality of the class struggle to those that have ears to hear. But of more significance than this, and of infinitely greater importance, is the attitude taken up by the men’s leaders, and reflected in the organ of the movement, the Daily Herald.

We have said that silence can be more eloquent than speech. This paper which the printers have founded to be their mouthpiece in the struggle, no less than the silence of the men’s leaders, is further evidence of that.

The dumb capitalist Press by its very silence proclaims in thunder tones the class struggle, while the quiet tongues of the strike leaders, and the still columns of their organ are vehement charges of treachery and cowardice against those who do know the true position, and a pathetic index of the ignorance of those who do not.

In every quarrel between masters and men, we take up the position that, as between masters and men, the latter can never be wrong. But in the matter of their conduct of the fight, we have seldom found a British trade union in the right—and the present strike affords no welcome exception.

Granted, in the first place, that workingmen must, however little it may affect their class position, struggle continuously to secure the best price and conditions for their labour-power, granted also that at the moment trade unions may be the most effective means to that end, still the vital thing has not been said.

After all, where does trade union effort land the workers ? After each “famous victory,” after the most famous victory that any trade unionist, as such, and under the affliction of the most violent form of palpitation of that imagination, ever dared dream of, where do the victors stand ? They may have held their own ; they may have recovered a little of what was their own. “Simply that, and nothing more.”

This much is confessed by the men’s leaders when they admit that they have been driven to the present action by the great increase of unemployment consequent upon the advance of machinery and the general speeding-up that has taken place in all branches of the printing trade. For if that is so, it is an admission that all they can hope for from victory is the regaining of some of the ground lost of recent years.

Of course, as far as the men’s action goes it is sound enough. Everyone who has anything to sell must fight for the best terms—that is a presupposed condition of the competitive market—and those who have only their labour-power to sell are no exception. But if after each battle the workers have only regained something of what they have lost, or let us even say all that they have lost; if each succeeding conflict is to find and leave them in the same state of mental torpor, with, the same paralyzing faith in the union and the strike as their economic salvation, and no outlook beyond a stronger position as sellers of labour-power, then indeed Hope may sit down by the wayside and turn her eyes backward over the way we have come—for there is nothing to gladden them in the way we are going.

For, think ! These men demanded a reduction of 4½ hours per week, and the limitations of their union are shown by their compromising, in the midst of a “winning fight,” for a 2½ hours reduction. That is less than 5 per cent. of the week’s hours. Those who know anything of the printing trade do not need to be told that this 5 per cent. reduction does not anything like counterbalance the increased output per head which has taken place in the decade or so that has slipped away since the last reduction of hours. The speeding-up and the development of, machinery in all departments have been astounding, and new processes are discovered almost daily.

In the composing department there are the Linotype and other machines, for which it is claimed that the output per man is six times that of the hand compositor. In the machine room speed has been enormously increased, and in addition mechanical contrivances are pushing the workers aside. In the case of cylinder machines, first the “flyers” got rid of the taker-off, now automatic feeders make the layer-on a superfluity. With regard to platen machines the same tale is to tell—first self-delivery, now self-feed. In newspaper production, you give the Hoe Double Octuple press half a ton of ink and a few miles of paper, and it will deliver to you 192,000 8-page papers, folded, per hour.

Magazines and the like are trimmed on all three sides simultaneously at a fearsome rate ; in the stereoing department equal strides have been made ; the process block has banished the old pictorial wood engraver so that not one of his kind now practises in this country. Even the artist and designer, who was wont to comport himself with a leisurely dignity, as one whom mechanical contrivances could not touch, has been brought to a chastened frame of mind by the camera, and may be seen plying the air-brash like a man in a mighty hurry.

In face of all this who will dare to assert that trade unionism, in winning a 5 percent. reduction in a decade, has maintained the workers’ position ? At the very moment of the strike there enters the market a new composing machine of improved form at £200 less cost ! Meanwhile the older machine develops new capabilities which enable it to eat its way into the jobbing offices. And one City firm has in position on one of its printing machines, at present under cover, lock, and key, an American automatic feeder that is going to strike consternation into the hearts of the men.

In the past this development has cheapened production and increased demand. It has given us the halfpenny morning paper—which we all read nowadays—and extended the use of advertising matter. Else had the effect of machinery been even more severely felt. But there are limits in this direction, for few of us can read two papers at once, and it is not wise to count on the abnormal increase of the cross-eyed, even to keep trade unionists in work.

And it must not be lost sight of that it is the machine the workers have to compete with. Machinery is adopted because it is cheaper; hence the very fact that this shortening of hours raises the cost of labour-power must give a fillip to the development of machinery. There is a circle of profitableness to every grade of machinery. On the fringe of that circle stand the doubters, who hesitate to adopt it. But raise the cost of labour-power and they are decided—the circle takes on a larger circumference, and the advance of machinery tumbles men out into the streets to starve.

While this in no way lessens the fact that the workers (it applies to all trades) must continually struggle against the encroachments of the masters, it shows them that the struggle is a hopeless one, and that they must look elsewhere for the true remedy for their troubles. There are among their leaders men who know this—why do they not say so ? There are among those producing their daily newspaper, men who are well aware that Socialism alone is the only hope—why, then, is no mention of the fact made ?

One reason is this—the constituencies are not ripe yet to return Socialists to Parliament, and should enlightened trade unionists demand that their officials run as Socialists, they would surely lose place and pelf.

Printers, when you have won your strike your advantage will immediately begin to slip from your hands. Socialism is the only remedy for working-class ills. We earnestly invitc you, therefore, to study Socialism.

The Commune of Paris. (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

France was at war with Prussia. On September 4th, 1870, Paris proclaimed the Republic. A similar proclamation immediately followed throughout France.

The real leaders of the working class were in the Bonapartist prisons, and Thiers, one of the foremost men in the Bonapartist regime, was allowed to act as their statesman, and Trochu as their general, on the one condition that they held these posts for the sole purpose of

NATIONAL DEFENCE ONLY

against the Prussian invaders.

Now Paris armed its workers to defend itself against the Prussians, but here a difficulty presented itself to the capitalist class. If the workmen of Paris should gain a victory over the invader, they would undoubtedly take the Government of the town into their own hands—a thing most undesirable to the master class—and as the Manifesto of the International puts it, “In this conflict between duty and class interest the Government, of National Defence did not hesitate one moment to turn into a Government of National Defection.”

Thiers and Trochu, playing the game of the capitalist class, did all in their power to assist in the fall of Paris. From the first Trochu admitted that Paris could not stand a seige, yet Thiers, Trochu, Favre, and the rest, of the so-called Government of National Defence, had bombastic and lying manifestoes issued, declaring that “the Government of Paris will never capitulate,” “Jules Favre, the Foreign Minister, will not cede an inch of our territory nor a stone of our fortresses.” But Favre admitted in a letter to Garnbetta, that they were defending Paris

AGAINST THE WORKERS,

and not against the Prussian army.

Documentary evidence has since been produced which plainly shows that, amongst those in command, it was well understood that Paris should capitulate, and on January 28th, 1871, the Government of National Defence fully exposed the treacherous game it was playing by assuming the title, with the permission of Bismark, of “The Government of France.”

When the Commune was established a good deal of evidence of the treachery was discovered, to regain which, says a manifesto of the Commune, “these men would not recoil from battering Paris into a heap of ruins washed by a sea of blood.” This prognostication proved to be absolutely correct.

Paris was invested, and five months later the gates were thrown open to the beseigers. The National Guard (consisting chiefly of workmen) had been provided with armaments by public subscription, and their weapons therefore were their own property. As such they were recognised and

EXEMPTED IN THE GENERAL SURRENDER.

On the eve of the capitulation the Government took no precautions to safeguard these weapons, but cunningly left them where they would be most likely to fall into the hands of the enemy. The National Guards had elected a Central Committee, and they had the guns removed to Montmartre, out of the reach of the Prussians.

Prior to this Thiers had travelled Europe in an endeavour to “barter the republic for a crown.” The great obstacle in the way of the restoration of the monarchy was armed Paris, the stronghold of the republicans, and “Paris armed was the Revolution armed.” This in itself explains why the guns of the National Guard were left to be captured by the Prussians. This move having failed, the question that presented itself to the arch-traitors, Thiers & Co., was how to disarm the Parisian workers. So, under the pretext that “the artillery of the National Guard belonged to the State,” Thiers ordered them to deliver it to the Government.

The National Guards refused to comply, and, thwarted in their trickery, the National Assembly sent regular troops in the night to take the 250 pieces of ordnance from Montmartre. This was nearly successfully accomplished, but, with astonishing lack of foresight, no means of transport were provided, and the delay which ensued enabled the citizens—men, women, and children–to surround the guns and fraternise with the soldiers. General Lecompte ordered his men to

FIRE UPON THE PEOPLE.

Four times the order wan given, but when they did fire it was to dispatch Lecompte himself.

So sure were the Government of success that they had beforehand printed their bulletin of victory, and Thiers held ready the placards announcing his measure of coup d’etat; but now these had to be replaced by an announcement that he had resolved to leave the National Guard in possession of their arms, with which, he said, he felt sure they would rally round the Government against the rebels. “Out of 300,000 National Guards,” says the Manifesto of the International, “only 300 responded to this summons. . . The glorious working men’s revolution of the 18th of March took undisputed sway of Paris. The Central Committee was its provisional Government.”

If the Government blundered in the attempt to seize the guns, an even worse blunder was committed by the revolutionaries in allowing the National Assembly to escape when they had them at their mercy. Instead of arresting them they allowed them to march to Versailles, which town they made their headquarters. And here, with the assistance of the Prussians, who released the prisoners of war on condition that

THEY FOUGHT AGAINST THE COMMUNARDS,

they were enabled to get together an army.

On the 18th March the Central Committee issued a manifesto which said : “The Proletarians of Paris, amidst the failure and treason of the ruling class, have understood that the hour has struck for them to save the situation by taking into their own hands the direction of Public affairs. They have understood that it is their imperious duty and their absolute right to render themselves masters of their own destinies by seizing upon the Governmental power.”

The Commune was proclaimed, and its officials, elected by universal suffrage, were the acknowledged representatives of the working class. The police were converted into the responsible and revocable agents of the Commune, as were all the other officials. All services were rendered for workmen’s wages. “The vested interests and the representation allowances of the dignitaries of State disappeared along with those dignitaries themselves.” The Church was disestablished. All Educational institutions were thrown open free to all. The Post Office, placed under the direction of a workman named Theisz, raised the salaries of all its employees and reduced their hours. Night work in bakehouses was abolished. A labour exchange was established which recommended the return of pledges to all necessitous persons, and the suppression of the pawnshops, as the Commune intended to give guarantees of support to workmen out of employment. All offices appear to have been most ably administered, except the War Department, which made a series of blunders. But with the Versailles army being reinforced by Bismark,

PARIS WAS DOOMED.

Sunday, the 21st of May, saw the Communards gathered in the Tulleries Gardens at a concert held in aid of the widows and orphans of the National Guards slain in the defence of Paris. A similar concert was to take place the following Sunday, but already the Versailles troops were in the city, having entered by the gate of St. Cloud without opposition. And in a few hours black smoke was pouring over Paris from her blazing buildings, and her gutters ran with the blood of her workers.

Consternation reigned among the Communards when the news was announced, and the sitting of the Commune then in progress—the last as it proved—was soon afterwards dissolved. The one thing that now seemed to occupy the minds of all was how to defend their own particular quarters. Barricades were erected at all points, men, women and children assisting in the work—but all was hopeless endeavour. One by one the barricades were battered down and their defenders butchered.

Hundreds were taken prisoners by the Versailles Government. The “London Daily News” said that General Gallifet ordered hundreds of

MEN, WOMEN, AND CHILDREN

out of a column and had them shot down without even the pretence of a trial. The correspondent of the same journal says : “It was not a good thing on that day to be noticeably taller, dirtier, cleaner, older, or uglier than one’s neighbours. One individual in particular struct me as probably owing his speedy release from the ills of this world to his having a broken nose. Over a hundred being thus chosen, a firing party was told off and the column resumed its march, leaving them behind. A few minutes afterwards a dropping fire in our rear commenced, and continued for a quarter of an hour. It was the execution of these summarily-convicted wretches.”

No great care was taken to see that life was extinct before the bodies were buried. Owing to groans issuing from the spot where burials had taken place exhumations were sometimes made, only to reveal the fact that the wounded had been buried alive. The Paris correspondent of the “Evening Standard” says in that paper on June 8th, 1871 : “That many wounded have been buried alive I have not the slightest doubt. One case I can vouch for. When Brunel was shot with his mistress on the 24th ult. in the courtyard of a house in the Place Vendome, the bodies lay there until the afternoon of the 27th. “When the burial party came to remove the corpses they found

THE WOMAN STILL LIVING

and took her to an ambulance. Though she had received four bullets she is now out of danger.”

But enough. Let us no longer dwell upon the terrible atrocities perpetrated by the party of “Order.”

All the powers of the lying Press were directed against the Communards. All the terrible deeds enacted by the agents of the capitalist class were laid at the door of the Communards themselves. Yet the only crime that could be truly brought against them was that they had been far too lenient toward their enemies.

While the Versailles Government were massacring their prisoners wholesale, the workers were treating theirs with respect, and not until thousands of their comrades were slaughtered did they retaliate.

Then, acting in accordance with recognised principles of warfare, they took a few of their hostages, including Archbishop Darboy, Judge Bonjeau, Jackers (a high financier), and some gendarmes, and had them shot. Thiers could have saved the life of the prelate, for he, with four others, was offered in exchange for one of the Communards, but the ogre refused.

And what a cry was raised by the capitalist Press over the execution of the archbishop ! Ten thousand proletarians could be butchered in cold blood, and with every detail of barbarity—men, women, and children—without a protest being raised, but an Archbishop ! And to think he had been shot by the working class, too ! Yet the man who was responsible for his death was Thiers, the bloodthirsty gourmand of the capitalist class.

Incendiarism is another charge brought against the Communards. But the buildings of Paris were burned by both sides. The workers used this as a means of covering their retreat, a resource recognised as

LEGITIMATE IN WARFARE.

For over twelve months the slaughter of the prisoners continued, until the total reached the appalling number of 30,000.

Many are the lessons taught us by the Paris Commune. Remembering the price paid for those lessons let us not forget them.

We have seen two sections of the capitalist class at war with each other join hands immediately the working class rise against one section, and together turn to crush them.

The revolution of the 18th March 1871 was a failure from the first, as all such local or national uprisings must be. The capitalist class is international, and all its force will be brought to bear to crush any uprising if necessary. The working class must organise like the master class—internationally. Remember the significant words of Professor Thorold Rogers: “They [the masters] are an organisation, and the workers are too apt to be a mob.”

Fellow workers, be no longer a mob. Get to understand your true historic mission. Organise with the wage-slaves the world over, with one object in view—

THE EMANCIPATION OF YOUR CLASS

by the establishment of Socialism.

H. A. Young

Jottings. (1911)

The Jottings Column from the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

The following is culled from the front page of that ultra-respectable journal, the “Labour Leader” :

”LET LIARS PERISH

and prove the truth that Socialism is not Atheism by helping me with

10,000 Socialist Shillings.

Cheques or Bank Notes to help pay off debt of £800 on my New Church. . . Rev. W. Schoneld, Manchester. Thy will be done on Earth, United we stand.”

This from the Church that deadly foe of all intellectual progress, the enemy of Science and the upholder of slavery. Could barefaced cheek go farther ?

* * *

This same gentleman at the last General Election, speaking at a meeting in support of Mr. John Hodge, Labour candidate for the Gorton Division, stated that “he was not a Liberal, in fact he hadn’t a vote at all, but he recognised very clearly that Liberalism and Labourism were identical, and the Liberal workingmen in the audience would be noodles indeed to waste their votes when they could achieve the same object by voting for the Labour man” (cheers). That “object” was the veto of the House of Lords. After appealing for Liberal votes for a “Labour” candidate, he now appeals for “Socialist shillings” for the purpose of still further prolonging the process whereby the workers are reduced to a condition for being all the more easily exploited by the master class. I am fairly safe in affirming that he will not get one Socialist shilling.

* * *

Not only are the working class deluded into voting the parasites into power, they are even required to pay for the chloroforming process which keeps them in ignorance and upon which the capitalist sharks rely so much. These gentry profess to believe in a special Providence : why don’t they appeal in that direction ?

The fact is that when it comes to a question of £ s. d., they are as materialistic as the most brazen Atheist. They evidently believe in practising the (slightly altered) dictum, “you will be done on earth.” When will the workers get wise to this ?

* * *

Speaking at the Prince’s Theatre, Blackburn, on Jan. 22nd, under the auspices of the local I.L.P., Mr. Philip Snowden said :

“Socialism is nothing more than a scheme of industrial reorganisation for the reconciliation of Capital and Labour by placing the ownership of land and capital under democratic control. Out of all their theories they have now evolved that concrete idea.”

That’s all !

* * *

In his opening remarks Mr. Snowden said “He had felt for a long time that the I.L.P. had been so much engaged in mere political work that they had not paid the attention which was needed to the education of the people in the fundamental principles of Socialism.”

The reason is that they do not understand the fundamental principles of Socialism—excepting perhaps, those few who hold to the opinion that where it touches the pocket to tell the truth, it is the very height of folly to be wise. To speak of reconciling Capital and Labour under Socialism is an obvious attempt to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds—but it pays at the moment. Mr. Snowden professes to believe in a kind of harmony between Capital and Labour, but the only harmony I can conceive is that existing between the horse-leech and its victim. Besides, I was not aware that capital would exist at all under Socialism. The existence of capitalism, presupposes exploitation. But, of course, Mr. Snowden, being interested in the maintenance of capitalism, cannot be expected to shout that truth from the housetops.

* * *

This according to Liebknecht: “Whoever conceives of Socialism in the sense of a sentimental philanthropic striving after human equality, with no idea of the existence of the evils of capitalist society, is no Socialist in the sense of the class struggle, without which modern Socialism is unthinkable.”

The working class must learn that it need expect nothing from any political party that does not stand upon the basis of the class struggle. The S.P.G.B. is the only party that takes up this position, therefore it is the only party of the workers.

* * *

A remarkable letter penned by a suicide was read at an inquest held at Aldershot recently on the body of an unknown man who was found decapitated on the railway. The deceased wrote :

“Kindly free from censure the courageous driver of that train responsible for this, another tragedy. The cause of this tragedy is the unfair distribution of work. I have searched in vain, for the past three and a half months, for a situation.

“But I say the time is coming when a man who becomes really conscious of the real cause of this hellful drama, the unfair distribution of work, will not commit, as I have done, suicide; but will instantaneously arm himself with a revolver, and he will make a “B” line for the Prime Minister of the country and make him pay the penalty with his life.

“I have been to church—the manufactory of crime—and I am convinced that if people from the North, South, and East refrain from going to church after this day, there will be no recurrence of the Sidney-street affair.

“I do not believe in murder, nevertheless I warn the leader of the Opposition and the Prime Minister of this country of the real and, as I believe, proper conviction that is growing….it cannot be stopped.

“Now I am afraid I shall have to close up as my train will be here presently.—Good-bye, BRITON.”

The jury returned a verdict of suicide whilst of unsound mind. Of course ! It would not do to say that this hellish system of capitalism had forced him to seek oblivion, would it ? It might enlighten the proletariat. And how near to the truth this poor devil got, to say that he was insane. If he had elected to kill someone else instead of himself would he have been found insane ? I venture to think not.

Tom Sala

The queer side. (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

Under a capitalist regime one is either exploiter or exploited ; there is ever a gulf between the two sections of society, and that gulf widens as the system developes. The affairs of every-day life give the lie to those who, from ignorance or interest, promulgate the idea of the identity of interest between robber and robbed.

* * *

“Before an audience of 10,000 sightseers and guarded by a band of 300 police, Lord Deceis has been married to Miss V. Gould, heiress of Mr. G. Gould . . Lord Deceis is 45 years of age, his bride 18. . . A cake costing £200 was imported for the purpose from Scotland. . . . The bride wore a dress of white satin embroidered with silver . . and a rope of diamonds.”

* * *

“That the worst of slums may exist even in fashionable Folkestone was proved at an inquest on the body of an old woman, of 72 named Mary Sellars. The evidence proved that she died under the most terrible conditions of suffering and neglect. ‘In a small attic 8 ft. x 10 ft., which contained as furniture an iron bedstead, an old chair and a pail,’ said the coroner’s officer, ‘he found the deceased, in the midst of the squalor, lying naked save for the protection of a pair of trousers, an old skirt and a coat thrown over her.’ The deceased had suffered from pleurisy and peritonitis, and had not had any food for hours before death.

“The husband was a corporation labourer earning 18s. a week. The coroner censured him severely, and the jury returned a verdict that ‘Death was due to natural causes.’ ”

* * *

The above cuttings are from the same issue of Reynold’s Newspaper (12.2.11). The first refers to a marriage of members of the capitalist class—people who have never performed a necessary function in the production of the wealth they waste. The latter records the death of one of the exploited—a member of the class that produce the wealth that loafers such as Lord Deceis may roam the world in luxury and comfort, and that the daughters of millionaires may purchase titles.

Such is the evidence of the “identity of interest.” Wealth produced by one class whose members starve, and owned by another class whose members squander.

* * *

“Death was due to natural causes.” It is, of course, natural for a person to die under such conditions, but are the conditions natural ?

It was natural for a policeman to die after receiving a bullet in a vital part, but the twelve “good men and true” returned a different verdict. But then the policeman was a defender of private property, while the woman was only a worn-out toiler. More evidence of the “identity of interest.”

* * *

A writer in the same paper says “Pauperism is the question of the hour. . . The public mind is aroused to the importance of the subject and measures heroic are advocated in order to strike at the root of the evil.” He also quotes Dr. Chalmers as having said “It is thus, then, by a sort of festering and spreading operation, the sphere of destitution is constantly widening in every parish where the benevolence of love has been superseded by the benevolence of law. The following might be given as an example of the benevolence of love.

* * *

The Evening Times, reporting an interview with a Mr. Mumford, chairman of the Paddington Works Committee, quoted that gentleman as follows :

“These figures might be given as an approximate estimate of the numbers of willing to work “out of works” in the building trade :

Painters 3,823

Plasterers 297

Bricklayers 847

Carpenters 597

Navvies 1,269

Labourers 5,254

“It is a simple proposition in the economy of labour to suggest that housewives get their houses in order early this season in order to give work to the painter and others, and to save the extra money they will have to pay when the men are in demand for the Coronation week.”

* * *

The usual form of “benevolence.” Get the work done now, primarily in the interest of the poor unemployed workman, but incidentally—quite incidentally of course—to save money. That means that the same amount of work will be spread over a longer period at a reduced cost. It means that, in the long run, less wages will be paid. That appears to me to be a good method of increasing poverty—but then, of course, the more poverty there is the greater scope for the “benevolence of love,” for this particular sentiment, like appetite, “glows by what it feeds on.”

* * *

The other brand of benevolence can be witnessed in the spectacle of the kind Liberal Government endeavouring to persuade the aged pauper to leave the workhouse and starve outside on five bob a week. According to a writer in the London Quarterly Review, the cost of London indoor paupers, including all charges, amounts to £34 15s. 11¾d. per head per annum. The benevolence of the law offers them £13, and that fierce democrat, Lloyd George, swells his manly buzzum and talks about “sweeping poverty from every hearth.”

* * *

The fringe of the evil is not touched by such reform, much less does it “strike at the root.” The cause, as Lloyd George admits, “lies deep down in the social system,” where also that antagonism of interest finds its root—in the ownership by a class of the means of life. It is indeed questionable whether George & Co. could do anything if they desired to, as all things work to the interest of those who own.

* * *

A contributor to the Nineteenth Century Magazine (Jan., 1911) says that the introduction of State maintenance means that the husband gives the wife less for housekeeping because the children are now provided for by the benevolence of the State. True, and the unemployed worker will reduce the price of the said husband’s labour-power by the amount so saved in order to obtain a job, and so in a short space of time the average wage will suffer a depreciation equal to the diminution of the burden placed upon it.

Nor does it necessarily follow that money wages will drop. The cost of living of the working class is continually on the increase. The Board of Trade Labour Gazette (January, 1911) shows a steady increase in the price of necessaries. The price of food in 1909 reached a point that has net been recorded since 1884. So, even did money wages remain stationary, the workers’ condition would be worsened. The same official return for Feb., 1911 shows a fall in the total wages bill of £49 per week, while the number of unemployed has increased.

The interest of the ruling class is to rule and to keep a subject class as cheaply as possible and all such alterations will be toward that end.

The interest of the working class is not to be ruled, but to shake from their backs those social parasites who keep them poor and insult them by talking twaddle and endeavouring to prove what is obviously untrue, that these tinkering reforms and proposals are introduced “in the interests of the masses.”

Twel.

Daylight robbery. (1911)

 From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are frequently told by our more outspoken enemies that the workers are not robbed, and, there are members of the working class who actually believe it. But the following extract from a recent issue of the “Daily Telegraph” not only completely refutes the former, but may also enlighten the latter.

Under the heading “Census of Production” was given a list of industries concerned mainly with food, drink, and tobacco, and it was stated that the Board of Trade preliminary tables summarising the returns received in respect of those trades give the following results for twelve months:

Gross output from 13 divisions £257,215,000

Net                               „ „ „          £84,325,000

Persons employed                             407,830

The “Daily Telegraph” commented thus, upon the figures:

“The first column represents the gross output, that is the selling value or value of work done. The second shows the net sums realised after deducting the cost of the materials used. The figures denoting the net output express completely, and without duplication, the total amount by which the value of the products of the industries exceeded the value of the materials purchased from the outside, that is they represent the value added to the raw materials in the course of manufacture. This sum constitutes for any industry the fund from which wages, salaries, rents, royalties, rates, taxes, depreciation, advertisement and sales expenses, and all other similar charges, as well as profits, have to be defrayed.”

Now rents, profits, etc., are not paid to the working class, who benefit only under the item wages. On the other hand, no value can be added to raw material except by labour. It follows therefore that while the workers produce the whole of the £84,325,000 worth of wealth which figures as the net output, they are robbed of all that is not included in the term wages.

Now let us do a little sum in simple division. 

The net output, £84,000,000, divided among the 407,830 persons employed, gives over £275 per annum to each. The difference between this sum and the average wage of the workers in those trades shows the extent of the robbery as far as those particular industries are concerned. And if the average rate of wages in these industries is that of the whole country, then these workers are rolled of over three-fourths of their produce.

Criticus

The affairs of the criminal. (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Press has given no little attention to the Government’s changes in the methods of handling released convicts. Has the Socialist anything to say on the matter ? Yes. He, like the rest of the workers, is called upon to support the administration that thus deals with the suppression of “crime” and “criminals,” and, since he would influence the workers in another direction, he must give reasons why he refuses to support that which, for him, is a detail of capitalist defence. The occasion, then, calls for some discussion of the new arrangements and, necessarily, as the Socialist view is quite distinct from, and in violent contrast with, every other view, a general statement of the nature of “crime” and “criminals.”

To-day men speak of actions as criminal which are commonly held to be very immoral—actions in violation of the law of the land, or of what is considered to be correct living. But in the narrow sense those are criminals whose actions bring them within the cognizance of the Law of the day, and render them liable to imprisonment or death.

It is useful to point out in the first place the important fact that there is nothing fixed or absolute in “crime.” Actions that are “criminal” at one time or in one country, are not so at another time or in another country, In Borneo and New Guinea, to this day among the natives, man-eating is quite correct, while in most other lands it is criminal. To-day, in England, someone sticks a knife into a fellow human and gets hunged for it, while another pushes his knife, on the end of a Lee Enfield, into a man whom he never saw before, and is a “hero.” Often in the past the usurer and he who “cornered” stuffs was hoist on the gallows or imprisoned, but now such a person has but to succeed to be acknowledged a smart fellow, worthy of every honour. One might continue indefinitely to multiply examples showing the changes in men’s attitude towards certain conduct, but it is more interesting to enquire why these changes take place.

Take our examples. Those who have studied savage life tell in that behind custom aud ritual cannibalism has its roots in famine—in human necessity. And men “make virtue of necessity.” With peoples in a higher stage of development, the necessity has passed away, and with that the virtue. Here “order” of a different kind is required ; industry must proceed with a minimum of waste and disturbance, and the stranger within the camp may be more useful to the ruling interest alive than dead ; human sympathy comes through in queer ways, for man who may starve one another may no longer eat one another.

Likewise your fellow with the knife—he has become a general nuisance. The rich have other tools, and no longer have need of the bravo ; there’s no virtue in him, and he is suspended. The soldier, on the other hand, is a handy fellow. In orderly fashion he will proceed to wipe out the inconvenient Kaffir or the troublesome workman. The more he kills the finer fellow he is.

Clearly here the change of attitude is due to the change of interests—interests, of course, of men in a position to enforce their desires—ruling interests. Such are only the common interest or that of the great, majority, while society is in its primitive stages. But since classes evolved, men have been branded as criminal and punished for actions that conflict with the class-interest dominant at the moment.

Unlike the Christian and capitalist hack, the Socialist may not approach this question through the mysteries of God given conscience, and the assumed absolute “right” and “wrong,” but must view it from the basis of human experience. He perceives that crime is a question of circumstances, pre-eminent among which is class-interest. Class-interest decides that the satisfaction of men’s hunger by taking and eating bread is in certain circumstances criminal. The principle of property—the basis of class rule—may not be violated with impunity. The punishment for man-slaying in certain circumstances will be found to be ultimately on the same basis of class-interest, just as sanitation was undertaken when the gay clothing made in fever-infested slums wan found to kill aristocrats.

Criminality, then, depends upon circumstances, and your criminal is a victim of such.

Let men but consider the criminal’s case and ask how came he in such a position. They will find that such are made of very much the same flesh and blood as themselves, that while unasked-for inherited characteristics count for something, it is essentially the difference of circumstances, of child-training, companionship, opportunity, and requirements, that accounts for the difference between the criminal and the man in the street.

Our opponents are fond of bragging of the “individual” who makes his mark and imposes his will upon the world, as though he were some Olympic deity. But the slightest examination of the individual’s career will show that he is but a fly upon the wheel, and makes little difference. Rather than he imposing his will upon the world he will be found to derive that will, in its specific form, from the world about him, the social organisation or system of which he is but an atom. That system to-day is one wherein the means of livelihood, of joyous and comfortable existence, are greedily monopolised by a small class—the ruling, capitalist class. The great bulk of mankind are kept poor and hungry and anxious and miserable, and as such are treated with contempt until, taking instruction from the masters, they come to hold one another in disdain. When some seek to satisfy their needs—seek to get out of their wretched position—in ways inconvenient to the ruling class, the latter, with its instrument the machinery of State to hand, lands them in gaol.

Latterly the ruling class has taken to improving its prison arrangements—all in the interest of the prisoners, of course. Some of the revelations of police persecution and “criminal”-breeding under the “ticket-of-leave” system have made somewhat of a scandal, while the more up-to-date and cheaper prison-elevator schemes of the Salvation Army and other bodies seem to offer a better way.

The latest scheme is to hand the supervision of released convicts over to a new organisation composed of the Salvation Army, the Church Army, and other bodies concerned to clear the streets of the human wreckage produced by capitalism.

Here is no real improvement on the old conditions, for these organisations can only do as in the past, namely, force the men to work for next to nothing and destroy outside firms, as in the notorious case of the firewood industry. It means that badly paid workers will be discharged and replaced by worse paid ones. Others will go to gaol instead of these—that is your reform.

The Socialist cannot stand for any such hollow sham, and must needs denounce it. He knows that while the criminal withholders of the people’s bread are allowed to keep on the even tenor of their way, and millionaires are produced at one end of the social scale, gaols will be filled at the other. He knows that millions of sons and daughters of men shall rot aud die in the brothels and gaols, secular aud religious and industrial, of capitalism ere it shall be ended. Let Tories and Liberals and Labour men continue their shams and futilities. For us the cleansing touch of Revolution !

H. B.

Correspondence. (1911)

 Letter to the Editors from the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

A. E. Hester writes :

(1) Production under your system must be international, obviously therefore each country will be interdependent upon the ether. They must, then, agree to sustain each other in food, clothing, etc. Is this possible?

(2) How could each get the full value of his labour?

(3) The natural wealth of some countries is greater than others, who could not produce on equal terms.

(4) If Production is to be national, then Socialism is impossible and not worth consideration.

____________________________________

(1) Even under capitalism countries are interdependent, and, in a sense, “sustain each other in food, clothing, etc.” Hence your query “Is this possible ?” is answered in the affirmative by the facts around you to-day.

(2) No Socialist says that “each man will get the full value of his labour,” for the simple reason that, as the Socialist is always pointing out, production under Socialism will be social—as, indeed, it is to-day—and no man can say exactly what is the value contributes.

What the Socialist says is that the working class is the only section of society engaged in wealth production, and therefore the working class, collectively, should own the results of its applied energy.

(3) No one country has greater natural advantages in every direction than another. Some have the advantage in one way, some in another. And, as the development of International trade has shown, these advantages, or their results, are being exchanged in increasing quantities.

(4) The most elementary examination of present day trade shows that production is growing more international year by year. Raw materials from one part of the globe are worked up in another ; goods partly manufactured in one country are finished in another, and so on. Your query, therefore, has no basis in fact.

Jack Fitzgerald

Mr. Dooley on Strikes. (1911)

 From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

“I see the sthrike has been called off,” said Mr. Hennessy. “Which wan?” asked Mr. Dooley. “I can’t keep track iv thim. Somebody is sthrikin’ all th’ time. Th’ Brotherhood iv Molasses Candy Pullers sthrikes, an’ th’ Amalgamated Union iv Pickle Sorters quits in sympathy. Th’ carpinter that has bin puttin’ up a chicken coop f’r Hogan knocked off wurruk whin he found Hogan was shaviti’ himself without a card fr’m the Barbers’ Union. Hogan fixed it with th’ walkin’ dillygate iv th’ barbers, an’ the carpinter quit wurruk because he found Hogan was wearin’ a pair iv nonunion pants. Hogan wint down town an’ had his pants unionised an’ come home to find th’ carpinter had sthruck because Hogan’s hens were layin’ eggs without th’ union label. Hogan injooced th’ hens to jine th’ union. But wan iv thim laid an egg two days in succission, an’ th’ others sthruck.”

Blogger's Note:

"Mr. Dooley (or Martin J. Dooley) is a fictional Irish immigrant bartender created by American journalist and humorist Finley Peter Dunne . . . " For more information, keep reading . . . 

Answers to Correspondents. (1911)

Letters to the Editors from the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

P. Wright.—You are to be congratulated upon the alacrity with which you drop the religious issue. The point you try to uphold, however, is not a whit more defensible. It is not because production is carried on by a class that it is held to be social. Your “syllogism” is therefore beside the point.

“In dealing with production the word ‘social’ does not ’embrace every unit capable of taking part in that production.” You are evidently entangled in the coils of the absolute. All things are relative. The means of production in the middle ages were petty, individual, and practically self-sufficing. Today they are none of these things. Contrasted with the primitive tool the modern machine is a social instrument. The producer with his household is no longer self-sufficing. He depends on the simultaneous activity of millions. Even apart from the modern and essentially social factor of specialisation and the division of labour, the unit of production is now entirely dependent on the existence of huge and complex social organisations and forces, for production, regulation, communication, transport, and exchange. Both historically and economically considered, modern production has an obviously social character ; so much so that it cries aloud for social ownership, and the assertion that it has not this nature to-day is as little worth serious attention as is the statement that the earth is flat.

S. Hadden.—The term “general” means all industries, and contraction can take place, for instance, by a larger amount of profit being converted into revenue.

Acknowledgments. (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

RECEIVED —

“Western Clarion” (Vancouver, B.C.).

“Weekly People” (New York).

"New York Call" (New York).

“Gaelic American” (New York).

“Western Wage-Earner" (Vancouver, B.C.).

“Civil Service Socialist” (London).

"The New World" (West Ham).

“Freedom” (London).

Books Received. (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

"The Christ Myth," by Arthur Drews, Ph.D. T. Fisher Unwin 7s. 6d. (Will be reviewed next month.)

"The Concentration of Capital: a Marxian Fallacy," by W. Tcherkoff. Freedom Press, 127 Ossulton-st. N.W.

Suppression ! (1911)

Party News from the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

News comes to hand as we go to Press that the Islington Borough Council have declared their sympathy with and fellow-feeling for, the bourgeois murderers of thirty thousand Parisian working-men, -women, and -children. They have suppressed the Commune Celebration Meeting which our Islington Branch were arranging for the 20th March, at the Caledonian Road Baths.

The Commemoration Meeting will he held on March 20th at 8 p.m. (doors open at 7.30) at the Myddleton Hall, Almedia Street, Upper Islington.

All Workers should come and listen to what your masters say you shall not hear. Nothing to pay.

Islington branch. (1911)

Party News from the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

ISLINGTON BRANCH

Are holding the following lectures on Thurs. evenings at 8.15, at Co-operative Hall, 144, Seven Sisters Road (entrance in Thane Villas).

Feb. 2nd—”Socialism versus State and Militarism” …… T. W. Allen

„ 9th—”Society and the Genius”…… A. Reginald

„ 16th—”The Economic Position of the Workers” … J. Fitzgerald

„ 23rd—”The Futility of the Reform Movement” … H. J. Newman

„ 30th—”Socialism and the Religious Question” ……

Have you read “Socialism and Religion,” the latest S.P.G.B. pamphlet? It will interest and enlighten you, whatever may be your outlook on the religious question. It is an important addition to working-class literature.

S.P.G.B. Lecture List For March. (1911)

Party News from the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

Speeding-Up The Admirals. (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

Avast there, comrades! Haul in your slacks while I shiver my timbers.

The Navy, sirs, is going to the dogs. Senior officers are now expected to know something, and a special instructional course began at Portsmouth on Feb 13, with fifty rear admirals, captains, and commanders as pupils. How George must congratulate himself upon his shore appointment!

Feel for a proud flag officer like W. B. Fisher, fifty-seven years old and second in seniority, having to study gunnery and torpedoes. It is related of a distinguished admiral, who sometimes neglects to eat between drinks, that he once rolled up on deck and, gazing wildly at the far horizon gasped “Say, is that a sea-serpent?" He was told that it was. “Thank heaven!" he exclaimed, with relief. “I thought 1 had 'em again." Now, so absurd a position could not have occurred had the great man learned at a special instructional course for senior officers to recognise submarines at sight.

Cato studied Greek long after he became entitled to the old age pension — at eighty, I believe. But Greek is less undignified than signals and naval war, through a course of which Admirals F. T. Hamilton and Herbert Lyon, aged fifty-four. are compulsorily fagging. Waterloo was won in order to advertise the playing fields of Eton and Harrow. Let us hope the Government won't get up another Trafalgar in order to star their special instructional course for senior officers.

Seriously. this speeding-up is a national menace. While it affected only the productive working class, it did not much matter. But if it spreads to the upper ranks of employment, it may reach the Civil Service and compel the bureaucrats to work. In winch case the "end of all" is a safe prediction.

A. Hoskyns

Editorial: "But Humbly Regret —" (1911)

Editorial from the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

“The Labour Party stands pledged to the Right to Work as a fundamental principle, and every member is in honour bound to do all he can to fulfil the pledge.”

So says the official organ of the Independent Labour Party on Feb. 17th, in the midst of a wail that only thirty of the Labour M.P.s (including the tellers) supported the Right to Work amendment, while one of them actually voted against it.

Why did the Labour members hesitate to support their “fundamental principle”? Why did they not dare move an amendment to the Address, nor introduce their “fundamental principle” in the last Parliament?

It is because the Labour Party in the House only exists by permission of the Liberals, as the last three general elections have proved. Any suspicion of a vote of censure upon the capitalist Government (however necessary such bluff may be to quiet the murmuring rank and file) is consequently fraught with grave danger to Labour M.P.s.

We know how these adjuncts of Liberalism obtained their votes. And Mr. Russell Williams, in a communication to the Labour Leader (Feb. 17th), states in reply to a Labour Conference denunciation of traitors who took Tory gold:

  "Why a distinction between Tory gold and Liberal gold? There are members of the Labour Party in the House of Commons who make no secret of having received Liberal gold with which to fight their elections—and from Liberals who were fighting Labour men, fully endorsed by the Labour Party. Do these men come under the category of cowards and traitors? ”

We pause for a reply.

The need for making at least a show of independent existence caused the Right to Work amendment to be moved this year; but how apologetic were mover and seconder, how they cringed before the Government! Their amendment "humbly" regretted that no promise of a Bill had been made. Said Mr. O'Grady in moving (we quote from the official report):

  "Had we not been unlucky in the ballot probably this amendment would not be moved. . . . I know that every single member of this House is as sympathetic towards the unemployed as we are ourselves, and I am sure that this motion will be considered not merely with sympathy but with fairness’’

And he also said that there is 

   ". . upon the Statute Book one of the finest pieces of legislation in any civilised community in the world, and if it were put into operation it would effect the purposes contained in our motion. I speak of the Development Act. That Act contains every proposal of the Labour and Socialist movement for the last 25 year, proposals about afforestation, erosion of the coast, light railways, and reclamation of land."

Thus do the decoy ducks of Labour repay the Liberal support they obtain, and demonstrate their identity with Liberalism. Nearly every subsequent speaker complimented them on their “moderation” and “fairness.” Mr H. Harcourt particularly referred to Mr. O'Grady’s “moderate and friendly speech.”

But no "statement of the barest truth” can be “moderate” in capitalist ears; no champion of the working class can be friendly to the capitalist class. The fulsome capitalist flattery of Mr. O'Grady sets the seal upon his utter worthlessness to our class. But what of the Bill in question ?—is it any good?

Except that, owing to the hostility of local bodies, the State is to be made mainly responsible for its working, it is the Bill brought before Parliament by the Labour Party three years ago. Then even Labour members admitted that no effective remedy for unemployment is possible under capitalism, yet they claim that their Bill would deal effectively with that question. Such is the "logic” of their position.

To really provide reasonable work or maintenance for all workers would make the wage-labourer master of the labour-market and disrupt capitalism. How childish it would be, then, to beg the capitalist class to be so kind as to commit suicide!

If effective and useful, therefore, the passing of the Labour Party’s Bill would require a social revolution; but it is neither.

In spite of denial, it seems no more than systematic relief works. Its principle is that of the workhouse stone-yard. And there is nothing to prevent men being engaged, as in the post, at exceedingly low “relief" rates to do work which would otherwise occupy the same men at full rates of pay.

It is true, as Mr. Forster said in the House during the recent debate, that it ”must cause more unemployment.” . And he went on to say, with equal truth:

  "I am verified in that view by a statement contained in the report of the Poor Low Commission. They say that work and wages provided by local authorities is in practice either diverted from the ordinary employees in the localities, or extracted from what would otherwise have gone to regular workers, with the result in either case of creating, sooner or later, larger unemployment ”.

And what are the other essentials of the Bill? Its clause 3 is sometimes held to provide work at standard rates, but its wording is fraudulent. As Mr. J. R. Macdonald confessed in the Commons when the Bill was brought forward, the clause "may be badly worded," but “it did not mean that the local employment authority must provide work at, trade union rate of wages". No, the rate is only such as the capitalists may consider "reasonable,” and that means hell for the workers.

And if a man refused the hellish conditions that may be offered to him?

The authority is empowered under clause 7 to get an order "to enforce control of the person named in the order for a period not exceeding six months, which period must be passed in the performance of reasonable work under the control of the local employment authority.”

Now you have it. The capitalists as a class hardly dared go so far. It means that you must accept any conditions, however bad, in the labour market. If you cannot get even this, then the employment authority will give you work under still worse conditions. If, however, you decline to be still further degraded, they may give you six months penal labour!

This they call the Right to Work!

It is superfluous for Messrs. Clynes and O'Grady to say, as they did, that they are not defenders of the "won’t workers." This Bill speaks for itself. But their talk about loafers at both ends of the scale is shown to be the veriest clap trap, because they would allow the well-to-do loafer to go free, but would provide a further punishment for the poor one.

No, the most unhappy victim of capitalism finds no defenders among the Labour Members. On the contrary, they would all one more scorpipa to the scourge of scorpions inflicted by capitalism upon the most miserable and unfortunate of men.

It is not the Right to Work that is needed by the workers, but the opportunity to live; and Socialism alone can grant them this. The legal Right to Work imposed upon the proletariat would only emphasise the “right” of the non-working class to be idle. The "Right to Work,” indeed, excludes the right to live. It means only our "right” to our chains! And the Labour Party, in its characteristic work of legalising the right of the slave to his slavery, at the same time consecrates, to the greater glory of capitalism, the "right” of the wealthy parasite above to his ill-gotten gains and his laziness.